Victorian Labor shoots itself in the foot with botched political hit job on Matthew Guy
THE Andrews Government “inadvertently” releases medical and financial information about innocent Victorians caught up in a political hit. What a self-absorbed rabble, writes Matt Johnson.
Opinion
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WHAT a self-absorbed rabble.
The Andrews Government “inadvertently” releases medical and financial information about innocent Victorians caught up in a political hit and what was its response?
“I think it was unfortunate that information was published through the media before the Parliament had a chance to address this issue,” said Labor’s Leader of the House, Jacinta Allan.
THOR ACTOR’S MUM A VICTIM OF DAN’S DATA DUMP PRIVACY BREACH
MORE PRIVATE DETAILS OF VICTORIANS UNCOVERED
VICTIM PRIVACY BREACH BREAKS SILENCE
The state’s treasurer, Tim Pallas, said it was “a minor breach of data and we immediately took action with the clerks to have it removed.”
Except for the other personal detailed peppered through 80,000 pages of documents released.
Instead of pulling those down to redact psych reports and home addresses, it pressed on with its mission to damage a political foe, Matthew Guy.
Some ministers even had the temerity to call for no one to publish some details from documents it had released.
Just stick to Guy, please.
The arrogance is breathtaking.
No one gave a real apology, and when the premier said someone had apologised — he couldn’t bring himself to simply say sorry — that hadn’t even happened yet.
More victims are being identified as the documents are assessed, with the latest being the mum of Hollywood heart throbs Chris, Liam and Luke Hemsworth.
Not Thor’s mum!
This government has been blinded by anger about police probes, the opposition trashing conventions on pairing, and the suspension of Gavin Jennings from parliament over his failure to produce sensitive documents — the latter a ridiculous stunt by the Coalition and Greens.
Labor MPs had long faces yesterday, but few questioned why this was necessary.
They are narrowly ahead in polls, three months before an election.
The government has a big infrastructure agenda to sell to the electorate, which is worrying the opposition.
But it couldn’t resist this.
It wanted Guy, who signed off on a taxpayer-funded legal settlement to save his job, to fear the sort of police heat being applied to Labor ministers involved in a 2014 campaign rort.
It didn’t stop to think about potential damage to itself, again, let alone anyone else.
This week, before this blunder was revealed, government MPs laughed about the acronym FIGJAM — F*** I’m Good Just Ask Me — being tossed at opposition MPs.
That phrase is used to infer vanity and arrogance.
Talk about irony.
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