Poll threat to Annastacia Palaszczuk in marginal seats

Support for Annastacia Palaszczuk has fallen across key marginal seats in regional Queensland.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk speaks during Question Time at Parliament House in Brisbane. Photo: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

Support for Annastacia Palaszczuk has fallen across key marginal seats in regional Queensland, with polling showing her Labor government is in danger of being ousted at the October 31 state election.

A poll of four Labor-held seats commissioned by coal company New Hope, as it ramps-up a campaign for state approval of the stalled New Acland mine expansion, also indicates double-digit swings to the opposition outside Brisbane.

The surge in support for the Liberal National Party in the seats of Ipswich, Keppel, Mackay and Thuringowa, in suburban Townsville, comes off the back of Labor’s falling primary vote in three of the seats and a plunge in One ­Nation’s popularity from the 2017 election.

An extrapolation of the ­Omnipoll results would indicate a possible uniform swing of 5 per cent against the two-term Palaszczuk government, and deliver a comfortable majority to Deb Frecklington’s LNP if Labor is unable to counter any regional losses by picking-up seats in Brisbane.

Just weeks out from the start of the election campaign, the poll indicates a repeat of the plunge in support for Labor across regional Queensland at last year’s federal election, when it was left with just one seat outside Brisbane.

Ms Palaszczuk holds an effective majority of just two seats in the 93-seat unicameral parliament, with Labor’s 48 MPs, the LNP with 38 and the remaining electorates held by a mix of independents and minor parties.

 

While Labor would retain Ipswich, the poll indicates the government is under threat in the remaining three seats after preferences are distributed.

The release of the Omnipoll results follows a difficult week for Ms Palaszczuk over criticism of her government’s hardline stand on border restrictions and shock resignations of three cabinet ministers, including state development Minister Kate Jones.

In the last parliamentary sitting before the election, Mines Minister Anthony Lynham and Communities Minister Coralee O’Rourke also announced they were quitting, setting the scene for preselection stoushes.

Left faction member Ms O’Rourke’s ultra-marginal Townsville-based seat of Mundingburra is being targeted by the pro-mining Right faction, sparking a retaliatory strike by the Left on Dr ­Lynham’s safe Brisbane seat of Stafford.

According to the poll, Labor’s primary vote has slid by 9 per cent to 34 per cent in Keppel — held on a margin of 3.1 per cent after preferences — and also fallen 7 per cent to 36 per cent in Mackay — held on a margin of 8.31.

Both those seats are now in danger of switching to the LNP after the allocation of preferences, with Thuringowa also under threat despite Labor gaining 1 per cent to edge its primary vote to 33 per cent.

In all four seats, the LNP’s primary vote has jumped significantly with the biggest gain being in Thuringowa, capitalising on a loss in support for One Nation. In Ipswich, One Nation suffered its biggest loss in primary support, down 22 per cent, as the poll indicated that voters are turning to the major parties in the face of the global pandemic.

New Hope commissioned the poll as it readies for a High Court challenge to by farmers and environmentalists against the proposed $900m stage three expansion of its existing mine on Darling Downs, west of Brisbane.

New Hope has spent 13 years trying to get the redevelopment through, arguing that the existing ore body near Oakey is close to exhaustion. Without the stage-three mine the entire venture will fold.

Last month, the Australian Workers Union and CFMEU called on the Palaszczuk government to immediately approve the expansion of the mine.

The Omnipoll showed that 60 per cent of voters across the four seats supported approval for the expansion of the mine. It found 47 per cent of voters across the seats worked in mining or had an immediate family member dependent on the mining industry.