The veteran MP said the party was aiming to win four seats in the upper house and he believed it could unseat Reason Party MP Fiona Patten in the Northern Metropolitan Region.

“If that were to happen,I think it would be very possible that,if we didn’t have the balance of power by ourselves,we’d be a very important player in controlling the balance of power in the upper house,” he said.

“The DLP[is] standing up as a principled and traditional party that strongly believes in leading from the front and strongly believes in workers,strongly believes in small business,strongly believes in traditional families. And I think that will appeal to a lot of people.”

He said the party would choose its preferences on a case-by-case basis,but conservative Liberals “can be pretty much assured that if we run,they will have our preferences”.

“You’ve got people in the Liberal Party who probably should be in the Greens or perhaps even in the Labor Party,so we wouldn’t be preferencing them,” he said.

Patten said her campaigning on difficult issues such as drug law reform and the decriminalisation of sex work placed her in a vulnerable position in elections,but it was unlikely she would be ousted by the DLP.

“We know that the Northern Metropolitan Region is a very diverse community,but it’s very strong on LGBTQ rights,women’s reproductive rights,and drug law reform,so I can’t see Bernie carrying much favour in my electorate with his climate-denying and anti-abortion position,” she said.

Senior MPs from both the Labor and Liberal parties also dismissed Finn’s ambitious target of securing four seats,with one of Finn’s former Coalition colleagues,speaking toThe Age on the condition of anonymity,describing it as “ludicrous”.

The premier was asked at a press conference on Thursday morning about Finn’s decision to join the DLP,but said he would not comment on the matter.

“I’m the leader of the Labor Party and the premier of our state,I’m not here to talk about other political parties,” he said.

With Rachel Eddie and Annika Smethurst

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