O’Connor safe as Greens regroup

CASSY O’Connor’s leadership appears safe despite the Greens’ poor election result and a potential replacement entering parliament.

Party heavyweights are backing Ms O’Connor as a review of the election result gets under way and after Rosalie Woodruff brought the Greens representation in parliament to two.

The party garnered about 10 per cent of the vote, losing a seat in Bass and continuing a slide from five seats in 2014.

The state leadership is decided by the parliamentary party, meaning Ms O’Connor and Dr Woodruff would need to agree on any change.

Former federal leader Bob Brown said such a change was unlikely.

“Cassy’s the best of the three political leaders we have in the parliament,” he said.

“Rosalie certainly has huge future potential as a memorable statesperson in Tasmania.

“You’ve got in those two women talents way above the average of the parliament or the Government.”

Party spokesman and former MP Paul O’Halloran said he supported Ms O’Connor continuing in the role she took over from Kim Booth in 2015.

“I’ve worked with her closely and I admire her,” Mr O’Halloran said.

“I don’t think, whether it had been Cassy or somebody else at this time, that it would have made any difference to the result.”

The Greens’ several thousand Tasmanian members have received a questionnaire on how the party’s campaign strategy can be improved.

Mr O’Halloran said: “We need to somehow get rid of this tag we’ve got that we’re anti-everything and we want to stop everything, where nothing could be further from the truth.”