‘Serious women issue’: Leaked letter says Liberal woman should fill Molan vacancy

A veteran Liberal Party activist insists she is the rightful heir to the Senate seat left vacant after the death of Jim Molan, warning the party will appear misogynistic and hypocritical if it overlooks strong women such as herself in favour of a man.

Mary-Lou Jarvis, a former NSW Liberal Party vice-president and head of the NSW Liberal Women’s Council, has staked her claim to Molan’s seat on the basis she was the next endorsed candidate on the party’s 2022 NSW Senate ticket.

Mary-Lou Jarvis insists she is the rightful successor to the late Jim Molan.Credit:James Alcock

A factional war is brewing in the party over the Senate vacancy with moderate former Liberal MPs Andrew Constance and Fiona Scott preparing to run against conservative frontrunner Dallas McInerney, the head of Catholic Schools NSW.

In a leaked letter to NSW Liberal President Maria Kovacic, sent on Tuesday, Jarvis said the people of NSW were “being denied the representation they are legally entitled to in the Australian Senate” and warned the party it would deepen its much publicised “women problem” if she is not selected for the seat.

Noting Molan and Liberal frontbencher Simon Birmingham were appointed to fill vacancies after being next in line on the party’s Senate ticket, Jarvis said: “It is Liberal Party convention that in these circumstances I should be nominated by the Party to fill the Senate casual vacancy created by the passing of Jim Molan.”

“Denying and rebuffing a qualified and endorsed woman who has served the Party at the highest level for a sustained period must have a negative impact, not only on Liberal members and supporters, but also on women generally who already believe that the Liberal Party has a ‘women problem’,” she wrote.

“This will not augur well going into a State election campaign when polling is showing that women are deserting the Liberal Party.

“Voters might come to the conclusion this was a reflection of misogyny, discrimination and the ‘women problem’ within our Party and vote accordingly.”

The letter was also sent to Liberal Party state director Chris Stone, Liberal Party Senator Marise Payne, federal Liberal Party vice-president Teena McQueen and other senior party figures.

Jarvis, a member of Woollahra Council, said she had written the letter not only out of her desire to serve in the Senate but “out of concern that the Liberal Party will once again be seen by the voting public as being hypocritical – professing its support for more women in Parliament yet denying a senior, qualified woman of the Party a place in Parliament where she has been preselected and endorsed by the Party to represent it in the Senate”.

She noted the Liberal Party’s election post-mortem found its poor standing with women was an “important factor” in its crushing defeat and subtitled a section of her letter ‘a serious women issue’.

Jarvis declined to comment when approached for this story. Kovacic said: “We continue to mourn the passing of the late Jim Molan AO DSC, and mark his outstanding contribution to Australia and our Party.

“The Senate casual vacancy created by Jim’s untimely passing will be resolved democratically by the Members of our Division, in line with the requirements of the Constitution.”

The NSW Liberal Party is not expected to fill Molan’s seat until after the March 25 state election to avoid a damaging internal row as Premier Dominic Perrottet seeks re-election.

Jarvis said it was inappropriate that NSW voters should be left short of Senate representation for months when the constitution, electoral laws and various Senate resolutions make clear that vacancies should be filled promptly.

She said it was “politically risky” for the party to wait until after the state election to fill the seat given a new Labor government in NSW could technically deny the Liberal Party from taking up the position.

Jarvis said this was not a “far-fetched scenario” given the finely balanced composition of the Senate.

She attached a letter John Tierney, who served as a Liberal senator for NSW from 1991 to 2005, sent to Kovacic last month warning about this possibility and urging the party to appoint Jarvis to Molan’s vacant position as the next person in line on the party’s most recent Senate ticket.

Liberal sources privately dismissed Jarvis’s efforts as a desperate move given she had unsuccessfully sought preselection several times and was unlikely to win a party ballot to fill Molan’s spot.

Party sources said there is no automatic assumption, let alone a requirement, that a casual Senate vacancy should be filled by the next person on the ticket in the most recent election.

One source added the party’s biggest problem with female representation was in the House of Representatives not the Senate given 10 of the party’s 23 senators are women.

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