Source : the age
Anthony Albanese has intervened for a third time in a preselection fight for a prize Labor seat, benefiting his own Left faction and infuriating the Right.
Georges River councillor Ash Ambihaipahar was chosen last week as Labor’s candidate for the safe Sydney seat of Barton, replacing former Indigenous Australians minister Linda Burney.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and new Labor candidate for Barton Ashvini Ambihaipahar before a press conference at Gough Whitlam Park in Sydney.Credit: AAPIMAGE
Albanese joined Ambihaipahar on Monday to announce her candidacy, describing her as “a cracker of a candidate” and someone “who has an enormous commitment to this local community, and someone who I think will really add something to our team as we seek a second term in government”.
Ambihaipahar emphasised her links to the local community as well as her career as a scientist, then a lawyer and then with the St Vincent de Paul Society and as a state candidate.
But her selection has triggered serous consternation within the ALP.
The NSW Labor general secretary Dominic Offner wrote a letter to Labor’s national secretary Paul Erickson protesting against the intervention, the 10 Labor Right faction members of the 21-member national executive boycotted the vote and some key Right faction unions are weighing whether to withhold election donations from the party’s national office.
The National Executive, Labor’s top decision-making body, comprises 10 members of the Right and 10 members of the Left. Albanese, a member of the Left, has the tie-breaking vote.
Ash Ambihaipahar takes a selfie with partner of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese Jodie Haydon and wife of NSW Labor leader Chris Minns Anna Minns when she was Labor candidate for Oatley.Credit: AAP
Ambihaipahar’s selection is the third high-profile intervention by the executive this year to install candidates favoured by the prime minister and his Left faction.
Despite rank-and-file Labor members calling for a ballot of all members, Jo Briskey and Alice Jordan-Baird were handpicked this year by the executive for the safe Melbourne seats of Maribyrnong and Gorton, which are being vacated by veteran MPs Bill Shorten and Brendan O’Connor.
The Right believes Barton, held on a 15.5 per cent margin, was supposed to revert to it under a deal struck in 2016, but the Left argues the deal no longer holds as the Right was given a Left seat, Parramatta, in 2022.
Multiple sources on Labor’s national executive and three federal MPs confirmed to this masthead the Right was furious with the prime minister and the Left faction over the handling of the pre-selection, even as they conceded that Ambihaipahar was a better candidate than former state MP Shaoquett Moselmane, who stood for the Right.
“The Right abstained from voting. It was our silent protest to Albo to say ‘f— you’ for interfering in preselection,” one MP, who asked not to be named, said.
A second federal MP observed that “for a guy who said he wouldn’t act like a faction leader, he is being very factional”.
Both those MPs, and two members of the National Executive, said that there was talk in Right-aligned unions such as the powerful Shop, Distributed and Allied Workers union of withholding donations from Labor’s national office and re-directing donations to state divisions ahead of the federal election.
“The Shoppies are contemplating not donating to the federal campaign and instead giving to the state branches,” the first MP said.
“But that could change if the PM reaches out and seeks to reconcile things.”
SDA national secretary Michael Dwyer did not respond to request for comment.
A senior figure in the SDA who asked not to be named confirmed there were discussions under way about withholding donations from federal Labor, but downplayed the likelihood of it happening.
“There’s too much on the line at this election,” the union figure said, referring to the Barton, Gorton and Maribyrnong pre-selections.
“We know Dutton wants to unwind Labor’s industrial relations changes. The Right is pissed off and there is a lot of unhappiness with how the PM is using his casting vote to resolve these disputes.”
But a third member of the executive said that Ambihaipahar was the stand-out candidate, whereas the Right had not even been able to settle on who their candidate would be.
