The fall of John Pesutto

The execution of Victorian Liberal leader John Pesutto was a messy and drawn-out affair, but the ultimate outcome was never in doubt. Ever since March of last year, when his party room defeated him in the first of many votes on the Moira Deeming affair, his days have been clearly numbered. Last Friday, embracing the season of goodwill, his colleagues finally delivered the coup de grâce; the final vote of 18-10 was not even close.

Pesutto never seemed to understand the magnitude of the task that he had taken on. He gave the impression of framing his leadership for a different sort of party, perhaps the Liberal Party of thirty years ago that he had grown up with. But times have changed. This is now a party of tribal warriors, fed by the lurid fantasies of News Corp, and a leader who tries to be reasonable is, for them, a more dangerous enemy than any open adversary.

Brad Battin, who won the leadership (at his third attempt) in the ensuing ballot, thus becomes the party’s fifth leader (or sixth, if Matthew Guy’s two terms are counted separately) since it began its descent into the depths with the removal of Ted Baillieu almost twelve years ago. In that time it has lost three elections – one narrowly and two by huge margins – and Battin faces an uphill task to stop that from becoming four.

At the last election, in November 2022, the Liberal and National parties won 28 of the 88 seats (19 Liberal, nine National). Based on a uniform swing, winning another 16 would require a gain of 7.6%. That’s a big ask; the last time they won government, under Baillieu in 2010, the swing was about 6%.

But stranger things have happened, and some things count in Battin’s favor. Dan Andrews, who led Labor to its three victories, is no longer there; new premier Jacinta Allen so far looks like a much softer target. The opposition is travelling reasonably well in the opinion polls, and one might fairly assume that putting the leadership uncertainty behind it will deliver something of a boost.

Battin is from the party’s right, and while it would be unfair to describe him as an ideological soulmate of Peter Dutton, he clearly intends to embrace Dutton’s strategy of downplaying the inner suburbs. Instead, he hopes for gains in the outer suburbs, including the traditionally strong Labor areas to the north and west of Melbourne.

This is not an obviously hopeless goal. The Liberals scored big swings in some of those seats last time, and they have now moved into the possibly winnable column for 2026. Yan Yean, for example, which swung 12.7%, only needs another 4.3%; Sunbury swung 8.1% and needs another 6.4%; Greenvale now needs 7.1%, having swung an extraordinary 14.9%; Sydenham swung 8.9% and would fall with another 8.8%.

Battin also has an advantage over Dutton in that the heartland seats have not yet been lost. No teal independents were successful at state level last time; seats like Pesutto’s Hawthorn just have to be held, not won back. But if the party is seen to be trekking out to the extremes and abandoning the concerns of educated middle-class voters, even that will be difficult enough.

And the big task is to win seats in middle suburbia, the large and growing area that is neither on the outer fringe or in the inner heartland. That’s where the Liberals did particularly badly last time; unless they can recover that ground, they cannot get within reach of a majority. There are simply not enough outer suburban seats to deliver government.

The other problem Battin has is that Dutton gets to go first: the federal election will be a year and a half in advance of Victoria’s. By the time Battin is put to the test, either Dutton will be prime minister and presumably dragging down the Liberal brand, or (more likely) he will have failed to reach the top, potentially discrediting his strategy.

Best for the Victorian Liberals would be if Dutton can repeat Tony Abbott’s achievement of 2010, getting close to government but not quite making it – a result whose consequences we still live with. But can lightning really strike twice in the same place?