GetUp! plans 100,000 calls to electors in Boothby urging them to vote out Liberal MP Nicolle Flint

Boothby residents will be bombarded with phone calls in the lead up to the election with left-wing lobby GetUp! vowing to make 100,000 “persuasive” calls to voters urging them to unseat hard-right Liberal MP Nicolle Flint.

Boothby residents will be bombarded with phone calls in the lead-up to the federal election, with left-wing lobby group GetUp! vowing to make almost 105,000 “persuasive” calls to voters urging them to oust Liberal MP Nicolle Flint.

But Prime Minister Scott Morrison has hit back at the group’s attack.

He has accused the group as being a front for Labor, despite the Australian Electoral Commission last month declaring it had no association with Labor or the Greens.

Mr Morrison backed Ms Flint as one of the party’s “hardest-working MPs”.

GetUp! is so serious about the seat, the state’s most marginal at 2.8 per cent, that it has a paid campaign organiser and a media contact for Boothby, and is leveraging its 7000 members in the electorate and volunteers from across Adelaide.

A recruitment drive last month organised for GetUp! members to host “calling parties” at their homes at which they will hit up voters’ phones on Mondays and Thursdays until the May federal election.

More than 11,000 of 104,978 planned calls have already been made, with volunteers reporting having “meaningful” conversations about action on climate change, the future of the ABC, and cost of living concerns it says are being ignored by conservative MPs.

Liberal MP for Boothby Nicolle Flint. GetUp! wants to try to contact 100,000 constituents and urge them to vote her out. Picture: Roy VanderVegt

But Mr Morrison said Ms Flint had made significant contributions on issues, including women’s health, since she was elected in 2016.

“Nicolle’s achievements stand in stark contrast to GetUp!’s keyboard activists, who probably have never set foot in the electorate,” Mr Morrison said.

“For all GetUp!’’s talk about women in politics, it doesn’t seem to prevent them from singling Nicolle out for attention. GetUp! and Labor are the same organisation; if they weren’t, they would be targeting Labor candidates as well.”

An Opposition spokeswoman said the claims were “more desperate rubbish”, adding the party was focused on delivering for the people of Adelaide who want better schools, hospitals and action on climate change”.

GetUp! bought the landline and mobile numbers of Boothby voters from commercially available sources and intends to make multiple calls, it said.

GetUp!’s SA organiser Gabrielle Bond said its 63,000 SA members were reminding Boothby voters that Ms Flint “led the charge in (Peter) Dutton’s failed leadership coup against (Malcolm) Turnbull for daring to even acknowledge climate change”, when they were calling out for climate action.

Almost 123,000 South Australians are enrolled to vote in Boothby ahead of the election. Volunteers are already scheming stunts to pull, including the appearance of members in Bananas in Pyjamas costumes, which featured during the Mayo by-election, when Ms Flint is out on the campaign trail.

Volunteers dressed as the Bananas in Pyjamas follow Georgina Downer at the Mayo by-election in July. A similar stunt is planned for Boothby. Picture: AAP / Kelly Barnes

A brigade of volunteers wearing orange GetUp! T-shirts will also be at polling booths and distribute how-to-vote cards.

Paid advertising campaigns have not been ruled out.

The Advertiser understands GetUp!’s Boothby campaign has a smaller budget compared with the resources being funnelled into outing the hard-right Liberals at the top of its hit list – Mr Dutton, Tony Abbott and Greg Hunt.

Ms Flint said she stood by her record of delivering critical projects, local community and sporting facility upgrades.

“Boothby is hard-fought at every election,” Ms Flint said.

“I will not be distracted by personal attacks.”

She said she would continue to be out in the community daily, listening to residents and providing support.

She said had worked hard to deliver on fixing the Oaklands Crossing, reactivating the Repat and traffic solution at the Springbank/Daws/Goodwood roads intersection.