Brumby ‘surrounded by B-grade sycophants’
Paul Austin
The Age
December 4, 2010
SAVAGE recriminations have begun over Labor’s shock state election loss, with a former insider launching an extraordinary attack on John Brumby and the ALP hierarchy.
George Droutsas, who was senior campaign officer in Victorian Labor’s head office from 2006 until last year, has told The Age that Mr Brumby surrounded himself with B-grade sycophants who refused to give him bad news or tough advice. He says voters regarded Mr Brumby as arrogant, dismissive and a poor listener who refused to hear genuine community concerns, including about dilapidated public transport, alcohol-fuelled street violence and rising electricity and water bills.
The decision to build Labor’s election campaign around Mr Brumby was a lethal mistake, turning the election into a referendum on him and the 11-year-old government’s record, Mr Droutsas says…
See also : I For One Welcome Our New Tory Overlords (November 28, 2010).
*Following the Liberals’ decision to put the Greens last, the Greens were fuct. The closest they came to winning a seat was in Melbourne, where law-talking guy Brian Walters got 31.83% of the vote, just under 4% behind Labor’s Bronwyn Pike (35.77%).
