The battle for Tasmania’s four marginal federal seats will begin on Monday, with the major political parties insisting they are ready to wage an eight-week campaign.
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Labor has designs on preventing Liberal MHRs Andrew Nikolic, Brett Whiteley and Eric Hutchinson from securing second terms in the Northern seats of Bass, Braddon and Lyons, while Liberal candidate Amanda-Sue Markham needs a 5.1 per cent swing to remove Franklin MHR Julie Collins from the seat she’s held for three terms.
Denison Independent MHR Andrew Wilkie is expected to keep the seat he holds by a 15.5 per cent margin.
Mr Nikolic said the Bass election would be a microcosm of the federal contest.
“Do you want Andrew Nikolic who has delivered $150 million for job creating local projects and a Turnbull Liberal team that actually has a plan, or do you want to go back to the tax, borrow, spend days of the Rudd-Gillard years? That’s the choice confronting Tasmanians and Australians at this election,” he said.
Mr Nikolic said the government’s plan to grow the economy was working, and said he was committed to securing further job creating opportunities for Bass.
He pointed to a growth in sports and heritage tourism, a $10 million funding extension for the John L Grove rehabilitation centre and $7.2 million to create defence ration packs in Scottsdale as initiatives he had secured for the region during his first term.
Mr Nikolic’s Labor opponent, Launceston-based lawyer Ross Hart, said there was still a large number of people and businesses doing it tough in Northern Tasmania.
“We’re not doing as well as the Liberals think we are,” Mr Hart said.
Mr Hart said Labor’s $150 million funding pledge for the transfer of the University of Tasmania Newnham campus to Inveresk indicated he was already achieving results for the electorate.
Greens candidate Terrill Riley-Gibson said her small business background meant she was able to relate to the challenges and opportunities facing the people of Bass.
In Lyons, Mr Hutchinson has been dubbed by polling analyst Kevin Bonham as the most likely sitting MHR to lose his seat at the federal election.
Mr Hutchinson, who holds the seat by a slender 1.2 per cent margin, is up against Labor candidate Brian Mitchell and Green Hannah Rubenach.
