This is the personal blog of Ian Ker, who was Councillor for the South Ward of the Town of Vincent from 1995 to 2009. I have been a resident of this area since 1985. This blog was originally conceived as a way of letting residents of Vincent know what I have been doing and sharing thoughts on important issues. I can now use it to sound off about things that concern me.

If you want to contact me, my e-mail is still ian_ker@hotmail.com or post a comment on this blog.

To post a comment on this blog, select the individual post on which you wish to comment, by clicking on the title in the post or in the list to the left of the blog, and scroll down to the 'Post a Comment' box at the foot.

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Sunday, September 18, 2016

Do Unto Others …………

Minister for Transport and Agriculture, Dean Nalder, has followed Tony Simpson in resigning from Cabinet and former Minister, Helen Morton, has come out in support of them.

There is common thread in these three narratives and that is arrogance, lack of communication and even bullying.

Tony Simpson is reported as saying he was kept in the dark by the Premier’s Office and had to “second guess” Colin Barnett’s policy positions by listening to talkback radio. There were numerous examples of this lack of communication during the local government so-called reform fiasco, including when Col unilaterally ran up the white flag despite being defeated on only three of the proposals.

Dean Nalder is reported as saying "Colin is making irrational decisions without consultation with respect to Ministers". He instanced Perth Freight Link, the sealing of the Cape Leveque Road and the announcement of new Boyanup sale yards, all matters within his portfolios, as cases where the Premier directed him without discussion or made announcements without even informing him.

Former Minister, Helen Morton, is even more forthright. According to the ABC's Jessica Strutt, Helen Morton has accused staff in the Premier's office of running a "machine" of bullying, intimidation and threats of ministers. Morton says both Tony Simpson and Dean Nalder, who have quit Cabinet, have been victims of it. She also saw it when she was a minister.

Clearly, Col cannot continue as leader of the WA Liberals (and hence as Premier), without the confidence of key Liberal MPs or of the community, but it is not clear who might replace him. This itself is a direct consequence of Col's arrogance and bullying.

For me, I can't see anyone currently in the Parliamentary Liberal Party who has the qualities necessary to be an effective Premier. After the March 2017 election, the Liberals' talent pool will be considerably smaller.

Meanwhile, head-in-the-sand Mount Lawley MLA, Michael Sutherland (in whose electorate I now unfortunately reside after the recent boundary changes) said there is no leadership crisis, despite the current leader being so on the nose (Crisis 1) and the total lack of competent alternative leaders in the Parliamentary Liberal Party (Crisis 2).

The manner of Simpson and Nalder making their announcements suggests that their frustration has driven them to "do unto Col as he has done unto them". I can only hope that whoever is Liberal leader after the next few days (even if it is still Col) learns the pragmatic lesson of 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you'.

Saturday, September 17, 2016

Minister Simpson Resigns - No Confidence in Barnett

I've been away from this blog for several months, largely due to illness, but I couldn't let Local Government Minister, Tony Simpson's, resignation from Cabinet, on the grounds that he no longer had confidence in Premier Colin Barnett's leadership, pass without comment.

Readers of this blog (and the more recent one dealing with the City of Perth Act) will know that I have been very critical of Simpson in his role as Local Government Minister. 

In retrospect, however, it is unclear how much of the local government so-called reform (aka forced amalgamation) fiasco was Simpson being malicious and how much his simply being unable to stand up to Barnett. Certainly the fatuous and false 'economies of scale' argument came from Col's half-baked economics - I commented more than once that he must have attended the lecture on economies of scale but skipped the next one on diseconomies of scale. 

Simpson was often the scapegoat for Col's ignorance and intransigence.

Even so, Simpson cannot be held blameless, as he should have stood up to Col - that was the time to resign - but, in fairness, he was too new a minister for resignation to have had much effect.

Simpson has performed much better and more consistently in his other portfolios of Community Services, Seniors and Volunteering, and Youth, but these are not high profile ones and he has got little public recognition from them.

Col's predictable and rather puerile response was that Simpson's resignation provided an opportunity for someone else to be a Minister - as if the Government benches in Parliament were brimming with talent. Whoever gets the gig, we can only hope that their tenure will be short-lived.