From today’s Crikey email:
As the Coalition decides that there’s no mileage in personal attacks on Kevin Rudd and adds to its unique method of pork barrel policy a unique “theory of governance� where the “Labor state premiers� require checks and balances from a Liberal government, there’s been some speculation about the response of Queensland Premier Peter Beattie to Ruddism.
Beattie’s been having a terrible political time with the very vexed issue of local Council amalgamations. But he’s obviously been relishing the chance to play on the national stage. His sharp comments on Kevin Andrews and Dr Haneef are a stark contrast with Kevin Rudd’s caution and measured bipartisanship – a contrast so obvious that John Howard has mused that the Premiers are playing the role of Rudd’s attack dogs.
That’s unlikely to be true in Peter Beattie’s case, though his strong stance on Haneef will have gladdened the hearts of civil liberties activists waiting in vain for the preferred Prime Minister to take a stand.
Beattie’s actions are the product both of his own political interests and of his thorny relationship with Rudd.
Beattie’s Haneef position originated in a pressing political imperative – the need to ensure a continued supply of overseas trained doctors for staff starved Queensland hospitals, and to avoid any more scandals about their qualifications or competence. Any watcher of the Queensland Health’s job ads page would see workforce planning specialists constantly advertised – it’s a thankless job, as Tony Abbott will find out when the Commonwealth has to run Devonport Hospital.
But Beattie has clearly enjoyed the chance to take a high profile nationally.
It’s simplistic to suggest that Beattie’s stance is payback for Rudd’s local government stand.
There was no love lost between Beattie and Wayne Goss – who sidelined the prominent MP after he entered Parliament in 1989. Beattie chaired the Criminal Justice Committee, and, in line with the Fitzgerald vision, stood up to the executive government when warranted. He was later replaced by a nonentity, and only elevated to the ministry after Goss almost lost in 1995 when he was handed the poisoned chalice of Health.
Kevin Rudd was, of course, Wayne Goss’ bureaucratic offsider.
There’s also the feeling that Rudd is somehow not really of the Labor Party – too academic, or too disconnected from the party’s base. Unions haven’t forgotten Goss’ public sector reforms or the downsizing of rail and mining workforces he presided over.
Pragmatically, Beattie probably wouldn’t mind a Rudd federal government. But then, scoring points off Canberra always plays well in Queensland, and Beattie himself will be gone next year. In the meantime, he’s no doubt going to enjoy himself, even if his media profile irks a federal leader with whom relations have always been strained.
This surprises me as for a while there he was doing Rudd’s dirty work, giving rise to Howard’s whinge about being caught in a Labor pincer. More power to him I say.
When you consider that Rudd has pretty much left Goss behind, to Goss’ chagrin on Sunday a few months ago, you’ve squared a pretty untidy circle.
It’s difficult to appreciate the small target politics of Rudd, even though they have been a revelation as to dealing with Howard’s wedges.
But perhaps we need to look at the last decade and ponder if the real fault does not lie with the electorate itself. Time and time again the electorate has proven craven; unwilling to to apply even a skerrick of effort in understanding issues and devoid of “heart” as to issues involving ethics.
A succession of leaders from the non-right parties have been left dangling in the wind because of the lack of imaginatin and principles of the public and it is no wonder that the current opposition displays the timidity it does. The fact that this timidity is rewarded with such adulation speaks for itself.
As for the state premiers, one can hardly accuse them of rising above parochial let alone base considerations to embrace the wider interests of Australia and the national project.
A state premier going in to bat for a minority section of the public as ethically low as real estate sharks within a couple of months of federal elections, is typical of the moronic level at which these people operate. Think Cubbie Creek and the Murray Darling in general.
Let’s also never forget the damage done to this country by Lennon, certain liberals, Gunns and CFMEU in 2004, in betraying this country for the grubbiest of motives.
Heh, Paul Walter. Hooray for the small target strategy, after all these years?
Andrew E, would you care to elaborate on Beattie doing Rudd’s dirty work?
I didn’t see Goss but I’m not surprised to hear that he’s a tad annoyed that Rudd was now Premier of Queensland when he thought he was. I see in the Fin today an article quoting a speech Goss gave in 95, which Rudd says he wrote, and quotes from “Rudd/Goss”.
Haneef, water - saying the things that would get Rudd wedged or put him in a position where he was defending policies he has no power (yet) to enact, the very sort of thing Beazley did regularly.
Your point about Queenslanders loving a free kick at Canberra is a good one I think, and not generally understood elsewhere.
Folks around here go straight into State of Origin mode when it comes to anything south of the border. They can detest Beattie from cakehole to breakfast time, but let him savage anyone to the south, especially Canberra, and the cane toads line up behind him with pointed sticks at the ready.
It’s actually quite sweet in a twisted kind of way.
Well. If Rudd disagrees with Beattie on the councils amalgamations it shows that Premiers are not telling Rudd what to do, unlike stated by the Government.
Well, Liam,
Even the Australian public had to put two and two together eventually, concerning Howard’s plausible deniability and lies.
After all it’s taken them long enough.
Beazley etc didn’t use smalltarget at the right time in the political cycle in the right way, and didn’t have the ability to finesse it the way our former diplomat opposition leader ( or several of the state premiers) can. Very much a pocket Gough, am starting to think.
Good point Guido. It may be in Rudd’s political interest to be seen to be in conflict with a state premier. I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if it was an intentionally political tactic.
Rudd reminds me more of Howard every day. Not just in policy, but in his political strategy as well.
The whole conservative
strategypropaganda has taken an absolute pasting from Beattie over the past two days and is quickly coming apart at the seams. Howard has leapt in with a ludicrous proposition of holding a plebiscite to try to prop up his embattled state mates.I consider that the issue may well be all but out of hot air by the end of the week with Rudd unscathed Beattie getting on with the amalgamations as planned and Howard stuck with a meaningless piece of political junk that he has no option but to walk away from.
It only took a couple of questions in question time in state parliament today before the pain for the Libs and Nats was too much and they reverted to thier usual default questions.
Just ask the Liberal members for Kawana, Caloundra or Noosa if they feel as confident today as they did when parliament resumed yesterday and I am sure they would run away shrieking. Howard’s intervention has made tough men turn into dribbling sooks.
The fallacy of the Howard regime is that everybody including Howard himself, thought that ‘the people’ loved him’. They didn’t and don’t. Fear and loathing is potent and it has worked for Howard often in the past. It is still there, but now it is pointed directly at him. People never ‘loved’ Howard, they tolerated him, because he seemed ’steady’ after the roller coaster ride of the ‘joys of economic reform’ a la Keating. JWH understood that absolutely-remember ‘relaxed and comfortable’? Remember his ’small target strategy’? Commitment to the loathed (by him) Medicare arrangements, and a ‘never ever’ GST promise?
The full panoply of economic liberalism on steroids was never part of the electorate’s deal with Howard, and once the gloves came off (Workchoices) suddenly the battlers felt ill, all over again. The stench of an unpopular ‘movement’ feared and loathed at a popular level, has now proved to be impossible to cover with a dash of parky/mozzie bashing and a smidgen of ‘war on State Premiers/kiddie fiddling boongs’. His sense that ‘people are not waiting to take the baseball bat to the government’ is only half right. They don’t loath Howard with the passion that Keating engendered. They just think he is a lying old jerk. He will be swatted, rather than bashed, at the next election.
The more this faux ‘perpetual election campaign’ goes on and on, the more they are getting sick and tired of the sound and look of him. There is only so much yelling and shouting a person can put up with, particularly when you have made up your mind about the Holden v the Ford deal. It is hilarious to watch, and deeply satisfying.
too right paul.
this is the electorate that loved the ‘pacific solution’. some poor bastard only just finished doing a 5-stretch on nauru for his troubles earlier this year….sweden took him.
a mini-me howard, and a big hit to the hip pocket (workchoices) has finally cut through. wot a bunch of arseholes were are relying on.
Well then your only solution is to ’sack the people’. Stop being so sorry for yourself. Politics is a dirty and scarifying business. Howard is no better and no worse than any number of faux populists that have had big electoral support/success, despite being loathed by a large minority of the ‘people’ in whose name they profess to act. Australia has had a stack of them particularly at State level. Only Billy Hughes comes to mind as even close to the genius of Howard’s simulacra of the tribune of the people. And notwithstanding the terrible (and unforgivable) things that have happened to innocent people (refugees and all the rest of those who are not ‘one of us’) it pales into insignificance against the records of many of this type.
The absolute uselessness of berating the very people, whose better nature you profes act for and on behalf of, can be seen in the last 11 years of a neoconservsative government that has survived very nicely, if not nobly, by waging a total phony war on everything you stand for. The ‘better angels’ brigade don’t cut it, once the State turns its guns on you.
I don’t accept this allocation of blame on ‘the people’ (that is, you and I, our friends, neighbours, relatives, colleagues etc.) The people have been very, very poorly served (and led) by the Government and the Opposition. The power of bi-partisanship is immense in Australia and when both side of politics are united on an issue, it’s hardly surprising that a large majority of the county follow them. The ALP inadvertently wreaked immense damage on our national psyche with their response to Tampa and that cloud still hangs over them. Which isn’t a cloud of ‘leftist disapproval’, but that having backed the government to the hilt on that most vivid and immediate political issue and never disavowing that position, they still carry that baggage when they try to differentiate themselves from the Government on ‘National Security’. We are reaping what they have sowed.
d
Oh no, not the ‘people get the government they deserve’ argument, rearing it’s ugly head. Think crappy press and punters running so hard to pay their bloody debt, that they hardly have time to scratch themselves, let alone consider matters of f’in’ “ethics”. Just sayin’………
Topic: Beattie and Rudd
It’s not as if Pete’s gonna be around long after Federal election.
Drive past Anna Bligh’s electoral office on Vulture street, and you’ll see it’s being turned into a fortress. If you’ve ever been in Kev’s electoral office it’s like that too, it’s what they do when there’s going to be an elevation.
So this little neck of the woods is going to elect both the PM and the Premier, from ultra safe seats. Ergo, we’ll get doodly squat service since we can be taken for granted, and it just wouldn’t do to even look vaguely like home turf was being favoured.
So what you want to be thinking about is how Madam Bligh, and Kev, PM will get on. Hmm, have Anna and Kev got form with each other from back in The Original Dr Death days?
Nah, research says they passed like ships in the night: KR let go the Goss tiller 94 - mid 95, as AnnaB scored Anne Warner’s Sth Brisbane seat, (and later her Families portfolio methinks when Pete ascended).
That was the one seat majority Goss gov’t and only lasted until the court of disputed returns delivered Mundingburra up for a by-election, which finished off what the actual election almost did, dump Goss et al.
If Fed07 is like Qld95, JWH is Goss, Rudd is Borbidge, who’s could be a Ken Davies ( he of the 16 vote Mndbra margin) for the Libs, or Nats, that takes the ship down with him. Oh, the irony if there has to be a bennelong by-election.
Sounds like a plot frm a horror movie?
More the point, if that’s the scenario, who’ll be this year’s Frank Tanti? (Or, for those down Mexico way, who’ll be this year’s Matt Viney?)
Nice performance by Premier Pete on Lateline. His comment that his dog Rusty could beat Howard and Tony’s question about whether that implies Rudd should be put down if he loses rather supports my argument, I think…
They should replay the Beattie interview on all the stations - great performance. He makes lots of good points.
I find it amazing how poorly Costello compares to Beattie in speaking and presentation.
Beattie’s one of the best politicians of his generation, I think. It’s far too late now, but it would have been really interesting to see what would have happened if he’d gone to Canberra when his government was still at the height of its popularity in Queensland, and replaced Beazley. FWIW, he’d also have been much more of a big L Labor PM than Rudd will be if he gets there.
I find it amazing that he has been allowed to bring down so many budgets but the last two were so disastrous that his reputation will be tarnished by the time they get thrown out of office. Like Howard, he stayed in the job too long but it is sweet to see them tied to each other’s hip and going down together.
This is not an internecine Qld spat. Beattie is actually running some great interference for Rudd.
We are seeing a team play. But on the other hand, we will always see what we want to see.
And the Govt Gazette are backing the rodent on this, with quotes from various “ALP Candidates”.
While Mr Beattie yesterday vowed to press on with scrapping 84 of the state’s 156 councils, Labor Leader Kevin Rudd backed a move by John Howard to undermine the plan by offering federally funded plebiscites to ratepayers.
As the Prime Minister continues to attack Mr Beattie’s plan as anti-democratic, Opposition strategists fear public anger at the amalgamations could cost the party seven key seats in Queensland, where Labor must poll well to win the election.
I really don’t buy the idea that Beattie was speaking on Rudd’s behalf over Haneef. I think the difference was a real one. Remember the row was really about the executive v. the judiciary. Beattie’s legal links brought him down against Andrews over-riding the Brisbane Magistrate, Rudd is much more concerned about the integrity of the executive that was being undermined by the legal prfession. I think Rudd is much more sincere on where he agrees with Howard than some think.
No probs, Darryl Rosin- too much of what you say is true. Two sides for the full story.
Just the same…
So Rudd is calling Howard’s Bluff again? Am starting to actually rather like the cheeky little beggar. Which is not to say I disagree with Mark’s summary of Peter Beattie, over all. Saw Lateline also and thought him self-assured but just a little tired.
Why don’t these sorts of people get invited to Canberra instead of some of the twats that ARE thrown up during pre selection rituals?
Methinks the real battle is yet to fought, and that will revolve around fear campaigns over W……..s rollback.
But it seems Beattie is doing his best to prevent this with his forced local council amalgamations.
People hate it, and hate having it forced on them. It does not matter what clever and rational arguments Beattie puts forward, or how hypocritical is Howard’s stance on plebiscites, or whether plebiscites are even legal or binding, or how Howard’s stance is a stunt or a wedge. There’s anger out there, and anger at forced amalgamations will spill over to the Federal election, and Rudd will not pick up the necessary seats in Qld.
I really can’t understand why Beattie hasn’t learned the lessons of Goss Govt’s bypass road here.
The angry ants at Noosa Council are so democratic.
Why do you need councillors when they vote on ‘Staff recommendations’?
Jethro , I love a good fairytale but have you got any evidence of this wild claim? Truth is that it is the coalition the has descended into the usual bitter infighting over council Amalgamation and everybody knows it.
Seeing the link doesn’t seem to have worked. Here is the Courier Mail article:
A BESIEGED Bruce Flegg has been told he should quit as leader of the Queensland Liberal Party for the good of the state Coalition.
The Courier-Mail has learnt state Nationals MP Rob Messenger asked staff to leave a joint party room meeting before slamming Dr Flegg over his constant fumblings.
Mr Messenger told Dr Flegg he should resign to save the Coalition from disaster.
Several other Nationals MPs joined in the verbal roasting of Dr Flegg before leader Jeff Seeney was forced to call for calm.
The fracas erupted after Dr Flegg outraged Nationals and Liberal MPs on Tuesday when he issued a media release highlighting his first year anniversary as Liberal leader.
It diverted attention away from the Coalition’s attack on the Government’s forced council amalgamation legislation, with Premier Peter Beattie making fun of Dr Flegg’s record.
But the tension in the Coalition is unlikely to spark an immediate move against Dr Flegg, with MPs preferring to wait until after this week’s Parliament sittings to call a leadership spill.
The numbers in the Liberal partyroom remain locked at four each for Dr Flegg and rival Tim Nicholls with the Liberal leader surviving with his own vote. But efforts are being made to convince Dr Flegg’s supporters that his time is up.
It is understood Queensland Liberal president Warwick Parer recently spoke about the leadership issue with deputy Liberal leader Mark McArdle, who supports Dr Flegg.
Mr Seeney admitted Dr Flegg’s leadership had dominated internal meetings and he remained angry about the anniversary release.
He levelled a thinly-veiled criticism at Liberal MPs over their reluctance to make a decision on Dr Flegg’s future.
“I don’t have any choice or any say in a number of issues. I have to work with what I have to work with,” he said.
Mr Beattie continued to mock the Liberals in Parliament, urging the eight MPs to keep Dr Flegg because he was Labor’s best asset.
“Bruce, if we could give you a couple of numbers, would you let them come into your caucus,” he asked.
“They will vote for you. They will stick with you. Do we have a couple of supporters to vote for Bruce?”
Well the Qld Nat/Lib coalition may be clowns but that’s not gunna have much of an effect when voters go to the polls later this year for the federal election. The average voter will be angry at a Labor govt and this may be enough to dissuade swinging voters to not vote for Labor federally, especially if Howard is playing populist.
As I said, pointing out the foibles of local govt or the benefits of amalgamation isn’t sufficient. Forcing a change in govt structure - even local govt structure — without the consent of the governed is going to anger most people even if they understand the rationale for change.
So who’s gunna cop that anger come the election, especially if there’s a plebiscite on the issue on the same day?
I finally stopped listening to Kevin Rudd the other night when he got onto a YouthFMblogging site to adumbrate his aversion to the neo-Hayekian weltanschaung advocated by neocon policy wonks out of BostonU by the first-named author of recent seminal seminar papers on the governance quiddities of Emperor Nasi Goreng.
I mean, really !!!!!
Ambigulous
It’s odd to see Howard cheering local government when he, as opposition leader, opposed a constitutional amendment to recognise it. http://www.aph.gov.au/library/handbook/referendums/r1988.htm
That makes sense no sense Jethro:
Are you saying that some voters will be able to separate state from Federal issues while at the same time telling me that some voters will not be able to separate State from Federal issues and you alone can tell which voters will vote which way?
One thing that is true is that disunity is political death and the Coalition in Queensland has that by the truckload.
Just because the Queensland Coalition kick own goals does not mean they are winning anything.
Well Beattie has called Howard’s bluff and now it’s as good as over. Good try Tories but not good enough. Seems another Howard’s good idea’s has come to nothing.
You may be right PS, but the question is: what would a Rudd Government do? This is one area, I suspect, where pressure from that part of caucus which is not Kevin Rudd will force a change in whatever subtly media-managed way. The whole case was a knee-jerk, ad-hoc event and there will have to be a smoother way of managing events like this, which are bound to crop up again and again - without completely killing the influx of overseas-trained doctors.
Well, you gotta hope so anyway. Part of the whole idea of changing government is that you can have a fresh look at long-standing problems that the current government is too tired or embarrassed to change.
The clowning of Qld Lib/Nat coalition is par for the course and I doubt that voters will consider this a major issue for a federal election.
Forced redrawing of yer local govt boundaries without yer say so is pissing off the punters and I reckon that the anger towards state Labor will translate accordingly to the federal Labor come the election.
And if there was a state election coming up then that would be an issue.
Every Queenslander could have sent in a submission to have their say with the commission. Please tell me your submission was eaten by the dog or a computer virus and that was why you had no say or maybe the punters just slept through the process!
Forgot to post this last night …..
you’re quite right amused,
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2007/08/08/beattie-versus-rudd/#comment-391205
but sometimes laying some the blame squarely at the feet of voters just feels good (sigh), and makes a change from railing against Howard, who as you say, wouldn’t even make into the same aircraft hangar as the World’s Worst & Wickedest Strongmen I, II, III.
and you’re quite right too Darryl, sheeting it home to the ALP….
joe2 – but when do you draw the line, when are voters ever responsible? How barking mad does a leader have to obviously be, and how low the road, before you think – whoa, what a bunch of arseholes…..
It is a real RWDB argument..blaming voters who should know better, educate themselves more, pick themselves up by their bootstraps etc….
jo, I’m happy to blame the voters, well, some of them any way. It’s scary when you think that a small number of voters out of every 100 in 15 or 20 electorates can be suckered by scare campaigns or persuaded by pork-barrelling and there goes the election.
I’m quite specifically willing to blame the neighbours and some of the rellies whose political discussions I am familiar with, lovely people though they may be.
Brian, the neighbours were always surely recalcitrant National Party supporters - or such is my recollection from their very loud conversations on their deck denouncing the evils of unions and the hopeless slackness of dole bludgers, etc., and how Joh knew how to sort out those communists. Surely they wouldn’t have ever been swinging voters?
Looks like Noosa is going to be the centre of the action today with the Feds going to see if they can help them spend their cash.
Page 2526 Qld Hansard yesterday.
Channeling yer inner Vogon, perhaps:
Somehow I don’t think federal Labor will agree that blaming the punters for forced amalgamations is a winning strategy for electoral success.
Jethro,Nobody is blaming the punters. In fact I blame the Federal Government intervention as being the complicating factor but that was by design and not accident.
They are sending Feds to Noosa to inflame the situation today so it will be interesting to see if they have any effect - still think that they are just causing confusion though, I mean is it a Stalinist or a Nazi tactic they oppose?
All too complex for the swinging voter to get their head around I would suggest.
Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf, then?
Mark, you are right about our beloved neighbours. But I also blame them and certain country folk about their blindness and unwillingness to recognise where their true interests lie. And for their rank prejudices about Aborigines and foreigners with a different colour of skin.
I guess I’m really saying that I don’t go along with the notion that the voters are always right and always vote in their own best interests, let alone what’s best collectively.
I’d accept that I can be wrong about these matters as well.
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