During today’s COVID Press Conference, when asked about the suspension of the Legislative Assembly, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said:
I think if you ask Victorians, umm, whether, its, ah, people giving speeches on the floor of the parliament is as important as getting jabs into the arms of people, or contact tracing, or, you know I’m not apologising for the priorities that I’ve got Simone. I’m just not. I’m focused on keeping people well, and driving these numbers down.
He then goes on to add, when asked a further question that the opposition isn’t relevant to the work that he does.
And, this is where the problem lies.
The opposition isn’t relevant.
And because of that irrelevancy, they have let ALL Victorians down.
Through out this whole “pandemic”, apart from a few token comments, we have heard very little from them.
It has only been in the past few weeks, now that international attention is being focused on the draconian response, that we are hearing a little from them on social media.
With the Legislative Assembly being suspend for another week (at the moment) I doubt that most Victorians would realise that we have an opposition party, let alone who the leader of that party is.
And, this means that they have let us all down.
That being said, I won’t point the finger solely at them. A complicit and corrupt corporate press are making it easier for them to be totally forgettable.
Now before you jump up and down and tell me there isn’t anything that they can do because they aren’t in “power”, let me stop you there.
There is nothing stopping Michael O’Brien (Leader of the Opposition) from holding his own daily press conference.
Actually, it doesn’t even need to be the Liberal Party that holds the daily press conference, it could be any party that is in opposition to the Andrews Regime.
At the Liberal Party press conference, Mr O’Brien could talk about the COVID stats, and whatever briefing he has received from Professor Sutton (Victorian Chief Health Officer).
He should also stop the doom and gloom reporting that the Government and Corporate Press seem to be obsessed with.
The press conference could also talk about those things that Premier Dan Andrews doesn’t want to mention.
This would be things like the mental health shadow pandemic, how there actually isn’t any justification for a State of Emergency declaration, and so on.
When parliament returns, they could use their numbers in the Legislative Council to set up a parliamentary inquiry into the whole thing.
They will have to work for it, as they need to rely on the three Labor aligned cross-benchers to get it across the line. Though I sure a public campaign about the planned inquiry could help.
From there, they should be able to call all sort of witnesses to give evidence, under oath, that is relevant to the inquiry.
If that fails, there is nothing stopping them from asking questions of the relevant Minister during question time.
All this is just for starters, and there is likely to be more things that they could do, if only they had the political desire to do them.
If they don’t step up and starting acting like they are there to represent Victoria, rather than their own interests, they aren’t worthy of you vote in 2022.