Can Cathy McGowan’s anointed successor keep Indi independent or will the Coalition strike back?

Independent's day? The 'orange army' and its battle for Indi

With the retirement of Cathy McGowan, the rural Victorian seat of Indi is once more back in play and the group of campaigners who unseated Sophie Mirabella in 2013 are now fighting to keep the seat in independent hands.

Orange spray-painted chairs adorn the verandahs outside homes across the electorate – a symbol of the battle.

Barnaby Joyce requested updates on $80m sale of water by Eastern Australia Agriculture Read more

McGowan has passed the baton on to the rural health researcher and midwife Helen Haines. If successful, Haines will make history as the first independent to succeed another independent MP.

“I’m an underdog if you think about it from a historical perspective. Nobody has done this before,” Haines says. “In terms of the campaign spend, I’m massively the underdog.”

But what she lacks in cash, she says, she’s making up for in people power.

John Davis (@jonnomelba) It’s on. #ausvotes #indivotes Quite the splash of orange around #indi today.

⁦@HelenHaines1⁩ and the Orange Team ready.

A huge challenge ahead of us. Indi is a strong chance to return to #oldpolitics says ⁦@AntonyGreenABC⁩ #rustedoff ⁦@gabriellechan⁩ Maybenot pic.twitter.com/ByzbicEgLz

Voices for Indi, an orange army of 1,600 volunteers, are rallying behind Haines in what is shaping up to be a tight three-cornered contest against the Liberal candidate, Steve Martin, and the National party candidate, Mark Byatt. Labor is running the former Wodonga councillor Eric Kerr while the Greens have endorsed the Beechworth vet Helen Robinson, both of whom are outside chances.

The candidate who can win over the border town of Wodonga, with the biggest population base, is likely to be victorious.

Key issues in the electorate include mobile phone blackspots, train services to Melbourne, aged care, healthcare access, job security, cost of living and infrastructure spending.

Wondonga-based candidates Martin, an engineer, and Byatt, a former mayor and cattle farmer, could be at a slight advantage to the independent Haines, who comes from Wangaratta.

Indi has been independent since 2013, when McGowan secured a shock victory over Mirabella, then a Liberal frontbencher, by 439 votes. Mirabella served as a unifying enemy in 2016. She failed in her bid to regain the seat and has since retired from politics, taking a job with Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting.

The former Mansfield mayor Don Cummins put anti-Mirabella signs up on his rural property in 2016 and has some new offerings for this campaign.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Former Mansfield mayor Don Cummins is urging voters in Indi not to flirt with a return to a Liberal MP. Photograph: Don Cummins

Cummins notes in the past three years there’s been a quantum shift locally in views on climate change. There’s no longer dismissal of the evidence from people on the land, Cummins says.

“People who are voting Liberal have got white hair, are male” and, he says, hate the idea that they messed up the world. “They’re not going to admit that but a National party [voter] is in a slightly different position … Every farmer is starting to think, ‘Jesus it’s real’.”

The Corryong beef farmer Linda Nankervis also believes the Coalition’s lack of action on climate change could hurt them.

“We’re at the forefront of climate change as farmers,” she says. “When that rain turns off, it turns off.”

A renewable energy push is also popular – Yackandandah hopes to power its small township with 100% renewable energy by 2022 and the Old Beechworth jail is now home to a community solar project.

Haines, the independent candidate, says climate change is constantly raised with her by grandmothers worried for the plight of their grandchildren, young people and anxious farmers awaiting autumn rains that are running late.

“We start to worry a lot in this district if we don’t have rain by Anzac Day,” Haines says.

She says her opponents are underestimating how much the issue is resonating – pointing to their letterbox pamphlets referencing taxation and border control.

Liberal MPs erase party’s name and logo from election campaign material Read more

At a candidates’ forum in Benalla earlier this month, the Liberal candidate Martin played down concerns over government inaction on climate change, pointing to its Snowy 2.0 hydro power project and support for a Tasmanian interconnector.

“Yes I certainly think it’s most likely there’s a human contribution to climate change,” Martin says. “I believe we should be making decisions on the best available data not ideology.”

The Nationals candidate Byatt says there was a case for more leadership on climate change action. “I think you can do more,” he says.

When it comes to the Queensland Adani coalmine going ahead, independent candidate Haines is an emphatic no, saying “the smart money is on clean energy not dirty coal”, while Martin and Byatt say they had faith in the approval process.

“If you have a set a rules and a company goes through those and ticks the boxes … if at the end of that you then say we’re now going to say no – there’s a word for that, it’s sovereign risk,” Liberal candidate Martin says.

Byatt says: “You need to be able to rely on the process, the regulation and the expert evaluation … to determine whether it’s in or out. That’s where this needs to go.”

Back to a party person?

Indi voters are asking whether it’s worth hitching the electorate’s wagon to a Coalition government on the nose. Disaffection is still rife from Malcolm Turnbull’s knifing and the Barnaby Joyce and Andrew Broad scandals in the National party.

Byatt acknowledged there had been “the odd comment”. “It doesn’t undermine the party’s focus and vision on what regions should be and can be,” he says.

'It's a lie': Chris Bowen calls on Coalition to disavow claim Labor will bring in death tax Read more

The Nationals have a signage blitz, including billboards on trailers, but there’s local speculation that Byatt could be warming the bench for the deputy leader, Bridget McKenzie, to make a run for the lower house in 2022. The Victorian senator recently switched her office from Bendigo to Wodonga and some observers have noted she’s “been acting like the candidate”. But Byatt insisted he’s in the race to win.

Despite claims Indi could be the Liberals’ best chance of picking up a Victorian seat, there are rumblings resources are tight and their signage looks sparse next to the Nationals. The same people behind Mirabella’s past campaigns are running Martin’s.

“They’re running dead in the water, [Liberal] signage is minimal,” a Wangaratta observer noted.

Martin, who commenced a 50 towns in 50 days tour earlier this year, declined the Guardian Australia’s request for an interview.

Changing of the guard

Haines insists, like McGowan, she has the conservative credentials to win over traditional Liberal and National voters.

“I was raised on a dairy farm and my family traditionally voted Country party,” she says.

McGowan’s reign was defined by “doing politics differently” and now the electorate must decide whether it wants to continue the experiment under Haines.

“I’m accountable only to the community, I’m not accountable to a Melbourne or Sydney headquarters, and the policy positions I take are coming from the ground up,” Haines says.

McGowan has joined Haines out on the hustings. “The government’s not offering people anything,” McGowan says. “There’s quite a bit of pork barreling happening but aside from that there’s no regional Australia agenda. People are still very warm and friendly to me.”

The Coalition last week pledged $10m towards the Baranduda Fields sporting complex, which has repeatedly been overlooked for federal funding in the past.

“If people weren’t convinced before that having a marginal seat gets them attention from the major parties they’re pretty convinced now,” Haines says.

Meanwhile, Advance Australia, the conservative lobby group trying to counter the influence of the leftwing movement GetUp, will be sending its satirical superhero mascot down to Indi in May.

The national director of Advance Australia, Gerard Benedet, flagged his organisation was trying to highlight what it claims are links between GetUp and Voices for Indi. GetUp denies there’s any connection, saying it is independent and does not back individual candidates. Likewise Haines and McGowan say there are no ties.

Regardless, Indi voters will decide on 18 May whether orange is the new black.