Just a quick blog today. According to my car mechanic, Labor lost because of MyKi, tram conductors, desalination, Kennett and Brumby.
Let me explain.
According to my car mechanic, MyKi became emblematic of Labor’s inability to get public transport in order. Behind MyKi was a host of other issues, like safety on trains, over crowding and cancellations. MyKi is also emblematic of other major projects having cost blow outs. Lots of wasted money.
Linked to MyKi is the idea that Labor could have solved lots of public transport problems by reintroducing tram conductors. This, according to my car mechanic, would have made everything safer, saved money, created jobs and been a major symbol of Labor reversing the damage done by Kennett.
Desalination, for my car mechanic, was a problem because it was not perceived as “environmental”. Why didn’t Labor, asked my car mechanic, make the desal plant run on wind power? We could have built the solar panels and wind turnbines in Victoria. My car mechanic reckoned we need the desalination plant because we don’t know what our water system will be like in 10 or 20 years, but it should have been entirely environmental.
Over 11 years, Labor kept blaming Kennett for problems but didn’t fix them, according to my car mechanic. People hadn’t forgotten that the Liberals were bad for Victoria, but were sick of Labor’s excuses for not fixing the problems. This covers all of those unfulfilled expectations that people had about Labor.
Finally, my car mechanic reckons that it wasn’t good that Brumby got to be Premier without an election. People thought he was arrogant and stopped listening.
What do you think? Is my car mechanic (who is not political – he saw my car bumper sticker and gave me a piece of his mind) on the money or completely wrong?
4 responses to “MyKi, tram conductors, desalination, Kennett and Brumby”
Admin, couple of things, firstly, whilst your mechanic looks a lovely fellow, he looks like he is firmly rooted in the 1930's 40's, a bit like the liberals I guess. Secondly can you please let us know what your bumper sticker said?
An old "Kevin 07" sticker. Long overdue to be removed.
MyKi is certainly emblematic of the criticism leveled at Labor. It came to embody much more than it was, so in that I suppose your mechanic is right. I am consistantly surprised at the level of anger about MyKi from 'non political' people.
Did this issue or desal swing 6% of the state? I don't really think so, but certainly they could have made the difference in such a close election.
I think the "eleven years" factor combined with "death by a thousand cuts" (of which MyKi was one large cut) – contributed.