Suspended Victorian Liberal MP Moria Deeming has backed down over her dispute with leader John Presutto. This morning Deeming released a statement saying she never planned to take legal action against the party.
Earlier this week Deeming issued an ultimatum demanding the Liberal leader who pushed for her expulsion from the party publicly declare that he did not believe she was a Nazi or Nazi sympathizer. In an email attributed to Deeming the demand stated if Pesutto failed to meet the deadline she would ” instruct my lawyers to commence legal proceedings.”
Now Deeming says all the reports and comments suggesting she would take legal action against the party were wrong.
“All I have ever wanted, since the leader’s failed attempt to have me expelled for allegedly bringing the party into disrepute, was to have me name cleared.
“I have never once considered suing the Liberal Party and report that I have, or had planned to do so, are false.”
Deeming said the only things she had considered was mediation between herself and colleagues under the guidance of a legal representative. The embattled politician said once she heard that the party leadership were not willing to hold a second meeting to discuss the reasons she was suspended she informed the Liberal Party President Greg Mirabella that she would not be pursuing the suggestion.
Deeming said that now that minutes of the party room meeting had been made public it was clear that none of her colleagues were accusing of her of being a Nazi or a Nazi sympathiser.
“These minutes afford me the full official, written, public exoneration that the Leadership seems unwilling to provide.” Deeming said.
The politicians seemingly about-face on the issue follows reports that some of the Liberal party members who had argued against her being expelled from the party had now switched sides and were calling for a new vote to oust her from the team.
The long-running saga began after Deeming appeared at the ‘Let Women Speak’ event featuring British provocateur Kellie-Jay Keen. Keen, an anti-transgender activist who labels herself a women’s rights advocate, toured Australia in March. At her Melbourne event a neo-Nazi group took up a place adjacent to Keen’s event holding up insulting signs at members of the LGBTIQA+ communities and made Nazi salutes.
Initially Victorian Liberal leader John Pesutto called for Deeming to be expelled from the party, but a compromise of expelling her from the party room for nine months was the final outcome. A dispute then broke out between Deeming and her supporters and the party leadership over claims that there had been an agreement to issue a joint statement clarifying that Deeming has no links to any Nazi group.
Pesutto told the media this week that the dossier of information he put forward to colleagues did not suggest any connection to such groups, merely that Deeming had brought the party into disrepute via her association with the event.
On Friday it was suggested that federal opposition leader Peter Dutton may need to step in and take control of the Victoria branch of the party, something Dutton did not rule out during breakfast television interviews. Pesutto responded saying that while he had not spoken to Dutton, no intervention was required.
OIP Staff
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