The names of those parliamentarians would be familiar only to close watchers of politics: junior minister and factional power-player Alex Hawke, central coast MP Lucy Wicks and member of the NSW upper house Scott Farlow. NSW Young Liberal president Alex Dore with Tony Abbott. Senior Liberal sources described a network of party staffers, paid by taxpayers, who have set about disrupting weak branches to shore up factional control over internal party elections and processes. And the behaviour provides a window into the future. This new generation of party apparatchiks, who will tread the well-worn path from the youth wing into safe seats and ministries, are proving even more aggressive than their predecessors. "It's very troubling and upsetting that these Black Ops style tactics are being brought into my area," Chu wrote in a complaint to the NSW state executive. "The 'win-at-all-costs' approach has no role in the Liberal Party and risks damaging our reputation at a time when our focus must be on campaigning to re-elect the federal government."

The commotion within this previously quiet, plodding branch is but the tip of the factional iceberg. It comes as the soft right faction, a small force in the NSW Liberals at the best of times, struggles with several high-profile defeats including the loss of Bronwyn Bishop in Mackellar and the failure to shoehorn Hollie Hughes into the guaranteed fourth spot on the NSW Senate ticket over Concetta Fierravanti-Wells. Julian Chu, president of the Earlwood-Kingsgrove Young Liberals, with Tony Abbott in June. Those losses are compounded by a split in the hard right, which last year saw many members join the moderates, who now have an absolute majority in NSW. "That means that the soft right has become a lot less important," says one state executive member. "They've had better days - they're hemorrhaging at the moment." Hawke, the member for Mitchell in Sydney's north-west, runs the soft right with discipline and aggression. Most suspect his capitulation on Fierravanti-Wells owes to his aspiration to be a senior minister in a future Turnbull or Scott Morrison government. In the meantime, many insist Hawke continues to pull strings in the Young Liberals, of which he was once himself president. Under pressure: Alex Dore and Julian Chu Credit:James Dore

But why would adult MPs, including a minister, care about the goings-on within their youth wing? For one, the NSW Young Liberal movement is powerful, with members awarded the same voting rights as adult delegates at state council. Their president also gets a coveted seat on the NSW state executive. And without strong connections to conservative churches, the soft right is particularly reliant on drawing new members from within the youth movement. "[They] care because of power over preselections and elections to state executives," explains a senior Young Liberal. "For them it's just about the numbers. Whoever controls the branches controls the delegates." Happier times: Alex Hawke staffer Dimitry Palmer (second from left), NSW Young Liberals president Alex Dore (centre) and vice-president Dean Shachar (far right) earlier in the year. Hawke denies he, Wicks or Farlow retain any lingering interest in the affairs of the Young Liberals, or that the soft right is involved in a factional "push" to gain control of branches. He concedes affairs within the youth wing are turbulent and his staff are involved. "But no one's doing that at my behest," he says. Among the youngsters at the April 6 branch meeting were Hawke staffers Dimitry Palmer and Vincent So, Farlow staffer Nomiky Panayiotakis (the branch vice-president), as well as Dean Shachar who works for state MP Mark Taylor. None would talk to Fairfax Media, but according to numerous sources their overarching goals are to expand the power of the soft right and undermine NSW Young Liberal president Alex Dore, who has fallen out with Hawke and the faction.

Assistant Minister to the Treasurer Alex Hawke. Credit:Andrew Meares Dore is best known as the organiser of an infamous Liberal dinner at which guest speaker Alan Jones said Julia Gillard's father had "died of shame". Sources say he fell foul of Hawke and co because he does not blindly serve the factional masters. "He was never really a hard core soft-right loyalist," says a senior member of the Young Liberals. "He would push back and question decisions and not always be co-operative." The man they want to replace Dore is Shachar, the vice-president, who is described as more "blokey" and compliant. And while Young Liberals may band together to doorknock during the election campaign, on campus things are in disarray. The prestigious Sydney University Liberal Club, a preparatory for aides and future MPs, has been besieged by conflict and dysfunction since the soft right's split. Last week, the governing student union opted to dissolve the club's membership and postpone its annual general meeting, in an attempt to restore order. The club's presidency is being fiercely contested by Josh Crawford, a Dore loyalist, and Dom Bondar, aligned to Hawke. "The centre right, more than any other faction, want to control the Young Liberals," says a source on the state executive. "They're always hungry for new branches, new university clubs, new operators they can bring across to their way of thinking. They're also quite psychopathic, and just incredibly difficult to deal with."