Debate: What Will promises. What they said …

… While Mr Bartlett was grumpy and disinterested for much of the debate, Mr Hodgman was a touch wooden and prone to falling into motherhood statements when caught out without a winning answer.

But Mr Hodgman’s opening address was decisive, political and powerful compared to the Premier’s folksy story of how George Town would look in 2014 under a fourth-term Labor government, clearly winning the Liberals the opening round of the debate.

However, Mr Bartlett trumped the Liberal leader when it came to the following debating period.

In contrast, a relaxed and open-shirted Greens leader Mr McKim, for whom the stakes were much lower and the opportunity to gain profile higher, ably played the part of the third leader who could afford to crack a joke and break the tension.

Overall, none of the three leaders clearly won the debate, nor were there any major stumbles or mistakes.

But neither did the audience filling the Federation Concert Hall leave feeling they had learnt a great deal more about each of the parties’ policy platforms and positions.

The most revealing part of the evening came at the end, when the leaders were able to ask a brief question of each of their two opponents.

Tellingly, five of the six questions probed the conundrum of what shape and form the Tasmanian Parliament would take after the March election, in the likely event no party holds a majority of the 25 Lower House seats.

All leaders professed to be prepared to work towards delivering good government of some kind in minority as the will of the people dictated, although none would detail discussions about possible pacts or coalitions.

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Cartoon: Mark