Editor’s view: Crossroads moment is coming for the Palaszczuk government

The Queensland government is facing three major issues. The first and perhaps most significant: Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s habit of turning on those who challenge her, writes the Editor.

There is no evidence suggested or discovered yet that indicates the poor practices of this third-term Palaszczuk government extend to brown paper bags of cash being exchanged for political favours.

As far as we know, this is not a corrupt government in that overtly traditional sense of the word.

But it is becoming clear that this is a poor government, and a wide range of integrity-related issues already canvassed by The Courier-Mail over the past couple of years are coming home to roost.

It is not too late for those ministers and senior staffers who have hung around despite it all to turn things around. But they cannot delay change, for their own sakes sure, but also for Queensland’s.

A crossroads moment for this government is coming next week when Professor Peter Coaldrake releases his review into government integrity that was prompted directly by The Courier-Mail’s fearless reporting. It will not be good news for the Palaszczuk government – with insiders understood to have lined up to share their concerns with someone willing to listen.

And that, it turns out, is the first and perhaps most significant issue facing this government: Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s habit of turning on those who challenge her – from junior staffers right through to senior ministers. The Premier views any challenge – no matter how insignificant or well meaning – as a sign of personal disloyalty, and frequently puts on ice anybody who stands up to her. The consequence is that many good staffers have left, and her office is now filled with (increasingly disgruntled) people who have been conditioned to never tell the Premier that she is doing anything other than amazingly well.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

Of course, the ultimate victim of a culture like that will eventually be the leader. Perhaps, though, what is more concerning is that over time this attitude has also led to an erosion of the cabinet process – with ministers themselves forced to grit their teeth and endure a system that frequently sees important deliberations delayed indefinitely simply because one of them has been sent to the equivalent of the Premier’s naughty corner.

The second issue is the one sensationally raised again by the Crime and Corruption Commission on Friday – the influence on this government of Labor-aligned lobbyists. In its 12-page discussion paper, the CCC warned explicitly of the danger of a “small number of key groups and individuals”, who have disproportionate access to government decision-makers.

A public warning like that from the state’s corruption watchdog is extraordinary in itself. And yet it is not the watchdog’s first. On the eve of the October 2020 election won by Labor on the back of its successful strategy to do whatever necessary to “keep Queenslanders safe from the Covid pandemic”, the watchdog also publicly warned of the blurring of lines between the government and private sector – and “overlapping networks … involving consultants, influencers, lobbyists and executives”. That warning came after it was revealed former Labor state secretary and MP-turned-lobbyist Evan Moorhead had been brought in to help run the party’s election campaign. Since the election, Mr Moorhead and his lobbying business Anacta has had an extraordinary strike rate in terms of successful outcomes from government for his clients.

We are not suggesting any wrongdoing on the part of Mr Moorhead. There is no evidence he has broken any rules.

The problem here is with how those inside government are conducting themselves. As we said in our front-page headline on Saturday, there is a definite stench.

The third big issue every Queenslander should be concerned about is this government’s repeated willingness to use legislated or regulated rules to unfairly strangle political opposition. It has become just business as usual for this government to amend fundraising laws to cleverly benefit the ability of unions to donate to Labor while closing off the options for business to do the same to the LNP.

This government has meanwhile demonised property developers, and banned them from donating to politicians simply because they tend to donate to the LNP. These unfair rules are nothing more than a gerrymander – a similar strategy to the electoral boundaries fiddling the government of former Nationals premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen used to impede its political opponents.

Using power to hold on to power? That’s surely not the type of behaviour we should stand for in post-Fitzgerald Queensland.

And yet if you ask Premier Palaszczuk about this or any of the other big problems with the way this government goes about its work, the answer is invariably always the same – don’t you worry about that.