Weatherman looks to Canberra seat. Don’t be surprised to see former TV weatherman and environmental campaigner Rob Gell seeking a seat in parliament at the next federal election. We caught up with Gell after he ended his term as national president of Greening Australia recently and he admitted politics is definitely on the radar. The former […]

Vic public service policy-free zone? Apparently Ted Baillieu’s public sector purge will particularly target roles bearing the title “policy”. “The belief is that the public service should not be involved in such areas,” our Spring Street insider says. Council leg-up for son’s application. Some funny things go on in some municipalities. One anonymous tipster reports: “In one […]

Super system upgrade costs members. More revelations from inside UniSuper. Yesterday we said millions of dollars are being spent on an administration system upgrade that has corrupted member data and put super funds at risk. Well we were “spot on”, according to another company spy. Sort of. “Only it is not millions, but tens of millions!” […]

Dept penny-pinches, first class for bosses. Bernard Keane had the leaked email yesterday revealing the Commonwealth’s Department of Health has been forced to call for voluntary redundancies and will cut its workload to meet efficiency targets. With the penny-pinching now to begin, staff are also questioning the regular international travel by the most senior bureaucrats — and which […]

Union and Campbell in pre-election bed? A senior unionist is making no bones about cosying up to the Liberal-National Party ahead of the Queensland state election. We’re told the official has been holding regular meetings with leader-in-exile Campbell Newman and other senior party men over the past few months. His actions have not gone unnoticed — a number […]

Hunt, Price and the press connection. Shadow climate minister Greg Hunt always seems to be doing interviews with Steve Price on the ailing MTR. Could the fact his press secretary Wendy Black is Steve Price’s wife have anything to do with it? Jones was singing at the ABC. We’ve solved the mystery of why radio hothead Alan Jones was spending so […]

Jones at home in Aunty’s bosom. Why was radio shock jock Alan Jones spotted twice at the ABC’s Ultimo HQ in the past two weeks? Being interviewed? Farewelling departing chairman and fellow climate change sceptic Maurice Newman? Angling for a board position? (A crazy idea, the latter, given the hostility between Jones and the government, but […]

Victorian arts bodies in grab for cash. It’s not just NSW arts bodies desperate for their allocation of cash, as we reported last week. In Victoria, funding-starved theatre groups are questioning the Baillieu government about delays in announcing ongoing multi-year funding agreements. As one industry player points out, less than a month before the beginning of […]

Putting words into the PM’s mouth (cont). Another name to throw into the mix for a new Julia Gillard speechwriter: Carl Green. According to our source: “At the ALP conference on Saturday afternoon, Bob Carr was heard telling several notable ALP figures that Gillard desperately needs a new ghost writer and that she should put a […]

Putting words into the PM’s mouth (cont). If Julia Gillard is looking for a new speechwriter — her office denies it, but still the speculation continues — then you can rule out the name Joel Dean. Dean, who worked for Labor in Victoria as a press secretary and speechwriter, told us today he’s “flattered” by the speculation but the two […]

Putting words into Gillard’s mouth. The rumours about a new speechwriter for the Prime Minister just won’t go away. Despite Julia Gillard’s office denying to Crikey yesterday any recruitment search was happening, we’re assured by another insider the talk is “on the money”. They speculate: ”I hear that Tony Blair’s veteran speechwriter Peter Hyman has been asked […]

Gillard: pro gays, anti nuclear. This little snippet has been doing the rounds on Facebook. We’re not sure what publication or year it’s from — if you know, drop us a line — but it’s clear the prime minister wasn’t always for uranium exports and against gay rights … A new speech writer for the PM? Meanwhile, there was plenty […]

Promoting pollie pay debate. The hysteria on politicians’ pay is put into perspective by a public service insider: “It is my understanding that federal politicians have had four ‘promotions’ over the past 20-30 years. I personally recollect when the back-bencher pay rate was equivalent to a public servant section head (EL2) and went up to […]

No civil unions for MP of gay son. Four Labor Party MPs exercised their conscience and voted against the majority of their party on civil unions legislation during a heated debate in Queensland Parliament last night (the bill still passed, without any Liberal-National Party support, 47 to 40). One of those was a particular surprise to […]

Big news at the Herald Sun? One of the most prominent journalists in sports-mad Melbourne, Herald Sun chief football writer Mike Sheahan, announced his retirement from the daily news grind yesterday. But is it a mere coincidence the 64-year-old is stepping back as the Herald Sun apparently targets older workers for redundancy, as one insider told […]

Walkleys hangovers bite hard. It took you long enough. Finally, some decent gossip from journalism’s night of nights, the Walkley Awards held in Brisbane on Sunday night. One spy teases: “Which Courier-Mail middle manager put his foot in it by loudly declaring the entertainment at the Walkleys (renowned classical guitarist Karen Schaupp) was excruciatingly boring and […]

Victorian public service on alert. The purge of the Victorian public service has begun, according to a Spring Street insider. But not the one imagined. “There’s a coincidence of interests between Labor-appointed departmental heads and anti-Baillieu ministers,” our tipster says. “The departmental heads hunt down and ‘kill’ Bailleiu aligned and/or wet liberal public servants, so proving […]

Schools paying top students to stay? “It is widely known within the school community of a leading Sydney North Shore private girls school that when four high-achieving year five students announced they would be leaving at the end of year six they were offered full scholarships for years seven through 12 just so the school could […]

ABC coverage of the Kiwi election. Why isn’t ABC News 24 running rolling coverage of the New Zealand parliamentary elections on Saturday? And does anyone really care? Aunty’s elections guru seemed to suggest it was a budgetary decision on his blog on Monday, writing: “It is possible to take a feed from TVNZ, but you have to pay to […]

Flacks attack after media event goes awry. It was flacks at 10 paces in Canberra on Monday, with tensions rising between the offices of Transport Minister Anthony Albanese and the Transport Workers Union. As one spy tells it: “Matthew Chesher — husband of former education minister Verity Firth and former chief-of-staff to David Borger until he was arrested […]

Safe rates may split National Party. After a long wait, the federal government will legislate a so-called “safe rates” scheme for truck drivers — as Crikey reported in July  — to protect subcontractors from customers screwing down rates. Legislation will come before Parliament later this week, but Nationals leader Warren Truss has already ruled out opposition support. But does […]

Launching a book for ‘Spaghetti Brains’. “A former Rudd insider finds it curious that the foreign minister has agreed to launch a book by Troy Bramston, a former speechwriter who Rudd used to routinely refer to as “Spaghetti Brains”, and who was shifted out of his office to the Siberia of Tony Burke’s then-agriculture portfolio as […]

Money for job referral at Sensis. Sensis staff were still reeling from recent job losses when they saw this on the company intranet today: “We haven’t even had the farewell lunches for our colleagues made redundant, whose last day is today,” writes our insider. “This is massively insensitive and cynical. Very poor form.” CEO Bruce Akhurst announced 80 […]

Farewell, Harto, from your friends at News. News Limited is a company of the future. So with CEO John Hartigan heading for the door, the company is passing around the farewell card — online. Group editorial director Campbell Reid dispatched this email to staff yesterday: From: “Corporate Affairs” Date: 16 November 2011 3:24:57 PM AEDT To: “Group-DL-News Ltd […]