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We may not yet have a date to fill the member for Hinchinbrook’s seat in parliament, which was vacated this week. But the government’s campaign began almost instantly.
Within hours of former Katter’s Australian Party MP Nick Dametto making good on plans to contest the next month’s Townsville mayor byelection, Premier David Crisafulli was setting the frame.
“Byelections are very tough for governments,” he offered in response to a question time slow-ball from his own backbench. “There is no doubt about that, particularly when you do not hold the seat.
Queensland Premier David Crisafulli pictured in parliament earlier this year.Credit: Jamila Filippone
“But we will show up. We will give people a chance to vote and display their values. They will have an opportunity to vote for all political parties. That is the way it should be.”
And they will – despite Crisafulli suggesting that Labor’s slowness to pick a candidate means they won’t have one to field by polling day.
Crisafulli was also keen to set the vote as a test for Opposition Leader Steven Miles, somebody he said north Queenslanders had “seen right through”.
“He knows his record and he knows his leadership is hanging by a thread.”
Whether held by a thread or not, Miles’ leadership was in the government’s sights this week.
And there was no shortage of kindling: from clumsy deleted social media posts, breathlessly claimed to be inciting “insurrection”, to allegations of misconduct in Queensland’s container refund scheme.
Miles, for his part, has confirmed Labor will run, but insisted the race would not be a good measure of its broader popularity. The party haemorrhaged regional seats when it was defeated last October, and hasn’t held Hinchinbrook since 1957.
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Combined with Miles’ personal and preferred premier ratings still leaving much to be desired in new polling for this masthead this week, he may be hoping any poor byelection result is not representative.
But Crisafulli will also be hoping large recent shifts in his party’s polled primary vote support similarly don’t carry across in a seat he was born and raised in.
Byelection swings, at least at a federal level, often go against the government of the day. The two out-of-cycle state votes during the last state parliament did too.
Wasting no time, the LNP announced on Wednesday it would run Ingham-born Wayde Chiesa, a business operator and long-time radio match caller for North Queensland Cowboys NRL games, as its candidate in Hinchinbrook.
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(Crisafulli trumpeted not only Chiesa’s local chops, but the meaty ones his family still sell to Crisafulli’s parents from the local butcher shop they run.)
But the recent three-election Katter hold on the seat by deputy leader Dametto will leave another rich layer of tea leaves to read around the balance of party or personal support from voters.
KAP’s replacement candidate, the former Labor-aligned Townsville deputy mayor Mark Molachino, will find out how easily that public backing translates.
Deputy Premier Jarrod Bleijie was already wielding Molachino’s background in parliament on Wednesday to suggest, without citing evidence, that he would “jump ship” to the Labor benches if elected.
“I have heard this,” Bleijie declared. “If you vote for the Katter Party candidate in Hinchinbrook then you get the Labor Party.”
Strap in.
Catch up
- On the heels of his long-awaited energy plan reveal earlier this month, Treasurer David Janetzki introduced a bill on Thursday to put relevant parts of it in motion. Among the changes? A long-promised repeal of the former Labor government’s renewable energy targets.
Heads up
- Parliament will return for its next three-day sitting on October 28. Expect plenty of reflection on the year that has been since the 2024 election between now and then – from both sides.
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