George Street Beat: Qld politics news and gossip

Campbell Newman hasn’t had much to do with his former treasurer lately, but that’s all about to change. THIS IS GEORGE STREET BEAT

Then premier Campbell Newman (front) and treasurer Tim Nicholls in 2014

The LNP’s former premier Campbell Newman has little to do with Tim Nicholls, the man who sat alongside him as treasurer for three years from 2012.

Now, Mr Newman’s Libertarian Party will run its only state election candidate in Mr Nicholls’ Brisbane seat of Clayfield.

The former premier had teased he would personally run against his former money man in the seat Mr Nicholls holds over Labor by 1.5 per cent, but in the end the party went for 45-year-old real estate entrepreneur and family man Nick Buick.

Along with the usual platform of freedom and individual responsibility, Mr Buick has pledged to “fight with every fibre” to build the $6bn, 60,000-seat Olympic Games stadium at Hamilton North Shore.

He is also campaigning against a Greens’ proposal to turn the Eagle Farm and Doomben Racecourses into government-subsidised social housing.

Mr Buick labelled it “vindictive class-warfare and social engineering by radical left-wing extremists”.

LNP candidate for Mount Ommaney, Lisa Baillie. Picture: Facebook

FAILING TO ‘TOW’ THE LINE

The LNP’s Mt Ommaney candidate Lisa Baillie seems to find herself skirting outside the boundaries a little too often.

As previously revealed by GSB, Ms Baillie had somehow ended up in an entirely wrong electorate while door knocking a few months ago.

GSB’s cyber sleuths have now uncovered another error – one that could potentially land the vehicle owner a fine.

Ms Baillie posted a series of photos to Facebook last week declaring there were just “35 days ‘til you can show Labor the door in 2024’.

It included a picture of a trailer with a large corflute on the back.

The issue? The trailer is unregistered.

A quick check of TMR’s databases revealed, indeed, it hasn’t been registered for three months.

There’s really no excuse, especially since rego fees – including on trailers – are now 20 per cent off as part of Premier Steven Miles’s pre-election cost-of-living sweeteners.

STOLEN SLOGAN?

Katter’s Australian Party sentiment has spread from the tip top of the state right down to the Gold Coast before landing in the lap of the LNP.

LNP’s biggest election gem, “adult crime, adult time,” was first coined by Katter MP Shane Knuth in a 2023 media statement after an elderly Innisfail man was stabbed to death by a teenager.

“Enough is enough, adult crime deserves adult time,” Knuth said.

If that wasn’t enough to convince team blue, the phrase came gift-wrapped a second time, straight from Marcelo Alcantara’s testimony during the victims-of-crime public inquiry.

It was February 22, months before the LNP’s crime policy launch and Mr Alcantara, still reeling from his own experience as a theft victim, was trying to give honest feedback on how to make communities safer.

Funnily enough, it was Labor MP Aaron Harper who interrupted him to clarify whether he was asking for longer sentences for repeat offenders.

Mr Alacantara’s response became the LNP’s proud policy centrepiece: “Minimum sentencing. For example, adult time for adult crime,” he said.

And just like that, the LNP had its tough-on-crime slogan handed to them on a silver platter.

A stunning act of political pilfering we’re sure they don’t regret.

BATTLE FOR THE NORTH

The rift had been growing but relations between the Katter’s Australian Party and One Nation has hit an all-time low, amid accusations so inflammatory the Kings of the North are considering legal action.

One Nation, including its Mirani candidate Brettlyn Neal, posted to Facebook claiming “distressing content” of Premier Steven Miles “courting” the KAP to join forces in the event of a minority government.

This information is hardly new, as chronicled in this column particularly, that Mr Miles has been doing his best to curry favour with the KAP — though leader Robbie Katter has made clear they plan to stretch out all negotiations with either major party in order to get the best deal for the North.

But the most egregious claim, according to the KAP, was the allegation they had provided confidence and supply to Labor in 2015 (Spoiler: this didn’t happen).

It’s understood Mr Katter was so incensed at One Nation’s shot across the bow he was ringing legal minds on Friday seeking advice on how to pursue the matter further.

LNP COASTING

Premier Steven Miles might have slipped this week when attempted to defend Labor’s effort to represent regional Queensland.

Speaking in Townsville, Mr Miles declared: “The LNP is the party of the Gold and Sunshine Coast, the Labor Party is the party of the north.”

Member for Gaven Meaghan Scanlon. Picture: Annette Dew

We get his intention might have been good, but it’s probably going to do little to help Labor’s last remaining Gold Coast member and likely future leader Meaghan Scanlon and its Sunshine Coast MPs Jason Hunt and Rob Skelton.

SOUTHERN PRINTERS

We believed Katter’s Australian Party were the party for the north, but GSB came across a little nugget that reveals cash remains king.

These patriotic northerners got some of their election signage printed in north Queensland, but some was also done at Sunshine Coast’s Link Signs.

KAP MP Nick Dametto reveals why the party headed south to print some election material. . Picture: Nigel Hallett

With the Katter’s pushing for the state to be split in two, printing signs on the Sunny Coast would be like the premier turning to New South Wales for campaign material.

KAP MP Nick Dametto told us while the party’s MPs had printed some material in their electorates, it was a financial decision with Sunshine Coast so much cheaper.

With Labor’s election donation laws hurting, Mr Dametto said the party simply needed to watch its wallet.

GET OUT OF SYDNEY

Staying on the geographic theme, Member for Keppel Brittany Lauga was having none of the media’s reporting about unmotivated Labor’s regional pollies putting their feet up and waiting to be defeated on October 26.

Member for Keppel Brittany Lauga.

She attacked The Australian and its established Queensland Press Gallery reporter for writing the story, which was not disputed by the Labor Party.

That didn’t stop Ms Lauga: “The Australian might sit in their Sydney offices and have a perspective about regional Queensland but I’d invite them to come up”.

For the record, The Australian’s Queensland bureau is based at Bowen Hills.

ODD PLACEMENT

Greens candidate for the inner-west Brisbane seat of Cooper, Katinka Winston-Allom, has raised a laugh among long-time residents of Ashgrove and The Gap.

She has secured a spot for a beaming head-and-shoulders ad on a prime-position billboard on Waterworks Rd.

Greens candidate for the westside seat of Cooper Katinka Winston – Allom

Problem is, the billboard is on top of a shop which until recent times sold guns and ammo and was repeatedly graffitied by local anti-gun activists over the years.

The spot has previously been snapped up by LNP pollies including former federal member for Ryan Julian Simmonds, who was ousted by the Greens’ Elizabeth Watson-Brown.

Originally published as George Street Beat: Qld politics news and gossip