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Beattie vows to steer sober government.
Premier
Peter Beattie will comfortably win a fourth term of office in Saturday's
Queensland state election, according to the latest opinion polls.
A Galaxy Poll, conducted for The
Courier-Mail newspaper, predicts the Labor government will pick up extra seats
in a landslide victory.
A Morgan Poll has Labor - which
holds a 16-seat parliamentary majority - heading for a win but with a slightly
reduced margin.
An ALP win would be the first time
since 1941 that a Labor government has been returned for a fourth term in
Queensland.
Queensland Premier Peter Beattie has
vowed to govern as if he has a one seat majority, despite winning an historic
fourth term in a landslide.
And he will serve the full,
three-year term as premier.
Labor is on track to retain 60 MPs
in the 89-seat parliament after Saturday's election, with the Nationals holding
steady with 16 and the Liberals gaining two seats to take its numbers to nine.
Three independents are set to hold
their seats, as is One Nation's Rosa Lee Long.
Two other independents lost their
seats.
Mr. Beattie said he expected his
team to get to work immediately, after voters snubbed the National-Liberal
coalition even after a series of scandals over the past term.
"I
want to say to all my colleagues and all Queenslanders today, we are going to
govern this term as if we have a majority of one - exactly like we did in the
first term," he told reporters.
"We know we have been given another
chance and we are going to take that chance with both hands and serve the people
of this state."
Mr. Beattie said he could read
beyond the vote and understood many mistakes were made in the last term.
"There are a lot of people out there
that expect my government to do better," he said.
"We were very lucky yesterday."
The Labor caucus will meet next
Tuesday to decide the ministry, which will be sworn in at Government House on
Wednesday.
Mr. Beattie said there would be
three ministerial vacancies. He expected caucus to endorse renewal.
"I support my existing ministers and
all those ministers who want to remain in the cabinet have my support to remain
there," he said.
"There will be some changes, but not
a lot."
The premier revealed he had sipped
water at his post-election party instead of having a celebratory beer.
"It is true, I've been drinking
water because frankly I wanted to be level-headed about what we do," he told
reporters.
"I am sober and sensible about what
happened yesterday. The people of Queensland gave us another chance and I'm not
going to muck this up."
Mr. Beattie said he would stay the
full term as leader.
"As I've indicated, I've got
unfinished business and barring anything to do with ill health or whatever I'm
here for the duration," he said.
But he said he had not thought about
a fifth term.
Deputy Premier Anna Bligh, who has
been touted as a possible replacement for Mr. Beattie, said she was happy to
stay on in her current role.
"You've heard the premier's
commitment. He's here for the duration and, if he'll have me as number two, I'm
very happy to be there in that position for the duration as well," she said. |