LIBERAL candidate Chris Crether has denied any preference deal with Labor in a
Federal Election forum held in Birchip yesterday.
The six current candidates’
credibility was on the line in a frequently firey Q-and-A session, where an
strong crown at the Birchip Cropping Group Expo at Birchip P12 School put their
concerns to the fore.
When questioned whether Liberal preferences would be
swapped for Labor in a deal alleged by the Sunraysia Daily earlier this week, Mr
Crewther emphatically denied the claim.
“The first I heard of it was in the
newspaper… I’m not sure who put it in the media,” he said.
“It’s a false
rumour, there is no deal.”
Labor candidate Lydia Senior said she was
“surprised” by the report, and confirmed that individual candidates were not
involved in preference discussions.
Other topics to arise were the ‘Gonski’
reforms to national education, carbon tax, as well as road and rail
infrastructure, with questions arriving via text, VFF executives and local
councillors.
But the attendees at the agricultural gala asked mostly about
their own industry, with GrainCorp’s touted takeover high on the agenda for the
crowd of mainly grain growers.
For more on this story, see Friday’s edition of The Guardian (5/7/13).
