From today’s Crikey email:
Anna Bligh certainly wasn’t exaggerating when she observed that Queensland Labor had a bad week. Nor has this week started off well for her, with a Galaxy Poll showing her approval rating plunging to 33%, just barely ahead of a disastrous Labor primary of 30%. Nor, seemingly, are many disillusioned ALP voters parking their votes with The Greens. The Liberal National Party scored a 48% primary, and all this washes through to a 59-41 two party preferred lead for the LNP.
As William Bowe notes at The Poll Bludger (where he also has more detail on the poll), the numbers may be inflated precisely because of the beating Bligh took over recent days. But there’s enough evidence around (including a poll commissioned by the ETU on the privatisation of public assets) that the Queensland regime’s support has collapsed very quickly.
Galaxy asked a range of questions stemming from Tony Fitzgerald’s accusations last week about corruption and cronyism, and found a large majority of Queenslanders disillusioned with both their government and the Queensland Police Service. Bligh would have taken cold comfort only from Wayne Goss’ favourable comparison of her with her predecessor Peter Beattie in remarks he made recently, given that Goss also pointedly referred to the dangers of long term incumbency in creating a climate where ethical lapses flourished.
It’s unsurprising that comparisons have been made with the last days of the National government, which Goss himself swept out of power almost two decades ago. But a better analogy for Anna Bligh’s current plight might be the re-election of the Keating government in 1993.
Keating threw away the trust of electors by raising indirect taxes in his first post-election budget, tearing up the basis on which he’d come to power — opposition to John Hewson’s GST. Anna Bligh’s credibility was one of the few things the ALP had going for it in the March state election. Her opposition to the dictates of ratings agencies was a hallmark message. The announcement after Labor squeaked back in that the fuel subsidy would go, that public sector wages would effectively be frozen and jobs disappeared through efficiency dividends, and, particularly, the plans for the sell off of state assets have seen the trust the electorate had in Bligh collapse.
Fully 86% of Galaxy respondents oppose the privatisation plans.
This is the political context for the corruption and cronyism crisis. Bligh may well have acted quickly, banning consultants from reaping success fees, pre-empting a CMC enquiry by prohibiting Labor MPs from attending “pay for view” business fundraisers, and ratcheting up the pressure for full public funding of elections. But the public aren’t inclined to credit her for decisive action — because the basis of trust that existed between citizens and their Premier has already dissipated.
So it’s the backflip on Bligh’s election promises, and rhetoric, which has proved fatal to her chances of handling the Fitzgerald backlash effectively, no matter how skillfully she responds to public concerns. The LNP could always self-destruct, but the smart money at this stage would have to be on a change of government at the next election.
If that comes to pass, Bligh and her advisors will rue the day that they decided the Queensland public would cop a complete backdown on the policy stance they took to the people in 2009.
Anna will bounce back,you mark my words dont you worry your heads about that. Now as for the LNP= Mo policies,no cred, no chance just sleeze
As I said before somewhere, managing a modern state is a complex business and Captain Bligh, with the motley crew that she finds in her boat(or is that’vote?), with all the will and good intentions in the world, may find it far too difficult to steer a true course to a safe harbour (given that it is not already flogged off to some foreign company). To fly to the alternative camp is obviously not the answer. There are a few problem-solving routines that may help, but to convince the short-sighted party heavyweights to adopt such new, and to them, alien tricks is probably too much to expect – sigh!
“and ratcheting up the pressure for full public funding of elections.”
Yet the Premiers first counter-attack was against an Opposition Leader using tax funds for billboards. Isn’t that the future?
Ah, Mike Kaiser , the gift that keeps on giving.
I reckon that’s where the first crack in public trust and confidence in Anna appeared, when she boosted her chief of staff’s pay by $100,000, then gave the job to Kaiser. Talk about signals it was business as usual at Peel Street.
It was only the absolute unelectibility of the tories that carried her. Hard to see that changing, but hissy fits about Painless managing to squeeze a few billboards out of his budget, with approval, is the sort of thing that might overcome even that.
As billboards go, I’d be more worried about the giant AntiAnna billboard, conspicuously funded by unions, and impossible to miss by anyone coming down Gladstone Road, presumably including Herself when she drops down the corner shop for the morning milk and papers. It’s at one of the few petrol stations left in her electorate, a peak hour congestion spot. She must hate it, but it’s unlikely we’ll hear her complaining in public about the unions being against AntiAnna .
And I think there is a real argument for national reform, I agree with the Premier there. A cap on spending and possibly increased accountability with the spending od public money on it.
Get a grip. Nearly three years till the next election.
This is what happens when you listen to limp-wristed, nerdy, bean-counting neoliberals in Treasury.
Bligh won a victory despite – more accurately because – she did the responsible thing and put the needs of the people of Qld ahead of a silly AAA credit rating.
Here’s my advise: thank your neolib bureaucrats at Treasury for their suicidal advice but then politely inform them who’s in charge and watch your poll numbers return.
Corruption…blah. Just another problem that requires a solution. We’ll never see another Fitzgerald in this state. That is not a good thing by the way. No matter how much the CMC is ‘involved’.
Anna has let herself be trapped into becoming the chief crisis officer, bouncing from crisis to crisis like an out of control rubber ball instead of driving the changes that need to be made if she is to get Qld back on track well before the next election. There are several things she needs to do:
1. She needs to recognise that Parliment doesn’t contain enough talent to run all of the ministries well. She could go radical and appoint people from outside parliament as ministers for some of the ministries that need to be lead by experienced seniour managers. (One of the big advantages that the yanks have is that Obama is free to choose his cabinet from the best and brightest. so why not?) If this is a jump too far at least work out how to give competent people the power to get things done without being stuffed around by low talent ministers.
2. She needs to work out how to bring it all together, come up with good policies and make it happen.
3. She needs to screw up her courage and raise the taxes necessary to get the things that need to be done done.
4. She needs to recognise that she needs some enthusiastic supporters. It is crazy for a Labor premier to be fighting against teachers who want equal pay with teachers from other states or leaping in to a panic privatization that even the LNP thinks is crazy.
I can’t understand the fuss over Anna’s privatisation moves. It really is a minimal, almost a Clayton’s privatisation. Nothing that other states didn’t privatise years ago. We still need the state to run pine plantations and coal trains? Don’t think so!
John D @ 6 – your 4th point is a lot more important than some people are inclined to think.
You mean the 4th point of John D @ 6? (Otherwise, I’m really confused.)
Here is an alternative hypothesis.
Anna was receiving the same advice from the bureaucracy about the problems of Queensland’s public finances in the lead up to the previous election. Pragmatically, she decided during the campaign not to fess up to what reforms would be necessary because she doubted that the public would understand and knew that Springbord would run a scare campaign based on the changes. So, she made a series of committments she knew she wouldn’t keep, and is now banking on circumstances being different enough in 3 years time that enough of the electorate will have forgotten the breach of promises. For one, the state of the economy will be substantially better and she will be able to run the line that if she hadn’t made the “hard choices” Queensland would be in much poorer shape.
Of course, getting on top of the other problems with her government (corruption, poor quality of ministers, etc) will be critical – but I suspect that privatisation will be the least of her concerns at the next election.
Mark, I think you are stretching the comparison with Keating. Keating was not popular at any stage in the run-up to the election in 1993. He simply ran a very effective scare campaign against Fightback II (which included lots of nasty stuff besides the GST). That campaign masked his unpopularity for a while, but when the Libs had a credible leader again in Howard, Keating was screwed. Do you really think that raising indirect taxes had much to do with the increase in unpopularity? There were many other things going on at the same time, and much of the electorate still blamed him and Labour for the spike in interest rates at the end of the 1980s and unemployment peaking at over 10%. Remember also in the run-up to the 1996 election the RBA had had to tighten interest rates because the economy recovered too quickly in 1993/94 – the libs line of a there being a few minutes of economic sunshine was quite effective.
@9 – Down and Out, yep. Wrong way round, sorry. Have fixed.
@10 – The analogy with Keating isn’t meant to be a perfect one, LO.
I don’t think you’re right about privatisation, LO. It’s never been popular in Queensland, and it’s more vehemently unpopular than elsewhere for a whole range of reasons.
The first bit I’ve excerpted, though, may well be right. And no doubt she is thinking along those lines. The problem, though, is that if you lose public trust so precipitately it will be very hard to regain it again. Perceived dishonesty wraps together all the other issues, and in a way, Rudd’s emphasis on keeping promises is unhelpful for her. And then you have all the other difficulties that a government going for a sixth term would inevitably face.
That is true Mark – being generous to Anna, I reckon she was caught on the horns of a dilemma. A more honest approach would have been to be upfront with the electorate on the problems Queensland faced and how she planned to deal with them. But then that would have significantly raised the probability of losing the election. I’m sure she knew that there would be heat applied to her for backing away from promises, so in that sense it wasn’t a perfect strategy – but I figure she thinks she at least gets a few more years to govern (she might want to give up after that time anyway) and at least has a chance of winning the next one, assuming a significant improvment on the economic front and cleaning up the governance problems. You are right that the erosion of trust will make the task more difficult.
On the privatisation front – you are right that it hasn’t been popular in Queensland (in part because of the very different population distribution than in other states), but I think what will be most important is what the impact of those privatisations are – if many of people’s fears about the consequences are not confirmed, then she might be okay. The privatisations overseen in other states and by the Commonwealth over the past couple of decades weren’t popular either….
Anyway, it will be interesting to see how things evolve over the next few years…being a Queenslander you obviously understand how sensitive these issues are a lot better than I do…
“I reckon that’s where the first crack in public trust and confidence in Anna appeared, when she boosted her chief of staff’s pay by $100,000, then gave the job to Kaiser.”
I agree. And the Rio Tinto cap. And her government chose the wrong union to fight re: teachers…’cause even tho Labor needs to demonstrate it can’t be pushed around by the old guard…and arbitration/compromise should be the go…and the union over-stepped its mark considering the PERCEPTION that we were/are in a global downturn…it has come across as MESSY…
just like the swine flu & hospital-related responses…and has caused unnecessary STRESS to educators just trying to get on w/ the job of helping kids. A bad move considering the SUPPORT the Labor party received from educators and their families. Points can be proven w/out overly complicating the lives of many who are already pretty stressed & rundown. That goes for both the Union & the government.
The Nats unfortunately can capitalise on this if they break from the Libs. NOT if they remain as a CORPORATE MACHINE that will probably be undermined by the INTENSE SCRUTINY of the likes of this blog, Crikey and many other growing media outlets.
I still think Anna can up her popularity…but Mike Ahern was perceived as a decent bloke & reformer…still lost.
But Anna can still go out w/ RESPECT…& dignity…& make some significant changes. And come back down the road. And help leave Labor as a whole in a better place. Tho some tell me that Joe Tripodi undermines it decision by decision.
Apologies re: some passionate comments when exhausted in the past Mark.
Good to see yer keeping on. 2004 seems a long time ago now…
Cheers
N’
“The announcement after Labor squeaked back in that the fuel subsidy would go, that public sector wages would effectively be frozen and jobs disappeared through efficiency dividends, and, particularly, the plans for the sell off of state assets have seen the trust the electorate had in Bligh collapse.”
Yes, I agree Mark. The privatisation plans might’ve seemed pragmatic…but hurt. Spoke to TRUST. When so many no longer trust the relationship between big business (particularly invasive multi-nationals). Tough call considering the revenue problems. But coulda been handled better by the Treasurer who came across as cold-blooded as Howard. Sad.
The fuel subsidy cut shoulda been incremental.
Media bias didn’t help. QLD ABC…puke. Courier Mail…puke.
And I think Anna was exhausted post-election. More dictatorial than she realised. Same w/ treasurer. And now Anna is WAKING UP. She has to tackle this full-bore. Like she did the meet & greet during the election. Give the public the REAL.
Who knows? Perhaps she will rise like Lazarus. Smart lady.
Give the Lady a chance QLD. As LEADER she came outa a sh*tty corporate-dominated, fear-soaked, neglectful era.
N’
Well I’ve been curious as to how long it would take this blog to look at the curious deals going on in Qld.
I voted Labor at this last state election, the first and possibly last time I will do so given the blatant lies that were told the electorate.
My view is that prior to the election Bligh knew all about planned asset sales, no increase in teachers pay (makes union protests against Springborg look at bit silly now), dodgy union donations and the influence of former government members lobbying on behalf of business and lied to the Qld people in order to get elected.
Although not unexpected it still amuses me as to how the comments on this blog seek to absolve Bligh and blame ‘neoliberals’. The Labor party has been in power too long in Qld and like the Nationals before it has let this power go to its head.
So Tropsmurf@15
What do you do?
What is most significant is that the specific privatisations, and privatisation in general, have not become more popular over time as people have had a chance to see them in practice. If anything it’s the other way. Do people really think that the Commonwealth Bank and VIctoria’s public transport provide better service now than they did 20 years ago?
Another interesting aspect of Anna Bligh’s woes is that within a few years we could be looking at a combination of Liberal/LNP/Coalition governments in a majority of states facing a Federal Labor government in a position of strength vis-a-vis a disorganised and demoralised Federal Coalition. Given that the Liberals have more or less ceased defending federalism and states rights and (at least in the person of Tony Abbott) have become uber-centralists, it could be very interesting to see what the consequences of such a political configuration might be for Australian federalism.
The impression Im geting from some of the comments was “It was ok for her to lie, as long as it kept the lib/nats out”.
So on those grounds it would be ok for Turnbull or any state Lib/nat to promise free money and never ending spending “as long as it keeps Lab out”?
Pretty slippery slope there. Bligh went to the election lying knowingly. Its easy to say “well people shouldnt have believed her then”, but most voters dont expect to be completely lied to.
Its a problem of her own making, shes a bit of an odd one to be calling for more honesty in government given the platform of untruths she used to get re-elected.
If it was Springborg who was in and did the same things youd be screaming blue murder.
If the Premier intends to have campaigns financed from public money as on of the reform proposals I would suggest she think about her attacks on dentist ‘brother of’ over using public money for campaigning. Just a suggestion anyway.
Fran Barlow @16. I’m a small business owner..why?
Tropsmurf@21
I was ambiguous … I apologise. I wasn’t seeking your job status. I meant by my question — if you believe that all sides are corrupt or likely to becoime so in short order, how can you respond rationally?
Fran Barlow – that makes more sense. Consider my last post a free bit of useless info for you.
I think we need to put in tighter independent controls especially around political donations from all sources. I know this is another layer of bureaucracy but voters need to be able to trust the electoral system.
Also I think that politicians need to be held more liable for statements made or facts ommitted during elections. I’d be interested in other people’s views as to how this could be achieved because I’m struggling to think of a practical way to do it.
I’ll stress I am an optimist I don’t necessarily believe that power always corrupts just that the temptations increase.
Tropsmurf@23
I think we need to do more than that. We have to reconfigure the whole process by which candidates are selected in the first place. I have some ideas on this. I favour drawing up a short list via a process similar to the jury duty principle called sortition.
Essentially, random people who had indicated an interest in serving on their voter enrolment would be selected about two years out. Anyone with a clear conflict of interest could be either let go, or could resolve it. Each could be given resources to develop and publicise their ideas, requisite training, a stipend similar to their wage or average wage (whichever was the higher) and could run a blog (with help) in which they would communicate with potential voters.
At various points in time (say every six months) there would be deliberative votes where people would rate the candidate’s policies in terms of importance, feasibility and the belief they had in the candidate and his or her competence to do the job. Depending on how this played out, each candidate would get a certain number of winning tokens which would on election day be placed in a barrel alongside all the winning tokens of all the other candidates who were still running. Then the winner would be selected at random.
Statistically, this would result in a skew towards candidates whom most people found credible but people with somewhat more challenging ideas or different social backgrounds would not automatically be excluded. More importantly still, a much broader policy discussion would result with much more focus on issues rather than personalities. Every person who was seriously interested in making a difference could believe that they could stand and be elected without kissing up to powerful interests or getting involved in shady dealings, and because it couldn’t be a career (getting elected twice would be statistically improbable) candidates couldn’t forget who they were or why they were there. On election day, while people might wish that their person had got up there would be no large bands of people feeling that their side had lost, or that next time, if they managed to persuade enough people of the justice of their cause, that people wouldn’t be elected who shared their views.
There would be no direct role for parties in this system either. All a party could really do is to seek to influence the total potential candidate pool by discussing (shock horror) ideas. Imagine that. Political parties trying to get people talking about policies rather than personalities! And of course the legislature would really be both representative of the populace and indifferent to party discipline — so people who were incompetent or malfeasant could find no cover. At the same time, there’d be no reason for “gotcha” politics if people in power made honest mistakes. They could say “look, I screwed up, but here’s what I’m going to do now” knowing that the next election wasn’t an issue for them personally or any party. People could write to their pollie expecting a sensible response.
Gropups in the legislature coule eventually coalesce around common policies and organise interest groups in the populace to support various ideas. There could be scope for direct democracy on contentious issues.
I don’t know who would introduce such a system — only the public would benefit — but one can dream …
@13 – Nasking, no worries at all, and thanks for the comment.
Con Sciaaca says “The crackdown on fundraising basically means it transfers the cost of political fundraising from the business community to the taxpayer”
… and he’s right. But there’s surely a public good in full funding of election campaigns, if it prevents the appearance or the reality of access and favours for corporate interests who donate.
Mark@30
Why does anyone have to fund election campaigns? Why can one not simply insist that all unaffiliated politicians contesting an election keep records of all expenditure, account for the provenance of all funds expended and be limited to a maximum of $100 per person per calendar month? In the case or registered parties they would have to poroduce detailed accoutns of the origins of their funds and the targets of their disbursements.
There could be no fundraising dinners, or auctions or other means of getting access to funds that could not be tracked.
Fran, the other principle that public funding serves is a relative equality in the ability of parties to get their message out, rather than having it solely determined by whether or not they can attract private donations. The Greens, for instance, are significantly disadvantaged because they don’t take corporate money.
Peter and Anna have both said that QLD is not corrupt because they have Community Cabinet meetings. What part of that don’t you believe? Get with the program, Lefties.
Controlling funding sounds a good idea at first. However, you can give a party money or have outsiders run campaigns that support you. For example, the unions campaign on workchoices wasn’t an aid to the coalition and I am sure most of you can think of campaigns that favoured one side or the other even when they were not exactly supporting a particular parties line.
It gets more complex than that. If you try and count what outsiders are doing you have to start looking at media bias, push pollers, the blogosphere etc. Even the selection of entertainment can have political bias. Think of a rush of terrorist movies.
Any serious policy has to consider the rights of new parties and those who want particular issues to be considered in a campaign. However, the policy will be worthles if it allows outsiders to rort the intentions of the policy.
I don’t disagree Mark. I just don’t think this Premier is genuine when she claims to be serious about the idea.
I suspect she may be, Alex. I think in part it might be about trying to assert some more control personally over the back room boys who have been really running the show.
I take your point Mark@32.
Parties like the Greens are indeed disadvantaged under a private funding model. OTOH if you cut the flow of corporate funds to everyone then small grass roots parties would stand as well as everyone except large grassroots parties and you could avoid someone like me funding the production of bumpf for someone like Fielding.
And isn’t the production of bumpf, political or not, wasteful in terms of the planets resources, GHGs etc?
Do we really want any party being able to buy up air time on a very large scale to ram home its particular spin? If, for example, every party (by audited membership numbers or votes) had a certain very limited right to broadcast its messages under Community Service Announcement provisions in the electronic media then this rather than funding might be preferable.
But it is the perception of trying to assert control that is the problem I think Mark. It is only ever a move that has been formulated by the said backroom boys club of the Queensland Labor Party. In any event I see change of government at the next election with Ronan Lee returned as a Greens MP along th at least three others (one in the seat of Brisbane).
…advise? What a shocker! I can only plead extreme tiredness and 2 glasses of beer.
I can’t help but think if this were a Liberal Queensland government in exactly the same position, you would all be screaming for blood – instead you make excuses. A large portion of your arguments become meaningless because you are blinded by your loyalty to the ALP. If you are going to vote Labor in every election, regardless of their performance, then don’t you think your opinions become somewhat irrelevant?
The trouble with your basic claim Ian is that mechanically alternating between voting ALP and voting Conservative doesn’t help, as Fitzgerald himself showed.
Also there are worse (or just as bad) things than having a corrupt government. Having one with the wrong policies that is slightly less corrupt could be a lot worse.
I notice the opposition leader has dismissed his Chief of Staff. The Premier would be well advised to do the same, and possibly a few others as well especially those who avised her to sell QR’s freight business.
The LNP obviously just don’t get it! It’s a matter of TRUST. Opposition Leader, John-Paul Langbroek demonstrates bad judgement, perhaps even deceitful behaviour, at a time when the public are demanding more integrity in politics. Is this what we can expect from another corporate machine pretending to be a political opposition?
http://www.smh.com.au/national/bligh-blasts-statex2019s-x2018godwin-grechx2019-20090804-e8oj.html
Hopeless.
At least Bligh is out there trying to bring about appropriate reform. Langbroek is obviously another politician that has the “in one ear, BS emerges from mouth, and out the other” syndrome.
N’
“At least Bligh is out there trying to bring about appropriate reform”
No she isn’t. She along with the rest of the ALP and ACTU are trying to nobble the Coalition. I will believe that she and the others are serious when they call for the ALP to stop being funded by the Unions. Until then it is all smoke and mirrors.
The only surprise is that anyone, including Anna Bligh herself, should be surprised that she is now so unpopular.
If I were to be found out to have organised burglaries in my local community in order to sell cheap TV’s and Hi Fi equipment at my local pub, would I expect to be loved by my neighbours?
Why on earth should Anna Bligh hope to be regarded any better by those whose assets she is determined to sell against their clear wishes? She called an early election, contrary to earlier promises not to do so, for clearly disingenous reasons, and then misled the public about her privatisation plans, even though I personally e-mailed her on 19 February, before the elections were called to ask her to state her intentions to here electorate in regard to privatisation.
Given her total inaction, until recently, in regard to clearly corrupt governmnent practices and the fact that she has personally attended a large number of the kind of Labor Party business fund raising functions that she now professes to abhor, why should anyone believe that her current posturing is anything more than an elaborate charade designed to fool the voting public into believing that this leopard has changed its spots?
The newsmedia now, for their part, posturing as righteous campaigners for truth and virtue in state government have oh-so-conveniently decided that privatisation, opposed by between 84% and 91% of Queenslanders and have imposed a blackout of news on this issue.
Well, this issue won’t go away.
A lot of Queenslanders are determined to hold to stop this heist from proceeding.
A protest is to be held outside Premier Anna Bligh’s electorate office on Saturday 15 August:
Stop Thief! Rally on 15 August to stop theft of Queensland’s public assets
Tell Anna Bligh to get her hands off OUR public assets!
Time/Date: 11am Sat Aug 15
Meet @ Lizard Statue, Boundary St, West End
March to Bligh’s Office (90 Vulture St)
For further information, please visit saveourpublicassets.org.
If it’s a ‘bad week’ for Bligh, then what the last 12 years for ordinary Queenslanders, whose hopes that Labor would eradicate the corrupt culture of the Bjelke-Petersen years have been betrayed?
To the extent that Bligh has been seen for what she is by many Queenslanders means that it is a ‘good week’ for them.
Mark wrote, “If (a change of government at the next election) comes to pass, Bligh and her advisors will rue the day that they decided the Queensland public would cop a complete backdown on the policy stance they took to the people in 2009.”
I don’t think so.
I am sure that this possibility entered their calculations when they decided to so cynically betraye the trust that Queenslanders put in them on 21 March 2009.
Justice for Queenslanders requires a lot, lot more than just consigning this incompetent, unconscionable Government to the scrap-heap in 2012.
Whatever rotten, iniquitous contracts they enter into in the meantime, including for privatisation, must not be honoured by whatever Government succeeds it in 2012.
Their behaviour is no different in principle to that of corrupt third world dicatatorships that incurred massive debts on the part of their people in order to fill their Swiss bank accounts and to pay for weapons to repress theri people.
The right of people of such countries to default on such odious debts has been rightly acknowledged.
Paul Pisale now says the meejah are bordering on McCarthyism! And is threatening MP’s in Parliament who refer to Labor Inc, Ipswich Inc, Lobby Inc or Email Inc I mean gate I mean…Oh Paul just get over it.
I have been voting Labor. However, Anna Bligh has done the people of Qld grave wrong, she simply ignores the needs of the people, and does her own thing – why she stated today on the news that she is not poll driven and polls are the least of her problems I’ll never know [how did she get into power? Not by us voting her in] since, it only takes 1 vote to kick her out and I am that vote.
You cannot sell off public utilities, see the majority of people struggling to barely survive and ignore their plight by making things things worse and then expect to be kept in power. So much for caring for people. Good by Anna et al.