'It's my job to get attention': Meet the ambitious member for Kew

Tim Smith keeps a pretty straight face when he says he doesn’t know what all the fuss is about.

The state Liberal MP has attracted national attention with his colourful outbursts against Labor Premier Daniel Andrews and his response to the COVID-19 pandemic but says he is just doing his job as an opposition frontbencher: confronting the government.

Tim Smith's recent Twitter tirades have drawn attention to the member for Kew.Credit: Paul Jeffers

But the ambitious Smith’s interventions, mostly on Twitter where he has described Andrews as a “schmuck”, “dictator” and “friendless loser”, look designed to attract as much attention to the member for Kew as to the Premier or his policies.

Social media is a poor measure of public opinion, but the feedback Smith has received for his online musings on subjects ranging from golf to bats in Yarra Bend Park and his attacks on public health officials has not been positive.

In a political scene mostly static since Andrews' electoral rout of the Coalition 18 months ago, Smith’s colourful invective has sparked leadership speculation that Michael O’Brien could have lived without as he tried to launch policies this week for the post-COVID-19 economic recovery.

O’Brien, who cannot conduct a press conference without being asked about his colleague from Kew, lost patience with Smith a week ago after the Liberal planning spokesman went on national breakfast TV, without clearing the appearance with his leader, and called Andrews a "loony”.

Despite instructions from O’Brien to tone it down, Smith was back on Twitter the next night with a fresh choice of words for Andrews – a “schmuck” – and another stream of invective.

The Victorian Liberal Party is buzzing with theories on just what Smith is up to.

But he told The Age on Friday that there was nothing out of the ordinary going on.

“All I am doing is my job, which is to ask questions of the government and to raise issues the public is raising with me,” Smith said.

'All I am doing is my job, which is to ask questions of the government and to raise issues the public is raising with me.'

Member for Kew Tim Smith

“Now, do I do it in a way that sometimes gains me media attention? Yes, but that’s my job.

“This happens in Canberra every day. Every MP who goes out and makes a statement criticising the government, you don’t then have 50 questions about various aspirations that you may have.”

But questions there are. Whether Smith likes it or not, it is hard to tell, and while a leadership confrontation looks unlikely for now, theories among Liberals on their colleague’s true motivation fall into three broad categories.

The first is that he is trying to get himself thrown off the opposition’s frontbench and have greater room to manoeuvre outside of shadow cabinet.

“Not true,” says Smith.

Theory No. 2 is that there is no plan or strategy and that Smith, enjoying the attention, just doesn’t want it to end.

“In politics, a lot of the time you are responding to events,” he says.

“So yes, to an extent you are always making things up as you go along because that's the nature of politics.”

Liberal leader Michael O'Brien asked Tim Smith to tone down his language after the member for Kew called the Premier a "loony".Credit: Simon Schluter

The third and most obvious theory is that Smith is looking to provoke a confrontation with O’Brien.

“No, I'm trying to provoke a conversation by having a confrontation with the Labor Party.”

Smith said he had argued for a tough response to COVID-19 in the earlier stages of the pandemic, before forming the view, after the worst of the threat had receded, that Andrews and his health advisers had gone too far and had been far too slow to unwind the measures.

Besides, he says, Andrews is “a very aggressive incumbent”, a veteran political brawler who in opposition between 2010 and 2014 did not hesitate to play rough with his Liberal opponents and is very much fair game.

Smith has a small and tight group of friends in the Liberal caucus, and looks unlikely to command the numbers needed to mount a credible leadership challenge, if that was his aim, which he denies.

“Michael is the leader and he has my support," says Smith.

But some of those close to him say that Smith has been successful, dragging O’Brien into a more confrontational stance against Andrews and his lockdown, despite warnings from Liberal pollsters that voters would not look kindly on politicians squabbling in a time of pandemic.

“Bullshit,” scoffed an O’Brien loyalist this week in response.

But the party leader was still batting away reporters’ questions about Smith on Friday and insisting his team was united behind his policies.

“Every member of my team has been working to create a plan, that we’re putting forward for the government to take up, because this is what we need to get Victoria open again,” O’Brien said.

Smith, too, was talking about the team on Friday. He mentioned ambitions as well.

“I'm ambitious for the Liberal Party, I'm ambitious with the team,” the member for Kew said.

“We are a team in the Liberal Party, which is more important than all of us.”