Police have been called over an election campaign incident at the weekend with Chief Minister Katy Gallagher complaining about being ''harassed'' by a group of young men working for the Canberra Liberals.
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The Chief Minister's staff called ACT Policing after Ms Gallagher was allegedly pursued by two car loads of young male Liberals while she was campaigning in southern Canberra on Saturday.
The Chief Minister, who was alone in her car but had staffers in nearby vehicles, said she was followed at one point during the pursuit into a deserted Kambah car park.
But the Canberra Liberals yesterday accused the Chief Minister of ''overreacting'' and said reporting the incident was ''an absolute waste of police resources''.
Ms Gallagher said the two Liberals' vehicles, an SUV and a ute towing a ''triple your rates'' trailer, arrived at Chisholm Shopping Centre shortly after she set up a campaign stall there on Saturday.
The Chief Minister said the cars, each carrying two men in Team Zed T-shirts, followed her to her next stop at Kambah Village, where the rates ute parked in front of her stall and did occasional laps of the car park.
When she left for her next event, a Diversity ACT working bee in Kambah, the vehicles continued to tail her and two other cars carrying Labor staffers until they pulled into a car park off Summerland Circuit. Ms Gallagher said the trailer drove in and did laps of the car park, while the SUV waited across the road.
On Saturday, the Chief Minister tweeted: ''Campaign hotting up now just had to pull over after being pursued by Libs with obviously nothing better to do.''
Ms Gallagher said yesterday she did not mind ''a bit of rough and tumble'' during the last week of the election campaign but was not going to put up with being followed by cars of young men.
''I wouldn't mind if was a bit of fun, but I'm not going to be pressured on the road,'' she said. ''I drive myself everywhere, I don't have a chauffeur, and sometimes I have my children in the car.
''I've got enough pressure without being pursued by a car full of young Liberals thinking it's fun.''
Ms Gallagher said she would lodge a formal police complaint if there was any repeat of the incident.
''I do accept that young members of political parties do silly things. The Labor Party's not exempt from that at times,'' she said.
''It's just creepy having people following you, and they're following you to stress you out.
''That was their aim, to harass me with that stupid 'triple your rates' sign. I just thought, I'm not going to put up with it, having four blokes following me in a car on my own.''
A Canberra Liberals campaign spokeswoman said yesterday: ''Volunteers regularly drive between shopping centres to campaign, and volunteers often appear where leaders do.
''This is nothing more than the usual activities from young campaigners, and is a gross overreaction from the Chief Minister and an absolute waste of police resources,'' she said.
