My 2 cents here: 55450154"If Keith Pitt makes an "approval"...

My 2 cents here: 55450154

"If Keith Pitt makes an "approval" decision anytime between now and the election, it would become a hot topic which Labor would use to win over votes. I just can't fathom why they would make the decision anytime after August 2021 and "x" days before the election. There is a chance they make it 1-3weeks before the election, (with 1-3weeks processing and publishing time) to make sure the decision is published on the ASX shortly after the election (to potentially give labor the problem in the next 3 years). That is my theory, and that makes 100% sense to me. The tell tale sign will be when the application is removed from NEATS temporarily while they update its status, for example, WA-488-P was removed from NEATS for a few days, and its approval was only published on NEATS recently."

The part that makes the most sense here is that the Liberals can give Labor the extremely difficult problem of having to deal with a potential PEP-11 "renewal" (not extension), which is a far bigger political problem, because it would guarantee another ~5years of exploration / production / lease entitlement. I certainly hope the Liberals have thought about this... they certainly have had enough time to think about this political strategy.

So if they win, they probably don't care because they might secretly all support the gas industry anyway as others have suggested. And if they don't win, that is also good, because PEP-11's potential renewal after the drill will be a ticking time bomb for the Labor party, which would be perfectly timed for a potential Labor election for their second term.