Liberals finally choose candidates for some NSW preselections

The Liberal Party has cleared the way for candidates to contest key federal seats including Bennelong in the coming federal election after growing anger at delays that could weaken the government’s ability to hold on to power.

Top party officials approved aspiring candidates for three seats on Friday after Immigration Minister Alex Hawke, a key factional figure in the party’s NSW division, agreed to the formal process after holding out for much of last year.

Immigration Minister Alex Hawke has been under fire for delaying Liberal preselections.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

The contest for the Senate is also heating up, with former Army general Jim Molan entering the race for two Liberal positions on the NSW ticket against Foreign Minister Marise Payne and former minister for international development Concetta Fierravanti-Wells.

The Friday meetings, chaired by state party president Philip Ruddock, only addressed the less controversial contests for the lower house because faction leaders are still at odds over the best people to run for some of the most important marginal seats at the election due by May.

“It shows that Alex has been stung into making time available,” said one Liberal who is frustrated at the slow process to approve candidates.

“Federal intervention in the division is still a live option but things have cooled a bit.”

Mr Hawke is the official representative of Prime Minister Scott Morrison in the NSW division and has delayed the decisions on new candidates, leading some to suspect that Mr Morrison and Mr Hawke have dragged out the process so they can argue for a federal takeover and impose the candidates they want.

In a sign of the time being taken to make decisions, one of the Friday meetings formally vetted the sole Liberal nominee for the federal seat of Whitlam, local cheesemaker Michael Cains, who lodged his nomination last October.

The Whitlam electorate includes the southern highlands as well as Shellharbour in the Illawarra and is held by Labor frontbencher Stephen Jones by a margin of 10.9 per cent.

Another of the party’s nomination review committees approved Sam Kayal as the candidate for Werriwa in western Sydney, held by Labor’s Anne Stanley by 5.5 per cent.

The meeting on Bennelong approved potential candidates including former political adviser Gisele Kapterian, City of Sydney councillor Craig Chung and former McKinsey partner Simon Kennedy, with a preselection likely in March to give party members a choice in who could replace retiring MP John Alexander.

The Liberals are yet to choose candidates for Dobell on the central coast, Eden-Monaro on the south coast and Hughes in southern Sydney, where Mr Morrison wants to install state Liberal Melanie Gibbons in a bid to remove the sitting MP, Craig Kelly, who quit the Liberals for Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party last February.

A decision on Hughes is unlikely before a series of NSW state byelections on February 12, when the outcome will reveal whether NSW Liberal Premier Dominic Perrottet and his government can afford another byelection in order for Ms Gibbons to move to Federal Parliament.

The Liberal Party’s moderate wing is backing local lawyer Jenny Ware for Hughes instead. While the seat is usually safe for the Liberals, the party is up against several independents as well as Mr Kelly.

Neither of the major parties has chosen a candidate for Parramatta, with factions at odds inside the Labor Party over the best person to replace Julie Owens, who has held the seat since 2004.

With Senator Payne having Mr Morrison’s support to lead the Liberal Senate ticket at the coming election, Senator Molan and Senator Fierravanti-Wells are heading for a tough contest to decide which of them gains support from branch members to stay in Parliament.

Nominations for the party’s Senate preselection close on Wednesday. Liberals believe they have two “winnable” positions on the Senate ticket in NSW, being the first and third positions with the Nationals taking the second on a shared ticket.