Rita Panahi: Daniel Andrews is gaslighting Victorians on depths of triple-0 crisis

Any other government would be fearing the consequences of a saga like the triple-0 crisis, but once again Dan Andrews and his cronies are dodging accountability.

The extreme arrogance of the Dan Andrews government is evident again in the dismissive manner they’re handling the state’s triple-0 crisis.

To be clear this catastrophic failure has seen Victorians, including children, die waiting for emergency calls to be picked up.

It’s bad enough that Graham Ashton’s review of the broken Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority (ESTA) system was not immediately released to the public but both Premier Andrews and Health Minister Martin Foley haven’t even bothered to read it despite having access since March.

On Thursday Foley was repeatedly asked whether he had read the report or at least been briefed on its contents. His steadfast refusal to answer can be safely interpreted as a big fat “no”.

When the Premier was asked why he and Foley had not read the report, he responded with a bizarre diatribe.

Premier Daniel Andrews, and Health Minister Martin Foley both refuse to say if they have read the report. Picture: Luis Enrique Ascui

“This is completely and utterly a political game,” Mr Andrews said. “This is not the sort of stuff that I will be getting into. These political games, they don’t help anyone, they don’t serve anyone at all.”

That ladies and gentlemen, is what is called gaslighting. When you lie through your teeth and try to manipulate people to deny what is real.

How can the Premier and health minister doing the bare minimum required of them be characterised as a “political game”?

The Premier then said: “This ‘who has read what’ … If that is your focus, then fine. My focus is investing in the services that matter and that’s exactly what we have done.”

The failure to read the report has not stopped the Andrews government from pledging a substantial boost to funding including $333m for 400 additional staff.

That’s how this government operates; throwing taxpayers’ money at a problem that it’s created through gross mismanagement. No wonder we have the highest debt of any state or territory.

Any other government would be on its knees right now fearing that this saga would end ministerial careers and perhaps even see the leader step down in disgrace.

But this is Victoria, where accountability is a taboo word.