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Teal independent Zali Steggall has called for fallen colleagues Zoe Daniel and Kylea Tink to join her fledgling political party, as the newly formed alliance attempts to usher in a “new era” of Australian politics despite having only two members.
Just days after its formation, Community Strong Australia is also already preparing for an uphill battle to win seats in the Senate, seeking to recruit independent MPs and candidates to back the party in the upper house to boost its chances.
Speaking to this masthead earlier this week, Steggall said she was holding out hope that Daniel and Tink would return to parliament under her banner, saying the pair “were fantastic members for their communities”.
“For Kylea, the hard thing was AEC abolished the seat of North Sydney [before the 2025 election]. That is, that a lot of that area is now part of Warringah [Steggall’s electorate]. So I obviously talked with her, and it’s been a great privilege to represent that part of her community,” Steggall said.
“Zoe, again, I hope she does decide to run again in Goldstein because I think she really served the people of Goldstein well, represented them and was such a staunch advocate for the duty of care in relation to social media and the push to ban gambling advertising.”
On Thursday, Steggall and fellow independent Allegra Spender announced the formation of Community Strong Australia, a political party based on the community independent movement that unseated high-profile Liberal MPs over the past five federal elections.
Other parliamentary teals have taken a back seat, with Kooyong MP Monique Ryan and Curtin MP Kate Chaney remaining independent, while Sydney MPs Nicolette Boele and Sophie Scamps are consulting their communities about next steps.
Both Daniel and Tink won their seats in the teal wave of the 2022 election but were turfed out of parliament last May. Daniel is now the lead plaintiff in a High Court challenge to the Albanese government’s electoral finance reforms, while Tink has taken the reins at relief organisation Foodbank.
In response to Steggall’s comments, Daniel said she was “not likely to progress” her thinking on another tilt at parliament or membership of the party in the short term, but had received “very positive” feedback from voters in her former electorate of Goldstein on the new party.
“People are saying the reason we voted for you was because of your values and principles, so [joining the party is] not going to change our views,” Daniel said.
The former Goldstein MP said the party model employed by Labor, the Liberals and the Nationals was not working, and the new proposal by Steggall and Spender was worth a shot.
Community Strong is expected to remain leaderless for some time, only offers membership to MPs and parliamentary candidates, and allows MPs the privilege of free votes and campaigning on virtually all topics.
“There are some open questions [about how the party will function], but what they are trying to do is something innovative and different,” Daniel said, as she acknowledged the new party could evolve to meet the challenges it could face.
At the May 2025 election, Daniel lost her seat to now shadow treasurer Tim Wilson, who has mocked the party’s formation, saying it is a front for the Labor Party and that Steggall and Spender had yet to convey what they stood for.
Asked about these comments, Daniel said: “If your neighbour across the road was doing renovations, would you be worried about their style choices, or your house that’s burning to the ground behind you?”
Tink has been contacted for comment.
Community Strong will seek to run candidates in the Senate in 2028. But this masthead’s analysis of ballots cast at last year’s election – comparing the votes received by “community independent” lower house candidates with the lowest possible vote needed to win a Senate seat – shows support will need to be significantly bolstered to make inroads.
Assuming voters’ ballots are consistent for both houses, the party’s best chances lie in NSW and Western Australia, where in 2025 independent candidates collectively received between 70 and 80 per cent of the necessary votes to elect a senator. However, wins in these jurisdictions would be reliant on strong preference flows from other parties.
In Victoria, where Daniel, Ryan and popular regional independent Helen Haines have won, independent candidates captured between 30 and 40 per cent of the necessary votes.
Both Ryan and Haines have ruled themselves out of joining the party. When contacted to see if they would direct Senate votes to Community Strong on their how-to-vote cards at the next election, Haines declined to comment and Ryan said her team was not yet “thinking about the next election”.
Steggall said she respected her crossbench colleagues choosing to remain independent, but would be “seeking for them to be allies of Community Strong and support an upper house ticket”.
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Nick Newling is a federal politics reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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