Federal Election 2022: Ken O’Dowd, Barnaby Joyce, Matt Canavan and Colin Boyce visit Gladstone

With a federal election on the horizon, four Liberal National Party heavyweights toured Gladstone to address crucial issues such as inland rail and climate change.

A loyal Liberal National Party member through-and-through, outgoing Member for Flynn Ken O’Dowd has declared his party ‘will win’ the 2022 Federal Election - before an official date for the election has even been announced.

Flanked by Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce, Senator Matt Canavan and LNP candidate for Flynn Colin Boyce, Mr O’Dowd lead a tour of Auckland Hill in Gladstone on Monday.

With an election looming, Mr Joyce set about attempting to jolt Labor leader Anthony Albanese’s momentum in the Flynn electorate, which has been building in recent months.

Mr Albanese is expected to visit Gladstone later this week as part of a Central Queensland tour.

Mr O’Dowd said Gladstone was a fantastic place to be at the moment, given the excitement in the air regarding the region’s potential.

“We are looking forward to 2022, there are lots of projects in the pipeline, which will be great for the Gladstone community,” Mr O’Dowd.

“We are looking forward to an election year, an election which we will win.”

Mr Joyce said he got a great thrill every time he visited Gladstone, stood at Auckland Hill lookout and looked at the “wealth of our nation”.

“We in the Liberal National Party are unambiguous in our support for the coal industry,” Mr Joyce said.

“Because we know there are so many people out there in the great industrial city of Gladstone whose jobs rely on it, whose income underpins their house, their car, sending their kids to school.”

Mr Joyce accused opposition leader Anthony Albanese of “sinking his slipper into Flynn” by creating a new policy which increased taxes of 18 businesses.

“There’s one in Sydney and there’s 18 here, he’s got 18 reasons to stick the slipper into Flynn and that is how much Anthony Albanese really loves Flynn,” he said.

Mr Joyce concluded by saying the LNP was the party that would always look after Central Queensland and believe in this area.

Mr Boyce said at the upcoming election he was going into bat for the jobs of the people in Central Queensland.

“We want to see the port of Gladstone expand, industry expand and jobs expand, it is all about connecting Gladstone with the inland rail which will open up vast opportunities for future industries.”

Senator Canavan said the election was going to be highlighted by the importance of jobs and climate change.

“At Auckland point lookout you cannot really see a place which is not going to be taxed under Labor’s climate change policy, if you go to Centre Point Tower in Sydney there is hardly anything which will be taxed under Labor,” he said.