Liberal elder Alan Stockdale ‘reluctantly’ gave up golf to take over party

The political elder who suggested “men’s involvement” should be protected from “assertive women” has sparked further outrage.

Alan Stockdale has said he would “reluctantly” give up golf to take over the NSW Liberal Party. Picture: AAP Image/Julian Smith

Exclusive: The Liberal elder who suggested “men’s involvement” should be protected from “sufficiently assertive women” has sparked further outrage by telling a meeting of party members that he “reluctantly” gave up playing golf to fix the NSW Liberal Party’s mess.

Highlighting the depth of anger among Liberals at former Victorian treasurer Alan Stockdale’s comments, party members have been circulating a leaked transcript of a private party meeting on Tuesday night.

Mr Stockdale is one of three people appointed by federal Liberal bosses to oversee the NSW division after it failed to nominate almost 150 candidates for local council elections last year.

The administrative committee, also made up by Victorian Richard Alston and Peta Seaton, has infuriated NSW Liberals who opposed the federal division’s takeover.

According to the transcript, running more than 100 pages, Mr Stockdale said he only agreed to be part of the takeover as he was “reluctantly prepared to give up playing golf (a) couple of times a week”.

He said he did so because the Liberal Party is important “nationally and in the state”.

Administrative committee members Richard Alston (left) and Alan Stockdale as they appeared in the online meeting on Tuesday night. Image: supplied

One Liberal familiar with the meeting said the comments further proved Mr Stockdale was “out of touch”. Another said it was excessively “blokey,” suggesting Mr Stockdale should have “read the room”.

Mr Stockdale was contacted regarding his comments.

He previously said his comments about “sufficiently assertive women” was “a lighthearted but poorly chosen remark,” and that he “intended no disrespect to anyone”.

However, the comments sparked outrage from Liberal women and the party’s political opponents.

“The statements by Mr Stockdale … that somehow you might need to actually have discrimination in favour of men because women were too assertive in the Liberal Party, has been met with derision by members of the Liberal Party … I think people just shake their heads (at the comments),” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.

Coalition frontbencher Bridget McKenzie implored Mr Stockdale to “read the room”, adding his remarks were “shocking”.

“I think it’s time for Alan to head back to the Melbourne club … and chat with the old boys about what went wrong,” she told the Nine network.

In the meeting of the NSW Liberal Party’s Women’s Council, Mr Stockdale made the case for party reform, declaring that the federal executive wants to resolve the party’s internal divisions “once and for all”.

“(The federal executive) do not want to be intervening in NSW again … they want the problem in NSW resolved once and for all,” he said.

Mr Stockdale, with other members of the administrative committee, last month called for feedback from party members on constitutional changes which would stop the “abuse” of factional power.

Eyebrows among attendees were further raised when Mr Stockdale said feedback on the NSW division’s election campaign had “almost without exception” been “very complimentary”.

“There wasn’t a NSW failure, it was a Liberal Party failure nationwide and we paid the price for it nationwide,” he said.