Independents take on Liberals and the old political model

The old ways of Australian politics are about to be tested by new candidates who are challenging the Liberals in some of their safest seats with large numbers of volunteers, serious amounts of money and a real chance of victory.

The independent candidates are the biggest experiment of the 2022 election and could create a new template for future campaigns if their loose alliance topples Liberals in city seats.

Independent candidates Allegra Spender (Wentworth), Zoe Daniel (Goldstein), Kylea Tink (North Sydney), Sophie Scamps (Mackellar) and Kate Chaney (Curtin). Credit: Jessica Hromas, Elke Meitzel, Wolter Peeters, Nick Moir, Tony McDonough

While voters in every electorate are likely to have independents on their ballot papers, the “teal independents” stand out not just for the common colour of their placards but the common elements of their game plan.

The essential goal is to replace a Liberal man with an independent woman in a relatively wealthy electorate in a major city. The formula clearly works when the incumbent Liberal is unpopular. It helped Rebekha Sharkie replace Jamie Briggs in Mayo in 2016 and Zali Steggall sweep Tony Abbott out of Warringah in 2019.

While those contests were in big cities – Mayo is in the Adelaide Hills, Warringah includes Manly in Sydney – the formula can work elsewhere. Cathy McGowan replaced Sophie Mirabella in Indi in northern Victoria in 2013 in an upset that ran counter to the swing towards the Liberals nationwide. Helen Haines won the seat in 2019 when McGowan passed the torch to a fellow independent.

But the recent past suggests the pattern works for one independent in one seat at each election, which means the 2022 game plan has a scale and audacity never seen in living memory outside the usual political parties. It gains power with its call to voters in Liberal seats to send a protest vote to Scott Morrison.

Simon Holmes a Court is backing candidates under the Climate 200 umbrella targeting Liberal MPs.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

The game plan is also very different to the strategy used by GetUp at the last election when the activist group ran hard against leading conservatives in the government such as Peter Dutton in his Queensland electorate of Dickson and Greg Hunt in his Victorian seat of Flinders. Those attempts failed. While GetUp may have helped Steggall against Abbott, it generated a paltry result elsewhere for all its money and volunteers.

The unifying thread at this election is the funding from a different activist group, Climate 200, and its leader, Simon Holmes a Court, one of the most relentless opponents of the government’s climate policy.

Holmes a Court opposed the national energy guarantee devised by Malcolm Turnbull and his government in 2018 when some others reluctantly accepted it as better than nothing, so he sees no point in helping moderate Liberals support a Coalition government where they must work alongside conservative Liberals and Nationals who do not want to act on climate change at all.

Holmes a Court would rather remove the moderates altogether. And he is not funding a challenger to Dutton at all.

The impact could reshape the Liberal Party. If the Climate 200 candidates succeed in large numbers, the effect will not just be to drive Morrison and his government out of power. It will be to sweep moderate Liberals out of parliament while leaving conservatives untouched. The Liberal party room would shift to the right.

The main challengers and their targets are: Nicolette Boele against Paul Fletcher in Bradfield, Zoe Daniel against Tim Wilson in Goldstein, Claire Ferres Miles against Aaron Violi in Casey, Monique Ryan against Josh Frydenberg in Kooyong, Sophie Scamps against Jason Falinski in Mackellar, Allegra Spender against Dave Sharma in Wentworth and Kylea Tink against Trent Zimmerman in North Sydney.

The principal targets are all Liberals who support action on climate change and support marriage equality, the social issue that is the ultimate test for moderates against conservatives. The campaign against Frydenberg is especially interesting because the Treasurer is one of the contenders to lead the Liberals if they lose. Taking him out pushes the party towards Dutton.

There are variations to the Climate 200 game plan where it backs challengers to the Nationals. Caz Heise is taking on Pat Conaghan from the Nationals in Cowper on the NSW North Coast. Hanabeth Luke is running against Kevin Hogan in Page, the seat next door. Kate Hook is trying to unseat Andrew Gee in Calare. So far, however, Climate 200 is leaving Barnaby Joyce alone in his seat of New England.

The other exceptions are the contests gaining less attention where the independents are taking on Liberal women. In a big test in Western Australia, Kate Chaney is challenging Celia Hammond, the sitting MP in Curtin. Another independent, Despi O’Connor, is running against Zoe McKenzie, the new Liberal candidate for Flinders where Hunt is departing after 21 years representing the seat on the Mornington Peninsula.

Climate 200 is not the only option for an aspiring independent. In the Victorian seat of Nicholls, centred around Shepparton, local business owner Rob Priestly is trying to defeat Sam Birrell from the Nationals without taking money from Climate 200 because he wants to run a local campaign. The resignation of the sitting MP, Damian Drum, has thrown open the contest.

A bigger contrast is in Hughes in southern Sydney, where Craig Kelly holds the seat for the United Australia Party after defecting from the Liberals last year.

One independent, Georgia Steele, has Climate 200 behind her but the other, Linda Seymour, does not. Seymour wants action on climate change but is unimpressed with the way Climate 200 runs its campaigns. The government is fielding Jenny Ware, who was endorsed with backing from the moderate wing of the Liberals.

A triumph for one of these independents would match the pattern of the recent past. A triumph for the group would mess with the old political model. How many will win? Which ones? The mediocre result for GetUp at the last election showed that money and volunteers were not enough. One of the big questions in the 2022 campaign will be whether the independents can succeed with their new model. If it works, it will be with us for years to come.

Jacqueline Maley cuts through the noise of the federal election campaign with news, views and expert analysis. Sign up to our Australia Votes 2022 newsletter here.