Greens candidate Campbell Gome stands by role in Extinction Rebellion protests

A Greens candidate who could force Daniel Andrews into minority government says he stands by his role in Extinction Rebellion protests that disrupted Melbourne for days.

Greens candidate Campbell Gome, running for Northcote in Melbourne’s inner north, being arrested in October 2019 for his Extinction Rebellion protest.

A Greens candidate whose ­success could see Daniel Andrews forced into minority government says he stands by the leading role he played in a series of Extinction Rebellion protests that disrupted Melbourne for days.

Campbell Gome, who is running for the seat of Northcote, in Melbourne’s inner north, has been arrested on numerous occasions during protests in which he glued himself to buildings and blocked some of the city’s busiest intersections during peak hour.

The father and assistant school principal is running against second-generation Labor MP Kat Theophanous, who won the seat back from then state Greens MP Lidia Thorpe – now a senator – in 2018.

The Greens currently hold the inner-city state seats of Melbourne, Prahran and Brunswick, and are hoping to win three more on November 26: Northcote, Richmond and Albert Park.

Saturday’s Newspoll, published exclusively in The Weekend Australian, had Labor on track to lose 10 seats – prompting speculation that a strong showing from Greens, teals and anti-Labor independents could see the Premier’s 12-seat hold on ­majority government eroded.

Mr Gome is campaigning as a “local public school teacher, unionist and community activist”, citing school “climate strike” protests in which he, his daughters and his students have participated as inspiration for his decision to “make change happen at a political level”.

In October 2019, he participated in a week-long rolling series of Extinction Rebellion protests in which he glued himself to BHP headquarters in Melbourne and led peak-hour bicycle blockades of key routes including Hoddle St and the corner of Flinders St and St Kilda Road, boasting on the television news: “We’re a rolling traffic jam on wheels.”

At the time, Victoria Police ­Assistant Commissioner Tim Hansen said of Extinction ­Rebellion: “This group continues to choose not to co-operate with us or engage with us, and this is jeopardising and frustrating the broader community.”

Mr Gome boasted on his ­Facebook page of having been “arrested again, above the mighty Birrarung (Yarra River), again”. “Not everyone in this country would feel or be safe getting arrested, but I am. As a middle-class white man with secure employment I hold a privileged position in society. Getting arrested doesn’t put me at as much risk as it does others,” he wrote.

“The devastating impacts of the climate emergency will affect everyone, but they will affect the poorest amongst us the worst. And they will be even greater on the voiceless future generations. ­Unless we act now.

“As an educator, the concept of ‘voiceless future generations’ is not abstract to me. I am with the future generations every day and I take my duty of care for them seriously. I know what it is to watch a dearly loved young person die.”

Asked whether he was concerned about how his protest ­activities would be received by ­voters, Mr Gome said: “Everything in my personal life, including getting arrested as part of a peaceful protest for urgent climate action, has led to my current decision to run for the Greens in the seat of Northcote.

“Northcote residents deserve a local member with real power who will fight for climate action, not a backbencher who’ll vote to open up gas drilling at the 12 Apostles.

“Northcote residents know protest disruption is insignificant compared to the climate disruption that’s coming.”

Mr Gome also refused to ­distance himself from Senator Thorpe, who recently generated headlines for an outburst that First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria co-chair Geraldine Atkinson has said left her physically ill and requiring medical attention, and for her relationship with former Rebels bikie gang president Dean Martin.

“Senator Lidia Thorpe was a staunch representative for Northcote who achieved a 4.3 per cent swing to the Greens in 2018. If we get half that swing again we’ll turn Northcote Green, and we’ll be in a position to push Labor to quit coal and gas, implement rent caps and ensure everyone has a secure, ­affordable home,” Mr Gome said.

Senator Thorpe’s 4.3 per cent swing compares with the two-candidate-preferred result in 2014. When compared with her by-election win just a year earlier, the Greens’ 2018 loss represented a 7.4 per cent swing against Senator Thorpe.

The daughter of former upper house MP Theo Theophanous, Ms Theophanous is highlighting her credentials as a long-term local, mother of young daughters, SBS government relations manager and staffer for former Northcote MP Fiona Richardson, whose death from cancer in 2017 prompted the by-election that saw Senator Thorpe briefly hold the seat.

Ms Theophanous’s campaign has parallels with that of Ged Kearney, who has held off the Greens in the corresponding federal seat of Cooper, focusing on her personal brand and progressive credentials with limited references to the Labor Party.

Mr Gome’s unsuccessful rival for Northcote preselection was former Thorpe chief of staff, David Mejia-Canales, who slammed his then boss’s treatment of Ms Atkinson in an email which was leaked to the Nine newspapers.