I read with interest last Saturday’s edition of the North West Star, among the many Katter stories and photos,which is now the norm in every edition of our local paper, the story under the banner headline “Katter Rural Debt Bill Sunk”.
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In this article our Local Member slammed the State LNP for supporting the Labor Government to defeat the setting up of a Rural Bank which has been on the political agenda in our State for many years but in recent times has been claimed as an initiative of the Katter Party.
What convinced me that Mr. Katter was wrong and ill informed on this issue was when the President of the peak Rural Body Agforce came out and stated that this proposal from the Katter Party was unnecessary and a waste of resources.
According to Mr. Katter everybody was out of step, the Queensland State Government, the Queensland State Opposition and peak rural groups such as Agforce, and the Katter Party were right.
What nonsense. On the same day the Star reported the defeat of the Katter proposal we had the Speaker of the American Congress and the leader of the Republican Party saying they “have been in Opposition for the past ten years and during this time we simply ‘opposed’. Now we are discovering it is a very difficult and different situation moving from Opposition to Government where you have to deliver.”
I would suggest that this is the problem that we have here in the North West with our Federal and State members of Parliament.
They have never been in Government, they can tell people what they think that they want to hear they can say and do anything which will attract a headline. They promise the world knowing that they can’t deliver, but they also know that most of their utterances will be reported in full by the local media, never to be challenged by these media outlets.
This situation is not good nor is it healthy for the political process, our democracy relies on the careful scrutiny of the actions or lack of actions from our Politicians and Governments.
The media have a vital role to play in this process and the last thing that the media should be is a mouthpiece for our political representatives or governments regardless of which political party that they belong to.
Our elected political representatives obviously deserve to have their actions reported and views expressed but from time to time they should be challenged.
