If you haven’t heard about Friday’s Australian Border Force debacle in Melbourne, here’s the background: Timeline: How Operation Fortitude unravelled It started with their Friday morning statement, which said, among other things: “ABF officers will be positioned at various locations around the CBD speaking with any individual we cross paths with.” The media dutifully reported ... [More]
Category: Politics and activism
I’m a troublemaker sometimes
I’m not the world’s biggest drinker. So last Thursday night after a chat with a PT industry insider over 2 pints and a pot, I was feeling a bit tipsy as I headed home. Waiting at Flinders Street for a train home, I encountered one of the Spring Street state press gallery’s Finest and Brightest, ... [More]
The previously secret East West Link “side letter”, offering compensation even if the contract was deemed invalid, seems to underscore just how desperate the State Coalition was to build the road — despite it being a project that: is highly controversial is more expensive than just about anything previously built in Victoria has a Benefit ... [More]
A few thoughts post-election… Bentleigh As I write this, the seat is still too close to call. Counting is continuing, but it would seem we are destined to remain a marginal seat for the next election — in fact some voters reckoned they were deliberately voting to stay marginal. Elsewhere, some sandbelt (or as I ... [More]
Some photos from election day… The seat of Bentleigh is marginal, so we’ve been getting a lot of attention. The booth I usually vote at leans towards the Liberals (or at least did in 2010), so we had Labor politicians galore: local candidate Nick Staikos, along with Federal Labor leader Bill Shorten, and Labor luminary ... [More]
Two sleeps until the election. Apart from trying to get citizens out to a public meeting, where in the neighbourhood is the best place to meet as many people you can, face-to-face? Judging from what the politicians and lobby groups have been up to, it’s the railway station — on weekdays, at least. I’ve lost ... [More]
Only a few days until the state election, and the campaign is heating up. Here’s something interesting I’ve noticed: apart from posting and advertising on Facebook, the Liberals have paid for Google Adwords advertising — that is, links to appear above search results on Google. They’ve covered the names of a number of Labor candidates ... [More]
As I walked to the station this morning there seemed to be an unusually long tailback of cars approaching the level crossing. I found a gaggle of reporters at the station, and shortly afterwards state opposition leader Dan(iel) Andrews showed up, with public transport spokesperson Jill Hennessy and local Bentleigh candidate Nick Staikos, to announce ... [More]
Categories
Election wrap-up
So, to summarise… Abbott govt in. But not the Labor bloodbath some expected, which is good — whoever’s in power, a good Opposition is needed to keep them in check. Somewhat to my surprise, the only Greens lower-house member Adam Bandt is back in, as are some other independents, but the Coalition will have a ... [More]
Look, if you’re going to send around party political propaganda, you should at least have the guts to not disguise it as something else. This arrived in the mail yesterday: …and inside was this: I note that in their brochure, they’re still using the rail icon, despite repeatedly proclaiming that they will not fund urban ... [More]
Abbott’s outright refusal to fund urban public transport (while throwing billions into motorways) hasn’t won him any friends here. Make sure your vote counts.
If you missed it in the Sunday debate, or yesterday on social media, here’s the 30 second summary of Tony Abbott’s transport policy.
The government argues that cross-city traffic is so critical that the they want to (without a mandate) spend $8 billion building just the first phase of the East-West tunnel. If that’s the case, then why does the newly remodelled (2008-2010) M1 corridor only provide two lanes in each direction for those cross-city trips? Eastbound (coming ... [More]
One thing I really really hate about spammers is how they often insist on the bottom of their email that you’re receiving their crap because you subscribed to it. They know it’s not true. I know it’s not true. Along the same lines are these types of letters, one of which I received yesterday. The ... [More]
If Tony Abbott’s Coalition won’t build rail, why do they include a rail icon on their infrastructure policy? At least, I’m assuming it’s an icon for rail — not giant white picket fences to keep out asylum seekers, or something like that. (The above is from the summarised version. The slightly more detailed policy document ... [More]
A few thoughts on Federal politics from the last few days. I think Gillard did some great stuff. Carbon tax (some don’t like it, but it works), National Disability Insurance Scheme, the Royal Commission into child abuse, and (along with her predecessors on both sides) keeping the economy afloat in dire economic times — and ... [More]