‘We can’t win’: Shooters show Nats white flag
The Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party has given up on winning seats at the federal election.
The Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party has given up on winning seats at the federal election, offering respite to besieged Nationals leader Michael McCormack as his party faces a drop in support in drought-ravaged NSW.
SFF leader Robert Borsak said the party was struggling to recruit candidates for the seats it intended to contest, including the Deputy Prime Minister’s electorate of Riverina, before nominations close on April 23.
The Australian can reveal SFF has preselected Orange Deputy Mayor Sam Romano to contest the seat of Calare, west of the Blue Mountains, held by Nationals MP Andrew Gee on a margin of 11.8 per cent.
SFF won the seat of Orange, within Calare, in last month’s NSW poll with a primary vote of 49 per cent — almost double the Nationals’ vote of 26 per cent.
SFF, which won two former Nationals safe seats in the NSW election on the back of anger over the drought and the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, intends to run in Eden-Monaro, Parkes and possibly Barnaby Joyce’s seat of New England if it can find candidates.
Mr Borsak conceded yesterday that the party would not be a credible challenge to the Nationals in any seat, despite continued anger at the Coalition in NSW over a lack of water in western NSW, which has been blamed partly on the Murray-Darling Basin Plan.
“Given the proximity, our lack of resources and the timing of the whole thing, I don’t think we can win any of them, to tell you the truth,” the NSW MP told The Australian.
“It is difficult because of candidates, timing and money. I’d love to say we can win but I haven’t even got a good candidate yet for Riverina — that’s how tough it is.
“I was just talking to someone who was thinking of running in Parkes and it was about the fourth person who pulled out (as a candidate).”
Mr Borsak said voters were angry at the Nationals over the basin plan and wanted more water available for irrigators — a call backed by Mr Joyce but rejected by Mr McCormack.
“Talk of more buybacks for environmental water works against what they want. They want more water allocated for irrigation, not less water,” he said. “There is a dissatisfaction, even in Riverina, of who their current leader is.”
Liberal MP for Farrer Sussan Ley is facing a challenge from independent candidate Kevin Mack, the Mayor of Albury, who has promised to push for a review of the basin plan. Mr Mack took part in a 1000-strong protest against the plan in Albury on Wednesday.
“With the fish kills and the drought and everything else, the only water that appears to be going to anywhere is the lakes in South Australia, which is supposedly the environmental part of the plan,” Mr Mack said this week.
“The farmers are not happy.”
Mr McCormack talked down concerns about the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, saying the government had this week promised a $70 million water package to prevent mass fish kills.
“We have asked for those irrigators, those people holding water licences in the Barwon and Darling systems, if they are wishing to sell, then we will be a willing buyer and we can produce more water, we can supply more water for that Darling system which sadly has been largely hit by the drought more than most,” Mr McCormack said.
Mr Joyce, who lost the federal Nationals leadership to Mr McCormack at the start of last year, yesterday reiterated his call for a review of the basin plan, which he blamed for the loss of two Nationals seats in the NSW poll.
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