LAYING LOW
Candidates: Health risk to staffers a concern
CANDIDATES are telling their volunteers at pre-polling booths to go home and not risk getting coronavirus, a Bulletin election forum was told last night.
After the second day of pre-polling, tired candidates who attended the debate urged the State Government and Electoral Commission of Queensland to have a rethink and consider only staging postal voting.
Campaign volunteers contacted the Bulletin yesterday and asked to raise with candidates the question of safety around booths due to the health crisis.
“I’m concerned about the Electoral Commission extending hours of opening for polling booths. We are doing 12-hour shifts,” a volunteer wrote.
“We are going to get sick. Some candidates have lost 45 per cent of their volunteers. What safety measures are in place? What do you think should be done?”
Division 1 candidate Mark Hammel told the forum: “I think the State Government and ECQ got it wrong with this. I think the ECQ should have pulled the pin on prepoll centres.”
Mr Hammel said pre-polling was putting thousands of volunteers along with ECQ staffers at risk as they faced large crowds of voters.
Rival candidate Alec Pokarier said he had stood down his pre-poll volunteers because of concerns for their health.
“I think it’s the policy everyone should adopt. From my point of view, we have to minimise what we can do as candidates,” he said.
Renee Clark, also standing in Division 1, said the health of volunteers was important but she believed it was not up to candidates to make a decision on the staging of the poll.
Pat Reynolds said he believed
WE CAN’T GIVE THEM HAND SANITISERS. WE CAN’T GET ANY. THERE IS NOT MUCH MORE WE CAN DO ABOUT THAT DIVISION 1 CANDIDATE PAT REYNOLDS
he and other candidates felt the same after discussing the issue.
“Are we in favour of it (going ahead) — probably not,” he said.
Mr Reynolds said he believed most of the volunteers were pulling out of the campaign.
“We can’t give them hand sanitisers. We can’t get any. There is not much more we can do about that,” he said.
Greens candidate Andrew Stimson said the party had made a decision to tell volunteers “we love you, don’t do pre-poll”.
The Bulletin’s You Decide forum last night also hosted Councillor William OwenJones and candidate John Wayne in Division 2, Deputy Mayor Donna Gates and candidate Wayne Purcell in Division 3.
The debate in Division 1 focused on development and whether the cane fields should be used to house the growing population. The pressure on sporting fields was a hot topic in Division 2.
Cr Owen Jones and Mr Wayne disagreed about whether the former councillor could, if elected, stay in the council chamber and debate the Oxenford quarry expansion given he had made a submission as a resident.
Cr Owen-Jones said Mr Wayne as a submitter would have to leave the chamber because under new laws he had a prescribed conflict of interest.
In new Division 3, Deputy Mayor Donna Gates admitted she might “take a step back” and just concentrate on being a councillor in her new division.