The Sauce: Bullying claims over Dr Caroline Yarnell shock decision to quit race for Manly

The shock move by Labor’s candidate for Manly to quit last week set the rumour mill spinning — especially because social media posts now indicate that bullying may have been involved.

She was a Labor candidate for a key seat on Sydney’s northern beaches who quit in mysterious circumstances.

But social posts made by Dr Caroline Yarnell have raised questions about whether bullying may have been behind her shock decision to withdraw as the endorsed candidate for Manly last week.

Yarnell, who holds a PhD from Sydney University, is a known feather ruffler.

The avid ABC TV Q+A watcher and ex-international relations lecturer is not shy in making her views known, tweeting prolifically during the show.

In September last year, Yarnell declared Australia was still a “White Western outpost”.

“ … when will we have a non-white PM?” she wrote.

Caroline Yarnell withdrew as the ALP’s candidate for Manley …

… but denied Labor leader Chris Minns gagged her.

Responding to a tweet in March last year about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Yarnell wrote: “How did you feel about what we did in Iraq? Just wondering.”

Yarnell has also tweeted about the northern beaches — the area she was vying to represent — posting in response to a Q+A show in 2018 that local Boomers “like Abbot (sic) want poor infrastructure AND low immigration to keep the Peninsular insular”.

“The vibe on Sydney’s Northern Beaches is ‘we’d love a train and better infrastructure’ but we’d rather not have it if it means Westies can visit en masse”

Yarnell has quashed claims her resignation was triggered by allegations that she was told to quieten down by Labor leader Chris Minns.

Responding to the claim, Yarnell wrote: “I was NOT asked to stay quiet by Chris Minns or anyone in Labor at all.

“The last tweet I made has been misinterpreted. Staying stumm is MY decision.”

Dr Caroline Yarnell’s social media posts have raised questions about whether bullying may have been behind her shock decision to withdraw as the ALP candidate for Manly.

As for the tweet she was referring to — and which remains on her page — Yarnell had posted on January 17 that she had spoken to the Labor leader about her decision to withdraw, declaring how she would be “using Labor’s internal complaints procedures and staying stumm now (hard for me) until after the election.”

The clue about what really happened may be in her response to a post made three days ago, where another former ALP candidate wrote how she had run in an election campaign as a Labor candidate.

“I wasn’t as smart as you,” the former candidate posted.

“I just suffered through their bullying. Not in that party anymore”.

Responding to the post, Yarnell wrote: “I am not alone!”

WOMEN PROBLEM

Not all is well among the women of the NSW Liberal Party.

Premier Dominic Perrottet tried to fix the party’s gender problem by taking control of the Upper House ticket and installing three female candidates.

While the move last month understandably upset some of the blokes, not all Liberal women are happy about it either.

Former Liberal candidate Dr Fiona Kotvojs. Picture: PMO

In a scathing letter to Liberal Party officials sitting on the NSW state executive, Eden-Monaro FEC vice-president Dr Fiona Kotvojs declared that the decision to bypass the nomination process had left her contemplating about whether to remain in the party.

Kotvojs, who is a former Liberal candidate for both Bega and Eden-Monaro, said the added insult was installing a Sydney woman in a regionally held seat.

Outgoing Upper House MLC Matthew Mason-Cox, who represented the NSW “southern province”, is to be replaced by Susan Carter, who lives in Sydney, while Lou Amato who looks after the southwest Sydney province, is being replaced by Mosman resident Rachel Merton.

“My ability to continue to actively support a Party that so blatantly disregards its members and ignores its own Constitution is something I am now questioning,” Kotvojs wrote.

Kotvojs, who is a former party gender adviser, said had the party followed the process set out in its constitution, a woman would have likely been selected “if she was the best candidate to represent this province”.

“There was neither the need to foist external women upon us (regardless of how good they may or may not be) nor fail to hold a preselection,” she wrote.

“The very act of selecting three people as candidates for the Legislative Council on a

public holiday without previous advice to members of State Council, particularly those in the Province involved, indicates a complete lack of respect for both party members and good governance.

“In short, the message that this sends party members is that our perspective does not matter; ‘big brother knows better’.”

Kotvojs is not alone — fellow party member and former Law Society of NSW president Joanne van der Plaat is understood to share her sentiment.

Van der Plaat, who is president of the Cooma branch, was understood to have been interested in nominating — even meeting with ministers — only for the phone lines to go dead after the deal was done.

NEW GIG

Former Scott Morrison staffer Nico Louw has snared a new job with the Insurance Council of Australia.

Regular readers may recall Louw was among those embroiled in a leaking scandal involving the dissemination of Malcolm Turnbull’s book A Bigger Picture.

Turnbull at the time blamed Louw for distributing “pirated copies of my book”.

Copies of the book were later believed to have prematurely ended up with hundreds, if not thousands, of journalists and other Coalition figures.

Despite the kerfuffle that followed — and to Turbull’s disdain — Australian Federal Police (AFP) closed their investigation after concluding the initial leak of the book occurred on an overseas server, the book publishers had already obtained damages from a number of individuals; and that the cumulative harm from the distribution has been assessed as “low”.

Louw clocked up almost eight years working for the federal government, including four years in the Prime Minister’s Office and another four as a policy adviser to the Treasurer.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Louw’s role at the council is senior manager, government and stakeholder relations.

The Sauce was unable to reach Mr Louw for comment.

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