Brisbane Lord Mayoral candidate Rod Harding fails to get backing of Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk
There are behind-the-scenes moves afoot to have Labor’s prime candidate for the role of Brisbane Lord Mayor removed, and now his position has been weakened further by the Queensland Premier’s refusal to throw her support behind him.
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PREMIER Annastacia Palaszczuk hasn’t thrown her support behind Labor’s lord mayoral candidate Rod Harding following revelations there are moves behind the scenes to have him dumped.
“Rod Harding is the candidate for the lord mayor and these are matters for the party,” she said this morning when asked whether she had confidence in him.
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The Premier also laughed off a question about who out of Cabinet Minister Kate Jones and journalist Patrick Condren would make a better candidate, with both names having been touted for the top City Hall role.
The Courier-Mail revealed that internal frustration over Mr Harding’s performance has peaked in recent weeks.
Mr Harding was to have a second run at the mayoralty in September last year after reducing former lord mayor Graham Quirk’s margin by almost 9 per cent.
Council Opposition Leader Peter Cumming insists his caucus of five councillors is 100 per cent behind their lord mayoral candidate Rod Harding.
It came after The Courier-Mail today revealed there were moves behind the scenes of the Labor Party to have him dumped.
Cr Cumming today cemented his backing for Harding.
“We’re 100 per cent behind Rod, he’s our candidate,” he said.
“I don’t know where you got the information from.
“He’s been working hard and he’s been out and about and he’s come up with good ideas.”
Cr Cumming pointed to Mr Harding’s result at the last election, where he significantly reduced then Lord Mayor Graham Quirk’s margin.
He also said he had so far done a “reasonable job to date” since he was announced as the party’s candidate last year.
“He’ll get more and more visible as time goes on,” he said.
“He recently released the idea of getting rid of the footpath dining charges to make it better for small business.
“I know he’s doing a lot of door knocking now talking to cafe owners and restaurant owners that have got footpath dining permits.
“He’s getting a very favourable response.”
When appeared on the political radar in 2016, ahead of the mayoral elections, his curriculum vitae read like something out of central casting for the role of Liberal politician: Schooling at the elite Marist College Ashgrove, law at the University of Queensland and almost a decade with global investment bank, Macquarie Bank, colloquially known as the millionaire factory due to its penchant for looking after its executives.
But Harding is Labor to his bootstraps, counts Minister for State Development, Manufacturing, Infrastructure and Planning Cameron Dick as a friend, knows Palaszczuk from their days at uni, and “as a whippersnapper” in law, hung around former Bligh government minister Paul Lucas, at Labor Lawyers meetings.
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