Benita Kolovos

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Henry Belot |Benita Kolovos

As his party room imploded last year, plagued by infighting and a looming defamation trial, John Pesutto placed a blank sheet of butcher’s paper in front of his colleagues. In the dying days of his tenure as opposition leader, Pesutto asked MPs what should have been simple questions to answer: What are our values? What do we stand for? His attempt to unify a deeply divided party failed spectacularly. Almost a year later, there is no consensus answer to those questions.

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Henry Belot |Benita Kolovos

The Victorian Liberal party will provide a $1.5m loan to former leader John Pesutto to ensure he can pay Moira Deeming’s legal fees and avoid bankruptcy. The loan was debated by the 19-member administrative committee on Thursday night and ultimately endorsed after a secret ballot, which was proposed to limit any factional retribution within a deeply divided party.

1 week ago | theguardian.com | Benita Kolovos

Victoria’s crime rate has increased by 15%, with cost-of-living pressures contributing to a rise in theft and youth offenders singled out as responsible for the majority of robberies. The Crime Statistics Agency on Thursday released data showing 627,268 criminal offences were recorded in Victoria in the 12 months to March 2025 – a 17.1% increase from the previous year. When adjusted for population, the crime rate per 100,000 people was 8,838.7, marking a 15.2% rise.

2 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Benita Kolovos |Henry Belot

The Victorian Liberal party could reap $1m in interest from a loan deal that would see embattled former leader John Pesutto agree to repayments of around $10,000 a month. The party’s administrative committee will meet next Thursday, to consider loaning Pesutto about $1.5m to cover the balance of the $2.3m in legal costs he owes fellow Liberal MP Moira Deeming after the federal court found he repeatedly defamed her.

2 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Henry Belot |Benita Kolovos

Moria Deeming offered John Pesutto a chance to avoid bankruptcy and delay payment of $2.3m in legal costs until 2027 on the condition her pre-selection for the next election be assured by the Liberal party. The upper house MP commenced bankruptcy proceedings earlier this month after the former Liberal leader failed to pay the costs ordered by the federal court in May. The court found Pesutto repeatedly defamed Deeming by falsely implying she sympathised with neo-Nazis and white supremacists.