John Masanauskas: Change at Town Hall could be just the ticket
While Lord Mayor Sally Capp is considered the frontrunner for Town Hall elections, she will be challenged hard by her deputy Arron Wood, who finally declared his hand over the weekend, after months of speculation, writes John Masanauskas.
Opinion
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When Lord Mayor Sally Capp ran for Town Hall in 2018, she campaigned proudly as an independent candidate.
A political novice, she had briefly been a member of the Liberal Party, but was adamant that party politics would not play a part in her fight for the top job.
After all, her predecessor Robert Doyle — a former state Liberal leader — didn’t trumpet the party affiliation in his three successful lord mayoral campaigns.
But Doyle was a deft political strategist, and Capp needs all the political advice she can get as she tries to win a second term at the October 24 council election.
For this election will be more party political than most in recent years, with the ALP officially endorsing a ticket, an unofficial Labor ticket also set to run, some Liberal-leaning candidates, and, of course, the Greens putting on a solid show.
With less than seven weeks to the poll, the Lord Mayor is yet to reveal who she will run with, although some names have been suggested.
Prominent among them is former senior ALP apparatchik Nicholas Reece, who was elected four years ago as part of the old Team Doyle.
Reece is widely tipped to run as Capp’s deputy, although recent murmurings around Town Hall have indicated it’s not a done deal.
Also believed to be on the ticket is current councillor and former Team Doyle member Kevin Louey, who has strong links to the Chinese community.
While the Lord Mayor is considered the frontrunner, she will be challenged hard by her deputy Arron Wood, who finally declared his hand over the weekend, after months of speculation.
Wood and Capp have not seen eye-to-eye for some time, and the ambitious deputy will campaign hard to take business votes away from the Lord Mayor, whom he claims has not delivered.
“If elected, I don’t owe anyone anything, which means that I can govern purely with the city’s interests at heart,” said Wood.
The only other major ticket to declare so far is the official Labor team, led by former state political adviser Phil Reed, who also worked for WorkSafe and TAC, and is now head of government and stakeholder relations at law firm Slater and Gordon.
His deputy is multicultural campaigner Wesa Chau, while councillor candidates include small business owner Davydd Griffiths and former City of Glen Eira mayor Mary Delahunty.
Labor is taking the city council election more seriously because it wants to peg back inroads made by the Greens in the inner city over the years.
The Greens hold both the state and federal seats of Melbourne, which were once traditionally Labor strongholds.
The ALP won the seat of Northcote back from the Greens at the last state election, and pushed the minor party harder than most expected in Melbourne.
Labor’s rationale is that to make progress it needs to show up more than just two out of three elections, that is, it needs to contest strongly at local council level too.
The party will presumably campaign on the achievements of Premier Daniel Andrews, including issues dear to the inner city Left like public transport projects, renewable energy and moves towards a “treaty” with Aboriginal groups.
However, given pandemic shutdowns and continuing criticism of the Labor government’s handling of the crisis, this could prove to be a risky plan.
Some pundits claim that Labor’s strategy is to do a cosy preference deal with Capp in a bid to boost the party’s chances of getting councillors up.
Even if Reed fails to snare the lord mayoralty, he might get two councillors from his ticket elected, plus the election of Labor member Reece if Capp wins.
It will be a good result for the party if it can then control the council in league with Capp’s team.
Reed insists that his ticket is fair dinkum, and that he is in it to win it.
Also challenging the Lord Mayor from the Left is the woman who nearly beat her last time, ALP member Jennifer Yang.
Yang, who unsuccessfully ran for the eastern suburbs seat of Chisholm at the 2019 federal election, is backed by some Industrial Left unions, but also has support from some in the party’s Right faction.
Last time, the Yang team ran a very spirited campaign, and if this was repeated, it could cause problems for Capp, not to mention an interesting little power play within the Labor Party.
The Greens are yet to announce their lord mayoral candidate, but it’s not expected the party will be in the hunt for the top job.
The status quo position of getting two councillors up is the most likely result, with sitting councillor Rohan Leppert confirming he will run again.
Among other sitting councillors, Philip Le Liu can expect to be re-elected on an unofficial Liberal Party ticket, while Jackie Watts, an ALP member, will likely be returned on the ticket of pollster Gary Morgan.
Other candidates running are psychologist Michael Burge for deputy lord mayor, and Victorian Socialists’ lord mayoral hopeful Kath Larkin.
With more candidates still to formally declare, there should be room for surprises in a campaign period affected by lockdowns.
John Masanauskas is Herald Sun City Editor