THE POLL BLUDGER
Queensland Legislative Assembly Election 2006

MUDGEERABA
Labor 1.8%

Mudgeeraba is located immediately inland of the coastal Gold Coast electorates, from southern Nerang to the New South Wales border. It was created at the 2001 election when it replaced the abolished electorate of Nerang, which the Liberals gained from the Nationals in 1989. The Liberals had a notional margin of 11.6 per cent going into the 2001 election, but this was swept away by an 18.4 per cent two-party preferred swing that was catastrophic even by Gold Coast standards. Labor's unlikely winner was Dianne Reilly (left), the principal of a public relations consultancy firm. Like all of Labor's Gold Coast newcomers, Reilly won re-election in 2004 despite a 5.0 per cent correction in the Liberals' favour. A form guide printed in the Gold Coast Bulletin in February listed her as a member of the Labor Unity ("Right") faction.

Nursing administrator Ros Bates (right) will contest Mudgeeraba for the Liberal Party undisturbed by the Nationals, after the seat provided the most difficult sticking point in negotiations to determine which parties would contest which seats. Although the Liberals obviously had the stronger half of the argument (they had held Nerang from 1989 to 2001 after outpolling the Nationals in 1989 and 1992), it was initially agreed that both parties would submit preferred candidates to a joint-party committee in December 2005. Bates received the Liberal nod ahead of local Chamber of Commerce president Ken Tandy, while the Nationals nominated Gold Coast City councillor Ted Shepherd. However, the agreement broke down and it appeared for the first half of the year that the seat would be the election's only three-cornered contest, considerably boosting Reilly's slim hopes of re-election. This was averted on June 4 when Shepherd agreed to withdraw.

On July 22 the Gold Coast Bulletin published a survey of 749 voters in Mudgeeraba, Broadwater and Burleigh which pointed to a 5 per cent anti-Labor swing and defeat in all but the latter.

Suzanne Lappeman of the Gold Coast Bulletin wrote in the second week of the campaign that Labor had "all but written off" Mudgeeraba, but was increasingly hopeful its 2004 defeat in Currumbin would prove to have been an aberration born of the Tugun Bypass and the troubles of defeated member Merri Rose. Dennis Atkins of the Courier-Mail also referred to "wild talk" about Labor winning Currumbin, and concurred that Labor sources described Mudgeeraba as "next to hopeless".

ASSESSMENT: LIBERAL GAIN