editorial Welcome to this weeks editorial, If only there was an upcoming elec7on every month. You may have no7ced that the region has been awash with visi7ng Ministers, Members of Parliament, Vol 16 September 15th 2017 28 April December 7th, 2017 Senators, Opposi7on Leaders and Shadow Ministers. Vol 48 27th 2018 Every7me you turn around there is another announcement from the government of funding for this or that. But why now? Why are all these announcements happening right now? It’s elec7on 7me. The Minister for Emergency Services and Resilience has made quite an appearance availing Disaster grants to Mogo Flood affected homes and businesses. She popped up and handed the keys of a new vehicle and trailer to the local SES, announced some funding to go towards upgrading some other local emergency facili7es and made a big announcement of funds to help out the RFS in Moruya extend their Opera7ons Centre. All very nice stuff but when you boil it all down the Minister isn’t actually paying for any of this from her own pocket. Instead she stands there as the figure head of a bureaucracy that has been put in charge of a large bucket of taxpayers money and, at their discre7on, based on their algorithms of priority, the alloca7ons are made in response to grant applica7ons and lobbying. By rights there should be a steady trickle of funds, each and every day, of liAle announcements that barely are heard. A new vehicle was purchased because it was iden7fied as required. More nursing staff were employed because of the need, a new fire sta7on was built to replace an old, a new hospital was built with beAer services because the old ones were no longer fit for purpose. Even something as simple as a new bridge being built because the old one is failing or a new road sec7on built because the old one was dangerous. A town by-pass, a new jeAy, a toilet block, even a walking trail or a new pool. These are the day to day tasks of managing demands and expecta7ons with the budget available. It happens seamlessly on a daily basis without poli7cians. Hopefully it happens based on need and equity. Those in charge of the 7me line of new bridges and bypasses are faceless. They merely crunch the numbers for the poli7cians to then parrot off as being the ‘plan’. But from 7me to 7me it happens because of poli7cal interven7on. A poli7cian influences the distribu7on of funds and before you know it there is an announcement made that upsets the applecart. One might ask, with all of these announcements being made now from funds that have been in place for such works such as the Disaster Funds why has it taken so long for these announcements to take place? The need for an upgrade to our Emergency Opera7ons Centre, our ambulance sta7on, our fire sta7on, our SES sheds and our emergency communica7ons has now been in place for nearly a decade yet now, during an elec7on cycle, the announcement is made to look like a giG from a poli7cian’s pocket. The reason we vote for a local poli7cian to represent us is clear. We hope that they can communicate our needs to the keepers of the big pile of money and even offer influence. If you have a local poli7cian who is part of the ruling party then apparently you stand a beAer chance of accessing more money. But if your representa7ve is from another ‘tribe’ then you will probably get liAle if anything. One wonders, if the ruling party withholds funds for things such as Disaster payments, new emergency facili7es and assets so they can announce them as a ‘generous giG’ during an elec7on cycle then what other monies are they holding back on, wai7ng to be pressured or embarrassed to declare by way of another 7mely ‘announcement’? It is liAle more than a game—and we are but pawns to their Kings and Queens. Un7l next—lei beagle weekly : Vol 244 January 28th 2022
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