Peter Walsh takes over as new Victorian Nationals leader

THE Victorian Nationals have elected former water minister Peter Walsh as its new leader and a new MP as his deputy.

Victorian Nationals Stephanie Ryan and Peter Walsh.

THE Victorian Nationals last night elected former water minister Peter Walsh as the party’s new leader and a 28-year-old MP who has never been in parliament as his deputy.

Stephanie Ryan, the newly elected member for Euroa in central Victoria, and Mr Walsh were elected by the partyroom to lead the Nationals through the delicate rebuilding stage.

The partyroom did not vote on whether to remain in coalition with the Liberal Party, with Mr Walsh saying he would wait to see who was made Liberal leader when the party votes today to determine who takes over from Denis Napthine, who quit as leader on Saturday night after accepting he could not win enough seats to govern.

The expectation has been that the Nationals would want to remain in coalition.

Mr Walsh said despite the Nationals losing the northern Victorian seat of Shepparton to an independent, and almost losing the Latrobe Valley seat of Morwell to another independent, the seat-by-seat vote for the Nationals was relatively strong.

“Our vote was very similar to what it was in 2010,’’ he said.

Mr Walsh said he would be seeking talks with the party’s Coalition partner. “I want to have that discussion. The party wants to make sure we have a constructive but very vigorous discussion,’’ he said.

“I actually think that we delivered a lot for country Victoria as a government. I think we can all be very proud of what’s happened in individual communities in our particular electorates.’’

The decision to elevate Ms Ryan to the position was the biggest surprise, as she is yet to enter the parliament.

Ms Ryan is a former adviser to Mr Walsh and former premier Ted Baillieu. “Obviously I’ve been involved in policy and politics for quite some time. I have worked as a journalist in the community and I spent the last 10 months really, really getting to know the issues across the Euroa electorate,’’ she said.