Greens take on Zed Seselja, stake independence from independents, David Pocock

The blast, which has been rejected by both Senator Seselja and Mr Pocock, comes as the Greens seek to differentiate themselves as a party from the climate- and integrity-focused independent ACT Senate candidates. Mr Pocock, in particular, has been erroneously painted as a closet Greens candidate by a well-funded attack ad campaign by right-wing group Advance Australia.

In an interview with The Canberra Times, Dr Goreng Goreng declared the former Wallabies captain was "not Zed", but said if he falls into the line of "we need more police", "then he is just like Zed".

But she saved her main ire for Senator Seselja, who's campaigned for increased defence and federal police funding and against any moves in the ACT's Labor-Greens-controlled territory government to decriminalise drugs of addiction.

"It brings up in people's minds, 'Oh, there's going to be more crime' and people get afraid. And of course, they start thinking, 'Well, we do need more police,'" Dr Goreng Goreng said.

"And so if you're a representative and you're saying, well the only solution to this is to have more police, then you're not really seeing clearly the need for the whole community."

The Wakka Wakka woman points to the ACT having the highest rate of incarceration of First Nations people per head of population. There's also been concern about recent arrests in the ACT, with magistrate James Stewart recently expressing concerns about the use-of-force training.

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She said the Canberra community needed preventative and post-rehabilitation support as well as affordable housing and income support, not just more police.

Any other position for Senator Seselja, she said, was coming from a position of white privilege.

"He's actually neglecting a part of the community that would want their representatives to stand up for them," the academic and former public servant said.

"He is the representative for every single individual and the territory, not just the group of people that he thinks he should represent. Every black person, every person of colour, every woman, every child, every family, that's his responsibility as the ACT senator.

"It is a serious problem for First Nations people if your mob are dying in custody and your representative is just ignoring it and saying nothing about it. Then I just have to say, 'Hello, are you a white privilege person who doesn't care?'"

Senator Seselja has rejected the criticism.

"This is an extreme position from ACT Greens candidate Dr Goreng Goreng and I reject it completely," he said in a statement.

"The Labor Party is endorsing these disgraceful policy positions by preferencing the Greens in every lower-house seat, despite their belief that funding our police is racist."

Mr Pocock has also called for more police in his backing of the Australian Federal Police Association's call to expand the workforce by about 10 per cent to 8500 officers by 2025, as well as its call to improve the AFP's budget and better support officers who have served.

The former Wallabies captain is highlighting perceived deficiencies with policing at home while the Morrison government is campaigning on national security matters and defence spending.

"I will say this: He is his own person, he is not Zed," she said. "And he has chosen what his policies are and he's an independent. So if he falls into the line of 'We need more police', then he is just like Zed."

"Because if you just call for more police, you're not actually thinking about the needs of this whole system in terms of how do we take care of crime in the community?"

Mr Pocock has also rejected Dr Goreng Goreng's criticism, and said he shares her concerns about high incarceration rates among First Nations people.

"My support for the AFPA's call to increase the number of AFP has nothing to do with playing into the politics of fear, and everything to do with responding to concerns raised across our community," he said.

Mr Pocock has been targeted by Advance Australia, which has links to at least three political allies of Senator Seselja, in online ads and fake corflutes depicting him as a closet Green, using the official Greens party logo. He has complained to the Australian Electoral Commission, but the preliminary finding is that they are not misleading.

Dr Goreng Goreng can see why Mr Pocock has a problem with the ads, but said she is happy to be a Green.

"I thought, I'd be proud if somebody sort of did that to me and just said, 'Oh, look, there's the Green Wonder Woman', because in fact that's what I think we are. We're standing up for the planet. We're standing up for the Earth and the planet," she said.

While the independents are getting a lot of attention in 2022 and have been shown in polling to be possibly taking votes from the Greens, Labor and the Liberals, Dr Goreng Goreng said there was a big difference between the candidates.

"Whenever I listen to both Kim and David talk in public about what they're going to do, I think, OK, great ideas, but they don't come down to deep specifics about how they're going to do it," she said.

"For example, free dental, free Medicare, free mental health. That's been costed by taxing the billionaires and the rich who don't pay tax money as a way of saving money."