It’s been an annoying weekend for conservatives, but the weather is always warm if you wait long enough:
Zoe Daniel is gone!
Liberal MP Tim Wilson has claimed Goldstein from Simon Holmes e Whatsit’s Teal party non-party MP Zoe Daniel.
What makes the victory sweeter is that Daniel claimed victory on Saturday night.
Sky News Australia’s election analyst Tom Connell has called it. With postal votes overwhelmingly supporting Tim Wilson, Daniel is done and dusted.
Wilson deserves a ton of credit. He lost to the Teal in 2022 but didn’t give up. He went hard and recovered his seat.
Wilson reminds us that we don’t have to wait another six years to get rid of what will shortly become the worst government in Australian history, surpassing the previous worst government being the first Albanese term.
This is great news for those Melburnians who are not rabid lefties. As ‘the nation’s only truth-telling commission nears its end’ in Melbourne, due to report next week, Melbourne needs a conservative reality check more than anywhere.
Victoria is shaping up to be a model for Australia’s economic future. Any conservative influence can only be good for the nation.
Like Labor’s idea of the truth, Daniel’s election night declaration of victory didn’t stand up to the empirical evidence.
In her election victory non-victory speech, Daniel said:
‘What we have created in this community is rare… We might not have a minority government, but I’m pretty sure we can pull some levers… This has been incredibly hard, but we did it.’
In a more relevant statement, Daniel also said that ‘hope wins’. Ain’t that the truth.
Many are anxiously waiting to hear the fate of that other Teal party non-party member, Monique Ryan.
There is someone else, too, but I won’t jinx it. More to follow soon.
Dr Michael de Percy @FlaneurPolitiq is The Spectator Australia’s Canberra Press Gallery Correspondent. All opinions in this article are the author’s own.