Daniel Andrews denies ALP intercepted, leaked Liberal tape

DANIEL Andrews has denied Labor figures intercepted and distributed an interview with former Victorian premier Ted Baillieu.

VICTORIAN Opposition Leader Daniel Andrews has threatened legal action over revelations that senior Labor figures may have intercepted and distributed a journalist’s off-the-record interview with former premier Ted Baillieu.

The Australian understands Labor figures have been linked to passing on information from the Dictaphone, which Sunday Age reporter Farrah Tomazin lost at Labor’s state conference in May.

Mr Andrews today said allegations that senior staff from his office and Labor Party chiefs had any involvement were “wrong and defamatory”.

“The distribution of this recording always has been and always will be an internal matter for the Liberal Party,” he said in a statement. “These allegations have been referred to our lawyers.”

Planning Minister Matthew Guy said the allegations revealed the true nature of Labor.

“It shows the character of the kind of people who could govern the state after November,” he told the ABC. “These people’s character is bereft of any decency, of any honesty, of any transparency.

“That is how Labor would govern Victoria and for all Victorians it should terrify them that these people in the Labor Party could govern Victoria after November.”

The Australian has been told the recorder was lost and was found by a security guard, despite Fairfax’s earlier claims that it was stolen.

It is believed police understand the recorder was then improperly interfered with and the information, which detailed a bitter attack by Mr Baillieu against several of his colleagues, was widely leaked.

There is no suggestion Mr Andrews was aware of wrong­doing by any Labor member.

Victorian ALP secretary Noah Carroll last night denied Labor involvement: “The Victorian ALP categorically rejects any suggestion that it was involved in the theft of any Dictaphone or the distribution of the contents of any Dictaphone.’’

If it is proven Labor or anyone close to Mr Andrews was directly involved in disseminating the ­recording without the reporter’s approval it could have disastrous consequences for Mr Andrews ahead of the November 29 poll.

The recording was sent last month to hundreds of Liberal Party email addresses, prompting senior Liberals to lash out at “rats” within the Liberal ranks.

The Baillieu conversation was revealed at the time of a heated preselection battle and was an unauthorised recording of what was meant to be an off-the-­record discussion.

In it, Mr Baillieu stridently criticised several colleagues and The Australian, alleging a party conspiracy was behind the fallout over the preselection ballot that cost minister Mary Wooldridge her chance to remain in the lower house.