Queensland Election results 2017: Trad’s skin saved by the LNP

THE LNP has saved Deputy Premier Jackie Trad from an embarrassing election defeat, after a year-long onslaught by the Greens almost came to fruition.

Queensland Deputy Premier Jackie Trad, at a voting station at West End State School. AAP Image/Glenn Hunt

THE LNP has saved Deputy Premier Jackie Trad from an embarrassing election defeat following a year-long onslaught by the Greens.

AS IT HAPPENED: Election results and rolling coverage

Ms Trad was welcomed as a local hero by hundreds of cheering volunteers at her South Brisbane election party after surviving a swing to high-profile Greens candidate Amy MacMahon that was last night running at about 11 per cent.

Despite tracking second in the first preference count, the Labor was set to be returned on a reduced margin thanks to preferences flowing from third-place LNP candidate Simon Quinn.

The LNP’s decision to preference Labor over the Greens on its how-to-vote cards was a difficult one, but was driven by a desire to prevent the left-wing minor party from entering Parliament and prosecuting what the LNP believes are “loopy policies”.

In jubilant scenes at West End’s Souths Leagues Club, Ms Trad thanked her hardworking volunteers who she credited for her victory in the face of a “very, very aggressive campaign” by the Greens.

She said they had blamed her for “everything” from council issues to international problems.

“This campaign wasn’t easy ... but can I say, we won,” she told the cheering crowd.

“They threw everything at it, and they lost.”

But she said she had heard the message of the electorate in the swing they had recorded against her.

“There is a message in that for me and Labor and it is a message that we are listening to,” she said.

Greens candidate Amy MacMahon running for the seat of South Brisbane at a voting station at West End State School. Picture: AAP Image/Glenn Hunt

Ms MacMahon left her own party for the ABC’s South Bank studios, where she told viewers the huge swing to her would not be enough.

“I don’t think the party has ever been in a stronger position and we’re going to be heading into future elections in a really strong position,” she said.

“We always knew this was going to be tough, going up against the Deputy Premier, against the Labor party with their huge amount of resources and being a sitting MP as well, a lot of name recognition.

“But, still, a 14 per cent swing (on the first preference count)... I think we should be really proud.”

The result in the state’s smallest seat had been unclear during the 28-day campaign where an explosion in apartment living has meant a massive change in the electorate, with a major portion of voters not having lived there for the 2015 poll.

Despite holding a comfortable margin of almost 14 per cent, Ms Trad had been under pressure to retain the seat she won in a 2012 by-election called when a defeated Anna Bligh quit Parliament.

The Adani Carmichael coal mine has been a sticking point for the Deputy Premier, with Ms MacMahon campaigning heavily on what is an unpopular project in the inner-city seat.

With Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announcing she would veto a federal Government Northern Australian Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) loan to the Indian miner during the campaign, Ms MacMahon demanded Labor also cancel the project’s mining licence and environmental approvals.

The Greens had thrown major resources and brought in volunteers from interstate to win its first Queensland seat, buoyed by their victory in the Gabba ward during the 2016 Brisbane Council election.

Anti-Adani material littered the electorate and competing Greens and Labor signs plastered polling booths, monstering just a handful of LNP volunteers.

Increased development in the area was also a key issue, as well as Labor’s promise to build a new high school in the area to take pressure off Brisbane State High.

Originally published as Queensland Election results 2017: Trad’s skin saved by the LNP