‘On board with Coalition or quit’: Speakman fires warning to colleagues

The NSW Liberals will contest the Kiama byelection, with candidate nominations open for just 24 hours as the party desperately tries to win back the seat after the resignation of its former MP, convicted rapist Gareth Ward.

The party’s decision to run in the South Coast seat coincides with a bitter rift emerging in the Coalition over renewable energy, which has prompted a Liberal MP to quit the frontbench and has further fuelled speculation over Mark Speakman’s leadership.

A bill to allow Energy Minister Penny Sharpe to accelerate delivery of critical transmission infrastructure passed parliament last week, but it has split the opposition with MPs angry they were not given enough time to consider it.

Local government spokeswoman Wendy Tuckerman quit shadow cabinet over the issue, insisting the concerns of regional communities had been ignored, while Nationals MPs in the upper house were highly critical of the bill, arguing it was unnecessarily rushed through parliament.

The Liberals’ energy spokesman James Griffin has conceded he should have briefed Coalition colleagues on the renewable energy bill but stressed that it was “not controversial” and it was an extension of what was in place under the Coalition.

“I agree I could have taken the draft legislation to shadow cabinet but the legislation does not deal with solar farms or wind farms; it deals with a directions framework to allow the energy minister to tell network operators to do things and work on projects in a certain timeframe,” Griffin said.

The split also follows simmering concerns over Speakman’s hold on the Liberals’ leadership. Some MPs are convinced a challenger will emerge before Christmas.

However, in a pointed attack at his colleagues, Speakman said on Monday he was “not going to be distracted by a handful of cowards in the party”.

Asked who was sowing the seeds of doubt about his leadership, Speakman said the “minuscule handful of MPs” should “put up or shut up”.

“You’re either on board with the Coalition or, if not, resign and get out of the way,” he said.

In his most pro-development comments to date, he also stressed that the party needed to have “big and bold” solutions to solve the housing crisis.

Speakman said he was prepared to abandon the descriptor ADIMBY (appropriate development in my backyard) in favour of YIMBY (yes in my backyard) to underscore the importance the Liberals placed on solving the housing crisis.

“It is a crisis that I want my party to be on the front foot of. I make no apologies for being YIMBY,” he said.

Speakman also confirmed the party would run in Kiama, insisting that, unlike Labor, the Liberals do not shy away from a difficult fight, referring to the ALP’s decision not to field candidates in recent byelections.

“We don’t go into this contest as the favourites; we’re the underdogs. It’s a seat that voted for Labor in 2023 in the upper house ... if we have a miraculous win it’ll be bad only for [Premier] Chris Minns.”

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