Federal election 2025: Labor MP Bruce Saunders rules out running for Wide Bay

Rumours have been swirling that former Maryborough MP Bruce Saunders would contest the seat of Wide Bay, held by LNP MP Llew O’Brien.

Former member for Maryborough Bruce Saunders.

Former Labor MP for Maryborough Bruce Saunders has put to bed rumours he planned to take a run at the Wide Bay seat in this year’s federal election.

Mr Saunders lost his state seat to the LNP and John Barounis at the 2024 election despite being a favourite to hold on to it.

He said on Monday he had also heard rumours he planned to run for Labor in the seat of Hinkler, a seat that will be hotly contested at the 2025 election after incumbent LNP member Keith Pitt announced he was retiring.

Meanwhile, PM Anthony Albanese is locked and loaded to call a federal election this Sunday or Monday for April 12, and appears to have scrapped plans for a March budget after cancelling this week’s planned meetings of the expenditure review committee.

Candidates have been slowly revealing their hands in the past few weeks, with former Bundaberg Citizen of the Year Trish Mears announcing she will be the Labor candidate running for Hinkler, a big ask after 30 years of National party wins there.

Hinkler is held by the LNP with a 10 per cent margin, with David Batt preselected to as the LNP candidate for the seat.

Mr Saunders said his focus was on the next Queensland state election where he is committed to reclaiming the seat he had held for three terms before the October 2024 election.

Former Maryborough Labor MP Bruce Saunders.

Mr Saunders came to office in 2015, replacing LNP MP Anne Maddern, who was elected under Campbell Newman’s government.

Under Mr Saunders the state government pledged to build a new train manufacturing facility at Maryborough where trains for the 2032 Brisbane Olympic Games would be built.

Other businesses set up in the region, including a munitions factory owned by Rheinmetall.

But while the city found its feet economically, Maryborough faced its share of challenges. including two floods in the space of weeks in 2022 and two triple fatal car crashes, one caused by a 13-year-old behind the wheel of a stolen Mercedes and the other on the Bruce Highway at Walker St, an intersection the LNP pledged to make safer with an upgrade.

The LNP pushed for tougher measures to combat youth crime and it was a message that clearly resonated on the Fraser Coast, with a swing of 13 per cent against Mr Saunders and Labor.

Earlier in 2025, Mr Pitt was named Ambassador to the Holy See in a surprise diplomatic appointment.

He had announced late last year he’d be leaving politics, citing “frustration” and policy disagreements and hinting at the time that an undisclosed new job opportunity was among the reasons for his decision.

“I’m wishing Peter Dutton all the best in 2025, but I’ve got a very unexpected opportunity,” he said.

“My wife has asked me every week since I started why am I still doing this?

“And I’ve finally got to the point where I’ve said, ‘Well, actually it’s time to let someone else have a go’.”

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