LNP unhappy but ready for election fight

25 Jan 2012, 4:57 pm   -   Source: AAP
Share This

Queensland LNP leader Campbell Newman says a state election timed around the final flood report will allow Labor to run a longer campaign.

The Liberal National Party says the March 24 election date is politically motivated and is not in the best interest of Queenslanders.

Premier Anna Bligh said she chose the date to give voters time to digest the Floods Commission of Inquiry's final report before voting in state and local government elections.

She said voters must know the content of the report - to be delivered three weeks late on March 16 - because it could contain adverse findings that might affect the way people cast their ballots.

The government won't go into caretaker mode until February 19, when Ms Bligh goes to the governor to dissolve parliament.

Mr Newman said choosing an election date around the commission's final report was a ruse to allow Labor to run an eight-week campaign.

He said the government would continue to use taxpayer-funded government advertisements for the next four weeks, until parliament was dissolved.

"This is absolutely about manipulating the system," he told reporters in Brisbane.

"This is about giving them the opportunity to use the money of the mums and dads of Queensland to run an election campaign.

"It leaves a very sour taste in the taxpayer's mouth."

Mr Newman said the government had been spending $100 million each financial year on government promotional material such as the "Work for Queensland" ad campaign, which features government-funded projects, including the Gateway Bridge duplication.

Despite what Mr Newman called Labor's unfair financial advantage, he said the LNP was ready to fight, and the party had wanted to go to the polls earlier, even last year.

Mr Newman, who was the lord mayor of Brisbane when the flood crisis hit, said he was "ambivalent" about whether Queenslanders should see the commission's final report before voting.

But he said it was right to reopen the inquiry after fresh questions were raised over whether Wivenhoe Dam engineers breached the dam's operating manual and contributed to the 2011 Brisbane and Ipswich floods.

"What I'm objecting to is continuing the state of limbo for Queensland businesses and families. We need to get the state back on track," Mr Newman said.

The March 24 state election means planned council elections will be pushed back to late April or early May.

Mr Newman said that for the next four months, businesses would be unable to make investment decisions and families would still at the mercy of Labor's cost of living pressures.

Premier Anna Bligh laughed off Mr Newman's suggestions she was trying to hang onto power.

She said the LNP launched an election countdown clock two weeks ago that nominated March 24 as its chosen date.

"I don't know what he's got to complain about," she told reporters in Brisbane.

"It's an election date held on the Saturday, the nearest possible Saturday to the third anniversary ...

"Anyone who says this is somehow extending or clinging on to the term - I suggest Mr Newman has a long hard look at a calendar."

  • Follow us: 
  • Follow us on Facebook
  • Follow us on Twitter
  • Follow us on Youtube