Latest news with #ZoeDaniel
Epoch Times
3 hours ago
- Politics
- Epoch Times
Liberals Reclaim Goldstein After Recount
Independent teal MP Zoe Daniel has formally conceded the Victorian seat of Goldstein after a partial recount confirmed Liberal candidate Tim Wilson won by 175 votes. The result marks Wilson's return to Parliament and comes days after his appointment as the shadow employment minister.
Daily Mail
a day ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
PETER VAN ONSELEN: All of the hints Zoe Daniel could have escaped a humiliating loss to Tim Wilson were in her five minute concession video
Former teal independent MP Zoe Daniel has finally conceded defeat. After celebrating her 'victory' on the night of the election - including with ecstatic dancing - before demanding a recount despite the win falling outside the margin that requires one, Daniel has eventually acknowledged that she lost. The Liberal win in the electorate of Goldstein was the only seat anywhere in the country picked up by either of the Coalition parties. The Nationals didn't win a single seat off Labor or regional independents. Beyond defeating Daniel in Goldstein the Liberals didn't defeat a single sitting Labor, Green or teal MP. No other teals lost their seats. On any estimate, Daniel's failure was an isolated incident. It speaks to both the failure of the one term MP and the success of the campaign returning MP Tim Wilson ran against her. Far from being a blueprint for success, Daniel's loss was a sure sign that something wasn't right about her foray into parliamentary politics. Not that you'd know it if all you heard about the Goldstein showdown was Daniel's five minute concession video posted to social media. So far as ungracious defeats go, it was right up there. Perhaps not analogous with Donald Trump's reaction to losing the 2020 US Presidential election - but not as far off as you might have expected given the scathing commentary Daniel delivered Trump's way soon afterwards, accusing him of struggling to accept the reality of his loss. It took an unnecessary recount demanded by Daniel and weeks of denial to pass before the loser eventually reversed her election night victory dance and called Wilson to concede. The concession video including everything from claims about supporting lower taxes (Daniel voted for cancelling the legislated stage three tax cuts and once argued for a higher GST) to complaints about dirty tricks on the campaign trail. Daniel even delivered a statement directly to Vida Goldstein whom the seat is named after ('Vida, it's a mission') despite the pioneering feminist and suffragette passing away 76 years ago. There were hints in the concession speech that Daniel might run again, but no guarantees. If she does do so, she'll need to adopt a more conciliatory style to make a better fist of it. Despite Daniel's strong advocacy for the Palestinian cause, her concession video also included claims that she worked hard for both Jewish and pro-Palestinian constituents. During the course of the campaign, however, Jewish advocacy groups were critical of the stance Daniel took. It is highly likely that the Jewish vote in Goldstein was of itself enough to flip the seat given the seat has one of the highest Jewish populations of any electorate. While Daniel can be proud of winning the seat in 2022, there is little doubt that her ungracious failure to admit defeat before this weekend is a blight on her time in office. Whether it also turns out to be a nail in the coffin of any future ambition to return to parliament remains to be seen.
News.com.au
a day ago
- General
- News.com.au
Liberal candidate Tim Wilson takes back tightly contested seat in Goldstein, Victoria from independent Zoe Daniel
Liberal Tim Wilson said his win in the Victorian seat of Goldstein was because he looked to 'reverse engineer' teal strategies that brought them success in 2022. Mr Wilson said his campaign focusing on a bright vision for the future appealed to the electorate and delivered one of the rare flips for the Liberal Party in the federal election. 'I think we were speaking to people's sense of hope and ambition … we weren't playing small, we were going big. We talked very optimistically about a hopeful future,' Mr Wilson told RN Breakfast on Monday. Mr Wilson finished 175 votes ahead of independent candidate Zoe Daniel, attributing the result to the way his campaign had 'brought together a lot of people who wanted to have a shared vision for the community and the country'. 'After the 2022 election, we looked very closely at, well, what do we need to do to change and adjust to fight a new political threat? And what is it that's driving voters to support the teals? 'We worked on it for a very long period of time.' Ms Daniel hinted that she may make another run for the seat in the next election. 'Today we did not win. But we are not defeated. Hard things are hard, and a better kind of politics is worth fighting for. See you in 2028? Maybe!' the former ABC journalist wrote on X. Ms Daniel demanded a recount after losing the seat to Mr Wilson by just 260 votes, saying several errors were made during the distribution of preferences. The Australian Electoral Commission finalised the partial recount of 85,000 votes on Saturday, confirming Mr Wilson had won with a margin of 175 votes. In a statement posted to social media, Mr Wilson said after 29 days of counting the Liberals had 14,697 more first preference votes than the former MP. 'I want to thank all Goldstein voters but particularly the extraordinary effort some went to so their voice was heard,' he said. 'Now the recount is finished, the result is clear. It is time to get on with the job and take the voice and values of Goldstein to shape the future of Australia.' Ms Daniel declared victory in the highly contested seat on election night after early counting leaned heavily in her favour. But a surge in postal votes over the following days swung the pendulum back into blue-ribbon territory, with the seat called for Mr Wilson on May 7. Ms Daniel refused to concede the seat at the time, insisting on waiting for the full distribution of preferences, and then demanded a recount, which was granted in part by the AEC. She said it had been a long process to recount the 85,000 votes, representing 75 per cent of votes cast. 'Goldstein is now one of the most marginal seats in the country, and with that comes embedded accountability,' she said. 'In that, we have done our job. 'In a world where trust in elections is being eroded in so many places, we should never take this for granted.'
ABC News
2 days ago
- Politics
- ABC News
Analyst says Liberals can learn from Goldstein victory
A political analyst believes the Liberals can take lessons from the party's narrow victory in the Melbourne electorate of Goldstein after Tim Wilson won back the seat from Independent Zoe Daniel by 175 votes.
Sydney Morning Herald
2 days ago
- Politics
- Sydney Morning Herald
How to beat the teals? The city Liberals now have a template
What Wilson learnt was that Liberals who had voted for Zoe Daniel in 2022 would only switch their vote away from her if he was able to demonstrate that she had not delivered on their expectations. Scott Morrison was a lightning rod in 2022 but one of the mistakes the party made in 2025 was thinking that, with Morrison gone, Liberals who had switched their vote to a teal would be eager to come back. In fact, what Wilson discovered was that Liberal voters lost to the teals were the hardest to regain. 'Labor and Greens supporters were casting a strategic vote for the teal,' he says. 'Whereas people who used to vote Liberal tended to have switched their vote out of conviction.' While dislike for Morrison loosened Liberal voters' inclination to vote for the party, a positive motivation was also needed to complete the switch. Switchers were won over by one or more of the core promises the teals made in that election: more women in parliament, action on climate change and integrity. Winning them back meant reversing that process. First, loosening voters' attachment to Zoe Daniel. Then, providing a motivating factor to switch to Tim Wilson. So Wilson set about being the opposition member for Goldstein, focusing specifically on holding the local member to account. It's important to stress that this was a very unconventional approach for a major party hopeful. Between elections, the major party opposition usually focuses on the government as a whole, targeting its high-level policies. It is quite common for the Liberal Party not to confirm its candidate for an electorate until just months before an election. Loading For Wilson to undertake the work of opposing a local member was, as he says, 'a leap of faith'. He had no guarantee that he would be preselected by the Liberal Party preselectors to stand in Goldstein when he undertook the bulk of his work. For two years, he laboured without pay and without any assurance that he would even get to run for the seat. In that time, he made sure the electors of Goldstein knew when Zoe Daniel broke her promises. One such occasion was when the teal member went against her climate commitments by voting in parliament for a $2 billion fossil fuel subsidy. He also made sure that he was constantly visible in the electorate. He deployed a technique he calls 'coffee swarms', providing social proof that being a Liberal was a community activity and talking to anyone who wanted to chat about policy. Being Tim Wilson, there was never any suggestion that he'd mince his words or make himself a small target. 'Sometimes someone would come up to tell me they didn't like the Coalition's nuclear policy,' Wilson says, 'And that they'd vote for me if I walked away from it.' 'I'd say, I'm not going to do that. But I'll tell you why I'm going to fight for nuclear. They always walked away knowing that I have a big vision for Australia and I back things which support that vision.' In March 2024, when Wilson stood for preselection, two female candidates came forward to challenge him. So could all his groundwork have ended up benefiting one of them, if he hadn't been chosen as the party's candidate? 'No,' he says simply. In most other electorates where a teal got elected, the Liberal Party preselected a woman to run in 2025. And it didn't work because it's not just about gender. 'In fact, sometimes the vote collapsed because existing loyalty fell away.' 'I realised that we needed to keep the existing candidates, regardless of their gender. What we needed to fix was our campaign. Part of the problem in politics is that people lose and leave or lose and are sacked rather than getting the opportunity to learn.' Which often applies to policy as well. Good ideas which are designed to achieve important ends are dumped if a party blames them for its election defeat, rather than looking at its own failure to sell them. 'Personal growth is a big part of the way back out of the wilderness,' according to Wilson. 'Failure is a chance for growth. To learn the lessons of loss, you have to have lived them.'
