The state Liberals parties really are locked into a race to the bottom to see who can make themselves the most unelectable. Yesterday saw a neck-and-neck battle for the wooden spoon between Victoria and Tasmania.
Tasmania looked early losers, with Jeremy Rockliff’s government, the only remaining Liberal government in Australia, plunged into minority government over a backfired beer-and-circuses stadium announcement for Hobart.
Only to be pipped at the post by the execrable Pesutto Liberal opposition in Victoria.
Moira Deeming has officially been expelled from the Victorian parliamentary Liberal Party, and Renee Heath has confirmed she is no longer party secretary.
Ms Heath was among a group of Deeming supporters who were the first to emerge from the party-room meeting.
She did not comment other than to confirm she is no longer secretary.
As you will recall, Deeming’s sole sin was to speak at a women’s rights rally in Melbourne with Kellie-Jay Keen, which was essentially a curtain-raiser for the hate-filled transgender violence in Auckland. Inexplicably, Victoria police opened ranks to allow a group of attention-seeking neo-Nazis, who had no link to Keen or her supporters, pose for Heil Hitler salutes on the steps of Parliament.
Jumping to the crack of Dan Andrews’ whip, opposition leader John Pesutto launched into a vicious character attack on his own MP, culminating in today’s expulsion.
Pesutto is showing himself to be as delusional as he is unelectable.
Victorian Liberal Leader John Pesutto says the expulsion of Moira Deeming “marks a real turning point” for his party.
Perhaps so — but only in the sense of turning from a laughing-stock into a sorry disgrace.
“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,” he said in a press conference on Friday.
The Australian
If his idea of “effective opposition” is dancing like a broken puppet to every twitch of Dan Andrews’ strings, Pesutto is not just delusional, he’s barking mad.
He’s also about to find that Deeming is not going to go quietly. By effectively branding the part-Jewish Deeming a “Nazi”, he’s about to buy himself a gruelling defamation lawsuit.
The Australian on Thursday reported Deeming’s lawyer sent Pesutto a defamation concerns notice, warning of possible federal court proceedings if he does not immediately seek the withdrawal of Friday’s expulsion motion, publish an apology to her on his website, and pay her compensation and legal costs.
He can’t say he wasn’t warned.
According to the Australian, Deeming’s lawyer, Patrick George of Company Giles, alleges Pesutto accused the MP “of being a Nazi sympathiser” in March, when he moved a separate motion to expel her from the party room.
In the letter George, a leading defamation lawyer and the author of Defamation In Australia, alleges the accusation and the motion to expel Deeming was “defamatory of our client, are false, and have caused serious and potentially irreparable harm to her reputation”, according to the report.
Pesutto and his Liberal leadership team had sought to expel Deeming from the party after her attendance at an anti-transgender rally that was gatecrashed by neo-Nazis, who performed the Sieg Heil on the front steps of parliament.
He can’t say he wasn’t given the chance to pull his head in and save himself from self-inflicted disaster.
According to sources close to Deeming, as part of the compromise, Pesutto had indicated he would issue a joint media statement with her, making it clear she had not been accused of being a Nazi or sympathiser […]
Pesutto has maintained he never made such an agreement and has denied he ever accused her of being a Nazi or having Nazi sympathies.
The Guardian
In which case: why was she expelled?
Pesutto can’t have it both ways. Was Deeming expelled simply for defending women’s rights against creepy men in dresses? In which case, good luck winning back women’s votes.
Or was she expelled because Pesutto chose to sing along with Dictator Dan’s ludicrous accusation that every woman who asserted their rights as females in Melbourne that day is a “Nazi”?
In which case, Pesutto can’t lose the leadership soon enough.
The Liberals have to pull their heads out of their arses and find what’s left of their backbones, or they will deservedly be consigned to permanent opposition.