Was it all a Ruse (endaal)?

Well this was predictable.

Many of you will remember the kerfuffle before the last state election about the future of Eric Roozendaal. Many believed that he would retire as soon as he qualified for his life-time pension (mid-2011 - only a few months after the election).

There was even a suggestion that the shambolic sale of the power assets was motivated (at least in part) by Roozendaal's desire to set up a cushy job post-election.

Naturally enough, Keneally faced a lot of questions about whether Roozendaal was going to disappear early. That all lead to this, from Keneally during the leaders debate:

Both those promises have now been broken.

Does anyone care? Probably not. I had a look at the Google News Searches for Roozendaal today - the SMH, The Age and SBS made no mention whatsoever of the promise to stay.

The Australian had this to say, right down the bottom of their piece:

Believe it or now, only the Yahoo7 article gave the issue any prominence at all:

Conclusion? Clearly no one cares. Or, at least, no one in the media.

For my money, it's deeply disappointing that iron-clad guarantees like this are so readily ignored post election. Yes, Roozendaal leaving doesn't really affect any citizen's life directly - but at the election I (and, I suspect, most observers) suspected he intended to leave early.

To give him (and the Labor party) a pass on that promise just encourages similar deception in the future.

I can't sit here at my desk and say Roozendaal lied in 2011. It sure looks like it, but no one except him knows what his true intention was back then. And I don't have the access that would allow me to ask him (or, indeed, John Robertson) for an explanation.

And you can rest assured that, come 2015, no one is going to care, no one is going to write about it, and we will be graced with 1000 new promises that will be eagerly lapped up by both the media and the electorate.

You know what? When we don't care about politicians breaking promises, we send the message that we don't care when they do. It's not good enough.

The internet assures me that HL Mencken said this: "People deserve the government they get, and they deserve to get it good and hard"

Do they ever.

By the By

The by-election in Heffron is going to be held on 25 August.

I've already written about why the by-election is happening and what it all means here, so I won't repeat myself.

Suffice to say that, as expected, the Coalition has recognized that running a candidate is a no-win option, and are taking a pass.

Anthony Green has, as usual, put together an outstanding page on the by-election, which is thoroughly worth reading.

I just wanted to add a few thoughts.

First of all, the candidates: (summaries from Anthony Green's page)

First of all, as a Public Defender, Hoenig immediately earns some respect (from me, at least). PD's are barristers who work for Legal Aid full-time (as opposed to most barristers who are briefed by solicitors and may or may not do some legal aid work).

PD's work defending people who are often seen as being the lowest of the low, and their work is usaully pretty thankless. They do that for, in the vast majority of cases, far less money than they could earn in private practice.

It's also worth noting that he has apparently been Mayor of Botany Bay for over 30 years, which must be some kind of record.

A pretty impressive sheet.

A serial candidate - not that that is likely to affect her vote. I suspect that CDP voters are, typically, voting more for the party than the candidate anyway.

Unlike the CDP candidate, Faruqi is not only a local, but ran for the Greens in this seat in 2011. But for the fact that Hoenig has an equally impressive "pedigree", one would expect that to give her a big advantage in a by-election, given the usual collection of opportunists that tend to nominate.

She is apparently well-known locally, and has quite the profile in the party.

I don't really have anything to add, other than that is a heck of a CV he's got there.

According to Anthony Green, the Greens need a swing of 16.2%. It's difficult to see where they could possibly find that, given the local pedigree that Hoenig has.

That's all assuming that Anthony Green's analysis of the preference flow is right. He has (quite reasonably) based it on the preference flow in Marrickville in 2011, which is a seat where the 2PP was LABvGRN. That's sensible, and all he really can do - but it is flawed because the further west you go in Heffron the "Greener" you get. The flow in the Southern and Eastern parts will not flow the same way.

Having said that, the other two candidates will not really figure, except for the Coalition voters who go with the CDP candidate rather than do the unthinkable and given Labor or the Greens a "1".

The fact that Labor have drawn the top spot will only further guarantee what should be an easy victory.

What will be more interesting will be the reaction to Kristina Keneally's husband Ben Keneally succeeding Hoenig as Botany Bay Mayor, and whether he starts positioning himself for a tilt at a seat in 2015.

Fly, Fly Away

Labor have been going on about promises a LOT recently.

 

 

 

And so they should. O'Farrell has done a lot of stuff he didn't say he would, and a lot of things he hinted or outright promised he wouldn't.

Luckily for Labor, it is a little hard to break promises when you're not in government. Most promises made during an election are made on a "When I'm Premier" basis.

The only promise I remember either side making on a "If we lose" basis was in relation to members staying on after the election.

The Coalition hammered Labor over whether Keneally and particularly Eric Roozendaal would stay on after the election. During the debate, Keneally committed that they both would:

Full story from the SMH

Late last night it was revealed that her promise would be broken.

Unfortunately for the Coalition, I don't think there is any hay that they can make out of this. Come next election, almost no one will remember or even care what someone who was premier four years before did.

With the promises and guarantees O'Farrell has broken to date, "broken promises" is probably a discussion he would rather avoid anyway.

What will be worth watching will be what happens in the by-election for the seat. Keneally is leaving the Lower House next week, so things will move swiftly.

After the Clarence by-election last year I took a close look and concluded that it gave every side something they could use, and really didn't prove much at all.

Heffron is in a very different situation.These were the numbers after last year's election:

From this helpful ABC website

The website reporting on the 2007 election still exists - it's not as pretty but the numbers are all there. Bear in mind that in 2007 Keneally hadn't yet become Premier, and had just finished her first term as MLA for Heffron.

There was a big swing against Keneally in 2011 - but the swing was almost identical to the swing for the state as a whole.

Will the Coalition be able to engineer another 7% before the by-election? It is difficult to imagine how.

The polling numbers are still very similar to the election result. True it is that the recognition of a local member who was also the Premier may have artificially inflated Keneally's vote - but that works both ways when you have a massively unpopular government being given the boot.

Given what has happened in the last few months (not least of all the changes to WorkCover), I'm expecting at least a small move back to Labor in the next NewsPoll.

To me, the seat doesn't look winnable for the Coalition. So this comment from the excellent @PrestonTowers seems pretty spot on:

Unlike in Clarence, it is difficult to see the Coalition winning the seat, and short of that it is difficult to imagine how they could spin the result a being a "win". Keneally may have broken her promise to stay, but how much are the Heffron residents going to punish the Labor candidate for that?

Not a lot, I'd suggest.

A hair-brained idea?

Ex-Premier is a pretty tough gig. It's even tougher when you don't retire but rather remain as a humble back-bencher.  Moreover, a back-bencher for a party reduced to only 20 seats after one of the most inevitable and yet humiliating defeats in Australian electoral history.


Whilst I had plenty of criticism for Keneally in her time at the helm, at the end of the day the defeat she presided over was unavoidable. There was nothing she could do to prevent it besides hope that O'Farrell implode in spectacular fashion.


Upon being defeated she had the good sense to step aside and allow the rebuilding to commence, although whether her choice of replacement is any better suited to the task is another question entirely.

Photo from here

It seemed fait accompli that Keneally would step aside after the election, and speculation was rife as to what her plans were.


She committed to serve out her term to quell speculation that she was planning to pursue a career in Canberra.


In any event, that seemed to me to be an unlikely course - how much success could she really have with this defeat hanging round her neck?  Keneally wasn't solely to blame for the loss, but she was still part of the Labor caucus in the years leading up to the defeat.


Assuming she obtained preselection for a NSW federal seat, it is not difficult to imagine the tactics an effective Coalition campaigner would adopt.


In the event, Keneally really has gone to ground since the election.  She stopped tweeting, and she was either not offered or was refused a cabinet position. Presumably she has been doing some work behind the scenes, but her profile has been pretty much zero.


In fact, according to this piece she is the only Labor MLA to not have given a speech this term.

Photo from here

On 2 August, however, Keneally burst back onto the political radar.  And she did it with a haircut.


Personally, I couldn't care less how Keneally wears her hair.  On the day the new haircut debuted , there was a frenzy on Twitter as journalists frantically reported the rampant gossip.  I found it all rather unedifying.


The Tele published this rather breathless piece about the new 'do, including reporting that Keneally's "preferred hairdresser" refused to comment.


Nick O'Malley gave us this drivel (which I still can't believe the Herald published):

As if that wasn't enough:

Now, that's all by the by.  The point I want to make is that Keneally knew this would be the reaction.  Whether this reaction is justified or not, she must have expected a fuss.


That's not to say she shouldn't have cut her hair.  If she wants to shave her head and get a dozen piercings it's no concern of mine.


But her actions start to seem a little more calculated when you look at what has happened in the fortnight since.


Predictably, everyone was aflutter about the new haircut for a few days, The next day this piece was published in the Daily Telegraph dredging up all those old questions about what Keneally's plans were.


The journo took the opportunity to quote a "senior Labor source" saying "I think she's sticking with the line that she's going to stay but you wouldn't be wrong to say it's possible she'll go earlier."


Keneally would have known that she didn't need to do anything to keep her name in the headlines for the next few days - bored journos would keep filing stories about the hair for a few days.


According to this piece in the Southern Courier published on 8 August, "The Southern Courier was the only media Kristina Keneally agreed to speak with last week after her new hair-do quickly became the hottest political ticket item on returning to parliament."


She also "insisted there was no basis to any of the rumours that she was considering resigning" although the quote provided immediately following seemed a lot more ambiguous that the conclusion drawn:

In this piece published in the SMH she revealed that she had been appointed to the board of South Cares, the South Sydney Rabbitohs' charitable arm.

Today there was a puff piece in the Tele talking about Keneally and a concert next week.

What's important to note, besides the fact that both of these stories would no doubt be heavily based on a press release issued by her office, is that both carried posed photos.  The length of her hair in the photos proves that they are not convenient recycled stock photos, but rather the result of a photo shoot.


Most surprisingly of all, Keneally has also reappeared on twitter.  As Premier, she posted over 2500 tweets, but had not posted since the election.


Suddenly, on 9 August, she resurfaced with this:

SInce then, she has been responding to tweets, retweeting colleagues, having a dig at Fred Nile, and generally using twitter most effectively.


So, does this mean anything?  I think it does.  I just wish I knew what.


It can't be a leadership tilt.  Not even NSW Labor could be that stupid, and I doubt Keneally thinks they are.


Nor do I think a move into the Federal parliament is likely.  It just doesn't make any political sense.


It is possible that she is looking to retire from parliament, and is presently increasing her profile to try and score a job, either in the private sector or perhaps some important government position.  This would seem like an odd way to do it though.


Maybe this is all just part of her trying to take a more active role and perform well as a local member. But again, she doesn't need profile to make that happen.


Of course, only Keneally and her staff will know for sure what is going on.


But it seems to me that she is trying something.  Hopefully we won't have to wait long to find out what.

Bloodbath

Wow. What a night.


There are far, far too many things to talk about from last night, so I'm not going to pretend to do any of them justice. Let's just list the interesting stuff and then watch how things pan out over the weeks and months to come.


- The Greens. It looks like no extra seats in the Upper house. The Coalition will not need their votes to pass anything (given that they will probably have enough if Coalition, Shooters and CDP vote together). Looks like Labor will hold Balmain and Marrickville. Not a good result.


- The Coalition performance in safe Liberal seats. Lets look at the north of the harbour in Sydney. In Ku-Ring-Gai, 72% first preference. In Davidson, 74%. In Pittwater, 72% I don't care who the "other side" is - more than 70% first preference is an amazing number.


- The Labor performance in safe Labor seats. I haven't been through and counted myself, but I understand that there was only ONE seat where Labor won without needing to go to preferences (Liverpool). I mean, seriously. ONE. By contrast, the Coalition will have over 40 in the same category.


- Some of the swings. The biggest was Bathurst at 36%. ALP primary there down from 54% to 21%. That's 60% of the people who voted for you last time voting for someone else.


- NOT ONE seat swung to Labor. Not even one. Not even Penrith, won last year in a by-election, held while Labor was at its lowest (or so we thought), after the sitting member had to resign after ICAC got stuck in, with a swing then of 26%. Just incredible.


- The only good numbers for Labor - hanging on to Marrickville, and presently favoured to hang on at Balmain. In Balmain, Greens, ALP and Coalition each polled over 30%, so still nip-and tuck. The winner may just be decided by which of the three finishes third and then distributed preferences.


- Keneally resigned. It was always difficult to predict what would occur post election for the Labor leadership. Pre-election she refused to confirm her intentions, but it was difficult to see how she could possibly be the right choice for next time round. I think she showed some good sense in resigning - she must have known when she took the job that her position was always going to be an "interim" one.


- Robertson got up. As I type, the 2PP in Blacktown is 54/46, so he got up pretty easily in the end. Who knows whether his push-polling made a difference, but the overwhelming reaction on Twitter appeared to be along the lines that he is worst possible choice. Having said that, the next leader will never be Premier - the Coalition will have at least 8 years. Maybe Labor will look at the effect Abbott has had Federally and want someone to cause some chaos for a few years before they put someone realistic up there for 2019. We're going to see a lot more of that Keating letter.


- 2019 must seem a long way away if you're a Labor loyalist.


- And finally, I tipped 21 seats in @sspencer_63's sweep. Current ABC projection is 22. I can feel it in my waters, I'm going to win this one…


That is all. Now we wait to see what kind of shadow cabinet Labor can cobble together from what is left. Keneally said she would be on the backbench, but if she is she will be pretty lonely back there...

A Tale of Two Leaders

In the dying hours of the 2010 Federal Election, Tony Abbott went on a campaign rampage. 36 hours without sleep. He did radio, he made appearances, and he even did late night talkback to fill those pesky hours between 2am and 4am.


Opinion was split as to what exactly it was he was trying to achieve - was it the image of the infatigable leader, or did he really think he needed every one of those hours to be productive if he thought he was going to win?


Of course, only he knows the answer. Nonetheless, a lot can be learnt about a leader, a party or a campaign by what the leader spends the final hours on.


US presidential campaigns are famous for leaders chasing the sun across the country, making airport hanger speeches where the leaders do everything they can do to ensure they are in the public consciousness on voting day.


The approaches of Keneally and O'Farrell as Saturday creeps closer and closer could not be more divergent.


Alexandra Smith wrote an excellent article that appears on the front page of the Herald today along with a big photo of Keneally, head thrown back laughing, along with some coal miners who look like they can't believe that they, of all people, are being campaigned to.


This is the thread that Smith picks up - Labor campaigning to coal miners is the Illawarra. These seats should be safe as houses for Labor, and given the swings required (Shellharbour on 26.8% and Keira on 22%) they still should be in the Labor column on Saturday night. That said, Heathcote on 8.8% and Kiama on 12% are ripe for Coalition picking.


Of course Labor running a campaign (in at least some shape or form) in every seat is a given - despite the fact that I live in O'Farrell's seat I've still been getting mailouts from him, and his branch members have still been active in the area handing out pamphlets at the station and doing what local members can be relied on to do.


But I haven't see O'Farrell - he has at risk seats to hit.


The Premier spending valuable hours in what are usually safe Labor seats in the Illawarra shows just how bad things have gotten. The combined effect of Federal Labor being a bit on the nose, NSW Labor being universally reviled and, no doubt, some bitterness about the David Campbell debacle, has Labor petrified that the seats may be in jeopardy.


O'Farrell, on the other hand, left yesterday for the Four Bus All State Tour (my name, not theirs). Four large Coalition busses, manned by O'Farrell and his shadow cabinet, will, between them, visit all 93 seats.


Of course, there's no way that O'Farrell has sufficient hubris to think he could win every seat. Rather, by making this tour, he sends messages. Every seat is in danger. The whole state wants change and we know it. Every seat is important and we want your vote.


I don't know his precise schedule, but assuming each bus goes to 26 electorates, that's still 9 electorates a day for each bus. When one considers the travelling time, as well as just how big some of the rural electorates are, it's a mammoth job.


No doubt the visits will be cursory at best. Of course, that's no issue - it's not the presence that is important, but rather the story in the local paper, or the big flashy event at the Westfield, or even just the "all 93 electorates" line that will be repeated as nauseum between now and Saturday.


Labor will lose on Saturday. It remains beyond doubt that it is a question of how much, not if. OF course neither party will admit that, but their plans for the last few days make it very clear that they know this.


The Premier is spending time in seats Labor hold as much as 20%. O'Farrell is visiting electorates in South-West Sydney - the home of Howard's battlers who kept the Federal Coalition in power for so long.


The question this raises is this - how long will these new Coalition voters stick around? A large victory should guarantee the Coalition at least 2 terms - but if they can turn dyed-in-the-wool Labor voters into Coalition voters (or even just into swinging voters) they could fundamentally alter the electoral map in Sydney.

Courting Public Opinion

Labor have been bandying about a line recently that the Coalition will close the local courts that serve our community.  Given I have a lot to do with the local court in my day job this has obviously attracted my attention, and is a perfect example of the vacuous campaigning that we, as voters, let parties get away with every election.

This is how Labor justify the line.  The Coalition have a policy headed "Complete audit of the NSW Government's Financial Position" (available here: http://bit.ly/hhgGZK).  In short, what the policy explains is that "over the last 10 years expenses have grown by 6.6%" so the Coalition government will "conduct a complete audit of the NSW government's financial position".

Now, for what it's worth, that policy sounds more like the Coalition getting ready to start giving reasons why promises can't be afforded when the ghastly true state of the budget is revealed, but we'll leave that aside for the moment.

What Labor have done with this policy is to construe it as a willingness to cut the number of local courts in NSW.  Nowhere in the Coalition policy are the courts mentioned, and there is absolutely no suggestion from anyone that the local courts are in need of a trim.

Nevertheless, on Friday Attorney General John Hatzistergos was at Windsor Local Court demanding that O'Farrell quarantine community-based local courts (whatever that means) from the audit. The news of the speech was breathlessly reported on the Labor website: http://bit.ly/gYDti8.

It seems likely that there are two reasons that the local court system was chosen to be the alleged target.  First of all, it allows Labor to trot out the line that the last Coalition government "closed 73 local courts, including 39 in just one day."

Further, no doubt some focus group or phone poll taken in Western Sydney suggested that this would be a good idea.

It is, between you and me, politics at it's absolute worst. Take a perfectly sensible and reasonable policy from the other side, misrepresent the policy to a point where it is wholly unrecognisable, and then desperately fling it at voters to try and get them scared about the other side.

The worst thing is that the Coalition can't engage on the issue because if they do, not only will it inflame the issue and make the accusation seem credible, but further any promise to actually quarantine the courts from the audit would result in "Humiliating Backdown from O'Farrell on Planned Court Closures" or something equally specious.

The Coalition hasn't it seemed, done much of this kind of campaigning this election.  That's not to suggest that they have a higher moral standing - the Federal Coalition's relentless campaign against the carbon tax is a case in point.  It's just that, in my opinion, the Coalition is not going to win any more voters off Labor - their job between now and next saturday is simply to make sure that the inevitable drift back to Labor over the course of the campaign is kept to an absolute minimum.

They can do so by being calm, sensible, and reasonable - a task they are accomplishing quite well in the face of the rising hysteria from Labor, best optimised in the disgraceful speech Keneally gave on Friday.  The text doesn't need any commentary, so I'm going to copy and paste it in below:

''Take care of your neighbours because there will be fewer police to do that for you,''

''Take care of the old, the sick and the vulnerable because when the health budget gets cut, there will be fewer nurses and there will be fewer community care workers.

''And, as grim as it is to say this: be sure to follow up on the child who has gone quiet, who is out of character, who is withdrawn, because you can no longer assume that that child is protected. Please help any family with a disability, because what is now, today, a public priority will once again become a private problem.

''And be sure to read to your children as a good public education becomes a memory as our teachers join nurses on the unemployment queue.''

A despicable low in O'Farrell's words.  I'd say he's right.

A Higher Office

There has been a predictable flurry of chatter in the last few days about candidates not staying on after the election.

I wrote previously about the conspiracy theories regarding a Eric Roozendaal departure once he qualifies for his pension (here: http://bit.ly/f5c1lF). Many people are (predictably enough) are wondering how many Labor politicians will be moving on post election.

Presumably there will be less than one would normally expect when a party loses after 16 years in office, for two reasons.  First of all, the loss is inevitable, and it been that way for a long time.  No one from Labor could (plausibly) claim to be heading into this election still expecting to be in government - so there is little reason to expect the kind of exodus we say after Howard was punted in 2007 (Downer, Costello, McGauren and Vaile all jumped ship, Howard having famously lost his own seat).

Additionally, Keneally has been calling very publicly for what she has called "generational change" for some time.  Whether this is about renewing the party and trying to make sure they have a shot in 4 years, or rather just about trying to make the party look new and invigorated for this election is anyone's guess. 

This all means that most people who don't intend sticking out the 4 years have probably already jumped (or been pushed).  

During the Channel 10 debate last week, both leaders were asked questions about whether they will remain as leader after the election, which struck me as a particularly silly question. I've scoured the internet for a transcript but have been unable to find one, which seems typical of what seems to me to be the media's apathy to this election as a whole.

O'Farrell gave a rather cryptic answer that I didn't really follow about it being up to the party room and a vote having to be taken, when surely a simple "Yes" would have sufficed.

The question was difficult for Keneally because she knows that when Labor lose there will be people suggesting that she should no longer be leader of the party, despite the fact that no one really has much bad stuff to say about her leadership.  It may well not be up to her if she stays or not.

What she did guarantee is that she would be serving out her 4 year term as member for Heffron, she being one of the few Labor members all but guaranteed to retain her seat.

Today she is apparently refusing to comment on whether she will stay as leader if Labor are not returned (http://bit.ly/hi72Uq SMH online).  She was then asked whether she was considering a Federal career, to which she replied that she was not.

If she did go chasing Federal glory, she wouldn't be the first.  The most obvious example would be Rob Oakeshott, who quit NSW politics to run successfully for Mark Vaile's old seat in September 2008.  A number of current House of Representative members also cut their teeth in State politics.

There's also the question of whether the Labor leader who was at the helm of what may very well be the biggest shellacking ever handed out by a state in living memory would ever have a political pulse afterwards.

I recall discussion some years ago, back when the Liberals were at their lowest in NSW and Howard still seemed unassailable, that the party was going to struggle to get out of the doldrums in NSW because all the "talent" in NSW as heading for the Federal arena where there were opportunities to govern.

How times change.

That aside, it still seems that many people see Federal politics as the pinnacle for politicians.  I don't ever plan to run for anything, but if I did, and I was given the option of a job that would keep me in Sydney (for the most part) or job that would require me to spend much of my year in Canberra, I reckon it would take me at least 2 seconds to decide to stay in NSW.

I've also heard it said that it is State Governments that really get things done, and provide the services that people need - police, hospitals, roads, public transport, which surely must hold some appeal.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it seems a shame that people often regard state politics as a "stepping stone" or an audition for greater things.  It remains to be seen how many of the Coalition's members take the same approach in the years to come.

Flying High

Tonight I am not interested in writing about Keneally's "gaffe" that the Coalition has saturated the airwaves with. If you haven't heard about it, I wouldn't bother.  It's all about whether Keneally's view on the compensation to be offered under Gillard's Carbon Tax plan is different to Gillard's view.  The fact that Keneally may be a little too busy being slaughtered in her state election to worry about Federal issues appears to not matter very much.

Rather, I'm very interested in Keneally's announcement today about slashing the fees for the Airport link.  Well, that's not quite what she did, but I'll come to that later.

First, some background.  For those of you not aware, the price of a ticket to disembark at one of the stations on the Sydney airport link (Green Square, Mascot, Domestic and International) have always been, in my view, extortionate.  By way of example, a ticket from Town Hall station to the International terminal costs $15.80.  If there are two of you, a cab is cheaper.

This is compared to a ticket from Town Hall to Bondi Junction that costs $3.20

In fairness, travel to the airport from other parts of Sydney becomes economical compared to a cab as the fare doesn't increase much as you get further away, but I think it is fair to say people are generally put off using the line because of the price.

The relevant detail is that there are two other stations on the same airport link (see http://bit.ly/i9dGnY for a map, if you like) that, despite not being in any way part of the airport, attract the same surcharge.  Until now.

Keneally announced today that, from Monday, the government would be "subsidising" the fares to the two non-airport stations, effectively bringing the price of tickets to that station in line with the rest of the CityRail Network.

A number of reports today have commented on the fact that these two stations lie within Keneally's electorate of Heffron.  The Opposition Transport Spokesman Gladys Berejiklian called the move "cynical pork-barrelling" (SMH), although I can't see why it would be necessary - Keneally holds the seat by 23.7%, and no matter how awful things go for Labor on 26 March I think we can mark this one into the Labor column.

Labor of course tried to sell the move as being the chance to correct a "legacy" from the previous Liberal government, although why it took 12 years to correct this was conveniently not explained. Keneally even went so far as to explain that at the time the airport link was signed off, O'Farrell was chief of staff to the Liberal transport minister, which seemed a silly point to make as it only emphasised just how long it's been since the Coalition were in power.

In truth, my theory on the announcement was simply that it was a way to get people thinking positive thoughts about Labor and transport.  One of the concerns we constantly see ranked highly by voters is transport - by announcing this new subsidy, the government has had pretty solid coverage of them "doing something" to improve the transport system.

According to the SMH story, this move will cost $4 million per year, just 10% of what it would have cost to include the Domestic and International Terminals in the subsidy.  Odds are, many people watching the story won't notice the distinction between the two pairs of stations and will simply understand that the government has done something to decrease the fares on the airport link.

The Coalition can't say anything much because they don't want to be on the other side of a CityRail Fare Reduction Story, so the move is really a certain win for the government.  And I suspect it would have gotten a lot of airplay if not for the distraction of Keneally's non-gaffe.  Not doubt she'll be livid that this savvy bit of politicking has been drowned out by the carbon tax issue, which was always going to get traction because of the present controversy about the carbon tax in the Federal arena.

It remains to be seen how many more state issues are drowned out by the Carbon Tax, and which side of NSW politics will profit the most from it.

A Cult of Personality

The question of the importance of the leader is always an interesting one. In some elections, it seems that all any one cares about is who the leader is and what he or she is like.


Barack Obama was a perfect example. People were sick of George W Bush, true - but much of Obama's victory was a result of the vision he offered, and the person that he appeared to be.


This is a phenomenon that, for better or worse, doesn't show itself as much in Australia. Of course the leader is important, and of course a bad leader will sink faster than you can say "a conga line of suck-holes" - but by and large the leader's effectiveness is really only a product of his or her ability to enunciate a message, or his or her ability to connect with the public.


This may be a product of our voting system, or perhaps the amount of power with which we invest the executive. Either way, it's important.


Some time ago, NSW Labor abandoned any pretence of trying to win or retain votes based upon the Labor brand. Since Keneally's ascension, it has been all about "Brand Keneally". We've even had stories about Labor candidates actively removing any reference to Labor from the campaign posters.


One of the important questions of this campaign was always going to be how well this worked. Much of the answer would always be dictated by Keneally's performance, and yesterday she showed that she certainly wasn't going to die wondering.


The Channel 10 televised debate was inexplicably scheduled for 12 noon, so I expect that about 16 people watched it. Of course what this means is that most people will rely upon news outlets to tell them who "won" the debate, which for reasons that have always puzzled me seems to be what sways voters the most.


Many commentators noted that Keneally performed far more like an opposition leader, and O'Farrell more like a incumbent. She attacked and probed, whilst he seemed to spend much of the debate trying to keep his head above water. She seemed energetic and likeable, quick on her feet and confident. O'Farrell seemed under attack - his only response to much of what Keneally said was to say that Labor cannot be trusted, which surely is practically beyond question and therefore hardly worth mentioning.


Having said that, the incredibly unscientific SMH Online Poll suggested that O'Farrell won the debate, although this may reflect more of the reader's preconceptions and predetermined voting intentions than being a fair assessment of the debate.


The SMH also surveyed the 75 audience members: 25 Labor voters, 25 Coalition voters and 25 undecideds. How any editor could put the results of such a survey on the front page is beyond me, especially with the headline "Voters like Keneally but dump on Labor". (http://bit.ly/h6Qej7)


That's without even talking about how non-random a sample of 75 people who at a few days notice could attend a debate held at 12 noon on a weekday would be. Even more so, and ignoring for a minute the inherent problems, the "survey" result was 26 labor, 21 Liberal, 15 Undecided, 9 Green, and 0 National. For reasons passing understanding, the story was that Keneally had only swayed one voter, rather than the fact that O'Farrell had shed 4 or that the Greens appear to have picked up 9 of the 25 undecideds without even being a part of the debate. If you're going to write a story using a pointless survey, surely you owe it to your readers least draw the right conclusion from it?


The actually interesting part (as opposed to pointless surveys), was this. One of the audience members said that Keneally was "a better debater, and seemed more sure of herself," whilst another said "O'Farrell was visibly rattled at times." (SMH online)


Reading those remarks as they were reported yesterday reminded me of one category of people who would be switching to Labor to build on their awful poll number at the start of the campaign (as I wrote would inevitably happen here: http://bit.ly/ebGqKw)


Some people would decide they liked Keneally better, and that will be all it takes for them to switch to Labor. It's fair enough to question why people would switch based on something as superficial as whether you like their tone, but for better or worse it's what people do.


I think this all vindicates the Labor policy of Brand Keneally. It may be that Labor (correctly) judged that Keneally would play better on TV and would be generally liked by the voters - this would explain why Labor (contrary to the generally accepted approach by incumbent governments) agreed to more debates than you can shake a stick at. They may be banking on Keneally winning people over.


Of course there is practically no chance that this will swing the balance close enough to even make the contest interesting - but if O'Farrell wants a win big enough to all but guarantee 8 years then he will need to make sure people start seeing a side of him that they like.

Men are from Mars...

By all accounts, O'Farrell was roundly defeated by Keneally in the first debate of this campaign last week, although whether anyone saw the debate is another question.


One of the theories that have been advanced for what has been described as a hesitant performance on his part is a fear of being seen as, in short, a bully.


O'Farrell is not a small man. Whilst no longer as rotund or bearded as he once was, there is no doubt that a visual image of him intimidating Keneally either by his words or his actions would be very damaging for the Coalition.


O'Farrell's concerns (if indeed he had them) are is of course on one level ridiculous - unless he threatened Keneally or used foul language, there is no justification for a suggestion that he has sought to intimidate her. That said, the gender issue in politics is often ridiculous, so I suppose we shouldn't be surprised.


When Gillard became PM, the contrast in the way the media reported on her appearance compared to her predecessor could not have been starker. Suddenly we had the All White Jacket conversation. There was speculation and reporting over her hair, her make-up and yes, even her earlobes. I can't imagine a drearier topic, but I suppose if it didn't sell it wouldn't be reported.


Is this just because reporting on men's appearance would be even duller? We never heard a thing about Rudd's appearance (although cartoonists did seem to enjoy his boyish face, Alan Moir especially). One imagines that a report that "Today Rudd wore a dark suit. And a tie. Oh, and look at his tie-clip!" would not excite any editor, even on the slowest of news days.


When Anna Bligh was North-East Queensland over this summer, I can't count the reports about what she was wearing, or the fact that she was not wearing make-up, looking tired and drawn.


This isn't aiming to be a critique of the political reporting style of our Fourth Estate - there are plenty other people who are interested in having that conversation. Rather, I've been thinking about what difference it makes that Keneally is a woman, and O'Farrell is a man.


On one hand, one would presume that a woman would have some inherent advantages over a male politician. These advantages rely to a horrible extent upon generalisations and enforced gender roles, but anyone who pretends they don't matter any way is kidding themselves. It shouldn't matter if Keneally has her hair done in an attractive way, but it does.


People instinctively see female politicians as being more mothering - kinder, more likely to understand how hard it is to raise a family, more capable of empathy. By the same token, some people see women as being more irrational, more emotionally driven, even tempestuous. One only need to look at some of the comments made about the emotion Gillard showed on the first day of parliament this year as the condolence motion was passed.


Male politicians, it seems, are far more likely to be seen as powerful, as strong and able to lead. Along with that though, comes an inference of aggression, and of a thirst for power. If O'Farrell was seen to be being a bully, that would no doubt provoke significant resentment, and not just from female voters.


This all means that the starkest difference between the two leaders will most likely not get a single mention from either side for fear of being seen as taking advantage of the situation. Gender in politics (and in life generally) is such a sensitive issue that if it ever arose the media would presumably talk about nothing else for a week, which it seem both parties see as being counter-productive.


One can barely imagine the vitriol that would be poured on O'Farrell if he even implied that people shouldn't vote for Keneally because she is female. For Labor, it is difficult to imagine how they could possibly take advantage of the situation and explicitly capitalise on the perceived positive aspects of Keneally's gender without beginning a discussion about the perceived negative characteristics.


There has been little discussion of the gender difference to date, and that is of course the way it should be. I've seen no polling on the issue either, which is interesting. Whether the reason is because no one thinks it matters, or because everyone is afraid to ask, is something I would certainly be interested to find out.


A