Former Newman government MP to contest wafer-thin federal byelection

Trevor Ruthenberg will be up against Labor’s Susan Lamb, who this month quit the Parliament over the dual citizenship saga, with a “super Saturday” of byelections expected to be held in July.

Mr Ruthenberg, 50, held the state seat of Kallangur from 2012 to 2015, until the Newman government was swept from power.

Labor has already seized on Mr Ruthenberg's preselection win, connecting the dots with his time as an MP during the Newman years.

State member for Murrumba Steven Miles said Mr Ruthenberg would support Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's cuts.

"The last time he was part of a government, Queensland's public services were devastated by the worst cuts in living memory under [premier] Campbell Newman," he said.

Labor state secretary Julie-Ann Campbell emailed supporters on Wednesday morning calling for donations for the upcoming "long, hard-fought byelection" in Longman.

During last year's state election campaign, the Labor campaign repeatedly drew connections between then LNP leader Tim Nicholls and his time as treasurer under Mr Newman, and public service cuts, using TV ads and billboards and talking points at press conferences.

Mr Ruthenberg said “maybe” when asked if he would have been in a better position if he had been preselected six months ago when questions about Ms Lamb's citizenship first arose.

“But we are where we are and, mate, it starts tomorrow. We’ll be best foot forward and finish the race strong,” he said.

Mr Ruthenberg said he could “absolutely” say he had never been a dual citizen.

"I've only ever been Australian," he said.

"The preselection process that the LNP put me through, if Labor had put Susan Lamb through the same preselection process, we wouldn't be here, it's been arduous and correctly so."

Asked if the Coalition’s company tax cuts would be the lead in his saddle in Longman, Mr Ruthenberg disagreed.

“Not at all,” he said.

“I think given that probably half of the people in Longman that are employed, are employed by small business, I think they would think that company tax cuts are a great idea, they currently benefit from them.”

Mr Ruthenberg would not be drawn on whether One Nation’s decision to dump support for company tax cuts was a way of differentiating itself from the LNP in the upcoming byelection.

“I think the boys in Canberra will deal with that, I’ll concentrate on knocking on doors and dealing with local issues,” he said.

Mr Ruthenberg said local issues were crime and congestion in the division of Longman, which covers the areas of Caboolture, Burpengary, Kallangur, Morayfield, Woodford and Narangba.

Asked how the LNP would preference One Nation in the seat of Longman, Mr Ruthenberg said it was "not my issue, my issue is knocking on doors".

Mr Ruthenberg disputed suggestions the party could win the byelection based on preference flows from One Nation voters.

"The people can make up their own mind – how the preferences flow will be up to them," he said.

LNP president Gary Spence the party had only just chosen a candidate for Longman and preferences would be decided over the coming weeks.

He said the preselection process took as long as it did because the party took the matter very seriously.

The other hopefuls were former state candidate for Morayfield Jason Snow and businessman Terry Young.

The preselection meeting, held at the Caboolture RSL, finished just before 8pm.

The fight to win Longman will be fierce, with Ms Lamb holding the seat on a tiny margin of 0.8 per cent, after defeating former frontbencher Wyatt Roy in 2016.

A poll, commissioned by The Australia Institute and conducted by ReachTel, put the Coalition on 53 per cent and Labor on 47 per cent in two-party terms, in a survey of 1277 residents in Longman.

If Mr Ruthenberg wins the upcoming federal byelection, it will be a historic victory.

The last time a government won a federal byelection from the opposition party was in 1920 in the seat of Kalgoorlie.

One Nation’s candidate is Matthew Stephen.