By Jon Faine
Image: Paul Jeffers
May the games begin. After an atypical summer, the Victorian parliamentary year resumes February 2.
The Premier returns only partially refreshed, having interrupted his leave at his wife’s insistence. Spending his ‘holiday’ on the phone was never going to work. Dan Andrews went into ‘command and control’ mode early in 2020. Since his fate lay in how the pandemic was handled he decided to micromanage rather than delegate…
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It is not at all clear if Finn can be purged from the Liberal’s Upper House ticket. Only State Council can suspend an MP, but with COVID restrictions, there is no meeting planned. He cannot be easily removed as the Whip either. Andrews cannot believe his luck.
The crossbench – the independents – in the Upper House led by the strategically and tactically canny Fiona Patten can censure Finn using their own procedures. The government will watch with bemused interest but will wisely let others do the heavy lifting. It would not look good during a pandemic for a government to devote energy to a sideshow…
Read the full article on The Age’s website.
