Guests bail as s44 case push on

A citizenship action against Josh Frydenberg has caused chaos for organisers of the inaugural Kooyong Independents Group dinner.

Pushback at a section 44 citizenship case launched against Josh Frydenberg has seen the speakers’ list at a dinner decimated. Picture: Lukas Coch/AAP

The two key speakers promoted by Oliver Yates for his inaugural Kooyong Independents Group dinner will not be attending, amid pushback at a section 44 citizenship case launched against Josh Frydenberg by climate activ­ist Michael Staindl.

After weeks of publicity, The Australian has confirmed that neither Cathy McGowan nor Julia Banks will be attending the dinner, despite being promoted by Mr Yates as keynote speakers.

The dinner, the first gathering of Mr Yates’s support team of volunt­eers and independent backers, is expected to be held at a restaurant in Camberwell, in Melbourne’s east, tonight.

The Australian understands that Ms Banks — who unsuccessfully ran in the seat of Flinders and who was part of the “Independents Day” movement — was advertised as an attendee because of a communications error between her and Mr Yates.

The Australian has also confirmed­ that Ms McGowan is no longer attending.

Mr Yates said the absences had nothing to do with the challenge­ under section­ 44 of the Constitution aimed at establish­ing if the Treasurer has Hungar­ian citizenship through his moth­er, Erica, who fled the Holocaust.

The challenge was lodged on behalf of Mr Staindl by Vanessa Bleyer, of Bleyer Lawyers, who unsuccessfully ran for the Tasmani­an parliament as a Greens candidate and tried to replace­ former Greens leader Christine Milne in the Senate.

The Australian revealed yester­day that Mr Yates had tried to enlist supporters within the Kooyong Independents Group to investigate electoral issues such as parliamentary ineligibility.

The email, seen by The Aust­ralian, was sent weeks after the election and shows Mr Yates ­inviting supporters to join one of three subcommittees — including an eligibility review — with the purpose of specifically invest­igating section 44 disclosures.

Mr Yates, who won just 8.98 per cent of the primary vote in his attempt to unseat Mr Frydenberg at the federal election, is running a separate legal challenge through the Court of Disputed Returns against the Liberal Party’s use of Chinese-language signs, which he claims were deliberately misleading.

The former chief executive of the Clean Energy ­Finance Corp­oration has told The Australian he did not “believe” that Mr Staindl, who follows him on social media, ­supported his campaign or that he was a member of his Kooyong Independents Group.

Meanwhile, NSW Labor frontbencher Walt Secord yesterday condemned “vicious” claims Mr Frydenberg might be a dual citizen as “deeply offensive” and “rooted in anti-Semitism”.

The state opposition Treasury spokesman attacked Trevor Poul­ton, a lawyer who has told The Australian he was working with Mr Yates’s “Kooyong Independents” to test the Treasurer’s citizenship status.

“I believe the attacks and claims the Treasurer is a citizen of Hungary are scurrilous and ­deeply offensive,” Mr Secord told the NSW parliament’s Legislative Council yesterday.

“It is important to note that one of the key figures behind the recent push is lawyer Trevor Poulton. It is also no coincidence that Trevor Poulton is the author of a 2012 so-called piece of fiction, The Holocaust Denier. I believe the dual-citizenship claims against Josh Frydenberg are deeply rooted in anti-Semitism.”