Warringah contest: Activists driving Steggall-backed climate strike

Zali Steggall’s support for a school students’ strike over climate change fuels claims of outsiders taking over her campaign.

Independent candidate Zeli Steggall makes a point to Warringah MP Tony Abbott at a leadership summit yesterday

Zali Steggall has thrown her support behind next week’s planned school students’ strike over climate change, fuelling claims her campaign to oust Tony Abbott from his Sydney seat has been captured by outside activist groups.

Ms Steggall, a barrister and former world champion skier who is rated a chance of defeating Mr ­Abbott as an independent in blue-ribbon Warringah, yesterday stood by student activists behind the school strike from a group called Climate Leaders.

Climate Leaders was started shortly after the first school strike in November, when thousands of students held rallies in major cities, demanding Scott Morrison take ­urgent action on ­climate change.

The group, which named Ms Steggall as its first NSW “Climate Leader” after vetting her at a meeting a week ago, claims to be for under-18s who cannot “run for ­office” or “vote ourselves”.

But Climate Leaders is not ­headed by teens — its all-adult board is chaired by Christina McPhail, a professional activist with links to GetUp who previously worked as a “planetary protection officer” for climate group 350.org.

Other adult “founding supporters” on the board include Django Merope Synge, and group secretary Chris Cooper.

Mr Synge is a full-time national campaigner for GetUp, and until recently was campaign director in Warringah for GetUp, which backs Ms Steggall.

Mr Cooper is a senior campaigner with Purpose, a GetUp offshoot set up by its co-founder Jeremy Heimans.

Ms McPhail told The Weekend Australian she was not a GetUp member — despite authorising GetUp-linked websites at the 2016 election that attacked Coalition MPs — and she was not involved in Warringah because she was ­focused on organising the school strike. “I wish I was,” she said.

But Ms McPhail was involved deeply in Warringah before Ms Steggall entered the race on ­January 26, as a co-founder of a group called the North Shore Environmental Stewards, which ­mobilised disaffected local Liberals and ­others on climate change and ­prepared the way for Ms Steggall’s run.

Ms McPhail, now based in ­Canberra, helped organise the Stewards’ first meeting last March and a Stewards’ movie night in ­November.

The Stewards vetted Ms Steggall with two other anti-Abbott groups — Voices of Warringah and Vote Tony Out — before she announced her candidacy.

The links between Climate Leaders and Ms Steggall run ­deeper. When The Sydney Morning Herald reported Climate Leaders’ activists had endorsed Ms Steggall early this week, it published a photograph of the independent with three under-18 students she had met.

Not reported was how one of three intending to join Friday’s school strike and endorsing Ms Steggall, Alexia Giannesini, 16, is the daughter of Julie Giannesini, an ex-Liberal and Stewards’ member who now works in Ms Steggall’s campaign office.

Asked for her view of the school strike, and whether she supported it, Ms Steggall told The Weekend Australian: “I support students being involved in the most important issue of their time.”

She did not respond to further questions on whether it was acceptable for children to breach the NSW Education Act requiring ­attendance at school, and whether her own children would be participating.

NSW Education Minister Rob Stokes said he was passionate about building awareness of environmental issues but the law was “very clear” that students were ­required to attend school on school days.

“Political candidates should not be encouraging students to skip school regardless of the issue … they can do this on the weekend or school holidays with the same ­result,” Mr Stokes said.