Ben Smee

2 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Ben Smee

Only four years ago, some Queensland Liberal National party figures were contemplating the breakup of a political party that couldn’t work out what it stood for. “What is our raison d’etre?” the former party president, Cynthia Hardy, asked senior members in an email. Back then the LNP had lost 11 of 12 state elections. One senior party figure said at the time: “One more loss and the party will surely have to break up.

3 weeks ago | theguardian.com | Ben Smee

Police have charged a Toowoomba woman with murder, after the deaths of three of her children in a house fire last week. In a statement, the Queensland police service said the woman, 36, was facing three counts of murder, three counts of attempted murder, and a single count of arson in relation to the fatal fire at Merrit Street, Harristown, on 7 May. A boy, aged 9, was found dead inside the property by firefighters.

1 month ago | theguardian.com | Ben Smee

When Anthony Albanese visited Dickson on the first day of the election campaign, Labor strategists were still not expecting to mount a serious challenge in the Brisbane commuter belt seat, held by Peter Dutton for 24 years. “I think the logic was to start the campaign on the front foot, in enemy territory, rather than anyone thinking too much that we could win Dickson,” a Labor source says.

1 month ago | theguardian.com | Ben Smee

Peter Dutton has conceded his 24-year hold on the Brisbane seat of Dickson, in a gracious speech that noted the electorate had a “one-term curse” before he entered parliament in 2001. Dutton said he had called the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and his challenger in Dickson, Ali France, who he said would “do a good job” as a local member. France, an amputee, lost her son Henry to leukaemia last year. “No parent should ever go through that,” Dutton said.

1 month ago | theguardian.com | Ben Smee

A Liberal-aligned thinktank running last-minute anti-Greens advertisements targeting young voters received more than $600,000 from the coal industry during last year’s Queensland election, disclosures show. On Monday evening, the Australian Institute for Progress released a “Can you afford the Greens?” video advertisement pushing claims, based on its own commissioned research, that the Greens’ housing policies would lead to increased rents.