Re: Shawny’s concerns about Victorian and Australian Governments
Reply #753 –
Public hearings started in the same month as the election and will erode any support that the ALP may still have. The report should be handed down well into the first year of the new government who will be able to use it to their advantage. Damage control would have been calling the commission far earlier and retaining management of the report.
I’d say that it’s more like self-inflicted, terminal damage.
Sorry DJC, I respectfully disagree.
This was part of the Jacinta Allen knifing and Ben Carroll handover to attempt to save face leading up to the election race. Just like the pothole fixing that they are doing.
The spectre of it, was hanging over the Labor government.
Strategically they knew she would lose, and offed her to bring in Ben Carroll. Would the Royal Commission have occurred had that not happened? Its a way to attempt to distance Ben Carroll from Jacinta Allen, and save face, and blame the outgoing leader for all the woes.
Nothing more, nothing less.
I cannot fault the strategy, but to think this is noble thinking or "falling on ones sword" is naive, and Ben is actively spruiking it on advertisements as him trying to fix things.
Even if they had a point, the labor government at state level has ruled the roost for a very long time. You would be better off mounting an argument that Federal government is more culpable as the Libs have dictated that component for longer.
There's no doubt that Carroll called the Royal Commission in an attempt to distance himself from Allan and Andrews, but the timing couldn't have been worse for the ALP. We're in the final fortnight of the election campaign and every day there's going to be headlines from the Commission driving another nail in the coffin just like yesterday's scolding from the senior counsel over the redacted diary. Jess Wilson should be instructing her candidates to keep their mouths shut and let the Commission do their work for them.
I suppose that Carroll really had no option but the unwritten rules of Royal Commissions are never call one if you don't know the outcomes and can't control the timing of the report. Allan should really have called it when she took over, but it would probably still be just moving deck chairs on the Titanic.