Allan, Andrews Leave Big Shoes to Fill

Like a 40-year-old spinster pining that some day her prince will come, hope springs eternal for the legacy media that their precious uniparty establishment will be saved. The resignation of Victorian Labor Premier Jacinta Allan this morning has them giddy as a Trump-hater crowing, ‘Honey, bring your boyfriend in here – they got him this time!’

For the centre-left, like the Australian, it’s Liberal Leader Jess Wilson’s time to shine!

The strong voter appeal for Wilson is growing. Senior Liberals, who just a few months ago felt they might fall short at the November election, now believe their chances of winning are much greater.

Wilson, who replaced Brad Battin in November last year, is now claiming authority and trust from voters who believe she can lead Victoria.

Based on what, exactly? The Liberals’ polling is still abysmal, with their primary vote sitting at 31 per cent, according to Newspoll. The best they can say is that at least they’re not doing quite as bad as Labor, at 28 per cent – although other polls have them in fact neck-and-neck with Labor. Depending on which poll you choose, One Nation are either within a couple of per cent of both, or hovering at 20 per cent.

And this, all things considered, is a remarkable achievement: One Nation’s Victorian division has just one upper house MP and a single candidate confirmed to date. The party is frantically recruiting in Victoria, but is believed to be keeping its focus on NSW, which goes to the polls next year.

If the two major parties are barely keeping ahead of a party that is practically non-existent in Victoria, that’s the most damning indictment imaginable.

Wilson looks less the shining star than the drover’s dog.

Meanwhile, likely new Labor leader Ben Carroll is looking like Joan Kirner in drag, which isn’t stopping the left-leaning Age from gushing like schoolgirls.

A history lesson may be necessary to explain that remark for Good Oil readers. Joan Kirner was handed the poison chalice of the Labor leadership when then-Premier John Cain resigned as the state collapsed around his ears. Whatever virtues Kirner may have had, they were irrelevant: she was left to stand like a possum in the headlights as the Jeff Kennett steamroller barrelled over her government at the next election.

That may be a pity: Carroll at least looks like an old-fashioned working-class Labor lad. Born in Airport West (a stone’s throw from the Kerrigans, of The Castle), the son of an electrician, Carroll worked the checkout at the local Kmart from the age of 14 to 22. He joined the Shoppies (the Shop, Distributive and Allied Employees’ Association, the most right-leaning of Australia’s unions, which famously infuriated the Labor movement with a video depicting their house taken over by a bunch of weirdos and foreigners), supports the Shinboners (North Melbourne) and was introduced to politics by Old Labor stalwart Simon Crean. Carroll was no mate of Dan Andrews, either, stymying Dictator Dan’s preferred succession plan – and incidentally ‘gifting’ Victorians with Jacinta Allan instead.

Labor insiders, speaking anonymously to detail internal deliberations, say that as deputy premier and the leading right faction MP, Carroll has been a voice of constructive dissent within the government.

His scepticism about Andrews and Allan’s pet project, the $34.5 billion Suburban Rail Loop East, is widely known. Carroll has instead championed the stalled $13 billion Airport Rail Link, and pushed for it to include a station in his electorate at Airport West.

Carroll called internally for tougher bail laws at a time of growing public concern about crime, and also issued veiled criticism about the closure of police stations […]

And if he ascends to the leadership, he is likely to announce a royal commission into corruption on state government Big Build sites – something Allan has steadfastly rejected.

Little of that, though, seems likely to save a government that appears on a terminal slide to disaster – after already having dragged the state it’s ruled for most of the past quarter-century to Third World status.

It’s worth remembering that, had everything gone to plan, regional Victoria currently would be hosting the series of events that make up the Commonwealth Games. But the only thing the state has to show for the reckless proposal of the Labor government to stage the games is a bill close to $600m, with $200m simply handed over to the grateful Glaswegians […]

The saga of the Commonwealth Games is illustrative of the appalling quality of governance in Australia’s second largest state by population. A politicised bureaucracy, inadequate attention paid to policy and project development, and the wanton handing out of favours to politically favoured groups – these are the core features of the way Victoria is governed. Add in the high and rising tax burden placed on Victorians and it’s not a surprise that the Victorian economy is lagging the rest of the country […]

There is scant evidence that the current Labor government has learnt any lessons from the mistakes made during its terms in government.

The big question is: Have the Victorian Liberals actually remembered what the Liberal Party is meant to be, or are they still in the death-grip of the ‘moderates’? Have Victorian voters learned from their mistakes in re-electing the same clownshow, time after time?

That even a party that is practically non-existent in the state is nipping at the heels of both major parties is all we need to know.