THE POLL BLUDGER
New South Wales Legislative Assembly Election 2007

BLUE MOUNTAINS
Labor 14.8%

The electorate of Blue Mountains is bisected by the Great Western Highway, which runs through the population centres of Blaxland, Springwood, Katoomba and Blackheath (from east to west), and includes large areas of national park to the north and south. The redistribution has added Blaxland at the east end of the highway (from Penrith) and removed Hartley in the west (to Bathurst), each transfer accounting for about 900 voters. The seat was created in 1968 in place of abolished Hartley, which was held by Labor from 1907 until it fell to independent Harold Coates in 1965 (not counting the interruption of proportional representation between 1920 and 1927). Coates continued as member for Blue Mountains until 1976, when he was narrowly defeated by Labor's Mick Clough. This result was a decisive factor in the election of the Wran government as Coates was widely considered to be sympathetic to the Liberals, who had not fielded a candidate against him.

Bob Debus became member in 1981 after Clough moved to Bathurst, and would eventually serve as Attorney-General in the Carr/Iemma government. Debus's political career had a seven-year interruption after his defeat by Liberal candidate Barry Morris at the 1988 election. Morris was re-elected in 1991, but disendorsed in 1995 following a police investigation into bomb and death threats against a Blue Mountains councillor. He ran again as an independent but was unable to prevent Debus from recovering his old seat, with a margin over the Liberal candidate of 2.5 per cent. Debus is retiring at the coming election; it is widely believed that this is a prelude to an entry into federal politics as the member for Macquarie. He recently found himself at the centre of controversy when Peter Debnam told parliament he was under investigation by the Police Integrity Commission, which backfired on Debnam when it emerged he had merely been the subject of a complaint by a convicted paedophile with a demonstrably tenuous grip on reality.

When Debus announced his retirement in October, a brand new preselection can of worms looked set to open following a series of head office interventions in other seats. High-profile Rural Fire Service chief Phil Koperberg (right) was mentioned as a possible contender, but he initially denied he was planning to run. Steven Scott of the Australian Financial Review reported that the electorate's four branches were split between the Left and Right, the former backing academic and part-time school teacher Naomi Parry of the "hard Left", the latter backing barrister and Blue Mountains councillor Adam Searle of the "soft Left". The Left wished for the matter to be determined by a rank-and-file ballot, while Searle was reportedly lobbying for yet another head office intervention (though he denied this). Parry had the backing of Debus, but was compelled to withdraw when opponents unearthed a series of uncomplimentary remarks she had made about senior Labor figures on various political blogs, including a description of Morris Iemma as having "the charisma of a wet cat". The matter was resolved when Koperberg changed his mind and agreed to nominate, having reportedly been wooed by Morris Iemma, Bob Debus, party state secretary Mark Arbib and assistant secretary Luke Foley. With Koperberg securing support from both factions, Searle also agreed to withdraw.

Koperberg had been mentioned several times over the years as a potential preselection candidate, and claimed to have been approached by the Liberals as well as Labor. Before the 2003 election, Labor delayed preselections in Penrith, Heathcote and Charlestown so he could leave open the option of running. No sooner had he secured the Blue Mountains preselection than he was forced to go public about an apprehended violence order taken out against him by his ex-wife Kate in 1987. Koperberg told Imre Salusinszky of The Australian that the affidavit had been shown to Mark Arbib by Blacktown MP Paul Gibson, who had recently concluded a 10-year relationship with Kate Koperberg, and claimed Gibson was about to leak it to Adam Searle. He went so far as to say the "smear campaign" being conducted by Gibson was "bordering on evil", although Gibson denied all Koperberg's allegations. According to the Daily Telegraph, it had alternatively been suggested that the order was leaked by Luke Foley (a member of the Left) to "frame" Adam Searle; another theory was that the leak came from Koperberg's "enemies" in the Rural Fire Service.

The Liberal candidate is accountant Michael Paag (left); according to his campaign website, his "wife Bindi was involved in the Glenbrook train disaster and his father was on a Blue Mountains train that caught fire at Linden in 2000".

ASSESSMENT: Labor retain