The inner west could turn a shade of teal at next year’s state election, with the launch of a community independents group modelled on the successful federal political movement.
Voices of the Inner West of Melbourne has begun advertising around Maribyrnong and Hobsons Bay in the hope of emulating the voices campaigns in federal seats like Kooyong and Goldstein which resulted in teal candidates Monique Ryan and Zoe Daniel being elected.
Having been a supporter of Ms Daniel’s Goldstein campaign, Yarraville resident Anthony Warren realised the inner west was ripe for something similar.
“The inner west has similar demographics. There are a lot of inner east people coming to our area and there’s a lot of challenges in terms of our area.”
But because the state seats of Footscray and Williamstown are both Labor strongholds, Mr Warren felt that many of those challenges were not being met.
He said early feedback the group had received showed many others felt the same way.
“There was a general apathy in the sense that they were very safe Labor seats, and that people felt the Liberal opposition prioritised the outer-west.
“The inner west is more progressive, they’re more climate minded and lot of those values tend to resonate more, ” said Mr Warren who nominated climate and integrity as well as more local issues such as flood mitigation on the Maribyrnog River and air pollution from truck traffic, as the issues the group would focus on.
While no candidates had yet been chosen, Mr Warren said the seat of Footscray would be the primary target.
“At the last state election there was around a 12 per cent primary swing away from (Labor incumbent) Katie Hall.
“That was in 2022 and now in 2025, there’s a lot of demographic shifts which favour the local area being more marginal.”
Much of the swing against Ms Hall went to the Greens and Victoria Socialists, but Mr Warren said a community independent was more likely to actually win.
“There is an opportunity for leverage through the middle, for people who may not vote Green, and they may not like what the Coalition’s offering.“
He said the group would hold its first event in the coming weeks.
