‘Not Afraid of a Fight’: Nationals Leader Matt Canavan Abandons the Senate in High-Stakes Gamble for Capricornia as One Nation Surge Threatens to Rip Apart the Coalition’s Queensland Heartland
- Nationals leader Matt Canavan will seek LNP preselection for the Central Queensland seat of Capricornia, leaving behind a Senate spot that One Nation’s rise had put in danger.
- The move follows long-serving MP Michelle Landry’s surprise decision to walk away from the seat she has held for more than a decade.
- Pauline Hanson’s top lieutenant James Ashby has ruled out a tilt at the seat, removing a potentially brutal showdown on the Capricorn Coast.
- Senior Nationals are warning One Nation to aim its fire at Labor, not Coalition MPs, as the battle for the conservative vote turns ugly.
The cattle yards, coal trains and coastal towns of Central Queensland are about to become the front line of the fiercest fight in conservative politics.
And the man at its centre has just bet his career on it.
Matt Canavan, the combative Queensland senator who took charge of the Nationals earlier this year, has confirmed he will seek to swap the red leather of the Senate for the green benches of the House of Representatives, putting his hand up to contest Capricornia at the next federal election.
It is a calculated escape route.
Staying put would have meant gambling on a Senate ballot where the resurgent One Nation party looks increasingly capable of snatching the Coalition’s second Queensland berth.
The opening appeared on October 23, when sitting LNP member Michelle Landry announced she would not run again.
Landry has represented Capricornia since 2013, steering the Coalition through a string of tight contests in a region where loyalties are hard-won and quickly lost.
Her exit triggered immediate chatter in Rockhampton and beyond. Canavan lives in Yeppoon and runs his electorate office out of Rockhampton, making him the obvious, if unofficial, heir apparent.
The LNP holds the seat on a margin of 5.8 per cent, a cushion that looks comfortable on paper but offers little certainty in a political climate this volatile.
In a statement, Canavan insisted the decision was driven by the region rather than personal ambition. He said he wanted to keep Central Queensland moving and described the prospect of representing Capricornia as an honour.
He stressed the choice ultimately belongs to local LNP members, pointing to the party’s grassroots preselection process, and vowed he would keep fighting for the region whatever the outcome.
Canavan will remain a senator until the election.
Notably, he had initially played down reports he was eyeing the seat, saying it was a matter for the membership.
He had also flagged he would do whatever was needed to preserve a strong Coalition presence in the region, even as fears of a One Nation wave grew.
To understand why Canavan is moving now, look at the Senate arithmetic.
The Nationals leader sits second on the Coalition’s Queensland Senate ticket, behind Liberal senator James McGrath. Six years ago, Canavan secured the second of the two seats the LNP won in the state.
That second spot is precisely what One Nation now has in its sights. The party’s recent polling surge means it could plausibly claim that seat, leaving the leader of a Coalition partner locked out of Parliament altogether.
For any party, losing its leader would be a catastrophe. For the Nationals, it would be existential.
Canavan only took the leadership in March, following the resignation of David Littleproud. A defeat at the ballot box so soon would shatter the party’s authority at the exact moment it is trying to reassert itself.
Capricornia, by contrast, offers a seat he knows intimately, in a community he calls home.
The biggest threat to that plan appeared to be James Ashby, One Nation’s national director and long-time chief of staff to Pauline Hanson. Ashby lives on the Capricorn Coast and ran unsuccessfully for the state seat of Keppel at the 2024 Queensland election.
He had initially refused to rule out a run, raising the spectre of a bruising head-to-head.
Hanson, speaking at a press conference on Monday, flatly ruled herself out, saying Canavan’s choices were his own business, but declined to say where Ashby might stand, noting the election was still more than a year away.
Ashby has since confirmed he will not contest the seat.
Still, One Nation is far from irrelevant here.
At the 2025 federal election, the party finished third on primary votes in Capricornia, behind the LNP and Labor, recording a swing of roughly one per cent in its favour.
Results published by the Australian Electoral Commission show a seat where minor-party preferences can shape the outcome.
Analysis: What This Means for Australia
This is not merely a story about one politician’s career. It is a story about who gets to speak for regional Australia, and what happens when the conservative vote fractures.
Capricornia sits at the heart of Queensland’s resource economy. Debates over coal mining, energy prices and agricultural policy are not abstract here; they determine whether families keep their jobs and whether towns survive.
Canavan has built his brand as an unapologetic champion of those industries.
A split between the Coalition and One Nation risks diluting regional influence in Canberra.
If conservative voters scatter their support, Labor could be the unexpected beneficiary, and communities already battling the cost of living crisis could find their voices weaker, not stronger.
There is also a national dimension.
A Nationals leader sitting in the lower house carries greater weight in any future Coalition government and can more directly shape decisions on infrastructure, water and resources spending that flow into regional economies.
Socially, the contest exposes a growing disillusionment in the bush with major parties. One Nation’s anti-mass-immigration message is resonating, and the Coalition can no longer assume that rural voters will fall in line.
That anxiety was laid bare by Nationals Senate leader Bridget McKenzie, who told Nine’s Today program that One Nation should be targeting Labor-held seats if it were genuinely serious about “firing the liar”, rather than taking on figures like Canavan.
“(I’m) not afraid of a fight,” she said, arguing that changing the prime minister meant winning seats from Labor.
Political analysts say Canavan’s move is both defensive and strategic. By securing a lower house seat, he insulates the Nationals leadership from the unpredictability of a Senate count where One Nation’s momentum could prove decisive.
Party insiders warn, however, that preselection is not a formality. LNP members are fiercely protective of their right to choose, and any perception of a leader parachuting in could breed resentment.
Regional observers believe the real test will come in preference flows.
With One Nation a consistent presence on the ballot, how its voters allocate their second choices could decide whether the 5.8 per cent margin holds firm or crumbles.
Electoral strategists also caution that the broader war between the Coalition and One Nation is only beginning. As both chase the same disaffected voters, the coming year promises to be one of the most combative in Queensland politics in a generation.
For Canavan, the gamble is clear. Win Capricornia, and he strengthens his grip on the party.
Lose preselection, or the seat, and the Nationals face a leadership crisis few saw coming.