Why Palaszczuk government is history in Queensland

The YouGov poll (C-M, Jul 5) should be an indicator to the Palaszczuk government that all is not well.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk. Picture: NCA NewsWire/John Gass

SHADES of the Bligh Labor government? Is history repeating?

The LNP Opposition won’t win government at the next state election because of any new policies, because there aren’t any.

While it may have a new leader since the last election, it has a majority of members who were in Campbell Newman’s government.

Will they argue they have the experience of government, when the experience they left on the electorate and public service had them put out of office after one term?

By the time the election is called, any government, whether current or changed, will be faced with monumental inflationary factors, which are hitting us now.

With Cross River not due for another two years, the cost in wages and materials will skyrocket and the cost projections for the 2032 Olympics no longer apply.

The Labor government cannot rely on Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk getting them out of trouble.

In opposition she was able to rally a telephone box full of Labor members, helped by the policies of the Newman government, to bring Labor back to government.

The current LNP Opposition can camp outside the telephone box and watch the Labor government become so inward looking, believing their own rhetoric, they won’t need to put up any new policies.

The YouGov poll (C-M, Jul 5) should be an indicator to the Palaszczuk government that all is not well.

Unlike the Joh Bjelke-Petersen years, there is no gerrymander to save them.

Peter Haslett, Cashmere

I WASN’T here at the time, but does anyone have a sneaking feeling we are seeing shades of Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen all over again?

Goodness gracious me; no, no, no, don’t you worry about that.

He may well have had some good advice for Annastacia Palaszczuk on the bread and butter issues.

I can see him telling her, “You can’t sit on a fence, a barbed wire fence at that, and have one ear to the ground”.

I know Palaszczuk means well by telling the public servants to lift their game, but as Sir Joh said, “You don’t tell the frogs anything before you drain the swamp”.

Perhaps she might even agree with some of his advice: The greatest thing that could happen in Queensland and the nation is when we get rid of all the media. Then we could live in peace and tranquillity.

Unfortunately some of her chooks have come home to roost – not to be fed.

Michael Matthews, Bribie Island

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LAPTOP CLAIMS OFF KEY

THE Crime and Corruption Commission has released its Investigation Workshop report into the removal of laptops from the Office of the Integrity Commissioner (C-M, Jul 5).

It found that the “raid” and “seizure” of laptops from the Office of the Integrity Commissioner, which was looking like a conspiracy worthy of a Jason Bourne movie, was just an ordinary computer upgrade by an IT officer as part of their assigned duties.

But the Opposition on Monday claimed the report raised more questions than answers, thereby raising the hopes of conspiracy theorists of a sequel to the CCC’s Investigation Workshop report.

Valdy Kwitowski, Salisbury

I WONDER if all Queensland government department laptops are routinely removed for update installations?

No? Just the Integrity Commissioner’s?

In the middle of an integrity investigation? Who would have thought?

A Swiss watch has far fewer moves than this government.

Peter Corran, Wakerley

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BALANCE WITHOUT QUOTAS

READING the article (C-M, Jul 5) about the LNP needing more females in parliament was interesting as it is obvious that a balance would be a sensible idea.

I agree with LNP Senator Paul Scarr who supported setting targets rather than quotas, which has worked for the LNP-led Brisbane City Council.

Everyone who wants to stand up for election to government should be encouraged, male or female, as long as they are going to do the right thing for the country and not just themselves.

Lesley Brandis, Camp Hill

SADLY the LNP has allowed itself to be sucked into the female quota quagmire.

Why is this necessary?

Media reporters are now predominantly female. 

My doctor and dentist are women and I don’t think they got there on a quota system.

Has anyone considered women simply don’t choose politics as a career path and don’t need patronising special fast-tracking because they’re not good enough to make it on their own merit?

Richard Marman, Meridan Plains

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Prime Minister Anthony Albanese takes part in a meeting ahead of the NATO summit in Madrid. Picture: Gabriel Bouys/AFP

ALBO’S TOUR OF DUTY

COMPARING Scott Morrison taking a beach holiday in Hawaii to Anthony Albanese working the diplomatic arena during a time of international crisis (Letters, Jul 5) is sheer desperation.

Add in the fact that Australia now has a visible and energetic minister looking after national disasters and I think we should all be very grateful.

Australians are again seeing what a national government should look like.

It may take a while for some to shift their comfort zone and accept this, but for the rest of us the troubled times ahead seem a little less bleak with a new – if unfamiliar – competence at the helm.

Stephen Morgan, Carina Heights

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RELIGION IN TRANSITION

KEVIN Donnelly (Opinion, Jul 5) writes about religion as if mankind adheres to only the Christian variety as presented by the Catholic Church and congregation.

He says “concepts such as liberty, freedom and committing to social justice and the common good are Christian in origin”.

While that one ancient faith may have had a hand in such lofty social pursuits I’m pretty sure that every other religious belief, past and present, has held and still holds the same tenets in their proclaimed interpretation of the wonder of life and the certainty of death; of a single deity or any number of deities, coupled with a sense of security and safety in numbers.

Sadly all religions came about not as a celebration of life but rather about fear and the likelihood of death or injury.

And now with education and science taking the lead in dealing with sickness, depression and anxiety (the very things that Donnelly cites at the end of this discourse), humanity has tended to drop the pomp, the sombreness and the many pretensions of organised Christian religion (Western style) instead turning to the other two Abrahamic creeds found in Judaism and Islam.

Donnelly is correct that religion will accompany mankind until the end of time but the idea that Christianity will last for eternity in the same format as now is decidedly remote.

Merv C. Bartlett, Pallara

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HUNGER FOR THE ‘LUCKY COUNTRY’

READING Cathy Waite’s opinion piece (C-M, Jul 5) about food insecurity, my mind was drawn back to Donald Horne and his famous, or perhaps infamous, book The Lucky Country.

Despite how the title has come to be understood in Australian vernacular, Horne actually used the term “lucky” in a rather negative and derogatory manner.

Nonetheless, we came to understand or at least went on to believe that Australia is not only lucky but also fair, just and kind.

How then is it that Australia has now found itself neither lucky nor any of the other adjectives we believed to be at its righteous core?

I am concerned that too few of us care enough to take personal responsibility for it – preferring instead to live in a bubble of “care distribution” whereby we believe someone else, more qualified, more able or at the very least more elected can take responsibility for our nation’s growing social woes, leaving us to close our eyes and wrap ourselves in our own gripes and grievances.

The time has come to start considering the here and now and begin reaching out to those our country seems to be so abjectly and completely failing.

For surely we can never go back to our bubble of “luck” if even one child in this country goes to bed hungry.

Shani Doig, Holland Park

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