Tony Windsor has ruled out running against Barnaby Joyce in a New England byelection after the high court found Joyce was ineligible to be elected because he had New Zealand citizenship.
But he said he might run for the Senate instead.
On Friday afternoon, just hours after the ruling, writs were issued for a byelection to be held on 2 December.
Joyce has all but made it official that he would run again, and there had been confident speculation that Windsor, the former independent MP who held the seat from 2001 to 2013, would also contest the seat.
Windsor was coy about his intentions when asked in the lead-up to Friday’s court decision, but on Friday he ruled himself out of the race.
He said that among other reasons, his wife had “a pretty rough time” during the 2016 election with some highly personal attacks and reports, and he wouldn’t put her through another campaign.
“I’m also pretty busy at the moment, I’ve got a lot of things on. I’m helping build a house for one of my children,” he said.
Windsor said he would stay in the political space, immersing himself in issues such as the NBN, gas and water, and giving support to candidates who shared his concerns.
He would not rule out running for the Senate as an independent.
“I may. It’s about the issues. It’s not about whether I want to be there,” he said. “The issues are still there and they’re being neglected, and the National party in particular are the neglectors.”
After running through those concerns for several minutes, Windsor stopped himself: “It sounds like I’m running, doesn’t it?”
He said the Nationals would have to poll below 45% and not get preferences to lose the seat in December.
“I don’t think it will be a landslide to [Joyce] but then it depends on who’s in the zoo.”
Windsor joined the citizenship case in the high court – which involved seven politicians – as a “contradictor” against Joyce in August.
Through his legal team Windsor argued against claims by the attorney general, George Brandis, that politicians should not be punished by the high court if they were unaware of their citizenship status.
Earlier this month he requested a byelection should Joyce be found ineligible.
Speaking after the ruling, Joyce told media in Tamworth he was always prepared for such an outcome and didn’t stand there “totally surprised”, even though he said he never had reason to believe he had citizenship of any country but Australia.
Joyce thanked the people of New England for their support and apologised for the inconvenience of a byelection. “I thank the court for their deliberations. I respect the verdict of the court.”
He said he wasn’t technically a candidate for the forthcoming byelection because he had to be endorsed by the party, but those discussions would happen in coming days. He declared he was now just “Barnaby Joyce standing at the lookout in Tamworth”.
Asked if he was ready for a campaign, he replied: “I reckon I’ve got a fair bit of fire in the tank. Do you want to try me?”
National party emails calling for donations to support his campaign went out within the hour.
Labor have not yet announced a candidate. Had Windsor stood, the party would have been unlikely to run a high-profile candidate.
The Greens, who polled 2.9% of the primary vote in 2016 and 4.58% in 2013, said they were running preselection and would make an announcement when they were ready.
Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives party has put out a general call for applications for state and federal candidates, but did not respond to questions put to his office about New England.
The One Nation leader, Pauline Hanson, visited the electorate in 2016 despite not fielding a candidate, but on Friday gave a firm “no comment” on whether her party would field a New England candidate. A spokesman told the ABC last month “the prospect was real”.
On Tuesday the West Australian reported that former state MP Ian Britza, who defected from the Liberal party to the Australian Country party earlier this month, said he was considering throwing his hat in the ring.
Britza, who lived in New South Wales for two decades but now lives in Western Australia, said he would move to New England for the job, which he believed he had a good chance of winning because the Nationals did “whatever the Liberals tell them to do”.
So far the strongest competition looks to come from another independent.
In 2016 Rob Taber polled just 2.6% of the primary vote after a swing of more than 9.7% against him. Taber blamed the loss on Windsor’s decision to reenter the race.
Taber said he would run again, with Windsor bowing out.
“I’ve decided to stand, now that Tony’s not in the mix,” he told Guardian Australia on Friday.
“This could be really interesting. We knew last time around you only had to get Barnaby Joyce below the line and you could beat him ... The big key is probably if One Nation stands, they could take some conservatives votes from Barnaby Joyce.”
Taber said the last election showed a lot of the community had turned away from Windsor because of his decision to support Julia Gillard’s minority government after the 2010 election.
