Daniel Andrews, a Big Picture Man
Albo promised everyone $275. Chairman Dan left every Victorian with a $32,000 debt
The day before Daniel Andrews called in lawyers to advise how Victoria could get out of hosting the Commonwealth Games, his deputy - the now Premier Jacinta Allan - was assuring a parliamentary committee that the Games would be a huge success.
It was revealed today that Dan Andrews had engaged lawyers to help cancel the Games contract on June 14.
But on June 13 Jacinta Allan had been assuring a Public Accounts and Estimates Committee she was “confident” the Games would be a raging success.
She told them …
“The games are in 1008 days. In terms of the time that is needed to be taken to deliver these games, I am confident
“The team is already doing significant planning work with, again, the local community to ensure how we move people – not just to Ballarat, there are five host cities that we have to move people around – and we are confident that we can do that.”
“It is going to be one of the biggest logistical challenges of the running of the games, and I am confident we can do it.”
That’s two “I am confidents”, and one “we are confident”.
Less than 24 hours later, the government confident they could run the Games had contracted law firm Arnold Bloch Leibler to give them confidence they could ditch the Games.
Thank God Dan Andrews is gone now, you say.
Well, not so fast.
The woman who replaced Andrews when he suddenly resigned last week, was not only his deputy, she was the minister in charge of delivering the Commonwealth Games.
Victorians have seen Tweedle Dee Andrews replaced by Tweedle Dum Allan. If it wasn’t for the AFL and my mum’s roast dinners, I’m not sure why you’d continue living in Victoria!
On July 18, just over a month after engaging lawyers, Dan Andrews shocked the world by announcing the Games would be scrapped.
He’d been planning it for a month.
He claimed at the time that he had only just become aware that the original $2.6b cost had blown out to $7b. Or maybe it was $8b. Who could know?
It’s a hell of a blow out. Andrews had promised the Games in the lead up to last November’s election. So in less than 10 months the cost had blown out by $5b!
To junk the Games, Andrews spent $1.2m on lawyers who negotiated a $380m fee Victorian taxpayers would be billed to ditch the Commonwealth Games contract.
On top of that, it was revealed this week that the Government had spent $21m on consultants for the Games that never were.
This included $372,000 paid to Indigenous groups for options on how the athlete’s village and sporting venues could be designed. You have to laugh. Prior to Captain Cook’s arrival there wasn’t a structure on the continent. Now our politicians can’t build a velodrome without input from First Nations people.
I interrupt this article to bring you news of the top five highest paying jobs in the world:
(5) Rocket scientist
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(1) A consultant to the Victorian State Government
But I digress.
Despite all the criticism of Daniel Andrews, you have to admit that he was a big picture man.
Anthony Albanese promised everyone $275.
Andrews left every single Victorian with a $32,400 debt.
He might have been a big picture man,but the picture was always of himself.
Obviously Andrews did not inform Jacinta Allan before her rousing speech that the very next day his intention was to put in motion the scrapping of the Commonwealth Games. Later Announced without any regard or regret. Typical of the narcissistic authoritarian, thank God our prayers were answered and he is gone.
Sadly my grandchildren will be paying down the debt he has racked up in Victoria.