Queensland’s Labor opposition appears likely to have suffered a swing against it in the party’s northern Brisbane heartland, delivering a knife-edge byelection night result in Stafford.
The vote, in a seat lost by Labor only once since 2001, was on track to at least gut the party’s margin, 19 months after a bruising state election, and heap pressure on its leader, Steven Miles.
By 10pm, with about 60 per cent of the ballots counted, the early two-party electoral commission tally seesawed between a Labor or LNP win, with analysts suggesting Labor may still hold on.
Even if the seat doesn’t fall to the LNP, the swing towards the conservative party will further buoy the Crisafulli government after a byelection win in Hinchinbrook last year.
This time, she faced Luke Richmond – a lawyer with a health policy background who was most recently Labor’s assistant state secretary.
In a largely small-target campaign used by the government to tout fledgling fuel security plans – while Labor attacked the LNP over hospital beds – much of the focus has instead been on sending either the government or opposition a message.
Stretching from Newmarket to Chermside on Brisbane’s north, the seat comprises mainly younger, more educated voters, who tend to be renters.
Labor has held the seat at every poll since the electorate was established in 2001, except the 2012 Newman landslide. The LNP then lost the seat two years later in one of the state’s biggest anti-government byelection swings.
As a result, during the snap campaign, LNP government figures have been suggesting Labor needed to win with a double-digit swing.
But independent analysts have highlighted the stark differences between the two byelections.
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Matt Dennien is a reporter at Brisbane Times covering state politics, parliament and the public sector. He has previously worked for newspapers in Tasmania and Brisbane community radio station 4ZZZ. Contact him securely on Signal @mattdennien.15Connect via email.
