ALP fears Greens ‘deal’ will cost it inner-city seats

LABOR has been spooked by a Liberal decision to register open how-to-vote cards in the inner-Melbourne seats.

LABOR has been spooked by a Liberal decision to register open how-to-vote cards in the four inner-Melbourne seats most at risk of falling to the Greens.

The Liberal Party made the move at the weekend despite making a virtue of preferencing the Greens last and ruling out entering into any balance-of-power deal with the minor party.

Senior Liberals dismissed the move as a negotiating tool but Labor said there was a clear ­agenda for the Napthine government to breach what appeared to be an iron-clad agreement by the ­Coalition.

The move appeared to catch Premier Denis Napthine off guard yesterday, but he insisted that the Greens would be preferenced last.

“My understanding is the party registers a number of cards for perhaps negotiation purposes, but the card that we have selected, the card we are using, the card we are handing out on pre-polls, the card we’ll hand out on the 29th of ­November will preference the Greens last,” he said.

The open-ticket card backed by the Liberal Party, if handed out, would affect the inner seats of Melbourne, Northcote, Brunswick and Richmond.

In each seat, the Greens’ vote has been rising steadily in recent elections, posing a significant threat to Labor’s candidates.

If the Liberal Party were to back an open ticket, it could easily result in the loss of Melbourne and Richmond — from Labor — but then create a second consequence of potentially handing the Greens the balance of power.

Labor scrutiny of government spokesman Martin Pakula said there were clear problems if the government were to push ahead with the strategy. “Liberal panic meets Greens hypocrisy,’’ Mr ­Pakula said. “Seemingly, Denis Napthine is quite relaxed about the notion of the Greens picking up seats in the inner city.’’

Greens leader Greg Barber did not respond to The Australian.

Senior Liberal sources said there was “no way’’ that the party would use the open ticket and that it had been printed in the context of behind the scenes positioning.

The sources described it as “preferencing games’’.

Labor’s member for Northcote, Fiona Richardson, said a Greens deal with the Palmer United Party in the upper house was merely the beginning of the hypocrisy of the minor party.

“In the past, some associated the Greens with idealism. Now we see the Victorian Greens engaged in the worst form of political ­opportunism and hypocrisy,’’ Ms Richardson said.