George Street Beat: Qld politics news and gossip
In a room with his mates, LNP attack dog and deputy leader Jarrod Bleijie launched a brutal and personal attack on Premier Steven Miles. THIS IS GEORGE STREET BEAT
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In a room with his mates, LNP attack dog and deputy leader Jarrod Bleijie launched a brutal and personal attack on Premier Steven Miles and his wardrobe choices.
Mr Bleijie, in an LNP State Convention speech aimed at rousing the party faithful before his leader took the stage, slammed Mr Miles for choosing to “wear T-shirts five sizes too small for weird TikTok videos”.
The deputy leader, who would likely become deputy premier in a Crisafulli government, noted a social media video in which Mr Miles pretended to be a punter speaking in support of the state budget.
“He recently couldn’t even find anyone to support his announcements so his staff had to interview him in the first person in disguise in a hoodie in the Botanical Gardens,” Mr Bleijie said.
“Queenslanders are beginning to understand the desperation and the weirdness of Steven Miles.
“He’s worse than Joe Biden and that’s saying something I know.”
Sunak channels Qld Labor?
Did dumped UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak turn to Queensland Labor for a Hail Mary move to save him from defeat?
GSB believes Deputy Premier Cameron Dick’s jaw-dropping campaign tactic at the state budget might have inspired the doomed Mr Sunak.
Last month, after nine years of Labor reign, Mr Dick urged Queenslanders to “make a choice about their future, not to express an opinion about the past”.
In the trenches during the final days of a 14-year Tory government, Mr Sunak appeared to have copied Queensland’s cheshire-cat deputy premier.
″This election is not a referendum on the past,” he pleaded with Britons.
Obviously, it didn’t work and it might be a bad omen for Premier Steven Miles.
He, like Mr Sunak, leads a long-term government seriously out of favour with voters due to the actions of their predecessors.
Maybe we’ll see Boris Johnson here.
BAD MEDICINE
They say not to bite the hand that feeds you. It seems one spritely LNP member didn’t get that memo at the party’s mass love-in on the weekend after he likened the Pharmacy Guild to a militant union.
During a heated debate over pharmacy competition policies, the member likened the current pharmacy market saturation to a battlefield, dominated by giants like Chemist Warehouse.
As if that wasn’t enough, the member doubled down by equating the Pharmaceutical Guild’s grip on the market to the Labor Party’s infamous relationship with the CFMEU.
Awkwardly the Pharmacy Guild – considered the most powerful lobby group in the country – was also a major sponsor of the conference, held at the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre.
LNP president Lawrence Springborg sprang into action, swiftly remarking to the nearly 1000-strong crowd, “OK... Just pretend you didn’t hear that.”
The motion to remove the rule preventing pharmacies from opening within 1.5km of another was overwhelmingly lost.
KING-SIZED FLIP
Member for Pumicestone Ali King has performed the mother of all political backflips this week as she attempted to convince her constituents of her undying faith in satellite hospitals.
But hold on, these GSB writers have done our homework.
Back in 2020 during a Courier-Mail debate, Ms King was rather harsh about satellite hospitals.
“When you scratch the surface you can see that that’s not actually a hospital, it’s a glorified GP clinic with some urgent care,” she said.
“A hospital is where people can go to get their chemo, where they can go to get their dialysis, that is what a hospital is.
“Don’t go pretending it’s a hospital.”
Fast forward four years and surprise surprise, Ms King is unveiling a satellite hospital in her own electorate. Not only that, she’s gushing over how impressive the concept is, describing the clinic as “crucial, impressive, innovative”.
“We are so proud of our satellite hospitals,” she said.
Oh how times change!
BELLE OF THE CABINET
Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath scores a new prize as she soaks up the twilight days of her near 17-year political career – Belle of the Ball.
Ms D’Ath took the gong at the 63rd Brisbane Pride Queens Ball Awards last weekend for her flowing glittery-gold dress.
She was joined by ministers Leeanne Enoch, Di Farmer and Labor MP Melissa McMahon.
The loudest applause was reserved for a sick State Development Minister Grace Grace, who revealed it was her non-binary child Bear who inspired her to get out of bed and attend the event.
“They said mum how are you feeling and I said darling I’m feeling so bad, I don’t even think I can make the Queen’s Ball tonight,” Ms Grace said.
“They said mum absolutely not, you’ve never missed one – get up out of bed, have a shower... get dressed and be there.”
ATTENDANCE RATES
As far as announcements go $700m for a bridge is a pretty big one – so where was Transport Minister Bart Mellish?
The premier’s office said he’d be there, but Mr Mellish was a no-show, with a scheduling error later blamed.
The young minister might have seen the writing on the wall and avoided standing next to Premier Steven Miles and Deputy Cameron Dick as they defended splashing the cash on a project yet to have a business case.
There was also a curious case of a hanger-on MP a day earlier when Jonty Bush joined the government’s heavy hitters Mr Miles, Grace Grace and Shannon Fentiman at the announcement of a new CBD nurse-led health clinic.
Ms Bush’s Cooper electorate is under threat from the Greens, but it’s located some 2km away in Milton – leaving GSB wondering why she was there.
Has the government already started putting vulnerable MPs next to the premier for airtime?
Ms Bush told journalists she was a member “who represents an electorate that is close to the inner city… but also an electorate that has a lot of women and girls but also a lot of working professionals… and parents… people who tell me that they’re really busy.”
Clear as mud.
Adelaide St is the location for the first of four nurse-led clinics, with three more to come.
Where will those three be located? Will they be in marginal electorates?
“You’ll find out very soon,” Ms Fentiman teased GSB.
EXPERIENCE MATTERS
You would think being 22 would give her a tech advantage but LNP candidate for Pumicestone Ariana Doolan has made a social media blunder straight off the bat.
The aspiring MP took to Facebook to attack the government’s Bribie Island bridge announcement.
Problem was, she also posted the instructions from head office.
“Can we get this posted across the community Facebook pages please. With the following caption”.
Pro tip: It does pay to read things properly – a skill she might need if she joins parliament in October. Whoops!
Fentiman furious over Qld Health’s spin doctors for public servants
Shannon Fentiman axes Health Department decision to hire communications experts to teach top bureaucrats how to protect government’s ‘image’.
Bungles and sackings: Qld Health’s list of failures over the years
Queensland Health may be responsible for looking after the public but it has done a poor job looking after itself, if these cases are anything to go by.