IN ONE 10-minute radio interview with ABC morning host Tim Cox, Mr Bartlett managed to singlehandedly destroy the carefully crafted work of teams of public relations experts over the past two months.
Instead of hearing more cooing talk of a premier who was “listening”, “hearing”, “feeling the pain” and who was prepared to admit his mistakes and fix them, we saw a glimpse again of the David Bartlett we had come to know before last November’s devastatingly bad EMRS opinion poll for Labor.
We heard a Premier who was aggressive, arrogant, narky and cocky. We heard a smug David Bartlett let rip into anyone who dared suggest his education reforms may not have been the success he claims them to have been.
We heard an Education Minister throwing around statistics and showing off his own knowledge in an apparent attempt to bamboozle and belittle anyone who might question the integrity and contribution of his reforms.
It was, as one of Mr Bartlett’s own advisers said afterwards in an understatement, not a performance that was particularly calm, statesmanlike, edifying or uniting.
It was definitely not a demonstration of good leadership, or the way to go about convincing a sceptical community that all the recent talk of listening, hearing, changing and fixing was anything more than a good PR line designed to win votes.
…
But the real crux of the tragedy is that it has thrown into sharp relief the achilles heel of the Liberal Opposition team, which leader Will Hodgman and his team of advisers were desperately trying to downplay.
And that is the incredible lack of governing experience in Liberal ranks.
Even if the Liberals were able to achieve the electorally impossible and nearly double the seven seats they hold in the current Parliament on March 20 to win a miraculous majority, no one in the team would have the experience of being a minister in a practicing government.
There is nothing practical Mr Hodgman can do during this election campaign to change that reality of political inexperience.
Not even pointing to his political pedigree or pointing to a childhood surrounded by politics courtesy of his politician father and numerous relatives can fix this deficiency.
In fact, pointing out this reality might be the worst thing Mr Hodgman could do, building on voter perceptions that one of the Liberal leader’s perceived soft spots is that he has a “born-to-rule”, silver spoon mentality,
Instead, all Mr Hodgman and his team can hope for is that Tasmanian voters are so disenchanted with the current Labor Government, and so determined they will not be given another term in office after 12 bumbling, scandal-prone years in power that any option other than re-electing the incumbents will appeal.
The problem for both the Labor Government and the Liberal Opposition is that these two key weaknesses exposed coincidentally in each party during the past week have both already been detected and zeroed-in on by their political opponents.
Bob Burton picture
