Labor Gets Wiped Out in Queensland

[dsriggs]

So in the Queensland elections yesterday, the parliament went from:

Labor: 51
LNP: 31
Independent: 5
Australia Party: 2

to:

LNP: 78*
Labor: 7*
Australia Party: 2
Independent: 2
* - predicted total

An absolute bloodbath. This amount of bias in the chamber can't be good for Queensland, can it?

[SRW]

It will be detrimental as far as the committee system is concerned, but in Queensland a majority is a majority. Without an upper house, there's no counterbalance anyway. It might end up being problematic for the LNP having such a large backbench and only a set number of ministerial positions. The ambitious among them might not sit quietly forever...

[stumpjumper]

I dunno. I think a lot of them will be fairly happy to be there. The pay is excelllent, the work's easy and the perks are great. In non-election years, only one or two Queensland MPs give it away. But in a year like 2012, faced with lousy ppolls, 9 sitting ALP members gave up, usually 'for family reasons', took their entitlements and left to someone else the thankless job of fighting and losing the election.

Retiring and losing MPs take their super and go home but more problematic is the business of finding new hosts for the young drones - the cannon-fodder MPs of tomorrow being bred by the ALP and its larger unions. The Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees Assoc (the SDA), for example, is strong in Queensland, and must find new paid positions for its next batch of drones whose life support in Queensland has in most cases, just been extinguished.

No doubt these junior apparatchiks will flow south and west in the search for income streams to plug into. What's needed, if anyone can help, are gigs in the offices of ALP members such as electoral assistant, media adviser, etc. A desk and $90,000 to $120,000 per year should do it.

My bet is that there'll be a blip in the number of useless staffers employed in Canberra, Adelaide and Hobart as a couple of hundred drones are rehoused in ALP administrations.

As for bias, I think they'll have their hands full dealing with Bob Katter's two grumpy members. Here's Katter's list of grievances:

http://www.ausparty.org.au/page/attachm ... queensland