Winners and losers

Reading between the lines of the Liberal Party’s post-election reports for the federal and Victorian state elections.

In the wake of Craig Emerson and Jay Weatherill’s federal electoral post-mortem for Labor, two post-election reviews have emerged from the Liberal Party, with very different tales to tell – one from the May 2019 federal triumph, the other from the November 2018 Victorian state disaster.

The first of these was conducted by Arthur Sinodinos and Steven Joyce, the latter being a former cabinet minister and campaign director for the conservative National Party in New Zealand. It seems we only get to see the executive summary and recommendations, the general tenor of which is that, while all concerned are to be congratulated on a job well done, the party benefited from a “poor Labor Party campaign” and shouldn’t get too cocky. Points of interest:

• It would seem the notion of introducing optional preferential voting has caught the fancy of some in the party. The report recommends the party “undertake analytical work to determine the opportunities and risks” – presumably with respect to itself – “before making any decision to request such a change”.

• Perhaps relatedly, the report says the party should work closer with the Nationals to avoid three-cornered contests. These may have handicapped the party in Gilmore, the one seat it lost to Labor in New South Wales outside Victoria.

• The report comes out for voter identification at the polling booth, a dubious notion that nonetheless did no real harm when it briefly operated in Queensland in 2015, and electronic certified lists of voters, which make a lot more sense.

• It is further felt that the parliament might want to look at cutting the pre-poll voting period from three weeks to two, but should keep its hands off the parties’ practice of mailing out postal vote applications. Parliament should also do something about “boorish behaviour around polling booths”, like “limiting the presence of volunteers to those linked with a particular candidate”.

• Hints are offered that Liberals’ pollsters served up dud results from “inner city metropolitan seats”. This probably means Reid in Sydney and Chisholm in Melbourne, both of which went better than they expected, and perhaps reflects difficulties polling the Chinese community. It is further suggested that the party’s polling program should expand from 20 seats to 25.

• Ten to twelve months is about the right length of time out from the election to preselect marginal seat candidates, and safe Labor seats can wait until six months out. This is at odds with the Victorian party’s recent decision to get promptly down to business, even ahead of a looming redistribution, which has been a source of friction between the state and federal party.

• After six of the party’s candidates fell by the wayside during the campaign, largely on account of social media indiscretions (one of which may have cost the Liberals the Tasmanian seat of Lyons), it is suggested that more careful vetting processes might be in order.

The Victorian inquiry was conducted by former state and federal party director Tony Nutt, and is available in apparently unexpurgated form. Notably:

• The party’s tough-on-crime campaign theme, turbo-charged by media reportage of an African gangs crisis, failed to land. Too many saw it as “a political tactic rather than an authentic problem to be solved by initiatives that would help make their neighbourhoods safer”. As if to show that you can’t always believe Peter Dutton, post-election research found the issue influenced the vote of only 6% of respondents, “and then not necessarily to our advantage”.

• As it became evident during the campaign that they were in trouble, the party’s research found the main problem was “a complete lack of knowledge about Matthew Guy, his team and their plans for Victoria if elected”. To the extent that Guy was recognised at all, it was usually on account of “lobster with a mobster”.

• Guy’s poor name recognition made it all the worse that attention was focused on personalities in federal politics, two months after the demise of Malcolm Turnbull. Post-election research found “30% of voters in Victorian electorates that were lost to Labor on the 24th November stated that they could not vote for the Liberal Party because of the removal of Malcolm Turnbull”.

• Amid a flurry of jabs at the Andrews government, for indiscretions said to make the Liberal defeat all the more intolerable, it is occasionally acknowledged tacitly that the government had not made itself an easy target. Voters were said to have been less concerned about “the Red Shirts affair for instance” than “more relevant, personal and compelling factors like delivery of local infrastructure”.

• The report features an exhausting list of recommendations, updated from David Kemp’s similar report in 2015, the first of which is that the party needs to get to work early on a “proper market research-based core strategy”. This reflects the Emerson and Weatherill report, which identified the main problem with the Labor campaign as a “weak strategy”.

• A set of recommendations headed “booth management” complains electoral commissions don’t act when Labor and union campaigners bully their volunteers.

• Without naming names, the report weights in against factional operators and journalists who “see themselves more as players and influencers than as traditional reporters”.

• The report is cagey about i360, described in The Age as “a controversial American voter data machine the party used in recent state elections in Victoria and South Australia”. It was reported to have been abandoned in April “amid a botched rollout and fears sensitive voter information was at risk”, but the report says only that it is in suspension, and recommends a “thorough review”.

• Other recommendations are that the party should write more lists, hold more meetings and find better candidates, and that its shadow ministers should pull their fingers out.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

2,754 comments on “Winners and losers”

Comments Page 48 of 56
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  1. Peter Garrett urges Labor to reconnect with environmental movement, warns ‘true believers are dying’

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/peter-garrett-urges-labor-to-reconnect-with-environmental-movement-warns-true-believers-are-dying-20191206-p53hqe.html

    Warning that the suburbs of western Sydney and Melbourne are being “crucified on the altar of inaction” and regional and rural communities were “hostage to climate damage”, the former Labor minister said the party’s true believers are “dying out” and a younger generation of voters will be “more radical and less forgiving” if it fails to act.
    :::
    “Our times do not call for ‘business as usual’ politics,” Mr Garrett said.

    “Labor must face down self-interest and sectional interest, whether from some in business, or some in the CFMEU, or from individual members who eschew reality and are not committed to the challenge, and indeed in the case of the shadow minister for Agriculture and Resources Joel Fitzgibbon, deliberately undermine the party whilst still holding their position.”

    Peter Garrett, the frontman of legendary Australian band Midnight Oil says Labor must fight to put the nation on “a zero carbon pathway”.

    “Only by responding with courage and conviction can any political party hope to establish lasting legitimacy in the eyes of citizens.”

    “In short, just as John Curtin inspired the country’s response to World War II, we need similarly inspiring leadership to the meet this latest existential crisis,” Mr Garrett said.

    “Other than for a brief, ‘eureka’ moment when the Gillard government’s price on carbon kicked in and emissions actually starting coming down, the anti-science, anti-environment stance of a belligerent coalition has derailed the debate, frustrated real action, and cost the country dearly.”

  2. P1

    My sister left her husband sleeping at home to go into town to get some groceries (post Black Saturday fires). She wasn’t allowed back in.

    This sort of thing happened regularly over something like two months – I heard of a case where the children had gone home from school and the roadblock was set up so that their parents couldn’t return after work!

  5. zoomster @ #2338 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 9:38 am

    As we have gently explained to you, this is always a complaint at this point of the electoral cycle, because Labor is reviewing its policy platform.

    The problem here is that you think this explanation makes sense, when of course it doesn’t at all.
    This is not a difficult or nuanced ideological issue you have to agonize over. What is required is blindingly obvious – it is just that Labor is riven at both the state and national level – riven by fossil fuel interests, not ideology. No one with two brain cells believes this is about “coal miners”, FFS.

    Everyone can see this except Labor people, apparently.

    That involves consulting with experts (who’d do that?), looking at how the political landscape is likely to change over the next few years (no use fighting the next election on policies which, in the meantime, have become irrelevant) and running ideas past actual voters to see how they work out.

    Here we go again. You think this is a political problem. It is no longer. It is a scientific problem, and the “experts” have spoken time and time again. You are just deaf to them.

    Assuming that the policies which lost the last election are somehow going to be winners next time is the definition of madness.

    As is doing the same dithering and fence-sitting you did last time.

    In this scheme of things, Adani is irrelevant. It will either get up or it won’t, regardless of what position Labor takes on it in the meantime, and by the next election it will be a done deal either way.

    No, it isn’t. You have clearly not read the UN “production gap” report or you would not say thing. Or do you just hope that no-one else has done so?

    So it makes much more sense for Labor to concentrate on things which will be live issues at the next election, rather than on issues which will have long ago been dealt with.

    You mean like climate change? You honestly think that issue will have been “dealt with” by the next election? Seriously?

    Labor could make some tokenistic gestures, but surely that would be both dishonest and pointless.

    People are getting tired of waiting for Labor to do something … anything … that shows they understand the nature and extent of the problem. Your response here tells us we may still be waiting a long time.

  9. Confessions @ #2353 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 7:03 am

    Bushfire Bill @ #2349 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 6:58 am

    PvO implores his colleagues not to let the govt get away with non-answers and obfuscations.

    A bit late, PvO.

    Seeing as he’s the only journalist who routinely criticises the govt for avoiding scrutiny, I’d say his request is quite timely.

    Hes far from the only journalist who regularly criticises the government for their obfuscation. He’s just the only one you read who offers criticism.

  10. guytaur

    I must of missed the post.

    A report on the Green’s secret conference?

    What are you doing to get the party back to a position where the membership have a say on policy positions?

    I have a third question if I could.

    Do you think the Greens have a long term future as RDN private political party?

  11. Suppression Of The Right To Protest

    https://greenagenda.org.au/2019/04/right-to-protest/

    25 years jail for peaceful protest. That is the potential outcome from the Espionage and Foreign Interference Bill (EFI) that was introduced by the Liberals and rubber stamped by Labor in 2018. It was slammed through with such speed that the cross-benches had one hour to examine what was described as the most serious overhaul to national security in 40 years.
    :::
    Whilst these bills were pitched as managing emerging threats of foreign interference in elections and political decision-making, they are instead a Trojan Horse of breaches of civil liberties and human rights, wildly over the top and sloppily articulated, that had civil society up in arms. Amnesty International stated, “By joining regimes around the world in passing new, restrictive laws attempting to suffocate civil society under pretexts of “treason” and “security”, the opposition and government are lurching towards authoritarianism.”[2]

    Whilst the work of the Hands Off Our Charities alliance was commendable and saw some of the seriously problematic aspects of the bills wound back, it was generally considered a lost cause to attempt to lobby the ALP to block the bills, or attempt much reform of the EFI legislation, in particular, given the lock step approach the Labor party has to voting in support of even the most destructive of policies relating to national security.

    Consequently, legislation was passed that reframed “espionage” as working to act against “economic interests”, putting corporate dominance over civil and political rights into law
    :::
    This is just the latest in a pattern of legislation and practice at state and federal level that, when pieced together, makes up for quite the horror show: corporations prioritised, civil liberties tossed, dissent criminalised, hard-fought human rights relegated to paper promises, a surveillance state growing, and government architecture built by both Labor and Liberal governments that is incredibly dangerous, and yet to be deployed in full force.
    :::
    With the de-funding of critical support services, increasing regulation and administrative time required, and broad-reaching attacks on charities, non-profits, legal and support services, we are seeing the successful de-fanging of organisations that should be resourcing and leading a powerful pushback. Some of the large environmental NGO’s are so timid in their approach to supporting civil resistance they will rarely even share content or reports from the frontlines. Activists at the grassroots are facing increasing penalties, hostile magistrates, bureaucratic red tape over “designated protest zones”, and a student movement that has been thinned by the huge stressors in their lives – too busy trying to cover rent and food, working and studying with precious few hours for civic engagement.

    This paper examines some of the challenges to protest in Australia, from being branded as terrorists to increased penalties, violence and intimidation to surveillance and infiltration.

    Easy to see why Australia’s civil rights rating has been downgraded. The maintenance of the status quo aka business as usual is paramount.

  13. Hes far from the only journalist who regularly criticises the government for their obfuscation. He’s just the only one you read who offers criticism.

    Which other press gallery journalist has done so with the same frequency and regularity? PvO’s Ch10 news segments have been critical of Scotty’s avoidance of questions for the best part of the entire time he’s been with them.

    By contrast I don’t hear the ABC guy on ABC news do the same, nor does the guy on Ch7. And PvO also has a weekly newspaper column where he often criticises the govt for its lack of transparency.

  14. In Australia climate policy is very much a political problem.

    When the major Party that is advocating action can’t get elected, you’re not going to see action.

  15. Confessions @ #2356 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 10:11 am

    P1:

    I also don’t understand why you have internet but claim you cannot access local information and news.

    Our nearest regional ABC station is Illawarra – they have their own fires and are not interested in ours. The RFS website is only updated every few hours. The BOM website ditto. Our local newspaper website ditto. The road-closures website ditto. Things move much too fast for these sites to be of much use.

    We watch the ABC and Guardian live feeds when they are active, but they have little local information of relevance to us. The problem seems to be that our area has had few properties lost and no deaths yet, so it gets little coverage. Many people we contact are completely unaware we were even threatened. I have a friend who works in a newsroom, and he says he has listened constantly to the ABC updates. He did not even know there were fires in the Shoalhaven!

    We just managed to get access to our local radio station via the internet (thanks, BB!) so that is a plus. I’m currently listening to the Rolling Stones, waiting for the next local update 🙂

  16. Zoomster

    You say Labor is consulting with experts.

    This is not the case with high speed rail. I know this well.

    I’d also like to know which experts Labor is consulting with on the NBN.

    Or on potential new industries.

  17. Republicans trying to pour cement on impeachment proceedings.

    Manu RajuVerified account@mkraju
    17m17 minutes ago
    GOP wants delay of Monday hrng after Intel transmitted evidence to Judiciary last night. Nadler “has no choice but to postpone Monday’s hearing in the wake of a last-minute document transmission that shows just how far Democrats have gone to pervert basic fairness,” Collins says

  19. P1:

    If your local newspapers or radio stations have a Facebook page, that can often be a great, very local source of news. Same with your council, although if it’s like ours the page is unlikely to be staffed on weekends.

  20. Jeezus:

    Bob Hawke was named Father of the Year in 1971.
    According to today’s reported family secrets revealed by his daughter, the accolade became a twisted joke.
    The accusation is he asked his daughter to endure terrible abuses so he could become prime minister.
    His daughter, Rosslyn Dillon, alleges she was raped in the 1980s while she was employed by former Victorian Labor MP Bill Landeryou, who died earlier this year.
    Ms Dillon claims she was assaulted three times at the Hilton Hotel, Victoria’s Parliament House and a Melbourne home.
    Afterwards, she went to her father and told him she wanted to report the crimes to police.
    Ms Dillon claims her father urged her to keep quiet to protect his prime ministerial ambitions.

    https://www.news.com.au/national/politics/bob-hawkes-daughter-alleges-her-father-asked-her-to-keep-her-rape-by-a-labour-mp-a-secret/news-story/83b447245162dfdd51cc54239f69143a

  21. Guytaur you didn’t answer the following questions.

    1. Would you prefer a Liberal or Labor government?

    2. What are you doing to ensure Labor wins?

  22. P1

    Adani does not equal climate change.

    Labor will have a strong position on action on climate change, which will be all the more stronger for actually dealing with the situation at the time of the next election, rather than fighting battles retrospectively.

    I know you don’t understand this – I’ve often remarked on your poor comprehension – but others might.

  24. Queensland MP Michael Berkman, Member for Maiwar

    Protecting Our Right To Peaceful Dissent In The Face Of Climate Breakdown

    https://greenagenda.org.au/2019/09/protecting-our-right-to-peaceful-dissent/

    But recent disruptive protests and direct action are not only in response to this change of position from the State Government. They are a last resort. They follow years of petitioning, letter writing, rallies, marches, campaigning around elections, and directly lobbying MPs. And they are necessary – when it comes to action on climate change, we are at a tipping point. We don’t have long to turn the ship around before our chance to meet even the 2°C target vanishes.

    New anti-protest laws in Queensland

    The labour movement, and members of the Labor party, have historically been instrumental in movements for social change. Whether it be by strike, street marches, occupations or other confrontational tactics, large scale social change like the five day work week, or women’s right to vote can be directly attributed to more disruptive tactics. Against this backdrop, it is particularly shocking that Queensland’s Labor Government has announced legislation to crack down on protesters.
    :::
    Perhaps even more concerning is the way Labor’s announcement has created the political space for even more drastic proposals from the LNP, which is unconstrained by any internal opposition to this kind of erosion of civil liberties.
    :::
    The Queensland laws as part of a broader anti-democratic crackdown
    :::
    The pushback on scrutiny and civil disobedience from governments at all levels represents not only a further alignment of government and corporate interests. It’s also a truly scary demonstration of government’s willingness to subjugate our right to fight against those interests, even where our collective future depends on it.

    Back to the Bjelke-Petersen era?
    :::
    Because right now, with Governments at all levels supporting new thermal coal mining and gas exploration against the urgent pleas of the scientific community, we cannot afford not to try everything. Our current climate trajectory will condemn our Pacific neighbours, and First Nations people on the front lines, to climate chaos, and our children to an unsafe, unlivable world. That is extreme, that is unjust, and it is unbelievably negligent.

    As far as I’m concerned, politicians and big business who have knowingly gotten us to this point, and continue to do nothing are the true criminals and extremists here.

  25. P1

    ‘People are getting tired of waiting for Labor to do something … anything … that shows they understand the nature and extent of the problem. Your response here tells us we may still be waiting a long time.’

    Yes, they’ll wait until the next election campaign. Just as they have done for Labor’s past climate change policies.

    That’s when ordinary voters pay attention. If Labor doesn’t get their attention, then whatever policy they have – now or in the future – is irrelevant.

    Labor’s proof is in the pudding – every Labor government in the last decade or so has taken action on climate change.

  26. Cud Chewer

    The relevant Shadows consult with experts in their fields on an almost daily basis – it’s their job.

    Albo has pushed high speed rail basically forever. I’m sure he hasn’t done that out of his own brilliance – as with any Shadow/Minister, he would have taken on board the advice of experts.

    Ditto with the NBN.

    No, I don’t know which experts they’ve consulted with, but if there’s an expert you think they’ve missed, contact the relevant Shadow and tell them so.

    I went to huge lengths at one stage to ensure the then Victorian Minister for the Environment talked to a particular expert on climate change. He went on to work with her post-politics.

    It can be done, but you need to do a lot of jumping up and down, because there’s plenty of people trying to get the attention of even a Shadow at any one time.

  27. nath

    I posted earlier about Hawke. No one has responded. No doubt if this was a report about a Greens ex-parliamentarian, no matter how minor, there would be wall-to-wall outrage by the usual suspects who routinely decry misogyny

    I await the defence “innocent until proven guilty”, a defence that would more than likely be ignored if it involved a Greens.

  29. Confessions @ #2368 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 10:30 am

    P1:

    If your local newspapers or radio stations have a Facebook page, that can often be a great, very local source of news. Same with your council, although if it’s like ours the page is unlikely to be staffed on weekends.

    Facebook is not a source of news – it generally just repeats stuff you can get elsewhere, and is very often wrong. For instance, the RFS facebook page had advice for our area that had not been updated in over 24 hours. In that time, the fire had twice escalated from “advice” to “emergency” and back again.

    People who are not in the middle of the situation probably don’t realize how out of date the information they are looking at really is.

    Another example – we try and keep across the available access routes, in case we need to evacuate. Our most reliable source of advice on road closures is the occasional RFS volunteer who drives by. The road closure web site is way out of date. We have roads still shown as open where the bridge was burned out several days ago. 🙁

  30. zoomster @ #2371 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 10:33 am

    P1

    Adani does not equal climate change.

    Labor will have a strong position on action on climate change, which will be all the more stronger for actually dealing with the situation at the time of the next election, rather than fighting battles retrospectively.

    I know you don’t understand this – I’ve often remarked on your poor comprehension – but others might.

    Did you read the UN “production gap” report? If yes, you need to read it again, because you clearly didn’t understand what it said.

    If not, you are just talking crap.

  31. Apparently farmers can hardly wait to have guytaur, peg, P1, Rex, and nath involved in community decision making for their farm decisions:

    1. Will be expected to work to a National Strategic Plan.
    2. Will be saddled with ‘community decision making’ about farming.
    3. Will be saddled with Indigenous involvement in farm decisions.
    4. Will be regulated to force them to provide ecosystem services.
    5. Will be regulated on a new set of animal welfare standards that will be enforced by a National Authority that will monitor and punish farmers as required.

  32. P1:

    What a shame your local news outlets don’t seem to use Facebook to its full potential.

    During a bushfire emergency here last year the local paper sent reporters to the affected areas and they posted live videos on Fb from the scene which were enormously helpful to people who were impacted, and also to family and friends of affected households. Our local ABC and GWN/Ch7 do the same.

  33. P1

    The experience on Black Saturday was that all official sources were hours behind people on the ground.

    We had refugees from Marysville pulling up at a road stop near my sister’s home (having travelled for nearly an hour), telling us that Marysville had burnt to the ground. It was another hour before the police set up a roadblock and at least an hour after that before the ABC reported it.

    It seemed that the best source of information was texts from locals.

    As I’ve noted before, the official advice in Victoria is to leave, rather than to have a fire plan as such – and yet the vast majority of fire advice warnings I hear on the radio start with ‘It is already too late to leave’. We are setting people up for disaster by giving them the illusion that they don’t have to know what to do if a fire comes because they won’t be there.

  34. zoomster
    says:
    Sunday, December 8, 2019 at 10:41 am
    nath
    To be fair, most people I knew thought that Hawke getting Father of the Year was a joke at the time.
    ___________________
    but if it is true then it must be a new low in what PM aspirants are willing to do to gain factional support.

  35. This Hawke ‘news’ has several aspects, one of them monetary.
    The incidents were long before the MeToo era, which now makes everyone a ‘survivor’ of some sort of abuse and encourages official reporting.
    Hawke didn’t tell his daughter “to endure terrible abuses”, he allegedly begged her not to report them when they had already happened. She admits the family (Hazel?) were very supportive at that time.

  36. Pegasus
    says:
    Sunday, December 8, 2019 at 10:41 am
    nath
    I posted earlier about Hawke. No one has responded. No doubt if this was a report about a Greens ex-parliamentarian, no matter how minor, there would be wall-to-wall outrage by the usual suspects who routinely decry misogyny
    _______________
    Yes! who can forget the outrage over the rap lyrics guy.

  40. lizzie

    Yes, I think a lot of people forget (or don’t understand, because they weren’t there) what sorts of behaviour women were expected to put up with as par for the course.

    I remember reporting a student for sexual harassment when I first started teaching, and being told by the Deputy Principal that I should take it as a compliment!

  41. peg

    No, I don’t recognise nath’s description. So whoever the rap guy was, I’ve obviously forgotten him, making nath’s comment wRONg.

  42. I’ll make a statement to fill the apparent void in Peg’s soul and gaping chasm in her sensibilities:

    If the allegations are true, they are terrible. Under no circumstances can either rape or it putting moral pressure on an individual not to report the rape in acceptable. IMO, both rape and its cover up are evil acts.

    If the allegations are not true, they are terrible false allegations to be making. If the allegations are true there are three compounding factors. The person making the allegations should have been able to trust him. Secondly, the allegations were suppressed for political power. Thirdly, a Prime Minister needs to be better than the rest of us in these matters.

    The apparent facts of the matter are:

    1. There are allegations of three rapes against Bill Landeryou.
    2. There is an allegation of a suppression of the allegations of rapes by Bob Hawke.
    3. Both allegations could be true.
    4. Both allegations could be false.
    5. Both of the men involved in the allegations are dead. Neither can deny or refute the allegations.
    6. There may be further evidence or material that comes out that substantiates or supports the allegations.
    7. If they are false allegations then nothing will make them go away.

  43. Pegasussays:
    Sunday, December 8, 2019 at 10:57 am

    z

    I have no idea who you’re talking about.

    Comprehension problem?

    Only for you, unsurprisingly.

  45. 2. There is an allegation of a suppression of the allegations of rapes by Bob Hawke.
    ____________________
    That is what makes the allegation so powerfully sad. That the motivation was not to spare the daughter embarrassment or court room trauma but to bolster Hawke’s aspiration to be PM.

  47. B in TB

    Just mirroring z’s routine put-down of others re their comprehension problems.

    I am sad you are continuing your witless and unfunny trolling of me. Some creativity please.

  48. “Since 1974 he (Hawke) has frustrated his supporters and his numbers man in Victoria, Bill Landeryou, by refusing to make a decision about parliament.”

    Bob Hawke: The Complete Biography
    By Blanche d’Alpuget

  50. Confessions @ #2381 Sunday, December 8th, 2019 – 10:48 am

    P1:

    What a shame your local news outlets don’t seem to use Facebook to its full potential.

    During a bushfire emergency here last year the local paper sent reporters to the affected areas and they posted live videos on Fb from the scene which were enormously helpful to people who were impacted, and also to family and friends of affected households. Our local ABC and GWN/Ch7 do the same.

    We actually had a call from an MSM reporter. The media cannot get access to the actual fires so they asked us to take some footage (note: any footage you think you have seen with an actual reporter in it is either taken right on the edge of the fire zone with a telephoto lens to make the fire look close, or perhaps from another fire or backburn altogether). We gave them some footage, but because it did not show houses burning, or animals or people under threat, or spectacular images such as trees crowning – i.e. anything “newsworthy” – they didn’t use it 🙁

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