Clive Palmer's companies have pumped funds into his United Australia Party as he tries to topple Queensland's Labor government at the upcoming state election.
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The businessman's offensive comes as one of Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's own former cabinet member's attacked her for "demonising" the coal mining sector.
Mr Palmer's companies - Minerology, Palmer Gold Coast and Waratah Coal - have donated more than $80,000 to the UAP in the past two-and-a-half weeks, according to the Electoral Commission of Queensland.
Yellow billboards with the message "Clive says give Labor the boot" have popped up across the state ahead of the October 31 poll.
Mr Palmer wants to assemble a coalition to oust Annastacia Palaszczuk's government, saying the state's economy is on a knife-edge.
"She's hopeless ...terrible," Mr Palmer told the Sunday Mail.
"Never believe that things can't get worse."
Mr Palmer spent millions on political advertising during the 2019 federal election, particularly to attack Labor in Queensland, and it's believed that partly contributed to Prime Minister Scott Morrison's victory.
He's also trying to build a broader anti-Labor coalition but the opposition Liberal National Party has ruled out working with minor parties.
The LNP denied the two parties had struck a preference deal, with a spokesman telling AAP on Monday they had made "no deals with anybody", while a UAP spokesman said no deals had been done, at this stage.
Mr Palmer's offensive against Ms Palaszczuk comes as her own former cabinet minister Jo-Ann Miller slammed her government for "demonising" coal mining.
The former corrective services minister, who held the seat of Bundamba for Labor for 20 years, said the state government had caved to green groups at the expense of workers and tax income.
"The coal mining industry should never have been demonised by any Labor government and under this government they have allowed the coal mining industry to be demonised," she told the Courier-Mail.
Miller, who belongs to Labor's Left faction, said she wasn't surprised that the powerful Construction, Forestry, Mining, Maritime and Energy Union had turned on the Palaszczuk government.
"The miners were not being listened to, they were not being respected," she said.
"I'm amazed they stayed as long as they did but good on them for walking away.
"The $500,000 hole in the Labor Party campaign budget is huge and it can't be replaced by branch barbecues."
Australian Associated Press
