Premier’s pick to take on ALP
ANNASTACIA P a l a s z c z u k has been blindsided by one of her own as her failed captain’s pick in Labor’s Rockhampton preselection brawl, Margaret Strelow, has announced she will run as an independent.
The Rockhampton Mayor did not tell Ms Palaszczuk or her faction before revealing her plan to challenge Labor’s endorsed candidate – a move that sparked expulsion from the Labor Party under its rules.
And the hits kept coming, with Cr Strelow taking a veiled swipe at Ms Palaszczuk’s planned veto of the Adani’s Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund loan application when explaining her decision to run.
She said there were “multiple reasons” behind her decision, with the future of the Adani mine among them.
“If there is an in- principle argument that says there shouldn’t be loans – I’m not saying this about the Premier – but generally, if people say there should not be loans to get private infrastructure built in Northern Queensland, then they should have spoken up when the program was instituted,” Cr Strelow said.
“Because it is fundamentally there to get big pieces of infrastructure built and this was around a railway line which will open up through the guts of Queensland.
“I think some of the big picture about what this was for has been lost in the hurly burly of a lot of campaigning by various parties.
“But the Premier makes her own decisions and I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to comment any further.”
Cr Strelow will stand aside as mayor to compete against her Labor preselection rival, Barry O’Rourke, for the Central Queensland seat in a move that could hit the ALP’s chances of holding the electorate against One Nation.