Key points
- Liberal Party risks alienating a “major part” of its base if it expels conservative MP Bernie Finn, Christian lobby says.
- A motion to dump Finn is going to a vote in the Liberal party room on Tuesday morning.
- The Australian Christian Lobby has begun an online petition supporting Finn.
The Australian Christian Lobby has warned the Liberal Party it risks alienating a “major part” of its base if it dumps conservative MP Bernie Finn from the parliamentary team, and has begun rallying its members to make their complaints known to Liberal MPs.
Opposition Leader Matthew Guy and his senior colleagues were backing a motion, which was going to a vote on Tuesday, to expel Finn after the upper house MP said he was “praying” for abortion to be banned in Victoria, including in the case of sexual assault.
Bernie Finn at an anti-lockdown rally outside state parliament last year.Credit:Facebook
He was responding to a leaked draft opinion from the US Supreme Court indicating that the Roe v Wade decision, which legalised abortion nationwide in America, could be overturned.
On the day the draft opinion was published – and a day before Finn made the comments on social media – anti-abortion group Right to Life made a $4200 donation, the maximum amount allowed under state laws, to the Victorian branch of the Liberal Party.
Wendy Francis, the Australian Christian Lobby’s national director of politics, said the opposition was making a mistake by planning to send Finn to the crossbench.
“Bernie Finn is a democratically elected member,” Francis said. “Unless there was some big misconduct, the party should not be dismissing a democratically elected MP. They need to spell out what those transgressions are.
“If the Victorian Liberals expel Bernie Finn, then pro-life and Christian voters simply get the message they are not welcomed and not wanted. In an election year, the Victorian Liberals risk alienating a major part of their own base. That would be an own goal.”
The religious lobby group has begun an online petition urging the Liberal Party not to expel Finn, for his pro-life comments and “traditional Christian beliefs accepted by many thousands of Victorians”.
Francis claims more than 2700 had people signed the petition less than 12 hours after it went live, and emails had been sent to all Victorian state MPs, as well as federal Liberal MPs Josh Frydenberg, Gladys Liu, Jason Wood and Michael Sukkar.
For years Finn, who sits in the upper house for the Western Metropolitan Region, has drawn the ire of his colleagues, who say he has repeatedly undermined the Liberal Party and not been a team player because of his controversial social media comments.
Liberal MP Bernie Finn addressing anti-government protesters at Parliament House last year.
He has previously compared Premier Daniel Andrews to Hitler, described a former female staffer as a rat, shared several pro-Trump posts during and after the Capitol Hill riots in 2021, and described Andrews in an indecent position with a goat in a public toilet.
One Liberal MP said Finn had received multiple warnings over the years, and the party was canvassing expelling him in September last year when he said Victoria Police officers were the “modern incarnation of Despot’s militia”. His colleagues Brad Battin, Ryan Smith, Tim Smith and James Newbury publicly rebuked him at the time.
“There is not one particular act of stupidity but rather a regular ongoing campaign of stupidity,” a Liberal MP told The Age on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.
“He was given a final chance in September, he was publicly told off by a number of colleagues. There’s only so many times you can put up with an absolute moron. He has been given too many chances, and we’ve tolerated far too much for far too long.”
Finn has only a number of backers in the party room of 31, so the push is likely to succeed. An email was sent out to Liberal MPs on Wednesday morning, advising them of the party-room meeting scheduled for Tuesday at 8.30am to expel Finn from the parliamentary team.
It was signed by Guy, and the rest of the leadership team including David Southwick, David Davis and Georgie Crozier.
Liberal Party preselections for the upper house are expected to open shortly after the federal election on Saturday, with several people priming to challenge the upper house MP who has the number one spot on the western metropolitan ticket.
Even if Finn is expelled from the parliamentary team, he will not automatically be dumped from the Liberal Party. However, a Liberal source said they found it difficult to believe the party’s administrative committee would accept Finn’s nomination after being expelled from Guy’s team.
Finn was contacted for comment.
Cut through the noise of the federal election campaign with news, views and expert analysis from Jacqueline Maley. Sign up to our Australia Votes 2022 newsletter here.
Most Viewed in Politics
From our partners
Source: Read Full Article