<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> <docID>326713</docID> <postdate>2024-08-15 14:53:03</postdate> <headline>‘Basic’ council stuff-up plunges Liberals into chaos</headline> <body><p><img class="size-full wp-image-326718" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/20240424149165413501-original-resized.jpg" alt="" width="900" height="601" /></p> <caption>Opposition Leader Mark Speakman slammed his party's nomination blunder in an email to colleagues. (Dan Himbrechts/AAP PHOTOS)</caption> <p><span class="kicker-line">By <strong>Samantha Lock</strong> and <strong>Luke Costin</strong> in Sydney</span></p> <p><strong>A paperwork debacle inside NSW Liberal headquarters has left dozens of party candidates off council ballots and shows a lack of basic competence, senior figures say.</strong></p> <p>Eight local councils - including several in party heartland - will go to upcoming statewide elections without a Liberal candidate on the ticket after the party failed to submit nominations by midday on Wednesday.</p> <p>Another nine have only partial coverage, according to analysis of the Liberals' own-goal.</p> <p>Would-be candidates found out after it was too late to handle nominations for the September council poll themselves.</p> <p>Opposition Leader Mark Speakman called for party state director Richard Shields to quit after "the worst act of mismanagement that I can think of in the organisation's history" in an email to colleagues on Thursday.</p> <p>"It's a basic matter of competence and administration," he told reporters.</p> <p>"If you don't have the resources to handle these nominations, you call for more.</p> <p>"And if you're still not satisfied there are enough resources, you let the candidates nominate themselves."</p> <p>While denying it was a sign the party had lost its way, Mr Speakman said the "monumental stuff-up" would have ongoing ramifications.</p> <p>"It's well known that major parties often draw from local councillors for state and federal candidates," he said.</p> <p>Bewildered deputy NSW Liberal leader Natalie Ward said the state director only had two jobs: administer the party constitution and administer electoral matters.</p> <p>"He didn't give appropriate notice that anybody else needed to help," the senior state MP said.</p> <p>Federal party leader Peter Dutton also expressed disappointment, adding he hoped the NSW branch could sort out the mess.</p> <p>"I would suggest there needs to be at least two resignations," he told Sydney radio 2GB.</p> <p>Northern Beaches, Lane Cove, Camden and Campbelltown councils are among those affected in Sydney, while the regional local government areas of Cessnock, Wollongong, Shoalhaven and Blue Mountains are also affected.</p> <p>Several councils overlap with safe Liberal seats in state parliament.</p> <p>Election analyst Ben Raue said he had counted 45 contests where Liberals were expected to nominate but had either failed to do so or nominated too few candidates to get a party grouping, totalling 136 candidates.</p> <p>Polls in those areas could have elected about 52 Liberals, but now only about four party candidates had a realistic chance, the creator of the website TallyRoom said.</p> <p>The mess also means a ward in Penrith - where 10,000 voters chose Liberal at the last election - will be uncontested after Labor nominated the only candidates.</p> <p>"That election is over, today," Mr Raue told AAP.</p> <p>A Liberal party insider contested Mr Raue's figures, suggesting the mess extended to only about two dozen winnable seats.</p> <p>The "unbelievable" blunder led Liberal Lane Cove mayor Scott Bennison to quit the party on Thursday, saying he was "sick of all the factional rubbish".</p> <p>Mr Shields, a mayor, has blamed his mistake on a lack of resources and apologised to the Liberal-endorsed candidates who have not been nominated.</p> <p>But he had withstood calls for his resignation on Thursday morning.</p> <p>More than four million NSW voters will go to the polls on September 14, electing more than 1000 councillors to local government.</p> </body>