The Sauce: Matt Kean snags John Barilaro’s senior strategist
The war between Energy and Environment Minister Matt Kean and Nationals leader John Barilaro has intensified, with the Liberal powerbroker snagging Mr Barilaro’s “brilliant strategist”, his chief-of-staff Mark Connell.
NSW
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A new twist has emerged in the war between Energy and Environment Minister Matt Kean and Nationals leader John Barilaro with the moderate Liberal powerbroker brazenly snagging his rival’s chief strategist.
In a coup no-one could have predicted, Mr Barilaro’s chief-of-staff Mark Connell is leaving the Nationals to join the Liberal minister’s office as one of his most senior advisers.
His departure is a major loss for Mr Barilaro, with the multiple parliamentary sources who learned of the transfer describing Connell as “a brilliant strategist” and “highly intelligent”.
Prior to joining Barilaro’s office, Connell was the corporate and regulatory affairs director for British American Tobacco (BAT) Australasia with his LinkedIn profile describing the role as being responsible for “delivering the commercial objectives of BAT Australia in a highly controversial and heavily regulated market”.
With Kean driving reform on the equally contentious issues of energy and climate change, Connell sounds like just the person he needs.
How Barilaro and the rest of the Nationals feel about the move remains to be seen although The Sauce understand not everyone knew of the transfer.
One Liberal source likened Connell’s transfer to a scene out of Star Wars: “It’s the Sith becoming a Jedi Knight.”
Let the duels begin.
PARTY BRAWL DEVELOPS
Moves to ban property developers from running as Liberal candidates on councils triggered one of the bloodiest brawls to date within the powerful NSW Liberal state executive on Friday, with Premier Gladys Berejiklian and Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s representatives leading the division.
Tensions among members were already rife following the state executive elections last year, when the Centre Right faction attempted to break the Left-Right stronghold.
However the Friday night meeting quickly descended into a screaming match after members learned of a motion put up by left-wing lawyer James Wallace for the party to use its special powers to ban developers from running for positions on councils.
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Insiders have told The Sauce correspondent Linda Silmalis that the motion was being pushed by the party’s local government oversight committee chair Peter Poulos, who is an adviser in the office of left-wing minister Matt Kean, and deputy chair Charles Perrottet, who is the brother of right-wing Treasurer Dom Perrottet.
Assistant Speaker Mark Coure, who is the Premier’s representative on the executive, spoke in favour of the motion.
However, ScoMo’s representative, Centre Right powerbroker Alex Hawke, moved a motion to defer the vote, arguing that the executive should first seek legal advice.
The move followed NSW Liberal state director Chris Stone advising the room of “potential constitutional issues” relating to the use of special powers, a source said.
The Hawke motion, which required a 50 per cent majority, failed, as did the Wallace motion, which required a 90 per cent majority.
A separate screaming match occurred between NSW Liberal Party president Phillip Ruddock and Fairfield Liberal Matthew Hana — who dates a Labour councillor, Sera Yilmaz — who had not yet signed a confidentiality agreement not to leak the proceedings of executive meetings.
Hana allegedly wanted to seek legal advice before signing the agreement but ended up leaving the room after clashing with Ruddock.
Another verbal brawl is alleged to have occurred between Hawke and fellow executive member Alex Dore, although nobody could remember what the point of dispute was about.
With members still brawling after four hours of discussions, executive treasurer Michael Hughes — brother-in-law of Malcolm Turnbull — walked out in disgust, allegedly stating he had “better things to do” that listen to relentless “squabbling”.
“It’s fair to say the meeting was a total shitfight,” one wearied member said after the meeting.
“It’s going to be a long year”.
COURT CUTIE
All sorts of colourful characters hang outside courthouses. In the case of Goulburn Courthouse last week, it was a fully-grown alpaca by the name of “Heff”.
Legal sources said Heff usually toured retirement villages, bringing cheer to elderly residents.
However, he was brought the courthouse after an appointment fell through.
The word is that Heff was a hit with both sides of the law.
“Court staff and the public gave him love and pats,” a source said.
Among those not there was Attorney-General Mark Speakman, who shared this awful pun: “I’m tempted to alpaca my bags to hoof it to the long neck of the law at Goulburn Courthouse.”
BUCKET BONANZA
Queensland construction worker Mark Webster knew that one day his extensive collection of bucket hats, gathered back in 2005 as part of The Sunday Telegraph’s Australia Day coverage, would one day prove useful.
And when he joined his daughter on a volunteer student aid trip to South Africa recently, he found the perfect use for them.
Webster and the team from Volunteer Eco Students Abroad spent six days working in Khula village, spending time at a daycare centre with any orphaned children.
“Being a bit of a hoarder, I still had them and thought I could finally do something with them,” he said of the hard hats.
“It was a very eye-opening experience. We definitely live in very different worlds. When I gave the kids the hats they were very excited and very appreciative, absolutely over the moon.”
The Sauce heard the kids wore the hats on Australia Day and were still wearing them when Webster left.
Webster, like The Sauce, believes hard hats need to make a fashion comeback.
Got some Sauce? Contact linda.silmalis@news.com.au, miranda.wood@news.com.au, or annika.smethurst@news.com.au
Originally published as The Sauce: Matt Kean snags John Barilaro’s senior strategist