Liberals Far Right Take Over in NSW

Sex Discrimination Councillor Pru Goward's run for the seat of Epping appears to have been scuttled, after the Right dominated NSW State Executive voted to allow the outrageously stacked Cherrybrook branch to participate in pre-selections.

The momentous nature of this development cannot be underestimated, because it proves, for once and for all, that the Hard Right have taken over the NSW Liberal Party, riding roughshod not only over the ostensible state leader, Peter Debnam, but the Prime Minister John Howard, both of whom had been working hard to see Goward preselected in the seat of Epping. Thus, the ultimate power of David Clarke and his cohorts has now been definitively asserted. They've already helped depose a moderate leader, John Brogden, as well as infiltrated all state party organisations and stripped a moderate, Patricia Forsythe, of her pre-selection after she spoke out about the filthy tactics that got rid of Brogden.

This development is good for nobody - not the greater public of NSW, but least of all the NSW Liberal Party itself, whom infighting and factional battles have reduced to a rabble. While I don't think there will necessarily be a Pittwater-style backlash against the Clarke-endorsed candidate, Greg Smith, it is a disturbing trend that is likely to continue. The agenda of the Clarke brigade is extreme - anti-gay, fundamentalist Christian, anti-abortion (Smith is a former president of Right to Life), and their propensity for branch stacking wherever another fake member can fit in order to take over formerly left-dominated branches has caused such concern amongst other members of the State party that some have spoken out publically, such as City of Sydney Council's sole Liberal councillor, Shayne Mallard, who said, quite rightly: “I think it should be alarming for most mainstream Australians that any party is going to become marginalised to a very narrow base of issues"

Far be it from me to tell the Liberals how to win, but this certainly isn't it.