Inside the branch stacking scandal engulfing Daniel Andrews, Lily D’Ambrosio and Victorian Labor
A suburban club for seniors has proved to be a fertile recruiting ground for the Victorian ALP. But something there doesn’t quite add up.
The Italian Speaking Senior Citizens Association of Epping offers members a range of activities, from outings and lunches to bingo, bowling, cards, music and dancing.
Meeting at the Epping Memorial Hall, in High St, Epping, the club has been an important part of the lives of elderly Italians in Melbourne’s north for decades.
In addition to it being a social and cultural outlet, it has offered locals the opportunity to engage in another activity – politics. The club has proved to be fertile recruiting ground for the Victorian ALP, with a number of its members signing up to the party’s Lalor South branch.
The branch – which until 2019 met in the electorate office of senior minister Lily D’Ambrosio – has been key to the considerable influence the close Daniel Andrews ally has had within the Victorian Labor Party for more than 20 years.
Its numbers have also helped underpin the position held within the party by federal MP Andrews Giles, who is a close friend and Socialist Left factional counterpart of both D’Ambrosio and Anthony Albanese.
For years D’Ambrosio and Giles have used the Lalor South numbers to get delegates elected to state and national Labor conferences, and determine party policy, as well as to preselect state and federal MPs, and ensure their own preselections go unchallenged.
D’Ambrosio was a regular visitor to the Italian association over the years, along with Giles, whose federal electorate of Scullin overlays D’Ambrosio’s state seat of Mill Park.
Speaking to The Weekend Australian, one elderly member of the association recalled that while D’Ambrosio was a regular visitor 10 years ago, they hadn’t seen as much of her in recent years.
“No, no. Once upon a time used to come always, but now she’s got bigger, gone up and doesn’t have much time,” the woman said. “Met Lily there. She come over. Very nice person. She very friendly, and she give you her time to talk to you. Nice person. A people person. Friendly, lovely.”
Asked if members of the association were recruited to join the ALP, the woman said: “Yeah, I think so. They are all Labor.”
Association members say Giles was another politician who would visit. “He used to come a couple of times, he is a nice person also. Lily and Andrew are not snobs. They are people you can talk to. Listen to you. Answer you. Beautiful people. They mix with you,” the elderly member of the association told The Weekend Australian.
Responding to questions about his association with the club, Giles, the federal Immigration Minister, said: “I represent a wonderful electorate with a number of local sports and community groups. I attend their events and meet with them regularly.”
D’Ambrosio, who is Victorian Minister for Climate Action, Energy and Resources and the State Electricity Commission, said that as a life member of the ALP, “a proud movement of volunteers – I have encouraged people to join in the past, but reject any implication of wrongdoing”.
“Party membership and fees are a matter for the party,” D’Ambrosio said earlier this week.
For several families, D’Ambrosio and Giles’s socialising with the Italian Speaking Senior Citizens Association has this week come to be seen in a sinister light.
When The Weekend Australian contacted Tom Donato on Monday to let him know that Labor Party records appeared to show his father Antonio’s signature had been forged on party membership forms in May 2018 and 2019, following his death, aged 82, in July 2017, and his Alzheimer’s diagnosis in 2012, the hairdressing salon owner was “absolutely horrified”.
“I don’t know what to say about it other than it’s just a disgusting act. Lack of respect. Lack of respect for a deceased person,” Donato said. “My father never had any political involvement of any kind. He wasn’t interested in politics. He never spoke about politics other than when there was an election on – who would win and what not – and as far as I know my parents’ only contact with Lily D’Ambrosio was when Lily D’Ambrosio used to visit the Italian club and promise all the pensioners how she would help them and help the Italian community.
“I’m mortified to learn that a deceased person’s signature has been forged for political gains.”
Donato suspects the club – the Italian Speaking Citizens Association – is where his parents were recruited as ALP members.
Party records show Donato’s mother, Giuseppina, now 85, was signed up to the Lalor South branch of the ALP on June 25, 2007.
His father’s name appeared on the membership list a month later, on July 30, 2007.
Both their names were on the 2019 membership roll, current to May 2020, meaning both memberships were continually renewed for more than 12 years — a process that requires annual signatures on membership forms, and the annual payment of the concession fee of $35.
“I had a long conversation with my mother, and she said they never paid any fees whatsoever. Never filled out any forms,” Donato said.
“In fact (my mother) kept getting letters and she went to their (Lily D’Ambrosio’s) office and told them to stop.”
‘It used to be free’
The Donatos are not the only family whose father’s ALP membership was being renewed beyond the grave.
Celestino and Olga Nigro were signed up to the Lalor South branch the same day as Antonio Donato, on July 30, 2007.
Celestino, also known as Charlie, passed away on September 18, 2017, but that proved no obstacle to the Lalor South branch renewing his membership in May 2018 and 2019.
Like Tom Donato, Celestino and Olga’s daughter Mary Nigro is in the process of making a formal complaint to Victorian Labor Party Monitor and former deputy premier John Thwaites.
“I cannot believe that the Labor Party would go to the extent of forging my deceased father’s name to use that for their party benefit. If they are capable of doing this, what else are they capable of?” Ms Nigro said.
The Lalor South branch went from having 132 registered members in early 2020 to just 13 now, following an audit conducted by former premier Steve Bracks and federal deputy Labor leader Jenny Macklin in the wake of branch-stacking allegations. The allegations saw Daniel Andrews’ factional foe Adem Somyurek expelled from the ALP, and three of his allies lose their ministries and ultimately their parliamentary careers. IBAC did not find any criminal offences had been committed. Lalor South lost more members than any other branch in the audit, and was the only one in Victoria, including those linked to Somyurek and his allies, where 100 per cent of memberships were paid in cash.
It is not clear how many of the 132 members renewed in 2019 had ever paid membership fees or signed their own renewal forms, or how many were signed up following D’Ambrosio and Giles’s visits to the Italian Speaking Senior Citizens Association.
But despite many disconnected phone numbers, elderly people with limited English, and calls which went unanswered, The Weekend Australian did not struggle to find nine 2019 members who said they had no recollection of ever having paid a membership fee.
“I’m not a member any more because they started charging me. It used to be free. Before Covid it was free. When they started charging, I didn’t want to be a member,” said a 79-year-old South Morang woman, who confirmed she had been encouraged to join the party through the Italian Speaking Senior Citizens Association.
An 83-year-old Thomastown woman, who with her 88-year-old husband has been a party member since 2001 – the year before D’Ambrosio entered parliament – said she and her husband had “never paid”, and that it had been “Lily D’Ambrosio, the lady who’s a minister now” who had first encouraged them to join.
To join the conversation, please log in. Don't have an account? Register
Join the conversation, you are commenting as Logout