State elections: Labor Party yet to find candidate for Hinchinbrook electorate

Queensland Labor is still scrambling to find a candidate brave enough to run in an North Queensland electorate just a month out from state elections. See why.

Premier Steven Miles and his Labor team are doing what matters for Queensland and the Hinchinbrook electorate, a spokesman said. Photo: Steve Pohlner

The Queensland Labor Party has confirmed that it is yet to find a candidate brave enough to run in the expansive Hinchinbrook electorate just a month out from the state elections.

“We are currently working through internal party processes and look forward to announcing the Hinchinbrook candidate in due course,” a Labor spokesman confirmed.

The seat, which extends from Tully Heads to Townsville’s Northern Beaches, is held by two-term MP Nick Dametto who was comfortably returned in 2020 ahead of the LNP’s Scott Piper and Labor’s Paul Jacob who is now deputy mayor at the embattled Townsville City Council.

The seat has traditionally been a LNP/National Party stronghold since 1960, with the party only recently announcing its candidate, Innisfail-based real-estate agent and former Hinchinbrook police officer and businesswoman Annette Swaine.

Mr Dametto, who bases his electorate office in Ingham in the centre of the electorate, said he had not heard any “whispers or rumbles” of a Labor candidate.

Hinchinbrook MP Nick Dametto and Queensland Premier Steven Miles at the Port Hinchinbrook development project in Cardwell last month. Picture: Cameron Bates

“If the LNP found it hard to find a candidate that even resides in Hinchinbrook I’m sure Labor’s having an even worse time,” he said.

“Out of 38,800 voters in Hinchinbrook, the LNP has had to find someone an hour out of the electorate and who knows where Labor are going to pull their candidate from.”

Townsville Deputy Mayor Paul Jacob won almost 20 per cent of the first preference vote in Hinchinbrook in 2020, behind Scott Piper of the LNP with 25 per cent and Nick Dametto of KAP with 43 per cent. With preferences, Mr Dametto claimed 65 per cent of the total vote. Picture: Shae Beplate

The deputy leader of Katter’s Australian Party said Labor’s failure to stump up a candidate was disappointing.

“Sometime you want to have a dance with a decent candidate and go toe-to-toe on policy but we don’t get to do that by the sounds of things.”

Labor, in a statement, said new Premier Steven Miles and the Labor team were “doing what matters for Queensland”.

“Labor is working hard delivering cost of living relief, investing in important health and housing infrastructure, especially in the regions,” a spokesman said.

“This includes the new Burdell Ambulance Station and new CT scanner at Ingham Hospital – all initiatives that show only Labor will invest in Hinchinbrook.”

Mr Dametto also hit out at LNP over promotional material that appeared to some voters as having been sent by the Electoral Commission of Queensland. The practise of sending postal vote applications featuring an LNP promotional pamphlet was heavily criticised online on Reddit as a form of data mining. Picture: Reddit

The spokesman said the “health and wellbeing of regional communities is at risk under the LNP whose Shadow Health Minister Ros Bates called regional health workers ‘duds’.”

“When David Crisafulli was last in government he sacked nurses.”

Mr Crisafulli, the LNP leader, was born in Ingham.

Mr Dametto also hit out at LNP over promotional material that appeared to some voters as having been sent by the Electoral Commission of Queensland.

The practise of sending postal vote applications featuring an LNP promotional pamphlet was heavily criticised online as a form of data mining.

Bob Katter, centre, the federal member for Kennedy, and Katter’s Australian Party’ Queensland state MPs Shane Knuth, Robbie Katter and Nick Dametto, with Former One Nation-turned Independent member for Mirani Stephen Andrew (second left) who has joined KAP ahead of next month’s elections. Picture: Nigel Hallett

Mr Dametto said LNP had used similar tactics in the past.

“They send mail-outs close to the elections asking voters if they would like to register for a postal vote,” he said.

“Some residents are tricked into thinking it’s the ECQ they are sending their details to but in actual fact they are sending that request back to LNP headquarters,” he said.

“They’re recording the data, which is essentially data mining so they know who is interested in postal voting so they usually send out a how-to-vote card when the postal vote comes back – it’s a cheeky way of trying to shore up a vote in the cohort of people that decide to postal vote.”

Mr Dametto said he believed the tactic was dishonest but also outdated, expensive and probably ineffective as it just made voters angry.

“It’s probably discouraging people from voting for them, rather than attracting them.”

Originally published as State elections: Labor Party yet to find candidate for Hinchinbrook electorate