Labor’s hegemony was an aberration matched only once in Australian history by a similarly brief period of conservative rule in 1969 and 1970. Projecting recent trends forward would see the defeat of the Bligh Government in Queensland next year, the Rann Government in early 2010 and the Rees Government in NSW in early 2011.
A pig has turned on a woman who tried to look after it, effectively holding her hostage on a property in northern New South Wales. Sixty-three-year-old Caroline Hayes says she has been unable to leave her house to use the farm’s outdoor toilet at times because the white pig is aggressive towards her.
The carrier’s heavy promotion of aggressively priced wireless broadband and iPhone 3G plans has resulted in the network being overloaded with users, leading to widespread performance problems and frequent outages. The worst of the complaints have come from Sydney, where users have been forced to drop down to the inferior 2G network just so they can receive calls. But customers around the country are reporting problems including call dropouts and slow internet speeds.
Like his boss, former premier Morris Iemma, who has also quit politics, former treasurer Michael Costa crashed and burned over their doomed attempt to privatise New South Wales’ electricity industry. Earlier this month, in the most tumultuous week in state politics since the 1930s, Mr Iemma told Mr Costa he was being dropped from the ministry 12 hours before Mr Iemma himself was decapitated by Labor’s dominant Right faction.
The situation in New South Wales is similar to the state of affairs when Jeff Kennett came to office in 1992. For years, Victoria had been an economic basket case. Did Kennett respond, as Barry O’Farrell has done, by ignoring policy and presenting a small target? He did not. Instead, he and his supporters prepared to govern.
New South Wales Premier Nathan Rees says rumours that a leopard inhabits bushland on Sydney’s outskirts cannot be dismissed, because the safety of children could be at risk.
The $12 billion North West Metro is not expected to survive in its current form, and four big Rail Clearways projects worth $1 billion, promised by the New South Wales Government but not yet built, are also at risk. It is also possible the Government might defer the $1.37 billion South West Rail Link from Glenfield to Leppington.
Kevin Rudd and former New South Wales premier Morris Iemma struck a secret deal last October to cut the unions down to size after the federal election. But once safely elected on November 24, the Prime Minister squibbed on the undertaking, leaving Mr Iemma fatally exposed in his battle to privatise the state’s electricity assets.
Colin Barnett’s administration is barely ready for government. Whle the front bench will include some talented performers, for the most part the Liberal Party has spent the past 3 1/2 years as a rabble. However the soon-to-be-minted premier is a substantial figure and will now carry the all-important gravitas of incumbency.
If both parties can come to agreement it raises the prospect of a bipartisan report that for the first time in the country’s history recommends the introduction of legislatively mandated caps on campaign spending. The model that has committee members most interested is the “cap and gap” system used in Canada.