Brisbane news, politics, business and entertainment: Top insiders spill the beans in Corridors of Power
QUEENSLAND Labor’s own version of Game of Thrones is afoot — with almost as many plot lines.
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AS IT turns out, not all news is fit to print ... but these insiders will whisper if you lean in close. We’ve brought together our top insiders to report from Brisbane’s worlds of law, business and entertainment to bring you a concentrated dose of the week’s top tips and gossip.
Politics with Steven Wardill
Labor’s song of ice and fire
QUEENSLAND Labor’s own version of Game of Thrones is afoot — with almost as many plot lines.
The position of state president is up for grabs, and under a factional deal it has been promised to someone from Labor Unity, otherwise known as the Old Guard.
Only problem with that is that the Old Guard is looking, well, old.
The faction has all but collapsed and its only real union power base is the Plumbers Union of Queensland.
A coup at the plumbers recently cost state secretary Brad O’Carroll his day job and he was favoured to be made party president following his prodigious fundraising efforts for the faction.
However, some figures, particularly among the Left faction, believe if the Old Guard tries to stump up O’Carroll for Labor’s top job, a factional war will erupt.
So efforts are underway to find the former union boss a sweet spot in the public service.
We can already hear swords being sharpened in Peel Street. Valar morghulis.
What really goes on at pressers
IT seems some unions reckon their new-found hold over the Government extends to the fourth estate.
The Together Union’s Alex Scott likes to frequently hold press conference to publicly order the Palaszczuk Government around.
However, not content with offering his unsolicited advice on administering the state, Scott has taken to getting his erstwhile press officer, Sharon Marshall, to ask him questions during press conferences. He then dutifully answers the Dorothy Dixers.
It’s not unusual for interest groups to send out recorded grabs or press releases for reporters to quote from.
But a union interrupting a press conference so it can ask itself questions surely is a step too far.
Public servant blues
RUMBLINGS of discontent are percolating through the newly renamed Department of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships.
We’ve learnt disgruntled staff wrote a detailed letter with a long list of complaints and submitted it this month to director-general James Purtill.
They cite a litany of alleged problems across the department, including workplace bullying, sexual harassment and the improper hiring of mates.
Leadership style, restructuring and staff morale also get a mention.
Another 61 employees signed on to a separate letter of complaint from their union.
All this provides grist for those wondering whether Purtill will retain his position in the latest round of executive re-hirings.
It took two days for a spokesman for Treasurer Curtis Pitt to tell us senior executive HR matters are handled by the Department of Premier and Cabinet so, sigh, we’ll seek something from there and keep you posted.
Politics and friendship
ANNASTACIA Palaszczuk jetted to Singapore over the weekend to talk up northern Australia with Tony Abbott.
While there, the Queensland Premier helped cut the ribbon at James Cook University’s new campus and she praised those behind the decision.
“Congratulations to JCU Chancellor Lt. General John Grey AC, Vice-Chancellor Professor Sandra Harding and the whole team,’’ Palaszczuk said.
It was rare praise for Prof Harding from Queensland Labor.
Along with former federal treasurer Peter Costello, Prof Harding, who is a respected economic sociologist, co-authored the Commission of Audit report ordered by Newman government.
Treasurer Curtis Pitt once described the audit “predictable and purely political”.
Obviously they’re all friends these days.
Plonker laments revenge porn
IT seems poor former Redlands MP Pete “The Plonker” Dowling reckons he’s a victim of revenge porn.
For those who’ve forgot, Dowling was the LNP bloke who dipped his private part in a glass of red wine, took a picture of it and sent it to his secret mistress. Very tasteful stuff.
Dowling took to Twitter this week to rage about intimate images of women being posted online and the media’s coverage of the issue.
“It’s appalling hundreds of women had private, intimate images circulated without their knowledge or consent,’’ Dowling fumed before adding “Media outraged. You hypocrites.”
We assume Dowling can only be referring to his own saucy sexting scandal which made headlines around the world.
The part Dowling conveniently left out (pun intended) was that he was an MP elected on very conservative values who took his mistress on parliamentary travel trips.
And no one ever published the images. And, believe us, no one wants to see them. Ever.
Taxing figures
A FEW political types made urgent calls to their accountants after the Billy Gordon scandal broke earlier this year.
No one wanted to be caught with their tax affairs out of order.
However, we hear one political player has had a rather unfortunate run in with the good folk at the Australian Taxation Office in recent times. The figure they had to pay up was a healthy six-figure sum.
Entertainment with Nathanael Cooper
When rivals don’t give a tweet
IT may be the traditional home of Rugby League but even Nine News tunes in to Seven for State of Origin News.
Last week when the Origin III squad was announced, two Nine News twitter accounts retweeted the Seven Brisbane newsroom twitter account with the news that Daly Cherry-Evans had been dropped.
The rivalry between the two networks might be fierce, but when it comes to Origin news it seems everyone is happy to fight the good fight together.
Redundancies at Nine?
SPEAKING of Nine, tongues up on the hill have been wagging that the Nine Newsroom is about to go through a redundancy process similar to that of the Ten Network.
Ten’s redundancies saw their newsroom decimated to just a handful of journos filling the bulletin each night.
The rumours have caused beads of sweat to develop on the furrowed brows of Nine journos — but they can relax.
We asked Nine if they had any redundancies planned in the future and they flatly denied it.
Technical error? Neverland!
QUEENSLAND Ballet’s Peter Pan is one of the most technically tricky shows the company has ever tackled and it all went balls up on opening night.
Obviously any Peter Pan retelling is going to require the boy who never grew up to do a bit of flying, and the ballet company engaged the use of a complicated automatic flying rig to get their dancers up in the sky.
Unfortunately on opening night the rig was in no mood for keeping Peter moving around and broke down during the first scene it was required.
The stage manager smartly had the dancer lowered to the ground and the scene went on without much flying.
But we hear that wasn’t the right result for choreographer Trey McIntyre, who whipped backstage during the first interval to share his feelings with the poor stage manager.
When the pesky rig broke down at the end of act two, the curtain dropped, leaving the audience to wonder whether that might be the end of the show.
Nope, they had just reset the software that keeps the rig moving and had started the scene again.
Fingers crossed for the company that the rest of the season goes off without a hitch — the ballet isn’t all that bad.
Business with Louise Brannelly
Dog food is big business
Maybe it’s the MasterChef phenomenon extending to the canine world but dog food has come a long way since tinned Pal.
And it’s big business.
Family-owned Brisbane manufacturer Big Dog Pet Foods churns out 30 tonnes of pooch grub each week, generating turnover of more than $6 million a year.
Chris Essex, a food scientist, who owns the business with his wife Kirsten, has flagged 15 per cent growth this year and says the company is finding its way into petfood bowls in Asia.
Big Dog sold over 155 tonnes to overseas markets such as Taiwan, Singapore, Japan and Hong Kong this year.
Their popular products include BARF for dogs and Big Dog Museli, all with organic ingredients sourced from local farmers, where possible, and meat suitable for human consumption. Of course.
Investing in mining
WITH the coal mining sector seemingly in a massive hole, it’s interesting to see the occasional overseas investor buck the trend and make a play in Queensland.
That has been revealed on Wednesday with North Carolina’s Boyles Asset Management revealing it had acquired a 5.57 per cent stake in Mackay-based Mastermyne, which specialises in providing services to the coal industry, such as helping make underground roads.
Now Mastermyne, like a range of other service companies, has seen shares bashed in the past 18 months. Its stock was trading at 76.5 cents in January last year, and now around 18 cents.
Boyles cites the influence of Warren Buffett in its style of investment (like many a fund manager). Interestingly, their move up Mastermyne’s register comes local investor as Wilson HTM Investment had slimmed its holding from 6.53 per cent to 5.24 per cent.
Pollie donations down
OK, so there’s money for coal services business. But are there any businesses willing to plough cash into pollies? One source in donation circles told Corridors of Power that the donation pool is starting to get a little, shall we say shallow.
Update reveals major twist in building company collapse
The director of a collapsed Sunshine Coast building company, with nearly $500,000, remains uncontactable as the liquidator reveals the latest in the investigation.
Super quarry expansion under review as leaked emails surface
Confidential government emails have revealed concerns about a super quarry south of Brisbane which is currently under a federal review with a public submission period about to end.