Palaszczuk denies her stance on Adani took a toll on results

Labor insiders say the Queensland government’s attitude towards the proposed Adani coal mine has hurt the party in that state.

Premier Anastasia Palaszczuk and Jackie Trad, left, yesterday. Picture: Peter Wallis

Annastacia Palaszczuk and her deputy, Jackie Trad, have refused to accept their enforced delays over state approvals of the now-stalled Adani coalmine project contributed to federal Labor’s disastrous election result in Queensland.

Federal Labor suffered a crash in its primary vote and now doesn’t hold a seat north of Brisbane, with even Wayne Swan’s former stronghold electorate of Lilley, in the city’s northern suburbs, in danger of falling to the Liberals.

A series of 11th-hour state ­reviews of Adani’s environmental approvals by the Palaszczuk government — backed by Ms Trad and her Left faction — is being blamed by federal ALP insiders and state MPs for Labor’s thumping, particularly in regional Queensland.

Townsville-based state Labor MP Scott Stewart yesterday said the result sent a “clear message’’ that the government needed to ­approve the project quickly.

“Opening the Galilee Basin quicker is certainly … part of the bigger picture,’’ he said. “The very clear message is this is about jobs and we should be looking at every opportunity to create jobs.”

Labor insiders last month warned that the Palaszczuk government’s “politicisation” of the Adani project since the 2017 state election campaign had damaged federal Labor.

One senior ALP insider last night said the Adani project and election result had presented “an existential crisis for Labor in ­regional Queensland”.

“People like Jacki Trad and Mark Butler have arrogantly ­allowed parts of Labor’s agenda to be hijacked by the environmental lobby,” the insider said.

“Unless the influence of Jacki Trad is curtailed there is no state seat in regional Queensland that isn’t under threat at next year’s state election.”

State Labor MPs last week raised concerns in caucus meeting that they now feared losing their seats over the government’s handling of the project.

One state MP said it should be noted that federal Labor’s primary vote in Queensland was less than 1 per cent higher than state Labor’s primary vote of 26.6 per cent at the 2012 state election, which reduced the partyroom to just seven MPs in the 89-seat parliament. “This result is a disaster,” the MP said.

At a press conference, Ms Palas­zczuk blamed federal Labor’s “complex message” on the result but ducked the question when asked whether her government accepted any responsibility for Labor’s performance in Queensland. “There were swings against Labor nationally and there were states in which Labor thought they would pick up extra seats and they didn’t,” she said.

“But what I would say very clearly, we need to focus on jobs.’’

Ms Trad also refused to concede the handling of Adani had an impact, saying resources projects had been approved by the government and insisting the mine still had work to do to meet approvals.

Opposition Leader Deb Frecklington said the result showed the Palaszczuk government could not see “Queenslanders want the jobs”.

“This election result for the LNP in Queensland is a direct ­result of the fact that Annastacia Palaszczuk is anti-regions, anti-­resources and anti-jobs,” she said.