How to annoy Liberal women. Tell them they are ‘sufficiently assertive'
Stockdale and former Victorian senator Richard Alston, combined age 164, positioned themselves under a portrait of Robert Menzies as they fronted the NSW Liberal Women's Council on Tuesday night to argue why they should continue to run the troubled division.
The sole female and NSW representative on the federal takeover committee, appointed by former leader Peter Dutton, is Peta Seaton, who was seemingly the third wheel as Stockdale held court, reminding the NSW Liberals exactly why they still have a women's problem.
'Women are sufficiently assertive now,' Stockdale told the virtual meeting of at least 50 women, 'that we should be giving some thought to whether we need to protect men's involvement'. Great idea. Reverse quotas for men. If it were not so ludicrous and offensive, it would be comical.
A brief look back to why Stockdale and Co are running NSW. Dutton imposed a federal takeover on the NSW Liberals after the embarrassing debacle of the party failing to nominate 144 candidates for last year's local government elections. The trio (which was initially going to be all men until wiser heads prevailed) was sent in to clean up the mess and help NSW secure an election win for the Liberals. They have failed to do either. Now the administrators are arguing for an extension of their term, which was due to expire on June 30.
After his comment, which followed discussion over whether he would commit to quotas to get more Liberal women preselected, Stockdale chuckled, according to several women who were on the call. But if it was meant as a joke, Stockdale did not read the room. These women were already angry. Now they are positively apoplectic.
Charlotte Mortlock, a former journalist and Liberal staffer who founded Hilma's Network, which supports women for Liberal preselection, last month launched a petition calling on the party to establish gender quotas. 'Women in the party and across the country more broadly have been demanding the Liberal Party improves its female representation for decades,' Mortlock wrote. 'We have failed to act.' As of Wednesday, the petition had 449 signatures.
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