Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
If the Commonwealth had stepped up to and competently discharged the responsibilities that fall squarely within its power, when it became obvious what was needed, we would all be in a different place now. Quarantine, vaccine purchase and roll out and aged care facilities.
We all realise that Scotty doesn't hold a hose or a syringe or lay bricks or work in a laboratory or run aged care facilities, but it's his government that pays the Piper and could and should have called the tune a lot earlier.
But I agree with you about the underlying politics. That's why the rumours of an early Federal election have evaporated. Scotty and his team are becoming very unpopular, as a consequence of their incompetence and - most recently - the differential treatment of Victorians compared with New South Welshmen.
All they know how to do well is react to political risk. And many, many Australians are getting very, very angry.
As I've said before, I earnestly hope that the urgency with which vaccines are now being purchased and rolled out will be the 'circuit breaker'. The alternatives are pretty ugly.
Couldn't agree more that the vaccination program needs fixing. That said, when the initial roll-out and targets were announced I can't recall a groundswell of opinion that it wasn't fast enough (that could be down to bad recall).
I don't know about many, many Australians getting very, very angry. I've been trying to find polling on that topic. According to the
Lowy Institute back in May,
Almost all Australian adults (95%) say that Australia has handled COVID-19 ‘very well’ or ‘fairly well’ so far.
It's fair to say that a lot has happened since May but by the same token, 95% is a high ceiling to be dropping from.
According to
Essential it's a mixed bag. As late as last week people rating the federal government’s response to the Covid-19 outbreak as very poor had tripled since the start of the year but only to 12 percent.
Speaking of the vaccination program if you go to the third page of the Essential Report, there's some interesting (and worrying) data. Back in April, well before the AstraZeneca pile-on, 16 percent were saying they'd never be vaccinated! You might wonder what that number is now.
In terms of what people think about the spending on the pandemic response, nearest I've found is the response to the budget - a pretty good approval rating but with many people confused about exactly what it meant for them. Time will tell.