LYONS’ MARLES GAY JIBE STOUSH
A BIZARRE social media post from Darryn Lyons’ personal twitter account has attacked the former mayor’s federal Labor rival Richard Marles, and implied the MP — who has a wife and children — is gay.
The post — which was deleted minutes after it was published — tagged Corio federal Labor MP Richard Marles, and asked if he was gay.
“are u (sic) gay pls (sic) tell the people? I am unconventional and unconcerned as my niece is ! Pls (sic) tell @lyons4geelong the truth and the people of Australia”.
Mr Lyons (pictured) is running as an independent against Labor incumbent Christine Couzens in the seat of Geelong in Saturday’s state election.
The Geelong Advertiser has obtained a screenshot of the post, which was tweeted at 8.17pm.
When contacted by the Addy about the tweet, Mr Lyons said: “That was deleted. That wasn’t meant to go out.”
Mr Marles said the tweet was “more sleazy and bullying behaviour from someone who has plenty of form in this space”.
The tweet was posted to Lyons’ personal account, which has 379,000 followers, rather than the @Lyons4Geelong Twitter account linked with his political campaign.
Lyons’ personal account, @DarrynLyons, was active on Twitter throughout the evening, promoting his political campaign.
Mr Lyons last week decried “dirty politics” on his campaign Facebook page, saying the Labor Party had reached “new depths”.
Geelong Labor MP Christine Couzens said Mr Lyons “shows every day why he’s not fit to represent the people of Geelong”.
“He should grow up instead of playing silly games on social media,” Ms Couzens said.
Mr Lyons’ tenure as mayor ended in 2016 when the Geelong council was sacked after a damning report from an inquiry that alleged bullying and dysfunction inside City Hall.