Candidates for the hotly contested federal electorate of Brisbane faced a barrage of questions covering aged care, corruption and, most heatedly, climate change during a town hall debate last night.
Five of the seven candidates for Brisbane attended the debate, however, One Nation's candidate, Trevor Hold, and the Liberal Democratic Party's Anthony Bull were both notably absent.
A crowd of around 200 left few empty seats and raised a number of fiery questions, covering topics from net-zero emission to establishing a federal anti-corruption commission.
An impassioned attendee asked incumbent LNP member Trevor Evans to explain how the country's aged care crisis came to be and asked other candidates how they planned to rectify the situation.
Another asked whether any party had concrete plans to address housing affordability in the electorate.
Mr Evans, a law graduate and Assistant Minister for Waste Reduction, is campaigning on cost of living and infrastructure such as new green bridges.
However, the candidates' dialogue during the debate revolved heavily around climate change.
Mr Evans distanced himself from National's senator Matt Canavan's opinion earlier this week that the government's zero emissions target was "dead", saying the comments were "not in my view".
It was a strategic decision to try to retain the electorate, which has the highest number of voters under 30 in the country and where the Greens popularity surged in the 2019 election.
Mr Evans said he would have to win the seat on his primary vote, as Labor and the Greens exchange preferences for the seat.
"It is a swing seat, it is a close seat," he said.
"In the same way in previous elections, both Labor and the Greens consider this to be one of their target seats, they also exchange preferences in a pretty strong way."
The 40-year-old was the LNP's first openly gay politician and holds the seat by a 4.9 per cent margin.
He said he was concerned and saddened the transgender debate was being "politicised", however, he said he did not believe that government legislation was needed to "strike the balance".
"These issues are actually being dealt with pretty sensitively on the ground by non-government community organisations," he said.
Greens candidate Stephen Bates is also openly gay.
The 29-year-old works in retail but has a degree in social science.
"Don't underestimate the retail worker"," he told the crowd.
It was met with raucous applause, illustrating the intensity of the battle for one of the south-east's key electorates.
Mr Bates is campaigning on climate change, cost-of-living pressures and is calling for a federal independent commission against corruption and a code of conduct for politicians.
"In every other workplace there are workplace standards that workers need to abide. Parliament should not be any different," he said.
Campaigning at Wilston during peak hour on Tuesday, he said he was "very hopeful" of the vote trending towards the Greens.
"Action on climate change is the big one people are bringing up with us, and people say they are sick of politics as usual under the status quo," he said.
A movable seat
Existing since Federation, Brisbane has generally been a Labor seat and former members include Manfred Cross (1961-75, 1980-90) and Arch Bevis (1990-2010).
A redistribution ahead of the 2010 election moved the boundaries however, taking in strong Liberal voting areas around Ascot and Hamilton which cut more than 2 per cent from the Labor margin.
The LNP has held the seat since then, but in 2019 former Greens senator Andrew Bartlett increased support for the party to its highest ever percentage.
Support rose from 11.8 per cent to 22.4 per cent, putting the Greens just two percentage points out of second place.
While Mr Bates said he was a "newbie" to the electorate, he said has been out on the hustings for at least eight months.
Preferences may determine result in Brisbane
The ABC's chief elections analyst Antony Green said Brisbane would be determined by whatever the LNP's first preference vote was.
Mr Green said if Mr Evans' first preference vote fell below 45 per cent, down from 47.8 per cent last election, then there was a strong chance he would be defeated by whoever finishes second.
"It is a left-right contest but the left vote is now split between Labor and the Greens," he said.
"The Greens can get into second place in Brisbane, but they will not win the seat unless the LNP first preference vote falls."
Anti-Labor trend bucked in Brisbane last election
ALP candidate Madonna Jarrett first threw her hat into the ring back in 1995 in the Liberal seat of Aspley.
She had worked as a policy advisor in the Goss government, as well as working in public affairs and crisis management.
This time around the 56-year-old is campaigning for a change of culture in Canberra, and leaders who put women to "the front of the room".
The businesswoman said job insecurity, housing affordability and climate change were also issues constituents had brought up time and time again.
"It really boils down to people are hurting in the hip pocket, they do not have the money to spend with wages flat."
The mother-of-two said compassion "was in her DNA" and she was confident she could wrest the seat from the LNP.
Antony Green said between 2007 and 2019, Labor's two-party preferred support dipped by 11 per cent.
However in the 2019 poll, Brisbane did record one of the few Queensland swings to Labor.
The seat has seven candidates vying for votes on election day with the Animal Justice Party number one on the ballot paper.
The Greens scored third spot, Labor fourth and the LNP is listed fifth.
