Six weeks on from the state election and one week after being punted from parliament for the first time, Deb Frecklington spoke to Neil Breen about her fight for increased mental health services.

“The new health minister and the treasurer … were carrying on with a load of rot and I kept pressing them on it,” said Mrs Frecklington of the incident.

“They refused to answer my question, which is really quite a simple one: will the new Kingaroy hospital have increased mental health services?”

“The speaker thought I’d had my fair say and I got booted.”

While being kicked out isn’t ideal, Mrs Frecklington has no regrets.

“It’s not something I wanted my team members to do, so it probably isn’t leading by example, but it is a matter of course if you’re going to be a politician.”

“It’s worth standing up for your region and it’s worth standing up for what is wrong.”

“Yes, we’ve got the COVID response, but there’s still everything else going on in our community that we can’t take our eyes off.”

“What do you do when you get punted?” Neil Breen asked

“Well, we should ask Ros Bates, because she’s been punted three days in a row!” she said.

Press PLAY below to hear the full interview.