Activist group surveys members about role they want it to play in Melbourne contest

GetUp is yet to decide whether or not it will be active on the ground in the looming Batman byelection, and is waiting on a signal from Labor about its position on the controversial Adani project.



The activist group’s national director, Paul Oosting, told Guardian Australia GetUp was in the process of surveying its membership about what role they wanted the organisation to play in Batman, with the byelection contest now set for 17 March.

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The group was also waiting to see where federal Labor would land on the Adani project after Bill Shorten publicly telegraphed a shift to a more hardline stance in the past week.

“We think the right thing for Labor to do is oppose the mine,” Oosting said.

He said Queensland voters had sent a clear signal in the state election that there wasn’t broad public support for the mine, and all political parties should heed that message.

The shadow cabinet discussed Labor’s position on Adani on Monday.

Labor MPs are being lobbied heavily by campaigns being spearheaded by environment groups, and they report being lobbied by GetUp members as the party inches towards a final decision.

There is a weight of internal support within Labor for a hardline stance on the project but there are concerns about the consequences of that decision, both political and practical.

While there have been strong opponents of Adani within federal Labor for some time, and while some MPs have expressed opposition for months, there is also concern that announcing an official shift on Adani while the Batman byelection is under way could look cynical to voters in inner Melbourne.

With the Liberals not running a candidate in Batman, the March contest will be between Labor and the Greens, which presents a conundrum to some progressive third-party activist groups about who to support. It is also a headache for party strategists who are aware of the growing power and professionalism of activist groups, given their capacity to mobilise resources at short notice.

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The Greens are opposed to the Adani project and have been running a ground campaign against Labor highlighting its in-principle support for the mine in Melbourne for months.

The deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, was asked on the ABC on Wednesday night whether the project would ever go ahead, given the difficulty of raising finance, and a decision by the Queensland government to veto a federal loan for a rail link.

Joyce avoided dwelling on Adani’s proposal, focusing instead on the Galilee basin. He said it was “a question for Adani as to whether [the project] can go ahead but if you said we should develop the Galilee basin, yes, we should … should there be a railway basin built from the basin to a port? Of course there should. That’s how you drive the world.”

He said the development wasn’t about Adani, it was about developing the prospects of that part of regional Queensland.