Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk shared never before seen photos ahead of retirement

Just months before Annastacia Palaszczuk made the unexpected call to walk away from politics, she released a video asking Queenslanders to vote for her in 2024. In October, with 369 days to go until Queenslanders voted, the Premier debuted a taxpayer funded video detailing her family life and asking to be re-elected. It also detailed her government’s wins during her past three terms in the top job. “My grandfather came to Queensland as a migrant, he was a boilermaker, he said to me it was tough work but it was a job that put food on the table and a roof over his head,” Ms Palaszczuk says in the video. “He did the very best for his family … and I want the best for every single family for this state, it’s why I got into politics.” Following months of rampant speculation she would be pushed out as opinion polls plummeted, the Premier attempted to shift the focus. She shared photos of herself as a young child alongside her grandfather, urging Queenslanders to vote for her a fourth time. In the video, Ms Palaszczuk asks residents to vote for her again, saying she has “a lot more to do” as premier. The video opens with picturesque images of the state, which Ms Palaszczuk describes as “beautiful one day and perfect the next”. She says she is working to build a “better Queensland that the world is only just discovering”. The three-minute video details the major events the state has been through, including floods, bushfires, cyclones, and a global pandemic. She talks about her experience as premier and how she led the country through the Covid-19 pandemic, saying it brought the state “closer”. “Nothing could have prepared me for that, but we did it better, I think, than anywhere else in the world,” the Premier said. She says her time in the job has put Queensland in the best position it’s ever been in – with the strongest economy in the country and the lowest taxes. In the video, the Premier says she can now give Queenslanders the “biggest cost of living relief in the country, free kindy, cheaper electricity and free TAFE” while building new hospitals and schools. She talks about her other successes, such as decriminalising abortion, free period products in schools and legal access to voluntary-assisted dying. But despite promising not to “give in”, just two months later on Sunday afternoon following a Cyclone Jasper briefing, Ms Palaszczuk said she had nothing left to give. “Standing here today in this place, with these flags, and standing up for the people of Queensland has been the honour of my life,” she told reporters on Sunday. “I fought the good fight, I have given everything, but now is the time for me to find out what else life has to offer. “Thank you to every single Queenslander … It has been the greatest honour of my life and our best days are well and ahead of us.” Ms Palaszczuk will step aside as premier at the end of the week and retire as the state member for Inala at the end of the month. She has served as Premier since 2015 and sat in the Queensland parliament since 2006. – additional reporting by NCA NewsWire staff