Gold Coast city councillor and planning boss Cameron Caldwell has won the Liberal Party's preselection battle for the federal seat of Fadden and will be the frontrunner when the northern Gold Coast electorate heads to the polls in July.
The by-election was sparked by the sudden retirement of controversial former Coalition minister Stuart Robert, who presided over the implementation of the Robodebt scheme, and has more recently been accused of helping lobbyist mates and their clients bid for lucrative government contracts.
Saturday's party room vote at Runaway Bay was a five-horse race between branch chair and businesswoman Fran Ward, emergency doctor and 2021 Queenslander of the year Dinesh Palipana, Mr Caldwell, and a pair of lesser-known financial advisors, Owen Caterer and Craig Hobart.
Mr Caldwell has been a councillor on the Gold Coast for more than a decade.
Mr Palipana, a quadriplegic and well-known disability advocate, was endorsed by local state MP Sam O'Connor.
On Saturday, the successful candidate required at least 50 per cent of the vote and, with 153 branch members in attendance, the magic number was 77 votes.
Party members were locked inside the Runaway Bay Community Centre for three hours and listened to presentations from each of the candidates.
The result went down to the wire, and Mr Caldwell prevailed over Mr Palipana in the third round of voting.
It's expected Mr Caldwell will now resign from council, but because the next local government election is less than 12 months away there will be no by-election in his division.
Gold Coast City Council chief executive Tim Baker said a replacement would be appointed by the council.
"There is no requirement for Cr Caldwell to resign or take a leave of absence from any duties and I will meet with him this week to ensure all legislative requirements are met over the next six weeks," Mr Baker said.
"In the event Cr Caldwell is elected to federal parliament, the city will invite expressions of interest for the role with a decision on the appointment made by council resolution, in accordance with the Local Government Act."
Federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton congratulated Mr Caldwell on the win.
"He lives here on the Gold Coast, in the electorate of Fadden, he has a beautiful wife and two children and he's been working locally in this community, firstly as a small business person and for 12 years as a councillor," Mr Dutton said.
"He's already established himself as someone who's prepared to fight for the local constituents here."
Mr Dutton said Mr Caldwell had proven he had what it took for the fight in July.
"There's a big fight ahead of us, we need to make sure we work every day between now and the by-election because it will be important to send a message to the Prime Minister that the government's just not doing well enough when it comes to supporting families with small businesses. In fact, we know that Labor is making it much harder," he said.
Mr Caldwell said the win was "a great honour".
"I feel like as a long-term local in this part of the world I really understand what the community expects from their parliamentarians and I know that I can be the one that they can support in order to deliver for our local community," he said.
The Liberal Party is desperate to avoid a repeat of the disaster in Aston earlier this year, which marked the first time in more than a century that a sitting government has won a seat from the opposition in a federal by-election.
But the marginal electorate of Aston in the outer suburbs of Melbourne is a far cry from the LNP stronghold of the Gold Coast.
The Coalition has a firm grip on Fadden, holding the northern Gold Coast seat with a 10.6 per cent margin.
Safe seat 'doesn't exist anymore'
Queensland Opposition Leader David Crisafulli, whose state electorate of Broadwater sits within Fadden, refused to publicly endorse a candidate but said the notion of a safe seat no longer existed in modern politics.
"I think both political parties would acknowledge that the concept doesn't exist anymore," he said.
"The days of people being rusted on one way or another are over."
Labor doesn't expect to win
Griffith University nursing lecturer and ALP candidate at last year's federal election, Letitia Del Fabbro, will recontest the seat in July.
Speaking in Mackay, Gold Coast Labor senator Murray Watt said Labor did not expect to win the by-election in Fadden but would not "vacate the field".
"We need to recognise that Fadden is a rolled-gold LNP seat," he said.
"They don't get a lot better LNP seats than Fadden.
"I think that the activities of the outgoing member Stuart Robert suppressed the LNP vote in that seat.
"We do not go into this by-election expecting to win it."
The Greens polled strongly in 2022 and will also be contesting the by-election, but are still in the preselection process.
Pauline Hanson's One Nation candidate, Sandy Roach, who received 8.68 per cent of the vote last year, will also be recontesting.
Voters in Fadden will go to the polls on July 15.
