A shot of coffee and politics
IF you have never had the good fortune of staring into Scott Emerson’s blistering blue eyes over a freshly brewed coffee, you are missing out.
My calendar has been brimming lately with (by and large) gentleman callers of good LNP stock looking for a latte and column space ahead of the yet-to-be-called state election.
This is an election year, they suspect, and the LNP is in the mood for a spot of media romance.
“Trouty’s an annoying bastard,” Emerson admitted on Monday, referring to candidate for Barron River Michael Trout.
“When he’s in government he is just constantly in my face, at my door, demanding stuff for the local area.”
This was a repetitive theme for our conversation – apparently Labor is just terrible and Rob Pyne has gone batty, but the LNP is a bloody marvellous institution and its candidates up here are a delightful bunch. Irritating as hell, though. “Sam Marino, you can just see he’s going to be the same kind of annoying kind of guy again that’s going to do the same thing,” Emerson continued. “Robyn as well.” Emerson, rather jarringly, ordered a half-strength flat white on skim milk and confessed a deplorable affin- ity for decaf, an admission that would normally have me faking an urgent phone call and making a swift exit. But those eyes! The LNP’s Far North trifecta of parliamentary hopefuls have been doing the rounds like the election is a week away, rightly eager to get their names and faces out there before Labor pulls the trigger.
Candidate for the coveted seat of Cairns, Sam Marino, played chauffeur for opposition tourism spokesman Jon Krause on Wednesday. They were here to give Tourism Minister Kate Jones a god-almighty spray about lost China flights, but first they endured a meal with yours truly.
Krause patriotically ordered the Aussie breakfast, not quite finishing his baked beans, and his media adviser gobbled down the eggs benedict, leaving a shameful number of toothsome-looking mushrooms on his plate for Mr Manners. Marino had already eaten. Full disclosure: Krause shouted me the big breakfast medley.
Marino and Krause claimed the State Government was stalling on dredging Trinity Inlet and had something to hide over cancelled charter flights from Shanghai.
But the congenial mood soured when talk turned to the impending Chinese New Year yum cha corporate lunch, which Kate Jones would be speaking at a few hours later.
“I think, to be honest, everyone likes the steamed pork buns,” Krause answered when queried about his preferred menu item.
“I like the steamed dim sims,” Marino countered, controversially.
You could cut the air with a chopstick.
As an unrelated aside, we raced over to Virginia House to meet Syrian billionaire Ghassan Aboud just after the Chinese New Year lunch to talk about his third $100 million hotel planned for Cairns.
“I’m one of you,” he attested, referring to his short career as a journalist.
He did not return the offer when I suggested we might find him a job at the Cairns Post if he was ever short on cash.
Confirmed annoying bastard Michael Trout is everywhere at the moment, front and centre before the cameras whenever the LNP sends someone up north.
Mulgrave’s Robyn Quick is also hot on the trail, although less so in Cairns (she lives at Fishery Falls).
But Labor candidates are nowhere to be seen – not preselected and not taking reporters out for caffeine-driven rendezvous.
Labor Senator Murray Watt was here on parliamentary business this week, looking into customs security at the airport and shipping port, but no state candidate was dangling on his federal arm.
Nice bloke. He admitted he was still using his candidate business cards for his first few months as senator before thinking “hang on, I actually got elected” and updating his credentials.
This absence of Labor will be fleeting, with the party planning to announce candidates by the end of the month once draft new electoral boundaries have been released.
But while things are relatively quiet, I hereby openly invite Mayor Bob Manning to a beer date.
Nothing below the waist, I swear.
THE LNP’S FAR NORTH TRIFECTA OF PARLIAMENTARY HOPEFULS HAVE BEEN DOING THE ROUNDS LIKE THE ELECTION IS A WEEK AWAY