Queensland 2024

Labor currently hold a six seat majority. The polls have this being a very even race at present, but slightly favouring the LNP. Palazczuk has a very mixed satisfaction rating in polls, but also is preferred Premier because many still don’t know who Crisafulli is.

Labor are currently getting pilloried in the media for their supposed laxity on youth crime, which will no doubt be a major focus of LNP campaign rhetoric, and will likely result in a race to the bottom on the issue as Labor try their best to appear tough on crime to the electorate. This may help them in some of the marginal seats, especially in the regions, but I don’t think it will be enough to win many seats or sandbag all their current marginals.

If there are no big suprises leading up the election, I see the LNP being able to win Bundaberg, Nicklin, Hervey Bay, Townsville, Thuringowa, Mundingburra, while potentially losing Coomera to Labor due to the huge influx of young families. I also see the Greens picking up McConnel and possibly Cooper, and coming close but falling short in Greenslopes and Moggill. They may even be able to give Mark Bailey a scare in Miller, as he is liked by Labor supporters but hated by many others.

Suppose all those changes happened but with Cooper remaining with Labor. They would be reduced to 46 seats, one short of a majority. Given the government’s record of antipathy towards the Greens, they’d likely instead try to negotiate with Sandy Bolton or even the Katters to stay in power. If Cooper did fall, that means they would definitely need either the Greens or the Katters (or Bolton plus One Nation, but the optics of allying with One Nation would hurt Labor severely in Brisbane at the 2028 election).

What would the odds be of Palaszczuk facing an internal coup if the polls continue to favour the LNP? it could refresh Labor’s rather tired image and give them a better shot at retaining majority government. They’d need to choose the right replacement though. I can see Shannon Fentiman being received better by the public than Steven Miles.

Bolton is a progressive independent/teal. Noosa was the Greens best prospect in Queensland but they dropped the ball. I think she’ll be Labor’s first choice to get confidence and supply, then the Katters.

Ultimately I think QLD Labor would take the Greens confidence and supply, but it will be messy and neither party will miss an opportunity to sledge the other. If Stephen Andrew quits PHON and retains Labor would rather work with him than Greens.

I could see the spectre of Greens in balance of power making life hard for Labor north of Noosa. Labor can potentially maintain all their Brisbane seats (even McConnell and Cooper) but they’ll need to convince Townsville, Keppel and Mackay they can do that.

To signal that, Labor may go nuclear and preference the LNP over the Greens. This would potentially make the Greens spoiler candidates in some seats, and risk blue Maiwar. Greens would potentially pull out of Labor held Brisbane seats freeing up capacity to sandbag the north.

It could also backfire horribly on Labor’s volunteer base and voter perceptions in other Brisbane marginals, and cut off any chances of getting Clayfield and Moggill out of the blue column.

I don’t think that will happen. But Greens really need to actually try in Fadden and put forth credible cases that they take votes and seats off both parties, because Labor could go fully hostile.

When they accuse Greens of doing preference deals with the LNP (actual deals, not just receive preferences), it can seem like covering fire for the notion Labor may do that. Accusations from the (relative) right are often confessions.

There is no way on earth the Greens would pull out of Labor-held Brisbane seats. Three of their best opportunities for gains fall into that category. Labor will eventually have to choose which front they want to defend most, because they won’t be able to spend their party resources everywhere. I think the smarter move would be to focus on the regional cities and let inner Brisbane go, because like them or not, the Greens will support Labor in a confidence vote and the LNP will not. That’s also a very good reason for Labor to not preference the LNP above the Greens, even if their support base doesn’t riot over it, which they very well might.

Why exactly do the Greens need to try in Fadden, a federal seat where their primary vote is nothing remarkable at all, and there is no reason to think it would be a good prospect anytime remotely soon?

The KAP MPs are these days fairly indistinguishable from One Nation in rhetoric and focus – they’re much more invested in conservative culture war issues than Katter is federally. I do not think Labor would find them easy to work with at all. Despite whatever tensions exist between the parties, a Labor minority government would still find it easiest to work with the Greens for most legislation, occasionally having to rely on the LNP, KAP, or whoever else for anything more right-wing they want to do that the Greens do not support.

Wilson – Labor could go nuclear on any winnable seat that involves pushing Labor into 3rd on primaries (most of them – all 3 federal QLD seats and Maiwar were won this way) by preferencing the LNP. This would put otherwise unwinnable LNP seats like McConnel and Cooper into play.

Greens stood aside in Doboy ward 2020 to give Labor a clean run at it under OPV. It didn’t work but that’s precedent for Greens standing aside. There are no statewide races in QLD state elections so no harm in Greens not running a full ticket.

We saw confirmation that UK Labour’s right faction sabotaged the party in 2017 to prevent Jeremy Corbyn becoming PM. I would not put it past QLD Labor to prefer losing to the LNP over governing with Greens if they see a 2012 style wipeout happening on the other side – not that Labor aren’t capable of getting those results all by themselves.

It’s easy to manage the optics – Labor could literally test the house and show that an LNP government is dead on arrival and a Labor one isn’t. But the antipathy is high.

@Babalumba – the Greens have intentionally been exclusively targeting ALP held seats for doorknocking to pressure Labor over housing.

They need to show that they can still sway LNP voters. The Gold Coast has potential – renters and an URBAN demographic that has historically voted Liberal. Greens get in the high teens in other parts of the GC. Potentially untapped “teal” territory. Before the teals emerged there was speculation Greens may win those seats some day and Greens win historically safe Liberal Ryan. Maybe this will still happen depending on what teals do long term.

If Labor sees Greens as exclusively a threat to them and only them, they could smother them in the crib. FWIW I disagree with this perception. If the Greens didn’t exist I imagine gentrifying areas would have started trending towards the LNP instead of going Green – they’d look more like the centre of Adelaide (marginal) than Melbourne. Maybe the teals would be that threat? But alternate histories are never good arguments.

The Katters are a soft touch compared to the Greens in BOP situations. They would be an effective shield for Labor to hide behind on things their voters want and their donors don’t. They worked together well enough in 2015-2017.

The optics of them working with the Greens over the North Queensland identity party would make life hard for them in a bunch of seats Labor count on North of Noosa.

John, given how Doboy went for Labor in 2020, I don’t think the Greens are keen to repeat the experience. It only made any sense at all because BCC operates under optional preferential voting, whereas state elections have compulsory preferential voting, so there is little benefit in the Greens standing aside a state seat. Also, BCC Labor are much more willing to play ball with the Greens than state Labor are, perhaps because they’ve been out of power for 20 years now, whereas state Labor are the usual party of government.

So again, there is no way on earth the Greens will stand aside in any seat they have a hope of winning, regardless of which party is incumbent. Even in seats where they don’t have a hope of winning, the Greens run a candidate pretty much everywhere in every election.

If Labor are that consumed by hatred for the Greens that they’d sabotage their own chances of retaining government, I’d question the sanity of their leadership. Corbyn was leading the Labor Party and would have been Prime Minister. The Greens are not going to be leading any sort of minority government and will not supply the Premier. The comparison isn’t a good one in my opinion.

Your average ALP politician probably does hate the Greens more than the Liberal Party, but they like their own personal job security even more, and a ‘nuclear option’ would be as politically suicidal as it sounds. And not just for Qld Labor either.

@Wilson they stood aside in Doboy because of the spoiler risk. Labor, if they wanted to, could make the Greens a spoiler through HTVs. I can imagine the narrative – “We can’t recommend preferences to the Greens anywhere – it will kill us in North Queensland. So if you don’t want an LNP government, you have to vote Labor.” In that scenario, the Greens may want to step aside to avoid spoiling Cooper and McConnel into the blue column. Looking at Green parties in FPTP countries that happily run anyway, it’s not likely, but Greens being spoiler candidates is a horror scenario for them that always looms in OPV, and could loom in CPV if Labor willed it.

@Furtive While Labor wouldn’t sabotage their government jobs, if they are on track to lose anyway they may want to bring down the Greens with them. Labor tend to treat Liberals like rivals and Greens like enemies. And it does happen – I remember Danby’s dodgy HTVs in 2016.

Anyway I’ve posted enough about that scenario. I suspect the strategy will be more to try convince LNP voters to give their first preferences to Labor to keep the Greens out in those seats where Labor is at risk of coming 3rd to give Greens the win. If libs do come 3rd I think Crisafulli will repeat Frecklington’s decision to preference Greens over ALP, but HTVs are recommendations and not hard preferences so there’s also that. Jonty Bush may survive anyway on personal vote (more likely than with Grace Grace). There are other seats (Miller, Ferny Grove, Greenslopes, Stafford) where Greens could mount a real challenge but Labor won’t need to put too much into sandbagging them at least compared to the aforementioned.

Greens will do well to target Clayfield and Moggill, which sit in federal Green territory and where Labor can’t ever quite make it. They can also potentially help Labor over the line in Everton, Chatsworth and Glass House, and maybe some gold and sunshine coast targets – these are areas that are conventionally marginal where Greens are more likely to help than hurt ALP by association. That could soothe hostilities.

Clayfield is not a particularly good Greens target in the immediate future. It largely overlaps with the federal seat of Brisbane, yes, but that area was easily the strongest for the LNP – the Greens didn’t come close to winning the TPP there. It’s a much worse prospect than Moggill, which I doubt will be won next election but is at least potentially in reach within a few elections.

Even if this ridiculous ‘suicidal Labor decides to put LNP above Greens on its HTV out of spite’ scenario happened I don’t know that Labor voters would follow the HTVs enough to make the LNP win if Labor fell to third in seats like Cooper and McConnel.

Agree Babaluma with respect to Clayfield. Living in that district, I feel it is akin to some parts of the outer Inner West for Sydney (suburbs like Haberfield, Drummoyne and Five Dock) which are quite affluent in nature and tend to back the Liberals rather than the Greens.

Clayfield is very marginal at the state level and comparable to the other LNP held marginals in southeast QLD. It won’t be an easy win but you don’t need much of a swing from right to left to get it out of the blue column. The bigger challenge for Greens will be boosting their primary vs ALP – they don’t yet look like they’re within striking distance but that was before Bates broke through.

In fact Labor only needs another small boost in Southeast QLD to pick up a swag of seats (7 seats on 2.2%), less than what the LNP would need in their direction to get the Townsville 3. Even if you assume a few of the 2020 gains are goners, Labor has quite a few paths to hang on.

John, as I already pointed out above, spoiling isn’t possible in a CPV system because people absolutely must put Labor and the LNP on the ballot in some order to have a valid vote. This scenario you’ve created has a massive logical hole in it and that’s why it would never happen as long as we continue to have CPV voting at state level.

And even if spoiling was possible at the state level, do you honestly believe that if Labor scorned the Greens like that, there would be any chance at all that the Greens would turn right around and fall on their swords to assist Labor? This sounds like the sort of mentality I’ve seen from some Labor members, where they just expect the Greens do to Labor’s bidding, and get annoyed when it becomes clear the Greens have ambitions and an agenda of their own.

I want to leave this thread behind but I feel like I haven’t been clear. @Wilson Labor has high HTV follow rates. I suspect if Labor preferences LNP over Greens on their HTVs that Liberals get about 60% of the ALP preferences at the end of the day (Greens 40%). Not talking about exhaust, but valid ALP 1 LNP 2 GRN 3 votes.

There are also some Tasmanian LC examples of Labor to Liberal preferences over a progressive independent being surprisingly strong (IIRC there are no HTVs in Tasmanian state elections).

Green voters on the other hand don’t consistently follow HTVs and there are several examples of a large contingent of Green voters ignoring the Green HTV and preferencing Labor over the progressive independent the HTV recommended.

It’s clear that many parts of Labor see the LNP as rivals and the Greens as enemies. Not all – Fiona Phillips and Susan Templeman come to mind as ALP MPs that are friendly with Greens, and they’ve benefited from especially high preference flows. Its party hacks and MPs in seats where Greens are strong that most have it in for them. Terri Butler holds the distinction of remaining extremely hostile to Greens even after leaving politics (I think she will try to win Griffith back – she’s Labor’s Sophie Mirabella)

It’s more pronounced in extractive industry states so it could get very ugly in QLD. This election will be a war on all fronts

I don’t want to keep piling on to John and I know he’s getting annoyed with the whole conversation. So I’ll make this my last word on that: If Labor go nuclear in Qld 2024, it *might* make it hard for Greens to retain Maiwar. It probably would make the difference in some where like Clayfield (and Moggill, though I suspect LNP would retain regardless, despite what I said a few days ago).

OTOH, Labor basically have no hope of retaining state government if they do this. They’ll be pilloried for throwing the election and probably permanently tarnish their brand as the natural sensible party of the ‘left’ and ‘centre-left’ government. They won’t be able to hide behind someone like Corbyn. The Greens don’t lead Labor.

And after that? Labor’s opens up the front to complete open warfare at the federal level. They have a slew of marginal seats that rely on Greens preferences flowing to them at rates of >80%. Even a small change to preference flows loses government for them there as well. Despite promising three terms of government and resisting meaningful reforms on the basis that doing anything is too risky, Albo leaves office after one term, having achieved not a whole hell of a lot. ALP’s brand as the party ‘that can win’ is again irrepairably tarnished.

It’s just an insane risk not worth taking. It would be so much worse for Labor than the Greens. It could very well result in Greens, not Labor, emerging from the ashes as the natural party of the ‘Left’.

So enough about that. I think John’s right that the Greens should at least give some priority to Clayfield. If the entire electorate looked like the suburb of Clayfield itself, let alone Ascot and Hendra, I’d probably agree that it’s unwinnable. But it’s marginal, and for good reason. Overall its demographics are pretty favourable to the Greens. The reason Greens haven’t done as well there compared to Moggill is pretty much entirely on the Greens themselves- they selected a POS and right-wing factional warrior for their candidate, who was accused of some very unsavoury treatment towards staff and inevitably went down in flames… but not before deliberately sabotaging what was left of the campaign. I don’t think that’s likely to happen again. Their factional problems are basically over and they’ll be more careful about candidate quality besides.

It’s more a case of convincing erstwhile Labor voters, which is significantly easier than LNP voters- but that’s not impossible either.

WRT the stats in the 2022 election: I volunteered on the Brisbane campaign, and yes my perspective is limited, but it was clear to me even then that the north-east was by far the most under-resourced part of the division. Nonetheless they still managed some decent swings in places like Clayfield- 6% I believe. They essentially matched Labor’s primary vote there without really trying. Suburbs like Lutwyche and Windsor are chock full of young renters – almost half the population across the entire ED- in dense developments, and even Albion, Hamilton and Clayfield are starting to look more like that, despite the palatial estates like on East Adelaide Street. Compare it to Moggill – less than 20% of the electorate there rents. And (courtesy of SEQ) it contains the least number of millennials and the highest proportion of centrist dads. Frankly it’s amazing how well the Greens do there regardless, and it might be winnable in the future. But if there’s an LNP target seat then Clayfield should be it. And I agree that it’s worth it for the Greens to target LNP seats as part of their broader narrative of not just being an ALP protest party.

What I don’t agree with is Greens deliberately standing down in Labor held seats they can conceivably win. That’s absurd imo. We’ll get absolutely no credit for it and relations between the two parties will only deteriorate regardless. Of course they will- the Greens are an existential threat to Labor. That’s what we want.

and the latest joke from Palaszczuk. to rename Brisbane to Meanjin. seriously is anyone planning on voting for her?

potatqes, I wouldn’t believe everything you read on the internet. That story was reported by Peter Gleeson, a disgrace of a journo who was sacked last year for plagiarising stories.

@wilson Plagiarizing stories means copying not making them up. Besides it sounds like something she’d do. She’s desperate.

It was a completely fabricated story by Gleeson, Palaszczuk has denied it and there was no evidence it was true. It didn’t even make sense – one purported detail was that she was negotiating with the Greens over the policy but the state government has no need to negotiate with the Greens over anything.

Potatqes, the point is that Gleeson has no sense of journalistic ethics, so it’s not a stretch that he’d resort to concocting fake news. If he can’t be bothered doing the hard yards of actual journalism, and can’t steal other people’s work any more, the other way for him to keep pumping out stories is to invent them.

Agree Wilson and Babaluma, I haven’t heard any news of this sort on TV or other ‘reliable’ sources (even the Courier Mail, which is a known to be a conservative media outlet). An event of this sort would be headline news on all the major TV stations including ABC, just like when they announced Fraser Island would be renamed Kgari.

AFR/Freshwater Strategy today shows LNP 52% ALP 48% (Primaries are LNP 40%, ALP 34% Greens 11%).
Crisafulli is the preferred Premier but only just. Labor was behind in the polls in 2017 and 2020 but ended up increasing their statewide 2PP and seat count.

I suspect that this will be the next LNP victory, if not in NT. Winning a fourth term is a big ask for a Premier about to clock up ten years. There’s growing baggage associated with Palaszczuk coupled with the ‘it’s time’ factor. Add to that, Labor is fighting the Greens in Brisbane seats.

Labor had surprise wins in 2020 in seats that: are historically non-Labor and have much older demographics in 2020 e.g. Caloundra, Hervey Bay, Nicklin. This was probably because of the hard border during Covid and that was really popular amongst older voters. These will be the first to go in 2024.

Labor won’t lose because of the “Its time” Labor was in power for 14 years of you count the Borbidge stint 1998-2012 or if you don’t count it, all but 2 years since 1989-2012.

And if there is “it’s time” then why isn’t it applying to the government down here in Victoria? Andrews has been premier a few months longer and is riding high in the polls.

The LNP will win actually because the government has failed to tackle youth crime and Albanese being unpopular in Queensland (I don’t buy that Labor is ahead in QLD federally because the polls said this before 2019)

Labor can still win 2024 but if they were to, the crime crisis will only worsen and they will face a landslide defeat in 2028 (but not like 2012) probably more like a Victoria 1992 style defeat (60-65 seats for the conservatives)

I would favour the LNP to win, but I think they are, right now, making the case why Labor SHOULDN’T be in government, but they aren’t yet saying why they ought to be in government. These polls are intriguing me more and more. This Freshwater poll has the highest 2PP of any Queensland poll that I am aware of, but on a statewide swing, the LNP doesn’t gain enough seats for majority government – I think its something like ALP 42 LNP 44. The Greens have to side with Labor, otherwise the ALP has a strong case to attack the Greens in South Brisbane at least. Given this (in a minority government situation), that brings the totals up to 44-44 (assuming no new crossbenchers). The 3 KAP members will have a lot of power in this new government. I think they will be the main minor party wielding the balance of power as opposed to the Greens who really have one option. I think minority government is the most likely option, but I can see both parties winning majorities.

What I think is interesting is the federal Queensland polls which show a strong swing to the ALP. I know they don’t always correlate, but if Albanese gets involved in more marginal seats, he (who is more popular than Palaszczuk) might be able to save a few seats that would have otherwise been foregone conclusions. This might also end up saving the state Labor government, but of course this is all speculation still more than 12 months out from the election.

I wrote in the election guide thread that I sense that there won’t be a landslide LNP victory. It won’t be 2012 again but rather a minority or slim majority. There’s also a path for Labor to go into minority and just still cling on, but it will require support from KAP or whoever the independents may be. If Palaszczuk wants to pass the batton over like Beattie did in 2007, she should start planning.

I am taking this latest opinion poll with a grain of salt – it’s 15 months out from the election. Also, opinion polls in 2017 and 2020 showed LNP leading 52:48 just 3 to 6 months before the election. Not to mention, projected 2PP is not the same as the number of seats won. In 2020, pollsters really underestimated Labor. I agree with the above comments that now the LNP isn’t prosecuting the case as to why they deserve to win government. The latest poll shows Labor lagging on points like law and order and cost of living.

Sportsbet odds:

LNP: $1.80
Labor: $1.95
Greens: $101.00
KAP: $101.00
One Nation: $101.00

Source: https://www.sportsbet.com.au/betting/politics/queensland-politics/next-queensland-election-sworn-in-government-6907808

Sportsbet clearly doesn’t realise that their odds say that the LNP and Labor both are more than 50% likely to win. The Ladbrokes odds make more sense:

LNP: $1.70
Labor: $2.00
Greens: $101.00
KAP: $101.00
One Nation: $101.00

Source: https://www.ladbrokes.com.au/sports/politics/australia/qld-politics/queensland-election-next-sworn-in-government/10e42a3c-f4c2-4ae8-a67d-9f966bc726f0

The odds that make the most sense are from Tab:

LNP: $1.75
Labor: $2.05
Greens: $151.00
Any other: $151.00

Source: https://www.tab.com.au/sports/betting/Politics/competitions/QLD%20Politics

@Nether Portal, Sportsbet have it that way by design, they want to have a margin on the money they are capturing. They’re never going to pay a full amount based on a sum of implied probability of outcomes totaling 100%.

For most of the bookies in Australia, $1.90 implies a probability of 50%. This represents $2.00 minus the bookies 5% margin cut. Occasionally with futures, particularly political and novelty bets, they operate with an even higher margin cut. It looks like for this line in particular, the Sportsbet and Ladbrokes are operating on a margin a lot closer to 10% because of the uncertainty of outcomes this far away from the election. They’ve also assigned a massive 3% implied probability of winning to the field even though it should realistically be <0.01%. But they also don't want to offer $100,000 or $1,000,000 returns to punters because it is dangerous.

All things equal as long as the premier recontests Labor have an even chance of victory.

I’ve seen comments about Labor holding on in QLD but being defeated Victoria. I want to say that the QLD opposition seem to have some competence unlike the Victoria opposition that are infighting and been infiltrated by the christian right an example of this is candidate that has been preselected for the Warrandyte by-election. In the current state for the QLD and Victoria I suspect that Liberals will win in QLD with a 2-3 seat majority and Labor will hold on with a reduced majority due to losing seats to the Greens in the inner city and I suspect Labor’s primary vote to increase.

@Daniel T: The reason why the “It’s time” factor oreven federal drag doesn’t apply in Victoria is because there is no viableOpposition in the Victorian state Parliament. The Victorian Coalition is simplynot fit to govern. The Victorian Liberals have spent much more energy fightingeach rather than fighting for the best outcomes for the issues Victorians careabout since their third consecutive election defeat. Some members of the Victorian LiberalParty like Moira Deeming, who continue to spread divisive fringe views but arestill supported by many within the Party, and the deepening infiltration byhard-right religious church groups also put off many progressive urban voters.Victorians rightly view the Victorian Liberal Party as a bigoted, divided andunelectable rabble, and I can confidently say that Victorian Labor willcomfortably win an unprecedented fourth term in 2026 and will remain in poweruntil a viable alternative party of government emerges. TheBolte-Hamer-Thompson LCP/Liberal government was in power in Victoria for 27 years, and I believe Labor can even break that record unless a centrist partyemerges and starts to run serious campaigns. 

By contrast, the Queensland LNP seems to be getting their acts together and don’t have problems of infighting or religious infiltration thatare as pronounced as the Victorian Liberals do. Queensland is also a much more conservativestate than Victoria. That’s why Queensland LNP is still seen as a viable partyof government by Queenslanders while the Victorian Coalition isn’t seen byVictorians as a viable party of government. Therefore, the “it’s time” factorand federal drag will be in play at the 2024 Queensland state election. However,I do agree that the reason why the LNP is the favourite to win the 2024Queensland state election is because Queenslanders think Labor has failed toaddress important issues like crime, cost of living, housing and the economy.  

@bajoc: “I think theyare, right now, making the case why Labor SHOULDN’T be in government, but theyaren’t yet saying why they ought to be in government.” I think this is thestrategy that most oppositions use to win government. In fact, this was exactly what the Albanese-led Labor party did during the 2022 federal election campaign. During the 2022 federal election campaign, Labor spent more energy attacking the Morrison Government, making the case why the Morrison-Joyce Coalition shouldn’t be in government, while adopting a small target strategy with no convincing reason as to why Labor should be in government. Just as conventional political wisdom suggests that oppositions don’t win elections, governments lose them. 

As for the 2024 Queensland state election, recent polling shows Queenslanders trust the LNP more on many important issues and that more Queenslanders preferred the LNP leader David Crisafulli to be the Premier than Annastacia Palaszczuk, despite 39% of respondents having not heard of Crisafulli at all. This shows the poor polling result for Labor was mainly due to Queenslanders thinking the Palaszczuk Govt has failed them, not because the LNP Opposition’s policies appeal to them very much. This means the strategy of spending more time making the case why Labor shouldn’t be in government rather than saying why they ought to be in government could work well.

Joseph I disagree.. the Qld opposition is not seen as fit to govern. To be superior to the Vic opposition is a very low bar Imdeed.

Can Labor shed much of their baggage with a change of leader? In other words, is their perception tied more to Palaszczuk, or to the party as a whole even without Palaszczuk?

MICKQUIN, if QLD LNP was not seen to be fit to govern it wouldn’t have such good poll performance. Both major party leaders received a high score in the question “Who would you prefer to be Premier of Queensland” with the percentage of “neither” or “undecided” much lower than preferred leader questions in other state or federal polls, which shows both major parties have strong support among Queensanders and both are seem as viable parties of government by Queenslanders.

i think Palaszchuk is gone. the its time and crime problems among others will ensure they are finished. when an opposition leader is outperforming the premier as preffered premier in the polls their done.

I would still say Palaszczuk still has a chance, but it’s very much 50/50 unlike 2020. On the point of crime: I’m not from Queensland, but from what I have seen, it has been slightly overstated/exploited by the LNP to capture voters who are fearful of crime. The premier is handing on by a thread but she isn’t. PLEASE can we keep in mind that this election is OVER 12 months away and a lot can change during that time in politics. Don’t write anyone off!

The Qld LNP agree with Moira Deeming on nearly everything – they’re both overwhelmingly anti-abortion and anti-trans, etc. – the difference is that’s the mainstream party line in Qld rather than just the position of a troublemaker on the fringes of the party.

It’s not like the LNP are overwhelmingly ahead in the polls yet either – the best poll for them so far is the recent Freshwater one with them on 52 TPP, and that still wouldn’t be enough to clearly secure them a majority – it could be enough but just falling short would be more likely.

Qld Labor have repeatedly bounced back from being that far behind in the polls before, so I certainly wouldn’t rule them out. The media narrative (mostly the Courier Mail) is that Labor is doing disastrously on everything, but the polls aren’t really reflecting that yet – they’re showing a government that could lose but is far from certainly gone. The one difference to previous elections is that Palaszczuk’s personal popularity appears to have finally worn off, which might make bouncing back more difficult.

@Bajoc nobody’s writing any state Premier/Chief Minister of any state Opposition Leader, nor the federal Prime Minister or Opposition Leader off, but I still doubt she’ll get a fourth term. Crisafulli will most likely be the next Premier of Queensland, even if there’s a Green/teal wave that reaches Brisbane. And there are many reasons why Crisafulli is probably going to win.

@Babalumba opposing trans women competing against biological women in sport is not transphobic, it’s just logic. Also the entire LNP isn’t anti-abortion, just some. Even though most were opposed back when Queensland legalised abortion, their stance may have changed, which is something politicians do a fair bit. Peter Dutton was an opponent of same-sex marriage and voted no in the 2017 postal survey but in Parliament he voted yes (though to be fair other than the few who abstained in Parliament (e.g Scott Morrison) only three people voted no in the House of Representatives).

Although maybe in that case he was just trying to avoid going against the public and his electorate of Dickson.

Anyway, Crisafulli wouldn’t criminalise abortion if elected. Christopher Luxon, the leader of the NZ National Party and the Opposition Leader in NZ, says he is personally opposed to abortion due to his Christian faith, but said that he won’t change the abortion laws if he becomes PM (which is most likely at this stage even with Labour having Chris Hipkins as PM and leader instead of Jacinda Ardern).

Agree Nether portal, the main difference between the conservatives in USA vs other western democracies (UK, NZ and Australia) is that the Republican Party actively implement their ideology whereas other conservative parties know that some of their beliefs (anti-abortion etc) will not play will with the general public and therefore they do not proceed with those policies.

The only LNP MPs still in parliament who voted for abortion legalisation are Tim Nicholls and Steve Minnikin (Jann Stuckey alleged she faced significant bullying from inside the party over her vote in support of the bill and retired in early 2020). That is overwhelmingly anti-abortion. Before the 2020 election the LNP indicated they would at the very least significantly wind back the abortion laws, while promising not to fully recriminalise it. Crisafulli has kept his position much vaguer but he hasn’t even even ruled out winding back the laws completely. There is absolutely no reason to think that recriminalisation or significant restrictions are not on the table under an LNP government, or that anyone in the LNP has changed their mind and is now pro-abortion.

As to trans issues, the LNP’s anti-trans bigotry extends far beyond just sports and the commentary in parliament last month from many LNP MPs smearing transgender people as a predatory threat was reprehensible. There is every indication that the LNP will make significant attacks on trans rights if they form government.

Yep. Way I see it, the reinstatement of abortion restrictions are at the very least a reasonable risk under LNP, while trans people can absolutely, definitely expect some level of persecution- probably less than a Florida level witchhunt, but still probably unprecedented by Australian standards.

@Babalumba but think about it: Dominic Perrottet did not ban abortion or same-sex marriage when he was NSW Premier. In fact he even delivered World Pride in Sydney. I don’t see why Crisafulli would ban abortion or same-sex marriage if elected Premier. His focus would be more on youth crime and stuff. When the LNP supported the KAP’s bill about banning trans women in women’s sports and it didn’t pass due to opposition from Labor and the Greens, Crisafulli said while he voted for the bill, it wouldn’t be a top priority for him should he become Premier. Anyway it is worth noting than there was actually a Labor MP that voted against the abortion bill.

The NSW Liberal party has a significant moderate faction who are pro-LGBT rights and backed abortion legalisation, Perrottet was leader under a factional deal between the right & the moderates, and they were in minority government, so even if Perrottet had wanted to pursue socially conservative policies it would have been very difficult (likely impossible) to pass any legislation and it would have significantly destabilised the government and Perrottet’s leadership.

The Qld LNP’s moderate faction is miniscule (again, only two pro-abortion LNP MPs in parliament) and those MPs are still significantly to the right of the NSW moderates. That is a very different situation to the NSW Liberal party, and before last election the LNP were reassuring conservative groups that they were going to significantly roll back the abortion laws (just not completely repeal them). The single Qld Labor MP (Jo-Ann Miller, by far the most conservative Qld Labor MP) who voted against abortion legalisation has also since left the parliament.

Crisafulli would not ban same-sex marriage because that is not a state government power under the constitution, and while some in the party may still oppose same-sex marriage they already lost that fight with the postal survey so it is not likely to be an active issue anytime soon. Rather, I would expect significant restrictions on trans healthcare, repealing the recently passed birth certificate reforms, and potentially watering down anti-discrimination laws, given the disgraceful rhetoric during the recent births, deaths & marriages bill debate. That sort of thing not being a top priority for Crisafulli is hardly comforting news and only means he isn’t going to actively campaign on such socially conservative policies and is no promise that he will not pursue them.

@Babaluma I still don’t think it’d be like the repealing of Roe vs. Wade in America though. If an LNP MP met a trans person they wouldn’t be rude to them because they’re trans. Also again, maybe some MPs changed their position. Crisafulli does however oppose the Voice, while Perrottet supports it. But anyway while most Queenslanders support abortion, it seems the Voice isn’t particularly strong there and Queenslanders are obviously more conservative than say, Victorians.

I don’t share Nether Portal’s views on politics, nor their faith in an upcoming LNP victory, but I think they’re probably correct in their analysis of Crisafulli as a leader. He seems to be smart enough to keep a lid on the anti-transgender and anti-abortion rhetoric, or at least not put those issues anywhere near the top of the LNPs election platform. Queenslanders may have a reputation for being socially conservative, but by and large that isn’t what they base their votes on in state elections; instead, they are more concerned with service delivery. A big reason why Labor has been the natural party of goverment in Queensland for the past 30 years is that they’re more trusted on health and education.

I get the feeling Crisafulli knows this, and that’s why he (and his allies in the media) are focusing greatly on crime, which is a lot more relevant to people’s day to day lives than transgender people or abortion. I can’t see it playing well for him to engage in contentious culture wars, whether in the leadup to the election or afterwards. If he does end up doing so once he’s Premier, then I predict he’ll meet the same fate as Borbidge and Newman before him.

@Wilson I am a male so “he” not “they”.

Anyway of course crime is a bigger issue than trans people, abortion or euthanasia. All of those things are already legal. Obviously robbery is already illegal but these kids are still roaming the streets without any real punishment whatsoever, they’re just constantly being granted bail and committing more crimes.