State opposition tells court it will not take any steps to disendorse MP while legal proceedings under way
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A Victorian Liberal MP who sued her party to stave off a meeting that will determine her political future has been handed a temporary lifeline.
Moira Deeming launched an eleventh-hour supreme court challenge against the Victorian Liberal party president, Brian Loughnane, and the party on Friday morning, seeking a temporary injunction to stop the meeting.
Party executives, including Loughnane, were set to gather on Friday evening to determine Deeming’s candidacy after she made an assault allegation against former leader Matthew Guy and subsequently rejected calls to apologise after Victoria police determined “there was no offence detected”.
On Friday afternoon, the party accepted an undertaking “not to take any step that will render this proceeding inutile”.
“We give the undertaking not to take any steps to disendorse the plaintiff until the hearing determination of this proceeding,” Marcus Clarke KC, representing Loughnane and the party, told the court.
The party issued a statement after Friday’s hearing, saying the state executive meeting will be adjourned until the matter can be determined.
Justice Kerri Judd had earlier asked Clarke whether his clients were prepared to give an undertaking.
“Given the court has been accommodating in terms of providing such an early hearing date, I don’t want any step taken that will mean if Mrs Deeming succeeded [in this case], the relief that she is seeking would not be granted,” she said.
The judge said accepting the undertaking “does not necessarily mean the 6.30pm meeting could not still go ahead”.
Justice Judd acknowledged the need for an expedited hearing, saying she was “not here to review the decision of Victoria Police not to charge Mr Guy”.
Deeming’s barrister, Ganesh Jegatheesan, said the evidence he relied upon would be “of a very narrow scope”.
The trial is set for 17 July for a one-day hearing.
The latest round of Liberal infighting comes less than five months out from the 28 November state election and after the upper house MP made a police complaint against Guy, alleging he assaulted her by grabbing her “violently” in a headlock at a gala dinner.
Victoria police investigated the 23 May incident and found “there was no offence detected”.
Guy has demanded a public apology from Deeming.
“There was no ambiguity. I did not do what was alleged. The CCTV proves this. It did from the start, and Victoria police agree,” he said.
The opposition leader, Jess Wilson, on Thursday told reporters Guy’s reputation had been harmed and she had directly asked Deeming to apologise.
“I think he deserves an apology,” she said. “That is the right thing to do, and Moira has decided that’s not the case. And now the state executive will meet.”
Pauline Hanson has declared she would not offer Deeming a position at One Nation. The senator said Deeming’s refusal to apologise to Guy showed the first-term MP could not “admit that she got it wrong”.
“You don’t do that to your fellow colleagues,” she told 3AW radio.
The scandal is yet another flare-up of what the public would see as disunity and disorganisation in the party, said the Monash University political scientist Zareh Ghazarian.
“This is arguably the most critical point for the Liberal leadership right now to clear their internal problems,” he said. “This has to be resolved as quickly as possible because it’s already taken up a lot of political coverage … it has hobbled the party significantly.”
Deeming’s lawyer Tim Houweling said his client’s complaint had been made “honestly, in good faith and only as a matter of last resort”.
He referred to CCTV footage that shows Guy sitting at a table and talking with Deeming and another man. The former leader appears to place his hand on Deeming’s upper back or shoulder area and pull her in to say something before doing a similar gesture with the man.
The lawyer said Guy had maintained a grip as Deeming tried to pull away and this physical contact was “unexpected, unwelcome, physically painful and caused her to feel fear and confusion”.
Deeming successfully sued the former leader John Pesutto for defamation when he wrongly implied she was associated with neo-Nazis after they gatecrashed a rally at parliament she attended.
