politics

Queensland State election, 2012. Anna Bligh’s ALP was swept from office and almost entirely from the political map after a massive state-wide electoral swing handed government to the LNP under new leader, former Brisbane Lord Mayor, Campbell Newman. Most Independent and Labor MPs were defeated, leaving the ALP with only seven of its 51 seats going in to the poll: four in Brisbane’s south and south-west and three in northern provincial areas. The State’s electoral map is awash with LNP blue after the party captured seats never before given up by Labor, and took a stranglehold on the all-important south-east corner. The ‘barnstorming’ arrival on the electoral scene of Bob Katter’s Australian Party attracted 11.5% of the state-wide vote, but succeeded in winning only two seats in the State’s far north. Details of polling at Queensland general election, Electoral Commission of Queensland, 2012

Civil Liberties rally march route, Brisbane, 1968. This map captures the divisions between old and new left within a purely spatial context. While Brisbane’s New Left required a large map of the city outlining a precise march route, no such map is extant from North Queensland’s strike waves, due simply to the fact that these struggles were highly localised affairs in small towns, often based around only a few streets. Organisation however appears as vital in both instances, with the almost comical march starting time of 12:37 indicating a high degree of organisational rigidity among Brisbane’s youth protesters. Collection of the Fryer Library, the University of Queensland