Women in fight to restore order to upper house

Almost every sitting Liberal MP in Victoria’s upper house is facing a preselection challenge, with professional women prominent in a Melbourne Cup field of nominees.

Former Deputy Director of Work Place relations at ACCI, Tamsin Lawrence, is running for Liberal preselection in Victoria’s upper house.

Almost every sitting Liberal MP in Victoria’s upper house is facing a preselection challenge, with professional women prominent in a Melbourne Cup field of nominees.

Opposition Treasury spokesman David Davis is the most prominent of those being ­challenged, with only transport infrastructure spokesman Matt Bach being spared a preselection battle.

The challenges follow the expulsion from the parliamentary Liberal Party of veteran MP Bernie Finn, and announcements last week from former upper house president Bruce Atkinson and Baillieu-Napthine minister ­Gordon Rich-Phillips that they would not recontest the November state election, amid imminent challenges.

Former Australian Chamber deputy director of workplace relations Tamsin Lawrence is vying to take over Mr Finn’s Western Metropolitan seat, with one Liberal telling The Australian the state election represented an unmissable opportunity for a party overhaul.

“We’ve got people like Tamsin, who grew up in Essendon, who’s been the head IR negotiator at ACCI, who’s a 33-year-old woman, putting their names forward,” the Liberal said.

“We’ve got a narrative following the federal election that we’ve lost the inner-city seats and we’ve lost professional women and we need to appeal to people in the suburbs.

“To overcome that, we need people from the suburbs who are professional businesswomen to put their hands up, and we’ve got one in Tamsin.

“This will be a test of the ­Victorian Liberals’ appetite for ­reform.”

Following the close of ­nominations on Monday, Ms Lawrence is expected to be up against Morrison government senior adviser Mark Briers, education consultant Fred Ackerman, David Davis adviser Jenny Matic and others.

In Southern Metropolitan, tech company founder Colleen Harkin has put noses out of joint by nominating for the first, second and third positions on the ticket, meaning she is challenging Mr Davis and health spokeswoman Georgie Crozier for their seats.

One Liberal described the challenge as “erratic”, and others described Ms Harkin as a “serial vexatious nominee”, given she challenged Brighton MP James Newbury for his seat earlier this year, before contesting the federal seat of Macnamara against sitting Labor MP Josh Burns, resulting in a 7.34 per cent swing against the Liberals in two-party-preferred terms.

Others said it was unsurprising Mr Davis was being challenged, after his unsuccessful attempt to gain preselection for drink-driving MP Tim Smith’s seat of Kew last year against former Josh Frydenberg staffer and Business Council executive Jess Wilson.

In North Eastern Metropolitan – which is replacing Eastern Metropolitan – Dr Bach will be uncontested for top spot, but a long list of people is vying for second position, including former MP Gladys Liu, who recently lost the marginal federal seat of Chisholm, oncologist and Fulbright scholar Ranjana Srivastava, software consultant Shilpa Hedge and family lawyer Monica Clark.

In Northern Metropolitan, sitting MP Craig Ondarchie is seen as unlikely to be able to hold off a challenge from three well-known candidates, namely Leukaemia Foundation advocate and former Michael O’Brien staffer Catriona Rafael, IPA communications director Evan Mulholland and Victorian Liberal Party treasurer Owen Guest.

In regional Victoria’s Eastern region, chiropractor Renee Heath is challenging Cathrine Burnett-Wake, who recently replaced former opposition legal affairs spokesman Ed O’Donohue following his retirement.