New South Wales has burned through its fifth Premier in a decade with today’s unexpected resignation by Mike Baird, who had been there for two years and nine months. According to Alex Mitchell in Crikey, candidates for the succession are “North Shore MP and Treasurer Gladys Berejiklian, Anthony Roberts, MP for Lane Cove and a former John Howard staffer with close connections to broadcaster Alan Jones, and Dominic Perrottet, MP for Hawkesbury, an avid supporter of privatisation, small government and free markets”.
Actually if Gladys gets in, I’d be curious to know who gets Transport.
Berejiklian moved from Transport to Treasury after the 2015 election, with Andrew Constance becoming Transport minister. So no forced vacancy in Transport, although you`d expect the new premier to reshuffle the ministry.
For all his stumbles over greyhounds, the trashing of the environment in Sydney to build more motorways, and other issues, you would have to say Baird did well with some other policies. E.g. he stood by the Gonski model for education funding, he built the norwest rail (after an almost infinite sequence of plans by other governments), he bought out the CSG rights for the Liverpool plains.
So, although not a true fan of the LNP I think Baird was one of our better Premiers.
Booleanbach
“So, although not a true fan of the LNP I think Baird was one of our better Premiers.”
The fact that Brownyn Bishop is currently cursing him as a socialist makes me think better of him.
And then there is ‘the view from the Street’ …
http://www.smh.com.au/comment/view-from-the-street/with-sydney-finally-dead-mike-bairds-work-is-done-20170119-gtudfe.html
Nope. Nope. Nope.
You haven’t been paying attention.
Baird’s put in into process the privatisation of electricity, hospitals, prisons, TAFE, and land titles. He taken a blowtorch to mental health. He’s outsourced child protection to non-profit and for-profit groups. He’s criminalised protest and made it more expensive to protest than to illegally mine. He’s crippled ICAC. He’s sold Sydney to the developers and royally screwed regional NSW.
Baird is a destructive grub with groomed eyebrows and a fake smile pasted on.
At least he was right about the greyhound thing. Industries that involve animals need to operate humanely or not at all.
And you didn’t mention his removal of democratically elected local representatives from several amalgamated councils, which just happened to the the ones in areas that were problematic to his developer mates, e.g. around Westconnex.
Jimmy Doyle
Quite a character reference of Mike Baird. Very pointed and with a fair amount of personal bile. Grubby? Really – how long have you known him, and his family? Fake smile – you sure?
Well take you at your written word Jimmy. We must as you obviously know better than many of us.
Good riddance. Look beyond the good bloke veneer and you will see a premier and a government totally out of control with little to no regard for the average joe in this state.
From Barangaroo (an absolute farce of a process with barely a bum print of public access land and you can bet your last dollar, pun intended, that Packer will get pokies on that site) to the ludicrous west connex, the gutting of Tafe, forced council mergers, the closing or selling off of other social services and the sell off of our electricity assets, this has been a venal and vindictive premier and govt.
The silvertails in Waringah, his electorate, who don’t use public transport or rely on state services are loving it all of course as they see another high rise development go up (but no near them of course) and count their negative geared returns but the other 95% just have to cop it.
I wish him well.
Gladys will get the gig, despite the queen of talk back radio giving her the thumbs down.
‘Quite a character reference of Mike Baird. Very pointed and with a fair amount of personal bile. Grubby? Really – how long have you known him, and his family? Fake smile – you sure?
A character reference that is entirely accurate.
If you are critical of this characterisation you might like to address the actual issues that JD addresses, and yes, including forced council amalgamations.
I live in an area under the control of a government appointed administrator. The previous councils did nothing wrong, apart from not being friendly enough with Baird’s developer mates.
Now we have future ghettos springing up everywhere with no infrastructure to support them.
I’m backing old Gladys.
Please advise why a former “objective” contributor awaits moderation.
That said, I can understand William’s reticence given my former outrageous contribution, under another alias – Puff we apologise, only royality & legal practitioners permitted to use the plural pronou “we”.
Please advise why a former “objective” contributor awaits moderation.
That said, I can understand William’s reticence given my former outrageous contribution, under another alias – Puff we apologise, only royality & legal practitioners permitted to use the plural pronou “we”.
I must add that compared to Fairfax, this site works a treat.
Alan Jones says no to Gladys Berejiklian. Since he has said yes to:
(a) Murderer, Andrew Kalazjich;
(b) murderer, Roger Rogerson;
(c) Graham Richardson.
She is the right choice.
Gladys is the nut selling off the Land Titles office. Nuff said.
My dog, this site is so boring that I might return to Fairfax.
Where’s “Bemused” et al,
I have to admit that hearing Alan Jones mouth off at Gladys has made me more fond of Gladys.
Apparently its a terrible thing actually listening to experts.