Tasmanian Liberal Senator Eric Abetz has danced around questions about a potential return to cabinet, preferring to concentrate on maximising his party’s vote in Tasmania.
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After Tasmanian Liberal candidates stressed their support for the former Employment Minister to return to the front bench, Senator Abetz said determining the make-up of cabinet was Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s prerogative.
"I'm happy to return in whatever capacity the Tasmanian people might elect me to and then, if I do get reelected as I'm hoping to, then it will be up to others to determine my future," he said.
Asked if he had designs on returning to the ministry, Senator Abetz said his only focus was maximising the Liberal vote in Tasmania.
Senator Abetz joined Tasmanian Premier Will Hodgman in warning against voting in a Labor-Green minority government.
The Greens have indicated they would seek to form a coalition government with the Labor Party in the event of a hung Parliament. That tells each and every Australian, given the tightness of the polls, that there is no way you should spray your vote around to any party other than the Coalition,” he said.
A former minister in a Tasmanian Labor-Green government, Greens Senator Nick McKim told Sky News he had no doubt his party’s phones would start ringing if Labor needed extra Lower House numbers after polling day, despite Opposition Leader Bill Shorten’s move to quash talk of a deal.
“With Labor, there are some policy issues, granted not asylum seekers, but there are other policy issues where we would be able to find some common ground with Labor and I think that’s a much more natural alliance,” Senator McKim said.
Senator McKim said the previous collaboration between the parties implemented valuable policy outcomes, including the introduction of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and a price on carbon emissions.
Labor Franklin MHR Julie Collins said her party was not interested in doing any deals.
“Labor is running to win. We are fighting for every vote, in every corner of the country,” she said.
Senator Abetz would not be drawn on whether the Liberals would join Labor in promising $150 million to fund the University of Tasmania’s Northern Cities expansion, but said there were many weeks to go in the campaign before the July 2 election.
