To lose one Liberal Member of Parliament by your own hand might be regarded as misfortune. Two looks like carelessness. But what about three? The ABC reports:
Two Tasmanian Liberal MPs have quit the party to sit as independents, pushing Australia's only remaining Liberal stronghold into minority governance.
Bass member Lara Alexander and Lyons member John Tucker resigned this morning as both party members and members of the parliamentary Liberal Party.
They have also left their parliamentary positions, including memberships of parliamentary committees.
Both politicians will continue to serve their electorates as independents on the crossbench.
They have both said they did not plan to bring down the government, with Mr Tucker saying he hoped Mr Rockliff would remain as premier.
(Mr Who? I hear you ask. No, I hadn’t heard of him either).
These two didn’t like something about the construction of a new footy stadium. The imposition of the Covid State – admittedly less onerous in the Apple Isle than elsewhere – wasn’t enough to get a single Liberal to quit the Party across the wide brown land, setting aside the case of Craig Kelly. Yet a stadium … we can’t have that!
Mind you, seeing someone stand up to a deal involving the repulsive AFL has its upside. Apart from the deal over the stadium and a new Tasmanian AFL team, the woke, corporatised football administrator has been the news most recently because of the actions its General Manager of Inclusion and Social Policy, Tanya Hosch, has taken over alleged racism among the punters in the stands. Yes, you read that correctly. An organisation charged with the heavy responsibility of running a footy competition has an executive position for inclusion and social policy. At any rate, Tanya is seeing to it that alleged racists are barred from the football for life. Barred with the help of dobbers at the ground.
AFL Executive General Manager Inclusion and Social Policy Tanya Hosch on Saturday applauded fans for calling out racist behaviour at matches and urged them to alert authorities to similar incidents in future.
Yes, dobbing Covid behaviour has jumped over to the sporting arena.
Back to the Liberals. Alert readers will be aware that the Liberal Party’s only remaining government is in Tasmania. They haven’t got a lot more to lose. One might conclude that it should be doing all in its power to avoid “man overboard”. Or in this case, man and woman overboard.
Jump across Bass Strait to the north and there is yet more Liberal carnage. (It must nearly be time for the old joke, that Victorians are proof that Tasmanians can swim).
The case of Moira Deeming’s expulsion from the Party has kept the complete idiocy and disunity of the rag-tag Liberals in the news. Daniel Andrews must get down on his knees every day to thank the gods of politics for his good fortune at landing in office at a time of unprecedented opposition buffoonery. A Victorian young(ish) Liberal once explained to me that there are about seven factions in the Party down there. They are THE exemplar of an organisation that doesn’t know what it is there for. That is yet to figure out what it believes in. The Victorian Branch makes its cousins north of the Murray look like a well-oiled, disciplined, highly focused machine.
Moira Deeming is only in the Parliament because the Victoria Liberals got rid of someone else (Bernie Finn) for celebrating a legal victory (in the United States) over abortion. Finn was and is highly pro-life. This was deemed unseemly by the Victorian Libs. No doubt they had other objections to Finn’s old-fashioned brand of conservatism. Deeming’s alleged sin was to attend and speak at a pro women’s rally. Yes, pro women. Given the Liberals’ much discussed “problem with women”, you might think that Deeming’s move would see her in the Party’s good books. But the rally was invaded by (probably paid) Nazi impersonators with a brief to turn the thing ugly. It is amazing how easy it is to undermine a craven political party these days. They just roll over. Given her initial suspension, Deeming’s subsequent decision to sue the Liberal leader for defamation was entirely reasonable. She was unreasonably vilified. Her delusional leader (this week his name is John Pesutto) couldn’t stand being humiliated, so, as all good Victorian Liberals do, he took his petty revenge at the earliest opportunity.
Another outstanding conservative overboard. At least Nicolle Flint and George Christensen (sort of) left voluntarily. Inevitably, the ABC referred to Deeming as a “rebel”. Really? Rebel is one of those words that ABC types use to belittle or defame those of whom they do not approve. Embattled. Controversial. Divisive. All these words are similarly deployed. In fact, Mrs Deeming is a breath of fresh air in the parliament.
Deeming’s parliamentary web page states:
Prior to entering Parliament, Moira worked as a high school teacher for over a decade, teaching English, Literature, Legal Studies, Philosophy, Science and Psychology. She also served as a local Government Councillor for the City of Melton from 2020-2022.
She was prompted to run for Parliament to see individual rights and responsibilities balanced equally in law, and to ensure that the Government and its departments exist to serve individuals and families, rather than the other way around.
Moira’s priorities are to ensure that we have clear, fair laws that promote and protect justice, personal agency and community, rather than special interests or authoritarian governance.
https://new.parliament.vic.gov.au/members/moira-deeming/
So far, so good. In her maiden speech (now ludicrously called inaugural speeches), Deeming stirred up The Age:
Victoria’s new upper house Liberal MP for the western suburbs used her inaugural speech on Tuesday to slam left-wing school curriculums, decry the decriminalisation of sex work and take aim at the state government’s approach to gender-diverse young people.
In a wide-ranging speech, Moira Deeming, a former teacher and Melton councillor, denounced ideals of unity and equality “taken to extremes”.
Deeming, who was chosen by the Liberal Party to top its ticket in the Western Metropolitan Region at last year’s state election, slammed what she described as left-wing educational curriculums.
“The final straw which compelled me to challenge the government head on was discovering that school policies and curriculums had been radically altered,” she said.
“Instead of being inspired by history’s heroes, students were being chastised and even told to stand up in class and apologise for historical crimes they had neither committed nor condoned.
She sounds all right to me. See for yourself. She started by thanking God. Perhaps as a part-Maori, she felt unobliged to mention whoever’s sacred ground she was standing on. More brownie points. She referred to the age (we live in) of “hive mind politics”. A very good description. She is a proud “westie”. Hence, grounded. She gave an honourable mention to “independent thinking”. She is an ally of “Uncle Wazza”, aka Warren Mundine. Ironically, she referred to bullies. Union bullies!
I think we are beginning to see why the Liberal leaders wished to be rid of her. Another slap in the faces of the pre-selectors who only very recently installed Mrs Deeming as Finn’s replacement. The Human Rights Law Alliance (John Steenhof) asks whether:
… there is a place for people who hold Christian views in the Victorian Liberal Party.
https://www.hrla.org.au/moira_deeming_and_religious_freedom_in_victoria
Indeed. The HRLA goes on:
A Victorian Liberal Party insider made the following comments to the media about Ms Deeming:
“At end of the day, an MP is a brand ambassador for a political party. Moira knows that. Rather than focusing on helping the team rebuild the Liberal Party for the modern era, she’s focused on herself and everyone blowing up with her,” they said.
“If you’re joining the Liberal Party to implement regressive politics such as repealing abortion or turning back voluntary assisted dying, it’s not the party for you”.
We get the picture. The culture wars as they are termed appear to be “toxic” for the “modern” David Cameron-type Victorian Tories. How is this approach working out for you in Victoria, lads? The Liberal branch of the UniParty. There is a problem here, and it is Blind Freddie territory. The Liberal leadership – I use the word ironically – wants to get rid of “these people” (Renee Heath is another in Victoria) yet the Party pre-selectors keep voting for them. And the leaders keep on losing to Labor by the length of the Flemington straight. Go figure.
The imbecilic Pesutto claimed after the expulsion:
“Today marks a real turning point for the state parliamentary Liberal Party,” Pesutto said after the two-hour party room meeting.
“We are committed to being a disciplined, united and focused team. We know that in order to be an effective opposition, which is our primary responsibility now – to hold the Andrews Labor government to account but also to be the alternative government in 2026 – we know we have to be inclusive, welcoming and an engaged party that is in touch with our local communities.”
The Age also claimed that there was much anger in the room, despite the leader’s bluff.
Five Liberal MPs, including former leader Matthew Guy, on Sunday co-signed a motion to expel Deeming from the party room after she threatened to launch legal proceedings to challenge her nine-month suspension.
You could not make this up. That Matthew (call me “Matt”) Guy, probably THE worst leader of ANY party in Australia’s history, was one of the gang of five, tells you all you need to know about the bungling wets of the south.
One is minded of sinking ships. Yet the rats here seem to be at the top. Mixing animal species as well as metaphors, they say that the fish rots from the head down. So it would seem, if the hapless southern Liberals on either side of Bass Strait are taken as examples.
Paul Collits
13 May 2023
Well said. Guy and Pesutto are both Turnbull devotees- they haven’t worked out yet that he wasn’t liberal. As a woman I will not be voting for these clowns even though I’m conservative. BTW the Gillard government removed the word women from the human rights legislation. What I want to ask is where the hell are the feminists?
Where was Evan Mulholland - from the IPA? Where is Renee Heath- there must be other Christians in the Victorian Liberal party? Lyle Shelton hinted that there are others.
As for Tasmania- the stadium and the AFL team are really ridiculous when you have Bellerive Oval. I remember when I was a teenager growing up in Hobart, fun occasions when we used to watch our favourite TFL teams at Bellerive oval and the one at North Hobart. As someone who grew up in Tasmania, modern day politics in Tassie are a mystery wrapped in an enigma. Tasmania has become a retirement village in a national park. Did you know it has 27 councils?