RUDD SET TO CALL AUGUST 31 ELECTION DATE: QUEENSLAND MPS

Tony Moore Published: July 22, 2013  

Southeast Queensland Labor backbenchers have circled August 31 as the most likely date of the federal election.
But if the election is not held then, they predict Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will avoid the September school holidays and football finals and run for office in October.
This is a flawed piece of logic given that there is a referendum presently set down for September 14.
That gives Mr Rudd just this week to sort out important issues arising from today's special caucus in Sydney such as ALP membership and the stability of Labor's leadership, the MPs say.
The minimum campaign period for an Australian election is 33 days, meaning election writs are normally issued on the Monday after the weekend, five weeks before polling day.
With that timetable, Queensland backbenchers are predicting Mr Rudd to use this week to finalise his strategy and call an election next weekend with a short-election campaign on August 31.
Moreton, Oxley and Blair MPs; Graham Perrett, Bernie Ripoll and Shayne Neumann say the final decision is up to Mr Rudd.
"I'd put a lazy $10 on August 24th, and then a bit more on the 31st," Graham Perrett said yesterday.
Labor's Oxley MP Bernie Ripoll, first elected in 1998, said he believed only three dates were realistically possible.
"August 31 - which I think right now is a 33 per cent chance - or October 19th or October 26th," he said.
Mr Ripoll said he believed September was too complicated for families.
"September is a difficult month because you have school holidays and football finals," he said.
There it is again. 
Mr Ripoll said he did not think Mr Rudd will call the election on Monday.
"I could not see a reason why he would call it tomorrow, because he does not need to," he said on Sunday.
He rated calling an election today as "5 per cent".
Blair MP Shayne Neumann, also elected in 2007, said he believed an election would be held "sooner, rather than later."
He said August 31 was a "good date" but declined to say whether he though it could be the election date.
Other informed Labor sources believed August 31 was firming up as 2013's likely election date.
Mr Neumann also said Mr Rudd's plan to resettle asylum seekers in Papua New Guinea was all people wanted to talk to him on Saturday.
"I went to four meetings at Redbank Plains, at Esk, to West Moreton Anglican College and to my local church and every place I went to people spoke to me about the asylum seeker plan," he said.
"And they all thought Rudd had done a good job on it. People genuinely don't want to see people die on the high seas."
Mr Perrett, first elected in 2007, described Mr Rudd's Papua New Guinea asylum settlement plan announced on Friday as a "masterstroke."
Mr Perrett's Moreton electorate contains the suburb of Moorooka which is home to a large percentage of people re-settled from African countries.
"It has been a topic with one in three, one in four people that I have spoken to," Mr Perrett said.
"It just seems logical that we have achieved something with our regional neighbours that will stop the 1 in 20 people who have been drowning on these dangerous maritime journeys."
Labor's decision to return Mr Rudd to the Prime Ministership has re-energised the party base.
Mr Neuman on Sunday night said a recent meeting to recruit new party members at the Ipswich Trades Hall was been packed.
"We had the Trades Hall rooms on level three packed - I have never seen that many workers on a campaign in nearly 30 years of Labor campaigning," he said.
AAP reported that 500 of the 1650 new ALP members since Mr Rudd took over Labor's leadership were from Queensland and 440 from New South Wales.
- with AAP

This story was found at: http://www.smh.com.au/queensland/rudd-set-to-call-august-31-election-date-queensland-mps-20130721-2qcd3.html

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