A spat has broken out inside the NSW Greens after Senator Sarah Hanson-Young endorsed a rival candidate for the imminent byelection for the lower house seat of Sydney.
Last night, Hanson-Young took to Twitter to endorse gay marriage lobbyist Alex Greenwich as Clover Moore’s successor for the prestigious bearpit possie.
Problematically, the Greens have already formally endorsed a candidate, former Sydney City councillor Chris Harris, who decided not to contest the recent council poll to focus on the byelection triggered by Barry O’Farrell’s “Get Clover” laws. Harris is close to Greens NSW Senator Lee Rhiannon’s so-called “eastern bloc” faction, which is rarely on friendly terms with Hanson-Young.
On the Greens’ Sydney electoral campaign committee mailing list late this morning, De Brierley Newton — who replaced Harris on the council ticket but failed to get elected after the Greens’ vote slumped — leapt into print to ask how Hanson-Young could be “this stupid or this calculated”.
“Perhaps a call to her office explaining that if Sydney goes pear-shaped it will impact on the Federal election result for The Greens and our lead Senate candidate. Might help,” she said.
From: De Brierley Newton
Subject: Re: [SydECC] Sarah Hanson Young endorses Alex Greenwich
Date: 21 September 2012 11:54:52 AM AEST
To: Matt Robertson, Greens Federal election Campaign committeeHi Matt
Is SHY this stupid or is this calculated?
Perhaps a call to her office explaining that if Sydney goes pear-shaped it will impact on the Federal election result for The Greens and our lead Senate candidate.
Might help.
Cheers de
Others have been just as harsh as Newton, who ran in Sydney at the 2011 state election. Earlier, former Wentworth candidate and Woollhara council hopeful Matt Robertson told Harris to “phone her office, explain the delicate nature of the situation, and ask her to REMOVE the tweet. I will email her office and explain that her tweet is a foolish move … the tweet has already been re-tweeted, and could be used against us, or picked up by the media to demonstrate we’re split.”
But Hanson-Young appears to have ignored the advice — as Crikey hit deadline, the tweet was in cyberspace and was still being retweeted. The Senator’s office has been contacted for comment and we will add the response when we receive it.
UPDATE: Sarah Hanson-Young says “of course” she’ll be supporting the Greens: “Of course I want the Greens to win. I was just commenting on what a great advocate Alex Greenwich has been for marriage equality. The Greens always work with progressive groups and people to achieve positive outcomes for the community.”
Its out there, any damage that can be done, has been, have you never heard of caching? Don’t try and cover things up, that looks really bad.
I think Sarah’s enthusiam for her good friend may have caused her to overlook the senstivities in the NSW Greens since the tough recent local Government elections. There are many good “community advocate” so-called ‘independents’ across the state, but they do tend to soak up a large chunk of the Green vote, and also take the Greens for granted. Also, I’m not sure what the situation is like in SA where SHY hails from, but where there has been a popular ‘independent’ local member or candidate, such as Sydney or Manly, the Green vote has tended to underperform compared to neighbouring areas. That’s why, regardless of the personal friendships involved, a prominent Green, such as a Senator, should never publicly endorse an ‘independent’ candidate where a Green candidate is also standing.
So she’s a real “politician”?
That cheap stunt of taking her baby into the house (because she could, because she’s a politician) was enough for me.
There’s a little bit too much nitroglycerine about her.
Oh please, nothing wrong in my eyes in saying something nice to a fellow politician. I’d rather that than the petty bagging-out that usually goes on.
I would have thought that Senator Hanson-Young might have checked the local political landscape before leaping in with an endorsement