To lead a party to something approaching electoral annihilation might be regarded as a misfortune. To do it twice — and with exquisite precision — could be mistaken for a cry for help.
That said, there are indications Matthew Guy’s Liberal Party was not the only loser on election night, with cracks beginning to emerge in “preference whisperer” Glenn Druery’s house of cards. Early counting in the upper house suggests a progressive bloc could hold the balance of power, as hopes for right-wing micro parties aligned with Druery fall to the wayside.
As of this morning, the Greens — with about 30% of votes counted — were favoured to win four of the 40 upper house seats, and the Legalise Cannabis Party, the Victorian Socialists, Fiona Patten’s Reason Party and the Animal Justice Party are likely to secure another four between them. Labor, meanwhile, is hovering around 15 seats.
Druery conceded he would probably only deliver between two and four of the eight seats he had predicted, but dismissed the suggestion the poor showing might owe to the Animal Justice Party’s so-called sting operation.
“It’s still early days, and certainly everything impacts everything — you know, that whole chaos in the Amazon and the butterflies flapping their wings,” he said.
“But it’s the way the major parties locked down their preferences which had the biggest impact. They saw me coming; everyone effectively preferenced against me, which made me feel a bit like Germany in May of 1945 — totally surrounded.”
The Animal Justice Party said it bordered on unreality to suggest its decision to play false with Druery was of minimal consequence.
“Our very elaborate and fantastic scheme certainly had a role in Druery’s miserable result,” said Ben Schultz, its campaign manager.
“To get [Georgie Purcell] in, he wanted us to do the dirty on Fiona Patten’s Reason Party and preference the DLP and his cabal of riff-raff parties, which was just unconscionable. So I did what I did to make a statement about the need for electoral reform and to undermine Glenn Druery’s business model, which is undemocratic, immoral and stinks.”
Psephologist Adrian Beaumont said the Animal Justice Party’s ploy — which he says has influenced the outcome in at least one seat — could ultimately prove decisive in delivering a left-aligned upper house, assuming the final flow of preferences produces a six-person bloc of progressive crossbench MPs.
“I’m not confident [current predictions] will hold, as most upper house regions are under 30% count,” he said. “If, eventually, left-wing parties [including Labor] win 21 seats, you could say this sting won it for the left.”
Neither Animal Justice Party candidates nor progressive parties were forewarned of Schultz’s ploy. However, Druery insisted the move had destroyed the party’s reputation and heralded the return of the “bad old days”, where distrust and self-interest among minor parties were rife.
“What I do is good for diversity — I help ordinary people get into Parliament and I’m really proud of that,” Druery said. “What Animal Justice did is forensically lie, not just to me, but to half a dozen minor parties, and work against 20 years of at least one minor party being part of the balance of the power somewhere in this country.”
Schultz accepted the charge, adding he was touched Druery said he was a good actor: “I got an A in Year 9 drama, so I really appreciated it when he said ‘great acting’.”
On current analysis, the slated return of sacked former Liberal Bernie Finn to the upper house for the DLP appears increasingly uncertain, as does the headlined return of former Labor MP-turned DLP candidate Adem Somyurek.
Yesterday Somyurek said his two leading priorities — if reelected — turned on declaring the Victorian Socialists a “proscribed terrorist organisation” and preventing the commission of a bronze statue of Premier Daniel Andrews once he reaches 3000 days in office.
As an aside, Druery said he was, however, pleased that “the cookers failed”.
“I’m very happy the extreme right-wingers have cocked up their campaigns. While I certainly respect their right to exist, I did all I could to stop them, and that makes me happy.”
