Podcast #131: Catching up on Queensland

Thanks Ben. I like Dennis as he generally gives a fairly balanced and impartial analysis.

I was surprised by his comments that this is going to be a “revenge” election as it feels (with no empirical evidence) to me to be an “Its Time” election (i.e. no hard malice, but you have had your time and now it is time to move over). A common theme I often espouse is most governments have a certain life span and Queenlanders in particular tend to turn hard and fast when they sense it is past their use by date. Both the Beattie / Bligh and the current Labor Government seem to have survived one election too long and thus get really punished hard when they get voted out and I suspect this will be the case this month.

I personally hate the fact that oppositions skate in on negativity. It is easy, especially in this time and age of world wide trends, to paint a negative picture. But I have not heard anything from Crisafulli outlining what he would actually do to address the negative issues. Still that seems to be the way of modern day politics – pump up the disquiet, fear and anger and you just have to adopt magic thinking that somehow the “saviour” will just wave the magic wand and everything will be right again.

The only real interest for me will be to see Labor and The Greens duke it out within Brisbane. As an outsider looking in, it seems as though the Greens have really got Labor spooked across all three levels of government. But do the Greens have that something extra to get them across the line with average Joe / Jill Blow – I don’t think they have reached that point yet.

Neil, I personally found Crisafulli hasn’t embraced most of the ‘negative’ messaging that the LNP as a party appears to campaign on. I got the feeling he is like Chris Minns as Labor leader heading into the 2023 NSW election, keeping a low profile and hoping voters back the party seeking a change of direction.

I do agree with you that Crisafulli and the LNP haven’t really articulated their ideas/proposals unlike Barry O Farrell as Coalition leader heading into the 2011 NSW election where he really focused on major infrastructure developments that the party eventually implemented throughout their 12 years in office.

Ben,

Many thanks Ben. It looks like Queensland is heading in the same direction as that of the NT, when Labor was wiped out in metro Darwin.

Darwin resembles more like the tropical cities such as Cairns, Townsville and Mackay are heading in the same direction as that of what happened in metro Darwin.

And I think that this could be sensed in the 2022 Federal results in Queensland.

Yoh An. I used to be a political junkie, but now I am mostly repulsed by it, mainly because of all the negativity associated with it. As a policy person, it saddens me the level of public discourse around issues to help us, the general public, understand the choices that are available and their respective pros and cons in order to help us make more informed decisions. But I fully accept that I am in the minority in this position and I understand why politicians do it, but I don’t think it makes for good governance. Exhibit 1: Brexit.

I used to have this internal battle with my bosses all the time when working at local government and preparing land use planning schemes. Give the public the policy options and the reasoning why we jumped one way or the other. This way they can at least see that there is more than one choice and there are pros and cons (as well as consequences) for each option. So when they make their submission they are doing so with an ounce of knowledge. But managers and politicians hated to see alternatives put out there; or the costs and consequences of each option, because it then only opens up lines of attack for those people who disagree with your final choice (i.e. the weightage you give to one matter over another).

I am not naive enough to believe there are perfect options out there. But to bring it back to Crisafulli, I can’t see youth crime reducing unless we go all police state and authoritarian. That is not what he is saying – tougher sentencing is his policy proposal. This assumes that the youth criminals are caught and harsher sentencing is sufficient deterrence for others. Even if this proposition is right, that comes at a significant cost just in incarceration, let alone rehabilitation. I think there is enough evidence from criminologist to suggest locking kids up for longer doesn’t solve the problem. Simple solutions for complex problems.

I am not here to argue for Labor. Depending on who is on my ballot, I will be putting Labor last because I think it is good for democracy and governance to roll over governments every so often, especially when they get a bit stale. But I would like to think I have a viable alternative to vote for and thus far I have not heard a convincing reason to vote for the LNP, other than Labor have had their time. Unfortunately we have compulsory preferential voting up here this State election.

Lnp hold 4 Brisbane seats
Alp hold 14 seats outside Brisbane

@neill
If you put Labor last you vote lnp .. but that does not seem to be what.you say.in
Your post

I think Greens are favorites to pick up Cooper and McConnell but winning Miller would insane. Not sure i agree with Dennis on that.

@Mick Quinlivan Labor holds 17 seats outside Brisbane. I assume you meant outside SEQ?