Liberal candidate says his party has problems and 'can do better', before 'clarifying' comments

Exclusive: Lucas Moon spoke to 6 News about being the first Liberal candidate in Richmond since 2014.

Lucas Moon, the President of the Hawthorn RSL, has been announced as the Liberal Party's candidate for the Victorian seat of Richmond.

It's the first time the Liberals will be contesting the seat since the 2014 election, when they picked up 20.7% of the vote & came third on a first preference basis.

The Greens have contested the seat at every election since 2002, and have always ended up as one of the two-party-preferred parties.

Labor has held the seat in some form in every single year since 1889, with the MPs before that being officially unaligned with any political party - as well as the exception of Frank Scully, who was elected as a Labor MP but joined the Democratic Labour Party following the ALP split in 1955 & remained as the Member for Richmond until 1958.

Incumbent Labor MP Richard Wynne is retiring, leading many to believe this will be the year that The Greens finally pick up the seat.

Moon recently went viral for a campaign ad, which saw some people ask why he's not running as an independent.

"A lot of people have said that to me over the journey," Moon told 6 News.

"I've been a Liberal Party member for a long time...like any major organisation, we do have problems and we can do better."

"Instead of sitting back and not contributing to fixing the problem I'm putting my hand up and running."

When pushed on what he thinks the 'problems' are, Moon 'clarified' his comments, and said there are "some perception issues...specifically with the younger demographic."

"At times our opponents exploit that, and point us out to be - and I'll say it for your audience - 'stale pale old White males'...we're far from that."

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Richmond candidates (2022)

ALP Lauren O'Dwyer (Labor)

LIB Lucas Moon (Liberal)

GRN Gabrielle de Vietri (Greens)

AJP Lis Viggers (Animal Justice)

RP Jeremy Cowen (Reason)

VS Roz Ward (Victorian Socialists)

RETIRING

ALP Richard Wynne (Labor)

NO LONGER RUNNING

IND Aaron Lim (Independent)

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Watch the full video here.

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