Adem Somyurek: From cabinet comeback to betrayal

The decision to reinstall Adem Somyurek to cabinet was ‘payback’ for Philip Dalidakis’s refusal to join his party grouping.

Victorian upper house MP Philip Dalidakis. Picture: Mark Stewart

Daniel Andrews’s decision to reinstall factional powerbroker Adem Somyurek to his cabinet in 2018 at the expense of colleague Philip Dalidakis was “payback” for Mr Dalidakis’s refusal to join his party grouping, according to allies of Mr Dalidakis.

However, Mr Somyurek has disputed the claim, saying the decision to dump Mr Dalidakis was the Victorian Premier’s.

After his 2018 landslide election victory, Mr Andrews announced a new-look ministry, spruiking the fact that 50 per cent of his cabinet were women, but also announcing the addition of his “very good friend”, Mr Somyurek, as Minister for Small Business and Local Government.

The rehabilitation of Mr Somyurek came after he was forced to resign from the ministry in July 2015, over allegations he bullied then chief-of-staff Dimity Paul.

Mr Somyurek maintained the allegations were part of a “union revenge plot” amid factional tensions between his breakaway “Mods” Labor Right faction and Ms Paul’s Shoppies union faction of which he’d previously been a member.

Asked to explain his decision to promote Mr Somyurek, despite saying he was dumping Mr Dalidakis to make room for more women in 2018, Mr Andrews said the powerbroker had paid a “significant price” by losing his job in 2015. “I think he is a better man than he has ever been, and that is a significant thing. If I wasn’t confident of that, then he wouldn’t be back,” Mr Andrews said. “I’ll leave you to interpret who stood aside for who. What Philip Dalidakis did was make way for a massive structural and cultural change.”

Members of Mr Dalidakis’s Stephen Conroy-aligned Labor Right faction told The Australian on Monday that before the 2018 election, Mr Somyurek had asked Mr Dalidakis through a “third party” to join his party grouping and give them his votes at meetings of the Victorian ALP’s Public Office Selection Committee, which helps determine who the party preselects for parliamentary seats.

In exchange Mr Dalidakis would be “protected” from losing his ministry. The sources said “payback” for Mr Dalidakis’s refusal to agree to the deal came when his ministry was given to Mr Somyurek.

Mr Somyurek disputed the claim, saying his faction’s position was that “we don’t accept Cons” (Conroy faction members).

“Therefore there is no way in the world we accept Phil,” he said.

“He upset (then special minister of state and Andrews ally) Gavin (Jennings) and Daniel (Andrews). Nothing to do with us.”

Victorian union leaders who coalesced around Mr Somyurek after splitting from Mr Andrews’s dominant Socialist Left faction insisted on Monday that they would remain as a stand-alone power bloc. Socialist Left sources said on Monday that Mr Somyurek’s demise represented an opportunity to revive a stability pact between the Left and Right factions and to try to reach a new accommodation over preselections before the next federal election.

“We have got to get the Victorian branch back in shape,” one Left figure said.

But sources said Left and Right union leaders on Monday recommitted for the time being to staying apart from the main factions and remaining in the Industrial Left, which includes the John Setka-led CFMEU and the Rail, Tram and Bus Union.

Mr Somyurek succeeded in exploiting factional divisions in the Victorian ALP and claimed to control about two-thirds of the branch numbers before his demise. For a period, he employed Mr Setka’s wife, Emma Walters, in his electorate office.

It is understood union leaders from the Industrial Left have agreed to meet next week to map out their next moves and try to manage the fallout from Mr Somyurek’s removal.