News / Council Elections
Battlelines drawn for council elections
Labor line-up includes new and familiar faces
Mark Phillips
LABOR has settled its line-up for Merri-bek Council elections in October and is claiming underdog status in the battle with the Greens.
The ticket is headed by current Deputy Mayor Lambros Tapinos, who will chase a fifth term on the council by running for the new Brunswick West ward.
This year will be the first election to be held under the new single councillor ward structure. In all, 11 seats are up for grabs across Merri-bek, including four in Brunswick. All four Brunswick wards have Park Street as their southern boundary and Moreland Road as their northern boundary.
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Tapinos is the only incumbent Labor councillor seeking re-election after Annalivia Carli Hannan decided not to stand again. He is also the only current South Ward councillor who is standing again following the retirement of Mark Riley and resignation of James Conlan.
The Greens plan to nominate Ella Svensson, a psychologist, and family therapist working in the public service, for the Brunswick West ward.
Helen Breier, a former secondary school teacher who works in the industry superannuation sector and who narrowly failed to be elected for the South Ward in 2020, is the candidate for Bulleke-bek ward, which runs through central Brunswick between Sydney Road and Pearson Street. Her Greens opponent will be Dr Jay Iwasaki, an ecologist, educator, and bee scientist.
Jenne Perlstein, a social worker and educator who captained the Yes campaign in Wills last year will be running against current Mayor Adam Pulford from the Greens in Warrk-Warrk, which takes in Brunswick East and part of Fitzroy North. Pulford has shifted home to Brunswick since he was first elected to the North-East Ward in 2020.
The Labor candidate for Randazzo ward – which runs between Sydney Road and Lygon Street – is 22-year-old Thomas Nash, who went to school in Brunswick and was also a co-ordinator of the Yes campaign in Wills. The Greens will nominate transport planner Liz Irvin for that ward.
Elsewhere, Suzan Saka is running for Pentridge – one of the two wards in Coburg – in what will be a tight battle with the Greens’ Kenna Morrison, and former Greens councillor Natalie Abboud, who is now an independent.
Helen Politis, a well-known figure in Brunswick’s Greek community, will be the Labor candidate for the other Coburg ward, Harmony Park, where 2022-23 Mayor Angelica Panopoulos is standing for the Greens.
In Pascoe Vale South, Corey Perkins will be attempting to unseat long-time independent councillor Oscar Yildiz, while in Djirri Djirri – which includes Glenroy, Gowanbrae, Oak Park and Tullamarine – Praveen Kumar will face off against another former Mayor and current councillor, independent Helen Davidson.
In Bababi Djinanang, which takes in Fawkner and Hadfield, the Labor candidate is Hassaan Gul. His main opponent will be Socialist Alliance’s Sue Bolton, who is seeking re-election.
The final two Labor candidates will be Chris Miles in Box Forest (Glenroy) and Katerine Theodosis in Westbreen (Pascoe Vale, Hadfield and Oak Park).
Read more:
Greens aim for control of council
Tapinos, who has served as Mayor three times since he was first elected to the former Moreland Council in 2008, said Labor candidates stood for a “back to basics” approach to local government with a focus on services and infrastructure.
He said this was a contrast to some other candidates who regarded the role of a councillor as being an advocate on national and global political issues.
“I think you can focus on the social issues – and we do as a council – but the basics need to be done first, and they need to be done well, not a council that wants to have an advocacy opinion on every issue” he said.
“We have a united team and a party platform that focusses on the core services of the council – a lot of the basics which have been neglected and we need to do better, whether it’s making sure we’re improving traffic management and cleanliness, more open space, or improving the Brunswick Baths.”
Tapinos said Labor was now very much the underdog in Brunswick given the dominance of the Greens in the area at recent federal and state elections.
This year’s council election will be a test of whether the single councillor ward system favours a dominant party or not.
“Labor is very much the underdog in this election and it’s a concern that we may end up with the same party [the Greens] in each of the four wards [in Brunswick],” he said.
“We want some diversity and balance on the council, and we urge people to look carefully at each of the candidates and their credentials.
“We’ve endorsed four candidates who have been long-term residents with a mix of ages and experiences, and are community activists with great credentials in the community and in community organisations.
“It will be the most challenging election for me, but I’m hoping the community would see what I have achieved and what I want to achieve over the next four years and endorse that program by re-electing me.”
Nominations for council elections officially open on September 9 and close on September 17. Elections will be conducted by postal voting from October 7 to October 25.
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