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Jeff Kennett was premier of Victoria from 1992 to 1999, served two stints as Hawthorn Football Club president and was the founding chairman of Beyond Blue.

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MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - NCA NewsWire Photos November 21, 2020: People are seen at a busy Flinders Street Station in Melbourne, Victoria. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Daniel Pockett

2021 will throw us some of our toughest challenges yet

We have endured many curve balls this year, and as head into 2021 there are even more challenges we are going to have to confront.

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MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - NCA NewsWire Photos October 24, 2020: Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews speaks to the media during a press conference in Melbourne, Victoria. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Daniel Pockett

Buck must stop with leaders

True, good and genuine leaders do not eat their own. Yet our Premier continues to dodge responsibility and shift the blame.

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Photographer: SGT Neil RuskinCaption: A soldier from the Special Operations Task Group mans the gun on a convoy to the Northern Kandahar region for a disruption operation. Mid Caption: The SOTG and partnered Afghan police of the Provincial Response Company conducted the operation to secure the northern approaches of Kandahar province and disrupt insurgent activities.During the operation Australian soldiers cleared paths through areas heavily sown with IEDs to attack insurgents in their safe havens.Afghan police and SOTG members warned locals to avoid areas where they had identified IEDs.Over the course of the operation, SOTG elements destroyed 16 IEDs.A large amount of materiel and components for the construction of IEDs were also recovered by the force element. The items were destroyed to ensure the safety of Afghan civilians, Afghan National Security Forces, Coalition and ISAF forces.

Why we must show compassion for our soldiers

Most of us can never understand what our forces in Afghanistan were submitted to. The findings of the report into alleged war crimes by our men may shock us but we must remember our compassion, writes Jeff Kennett.

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MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - OCTOBER 20: Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews speaks to the media during a press conference on October 20, 2020 in Melbourne, Australia. Victoria has recorded one locally acquired COVID-19 case in the last 24 hours. Coronavirus restrictions have eased further in Victoria as of 11:59 on Sunday 18 October, with Melbourne residents are now able to travel up to 25km from their homes, and no limits on the time people spend outside their homes exercising. People must continue to stay at home unless for the four permitted reasons Ã¢â¬â to shop for food and other necessary goods; for care or compassionate reasons; for work or education; for exercise or social interaction, and from Monday, people can also now go to the hairdresser. Up to 10 people from two households can also now meet outdoors, while tennis, golf, bocce and skate parks are now able to open. (Photo by Daniel Pockett/Getty Images)

The moment Dan Andrews finally lost the plot

The Premier’s attack on the federal government, the hand that had so handsomely fed Victoria over those months, was a sign he’d finally collapsed under the weight of the economic and social disaster he was personally responsible for, writes Jeff Kennett.

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MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - NewsWire Photos OCTOBER 14, 2020: Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews gives his latest COVID-19 update. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Andrew Henshaw

Why I feel for Dan the man but not the leader

On a personal level, I have empathy for the pressure Daniel Andrews must be feeling from public scrutiny during this pandemic but professionally, the Premier has failed Victorians on a massive scale and he must be held accountable, writes Jeff Kennett.

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MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - NewsWire Photos OCTOBER 12, 2020: Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews updates the media at his daily press conference. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Andrew Henshaw

Is Andrews’ house of cards about to fall?

It is so often not the mismanagement of an issue that causes the most damage but the cover-up that follows. Maybe now the Victorian government’s response to its bungling of the hotel quarantine program will send Dan Andrews’ house of cards crashing down, writes Jeff Kennett.

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