Queensland election: Labor MPs biff on social media over service road

A social media biff has erupted between Labor MPs in neighbouring suburban Brisbane seats as they aim to appease voters over a 1km service road running between their electorates.

Labor MP for Cooper Jonty Bush and her colleague in the neighbouring electorate of Ferny Grove, Mark Furner, are at odds over a service road proposed to run between the electorates.

A social media biff has erupted between Labor MPs in neighbouring suburban Brisbane seats as they aim to appease voters over a 1km service road running between their electorates.

Backbencher Jonty Bush – a member of the tiny Old Guard faction aligned with Premier Steven Miles’s dominant Left – is publicly at odds with Agriculture Minister Mark Furner, a member of the Right faction, over the road as both fight to hold their respective seats of Cooper (10.49 per cent) and Ferny Grove (10.97 per cent) at the October 26 election.

Ms Bush, who faces defeat by the Greens, is pushing for the yet-to-be-built road to be used only by ambulances and police vehicles, and in emergency evacuations by residents of a housing development in the northside suburb Upper Kedron in Mr Furner’s electorate.

The road would connect to Mount Nebo Road, on the border of Ms Bush’s electorate, and she is worried about traffic and safety on the bush-lined road if it is opened to public use.

Mr Furner, however, has launched a formal petition for the Brisbane City Council to amend the neighbourhood plan to open the road to cut travel times for his constituents in the Cedar Woods development, Ellendale. The petition has 1400 signatures.

A post from Ms Bush on Facebook.

An opposing post by Mr Furner on Facebook.

Residents of the Ellendale community must now travel a ­further 10 to 15 minutes through Ferny Grove to reach Mount Nebo Road and the adjoining Waterworks Road.

This debate has heated up on Facebook in recent months.

The tension stems from former planning minister Jackie Trad’s 2015 decision to “call in” the residential community ­proposal over environmental ­concerns, effectively taking ­approval power away from the local council.

The connection road was initially included within the project’s master plan but later removed.

Mr Furner, at risk of defeat by the Liberal National Party in Ferny Grove, has posted on Facebook three times about the road since July. “The road has never been applied for by the LNP Brisbane City Council,” he said.

“It has never been rejected by the state government because it has never been applied for.”

LNP Treasury spokesman David Janetzki and Ferny Grove LNP candidate Nelson Savanh have also promised to open the road for residents.

The Cedar Woods development was an election issue in 2015 when the Labor candidate for ­Ashgrove, Kate Jones, defeated premier Campbell Newman after she campaigned strongly against the project and connecting road.

Ashgrove became Cooper in 2017 after a redistribution.

Ms Bush, who was elected following Ms Jones’s retirement in 2020, said Planning Minister Meaghan Scanlon had made it clear there was no appetite for the connection: “I don’t support it. The Labor Planning Minister doesn’t support it. The Labor government hasn’t supported it since 2015.”