ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr – the most radical left-wing leader in the country who blames everyone else for his mistakes – should have no authority over a criminal justice system.
Canberra is a town where bikies thrive, pitbulls roam, meth heads hoon and hard drugs are legalised, while the Greens-Labor government bans gas appliances, locks up cats, installs 40km/h speed cameras, forcibly seizes a Catholic-owned hospital, considers abolishing wood fires and imposes massive rate hikes during a cost-of-living crisis.
Barr’s attack on the respected and independent legal veteran his own government appointed to lead the inquiry into Shane Drumgold’s farcical prosecution of Bruce Lehrmann – Walter Sofronoff KC – revealed the true character of a leader who shuns accountability.
Safe in his Canberra fiefdom and confident the ACT political system and his army of retired public servants and left-wing activists will return his government at next year’s election, Barr is full of bluster.
Standing alongside him on Monday, ACT Attorney-General and Greens leader Shane Rattenbury was across the detail as he announced the government was accepting all Sofronoff recommendations. Rattenbury’s calm and methodical demeanour contrasted with Barr’s aggressive and attacking tone.
In 2018, Barr – who unsurprisingly despises media outlets who criticise his government or hold him to account – declared he hated journalists and was “over” the mainstream media.
He had recently cancelled his subscription to Canberra’s daily newspaper, The Canberra Times, because the publication was too “conservative”.
“I hate journalists. I am over dealing with mainstream media as a form of communication with the people of Canberra. What passes for a daily newspaper in this city is a joke. And it will be only a matter of years before it closes down,” Barr, exposing his arrogance and lust for power, said in a leaked recording.
In his left-wing bubble paradise – where decriminalising hard drugs is OK – few publications outside The Saturday Paper and Crikey would pass muster.
While he showed glimpses of seriousness on Monday, he heaped criticism on the media and Sofronoff for spoiling his plans to release the findings of the inquiry at a time suitable to him. “I am reminded of the film Muriel’s Wedding and when Bill Heslop says Deirdre Chambers, what a coincidence, what a coincidence,” Barr said in response to how The Australian obtained the Sofronoff report.
After almost 22 years in government, the Labor-Greens cabal is likely to remain unless the Liberals and independents, potentially led by the popular David Pocock, form an alliance to blast them out of power.
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