Dan Tehan warns of ‘left-wing alliance’ working against Coalition

Opposition frontbencher Dan Tehan has warned that Climate 200, Labor and the Greens are working as a ‘progressive front’, urging his Coalition colleagues to be wary of the threat.

Rhiannon Down

Coalition frontbencher Dan Tehan. Picture: NewsWire / Martin Ollman

3 min read

6:24PMJune 10, 2025

Opposition frontbencher Dan Tehan has warned that Climate 200, Labor and the Greens are working as a “progressive front”, urging his Coalition colleagues to be wary of the threat or face the loss of more metropolitan and regional seats.

After he defeated teal challenger Alex Dyson to retain the regional Victorian seat of Wannon at the May 3 election, Mr Tehan said the Coalition needed to look at how to combat the progressive parties.

In his first major interview since being appointed opposition energy and emissions reduction spokesman, Mr Tehan told The Australian he was in no rush to decide whether the Coalition will walk away from a net zero by 2050 target.

He also revealed he had witnessed an extraordinary level of co-operation between left-wing parties during the campaign, in a co-ordinated push to “hollow out” the Coalition.

“What we have to understand, both the Liberal Party and the National Party, is that what we’re facing is a joined-up progressive front, and the teals work hand in glove with the Greens and with the Labor Party,” Mr Tehan said.

“They’re also using it to maximise the preferential system of voting that we have in this nation, and we’ve got to be very much awake to this threat.

“Because the way they do it, in such a joined-up fashion, brings resources that I haven’t seen the like of to these campaigns, both physical and financial.

“So it means that we’ve got to really look at how we counter this on our side.”

Though Mr Tehan retained the western Victorian seat he has held for 15 years by a margin of about 7000 votes, Mr Dyson attracted a swing of almost 13 per cent towards him.

Mr Tehan believes the Greens and Labor collaborated to ensure their candidates “ran dead” in Wannon to maximise the vote for Mr Dyson, a former ABC Triple J host.

“There’s no doubt that Greens, Labor and the teals work jointly together,” Mr Tehan said.

“There’s lots of stories of Greens members joining the teal campaign to hand out how-to-vote cards.

“Wearing a Greens T-shirt for a couple of hours and then swapping over to their teal T-shirt to do another couple of hours of handing out.”

Mr Tehan pointed to a photo that surfaced on election day of a box containing how-to-vote cards for Legalise Cannabis with a label on the side also displaying the words Climate 200, as proof Simon Holmes a Court’s funding body was supporting the minor party as part of a preference deal.

Climate 200 denied paying for the Legalise Cannabis flyers, saying it did not order pamphlets from the printer concerned.

“If he spent as much time representing his electorate as he does making up stories about his political rivals, the people of Wannon would get the road upgrades and local infrastructure they desperately need,” a spokesman said.

The Australian understands the labelling was the result of human error at the printing company.

Mr Tehan said he had spoken to a woman handing out flyers for Legalise Cannabis who said she had been paid to man the pre-poll centre.

“We’ve got to understand the size of the threat that we’re facing, and how we are going to be able to combat that,” he said.

As the Coalition begins rebuilding its policy platform under Sussan Ley, Mr Tehan said he had been “glad to have my name mentioned in dispatches” about a potential leadership tilt but had ultimately decided against running.

“I was prepared to basically play whatever role people saw that best worked for me,” he said.

“After taking soundings, it became clear to me that probably the best role that I could play at this time was being a part of the team, in whatever area.”

The Legalise Cannabis Party was contacted for comment.