‘Not about John’: Liberal party room meeting to focus on Deeming, rebel MP says

An organiser of a snap Liberal party room meeting to consider the overturning of ousted MP Moira Deeming’s exile has said it is not a move against John Pesutto’s leadership.

Bill Tilley, a long-serving Liberal MP – and the first signature on a formal request for a special party room meeting to discuss Deeming’s return – said there was no leadership spill planned.

John Pesutto will face a special party room meeting called by MPs pushing for the return of Moira Deeming.Credit: Eddie Jim

“It is not seeking a leadership change, it is righting a wrong,” Tilley said. “They are two completely different things.

“Whatever happens after this meeting on Friday, if people want to push on and have a leadership change, that is a completely separate issue and not what this is designed to do.

“There is no one in the group that wants to bring on a spill. We want to keep this absolutely professional and separate. It is not about John.”

Another MP backing Deeming’s return said that once the meeting was convened, no rules precluded a leadership challenge. “It is a party room meeting, anything can happen,” they said. “But it is not intended.”

Moira Deeming was awarded $300,000 in damages after winning her defamation case against John Pesutto.Credit: Darrian Traynor

The formal request, lodged on Monday, was signed by Tilley, Richard Riordan, Renee Heath, Joe McCracken and Chris Crewther. They are part of a larger group within the party pushing for Deeming to resume her place on the opposition benches following her Federal Court defamation win against Pesutto.

Under its rules, the Victorian Liberal party room must hold a special meeting once a request has gained five signatures. A meeting has been confirmed for Friday morning.

At the meeting, the group will put a motion for Deeming to be immediately readmitted to the parliamentary Liberal Party. To succeed, it needs majority support within the party room.

“It is a simple matter of fairness,” the five signatories said in a statement released late on Monday. “As Justice O’Callaghan’s judgement makes clear, the justification put to the party room for Moira Deeming’s expulsion was fundamentally flawed.”

Liberal MP Bill Tilley says the special party room meeting hasn’t been called to challenge John Pesutto’s leadership.Credit: Jason Robins

Although the motion is not a leadership challenge, it is a major test of Pesutto’s sway over his party, which has been bitterly divided about Deeming since she was exiled to the crossbench in May last year.

At the time of that vote, 18 MPs voted to expel Deeming and 12 voted against. A total of 28 MPs are expected to attend Friday’s meeting. Two MPs from opposite sides of the May 2023 vote are confirmed absentees.

Liberal MP Sam Groth, a first-term Liberal MP who has made no secret of his leadership ambitions, quit the opposition frontbench on Friday, saying that Pesutto should have resigned the leadership after the Federal Court judgment, and he could no longer “in good conscience” serve in his shadow ministry.

Pesutto frustrated others in his party room by refusing to apologise to Deeming or display any contrition after Justice David O’Callaghan found his central allegation that precipitated her expulsion – that she knowingly associated with neo-Nazis – was baseless.

Pesutto repeatedly made the claim after a group of neo-Nazis gatecrashed a Let Women Speak rally that Deeming addressed on the steps of state parliament last March. Pesutto was ordered last Thursday to pay her $300,000 in damages for the severe harm and damage inflicted on her reputation.

Liberal Party state president Philip Davis wrote to all party members acknowledging O’Callaghan’s judgment and expressing his “deep personal disappointment and frustration” that he was unable to broker a settlement between Pesutto and Deeming before the matter reached open court.

“For this, I must apologise to all our members and supporters,” he wrote. “It is an understatement to say the political efforts of both staff and volunteers to activate fundraising and engagement has been challenging with this matter so prominent in the minds of many of our members.”

He urged the party to put the litigation behind it and for MPs to “demonstrate a renewed vigour and collaboration”.

Deeming has not made it clear whether she wants to return to the Liberal party room, but after the judgment she said there was no reason for her not to be invited back.

She is also pushing for Pesutto and the party to formally retract the statements that defamed her.

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