Howard man Warren Entsch gets back to his old Canberra pastures

FORMER Howard government MPs Warren Entsch and Teresa Gambaro are set to be given a second political life by voters.

FORMER Howard government MPs Warren Entsch and Teresa Gambaro are set to be given a second political life by voters.

Both were Howard heroes elected in the 1996 rout of Labor that brought the Coalition to power for four terms, until Kevin Rudd came along.

Mr Entsch, 60, retired from his far north Queensland seat of Leichhardt and was spared the Kevin07 "Rudd-slide" that put the broom through conservative seats in Queensland, including that of Petrie in Brisbane's northeast, held by Ms Gambaro, 51.

Mr Entsch made his comeback with an emphatic victory on Saturday over first-time MP Jim Turnour, who was knocked out by an 8 per cent swing against the ALP.

Ms Gambaro's opponent, Arch Bevis, who has held his seat of Brisbane through thick and thin since 1990, was hit even harder by the anti-Labor backlash in Queensland. He saw a 12 per cent swing against him and seemed down and out, but recovered in late counting to put the seat back in play.

Ms Gambaro, however, was leading by 50.68 per cent to 49.32 per cent and her Liberal National Party was optimistic she could pull off one of the surprise wins of the campaign.

Months of grinding it out and an election night that had it all, from gripping tension, to elation and then more nail-biting, took it out of Ms Gambaro, who was too ill to be interviewed yesterday.

She and Mr Entsch could take additional satisfaction from knowing that another Howard-era conservative, Ross Vasta, had regained the Brisbane seat of Bonner he lost in 2007 to Labor's Kerry Rea. She was hit by a double-digit swing on a night when Queensland turned against the ALP so comprehensively that the nine gains that helped put Mr Rudd in power were effectively wiped out.

"Teresa and Ross are very good people persons and I think they put the people back into politics," Mr Entsch said yesterday.

"Don't underestimate the fact that it's their doing. In my case, it's about the people desperately wanting to be heard."

Mr Entsch paid tribute to Mr Howard, who joined him on the campaign trail in Leichhardt during the penultimate week of campaigning. "I learnt a lot about politics (from him)," he said.