Kristina Keneally mulls over a move from Senate to lower house
Kristina Keneally is considering a tilt at a safe lower house seat as key union leaders in NSW prepare to back Deb O’Neill for top spot on the Senate ticket.
Kristina Keneally is considering a tilt at a safe lower house seat as key union leaders in NSW prepare to back Deb O’Neill for the party’s top spot on the Senate ticket.
Senator Keneally is weighing up running for preselection in the western Sydney seat of Fowler, which is being vacated by veteran Labor MP Chris Hayes.
Sources say NSW Labor general secretary Bob Nanva has been pushing the proposal as a way to keep Senator Keneally in parliament, given the growing likelihood that Senator O’Neill will gain backing for the winnable spot on the ticket for the Right faction.
Under NSW Labor convention, the Right faction gets top spot on the Senate ticket while someone from the Left faction gets the No. 2 spot.
Sources said it had become increasingly likely that Senator Keneally would be forced into the No. 3 spot, which Labor has not won since 2007.
Senator O’Neill is a member of the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association, which has refused to back down to demands that it support Senator Keneally taking the top spot on the ticket.
If Senator Keneally decides to run for the Senate and fails to get the top spot, Anthony Albanese can override the state party’s decision through the national executive.
The Opposition Leader is a close ally of Senator Keneally and he would be unlikely to allow her to be put in a position where she would be forced out of parliament.
Senator Keneally would lose her position in the leadership team if she were to go to the lower house because she would no longer be deputy leader in the Senate.
A lower house tilt would also be controversial as Mr Hayes is backing local woman Tu Le to succeed him, while Senator Keneally lives on Scotland Island in Sydney’s affluent northern beaches.
Labor frontbencher and NSW Right heavyweight Tony Burke said the party should “never take local electorates for granted”.
“No seat, no member is anything but beholden to the community that they‘re part of,” Mr Burke said.
“Making sure that the community is not taken for granted is something that needs to be absolutely the first principle of any conversation at all.”
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