Although both Anna Bligh and Campbell Newman hit the campaign trail hard again today, their announcements, stunts and media releases, together with an awkward encounter between the two of them in Townsville, were all completely overshadowed by the news that Kevin Rudd had quit as Foreign Minister.  While this will push State election off the front pages for a few days, it is hard to see how this will not further hurt the Labor brand in Queensland.

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The Electoral Commission of Queensland have posted to their Facebook page the writ for the election:

In Queensland, when a general election is to be held, the Governor (on the advice of the Executive Council) issues a writ, which commands the Electoral Commissioner of Queensland to hold an election. This writ contains dates for close of rolls, close of nominations, polling day and the return of the writ.

After the general election, the Electoral Commission of Queensland must return the writ to the Governor with the names of the successful candidates.

The key dates from the writ are:-

- Sunday 19 February 2012 to be the day of issue of the writ.

- Saturday 25 February 2012 to be the cut-off day for electoral rolls for the election.

- Monday 27 February 2012 to be the cut-off day for the nomination of candidates for the election.

- Saturday 24 March 2012 to be the polling day.

- Monday 23 April 2012 for the return of the writ to the Governor.

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Yesterday I blogged that it was good to see that the first full day of the election campaign focused predominantly on policy announcements, expressing hope that the rest of the campaign would be equally substantive.  It was nice while it lasted, as unfortunately day two saw the campaign descend into bitter, negative attacks as the issues took a back seat to the admittedly unacceptable comments of two relatively obscure candidates.

The day began with the news that Labor had been forced to disendorse and expel its candidate for Southern Downs, Peter Watson, over racist and homophobic comments he made online several years ago.  Although Labor should have done a more thorough job of vetting this candidate (even if Southern Downs was always going to be an unwinnable seat), they acted swiftly and appropriately in disendorsing and then expelling Watson when his comments surfaced.  Predictably Labor then sought to deflect any negative attention by once again bringing up the refusal of the Liberal National Party to disendorse Cairns candidate Gavin King for having once suggested rape victims were partly to blame if they were drunk.  The allegations then went back and forth between the two parties as the rhetoric became more and more heated and inflammatory.  However ultimately the unsavoury comments by these two candidates and the political grandstanding that followed today are nothing short of a distraction from the substantive issues of this election.

But it seemed as though this day was never going to be remembered for substantive issues, with both the LNP and Labor putting forward what can be best described as weak policy proposals today (and at worst political pork-barrelling).  The LNP released their full policy on the dredging of the Cairns port, Trinity Inlet, in order to allow for larger cruise ships, which whatever the merits of that policy may be, is a fairly obvious attempt to woo voters in the seats of Barron River, Cook and Cairns, all of which are currently held by Labor.  While Labor continued to focus on education with the ridiculous policy of giving iPads to year 7 students.  Much like Kevin Rudd's laptop promise in 2007 election, these sorts of announcements are initially appealing (after all, who doesn't want an iPad?) but the roll out of these programs are problematic, and Labor's policy document does not even begin to issues of corporate tablet manageability.  Nor does this policy address the far more important issue of struggling information technology infrastructure at many primary and secondary schools in Queensland.  And that is even accepting that there are real pedagogical advantages in using tablets in the classroom (something I am particularly dubious about).

All in all, the second full day of campaigning was disappointing, with neither Labor nor the LNP impressing.  Let's hope days like this are few and far between in the lead up to the election next month. 

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The first full day of the election campaign saw both Labor and the LNP have strong starts, announcing major policy positions and launching effective television advertisements.  However, Labor will be disappointed that the homophobic comments of a rogue candidate in an unwinnable seat will attract media attention and detract from the themes of their campaign.

Campbell Newman spent the day in Brisbane, beginning with a visit at De Bella Coffee at Bowen Hills, where he was heckled by a disgruntled resident.  These sorts of scenes, where the campaign is hijacked by a member of the public and driven off whatever the message of the pre-staged and pre-packaged campaign event was, always attract more media attention than they deserve.  After all, it's hardly news that not everyone likes Campbell Newman (or Anna Bligh for that matter).  However, they do offer an insight into the personality and temperament of a politician, even if a professional politician is usually more than able to deal with these moments with grace.

The substantive policy announcement of the day for the LNP was the release of its economic blueprint, including promises to introduce $580 million in business tax cuts and to reduce government regulation.  Tax cuts like this are a fairly standard political promise of conservative political parties but one does have to question how the LNP would implement these tax cuts and still achieve their main economic promise of returning the budget to surplus in 2014-15.  Unfortunately we won't the answer to this until much later in the campaign, when the LNP have indicated they will submit their costings to scrutiny by former state auditor-general Len Scanlan.  Sadly this sort of economic chicanery has become a feature of modern political campaigns in Australia; oppositions delay announcing policy and making promises until the election campaign begins, and then submit their costings to a so-called "independent" body or individual for assessment, rather than releasing policy a long time before an election called, giving the treasury, the media and the public sufficient time to scrutinise their economic viability.  Yet this is a game both sides of politics play and so it is probably a little harsh to condemn the LNP too strongly for also adopting this approach.

The LNP's promise to cut government red tape by 20% by 2018 is also hard to take seriously.  It's nothing more than a meaningless, jingoistic slogan that is impossible to quantify and implement, even if the aspiration of reducing unnecessary government regulation is admirable.

Labor's major policy announcement of the day was Mines to Minds: A Queensland Education Trust.  This $2.5 billion policy, which will be funded in the short-term by GST revenue, before using 50% of future LNG royalties, has two main features.  First, scholarships valued at $4,000 for every Year 12 graduate who goes on to undertake postsecondary education or training.  These scholarships go by the cringe-worthy name "Tomorrow Scholarships".  And second, grants to support strategic education investments.  While increased funding for education is needed and Labor should be commended for using future LNG royalties in this way, the so-called "Tomorrow Scholarships" are good politics masking bad policy.  The idea of these scholarships will be very appealing to large parts of the electorate (after all, who wouldn't want $4000 for enrolling in postsecondary education?) but they are little more than an education bribe.  These scholarships will be ripe for manipulation and exploitation, and if their use is to be tightly restricted to education or training purposes, it will inevitably involve the creation and maintenance of considerable government bureaucracy.  There are also existing federal government schemes that provide support for individuals undertaking postsecondary education, making their utility somewhat limited.  If Labor really wants to invest in education in Queensland, then use this money to improve educational infrastructure in schools and tertiary education providers and to recruit the best teachers and lecturers to the State.

Overall it was good to see the first full day of the election campaign focused predominantly on policy announcements.  Hopefully the rest of the campaign will be equally substantive.

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You haven't been able to turn on the TV over the last 24 hours in Queensland and not see of one Labor's TV advertisements, "Anna for Queenslanders - Flood Recovery" and "Anna for Queenslanders - Cyclone Yasi Recovery":  

While there is no doubt these advertisements are superbly produced and Labor is smart to highlight Anna Bligh's strength as a leader, I must admit these two ads left me decidedly uncomfortable.  In both instances, I fear that the ads are politicising the tragedies of the January 2011 floods and Cyclone Yasi.  I've watched both these ads several times and I cannot help but feel that they are precariously close to exploitating those disasters for political gains.  

Judging by the positive reaction these ads have received on Twitter, I am probably in the minority in having this reaction to them.  However, I do think the Labor Party will need to be careful throughout the campaign that they are not seen to be exploiting those natural disasters for political gain.  If they do, they risk undermining what is arguably Labor's greatest asset in this campaign - Anna Bligh.

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I'm also looking to update my Google Reader with good blogs and websites that will covering the Queensland election.  If you plan to blog about the election, or know of someone who is, please leave a comment below or send me a tweet @peterjblack.

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I am trying to put together a list of tweeps to follow for the Queensland election.  If you plan to tweet extensively about the election, or know of someone who is, please leave a comment below or send me a tweet @peterjblack.

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Although the unofficial election campaign has been underway for weeks - if not months - today the Queensland Premier Anna Bligh met with Governor Penelope Wensley for about half an hour at 11am to dissolve Parliament.  Queensland will finally go to the polls on Saturday 24 March.

Over the next five weeks I will blog about the Queensland election here at Election Blackout.  I will post commentary, analysis, links and maybe the occasional podcast or two.  I will also tweet about the election at @peterjblack and @qldvotes2012.

This will be an interesting election as while the opinion polls show the LNP and Campbell Newman in a commanding position, I don't think you can write Labor and Anna Bligh off yet.  She is a strong campaigner and the LNP has so far run a very shoddy campaign.  It is also unclear how much of an impact federal politics - especially Labor's leadership tensions between the Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd -  as well Bob Katter's Australia Party will have on the election.  If the last few months are any indication, it will also be a very nasty campaign.

I am looking forward to this election campaign and blogging extensively about it here on Election Blackout.  I hope you will come along for the ride ...

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