Can oil and water mix? Mormons and the Liberal Party of Australia?

According to Australia's 2016 Census data, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons) forms 0.3% of the population.  Mormons have been more or less invisible on the political landscape.  I have been politically active for most of my long life and I can't recall any members of any Australian parliament who were/are Mormons.

I can't even recall them being politically active i.e. active in political campaigns, door knocking, public statements, etc.

Until the last few years. 

In recent times, a program has come about called Safe Schools Coalition Australia and http://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/Pages/safeschools.aspx.  This program has caused angst and outrage among people on the political right and out of the woodwork has come some people who are Mormons.  

These people have found a home and consolation within the right wing of the Liberal Party of Australian (Victorian Division).  To clarify the political spectrum in Australia, the Liberal Party in Australia is a party more like the Republicans in the USA and the Conservatives in Britain.   There would be some true Liberals in Australia's Liberal Party but there are also Conservatives and people on the Far Right of the political spectrum. So if Mormons joined an Australian political party it is highly unlikely that they would join the Australian Labor Party (which is the equivalent of the USA's Democrats). 

In the wake of the scare campaigns run by the Right and the Mormons in relation to the Safe Schools program, Mormons have been acquiring strategic influence in the Victorian Liberal Party - and, in some quarters, this is causing concern. 

http://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/Pages/safeschools.aspx?Redirect=2

The invasion of the Liberal Party of Victoria

From The Age, Melbourne,Victoria

By Royce Millar & Ben Schneiders

A doctor and senior Mormon who blames ungodly love for HIV, as well as a prominent campaigner against the Safe Schools program, have been elected to positions in the Victorian Liberal Party.

They are among at least five Mormons elected as party officers at last week’s state conference.

Infectious diseases specialist Dr Ivan Stratov won a seat on the party’s powerful administrative committee as part of a ticket of ultra-conservatives and religious activists who are centred around 28-year-old Liberal factional whirlwind, Marcus Bastiaan.

Liberal elders believe Dr Stratov to be the first Mormon to hold a senior party position in Victoria.

Also elected, but in a more junior position as a party delegate, was controversial anti-Safe Schools campaigner, and Mormon, Marijke Rancie.

In her Liberal delegate campaign statement she described herself as a ''lobbyist against the appalling Marxist Safe Schools programs’’.

Ms Rancie, in online videos, called on Victorian parents to get ‘‘really angry’’ about the Safe Schools program, which she said was ‘‘grooming’’ children.

The Department of Education has said a number of claims made by Ms Rancie were false.

Sources confirmed that five or more Mormons were elected as party delegates, including Cynthia Watson and her husband Elliot, out of 79 people elected to party positions.

Where their conservative morality has made Mormons reliable supporters of the Republican Party in the US – especially in their home state of Utah – Australian Mormons have not traditionally been prominent in party politics.

But in recent years in Victoria, key Mormon figures have been active in Mr Bastiaan’s statewide party rejuvenation and recruitment campaign, which has been slammed by his critics as blatant branch-stacking.

The Bastiaan faction’s push for power paid off at last weekend’s Liberal State Council when it won 13 of 19 seats on the powerful administrative committee in an alliance with party president Michael Kroger and Opposition Leader Matthew Guy.

Mr Bastiaan was elected party vice-president.

Former prime minister Tony Abbott also recently met senior Mormons and missionaries in Melbourne where he reportedly spoke of his own experience of training to be a Catholic priest.

Dr Stratov was previously involved in the Family First Party. Alongside Mr Bastiaan, he has actively recruited Mormons and others to the Liberal party.

The Age approached Dr Stratov for comment.

In 2017, Dr Stratov sparked controversy while speaking at an anti-Safe Schools forum in Bendigo, part of his Liberal recruitment drive, when he blamed HIV on lapsed moral judgement.

“I studied a disease called HIV; 35 million people have died from that disease because they all decided they were going to make man’s love, not God’s love,” Dr Stratov reportedly told his audience.

The Age quoted Dr Stratov in 2017 as saying that his task for signing up new Liberal members had been made easier by community anger over progressive policies including the Safe Schools program and the assisted dying legislation.

How many Mormons have signed up to the Liberal party is unclear. One senior conservative estimates there are about 50 across Victoria, others say the figure is much higher.

Some more moderate Liberals see last weekend’s result as an effective takeover of the party by social conservatives likely to lead to more progressive Liberal MPs being replaced.

They also fear that many moderates and progressives may now abandon the party.

Further reading at the links below:
https://bit.ly/2rtS9OO
https://bit.ly/2rtyuj1
Who's behind the Safe Schools videos?
Marijke Rancie on Facebook as Political Posting Mumma
Michael Rancie
Rancie Financial