Climate a Stokes in Liberal Party’s wheel

ANTHONY KLAN

The takeover of the NSW Liberals by the “right-wing” of the federal party hit a major snag after one of its apparent saviours turned down the gig — because he is busy taking action on climate change.

Yesterday the federal Liberal Party announced it would take over the NSW Liberals after it missed the deadline to nominate around 140 candidates in upcoming NSW council elections, and NSW Liberal MP Rory Amon was on Friday arrested and charged on child rape offences.

The forceable takeover from Thursday next week would last ten months because the NSW Liberal Party was currently unable to “contest or win government at the forthcoming federal election”.

Three men would take the reins, former Victorian Liberal Treasurer Alan Stockdale, Howard-era communications minister Richard Alston, and former NSW planning minister Rob Stokes.

But late yesterday, Stokes, who was a NSW Liberal MP from 2007 until last year, indicated he hadn’t even been formally asked — and couldn’t anyway because he was busy.

“I am always happy to help but I did not anticipate this appointment and I am not in a position to accept it,” Stokes said in a statement.

A simple Google search shows why.

In the 18 months since leaving NSW Parliament the highly-educated Stokes has been appointed Industry Professor, Environment and Sustainability at Macquarie University; chair of the Net Zero Cities Cooperative Research Centre;  and a member of the Albanese Federal Government’s Urban Policy Forum, which focuses on “crucial urban policy areas” including “sustainable development, planning” and “climate change adaptation”.

 “I did not anticipate this appointment and I am not in a position to accept it” — Rob Stokes

His role as Industry Professor, Environment and Sustainability, involves “strategic collaborations with government and industry partners to deliver change across sustainable urban development by fostering net-zero cities, advancing social justice and promoting sustainable urban environments”.

Stokes, 50, would “drive world-leading research in sustainable urban development,” Macquarie University said in announcing his appointment in April.

The Net Zero Cities Cooperative Research Centre (CRP), where stokes has been chair since July last year, is a developing a “10-year initiative (2025-2035)”, bringing together industry, government, and research partners in a “deep collaboration to advance sustainable urban futures”.

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The Liberal Party’s bungling has attracted widespread derision. Source: Twitter/X

The Federal Coalition, whose senior ranks include numerous climate deniers and assorted “sceptics”, drew international condemnation for refusing to act on climate change during its near-decade in power, to 2022.

The Liberal Party, like the ALP, is heavily funded by the fossil fuels industry.

“While the federal executive said its intervention was designed to put the party on a firm pre-election footing, moderates in the NSW division regard the move as a hostile takeover from conservatives,” the ABC reports.

“NSW moderates regard the move as a hostile takeover from conservatives”

“Everyone is in shock,” the ABC quoted one NSW Liberal source.

“You’ve got two 80-year-old from Victoria [on the committee]. They have no self-awareness”.

Another NSW Liberal source said “it demonstrates how out of touch they are”, the ABC reports.

Alston, 82, held communications minister roles from 1996 to 2003 under the Howard Government, and was federal president of the Liberal Party from 2014 to 2017.

Stockdale, 79, is a former Victorian state Deputy Liberal leader and was federal president of the Liberal Party from 2008 to 2014. After leaving state parliament in 1999 he took a position as executive chair of Macquarie Bank’s Asset & Infrastructure Group and as chair of chemicals company Symex Holdings.

In 2014 Tony Abbott, who was Coalition Prime Minister from 2013 to 2015 — during which period both Alston and Stockdale served as Liberal Party federal president — repealed the nation’s carbon pricing scheme.

Alan Stockdale. Source: Wiki

Three weeks ago it emerged the NSW Liberal Party failed to nominate around 140 candidates across 16 councils ahead of NSW local government elections to be held on September 14.

The NSW Liberal Party sacked its state director Richard Shields over the affair, but its president Don Harwin staved off calls to resign, initially stating was considering taking action against the NSW Electoral Commission.

He decided against taking action after receiving legal advice.

Harwin will reportedly be ousted under the federal takeover and replaced with former NSW state director Chris Stone.

Former federal Liberal party director Brian Loughnane was commissioned to conduct a report in the wake of the council nominations scandal.

The Federal Liberal Party executive met yesterday afternoon, considered Loughnane’s report and reportedly declared a federal takeover was necessary because the current state of the NSW Liberals meant it would be unable to “contest or win” the upcoming federal election.

On Friday last week Amon, the NSW MP for Pittwater, was arrested and charged with a string of child-sex offences, including five counts of having sexual intercourse with a child between the ages of 10 and 14.

Alleged Pittwater pedophile Rory Amon. Source: NSW Liberal Party

The charges reportedly relate to the alleged sexual assault of a 13-year-old-boy over two month period in 2017.

Amon denies the allegations, which he said he would fight, but resigned from parliament within hours of being arrested at 6am last Friday.

Coincidentally, Stokes had been the NSW MP for Pittwater until he retired ahead of last year’s state election.

Amon won the seat for the Liberals on a small margin, defeating independent Jacqui Scruby 50.7% to 49.3% after preferences.

A by-election will now be held for the seat.

Amon narrowly beat independent Jacqui Scruby in the seat of Pittwater at last year’s NSW election. Source: ABC

Stokes holds a PhD in law from Macquarie University, completed in 2008, and a Master of Science from the University of Oxford in the UK.

A search of his LinkedIn profile shows he is also chair of not-for-profit Faith Housing Alliance, which seeks to tackle homelessness by “working to increase the supply of safe, healthy and secure affordable housing for all”.

That “right wing” forces in the Federal Liberal Party were seeking to take control of the NSW arm was well known.

Two weeks ago Crikey’s political editor Bernard Keane wrote that such a takeover would “spell a Victoria-like disaster for the state”, with the Victorian Liberals currently “unelectable” having pushed even further to the right.

“The right-wing rump of the Liberal Party, backed by the Murdoch press, is liking what it sees in NSW — the chance to take over a division characterised by sensible, centrist liberalism, and purge the influence of moderates,” writes Keane.

“A right-wing takeover would satisfy the thirst for revenge of right-wingers like Abbott against decades of defeats at the hands of moderates — and send NSW careening down the path of Victoria”.

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