Kylie Lang: It’s the Palaszczuk government’s party and you’re paying

The continual and monstrous waste of taxpayer dollars to benefit Labor’s inner circle is a slap in the face for Queenslanders struggling with rising costs of living, writes Kylie Lang.

You can hear the disco party raging at 1 William St. ABBA’s 1976 hit Money, Money, Money is blaring as politicians boogie and laugh at our expense. Our significant expense.

They’re laughing at us, because we’re the bunnies paying for their enormous financial bungles – billions of taxpayer dollars that have either gone nowhere or to the wrong people.

Every week there is a new revelation of how our money is being wasted. There is ongoing secrecy too around massive spends that benefit Labor’s inner circle but nobody else.

The Palaszczuk government isn’t worried; it just keeps turning up the volume to drown out its problems.

But the struggle for the majority of Queenslanders who don’t live in “a rich man’s world” is real.

“I work all night, I work all day to pay the bills I have to pay. Ain’t it sad?

“And still there never seems to be a single penny left for me. That’s too bad.”

Attorney-General Shannon Fentiman during Budget Estimates hearing at Parliament House. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Dan Peled

In ABBA’s time, the solution was to marry someone wealthy so “I wouldn’t have to work at all, I’d fool around and have a ball”.

Fast-forward to the present and the only people having a ball are the members of this government.

Meanwhile, Joe Average is left dreaming of “all the things I could do, if I had a little money”. Like buying groceries without having to leave items behind at the checkout, like not losing sleep as soaring utility bills roll in, like filling up the car without wincing.

One of this week’s jokes at our expense came from Attorney-General Shannon Fentiman.

In Budget Estimates, she repeatedly refused to disclose how much it cost to provide legal indemnity to factional ally Jackie Trad in the former minister’s bid to suppress a Crime and Corruption Commission report into the appointment of Frankie Carroll as under treasurer.

It emerged that it was Ms Fentiman – along with Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk – who approved Ms Trad’s personal application for the state (read: us) to bankroll those legal fees.

Ms Fentiman also admitted on Wednesday to approving a second indemnity application for her gal pal.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk during Budget Estimates. Picture: Liam Kidston

We’re not allowed to know yet the cost of such ongoing largesse, just as we were kept in the dark for the best part of a year over the astronomical $223.5m outlay for the dud Wellcamp quarantine facility that is now gathering dust.

Ms Fentiman said the figure to support Ms Trad’s fight – which the opposition speculated would be $15,000 a day – would be provided when the case was finalised.

Rather fishy then, you’d have to agree, that her department was fine to reveal the $109,691 it spent on another case, involving former public trustee Peter Carne, before it was finalised (Mr Carne won his appeal to keep secret a CCC report into allegations of misconduct on Friday).

Also on the nose this week, we learned the state government will be writing off $4m in potentially fraudulent grants handed to double-dipping businesses during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Department of Employment and Small Business director-general Warwick Agnew said his agency would not pursue about 400 businesses that received both payroll tax relief and adaptation grants, noting the effort required.

The schemes were also oversubscribed, meaning struggling businesses that may have been entitled missed out.

Jackie Trad. Picture: Richard Gosling

But the government has deemed it not worth the bother to investigate this latest debacle. Turn up the volume and keep dancing.

When you consider the myriad ways our taxes are being misspent – the ways we know about – it is staggering.

Two weeks ago, I wrote about the missing billions meant to help our smashed economy recover.

A damning report by Auditor-General Brendan Worrall found the government didn’t know how many jobs it created or businesses it helped through Covid support packages.

There was also no evidence a single cent had been spent on 79 recovery initiatives.

Instead of dancing under a disco ball, the Premier and her team need to tune into what’s really going on with our “money, money, money”.

Kylie Lang is Associate Editor of The Courier-Mail

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Auditor-General Brendan Worrall. Picture: NCA NewsWire/Jono Searle

LOVE

● The return of the Ekka – still the flagship event where city and country folk meet. Not sure we need more than 400 showbags though.

● Queensland’s stellar showing at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games. Augurs well for the Brisbane Olympics in 2032.

● The blocking of 40 websites used by uni students to buy assignments and cheat on exams. Do the work, lazy sods.

LOATHE

● The dumbing-down of education that comes with teaching kids to perform well on tests instead of understanding and interpreting knowledge. New research from the Australian Catholic University shows this superficial learning is driving teachers to quit the profession. Don’t blame them.

● Beer prices to hit $15 a pop in some pubs. As if pre-loading isn’t rampant enough.