A battleground seat will see more Liberal signs after the party won a last-minute court order preventing the local council from limiting them to one per candidate.
Dozens of Liberal Party A-frame signs were removed from outside an early voting centre at Kew in the inner-east Melbourne electorate of Kooyong on Wednesday, three days out from the poll.
Liberal candidate Amelia Hamer was earlier directed to comply with a local council rule that limits candidates to just one sign each on public land.
The City of Boroondara argued the signs were a risk to pedestrians and road users.
Hamer’s main rival for the seat, teal independent MP Monique Ryan, and all other candidates abided by the one-sign requirement.
Supreme Court Justice Kerri Judd on Thursday ruled in favour on the party’s injunction that restrains the council from removing Hamer’s signs outside the voting centre.
“I am satisfied the plaintiff would suffer greater damage if an injunction were refused and his claim were ultimately upheld,” she said in her ruling, referring to Liberal state director Stuart Smith.
For each breach, the council can issue daily fines of $500 per sign.
But Smith made good on a threat to take the council to the Victorian Supreme Court on Thursday.
He is challenging the permit rule on the grounds it might contradict the implied constitutional freedom of political communication.
In his affidavit, Smith said he had worked on every election campaign since 2001 either as a volunteer or party employee.
“He’s never seen anything like it,” his barrister Dean Luxton said.
Smith suggested signs outside polling booths were crucial for candidate recognition, helping voters relate a face to their name on the ballot paper and communicating policies.
Luxton said the council notified identified candidates for the Kooyong election of the sign rule in April, but other candidates for neighbouring lower-house seats and the Victorian senate were not informed.
“There’s no rational reason that a party should be confined to a single A-frame,” he said.
“A single independent might find a single A-frame is sufficient because they’re a single candidate.
“The permit system … it’s effectively arbitrary and it’s going to affect some political parties more than others, particularly where a party has more candidates, more policies that they want to promote.”
The confiscated signs were returned to the party on Thursday morning but Justice Kerri Judd was asked to rule on an injunction.
Luxton said the implied freedom of political communication was indispensable to the system of representative government, and pedestrian safety and accessibility could be put right through an undertaking from Smith.
“We’re not blind to the issue of safety,” he said.
Boroondara’s barrister Emrys Nekvapil SC argued an injunction would effectively grant Smith with “final relief”, allowing the Liberals to display multiple signs over the final days of pre-polling.
But Luxton insisted a final ruling would have relevance for future elections in the area.
