Senator Andrew Bartlett
Saturday, April 30, 2005
 
Premier Pete

When I was down at the shops this morning getting my mail and buying papers, I ran into Queensland Premier Peter Beattie and his wife Heather. (I may have mentioned before that I live in the adjoining suburb –he lives up the top of the hill and I live at the bottom). They looked like they’d been out doing some morning exercise around the neighbouring hillsides, which I’ve occasionally seen pictures of them doing in the paper – a bit like John Howard.

Mr Beattie’s been copping a bit of a pounding in recent weeks over the Dr Death saga and also from his own people about giving Joh Bjelke-Petersen a state funeral – (I’ve said elsewhere that I don’t have a problem with him getting a State funeral and think it is a stupid thing to target).

I’ve met the Premier and his wife a few times here and there and had a brief chat about the possible Senate dynamics after July 1st when the Government gets control and the ‘character building’ nature of public criticism. Despite all the criticisms people may have about Peter Beattie, many of them valid, there’s almost no doubt that when he’s getting his State Funeral he’ll be (rightly) copping far less criticism that what Joh is getting now. Of course, it’s a bit late to try to build people’s character by criticising them after they’ve gone, so I’ll try to be helpful and get all my criticising in while he’s still Premier.

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Saturday, April 30, 2005 Permalink
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