Young LNP in Queensland votes to refuse endorsement for Tim Nicholls, Steve Minnikin and Jann Stuckey

QUEENSLAND’S Young LNP members have voted for three MPs who used their party-sanctioned conscience vote to back abortion decriminalisation to be refused endorsement to recontest their seats.

QUEENSLAND’S Young LNP members have voted for three MPs who backed abortion decriminalisation to be refused endorsement to recontest their seats.

It is the latest as the fallout over the decision of LNP MPs Tim Nicholls, Steve Minnikin and Jann Stuckey to use their conscience vote to back abortion decriminalisation laws.

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The Young LNP is meeting in Warwick today ahead of next month’s LNP State Council where angry pro-life members will attempt to move that the trio’s political future be cut short as a result.

The Courier-Mail understands Young LNP member Kurt Tucker moved the motion for the youth branch to adopt that position and call for Mr Nicholls, Ms Stuckey and Mr Minnikin to be refused endorsement to run again at the next election in October 2020, gaining the support of the majority on the floor.

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Mr Tucker made headlines last year when he publicly declared he would have joined the Nazi Party in 1930s Germany.

He subsequently retracted the comments, apologised and stood down as president of the UQ LNP Club and from the Young LNP management committee following backlash.

The Young LNP’s latest motion comes after it moved a motion in August calling on the State MPs to reject the motion in keeping with party policy.

Deputy Opposition Leader Tim Mander has called for calm, yesterday describing calls for retribution as “totally inappropriate”.

“The party room granted a conscience vote which means people are free to vote according to their conscience so it’s totally inappropriate for there to be any repercussions for them exercising their conscience,” Mr Mander said.

“We need to take a deep breath and consider our approach to this issue in the future but in my opinion it is not appropriate to take some sort of retribution against people who exercise their conscience.”

The motion was not passed unanimously, however, with at least 10 Young LNP members understood to have voted against it.

One MP present at the Young LNP meeting as the special resolution to condemn his colleagues MPs was backed, Sam O’Connor, is understood to have quit the youth branch as a result.

Both he and Southern Downs MP James Lister voted against the abortion decriminalisation bill in Parliament but spoke against the young lnp motion, calling on the branch to respect the conscience vote.

But their pleas failed.