Bob Brown backs Greens deal with Clive Palmer

FORMER  Greens leader Bob Brown has defended the Victorian Greens’ preference deal with the Palmer United Party.

FORMER  Greens leader Bob Brown has defended the Victorian Greens’ preference deal with the Palmer United Party, saying coalmining magnate Clive Palmer’s role in ensuring the Abbott government preserved the $10 billion renewable energy fund put the PUP ahead of parties who “either don’t believe in climate change or want to burn more coal”.

The Greens have preferenced the PUP ahead of Labor in four of eight upper house seats for the ­November 29 state election.

Campaigning in the inner-­Melbourne seat of Prahran with candidate Sam Hibbins and Victorian leader Greg Barber, Dr Brown said people should vote for the Greens, not the PUP.

“But when it comes to preferences, it was Clive Palmer that saved the $10bn — what was called the ‘Bob Brown Bank’ by Tony Abbott — renewable energy fund, and Victoria’s doing extremely well out of that,” Dr Brown said of Mr Palmer, whose main business is exporting coal. “Let’s hope it is protected. That’s something that the Liberals, the Coalition in Melbourne or in Canberra haven’t done, wouldn’t do, but he did.”

Dr Brown said the Greens hoped to win as many as three lower house seats in Melbourne. “People turned off when I said Adam Bandt would win the seat of Melbourne back in 2010,” he said. “Well, he’s not only won it, but he consolidated that seat against the trend last time, and within that seat are two or three state seats where the Greens are polling to win.”

Mr Barber said the Greens had allocated preferences to parties on the basis of shared interests, and the decision to preference the PUP over Labor had come down to a choice between “the Palmer party and the Packer party, sometimes know as the Labor Party”.

“Both (Labor) and Liberal are backed by the same set of corporate interests,” Mr Barber said.

“(Labor is) out there boasting about the hundreds of thousands of dollars that are pouring into their coffers ever since they got the famous slap on the back from James Packer’s mate Lloyd (Wil­liams). So that’s why Labor and Liberal lock in together and that’s why Labor is willing to preference people like the Shooters Party and the DLP to keep the Greens out.”

Victorian Labor innovation spokeswoman Fiona Richardson slammed the Greens’ deal with PUP. Ms Richardson, fighting the Greens in her inner-city seat of Northcote, said the minor party had been disingenuous.

“This redefines what it means to be hypocritical in politics,’’ she said. “On the one hand they want to close coalmines, on the other hand they jump into bed with one of the biggest coalmining magnates in order to pursue political power in Victoria.’’

Labor MP Jane Garrett, who is also fighting the Greens in an inner-city seat, said the Greens had been “profoundly hypocritical’’ and were guilty of “sanctimonious grandstanding’’.

“And then we find they were doing a sweetheart deal with the coal baron,’’ she said.