Premier Daniel Andrews played politics with his return to school plan
It’s fair to say politicians have our full attention at the moment and our patience is at an all-time low. Despite this, Daniel Andrews played politics with his return to school plan, writes James Campbell.
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In normal times, most of us couldn’t care less about most of the decisions taken by our politicians.
We tune them out because deep down we think what they do doesn’t impact us.
To get our attention, politicians and their spinners have to play little games — teasing out announcements over days, contriving photo-opportunities with props to ram their messages home.
But these are not normal times. What with the state of emergency and the closure of large slabs of the economy, and our schools, it’s fair to say the politicians have our full attention 24/7 and our patience for stunts is likely to be at an all-time low.
Daniel Andrews could have told us on Monday that Victoria’s schoolkids would all be returning to the classroom by June 9. All it would have taken was for him to add about two paragraphs of information to the announcement of the relaxation of rules on home visits and outdoor gatherings.
Hell, he could have done that last Friday, which would have allowed everyone to have something approaching a normal Mother’s Day.
Instead, he made us wait until Tuesday morning at a special press conference timed to be carried live on breakfast television around the country.
It was self-indulgent and will stoke suspicions our Premier is enjoying this crisis a bit too much for his own good. His message on schools has never made sense. His Chief Health Officer has never said they need to be closed and indeed they are open for those kids who can’t be anywhere else.
Now there is to be a staggered return, littlies and VCE students first, everyone else two weeks later. What’s the reason? Why are we different to everyone else, especially NSW? Who knows?
The only answer that would make any sense would require him to come out and say Victoria is moving more slowly on schools — as well as cafes and restaurants — because the virus is taking longer to get under control here.
But that would cut across the government’s narrative that, Cedar Meats aside, things are going brilliantly.
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