Discontent over government integrity,environmental issues and urban planning has ignited the push to install an independent voice to represent one of Sydney’s wealthiest and most highly educated electorates on Macquarie Street.
Community volunteer group North Sydney’s Independent has fired the starting gun on its search for a candidate to seize Wilson’s seat of North Shore,which includes suburbs such as Mosman,Kirribilli,North Sydney and parts of Crows Nest.
North Shore MP Felicity Wilson will be a target of the teal movement.James Alcock
The organisation,which was behind North Sydney independent Kylea Tink’s successful Canberra bid,last month declared it was also hunting for a candidate to oust Planning Minister Anthony Roberts from his neighbouring seat of Lane Cove.
The group has not decided if it will support a new candidate to challenge conservative Liberal Tim James in Willoughby,the seat previously held by former premier Gladys Berejiklian.
Independent Larissa Penn is yet to formally announce if she will run again after she contributed to a 19 per cent swing against the government in Willoughby’s February byelection triggered by Berejiklian’s resignation. However,she is listed on the NSW Electoral Commission’s 2023 state election register of candidates which was published on September 7.
North Sydney’s Independent co-founder Kristen Lock said the volunteer organisation had been overwhelmed by calls to back a candidate in North Shore since
“The only reason we are doing this is because of the feedback,” she said,describing the community that felt their voices were not being heard in the growth and development of their area.
Planning decisions,loss of green space and over-development are among top concerns triggering constituents towards the independent movement in the lower north shore.
“We feel betrayed by the state government which,despite overwhelming community objection to proposed high-rise development,completely ignored us in favour of developers,” said Wollstonecraft local Sue Wadley in feedback to North Sydney’s Independent.
Wilson,who will be the first NSW Liberal MP to seek re-endorsement from the party on Monday night,said she had defended the seat against independent challengers in the past two elections,insisting she would continue to advocate “faithfully and fearlessly” for her community.
“I think what we saw in the federal campaign is mobilisation of people that wanted to get really active in politics,” she said. “My hope is they will be active enough to come and talk to me and let me work on their behalf. That’s the point of representative democracy.
NSI co-founders Kristen Lock and Denise Shrivell at the state election launch last month.James Alcock
“The role of the state government is to make sure we have the amenity and infrastructure and services we need,” she said,citing school,hospital and road upgrades in her electorate. “That’s what good governments do.”
A senior moderate Liberal MP,who spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely,said Wilson was “an outstanding senior member” and said the party was taking every challenge in every seat seriously.
While North Shore has been in Liberal hands since 1991,Lock said there had been a revival of support to return to independent representation,since Wilson’s margin was cut from 21 to 11 per cent at the 2019 election. She added that “the memory of Ted Mack” remained strong.
Mack,who became known as “the father of independents”,was a giant of independent politics over two decades during which he was elected to all three tiers of Australian government representing voters on Sydney’s north shore.
“The federal election saw the rise of community independent campaigns across the country,” Lock said.
“There’s no reason we can’t replicate that success at the state level. We know other community groups in Wakehurst,Pittwater and Manly,are also rising up out of a discontent with the state government”.
NSW elections use optional preferential voting,meaning voters only have to number one box. This is unlike in the federal election,where voters must number every square.
Optional preferential voting will therefore make it more challenging for independents to emulate the success of the federal campaigns,where many relied on preferences to get them over the line.
Resolve Political Monitor polling conducted exclusively for The Sydney Morning Herald last week revealed support for independents (10 per cent) is significantly higher than it was in 2019,when they received just 5 per cent of the vote.
The polling conducted in August and September revealed the Coalition’s primary vote had slumped to just 30 per cent – a 12-point drop since the last election,while Labor’s has surged by 10 points to 43 per cent.
It follows a bruising six months for the government as it battled the fallout from the trade commissioner scandal and ongoing public sector industrial action.
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