Diaries reveal the meetings LNP frontbenchers had before they took power

Earlier this year, the state Labor government was on a tear. Still having the numbers in parliament, it changed rules to force LNP shadow cabinet members to open their diaries to the public.

While such transparency was previously only required of the opposition leader, Labor wanted to focus as much election-year sunlight on David Crisafulli and his team as possible.

And any inconsistencies between what the frontbenchers declared in their diaries, and the details logged by lobbyists on behalf of paying clients, only gave Labor extra ammo.

The nature of lobbyists efforts to act as a bridge to government or opposition figures for paying clients often sees key firms’ cash head the way of the governing party – or the one bound for it.Credit: Matt Dennien

As a result of the rule changes, we now have a trove of detail about who the conservatives gave their time to in the months before the election, providing insight into the background work done by new government ministers.

So, having already analysed the former Labor government’s ministerial meet and greets last year, what can we glean?

Here’s a table we’ve prepared of the top 50-ish people with the most entries in the LNP diaries, crunched using this database.

Of the 56 individuals Brisbane Times has tallied with more than five appearances in the opposition diaries, 11 are registered lobbyists.

(That figure is higher again if you account for folks in “government relations” and other such roles at companies and organisations, who are often considered “in-house” lobbyists but not regulated as such.)

Nine individuals were mayors, council chief executives or the boss of the Local Government Association of Queensland. A further eight were energy or mining sector figures.

Top billing went to Geraldine Mitchell, a director with lobbying firm Govstrat and a former senior media adviser to Crisafulli during the first half of his term as opposition leader.

Contacted for comment about the detail, Govstrat managing director Damian Power (a former state Labor Party official who also appears further down the list) said the firm took a bipartisan approach.

“Geraldine is a valued member of the Govstrat team and brings a wealth of experience in media, corporate affairs and government,” he wrote in an email.

The firm counts mining giant Rio Tinto among its long-term paying clients. Developer John Holland (June) and charity Mission Australia (this month) are more recent additions to the roster.

Govstrat had been much more consistent contributors to Labor since the 2020 election, largely via the party’s business membership scheme, until that flipped the LNP’s way this year.

The nature of lobbyists’ efforts to act as a bridge to government or opposition figures for paying clients often sees key firms’ cash head the way of the governing party – or, in the case of the LNP, the one set to take power.

In a real changing of the guards from Labor’s last term, all other lobbying firms featuring on the list now contribute money almost exclusively to the LNP.

Companies represented by these firms include Sportsbet, Bunnings, Coal Australia (which tipped significant cash into third-party anti-Labor election campaigns), Glencore, Star, and Cleanaway.

Contact logs show a flurry of activity since the election – including efforts to arrange meetings on behalf of Glencore (previously a Labor-aligned Anacta client) and Rio Tinto.

With the new government set to reopen or cast wider for its pipeline of looming infrastructure tenders, committing to consult more with the mining sector, and work with the private sector to deliver yet-to-be detailed “smaller more manageable” pumped hydro plans, expect a lot more.

Heads up

• Queensland’s 58th Parliament will kick off on Tuesday with a swearing in of all 93 MPs and election of Speaker-to-be Pat Weir before he takes a trip up to meet Governor Jeannette Young, who will then open the new parliament on Wednesday in formalities including a 19-gun salute from Kangaroo Point.
• After all that’s done with, the parliament will get to work on Thursday – when the new LNP government will introduce its “Making Queensland Safer Laws” set to be considered by a government-controlled committee process, debated and voted through in the second sitting week scheduled for December 10-12.

Catch up

• Speaking of parliamentary committees, readers may recall recent suggestions Queensland needed one to handle looming seat redistributions, changes to voting laws and other relatively uncool but actually important elements of our democratic system in a more bipartisan way. An open letter has been prepared by some knowledgeable folks calling for just that. Whether it is a priority is another thing (word is the response rate among MPs and parties has been ... low).
• The ministerial charter letters Crisafulli talked up on the campaign trail as an accountability measure are out in the wild now (though were released late on a Friday and have had their accountability element questioned by one academic). One curious element among them is that, with all the emphasis on major projects being delivered on time and budget under the LNP, the only minister with a relevant “deliverable” is Transport Minister Brent Mickelberg, but seemingly only for “transport project election commitments”.

Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.