Premier's faction loses to union-stacked rebel alliance in committee vote

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Premier's faction loses to union-stacked rebel alliance in committee vote

By Samantha Hutchinson

Premier Daniel Andrews’ Socialist Left powerbase has suffered a blow in a ballot deciding the ALP’s central decision-making body for the state, putting the faction in the back seat as a series of preselections approach.

Labor officials conducted a vote to decide the composition of the party’s 33-person State Administrative Committee on Tuesday night, resulting in a redraw of Labor's Victorian factional boundaries.

Mr Andrews’ Socialist Left faction scored 11 votes, a third of the total, while a new faction made up of the party’s right and an alliance with powerful industrial unions from the Left, including John Setka’s construction union, scored a near absolute majority of 21 votes.

The result confirms the ascent of Victorian Cabinet member Adem Somyurek as state Labor's pre-eminent factional powerbroker, just four years after he resigned from his ministerial position following an investigation into allegations he had bullied a member of his staff.

Premier Daniel Andrews, who is in the party's Socialist Left faction

Premier Daniel Andrews, who is in the party's Socialist Left factionCredit: AAP

Mr Somyurek is the architect of a alliance bringing together the industrial unions of the Left - including the CFMMEU, the Rail, Tram and Bus Union, the Financial Services Union and others - with the factions and unions of the party’s Right, included Bill Shorten-aligned Australian Workers Union.

The alliance was formed in February 2018, tearing up the old 'Stability' deal that had been overseen by long-time factional warlords Stephen Conroy and Kim Carr, who now struggle for support.

It is understood that Senator Kim Carr's Socialist Left are struggling to renew the old deal but can’t find partners willing to sign up.

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Meanwhile, former Senator Stephen Conroy was also one of the biggest losers of the vote, with the one-time warlord’s holding within the Right dropping to just one vote on the committee, represented by student politician Jett Fogarty.

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The Right and Industrial Left alliance believe that preselections should be contested in ballots open to all factions, rather than the previous Stability Deal which allocated certain seats to particular factions.

Former Labor leader and Right heavyweight Bill Shorten memorably left the Bennelong by-election campaign trail in 2017 to meet with Mr Somyurek, Plumbers’ Union secretary Earl Setches and Labor operative Andrew Landeryou, to shore up the alliance deal.

The Stability Deal was pivotal in ending infighting that gripped Labor throughout 1990s and into the 2000s, but has attracted criticism in recent years for alienating members who lived in a seat, but were discounted from preselection because of their faction.

The new administrative committee make-up comes ahead of a testing eighteen month period for Victorian Labor in which a slew of preselections will take place, with some party members tipping seats including Mark Dreyfus’ seat of Isaacs, Brendan O'Connor in Gorton, as well some upper house positions, could come into play.

Some pockets of the party believe Senator Kim Carr could be mulling retirement at the end of this term, while others believe he has a long-held ambition to retire while Labor is in government.

Within the state government, the parliamentary party is a year into Premier Daniel Andrews’ second term in power, prompting early talks on succession plans at a time when the Left faction has the balance of the power in Cabinet.

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