Accusations of ideological warfare fly frequently in politics, but it’s not every day someone openly admits to it.
So we just couldn’t go past this call to arms from our old mate Dean Hurlston, president of the Council Watch group – a persistent critic of local government, but mostly Stonnington Council.
Local government activist Dean Hurlston: “Local democracy and the right to be heard is not negotiable.”Credit: Simon Schluter
This is what he has to say to the group’s followers about the excesses of council bureaucracy in an updated manifesto – well, a couple of pars in the “about us” section on his website.
“Sadly, we are in an ideological war,” Hurlston reckons. “Are they meant to serve us or are we their puppets for radical social policy? Local democracy and the right to be heard is not negotiable, CEOs and executives are drunk on power despite being unelected – this must all radically change.”
Hurlston has long taken aim at mayors and councillors too, especially at Stonnington, but they were notably absent from his call to arms as he aimed at local government bureaucrats.
Could that be because Hurlston’s domestic partner Joe Gianfriddo was elected mayor of Stonnington last week?
After all, the updated vision was posted in the lead-up to Gianfriddo’s ascension to the mayoralty.
No chance, Hurlston told us, again. “Everybody’s fair game within a political context,” he said.
Dutton’s dud choices.Credit: Shakespeare
PETER PICKS
Poor old Peter Dutton has had a dodgy couple of days – brightened only by a bit of horror polling for his opposite number Anthony Albanese.
On Sunday, the Liberal leader’s two endorsements for a vacant NSW Senate spot – Zed Seselja and Andrew Constance – lost out to former Wentworth MP Dave Sharma, who pointedly did not have Dutton’s backing.
In Victoria on the same day, a winnable – well, sort of – spot on the party’s Senate ticket in the state went to some dude called Kyle Hoppitt, who hopped over the top of Dutton’s pick Greg Mirabella in the contest.
Then on Monday, former Department of Home Affairs boss Michael Pezzullo – with whom Dutton had enjoyed a certain simpatico vision when they worked together enforcing the hardline Sovereign Borders policy on refugees and asylum seekers – was told his services would no longer be required.
Some of the thousands of indiscreet text messages from the former senior bureaucrat, unearthed in an investigation by this masthead, showed Pezzullo lobbying the Liberal Party hard for Dutton to get the Home Affairs ministry after Scott Morrison’s ascension to the prime ministership.
Dutton returned the favour after the text message scandal broke in September, publicly praising Pezzullo and his “passion” for Home Affairs, not that you’d expect any of that to save the departmental boss from his fate under a Labor government.
Still, you’d have to think that Dutton – whose office wasn’t going anywhere near our request for a comment on Monday – would be due a win soon.
ZERO SUM
You can see why people might be worrying about the Victorian Labor government’s ability to get the big numbers right, and sometimes it’s in the small things that the doubts begin.
When Labor frontbencher Vicki Ward sent what should have been a routine mailout to voters in her northern-suburbs seat of Eltham, calling for Country Fire Authority volunteers ahead of the looming bushfire season, locals were left scratching their heads.
“The CFA has a strong and committed volunteer membership of nearly 5200 volunteer members – 28785 of those are operational firefighters,” Ward wrote.
OK, so a zero slipped off the back of the first figure in the production process – it should have been 52,000 – and CBD would be the last to cast the first stone in these matters.
Ward’s office told us they were undeterred from the task of encouraging Victorians to volunteer for their local brigades. But one of Ward’s constituents was sufficiently concerned to put pen to paper, writing that they saw worrying signs in the SNAFU.
“If this is the best they can do on simple and glaringly wrong numbers, then what hope have they got of getting it right on the big numbers in budgets and major projects?” our correspondent asked.
BY THE BOOK
The cat is well and truly out of the bag on the Netflix drama about the life and times of conwoman Belle Gibson – who found fame and fortune peddling false claims she had beaten cancer using wellness remedies – with the six-part series currently shooting in Melbourne.
US star Kaitlyn Dever, whose credits include Justified and Dopesick, was spotted filming in the central role last week.
But what is less well known is that the source material for the series comes from a journalist at this masthead, Nick Toscano, and our former colleague Beau Donelly and their 2017 book on Gibson’s fraud The Woman who Fooled the World.
The lads were tight-lipped when we asked about their book being brought to the small screen and referred us to publicists for the drama’s producer, See-Saw Films. We haven’t heard back from them.
SIGN OF THE TIMES
If, like us, you got excited last week at news that authorities in Canberra’s Parliament House were overseeing the construction of a new meeting room for the use of “the fourth party”, then you’re going to have to settle, petal.
The Department of Parliamentary Services finally responded to our inquiries on the matter, too late to be included in Friday’s column, explaining that “the ‘fourth party room’ is a reference to four of six party rooms across Parliament House”.
So what was “for the use of the fourth party”, printed on a sign outside the room in question, all about?
We messed up, was the explanation for that. “The signage was incorrect – this project is not delivering an additional party room,” a spokesperson said. “It is part of ongoing maintenance works across Parliament House.”
As you were, then.
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Council of war: Local government activist warns everyone is fair game - The Age
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