Spectre of irrelevance hangs over John Pesutto as backflip on treaty blind-sides Victorian Coalition MPs

Shambolic media conference has Coalition members saying opposition leader has shown ‘an abject failure of leadership’

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For half an hour on Monday, Victoria’s opposition leader, John Pesutto, tied himself in knots attempting to explain why the Coalition was walking back its support for a state treaty with First Nations people.

With a pained expression on his face, Pesutto began the press conference with hand-wringing about the gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Victorians.

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