The director of the NSW Liberals has been sacked, after the party failed to meet the deadline for submitting nominations for up to 140 candidates for local government elections.
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00:00It did all come off the back of that last-minute emergency meeting of the party's executive.
00:07They were looking to address the failure, as what they said about the Director Richard
00:11Shields, to ensure the lodgement of candidate documents for the upcoming local elections
00:17happening next month.
00:19That meeting did end poorly for the Director, a statement afterwards confirming that he
00:25had been sacked.
00:26This statement came from Don Harwin, the President of the State's Liberal Division, releasing
00:31that statement shortly after.
00:33In it, he said,
00:34This failure to meet such a fundamental responsibility has rendered his position untenable.
00:40As a result, the State Executive has resolved to terminate the State Director's employment
00:45with immediate effect.
00:47So a massive decision coming out of that meeting last night.
00:50But of course, the termination, it didn't come without a bit of furor.
00:54Speaking before the meeting, Richard Shields denied responsibility.
00:57He said he had been looking to the federal election, and he actually said that the responsibility
01:03for the local election had fallen on Don Harwin's shoulder.
01:07He had taken on that responsibility.
01:10At that time, Mr Shields also had declined to resign, saying the party should get the
01:14full facts first.
01:16Meanwhile, we know that anger is continuing to grow amongst the Liberal Party membership.
01:20A letter was sent to state MPs yesterday from the leader, Mark Speakman.
01:25In it, he called it probably the worst act of mismanagement in the party's history.
01:30He was also among the calls for Mr Shields to resign yesterday.
01:36So Charlie, what is the spread?
01:38Who does this affect?
01:39What's the spread of misnominations?
01:43Well that is continuing to become clear, and we do have a better idea of that today, since
01:47the ballots were made public yesterday.
01:51It's assumed about 136 candidates could be missing out on running for local government
01:57next month.
01:5917 councils in Sydney and surrounds, including much of the northern areas of Sydney, they're
02:04set to be without a Liberal candidate at this election, with many others in Sydney also
02:10set to be where some people have been nominated and others have missed out.
02:16So lots of councils will be running without a single candidate or without a requisite
02:21number of candidates from the Liberal Party.
02:24One election analyst has told the ABC this could mean that the Liberals miss out on more
02:28than 50 seats at next month's elections.