Qld parliament live blog: Premier defends yacht trip

The Premier has faced questions in parliament over her decision to cancel Cabinet to attend the opening of Hamilton Island Race Week. 

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has defended cancelling Cabinet to attend the opening of Hamilton Island Race Week, saying she was working while she was there but had requested leave to “cover off myself from any criticism.”

While insisting her Deputy Steven Miles couldn’t host Cabinet in her absence because he was chairing the Infrastructure Cabinet Committee, the Premier said the business of government did not stop.

SEE HOW QUESTION TIME PLAYED OUT IN OUR BLOG BELOW

“We had five Cabinet subcommittees that met last week,” she said.

“When I came back I had the Cabinet Budget Review Committee meeting, also too our future economy meeting, and very importantly, we actually had a Queensland Disaster Management Committee, of which we did scenario planning in the event that there was ever a Foot and Mouth outbreak in Queensland.”

The Opposition has slammed Ms Palaszczuk in recent days following news that the regular Cabinet meeting was cancelled last week while the Premier took leave to attend the yacht event in the Whitsundays. Ms Palaszczuk said Ministers were informed the previous week that Cabinet wouldn’t be going ahead.

“It was a very, very busy week of government,” she said.

“I’m the chair of Cabinet and I’m sorry, I took three days leave, I apologise to the people of Queensland that during a pandemic for over two and a half years I’ve had very little leave.

“In fact, I was officially opening the event and to cover off myself from any criticism I put in a leave application for three days even though I was working.

“I have officially opened this event in the past with Minister Kate Jones, and not one person has raised an issue with it.”

The Premier said the subcommittees weren’t organised just because Cabinet wasn’t being held.