Teal independent joins crowded race for Sturt
A former Greens member will run as a Teal independent candidate in the federal seat of Sturt, setting up a four-way race for the marginal eastern suburbs electorate.
Retired general practitioner Dr Verity Cooper will on Wednesday be unveiled as a “community independent candidate” targeting Liberal MP James Stevens’ seat of Sturt.
Cooper, a long-time Parkside GP, is the first South Australian “Teal” candidate to announce they are running at the 2025 federal election.
She will be supported by the Simon Holmes à Court-backed Climate 200 group, which, according to Cooper, has already granted $30,000 to the campaign with another $36,000 coming.
She also said she boasts an army of at least 150 to 200 volunteers.
But she faces an uphill task to unseat Stevens – the last federal Liberal in metropolitan Adelaide – who holds Sturt on a razor-thin 0.5 per cent margin over Labor.
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Labor has already preselected lawyer and local councillor Claire Clutterham as their candidate while the Greens have made Sturt their one target seat, backing staffer Katie McCusker for the job.
Cooper told InDaily she was a Greens member only months ago – even volunteering for McCusker’s 2022 campaign in Sturt – but resigned in frustration over the party’s “obstructionist politics” in the federal parliament on housing.
“We are different to the Greens,” Cooper said.
“I used to be a Greens member but I became disenchanted by what I saw as the increasing political games they were playing.
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“I understood why they were doing it to try and get more concessions from the government about those issues, but unfortunately, it just delayed… necessary legislation that we needed as soon as possible.
“So that’s where we will be different. We’re also looking for integrity and transparency and accountability in politics.”
Cooper started a general practice in Parkside in 1988 and worked there for 35 years.
The Liberal Party has held Sturt for 66 of the last 69 years. Before Stevens, it was the blue-ribbon electorate of Liberal frontbencher Christopher Pyne.
The Teal independents won seven seats at the 2022 federal election unseating a slew of high-profile Liberal MPs.
But its campaign in South Australia fell short, with former Adelaide Writers’ Week director Jo Dyer unsuccessful in her bid for Boothby.
“We’re going to be trying as hard as we can to win this,” Cooper said of the Sturt race.
A Teal independent candidate is also expected to run in the regional electorate of Grey, which covers 92 per cent of South Australia’s land mass.
Long-time Liberal MP for Grey Rowan Ramsey is retiring at the next federal election. In September, the Liberal Party preselected Tom Venning – nephew of former state Liberal MP Ivan Venning – as his replacement.
