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An increasingly malevolent LNP, clutching desperately for power in Queensland this weekend, take their stereotypical “law and order” campaign a jackbooted step further to now target vulnerable children. Dr Lee Duffield reports.
THE QUEENSLAND ELECTION this weekend turns on the Liberal-National proposal to gaol First Nations children.
That proposal conjures up core ideas about civilisation: whether to deal with a crisis in a considered way or go for simplistic “solutions”, effectual or not; whether to go for problem-solving or blame; whether to be open to work on relations with “others” – “skippy kangaroos”, indigenes, migrants – or indulge in racial prejudice.
As a tactic it is old news, finding a way to mobilise passions among the “ten per cent” own to political analysts and operatives, especially in Queensland with its heavy loading of provincial votes. That “ten per cent” is a volatile sector among the public, susceptible to reactionary propositions on race, guns, mining against the environment and the like.
The One Nation constituency is the known kernel of it: mostly regional-based, usually older, behind on formal education, with some money, psychologically uneasy in a changing world. A good proportion of this segment has some memory of working class and Labor antecedents, so stirring it up on a divisive issue that works their way, is extremely attractive to the conservative parties.
Ten per cent of the electorate can become up-for-grabs in a divisive election — dangerous for the Australian Labor Party.
The tactic is a cousin of Donald Trump in America declaring for mass deportation of undocumented migrants; England’s Boris Johnson running a xenophobic campaign for leaving the European Union; John Howard’s “children overboard” campaign against asylum seekers during the 2001 Federal Election.
The Liberal National Party (LNP) leader this time, David Crisafulli, is betting on the gaoling policy as his main card. He is on billboards up and down the State displaying the LNP election slogan for 2024: “Adult Crime, Adult Time”.
It touches a raw nerve in the community, with groups of Aboriginal children out at night in Queensland towns, doing break-ins, and occasional assaults, stealing cars and joyriding at high speed. It is not Port Moresby or Johannesburg, but dangerous enough that the most reasonable of people are demanding an end to it and a good number also wanting better help for the perpetrators. The issue has been kicked up in the last two State elections in Townsville, the worst affected city, without defeating the three Labor Members there, but the activity and reaction to it have been getting more vicious as time goes by without a settlement.
The LNP has been emboldened in pushing the issue also, by the “No” vote against Aborigines in the 2023 Referendum and by the success of their campaign for gaoling juveniles in the Northern Territory election on 24 August. The Labor Government, in response to a continuing surge of trouble, is building two new remand centres for minors and both parties say they will spend much more on rehabilitation.
On the right wing in Queensland, Pauline Hanson’s One Nation has read bad polling for Labor as an opportunity to try and get Members back into the State Parliament. The main concentration has been a high-intensity campaign in the electorate for Keppel around Rockhampton, for James Ashby, known as a leading light of the party, as well as for other political incarnations. The electorate includes a hillbilly component, but even party supporters say the primary vote they are starting with looks to be too low – the main hope is to help the LNP win with preferences.
The other rural conservative group, Katters Australia Pary, wanting to “get with the strength”, have broken precedent by preferencing the LNP in Townsville and has thrown up a potent new issue. In a hung parliament, they will support the LNP, if they agree to repeal Queensland’s pro-choice abortion law, wedging Crisafulli who has intimated he would keep the law intact.
Over on the left, the Greens party has been organising and spending heavily to make some gains in inner-city Brisbane, telling under-40s share-houses they would impose a rent freeze. Apart from attacks on mining corporations, who would pay bigger royalties than ones already raised by Labor during its last term, not that much has come from the Greens on environmental issues. Not even on the central debate in Queensland, over tree clearing: Labor regulates it, the conservatives then “deregulate”. Not much either against gaoling Aboriginal children.
Stay tuned for Independent Australia’s exclusive report on the infamous James Ashby’s tilt for the seat of Keppel, near Rockhampton. Investigations editor Ross Jones and IA founder Dave Donovan spent days on the ground last week interviewing locals and politicians, and following the antics of the infamous Ashby and his equally notorious boss, Pauline Hanson, while managing editor Michelle Pini interviewed Ashby by phone. Up soon on this platform. One not to be missed.
Amongst Dr Lee Duffield’s vast journalistic experience, he has served as ABC’s European correspondent. He is also an esteemed academic and member of the editorial advisory board of Pacific Journalism Review and elected member of the University of Queensland Senate.
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