by PAUL COLLITS – LABOR’S new Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan has been personally responsible for the creation of more public debt than perhaps anyone else in Australia’s history.
In her former ministerial portfolios she spent like a drunken sailor – making Gough Whitlam look like a miser.
- They are both political pugilists, especially Allan. They are age adjacent (43 and 50).
- They both believe in big government. They were both disciples of Zero COVID lunacy.
- And they are both good mates of the departing Daniel “rubber bullets” Andrews.
It’s of no surprise that comparisons have arisen between Jacinta Allan and New Zealand’s Jacinda Ardern.
Puzzleheaded on Reddit stated this week: “I read ‘Jacinda Ardern elected as new Victorian premier’ and thought that was quite the development.”
ERROR
Not quite, but close enough, to consider granting Puzzleheaded a cigar. I, too, misread an early story on the new Victorian Premier and made precisely that error. It wasn’t wishful thinking.
It is true that someone from a Commonwealth country can become British Prime Minister. Someone (from Canada) did once.
UK commentator Mark Steyn even suggested that, after Boris and then Liz Truss left in short order, Tony Abbott should have been drafted as British PM.
But it isn’t true that Kiwis can simply cross the Ditch and rise to high office here. Joh Bjelke-Petersen, Alex Greenwich and Barnaby Joyce notwithstanding.
For some reason the Daily Mail considered it a “happy coincidence” that Jacinta Allan had the same initials as Jacindarella.
I’m not sure why this coincidence is particularly “happy”.
I doubt that Jacinta “Commonwealth Games” Allan will ever have her visage adorning a wheat silo in Brunswick as occurred with her much adored-in-Victoria almost-namesake.
Until July this year, Allan was Minister for Commonwealth Games Delivery. (Yes, that really was a portfolio title). Domino’s and even Deliveroo have better records on “delivery”.
As noted by The Daily Mail: “The cancellation [of the Games] will see Victorian taxpayers hand over $380m to the Commonwealth Games Federation in London.
BLOWOUT
The new Premier might equally appropriately be known as Jacinta “project blowout” Allan, such have been her repeated associations with disaster across a number of portfolios, especially Transport and Infrastructure.
Her debt record is truly astounding.
As Transport Minister since 2014, she has also been associated with a $3.3b cost blowout in Labor’s signature program to replace railway level crossings with bridges.
But this is only scratching the surface of Victoria’s debt blowout.
Even The Age is reporting at least some of the facts, for once: “Jacinta Allan oversaw $20b in cost blowouts, now the debt bill will bite.
“In 2016, the North East Link was to cost $10b. Its price tag is now $16.5b. The West Gate Tunnel ballooned from $5.5b to $10b. The Metro Tunnel’s 2015 business case said it would cost $7.5b, but it will cost $12b. And the Suburban Rail Loop was to cost $50b. Its first stage, covering a third of the total plan, is budgeted at $34.5b.”
Back to Jacindarella. The similarities between the political doppelgangers are there. They are both Leftie women.
They are both political pugilists, especially Allan. They are age adjacent (43 and 50). They both believe in big government. They are both mates of the departing Daniel “rubber bullets” Andrews.
LUNACY
They were both disciples of the Zero COVID lunacy.
Back in 2020, we had this: “Member for Bendigo East, Jacinta Allan has been announced a member of the Victorian government’s new Crisis Council of Cabinet, responsible for decision-making on matters related to the State’s coronavirus emergency.
So, the new girl, just like her colleague in New Zealand, was right at the heart of decision-making about a minor virus, decision-making that had devastating consequences for Victorians.
Ardern locked down and locked up the island nation, to keep the COVID boogie-man out.
Andrews’ Gang of Eight (the CCC) did much the same thing, only with more thuggery and modern weaponry than occurred across the Ditch.
While Andrews will forever be seen (rightly) as the ugly face of the Victorian lockdown, his successor cannot escape the opprobrium that many of us still believe and hope will one day come.
Come to think of it, Allan has been associated directly with three of the greatest disasters of the Andrews reign. The Games, the blowouts and COVID. (Yes, I know it’s hard to pick just three disasters from such a long and impressive list.)
Allan will be marketed as a fresh face, a little like Ardern was, initially.
She will have some of the sparkle that, unaccountably, usually attaches to female leaders (though this might be beginning to fade).
As Allan contemplates the $200b suburban rail loop – now that is a rail loop – and the rest of the ballooning debt, Jacinta might just be wondering what she has let herself in for.
All this is now on her plate, as Daniel “the thug” Andrews waltzes off with his eye watering $300,000 a year superannuation package and no COVID Nuremberg – thanks to his Leftie mate in Canberra.
INFLICTED
Good work if you can get it. He should be just able to cope with the cost-of-living crisis that the rest of us are battling, a cost-of-living crisis that was the direct result of the pandemic policies that he and his National Cabinet mates inflicted on us all.
Andrews will also get a driver as part of his going away present. Perhaps Andrews’ wife might put him or her to use on occasions. To avoid pesky cyclists.
With Andrews gone, Australia now has two Jacintas on the national political stage. One of them is the first female Victorian Premier since … Joan Kirner.
The other is a true leader, and would never in a million years be thinking that she had anything in common with Jacinda Ardern. Or Joan Kirner.PC
The confusion with Victoria and New Zealand is understandable. Both are peculiar.
Will Victoria political history repeat?
* Labor Premier John Cain handed over to Premier Joan Kirner with the state economy in decline.
* Soon afterwards economy basket case called Rust Belt of Victoria, shops boarded up, service station driveways chained off and no access, people in a cost of living crisis.