While the national media was focused on the federal election announcement being delayed by Tropical Cyclone Alfred, for those of us who were close to the storm it was striking to see how differently state and federal leaders handled this situation to their predecessors.
Arriving before the disaster, accompanied by proper resources, including the ADF? This is pretty much unheard of, as far as the Northern Rivers and South East Queensland is concerned. NSW Premier Chris Minns, Minister for Emergency Services Jihad Dib, PM Anthony Albanese, Treasurer Jim Chalmers and local members are to be congratulated for the way they stepped up on this occasion.
The prime minister made an excellent speech as the cyclone approached, thanking the public servants and media for playing crucial roles in preserving public safety, along with the communities coming together to help one another across political and geographic borders.
‘I think particularly of the people of Lismore, for example, who have been knocked down, they get up, they get knocked down, they get back up, and now they are being confronted with this,’ he said. ‘On behalf of the Australian government, we have your back, and Australians have each other’s back at this important time as well.’
It’s a far cry from Malcolm Turnbull showing up after the 2017 flood and pretending to scrub floors in Lismore, or Scott Morrison flying to Hawaii while the Black Summer fires were raging.
Where the hell are ya?
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s own electorate of Dickson was directly in the firing line of Cyclone Alfred, but he decided to abandon the region shortly after attending an emergency briefing so he could fly to a Liberal fundraising event with hospitality billionaire Justin Hemmes in Vaucluse.
Yes, this is the same bloke who was caught and penalised for underpaying 14,000 employees last year.
While people like Jim Chalmers and the Greens’ Max Chandler-Mather were literally filling sandbags, the closest Peter Dutton got to the action was a Queensland radio interview in which he said he hadn’t taped up his windows yet.
Of course the traditional role of politicians at these times is to provide useful words and reassurance, not hold shovels or hoses. Unfortunately Albo’s fine words ran out when a journalist had the temerity to ask the PM to connect the dots between Tropical Cyclone Alfred, a heating ocean and the worsening climate crisis.
Switching to autopilot, he misquoted Dorothea Mackellar, noting Australia has always had natural disasters, but ‘you can’t say this event is just because of climate change. What you can say is that climate change is having an impact on our weather patterns.’
Pressed on whether new emissions targets would be released before the election, Albanese obfuscated and said, ‘I take climate change seriously, and my government takes climate change seriously.’
Unfortunately though, not seriously enough to stop approving coal and gas projects, which may have contributed to the Greens getting their best-ever result in the Western Australian election on the weekend, despite $5 million being spent by right-wing ratbags Advance to stop this happening.
While Labor won comfortably, the Greens got twice as many votes as the Nationals, and are likely to hold the balance of power in the upper house.
Disaffected Labor voters didn’t vote for the hapless opposition, on the whole, but for the Greens and other minor parties, a result which would have interesting implications if repeated nationally.
In other catastrophic disaster news, Anthony Albanese continues to publicly claim that the United States is our ally, as is Ukraine, apparently. It’s a bit like Labor’s position on the climate, internally contradictory but borne of the need to integrate mutually incompatible realities.
The next federal election is due to be held on or before 17 May.
Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning filmmaker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.
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