Breaking: Victorian Liberals dump Williamstown candidate over offensive comments

Breaking: Victorian Liberals dump Williamstown candidate over offensive comments

The Victorian Liberal Party has dumped Williamstown candidate Paul Lindemann over offensive comments it says he made about Indigenous Australians.

In a statement, the party says it has withdrawn its support and endorsement of Mr Lindemann over views he expressed, which had recently come to light.

"These comments are offensive, unacceptable and inconsistent with the values and standards expected of Liberal candidates," the statement says.

The party was not previously aware of Mr Lindemann's comments, the statement says.

Yesterday One Nation dumped former Preston candidate Franco Guardiani over comments he made about Hitler.

The seat of Williamstown has been held by Minister for Jobs Melissa Horne since 2018, and has been won by Labor at almost every election since 1889 on very safe margins.

The former dockyard town is now one of the wealthier seats in the state.

Earlier today, Sport Minister Steve Dimopoulos said Opposition Leader Jess Wilson should dump Mr Lindemann over allegations he insulted and mocked a young basketball player while coaching the Bay City Lakers.

In a statement, Mr Lindemann apologised for his actions and acknowledged he should have "handled the situation differently".

The ABC has attempted to contact Mr Lindemann for comment.

Victorians are set to head to the polls on November 28.

In brief

The Victorian Liberal Party has dumped Williamstown candidate Paul Lindemann over offensive comments it says he made about Indigenous Australians. "These comments are offensive, unacceptable and inconsistent with the values and standards expected of Liberal candidates," the statement says. The party was not previously aware of Mr Lindemann's comments, the statement says. Yesterday One Nation dumped former Preston candidate Franco Guardiani over comments he made about Hitler.

This is the opening of the story, shared with credit to ABC News Australia. The rest of the report — with every detail — continues on the publisher’s website.

Continue reading at ABC News Australia ↗

Cookie settings

Choose which cookies we may use. You can change this at any time from Cookie settings in the footer. Details of each cookie are in the Cookie Policy.

Strictly necessary

Needed for sign-in, security, payments and remembering these choices. Always on.

Preferences

Remember settings such as dark mode.

Analytics & performance

Help us count visits, understand which pages, devices and countries our readers use, and measure how well the site performs – anonymous and aggregated.

Advertising & marketing

Lets advertising partners show and personalise adverts, measure impressions, clicks and visits, prevent ad fraud and pay us – this is how the free site is funded.

🔔 News notifications

Get headlines from NewsHub on this device — even when the site is closed.

You can switch this off at any time. Works on Android, Windows, Mac and Linux browsers; on iPhone/iPad add the site to your Home Screen first.