What we're talking about

Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." @Bigfellah, with your permission, I would like to add that I thank you sincerely for acknowledging my success at being a ... more
Bella on Preferential voting FIRST PAST THE POST ~ is not as democratic as you may like to think.In a preferential system every registered voters final ... more
steve on A few facts on illegal boat people Hey Wendy - I'm an immigrant - I've lived here for 40 years and have learned to ignore people with attitudes like yours but ... more
James Weir on A few facts on illegal boat people Wendy, I'm surprised anyone lives in Adelaide. Even the Welsh born redheads are getting out of the place. more
Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." @Bigfellah. Again in typical Socialist Fashion, you are denying me my right to form an opinion. Mr. and Mrs. Newton ... more
Meg on "He's a dog..." I believe that any ordinary person who assaults women would have been charged and jailed not sent to rehab. Has Matthew ... more
Wendy on A few facts on illegal boat people Look around..In Adelaide now, you cannot spot an Aussie. Everywhere you look its Chinese/Asians, Indians and Pakistani's. ... more
bigfella on "He's a dog..." Hi z,The point is: How the heck would Phil of Springwood know what sort of parents Bert and Patti were to their son? For all ... more
z on Bob Brown Lazarus Where is the costings that they demand of everyone else, thier 5 minutes of fame will be up shortley more
Shanelle on System failure The whole system is stuffed. I have been apart of it for 10years now and still im confused. Im in a bad place at the moment ... more
James Weir on Barnaby Joyce How many Clem 7's would you like in your Super Fund, Barnaby? It lost $1.5B in it's current reporting period. Only Govts can ... more
Steve Martin on "He's a dog..." Rebecca Wilson as per normal is just plain out of touch.The hitting of women is wrong but personalising this with "he's a ... more
Ronny Of Brighton QLD on Preferential voting MichaelIve just come back from a holiday.That bloke Dean Jaensch Siad that if someone(call Him RONNY) had 40% he said 60% of ... more
z on Preferential voting the way it is working at the moment is the first loser joins with 2nd loser and so on untill they beat the winner, so a ... more
brisman on Bob Brown The guy is not green he absolutley red through to the core. His environmental visions are shallow and don't serve ... more
z on "He's a dog..." bigfella, Phil of Springwood is not talking from so called flippantly expertise, Ivory tower stuff but more from commonsense ... more
robert goodchild on Support our Diggers the sticker Idea is great.I would happily part with $20 for one and would like to see the profit go to families who have ... more
Phil of Springwood on "He's a dog..." Hey Bigfella, back again so soon after your mobs magnificent defeat by the Tories, I thought you and the rest of your Left ... more
z on "He's a dog..." Hey Phil, why don't you say what you really mean more
bigfella on "He's a dog..." Congratulations to Phil of Springwood,We've become accustomed to his astute political and social commentaries based on ... more

We need strong, united leadership...

Posted by: Michael Smith | 17 October, 2008 - 12:21 PM

On Wednesday this week (15 October) I had a chat with the Education Minister Rod Welford. We were speaking mainly about education, but I also spoke with him as a cabinet minister about the state's finances.

Rod said that he had spoken with the Treasurer Andrew Fraser who told him that stamp duty revenues from property sales had ground to a halt. Rod said the cabinet had been told about the financial situation. Have a listen for yourself here

The next day The Premier was interviewed about Rod's comments. At a press conference with our reporter she rebuked Minister Welford's position listen here. She was keen to allay fears about the state's budget.

I believe Rod Welford was speaking the truth, without spin. It just has the ring of truth about it - common sense. In fact it was so truthful and real that there was no real fall-out on our radio station from the initial comments - our listeners pretty much said that's what they expected the situation to be.

Why would the Premier try to put a different spin on those facts? Why not face up to the reality and level with us like her Education Minister did?

Later on that second day, the media started to take up the issue of cabinet solidarity - that is the media started reporting about cabinet appearing to be divided. I've been speaking about that for some time and the issue was the topic of my blog a couple of days ago.

So the Premier's spin started to change by 8.30pm, the Premier said the Education Minister's gloomy comments about the economy are consistent with hers, have a read of the report.

We need strong, united leadership with the whole team singing from the same hymn book. We have a 31 year old treasurer - a young bloke with very limited life experience. He was 11 the last time Australia was looking at recession. He's had no experience of life under anything other than times of exceptional economic strength. That leaves the Premier and ministers like Rod Welford as the most experienced hands in the team. The Premier would do well to take Rod's lead and level with the people.

Blog comments

I will believe Penny Wong's THEORY on climate change IF/WHEN the Federal Govt. forbids the sale of coal to overseas interests---in order to put a halt to this "Time running out" for GLOBAL warming. Does Rudd think the carbons won't cross the borders of China and Pakistan. All bull Mr Rudd Act intelligently or stop acting!! Margaret

Margaret Gannon Friday 17 October, 2008 - 4:35 PM
Doesn't matter what Michael Smith says - he's been punted off air at last to do sport???

MIchael Friday 17 October, 2008 - 4:24 PM