Photographs Melissa Gregg

In 1972, the Rolling Stones released Exile on Main Street, Atari’s videogame Pong was released to a grateful world, and in Australia Gough Whitlam was elected, ending 23 years of conservative Federal government. The year is also notable for being the last time that the electors of Herbert returned a representative who was not a member of the governing party.

The bellwether seat – the one that reliably indicates a change of government – is an easy but attractive cliché: everybody wants a seat that can stand in for the whole, and offer a predictive microcosm for a complex national process. As youdecide2007 will show, though, there is often a complex range of factors in each and every electorate that inform voter behaviour.

However, Herbert will be indicative in the context of this election for a couple of reasons. First, if Labor is to win government this time around, it must win seats like this one. Second, national issues like global warming, the “war on terror”, aboriginal affairs, mortgage stress, demographic change and regional disadvantage play out here in unique ways. Sitting member Peter Lindsay is notionally on a 6.2% margin, but in 2001 it was only 1.5%. The “Latham factor” (and what many ALP insiders concede to have been a poor local candidate in ’04) perhaps made Lindsay look a touch more comfortable than he is. High-profile local restauranteur George Colbran may be dangerous in an electorate that has long admired worldly success and public-spiritedness.

Herbert has been an electorate since Federation, and used to extend from Mackay to the Torres Strait, taking in tropical Queensland in all its sprawling, sweltering glory. Over time it has been cut back to include only the “twin cities” of Townsville and Thuringowa and two offshore islands, Magnetic and Palm. Its apparent consistency with the national mood belies a colourful political history in the area, including Fred Paterson’s tenure as a Communist alderman on the Townsville City Council, and his abortive candidature for the federal seat. Strong early sympathies for separation from Queensland have mostly been sublimated into support for local sporting teams like the North Queensland Cowboys, but local issues play strongly there, and national issues are uniquely inflected.

Townsville was founded in 1863 as a port, and in the Twentieth Century became a rail and air transport hub for the agricultural and pastoral districts surrounding it. Its relative distance from the capital, and proximity to the sources of the State’s wealth, strongly inform local politics – transport and communications issues and parochial concerns about government spending cut deep.

Many Townsvilleans are still employed in the transport industries, associated trade areas, or in refining and processing raw materials, particularly the ores carried in from the mines at Mt. Isa. Traditionally this has meant a significant amount of blue-collar trade union activism (and rusted-on Labor votes) in the City. But following the resources boom, it is a region hit hard by the national skills shortage. AWAs have not necessarily been disadvantageous to those with in-demand skills in hitherto unionised workplaces.

Les Moffitt from the Townsville Council of Unions concedes that in the short term, refinery and mine workers in the electorate may be doing well from individual contracts, but points to stories of hospitality workers being "forced onto" AWAs, and adds that “the skills shortage won’t be around forever, and the Federal Government can’t convince people that this is beneficial overall.”  Colbran is less gung-ho, but points to the lack of statistics on the uptake of AWAs, and the popularity of existing awards and EBAs with local employers and employees. How the voters working in “boom” industries read the Government’s workplace reforms will be crucial.

On the other hand, local mayors are agitating about the poor state of the region’s lifeblood – its roads – and taking Canberra task directly over claims that $2 billion worth of work is needed here. This goes beyond perennial sensitivities about money made in the region being spent “down south” – local Greens candidate Jenny Stirling insists that “people are dying” because of the poor state of the Bruce Highway, and Colbran says that “in 11 years, nothing has been spent on our roads”. It’s been suggested that the state of the Highway may provide an opportunity for some strategic federal largesse in the lead-up to the election.

An emerging infrastructure issue is broadband – Kevin Rudd’s promises to connect 98% of Australian homes may play well in a city where most have intermittently unreliable satellite connections. In a recent ABC radio interview, Mr. Lindsay played down the importance of broadband infrastructure to the region, saying that only teenagers downloading videos felt strongly about it. Colbran sees the unreliable service as an impediment to regional development. Which way the electorate judges the issue remains to be seen.

Following the Second World War, Townsville gained Lavarack Barracks – still a major Australian army base – and a RAAF base. Much of the town’s past and present prosperity is premised on servicing the army base, and the soldiers themselves represent a formidable voting bloc. The Prime Minster’s foreign policy commitments in Timor, Afghanistan and Iraq mean bonuses in serving soldiers’ pay-packets, and more money over the counters of local businesses. Postal votes in 2004 – overwhelmingly coming from soldiers serving overseas – returned around 60% for the government.

Peter Lindsay has been serving as Parliamentary Secretary for defence, and never loses an opportunity to speak up for the good name of the ADF. It’s difficult for alternative candidates to come out in direct opposition to the war, even if they do have reservations about it. Colbran stresses that there would be a “redeployment” of Iraq-based troops to where they are needed in Afghanistan. But he also brings up “social problems” that arise as a result of the long absences of soldiers from family members, indicating the possibility that Labor have identified service families as a source of votes. Recently, Colbran hit back hard in the local media over Lindsay's allegations that he was "anti-defence", but it's interesting that it's on this issue that Lindsay has chosen to go negative, early. 

Increasingly, the area’s adjacency to the Great Barrier Reef has made tourism important (although not so much as in nearby Cairns and the Whitsundays). Much national attention around climate change has centred on the drought, but episodes of coral bleaching due to warmer water temperatures could have a more immediate impact on visitor numbers and popular local pastimes like recreational fishing.  It’s not clear that the environmental issues will have a bearing on most voters, though.

North Queensland Conservation Council head James McClellan admits that it’s an uphill struggle on environmental issues in Townsville, and that “people are not making the link between local employers [like the refineries] and global problems.” The national drought has not affected the city drastically because of its access to the Burdekin Dam, but McLellan claims that there has been talk at the State level of transferring water supplies south, which is bound to be unpopular. He refuses to favour either of the major parties’ candidates, claiming that their policies are indistinguishable, and criticises Kevin Rudd’s support for locating further heavy processing industries in the area.

A looming issue in this policy area – one that local Greens candidate Jenny Stirling hopes to get traction with – is the proposed location of a Chalco (Aluminum Corporation of China) aluminium refinery upwind of the City, near the port. Whatever the economic benefits, Stirling is tipping that the plant will be an unpopular threat to the City’s lifestyle. Sitting member Lindsay is careful to say that he has argued for an inland location for the refinery. Rudd’s and Colbran’s unqualified support for the initiative brings them in line with the State government.

Stirling is also hoping to attract votes from the City’s social justice constituency, saying that the ALP candidate is a “multimillionaire who doesn’t understand the lives of ordinary people.” Colbran’s well-rehearsed response to this accusation (with shades of Kevin Rudd) is to emphasise his own humble background and the values this experience forged in him. Minor parties pointing out Colbran’s business affiliations may yet cause a few voters on the left to switch their alliegances, or at least their first preferences.

One thing that all the candidates agree on is the need for the City’s growing pains be managed. Queensland’s extraordinary period of growth has increased house and land values in the area in recent times, and many “sea-changers” have drifted north, particularly to Magnetic Island. Upwards of 2000 people a year move to Townsville, and people moving to the region represent over 63% of the city’s growth. Aside from mineral resources, part of the city’s boom is premised on an explosion in building in newer suburbs in the south-west of the electorate.

A series of large booths in the growing mortgage-belt suburbs of Thuringowa came out strongly for the Liberal candidate last time, but given the strong Labor vote there in the recent State election, Colbran is hopeful. He might have further reason for optimism if these suburban “battlers” follow current national trends and switch their votes to Labor. When interviewed by youdecide2007, Lindsay blamed housing affordability issues, in part, on the “financial illiteracy” of young people – this explanation may need to be finessed in the lead up to the campaign, as interest rates climb and families feel the pinch. 

It’s possible, though unlikely, that the Queensland Government-proposed merger between Townsville and Thuringowa city councils might swing votes. Although there is some noise about this in the Thuringowa council chambers, its not clear how much more widespread this disquiet about it is - it's not an "identity issue" as it is in other rural parts of the State. 

Another big election issue has a specific local echo: the electorate includes its own “remote Aboriginal community” in Palm Island, which has received wider attention in the aftermath of the trial of police officer Chris Hurley following the death of Cameron Doomadgee. The island votes consistently for Labor, and Lindsay has not endeared himself to them, but in 2004 Labor suffered an 18% swing in the local booth. The Federal government’s Indigenous policies are not sitting well with local people, and it is likely that many will return to Labor in a contest where every vote will count.

Hear the full interview with Peter Lindsay here. 

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