David Sharaz, the former political staffer turned activist, has been facing a ban from the National Press Club after the campaign group he works for claimed responsibility for a stunt orchestrated during Pauline Hanson’s address last month.
Over the past three weeks, police have been conducting interviews as part of an investigation into the stunt organised by activist group GetUp during the One Nation leader’s first address to the club. No charges have been laid. But the police investigation isn’t the only action Sharaz could face.
National Press Club chief executive Maurice Reilly confirmed some of the club’s staff have been interviewed by police over the June 17 stunt, in which a banner onstage was remotely lowered and revealed. It read, “I opposed a pay rise for workers while I took a $100,000 pay rise for myself”.
Sharaz bought a ticket to attend the National Press Club address, and separately applied for membership to the club. The membership application, Reilly said, has been rejected and Sharaz will not be welcomed back.
On the day, the National Press Club issued a statement saying the stunt caused “significant damage” to the club’s media wall and light box. Reilly said the club was still waiting for a quote for the cost of the damage and was mulling its options.
“We will consider our legal position when the outcome of the AFP investigation is completed,” Reilly told CBD. “Quotations for the damage are still being sourced.”
Funnily enough, CBD hears Sharaz learnt his membership application was rejected only after reading about it in the press, and he hasn’t heard from the club since Hanson’s address last month. Sharaz, who shot to prominence working alongside his partner Brittany Higgins, declined to comment when reached on Tuesday.
ACT Policing, meanwhile, wouldn’t be drawn on the status of its investigation, or whether Sharaz has been interviewed. In a statement, a police spokesman urged people with information about the matter to, er, contact Crime Stoppers.
“Investigations into this matter are continuing, including examination by AFP Forensics officers,” an ACT Policing spokesman said in a statement. “Anyone with any information about this matter is urged to contact Crime Stoppers via www.crimestoppers.com.au quoting P2460286.”
Crickets from ministers, PM on Commonwealth Games
In what may not come as a tremendous surprise, Victorian premier Jacinta Allan will be giving Glasgow a wide berth when the Scottish city hosts this year’s Commonwealth Games, which kick off in a fortnight.
Also staying put in Victoria and keeping out of the Games spotlight is Minister for Sport Steve Dimopoulos. In fact, a state government spokesperson confirmed to CBD this week that no ministers would be making the trip to cheer on our Aussie athletes.
Federal Sports Minister Anika Wells has yet to confirm whether she’ll make the trip north to support the nation’s athletes, while Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s office was evasive when asked multiple times over three days about whether he’d be going. For now, we’ll take that as a “not interested”.
We guess enough money has been spent on the event without accounting for travel. In late 2023, it was revealed Victoria would stump up $380 million in compensation to the Commonwealth Games Federation, Commonwealth Games Federation Partnerships and Commonwealth Games Australia for tearing up the hosting deal.
In 2024, it came to light that about $200 million of that settlement would be used by organisers of the games in Scotland to put on an “innovative, cost-effective and sustainable” event in Glasgow. So now, we guess, Victoria has nabbed premium sponsorship status without any of the benefits.
Libs love Ryde
It looks like Operation Rosny has already led some NSW Liberals to distance themselves from the party. How else to interpret the work of Jordan Lane, who has been dropping fliers in letterboxes across Ryde without a single mention of the Liberal Party?
The Liberal member for Ryde has been running a political campaign that borrows from the famous “I (red heart) New York” slogan, which the millennial MP has reworked to read “I (red heart) Ryde”. There are T-shirts and videos carrying the slogan. But it wasn’t until the campaign made its way onto fliers and into letterboxes around Lane’s electorate that it caught our attention.
“Hi, I’m Jordan Lane, your representative in NSW Parliament. I’m From Ryde, For Ryde and I (red heart) Ryde. Politics feels broken,” Lane wrote on the flier, which landed on our desk on Tuesday. “Too often, it feels like decisions are made by people who are more interested in arguing with each other than listening to the communities they are meant to serve. We need to do politics differently, but I need your help.”
Absent from the material, of course, was any Liberal Party branding or disclosure that Lane is a member of the Liberal Party. When we reached Lane’s office with questions about it on Tuesday, we were told our inquiries should instead be directed to parliament.
“As per the rules set by Parliamentary Entitlements, nothing distributed by an electorate office is permitted to advertise a party logo or use partisan messaging,” one of Lane’s electorate officers told CBD.
But it’s not just the fliers. A quick look at Lane’s social media shows a curious absence of any disclosure of his Liberal Party membership. He gushes over Ryde and Ryde only in his Instagram bio. Facebook is much the same. On LinkedIn, we get a flavour of his membership, but only by way of listing his 2022 candidacy on his CV. (Even then, more Ryde, Ryde, Ryde.)
All told, we don’t really blame him. Lane holds the most marginal seat in the state. With the NSW state election less than a year away, he’d no doubt be doing all he can to avoid reminding his constituents who his colleagues are.
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John Buckley is a CBD columnist for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via email.
Fiona Byrne is the CBD columnist for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.
