I’m increasingly convinced that if things carry on as they are at the moment, Labor is gone in Queensland as a majority government. Their biggest hope remains a shift in voter expectations away from an ALP win, and it seems from the latest Newspoll that Lawrence Springborg’s undecideds might point to a hesitation over the real possibility that he will become Premier. But Labor will have to lift its game, and hope that voters begin to tune in, and that minds aren’t already made up.
At Pineapple Party Time, I’ve had a look at the seats that are in play, arguing that the LNP can win without taking a swag of Brisbane electorates, and more recently, at another couple of bad campaign days for Labor. These aren’t “who won the day” style accounts, but rather critiques of a deeply flawed strategy. William Bowe reports on the Newspoll figures, and my latest post contrasts the ALP circa March 2009 with Peter Beattie’s reign.
Whatever you say about Beattie, I certainly won’t resile from the claim I made ages ago that he’s one of the best politicians we’ve seen in this country. Politically, Anna Bligh is much more congenial to me, but she’s not displaying the same range of leadership and campaign skills Beattie deployed effortlessly. Most of all, she’s failed to establish her authority over the party – an authority which was not guaranteed by the factional machinations which smoothed her path into the Premiership.
That’s a real pity in my book.
Not least because neither major party is doing much to address the genuine problems we have in this state.
Yep, Beattie = a less intellectual version of Clinton in a federal system where state leaders can’t move to national leadership.
These Independent MPs, the kingmakers you speak of, what’s their attitude towards uranium mining?
It really hasn’t surfaced much as an issue before, Nickws. But all the sitting Independents are more or less conservative.
They sit for seats which used to be Nationals ones, with the exception of Liz Cunningham in Gladstone (the only seat in which the LNP aren’t running).
That may be unfair. Beattie has a Master of Arts by research, awarded for a thesis on parliamentary committees written while he was in opposition.
I think Aussies have intuited that at the federal level its Tweedledee and dum much of the time so that the best checks and balances are opposite state party regimes. The real opposition is from below and under this model we’ll revert to all ALP state govt’s when the Liberal party Messiah arives.
A bit of an observation about the respective relationships between successive Premiers and the factional machinations. Would you agree, Mark, that Beattie’s authority was enhanced over time by a combination of (a) becoming and staying party leader despite the wishes of the AWU faction; (b) winning the 1998 election despite AWU expectations (and, arguably, hopes) that he could be burned off for good by losing it, making way for one of the AWU’s own to lead Labor back to government at the subsequent election; and (c) being re-elected in a landslide in 2001 under circumstances which highlighted Beattie’s worth as an asset to Labor and the AWU’s weight as a liability? And if Bligh manages, against current trends, to win reasonably well, what would that do for her authority over the party?
Paul Norton wrote:
Nothing – until she can master the phrase “Don’t you worry about that” in response to a tricky question. Beattie did it, the Borg was born to do it, but Bligh would struggle a little with it – she’s far too urbane for that paternalistic trick.
You’ll be popular with your consistent trumpetting of the “she’s failed to establish her authority over the party – an authority which was not guaranteed by the factional machinations which smoothed her path into the Premiership” line.
In a campaign which has staked all on Anna! Anna! Anna!, ( and yes I know you don’t have much truck with Hawker Britton’s campaign management, you or just about anyone could have done it better), spilling the beans on how queensland governence really “works” (ie at the behest and whim of party, and union, factional ambitions, through the medium of individual career management), has a touch of the crazy braves about it.
I’m impressed, but then again you having declared many times Paul Lucas as a mate, and him being the likely post-bligh poo-bah, (which might get actioned regardless of what happens, Anna being exposed as pretty flaky when tested, not good campaign material, and as you keep pointing out, not a leader. Paul polishing up his media histrionics performance over the big-desalination-plant-that-couldn’t makes sense, road testing a “strong leader” face), well it makes sense in a queensland labor party careerist kinda way.
This will amuse you: “Mr Lee said the Greens had a good chance of toppling Treasurer Andrew Fraser in Mt Coot-tha and Premier Anna Bligh in South Brisbane,”. Onya Ronan. You never know, when the penny drops that The Swing Is On, Enough, and folks in tese electorates detect the whiff of scapegoat about these local candidates, and about how loved and effective they will be as local members in a toxic ex-labor regime, in the face of an alternative scenario, my member as maybe holding balance of power, there could be a few percentage points in it.
What sort of resources are they putting into Ms Warner Jnr’s tilt?
Paul, I’d agree with all of that.
Beattie did himself no harm with the rest of the party by ignoring a lot of Ludwig’s attempts to throw his weight around.
If Labor lose, I wouldn’t expect Bligh to hang around. If Labor win narrowly, or there’s a hung parliament (and they’d really want Ronan to be in that mix – because a hung parliament might spell a minority LNP government), I think there’ll be a shitfight!
Danny – the thing with The Greens’ chances is that the ALP will be bleeding votes to the LNP in all their targeted seats as well as to them. Remember that they need the LNP to come third to be in with a show (except in Indooro) – and under OPV, it’s really hard to win from second place anyway.
I think the LNP probably has a clear lead in Indooro. Hence the increasing pleas for Labor preferences to Ronan. But I don’t think he’s in with much of a shot. He’d have lost the seat as a Labor MP, and I don’t think the party switch will end up making that much of a difference.
I don’t think a lot of resources are going into Indooro, because it would be harder for Warner to win without being an incumbent, and it is one of the first dominoes to fall even if the swing in Brisbane is more moderate than everywhere else.
Sarah’s good peoples, though, by the way.
Mark,
I respectfully disagree about the strengths of Sarah Warner as a candidate against the LNP’s Scott Emerson who is quite telegenic and eloquent (rare for the LNP I know). Emerson started working the seat over a few months before Warner was even in the picture. By calling the election early, Bligh fucked her chances of getting any kind of profile there. If there is anything to be learnt from this campaign I reckon it will be the pure folly of calling the election early.
That said, the ALP aren’t going down without a fight in Indro. In the last week at least there was an anti-Borg flyer dropped and a direct mailout plus Ronan was in there too. Emerson is one of the LNP’s better candidates though. I would expect him to win fairly convincingly in this environment.
3000 x $19,000 green jobs supplied by labor with the hope that these budding finishing school environmental space cadets will earn their political keep by pulling out weeds in moggill,bulimba,scrubby,tingalpa,doboy and creeks in any marginal seats. Now that is a very green smart state solution to build the states competitive future. Any way, I thought local councils were responsible for noxious weeds.
If Peter Beattie thought he could of won this election he would have stayed. As all political commemtators have said, the only reason Labor is even competitive at this election is because of a new leader in Bligh.
Just a quick update, Bligh has made another costing stuff up this time on the Carrara Steadium on the Gold Coast. http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,23739,25163898-5018787,00.html.
All Anna needs to do to win is keep reminding the undecideds that “LNP”stands for “Liberal NATIONAL Party”.
Some of us have long memories you know…
Just saw a news report on Channel Nine. Some none-too-bright ALP apparatchik went into a bayside servo and complained about the LNP cornflutes on display. Servo owner and another local business owner (both identified as LNP supporters) carry on about “ALP arrogance”, etc and the guilty apparatchik is rightly castigated by both Paul Lucas and Anna Bligh.
Fair enuff, one thinks, until the end of report morphed into what appeared to be a paid LNP ad: gratuitous pot shots by LNP-supporting local servo owner and local business identity over ALP policy regarding the Moreton Bay marine park, and a nice lingering shot of the LNP candidate’s cornflute at the end.
Bligh may want to remind voters what the N stands for in LNP, but she’s gunna have to fight against LNP bias in the meeja to do so IMHO.
Perhaps Peter Beattie will come back! Why did he go in the first place.
ahh even blind freddy can tell ya that the LNP ain’t nothing but a bunch of cheap tarts willing to say whatever it takes … and the way i see it, no one in the media is putting them up to any kind of real test – not in the least bit.
fer christsakes … the “efficency dividend”!!!!
#9 – I too live in the Indooroopilly electorate and apart from a bit of direct mail from all the players, you’d be hard pressed to know an election is on if you judge it by the corflutes in the front yard statistic.
Unlike over the border in Mt Ommaney electorate where corflute signs are breeding faster than rabbits!
“I certainly won’t resile from the claim I made ages ago that he’s one of the best politicians we’ve seen in this country.”
Can only agree with that. He was absolutely brilliant – and not only at the macro but also exceptional at the micro level.
The best I have ever seen at close quarters. And I should add – aided and abetted by his wife.
A hung or functionally weakened Parliament seems possible too, Mark. I’m supporting the Borgster obviously but whoever wins, I hope they win by a workable majority of at least several seats. Having said that, I suppose a conceivable upside to a negotiation-driven modus vivendi would be the tempering of political and fiscal wish-lists that are not really wise at the moment anyway. Whether a ‘State unity’ government can survive the considerable tensions in the Queensland polity at the moment is, however, doubtful in the long (three year) term. I do think the LNP has now broken through the perception barrier of the ‘unready’ meme and that may take them across the line. There is that feeling abroad in the State. Of course, that can also be a psephologically shallow commentariat-driven narrative that doesn’t play out come polling day. Bottom line: too close to call.
Dunno about that.
There’s the Borg making a goose of himself with the “Wot Recession?” remark, and beyond that I reckon most Quincelander’s could not name any other NLP candidate or policy other than “the ALP has buggered it all up”.
The same lack of recognition goes with Capn Bligh and her merry crew of dead wood.
My feeling is not that anyone reckons the NLP are “ready”, but that the ALP are so on the nose that even a clown like The Borg and his circus of unknowns are gunna find themselves on March 22 in the business section of Parl House with surprised WTF faces.
Oh my goodness. On the news? You’d think they’d keep that kind of thing for after midnight.
(From now on, nothing is going to stop me calling them cornflutes).
bit of a … ahem …. flautist are we?
There’s an article in today’s Courier Mail pointing out that the public service attrition rate is about 6.5% which means that the savings from that source is $55 million max. A drop in the bucket even if the whole 6.5% are de-necessary.
Mike Horan came back with the usual shtick about “spin doctors” (as if they wouldn’t use any) and a “large amount of obvious fat that could be cut from just Queensland Health, including $50 million on communications and $303 million on consultants and contractors.”
I guess those consultants and contractors wouldn’t have been doing anything at all necessary nor supplying skills and services not available within the permanent staff.
To put it mildly, Qld health is overstocked with “admin”.
“Qld health is overstocked with “admin”.”
Do you seriously think there’s any prospect of reducing the amount of admin work being done in QHealth? That there should be less record-keeping done? Or do you mean doctors and nurses should be doing more admin work?
d
Yes I do think “admin” should be slashed drastically.
The core business is medicine, ie, treating sick & injured people. Qld health resources should NOT be tied up in unnecessary “admin”.
Medical staff should outnumber the clerical staff, rather than the reverse.
A ratio of doctors & nurses (ie, “patient contact” staff) to non patient contact staff, should be specified.
The purpose of Qld health is to treat ill Qlders, not provide window seat jobs for a bloated public service.
Simple.
Darryl Rosin, thats pathetic. You know that Qld Health is over stocked with PR and media specialists that do not update records and appointments and the like. These people are in charge of putting out positive press spin, distorting the quarterly hospital performance reports and changing the definition of hospital bed. All of course is unnecessary and in uncertain economic times, just not on.
Steve at the Pub really ought to share his radical new theory of human organisation that would allow huge complex institutions like hospitals and the health service get away with less admin.
Oh boy o boy, is Qld in trouble when it is “radical” to suggest that hospitals have doctors & nurses instead of “admin”.
SATP, I’ll lay quids that that the great bulk of that $300 million on “consultants and contractors” goes on agency nurses, cleaning and cooking companies and medical consultants; it’s hard to see any hospital running without them.
.
Geez, people, you oughtta know that any opposition claiming there are huge but painless savings available by cutting “waste and inefficiency” are liars. Because if that level of savings really was available without slashing services then the present government would already have done it to generate electoral goodies of their own. Small government people oughtta have the honesty to argue that we need less public goods, rather than claim there is some sort of magic pudding where we can get the goods without paying for them.
Doctors and nurses need to be paid, Steve. They need to eat. They might have HR disputes with one another. They need lawyers to protect them from legal challenges. They might need to fill prescriptions. They might need to work in clean environments. Do you want doctors and nurses to do all those jobs on top of patient care?
Even if you could find a way to trim administrative jobs, I’d be amazed if these savings made even a tiny dent in cost of health care in Queensland.
I think everyone can agree that unnecessary positions are not needed, whether they are clerical or porfessional.
Fortunately they do. In 2007-2008 Qld Health employed 56 333 FTE positions. Clerical and managerial acounted for 20.7% of those; Medical, nursing and other health practitioners accounted for 61%.
Bligh has just realsised that Robertson is useless. Hooray. About Time. Not one of Peter Beatties better appointments. Ranks up there with Merri Ros, Gorden Nuttall and Liddy Clark.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,27574,25168461-3102,00.html
Bligh has just realsised that Robertson is useless. Hooray. About Time. Not one of Peter Beatties better appointments. Ranks up there with Merri Rose, Gorden Nuttall and Liddy Clark.
http://www.news.com.au/couriermail/story/0,27574,25168461-3102,00.html
“Even if you could find a way to trim administrative jobs, I’d be amazed if these savings made even a tiny dent in cost of health care in Queensland.”
Nick, I’ll guarantee I can find a way. (that word was “Guarantee”)
My big achievement in life is my ability to trim costs without impact on the service delivery.
Undoubtedly there is some administrative waste in Qld Health, as there is in every organization, private or public sector.
Undoubtedly there is unmet demand for medical services provided by Qld Health.
It does not follow, however, that the latter of these can be addressed by tackling the former. It is unlikely, as others have said that savings from the former could only provide a minute fraction of the latter.
“Darryl Rosin, thats pathetic. You know that Qld Health is over stocked with PR and media specialists that do not update records and appointments and the like.”
I have no idea how many people QHealth employ that work in PR, nor what the correct amount should be, but I would be prepared to bet all the money in my pocket against all the money in your pocket that it’s a tiny fraction of the 11,685 FT “Managerial and Clerical” staff employed by QHealth.
Clerks are the people who pay you, who deal with people at the front counters , who answer the phone when you call a hospital, who order the supplies, who handle the correpondance, who manage the diaries and appointments and who generally fix up the mess. And they’re the one’s who are blamed for everything. “What’s the matter with Q Health? Too many admin staff” “What’s the matter with Ed Qld? Too many admin staff.” “what’s wrong with our universities? Too many admin staff”
The Nationals aren’t going to reduce admin work. Collect fewer statistics? Record less information about patients? Keep fewer employment records? Purchase fewer supplies? There’s going to be the same or more admin work, but they’ll employ fewer staff to do the work. More overwork = more stress = more mistakes. And it’ll all the the clerks’ fault, as usual.
d
All so true, Darryl. I have worked as an academic at two universities, and the one with more admin staff, located within academic units where they and we could get to know and understand each others’ functions, is better administered and a more supportive environment for academics to work in and students to study in.
“My big achievement in life is my ability to trim costs without impact on the service delivery.”
I’m honestly curious as to how well that ability would from (excuse me if I’ve misunderstood your previous comments about your professional background) the retail sector to the kind of large public sector organisation that’s meant to deliver service to an entire society.
Back to the topic at hand — I really don’t know what the ALP has done of note in the last three years. Mark’s argued that Beattie’s mea culpa + “I’ll fix it” strategy worked wonders for the electorate but you’d think Labor’d be in a much better position now if he’d actually ever followed through.
i reckon Steve at the Pub is an alias for The Borg – as unlikely an alias as it may be (but shouldn’t an alias be exactly so?)
Didn’t the Borg make a statement fairly recently that running a government budget is not unlike running a household or a small business budget?? Thats gotta be true. And whatever can’t be paid for by the efficiency dividend would be picked up through trimming admin costs. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy. I’m going out now to the back of the garden to talk to the fairies for a while.
Good on SATP for his ability to “ability to trim costs without impact on the service delivery”… but I can’t see how running a pub scales up to running the public service of Australia’s third largest state.
Could there be trimming in staff? The problem is that there aren’t enough doctors and nurses in the system – not too much. Could there be trimmings in funding? Then you have problems keeping the doctors and nurses.
Or could there be trimming in processes? Yes, public service processes have the reputation of being long and onerous. But they’re meant to be fair and auditable. That’s the point of it all – otherwise you end up with spending allocated according to notes on a grubby table napkin from Oxley’s On The River. Or Ros Kelly’s friggin’ whiteboard. Perhaps there’s some happy equilibrium between the status quo and tenders for the mates… but I don’t know what it is.
On the subject, I went to a job interview yesterday for a software analyst role in the public service. There, I learned that they’re trying out Agile software development methodologies. They felt it’s a waste of time to engage in lengthy requirements analysis if you have a Minister that changes his mind a lot about what’s actually required. Perhaps the real waste in the public service is at the top.
Shishkin, you may be surprised to learn there is more than one person in Qld who grasps the concept of efficient allocation of existing resources. How much in common I have with Lawrence Springborg is anybody’s guess. I know there is plenty I don’t have in common with him. For starters I would be nowhere near as bland a campaigner. But then again, I haven’t had the National Party establishment around my neck for the last 10 years.
When the chips are down, there IS little difference between a household budget & a government budget. That is, one has to make the best of what one has. It is known elsewhere as “management”.
Nick Caldwell, trimming a buget is quite simple (when boiled down). It works on any sized entity (from a pocket money budget for the kids right through to the UN treasury). Just stop doing things which have no impact on the final outcome. You’d be amazing how much work the public service gets put to which is a complete waste of time & effort. Incredible as it may seem, there is even duplication within the same departments.
Indisputably Peter Beattie did nothing about fixing the healh system beyond braying “I’ll resign if it isn’t fixed by christmas!” (he didn’t even carry out that promise) The abysmal fiasco of the health system is the achilles heel of ALP support.
Even the most rusted on of voters will in a flash switch their vote if they realise they (or their parents) will start dying due to a poorly run health system.
Without Peter Beattie around slapping backs, will the ALP be able to retain government? They certainly have little to no achievements to jerk their thumb at.
i take that back Steve at the Pub – you seem to be well ahead of The Borg and i’d seriously consider voting for you if you were in the running