Voters have message for bumbling politicians – Not happy Jan

THE seat of Longman, north of Brisbane, is the most marginal of the Labor electorates that will go to by-elections in the wake of the latest citizenship scandal.

• MPs walk after ruling
• ‘I won’t be running again’

TO THE four feisty Caboolture women taking in the sun on Bribie Island yesterday afternoon Susan Lamb’s resignation as the federal Member for Longman was a travesty – “a complete waste of both our time and our money’’.

“Just because someone wasn’t born here doesn’t mean they can’t represent us in Parliament – it’s just become utterly ridiculous,’’ said Barbara Rollins, 68.

“A by-election is going to cost a lot of money, and we are the ones who will pay for it.’’

The four voters all knew of Lamb’s tearful admission in Federal Parliament last February, where the Member for Longman revealed she had failed to complete the renunciation of her British citizenship.

The problem stemmed from conflict with her mother from whom she could not obtain her parents’ marriage certificate.

But if the ALP thinks it might retain the seat on the back of a sympathy vote for Lamb, it had better come up with some policy action on the subject which much of this ageing electorate is fixated upon – aged care.

With over 17 per cent of the population aged over 65, the senior vote is beginning to carry serious weight in Longman, sandwiched between the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane and taking in Caboolture and the retirement destination of Bribie Island.

Longman is the most marginal of all the electorates expected to go to by-elections.

Lamb holds the seat with a margin of less than 1 per cent, in a region which can lunge in numerous political directions, including toward One Nation when ex-cop Bill Feldman won the state seat of Caboolture in 1998.

To the former LNP member for Longman, Wyatt Roy, his former constituents should be in an amenable pro-LNP mood when they cast their vote at the by-election expected next month.

“Longman is very much an aspirational electorate and there are hundreds of small business people who will appreciate the company tax breaks which will help boost employment,’’ he said.

“The work on the Bruce Highway by the Federal Government has also been favourable to the electorate.’’

Roy also believed one of the signature Budget’s initiatives – the $1.6 billion over four years to help ageing Australians stay in their homes rather than move into aged care – would hit a home run in Longman.

Ousted Member for Longman Susan Lamb in Parliament.

But to Christa Douglass, 80, paying out $87 a day to care for her infirmed husband, the $1.6 billion is irrelevant.

“There was really nothing in that budget for us at all,’’ she said.

Mrs Douglass and her three companions all had personal stories of the financial and personal horrors of aged care, and all believed governments of all persuasions had one overriding concern – to get as much money out of an aged-care patient as possible.

“And you look at the amount retired politicians are living on and then look at us getting by on $50 a day,’’ Mrs Rollins said.

Elaine St John, 73, said she normally voted Labor but her three friends were swinging voters who would look at the field before making any decision in Longman.

Lyn Ellem, 73, said she was a little disappointed Roy wasn’t running because she had met him briefly when he was the incumbent and he appeared “a complete gentleman’’.

“I think he did quite a lot of good things for this electorate,’’ she said.

Roy, now 27, says he was encouraged yesterday by former colleagues to have another tilt at the electorate he took as a rookie aged just 20 in 2010 before holding it for two terms, and even securing a junior ministry.

“For now I am happy to pursue opportunities in the private sector,’’ he said.

Roy, the son of a strawberry grower who grew up in the electorate, says he may not have entirely finished with politics.

“Who knows what the future might hold.’’