Queensland’s phantasmagorical election circus

In a single chamber parliament with 93 members the magic number is 47 with preferential voting compulsory. Currently the party balance is Labor 48, LNP 38, KAP (Katter) 3, Greens 1, PHON (Pauline Hanson’s One Nation) 1, Independent 1, and FNQ (Far North Qld) 1.

The FNQ (Whitsunday) member was elected as LNP in 2017. The member Jason Costigan:

    was expelled from the LNP in February 2019 over sexual harassment claims, first aired in Parliament, that were later withdrawn. The LNP did not reverse the expulsion and Costigan formed North Queensland First.

So if Labor lose two they lose their majority, a swing of 0.7% would do it; the LNP need to pick up nine to govern in their own right, a swing of 3.4%.

Across the board swings have limited relevance, because, as the ABC’s excellent election preview says:

The multi-party complexity of Queensland politics was revealed by the 2017 result. Only 65 of the state’s 93 seats finished as traditional two-party preferred contests between Labor and the LNP.

    There were 21 contests where One Nation finished in the top two after preferences, eight in contests versus the LNP and 13 versus Labor. One Nation’s Stephen Andrew won Mirani on LNP preferences. Katter’s Australian Party finished in the top two after preferences in four seats winning three, and the Greens in two seats winning one. Independent Sandy Bolton took Noosa from the LNP. With six crossbench members plus Jason Costigan, it is possible the 2020 election will produce an inconclusive result and who forms government will be a process of negotiation.

Looking at the minor parties, all have excellent chances of improving their representation, so the most likely outcome is thought to be a minority LNP or Labor government.

Katter’s three seats, which are very safe, were won on 2.32% of the overall vote. Their territory is Mt Isa and just north of Townsville, but could conceivably make gains in central Qld. They only contest where they think they have a chance, contesting only 10 seats in 2017.

Contrast this with PHON who contested 63, gained 13.73 of the overall vote, but won only one seat. They may have more luck this time, but a YouGov poll published in the Courier Mail on 6 October sees their vote slipping to 9%.

The Greens only landed one seat from 10% of the overall vote. YouGov has them at 12%. Since their vote in Qld is concentrated in the gentrifying inner city areas they look like breaking through in a few seats, so that Michael Birkman will no longer be doing it alone.

There was talk of seven Greens. The best chances are South Brisbane where the LNP are likely to come third. Their policy is to put Labor last on preferences, which seems specially designed to give Jackie Trad the flick.

Next best chance is McConnel, where the Greens could do a Maiwar, where Michael Birkman edged 78 votes ahead on Ali King, a very good quality Labor candidate, by 78 votes on a 7.4% swing, then won on Labor preferences.

Just going on letter box drops and visual signs, The Greens seem to be outspending Labor and the LNP by about an order of magnitude. Here’s an image of a corflute just down the road from us on the border of Cooper and Maiwar:

In Cooper and Maiwar there have been Greens corflutes everywhere on the main roads – two different big ones with different messaging, three or four versions of the smaller ones. Labor and LNP corflutes are a bit hard to find.

The letterbox material mainly targets Labor, like:

    Hey Labor,

    Don’t freeze teachers’ and nurses’ wages, Tax mining corporations instead.

On the other side they tell us there should be more for Queenslanders and less for mining billionaires. They are looking to treble mining royalties to raise an extra $55 billion for essential services and infrastructure.

Speaking of signs, this one is is being used by the Labor member for Mackay:

I think that is 18 new mines since 2015, to make 57 now. Unions are part of Labor historically, and some of them are existentially attached to coal. It doesn’t sit well with people inside Labor who understand something of climate change. I’ll say more about that the other day.

Antony Green’s preview shows Labor in trend decline:

This one from his piece shows that in 2017 the Greens broke through their previous ceiling of about 8.4% top reach 10%:

However, Newspoll published today shows Labor on 37%, LNP on 36%, the Greens on 11% and PHON dropping back from 13.7% to 10%.

However, it is still a contest that will be decided by the stories of about 20 seats.

A few generalisations are possible.

Paul Williams, the ‘go to’ political scientist for the ABC said at the outset that there were three main issues, firstly, COVID, secondly, economic recovery after COVID, and thirdly, youth crime in Townsville, where there are three Labor seats on small margins. He thought Labor was ahead on the first two (Campbell Newman really trashed the LNP’s record on economic management, and Frecklington was his assistant minister), but Labor could lose it’s majority in Townsville.

That is all still true, but he has since said that all the provincial seats from Gympie north (that is, north of the Sunshine Coast) apart from perhaps Mackay, are volatile.

It has also become evident that several seats in the Southeast with high numbers of retirees, like Pumicetone (Bribie Island and nearby) could go Labor.

As an aside Labor, has an excellent candidate in Ali King in Pumicetone, who was beaten by a handful of votes by Michael Birkman in Maiwar in 2017, then moved north.

Then, the Greens look certainties in South Brisbane and are looking good in McConnel (CBD, Newfarm and inner northside). Our seat of Cooper is also in play, following the unexpected retirement of Kate Jones.

Palmer United Party will get no seats, he knows that, but has run candidates everywhere so that he can attack Labor in his advertising. The big lie is that Labor “could” introduce a death tax, so we need to boot them out on the off chance they might. Opinion is that he could not run those ads in SA or the ACT, who have decent truth in advertising laws.

It may be worth a point or two here or there, and that could make the difference.

So anything could happen, but it’s looking like a hung parliament. The LNP can only look to KAP and One Nation.

Labor, I think will not do a deal with the Greens, because Michael Birkman says his top priority is to soak the miners.

Robbie Katter said his priorities were (1) water storage (2) mining (3) biofuels and (4) social issues, which includes opposition to voluntary dying legislation promised by Labor.

The first two are problematic for Labor and are likely to be diabolical for the Greens.

So a minority Labor government would be left without a promise of confidence or supply, having to negotiate individually on every piece of legislation.

Highlights

To start with the Greens, minor parties have trouble in gaining media attention. The only thing I heard from Michael Birkman on the airwaves is that school children should have free breakfast and lunch. It seems that because Frydenberg and Morrison have deemed poverty a necessity we can’t do without:

    20% of children start the school day without eating breakfast, while 15% of kids will arrive at school without lunch.

If he succeeds in getting something done about it he will have earned his keep in parliament. In the campaign it grabbed attention for a few hours. The Greens policies are here.

If they get a boost to public housing, it would also be good.

The LNP started with saying the would build a rocket launching facility at Bowen, then ran into a factory on the Gold Coast where they said they would build a rocket. “We can’t send these rockets to Cape Canaveral!”

Then it was a four lane highway all the way to Cairns, above flooding rivers and flood plains, and bypassing cities. It’s just that they aren’t going to spend anything much at all in the next four years apart from a feasibility study.

This was followed by a new Bradfield Scheme:

    To drought-proof Queensland and plan for the future, an LNP Government will partner with CSIRO to make the New Bradfield Scheme a key economic driver that helps build a stronger economy and drag Queensland out of recession.

    The New Bradfield Scheme is a visionary project that will deliver water security, transform our regional economies, boost renewable hydroelectric power, reduce carbon emissions from new vegetation growth and limit nutrient runoff into the Great Barrier Reef.

I think they are talking about the Hells Gate Dam proposal on the Upper Burdekin, which KAP want as a water supply to Townsville.

Put a bunch of engineers and agricultural scientists in a room for a few days, and they will tell you it can’t be done. The Palaszczuk government signed off on a feasibility study in July 2019. The Queensland Conservation Council have taken a look.

It’s not needed for water, it would struggle to make money out of crops and most importantly the environmental impacts will be profound. That’s without lifting the water into five or six river basins to “drought proof” Queensland.

Then Frecklington and Morrison ran into a Metallwerk factory, which Palaszczuk had opened in February, for photo ops driving around in serious armoured vehicles made in Queensland, saying we are going to make things in Queensland.

Over four weeks money and all good things were showered upon the electorate. I’m not sure anyone with a brain takes them seriously.

There election promises are here, highlighting the $300 rego rebate to all drivers as a Christmas present, costing a mere $1.1 billion.

Labor did a really good job of presenting its policies on the net in 2017. This time not so good. I could not find them by Googling of from Labor’s site. They are here under Palaszczuk’s Labor site, I think in the order they were announced.

As far as I can make out, there is about $6 billion in development, and $4 billion of borrowing. It includes $600 million to buy 20 new trains, a ‘second Bruce Highway’, a highway up from Mungindi (south of Goondiwindi) straight up the middle to Charters Towers, seven satellite hospitals across Southeast Queensland and lots of just about everything.

It doesn’t sound like a complete transformation, or a new portal for a different future, but if you want to move into the future you have to start from where you are.

Time is up, I’ll post this and watch the TV to see how it all turns out.

I was one of about a third of us who left there voting until today. As usual it was in a commodious school hall, built after a different emergency, plenty of room for spacing. To the right was the oval with kids palying cricket, about a dozen parents yakking under the pergola. Not a mask in sight anywhere.

Our neighbour can’t get his new pool rendered because the people who do these things are too busy. Real estate agents are saying that southerners are buying houses here sight unseen. They can’t get enough stock to meet the market.

Queensland is not closed down as the headline on the Oz would have it. Still I’m wondering whether Antony Green will be here in person. I believe he lives in Surry Hills.

25 thoughts on “Queensland’s phantasmagorical election circus”

  1. I haven’t proofread the last part of this. Will take a look later and probably replace the photo up at the top.

  2. I wrote a longish comment, then lost the lot.

    What a night!

    See Three-peat! Palaszczuk to claim third term for Labor.

    Palaszczuk will become a Labor legend.

    Labor’s vote has increased to 39.6%, with gains pretty much right up the coast.

    There are is a Green wave happening in selective places, although the Green vote was down a bit overall.

    Pauline Hansen’s One Nation retained Mirani, but my guess is that he works the seat as an independent.

    You can check individual seats here.

  3. Cooper was interesting for Greens supporters:
    Lab 34.01%
    LNP 32.7%
    Greens 30.6%
    The Greens were quite close to a win and may have got there if they had come in second.

  4. John, I agree with most of what you say.

    On Townsville and the north, the Cairns Labor bloke said crime was not an issue in Cairns. It definitely was in Townsville. Anthony Chisolm (ALP senator) said the curfew/pound campaign was rejected in the sense it didn’t change any votes in net terms. He said it has been tried up there before, and was a disgraceful failure.

    From here I can’t pontificate about way people up there voted the way they did, but I would say there were various crosscurrents.

    Terri Butler in Insiders said bringing Scotty up here for a week was a big mistake, and it may have been.

    The most significant pattern was a move to Labor in the Sunshine Coast and hinterland, where Labor gained Pumistone and Caloundra. However, it was ditto for the Gold Coast and Hinterland without perhaps changing seats. Several are still in play.

    Also north of the Sunny Coast from Hervey Bay to Bundaberg saw a swing to Labor.

    Some of it was definitely COVID, because some older people voted Labor as a reward for keeping them safe. There was more to it, however, part the collapse of One Nation, and I think the LNP with their weird schemes and Tim Mander as shadow treasurer did not inspire on economic management.

    On COVID, Palaszczuk has indeed been leaving to the Chief Health Officer, and Steven Miles as her deputy and Health Minister. Electioneering started a probably about August. Can’t remember exactly, but both sides were out very early glad-handing and getting photo ops in hi-viz gear.

    Miles was also working hard on running the government and preparing for the election, and Jeanette Young seemed to have a blindspot about northern NSW.

    Things haven’t been helped by Qld and southern pollies yelling at us, and not bothering to find out that when an emergency has been declared, then by law the CHO calls the shots. Gladys B still hasn’t understood that, and weighing in during the last few days saying she had talked to Frecklington and if the LNP had been in power the borders would have been open long ago.

    That wasn’t helpful to Frecklington or in any way whatsoever.

  5. On the Greens and the election, Antony Green said this morning that their vote was down slightly overall, roughly the same, but while it was 4.8% in provincial Qld, it was 11.3 in SEQ. That includes the Gold Coast and Sunny Coast. In greater Brisbane it was 16.5 and that was concentrated in half a dozen or so electorates. And once they go Green, he says on the Sydney-Melbourne pattern they stay Green and tend to ‘infect’ the neighboring electorates.

    I think the big factors are gentrification by the upper middle class, who dislike union influence in Labor and are basically with the bosses, plus many of them have green values and know we are stuffing up the environment.

    Then there are the refugees from Labor, again middle class (nurses, teachers and such) or upper middle class who can’t abide new coal mines, fracking gas etc.

    Final approval was given to Adani in June 2019. A royalty holiday was always part of the deal, but announcing it during the election period caused severe angst to many in Labor.

    Ditto for the Olive Downs mine. I remember approval of it in around May 2019, but it was approved again during the election period for phase one, which I think terminates in 2050.

    Not helpful in the leafy suburbs where latte sippers dwell!

    Dennis Atkins has a piece Coming of age for the Greens, but anyone’s guess where other fragments will fall.

    I don’t think he’s right about the One Nation vote. About half of ON voters originally came from Labor, and it’s not surprising that many would return there rather than to the bosses’ party.

    On the Greens he’s on the money, I think.

    On Cooper, the critical thing is who comes second. If the Green gets ahead of the LNP then the Greens win on LNP preferences.

    It turns out that Katinka Winston-Allom works in Larissa Waters office. We think she’s about 24 and in person looks barely that. Kate Jones was on about 40% primary and around double the Greens, so I think she was put in a place filler.

    When Kate Jones pulled out, the Greens realised they had a chance and put in a big effort. Labor’s Jonty Bush is the same age as Kate Jones, lost her sister through domestic violence murder when she was 21, then her dad the same way, was behind the One Punch can Kill campaign, was Young Australian of the Year in 2009, has a masters in criminology and a successful career mainly working on domestic violence and victims of crime. See her Wikipedia entry.

    I’d like to see her in parliament.

    John, what I said earlier about Katinka W-A was the truth. I did not intend to upset you, although I knew it probably would. My apologies.

    However, we don’t know anything about what Katinka W-A is like now, because she has one of the lightest internet footprints ever. I could not find out what degree she had, what her profession was or where she had worked.

    How do I know now?

    From Antony Green’s preview:

      She attended Bardon State School, Rainworth State School, and Hillbrook Anglican College, and studied government and international relations at Griffith University. She has worked in hospitality, customer service, advertising, and the Queensland Public Service, and is currently the Constituent Liaison Adviser to Senator Larissa Waters.

    There is a similar contest in McConnel. In that case the Green candidate Kirsten Lovejoy has a considerable track record in social issues rather than green, but would make a contribution.

    I’m told that Paul Keating was 24 when he was first elected, but I would not have approved of that at the time.

    More exciting for you may be a look at Moggill where the LNP is on 47.1%, Labor on 28.7 and the Greens on 20.1% with no special effort. In the course of time I think demographics will make the LNP vulnerable, and because Labor preferences flow better to Greens than the reverse it will probably be Green.

  6. Ambi, I wanted to say a bit about Jackie Trad.

    The thing about her husband buying a house in the path of a rad development was so dumb it probably was true. In any case she was exonerated by the CCC.

    Then there was the business of her being accused of interfering with the appointment of a principal of a school.

    She was entirely innocent. The incident was probably cooked up by the LNP. But it killed her career. Frecklington and the LNP have continued the slander and were still claiming she was basically corrupt.

    I was glad to hear last night the Steven Miles took time to doornock for her, and Senator Anthony Chisholm expressed great regret and admiration for her. her worked with her, or she with him, in the ALP office.

    Today on Insiders Terri Butler, who covers the electorate federally, said there was excrement smeared on a sign, another had ‘slut’ written on it, some were stolen, and someone from Extinction Rebellion followed her around.

    The LNP created the smear, then stoked it, then preferenced the Greens above Labor for the first time ever.

    The Greens stood by, although some of them I think are associated with Extinction Rebellion.

    Antony Green said this morning that but for the preferencing deal she may have survived.

    I doubt that, but it’s not a part of our public life that we can take any pride in.

  7. Freckle Beblington was a dud that was the stand in ( woke LNP ) for an anti Palacechook revolt, didn’t happen due to the Covid gift to ALP plus not enough folk care about destroyed economies any more and the death and misery resulting.

    I normally prep for Cyclones alone, now I’m seriously concerned that Veneztralia is a real possibility.

  8. Brian: “John, what I said earlier about Katinka W-A was the truth. I did not intend to upset you, although I knew it probably would. My apologies.” Wasn’t upset but not impressed your idea that Katinka had no right to run against the holy Kate Jones.
    I suspect that the Greens state vote went down a bit because the Greens decided to really concentrate their expenditure on winnable seats.
    The thing I noticed about Moggill was that the LNP had to go to preferences. See what happens there in the future.

  9. Nice spit Jumpy. What is your take on the collapse of the One Nation Vote?
    Liked “I normally prep for Cyclones alone, now I’m seriously concerned that Veneztralia is a real possibility.” Fortunately we don’t have the oil but I guess our coal exports might have the same effect. Coal exports haven’t helped manufacturing.
    China looks like it will now help Aus by killing our thermal coal exports as punishment for Morrison and to help them meet their 2050 emissions targets.

  10. John, Kate Jones is Labor legend because she knocked off Campbell Newman. She’s not holy – fallible like the rest of us.

    Katinka has every right to run, but from what I knew she did not meet the minimum requirements of being a parliamentarian. Moreover, I had severe cognitive dissonance trying to fit what I had been told of her and what she was telling us.

    And she seemed to be careful not to let the world know very much about her.

    Of course she may have changed growing up. Hillbrook is a good school.

    Anyway, it has been pointed out to me that Labor has been known to run people younger than that in seats they don’t expect to win.

    If she does win, she may turn out to be a star. In the long run. But Antony Green says it’s unlikely, so it’s been an exercise from which we have all learnt a fair bit.

  11. Antony Green’s latest is that Labor has 40.3% of the vote. He has Labor on 49, LNP on 31, 2 Green 1 Independent, 1 KAP and 1 ON.

    Another seat has fallen from LNP to Labor – Hervey Bay on a 11% swing. Who would have thunk it!

    The 6 doubtful include 3 tending to Labor – Bundaberg, Nicklin (includes includes Cooroy, Yandina, Nambour, Woombye, Palmwoods, Mapleton and Kenilworth, inland Sunny Coast) and Cook (FNQ and Torres Strait).

    Cook is sitting Labor. All involve collapsing ON vote.

  12. John, I think some of the boys were coming to get her, even from what they said on Saturday night.

    They are a bit short of good prospects, so we’ll see who turns up.

  13. I saw an article saying the LNP targetted ‘marginal’ Govt seats. In every one of those there was a swing TO the Govt.

    How could the LNP Leader stay on?

  14. Brian: “ACT Labor-Greens governing agreement prioritizes public housing, action on climate change, transport” https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-02/act-labor-green-parliamentary-agreement-climate-change/12837806
    The long term ACT Labor/Greens alliance will continue to deliver the sort of things that you and I could only dream about for Qld (And the rest of Australia.)
    The parties announced their new governing agreement for the next four years today, committing ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr to appointing three Greens to his nine-member ministry.
    The agreement outlines a renewed focus on climate change, planning, housing and transport for the next four years.
    Mr Barr said he looked forward to governing jointly with the Greens, who won a record six seats at the election on October 17.
    “My entire political career has been based upon collaboration, compromise and working with other people to get an outcome,” Mr Barr said.
    ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury said he was glad to have a closer relationship with Labor for the next term.
    “It gives me great confidence that the two groups are building a collaborative relationship for the next four years,” he said.

  15. John, in the single seat system is not conducive to good relations, because The Greens tend to put up impossible dream stuff, and too often win seats by burying Labor.

    When Gillard did a deal with the Greens there was long-term brand damage to Labor.

    Too often the politics is about defeating the Labor candidate.

    In the Qld election I can’t remember anything about climate being said at all. Not even much about renewable energy, because Frecklington was renewable-friendly.

    The latest is that Tim Mander won’t run for a leadership position. Looks like David Crisafulli.

    It is said that he upset a lot of mayors as a minister for local government in the Campbell Newman years.

  16. Brian: “John, in the single seat system is not conducive to good relations, because The Greens tend to put up impossible dream stuff, and too often win seats by burying Labor.”
    You can hardly be surprised that the Greens weren’t all that enthusiastic about a Labor party that was boasting about how many coal mines it had approved in recent years.
    When Bob Brown was leader I saw the role of the Greens as “redefining reasonable.” It did this by presenting an extreme position well beyond reasonable.
    I would also point out that the Greens are better placed than Labor to beat the LNP in places where voters like the environment but don’t like unions.
    The very effective long term Labor/Green alliance in the ACT shows what is possible.

  17. John, yes we know it’s easier for Greens to knock off LNP seats. I think I said that upthread.

    I’d query your assertion that Labor was boasting about coal. I didn’t hear Palaszczuk say anything about coal. There was a candidate in Mackay that highlighted coal, but I only knew that because Labor people were complaining about it to each other on Facebook.

    I eventually found the this page apparently posted before the campaign period, which links to COVID-19 Fiscal and Economic Review and Unite and Recover: Queensland Economic Recovery Plan, the latter worth $7 billion.

    The latter seems to be referred to as the Queensland Economic Recovery Plan. I gather it is additional to normal funding but it’s not clear to me how much is re-targetted, and whether there is more. The special Renewable Energy fund of half a billion or so appears to be additional and off-budget.

    In the Queensland Economic Recovery Plan there is a short section about $5 million to study a Bowen Basin gas pipeline on page 40, and a few paragraphs about resources on page 54. The document and indeed the election was pretty much coal and climate free.

    I can’t comment on those documents, because I’ve only had time to skim them.

    My beef is that climate was not highlighted by the Greens. They were concentrating on utopian visions of gold dust being sprinkled from trebling royalties etc from mining, and soaking the big banks. Neither of these was ever going to happen.

    If Labor didn’t win seats in the regions the LNP would rule, and the Greens would be irrelevant. It’s hard graft winning those seats, where the Greens average less than 5 per cent.

    Meanwhile, I’ll need to say more about climate policy. The Greens appear to have based theirs on IPCC thinking, as modified by the thought of one retired scientist, namely Will Steffen.

    Steffen actually knows better than he is saying about the inadequacy of the IPCC thinking. By adopting what he says, the Greens have been a bit lazy and convenient IMHO, as it comes up short on climate risk and what really needs to be done for safe climate, accepting something just short of Armageddon as the best we can aspire to.

    What Labor is up to is also problematic, especially on the need to close down coal-fired power stations before they are worn out, and on gas.

    Somebody in politics should be out there telling it like it is, and it’s not happening. Not Zali Steggall either, from what I’ve seen so far, although her call for the establishment of an independent Climate Change Commission, along the lines of the Labor Gillard government’s Climate Change Authority, might be the best we can manage politically.

  18. “I’d query your assertion that Labor was boasting about coal. I didn’t hear Palaszczuk say anything about coal. There was a candidate in Mackay that highlighted coal, but I only knew that because Labor people were complaining about it to each other on Facebook.” I saw pictures of the posters and the ALP didn’t speak up and say that the poster was not true. (Somebody would have done the approvals while Labor is in power.) I think I am right in asserting that Labor has made royalty concessions to people like Adani.
    The 5 Green Lord Mayors in NSW seem to be able to run councils successfully and the ACT has had its Labor/Greens government in charge for 4 terms. I think it is unreasonable to expect the Greens to not run in Labor seats.

  19. John, I want to get back to finishing a new post, but would be interested in how you were going to finish the sentence.

    On the poster, the Mackay poster in the post above seems to have been authorised by the local branch.

    Have you seen other posters? I haven’t.

    I read yesterday in a new Quarterly Essay by Judith Brett that Adani’s approval dates from Greg Hunt and Tony Abbott in 2015. Qld had to sign off in various ways, finally environmentally by the Environment Department acting as an independent EPA-style arbiter.

    That was never a satisfactory methodology, and many within Labor oppose it.

    Another country burning our coal has never been a reason for our governments to reject coal mining. A big part of the LEAN push before the 2019 election was (I believe, it was before I joined) to alter our 20th century environmental law, which takes no account of climate impacts.

    Royalties, as you would know, are not based on profit, more like on volume. So an arrangement to defer payment until they make some money (I think that is what is going on here, not a concession) is not all that unusual.

    That’s according to the state of my imperfect knowledge.

  20. John, and everyone, here’s some actual research – Labor politicians need not fear: Queenslanders are no more attached to coal than the rest of Australia. According to the 2019 national survey, the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems:

      46% of Australians supported the construction of new coal mines, and 52% were against.

      On average, people who favoured new coal mines tended to be Coalition supporters, less likely to have a tertiary education, more likely to be men than women and were older than average. In contrast, those who accept that human-driven climate change is occurring tend to be tertiary-educated Greens or Labor supporters. They are more likely to be women than men and are younger than average.

      Support for new coal mines declined as interest in politics increased in NSW and Victoria. Yet in Queensland and (to a lesser extent) Western Australia, the pattern was very different. In these so-called “mining states”, support for new coal mines increased with political interest.

      What’s more, as interest in politics increased among Labor identifiers, support for new coal mines decreased. However as political interest increased among Coalition identifiers, support for new mines increased.

    Also:

      The Queensland state election campaign has been dominated by the issues of economic recovery, job creation and infrastructure. Early in the campaign, the Palaszczuk government signed off on a new metallurgical coal mine in the Bowen Basin, further affirming its support for Queensland’s resources industry. Climate action, and the need to move away from coal, has been mentioned in the campaign, but it’s not at the fore.

    The “mention” appeared to be Queensland transition to renewables would generate almost 10,000 jobs, analysis shows:

      Queensland’s environment minister, Leeanne Enoch, told an environment forum that a re-elected Palaszczuk government would develop a climate action plan to set out how the state would meet its targets on lowering greenhouse gas emissions up to 2030.

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