WE NEED TO THINK AND SELECT CAREFULLY WHEN VOTING AT THIS STATE ELECTION
Islanders need to think carefully coming into the Queensland State Government election of Saturday, October 26.
The islands will be faced with elections in two seats, Redlands (Coochiemudlo, Karragarra, Macleay, Lamb and Russell Islands) and Oodgeroo (North Stradbroke/Minjerrabah Island).
The Labor Party has been in power for almost a generation.
With the exception of the one-term Campbell Newman LNP term of Government, Labor has been in control of Queensland since 2009.
Annastacia Palaszczuk started her run as Premier with a shock win in 2015 to amazingly oust Newman, going on to win further terms of Government in 2017 and 2020 (with four-year terms starting).
Palaszczuk stood aside about 12 months ago with Steven Miles taking over the reins.
In the meantime, the seat of Redlands went from LNP to ALP with Kim Richards snatching the seat in 2017, whilst the newly-named Oodgeroo stayed in the hands of the LNP’s Mark Robinson.
We are told that polls indicate that the ALP under Premier Steven Miles could be ‘on the nose’
Polls indicate that there could be a swing away from the ALP as much as 7 per cent.
That would mean that the seat of Redlands could well end up in the hands of the LNP and candidate Rebecca Young.
Rebecca Young seems a strong and worthy candidate.
But it would not surprise if Redlands MP Kim Richards bucks the trend and gets re-elected.
She has been an outstanding representative for Redlands and our Islands.
She has found money and resources that have contributed so much i.e. new island jetties; satellite hospital; etc
However, the issues confronting Queensland and Australia are considerable.
One of them is State and Federal levels of debt.
Queensland on its own is headed for a debt of a stunning $128 billion; whilst Federally it is just short or a staggering $1 trillion!
They are amazing amounts of money, and related to our households it means levels of debt the average householder could not possibly imagine or could ever repay.
Australians have long had a habit of traditionally voting Labor; and when they discover how much debt Labor runs up, they then vote the LNP in to pay it all off.
When faced with a huge drop-off in Government spending, Aussies tend to forget, and then vote Labor back in again . . . . . and so on it goes.
Our islands, more than anywhere else, needs considerable funding from every level of Government.
What we need to make sure is that our parliamentary representatives, in particular, are members of the ruling Government, otherwise we will hardly ever see any funding again.
Keep that in mind when voting on Saturday, October 26.
Comments