The Liberal Party’s campaign to retain the marginal inner west Sydney seat of Reid has been destabilised after members of one local branch withdrew their support for the campaign of sitting MP Fiona Martin on Monday night.
The heads of the Liberal Party’s Strathfield women’s branch said their friendship with high-profile former Liberal party member Natalie Baini – who is now running against Dr Martin as an independent – was a conflict of interest and they would be supporting Liberal candidates in Lindsay and Fowler instead.
In a statement made at a Reid presidents’ meeting on Monday night, Strathfield women’s branch president Liana Ross and secretary Vivian Hodgson also alleged Dr Martin lied about living in the electorate, and cited personal issues with one of her campaign managers as further reasons for their withdrawal.
Liberal MP Dr Fiona Martin speaks in Parliament.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
They claimed Dr Martin had told Liberal Party members that she lived in the suburb of Rhodes, which is within Reid, when she was living outside the electorate in Ryde. “This makes us uneasy in marketing her to the electorate,” their signed statement, seen by the Herald, said.
But Dr Martin told the Herald she had “always been upfront about purchasing a place for the family five minutes outside the electorate”.
“I grew up in Reid, went to school here, and I worked in Reid when I was at university. This is where my family has lived for almost three decades. So, when looking for a family home, long before I was in Parliament, we bought a block of land close to my ageing parents – five minutes from the electorate,” she said.
The branch leaders’ withdrawal from the campaign comes ahead of an anticipated tightly fought contest in the must-win Sydney seat, which straddles wealthy inner west areas such as Rodd Point and Canada Bay, working-class suburbs of Auburn and Lidcombe, as well as strong religious and ethnic communities around Strathfield, Homebush and Burwood.
Dr Martin, a child psychologist, was described as Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s captain’s pick when she was selected by the party to run in the 2019 election, replacing local member and pub baron Craig Laundy when he retired from politics.
She retained the seat for the Liberal party but suffered a 1.5 per cent swing, and now sits on a 3.2 per cent margin. Both sides of politics consider the highly diverse seat crucial to winning government in May.
But while Reid has traditionally been a tussle between the Labor and Liberal parties, this year’s addition of Ms Baini – the Liberals’ former Reid branch vice-president – as an independent candidate could bleed critical votes from the Coalition to deliver Labor candidate Sally Sitou – a Homebush resident contesting a federal election for the first time – the must-win seat.
Ms Baini will include preferences on her how-to-vote cards but said she had not yet decided who she will direct them to, leaving open the possibility that votes for her are directed to Labor.
The lawyer and former sports administrator has strong family connections in the area as well as ties to Strathfield church St Martha’s, local sports clubs and is on the board of St Patrick’s College in Strathfield.
Independent candidate for Reid, Natalie Baini, has strong family connections in the area as well as ties to Strathfield church St Martha’s, local sports clubs, and is on the board of St Patrick’s College in Strathfield. Credit:Nick Moir
Ms Ross, Ms Hodgson and a third Liberal party member nominated Ms Baini for pre-selection last year, in a challenge to Dr Martin. However, Ms Baini withdrew amid a dispute with the party regarding the handling of an internal complaint in which she alleged inappropriate behaviour by some senior men within the Liberals and government.
A recent Newspoll has buoyed her campaign, showing the Liberal primary vote down 15.3 per cent to 33 per cent, and independents gaining 12.6 per cent to make up 19 per cent of the vote. However, that independent figure also includes One Nation and the United Australia Party.
Labor was in the lead with a 39 per cent primary vote but only grew their share by 1.8 per cent.
One Labor insider said Ms Baini was influential in the area and shaping up to be the biggest threat to the Liberals’ campaign, but questioned whether she would be able to compete with Dr Martin’s communications budget and if conservative Liberal voters would break their usual patterns to risk a Labor victory.
Dr Martin’s decision to cross the floor during a vote on the government’s religious discrimination bill earlier this year is also having ramifications across key parts of the electorate.
The MP said she decided to defend her principles in helping strike down the decade-old law which allowed religious schools to discriminate against or expel transgender and gay students, citing her experience treating children with depression and suicidal ideation. But her decision blindsided Mr Morrison, who thought had persuaded her to remain with the government, and sparked recriminations from colleagues.
Both Labor and Liberal insiders said her decision might have played well in progressive parts of the electorate but it had rattled Reid’s conservative religious elements who were not consulted.
One Liberal branch member described it as a “stunt” that would win over a small percentage of constituents but put traditional Liberal party voters offside.
“It has annoyed branch members in Reid and people have downed tools because of it. From a constituent voter point of view, we lose overall. She’ll pick up some votes, but they usually go to Labor anyway. It’s lost conservative votes. There are lots of private and Catholic schools in Reid, people want to make those choices themselves,” they said.
“She’s done a lot of very left-wing things while she’s been here, and this is not a left-wing seat. We’re not in Wentworth, we’re in Reid. It’s a different style of seat. While she wants to follow the Dave Sharma, Trent Zimmerman brand on that left-wing path, unfortunately, traditional Reid voters are not left-wingers.”
But another branch member said local discontent was “not about Fiona Martin directly”. “This is what happens when you plonk an outsider in the seat,” they said.
“That’s the biggest problem that’s happened here – to run a federal seat of 90,000 constituents, much of your capacity to represent depends on your parochial local knowledge. She had no immersion in the local political scene.
“Reid is a complex area anyway, because it’s split by Parramatta Road, it’s split by economics, from housing commission to very luxurious residences. It’s a very diverse seat and if you don’t know how to handle that, you won’t be an effective member.”
Jacqueline Maley cuts through the noise of the federal election campaign with news, views and expert analysis. Sign up to our Australia Votes 2022 newsletter here.
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