Liberal backbenchers Elizabeth Lee and Peter Cain. Photos: Region.
Canberra Liberals Leader Leanne Castley has suspended rebel MLAs Peter Cain and Elizabeth Lee from the party room and plans to boot them out permanently.
The move came after the two backbenchers crossed the floor to vote with the Greens and Independents in a failed bid to stop the Legislative Assembly sitting calendar being reduced from 13 weeks to 12.
In a terse two-paragraph statement, Ms Castley said their actions had prompted her to suspend them and she would now seek to remove them permanently.
“As this is an internal party room matter, I will be making no further comment,” she said.
Ms Lee has countered by challenging Ms Castley’s right to expel them from the party room and has called for a party room meeting to discuss the issue.
It is unclear how the pair would operate in the Legislative Assembly without being in the party room.
The Liberals have nine MLAs and seven of them are in shadow cabinet.
The catalyst for the latest Liberal blow-up was a motion from Labor Attorney-General Tara Cheyne to cut the sitting calendar from 13 weeks to 12, which Ms Castley and six of her colleagues supported.
But Ms Lee and Mr Cain could not.
Ms Lee told the Assembly that she accepted the views of the majority of her party room colleagues.
“Respectfully, I disagree, and I made that very clear to my colleagues as soon as this issue was raised with us and made public,” she said.
“It is a very difficult decision to not vote in the same way as my colleagues, but I cannot in good conscience stand in support of Ms Cheyne’s motion.”
Mr Cain threw his lot in with Ms Lee.
“We are well looked after by the rules governing our workload, I believe, and a lot of that is on us and it’s on our choices, the choices that we make,” he said.
“And so I am choosing to support an extra week, and obviously I do see that as putting me apart from my parliamentary, my party room colleagues and in company with Ms Lee doing that.”
Canberra Liberals Leader Leanne Castley talking with her deputy Jeremy Hanson. Photo: Michelle Kroll.
In an email to Kurrajong party members, Ms Lee said she had exercised a conscience vote in the Assembly, a long-held Liberal convention and remained a loyal party member.
Ms Lee said it was disappointing that the leader did not notify her and Mr Cain in person of her decision, and that she found out via a media statement that Ms Castley was making moves to remove the pair permanently.
“Nor do I accept that the leader has the right to remove us unilaterally and I have called on the leader to call a party room meeting immediately so that all party room members have the right to discuss this issue,” she said.
Chief Minister Andrew Barr said today’s events were no surprise.
“It has been painfully clear the Canberra Liberals are deeply internally divided,” he said.
“In contrast, the government remains focused on community priorities like increasing housing supply, improving access to primary health care and building the infrastructure our growing city needs.”
The move against Ms Lee and Mr Cain brings to a head tensions that have been simmering away since last year’s election loss and throws the divided party into a new round of chaos.
In June, Mr Cain sensationally walked away from the shadow cabinet after becoming disillusioned with the current leadership team of Ms Castley and Jeremy Hanson.
“This decision follows ongoing concerns regarding the direction of the current leadership team and the processes through which key decisions have been made,” he said.
Last month, former leader Ms Lee said she had been frozen out after Ms Castley enforced new shadow cabinet confidentiality rules.
“As party room members are not bound by the principle of collective responsibility, it is not appropriate that they are included in the decision-making processes of the shadow cabinet,” the new rules stated.
“Members of the backbench who wish to be informed and participate in the decision-making processes of shadow cabinet are welcome to join the Shadow Ministry, but must take on portfolio work and be bound by the principle of collective responsibility.”
But Ms Lee, who has refused entreaties to take a shadow cabinet position since she lost the leadership, took umbrage, saying the move set a “dangerous precedent”.
Mr Cain backed Ms Lee, with both saying they would not rejoin the shadow cabinet under the present leadership.
Now it appears Ms Castley has had enough of the pair and wants them gone.
