Annastacia Palaszczuk’s anointed successor, Steven Miles, likely to face challenge, say Queensland Labor MPs

Senior Queensland Labor figures say they expect a contested ballot for the party leadership, despite attempts to rally support behind the deputy premier, Steven Miles, to avoid a messy contest to succeed Annastacia Palaszczuk.

Miles declared his intention to run for the Labor leadership on Sunday, just hours after Palaszczuk announced she would retire from politics and endorsed him as her successor.

The other two potential leadership candidates are health minister Shannon Fentiman and treasurer Cameron Dick. Guardian Australia understands one scenario being discussed among MPs involves the pair campaigning together on a ticket. In that scenario the numbers in the Labor caucus would be “incredibly close”, sources say.

Miles is considered the frontrunner and comes from the largest grouping (United Workers Union) within Labor’s dominant left faction. Fentiman, who is aligned with the Australian Manufacturing Workers’ Union, is understood to have strong support from within the remainder of the left. Dick is from Palaszczuk’s faction, the Australian Workers’ Union-aligned right.

Annastacia Palaszczuk resigns as Queensland premier – video

Labor sources said while Dick was ambitious he “simply could not win” a contested leadership ballot against a united left faction.

“If Cameron decides not to run, and Palaszczuk helps swing the right behind Miles, that’s the ballgame,” said one MP.

But others have suggested Miles is “no shoo-in” and that Palaszczuk’s support would not carry the same weight as, for example, Daniel Andrews when he backed Jacinta Allan in Victoria. Some backbenchers and ministers have been unhappy at the top-down approach by Palaszczuk in recent years. They said her intervention might backfire among MPs looking for a fresh approach.

“The idea she just gets to pick could end up galvanising someone to run,” one MP said.

Palaszczuk said on Sunday the caucus would meet on Friday to elect a new leader. But a contested leadership ballot, under party rules, involves a vote of unions and branch members. The push to cement Miles as the new premier on Friday is premised on the need to avoid a prolonged contest, and to begin the next year on the front foot, ahead of the election in October.

Sources said discussions had been held about ways to circumvent the drawn-out leadership vote, including “just going into caucus, sorting it out, and emerging with one consensus candidate”.

Some MPs on Sunday expressed a preference for Fentiman, citing concerns about Miles’s electoral appeal. The deputy premier has been the government’s attack dog for the past few years. One MP said Miles “just simply needs more time to polish his image”.

Labor sources also raised the prospect that Fentiman might ultimately form an unofficial ticket with Dick, who would stand for deputy leader. Such an arrangement would “split the caucus”.

“Ideally you want balance. One woman, one man, one from the left and one from the right,” a Labor source said.

“The idea of a left-left leadership team (Miles and Fentiman) might not go down so well in a few places. Two men (Miles and Dick) also probably doesn’t work.”

Miles released a statement on Sunday confirming he would run. Fentiman and Dick praised Palaszczuk but gave no indication yet as to whether they would contest.

Miles said he would “work day and night” for the people of Queensland and praised Palaszczuk’s legacy.

“A Labor government that I lead will build on that legacy and refocus the state on the services Queenslanders rely upon.”

Steven Miles

The deputy premier since 2020, and a regular sight on TV during the coronavirus crisis, Steven Miles will be a familiar face for most Queenslanders.

But like his predecessor as deputy, Jackie Trad – who he replaced after her defeat at that year’s election – he may struggle to shrug off his reputation as the government’s attack dog.

Originally elected to represent Brisbane’s leafy western suburbs around Bardon on a platform of “Miles better for the reef”, Miles was appointed the state’s first ever minister for the Great Barrier Reef in 2015.

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He abandoned his first seat after a redistribution in 2017 and now represents the mortgage belt northern suburbs electorate of Murrumba.

He was promoted to the ministry of health in the government’s second term, serving in the role until the end of the first year of the Covid pandemic.

The workout fanatic and PhD – and leader of the dominant Labor left – is also a tough political opponent. He stood out during a mini-campaign as acting premier in Paluszczuk’s absence this year and appeared a safe hand at the tiller.

Miles would be Queensland’s first male Labor leader since 2007.

Shannon Fentiman

In her maiden speech, Shannon Fentiman declared she was part of “a member of the next generation of the Labor movement” and in the nine years since, she has maintained her reputation as the new broom.

The trained lawyer has never spent a day on the backbench, appointed in 2015 to run the troubled and scandal-prone department of child safety, along with becoming minister for women and communities. She was later given responsibility for employment, small business and training.

In 2020 she was promoted again, leading a number of key reforms as attorney-general, including legalising voluntary assisted dying, changes to government ID to better accommodate transgender people, and fully legalising sex work, among others.

She was kicked sideways into the ministry of health in a reshuffle earlier this year and has spent the year grappling with a regional maternity crisis and the scandalous forensic unit run by Queensland Health.

Just 40, Fentiman remains one of the party’s younger MPs and represents the diverse Logan City seat of Waterford with an extremely strong margin. Part of Labor left, she is a committed reformer, one of the government’s smartest and hardest working ministers, and has long been touted as a charismatic way to reset the government after the resignation of premier Paluszczuk.

Cameron Dick

An outside shot at the big job, state treasurer Cameron Dick is the most experienced of the three contenders.

First elected in 2009, Dick has served at different times as minister for education, health, manufacturing, state development, industrial relations, and infrastructure and planning, among others.

After working as a solicitor in state supreme court and the high court, Dick served as attorney-general in the government of Anna Bligh. He was first elected to the seat of Greenslopes in 2009, but lost the seat in the 2012 wipeout.

He returned to parliament – and government – in 2015, reelected to represent the diverse south Brisbane seat of Woodridge which he now holds on a large margin.

He replaced Jackie Trad as treasurer in 2020, and recently delivered the country’s largest surplus, thanks in part to his controversial decision to increase royalties on coal production.

Dick’s largest weakness is his factional allegiance to the Labor right, which relinquished control of the party early in the Paluszczuk government’s first term to the left.

Dick is a strong parliamentary performer, and his economic credentials would help buttress the government’s message on cost of living.

He is the brother of fellow Queensland Labor veteran Milton Dick, the federal speaker.