Hanson-Young rules out bid for Di Natale’s job

Sarah Hanson-Young has ruled out challenging Richard Di Natale for the Greens’ leadership.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young in Adelaide yesterday. Picture: AAP

Sarah Hanson-Young has ruled out challenging Richard Di Natale for the Greens’ leadership, regardless of how the party performs at the upcoming election.

The South Australian senator yesterday saidshe had “absolutely no ambition” to become party leader and that Senator Di Natale was doing a “great job”.

The pair will today launch the Greens’ environmental policy in Adelaide, which is expected to revolve around Australia becoming a “renewable energy superpower”. This includes a move to 100 per cent renewables by 2030.

Senator Hanson-Young, 37, said Senator Di Natale’s leadership was assured after the election even if the party failed to improve its position, in terms of both its primary vote and representation.

“I won’t be putting my hand up for the leadership. I will be supporting Richard,” she said.

“I think Richard’s doing a great job … I look forward to a strong result for the Greens because people want climate action and they know we can’t waste another term of government. I think we’re really well positioned and this is a climate election and it’s an election where people just don’t believe they can trust the major parties.”

Senator Hanson-Young has twice failed in her bid to become the Greens’ deputy leader; a position currently shared by Queensland senator Larissa Waters and the party’s only lower house member, Melbourne MP Adam Bandt.

The Greens’ primary vote has gone backwards since Senator Di Natale succeeded Christine Milne in May 2015.

Since the 2016 election, where it received 10.2 per cent of the primary vote, the Greens’ Newspoll vote has flatlined at 9 per cent. But Senator Hanson-Young does not believe party support has peaked.

Mr Bandt and six of the Greens’ nine senators, including Senator Hanson-Young, are up for re-election on May 18.

Senator Hanson-Young said the party’s focus was to retain all sitting members, rather than expand its parliamentary numbers.

She said she was not complacent about being returned to the Senate, which she entered in 2008. “We’re doing everything we possibly can,” Senator Hanson-Young said.

She was elected 11th out of 12 senators for South Australia at the 2016 double-dissolution election, with only 5.9 per cent of the primary vote — down from 13.3 per cent in 2010.

“We know that in South Australia there is a myriad of minor parties vying for those final two (Senate) spots and we’re going to fight for it,” Senator Hanson-Young said.

After preferences, Senate candidates must win at least 14.3 per cent of the vote in their state to claim one of six vacant Senate seats — a bar twice the height of 2016, when there were twice as many seats up for grabs.

Senator Hanson-Young backed Senator Di Natale’s position that campaigning should continue over Easter.

“People have more to worry about than how many days off politicians get,” she said.

Labor and the Coalition have agreed not to run political advertisements or make any major ­announcements on Good Friday, Easter Sunday and Anzac Day.