If the Gummint donated money to the rebuild it would alienate every supporter of all the other teams.

Thanks for that. Fills out the picture. I note the term “your correspondent … “

In Warringah, the incumbent, Tony Abbott, holds the margin with 11.3% cushion.

But the local rugby league team, the Sea Eagles, through the CEO, has pulled a stroke by announcing three days ago that because of lack of funding and government help to refurbish the 1940s vintage Brookvale Oval home ground, the iconic northern beaches team will move its base to the Central Coast, namely Gosford.

This is clearly a put-up job to suck some money out of the desperate Tony Abbott and there would have been a bit of pressure leading up to this, with finally Abbo calling their bluff. He has ignored the requests, rightly or wrongly, saying this was state and local gumment matter – despite the fact that Johh Howard has promised $12 million for the hospital in Putney in Bennelong (a state matter), and Labor has pledged a few mil for Leichhardt Oval, home ground of the Wests Tigers rugby league team (another strictly state issue).

Below is a link to Peter Peter’s column in today’s Manly Daily. Peters, known as “Zorba” is a PR flack for the Manly Leagues and his “view” must be taken with a grain of salt – he is paid to say these things, just like Hendo elsewhere.

http://www.manlydaily.com.au/article/2007/11/17/7405_sports.html

The Manly Daily is a local throwaway that is a genuine daily newspaper and arguably the best read and most authoritative free in Australia running to 98 pages with a weekend gloss realo supplement. Its home delivered circulation covers Warringah and Mackellar fed electorates.

Warringah is largely a conservative electorate with a handful of genuine Labor booths. Yet it is gettable on local issues and people aren’t ideologically committed to the Liberal Party like they would be in, say, Toorak.

In 2001, local identity, state member and currently mayor, Dr Peter Macdonald had a very good go at Abbott and reduced his margin to 5.4%, but Tampa intervened and punters looked at the big picture of hordes of wogs on boats coming into Pittwater and stampeded back to the Liberals.

At another time, your correspondent ran the campaign for local councilor and deputy mayor, Julie Sutton, in the state election for Davidson, which is pretty much same as Warringah in the federal parliament.

This was the election in which Nick Greiner enticed the then state education minister, Terry Metherell, to resign and get out of parliament, by offering him a public service position. Terry was coincidentally up to then, a member for Davidson.

Metherell, a PhD, upset the punters with his unilateral and perceived arrogant beahviour in the education portfolio and was an electoral liability coming up to the state elections and Greiner wanted to rid himself of this millstone. And did.
But this caused a furore and led to an ICAC investigation, which ultimately caused Greiner to also resign from parliament – although he was later exonerated. I took advantage of the turmoil and suggested to Julie that this was an opportunity where the electorate was disturbed enough to vote against the normal trend.

It almost worked, and the new Liberal candidate, a rather obtuse chap called Andrew Humpherson, was taken to preferences.

What I think spoiled Julie’s run was Sally Loan’s breathless “investigation” piece in the SMH into Julie’s background “discovering” that she was the sister of Jeanette McHugh, the then high profile minister in the Keating government. The Liberal Party then put about quite false but damaging scuttlebutt that Julie was a Labor plant – she ran as, and was a genuine independent.

Abbott is on the nose in the electorate because of his down-the-throat-views about stem cell research and abortion and he is widely viewed as a hand-puppet for Pell on such things; because of his hands-off attitude towards the developing trainwreck that is the Royal North Shore Hospital and the hospitals debacle in Warringah generally, which involves the impending downgrade or closure of Manly hospital and its substitution in the as-yet-nonexistent hospital at Frenchs Forest.

Hospitals are unusually important issues in Warringah, because of the high number of people who are getting on in years and indeed, in a state by-election, a local independent mayor in Pittwater, which is in the adjoining peninsula federal electorate of Mackellar, was able to beat the Liberal candidate after the incumbent, John Brogden flipped his lid and resigned.

The mayor, Alex MacTaggart ran on a single issue: retention of the threatened Mona Vale Hospital (which is also set to be replaced by the non-existent super hospital at Frenchs Forest).

Abbott has been near invisible on all this and he is the health minister. His mantra has been: “it is all the responsibility of the nasty nasty state Labor gumment”. This was not a good thing to say. Now people don’t believe him after Howard’s intervention in Tasmania and Putney (Bennelong).

I reckon Abbo is already only just 3 to 4% clear from the brink. The Brookvale Oval shenanigans and payback threats for his intransigence, as per Zorba’s column, may indeed run him very close to the brink if not over it. And he knows it, hence the hysterical note in his latest appearances.

sorry I haven’t spoken to u, had to study for final exam. You said workchoices was working because I got another job, just so you know, workchoices had nothing to do with me securing employment, perseverance go me a job – brethren.

sayonara, mrs gusface.

Tried to get a Kevin 07 T-shirt today in Parramatta. No luck. So, I’ll poke me head out and say: Turnbull will retain Wentworth, just. Reason: He is probably the only “reasonable” voice left in what’s presently known as the Liberal Party of Australia. However, I doubt he will last the distance in Opposition. Three Kevin 07 t-shirts, size small, would be good … ta

1. Bet my freebie $100 on Maxine @ $2.75
2. $10 on Mike Bailey @ $7.00
3. $20 on Peter Tinley @ $2.10

If they all come in it’s a $287 payout for $30 outlay, or 8.6 to 1 odds.

But of course they won’t all come in. That’s why I’m a mug.