“Pay very close attention to what’s happening in your parliament and what your local members of parliament are doing… this idea of the separation of church and state – forget it,” he said at the time.
It coincided with the church’s pastor Rob Norman encouraging the congregation to sign up to political parties to prevent the passage of legislation such as the recently-passed abortion and voluntary euthanasia Bills, and came in the midst of a Right-faction-led “Believe in Blue” recruitment drive targeting largely Pentecostal communities to join the Liberal fold.
“I wasn’t part of that recruitment drive,” Speirs told this week.
“It was an initiative of a group within the party – they probably thought they were doing the right thing, and it was a means to an end… but look, I think we can move beyond that.
“I do not want to see any political party in this state run by a particular religious organisation or a particular faith – I think that would be unhealthy, unproductive and it’s not what South Australians are after.”
Asked if that meant he wanted the Believe In Blue campaign to stop, he said: “I don’t think there’s any need for it to continue.”
“I want to see us have membership drives into the future, I want to grow our party’s membership – but going into churches, preaching – for want of an better word – a particular political ideology is not what I’m after, because I actually think no single political party should be the domain of the Christian vote, or the Islamic vote, or the Sikh vote, or the Hindu vote… I would like to see people of faith feel comfortable occupying positions and membership of any political party in this state.”
However one of the architects of the recruitment campaign, SA senator Alex Antic, told in response he would “continue to encourage those who share our values to join our party, regardless of their walk of life”.
“The legacy of a period of left-wing dominance in this state has been one of electoral annihilation,” Antic said, after the moderate-faction-dominated Marshall Government last month lost power after just one term.
“The Liberal Party is a centre-right conservative party which has been damaged through this period.
“In order to appeal to middle Australian voters we need to be the party of true ‘liberal’ values and I intend to continue to encourage those who share our values to join our party regardless of their walk of life.”
Speirs said of his speech to Southland – during which he also railed against the state’s Legislative Council as a “laissez faire, Left-leaning place” – that he had “a habit of being very honest about things”.
“If I’d known there was a camera on me I might have made more nuanced remarks in terms of providing context to that,” he said of the speech, which was livestreamed on the church’s Facebook page.
“I think people of all faiths – and I would suggest a majority of people in SA have a foundational faith-based influence – should be comfortable getting into politics, getting into political membership [and] getting into elected positions… I think that should be celebrated as part of a multicultural diverse society.”
Speirs said he was a person of faith, describing himself as someone “shaped by what I’d describe as a fairly traditional Christian upbringing” who attends church “on a semi-regular basis”.
“I was really determined that I would never allow my faith to be piously preached from the benches of our parliament,” he said.
“I don’t think that’s appropriate, I don’t think that’s, again, what South Australians want… but of course when matters of conscience appear before parliament different things are going to motivate people, and foundational faith-based principles are going to be part of that for individuals – and that has influenced some of those conscience votes for me.”
Speirs won the backing of influential Liberal conservatives after he led the charge for amendments to the termination of pregnancy Bill, but he says now it is “interesting” that the episode pigeon-holed him as an arch-Right-winger.
“There was really only one issue I really focused in on – I struggled with the concept of a pathway to late-term abortion without appropriate protections for the unborn child, and so I took a bit of a leadership role on that item,” he said.
“I led the charge on that one [because] I strongly believe the average person in my electorate would be comfortable with the practices of abortion in society – and I am – but less comfortable with late-term abortion unless there were really strong protections around it.
“I became an advocate, no doubt about that [but] I think I did get pigeon-holed a bit there [but] in 95-plus per cent, probably higher, of the votes coming through parliament, my faith would not have influenced me one way or another.”
He said he “would describe myself as a political centrist… and really balanced by my very progressive environmental views”.
Speirs has retained the Environment portfolio he held in Government in his shadow ministry unveiled today.
The new leader suggested he was open to party reform, including formalising the factions that have riven recent Liberal administrations.
“It has been a challenge for the party and there’s no point sweeping it under the rug,” he said.
“We talk a lot about factions within the Liberal Party, but there are far more pronounced factions – and probably ideologically opposing factions – within the state Labor Party [though] they do seem to manage those differences pretty well… and again it’s probably because they’re quite good at the politics of it all.
