Foxy,

Before you get too excited, Labor is seriously on the nose in QSD, Vic and SA, and it won't be too long before McGowan's promises are shown to be bogus.

As for Tony Whinger, he personally made $ms from the sale of his farmlands to the coal industry whilst campaigning against them. As you live in the city you wouldn't know the country if it bit you.

Dear Shadow Minister,

Blaming others again?

You really need to acquire some new tactics.
The same old, same old, are wearing a bit thin.
But I guess that's all you've got. You could try
answering some of the questions I posed earlier
about what Mr Joyce and his party have done for
regional and rural Australia, apart from cuts
and spending taxpayer's money on entertainment.

As for my not knowing what country life is like?
Funny you should say that. I've got family members
who are stud-farmers in the Quirindi region of
NSW. Others who live in Kempsey. Still others in
Port Macquarie, South West Rocks. Others in Byron
Bay. And there's more on the list but I won't go into
further details. It just shows how much you think you
know.

Not much at all!

cont'd ...

If Labor is on the nose?

The Coalition is way past that point -
as you'll see at the next election.
WA - is just the beginning.

Foxy,

That's rich coming from you Foxy, considering your standard tactic is never to answer a question and reply by highlighting unrelated issues of the other side. That Tony Whinger profited $ms personally from the coal industry whilst slagging it off (Increase land sales prices?) is a matter of record, and probably one of the reasons he got booted from office.

Here is a long list of what Joyce has achieved, not only for New England:

http://www.barnabyjoyce.com.au/News/Releases/Two-years-of-achievements-in-Australian-agriculture/

FYI the next elections due are in the states of NSW, QLD, VIC, and SA, for all of which Labor are on the nose.

P.S. Having friends and family in the country is a far cry from actually living there. I have spent more than a decade living and working in small country towns where the politics is very different from the cities.

Dear Shadow Minister,

The same old, same old tactics from you.

That's more than rich - it's nauseating!

And giving me a link of Barnaby's achievements from one of
his own sites?

Joyce is an embarrassment. He does a good line in bluster
but not when you check the details.

"You can tell how he's going by the colour of his head."
(Scott Buchhotz).

BTW: - I was born and raised in the country.
Just thought I'd let you know. I also come from several
generations of farmers.

As for Barnaby - it's what he's going to do in the future
that will matter in regional and rural areas. The same goes
for the Coalition. Between now and the next set of elections
what will matter is how voters perceive both parties and what
they are providing. Nothing is set in concrete in the world of
politics.

The experience of country towns with the social problems from indigenous unemployment and resultant drug abuse and domestic violence should suggest to those who see everything through their far left political glasses that they should be reconsidering their stance.

For many years now federal government departments have been quite unreasonably highly centralist, even more than they have been in the past and have built up their pyramids of 'managers' and 'coordinators' in Canberra.

The management overheads in Canberra are excessive by any measure. How can departments have so few (almost rare!) staff at the bottom and lower rungs, but a preponderance of middle and higher 'managers'? The turnip-shaped organisation, where the base and lower levels, the production workers, are the tiny root below.

Departments conduct their business and manage and store information electronically. There is no justification for the thousands of public servants and the enormous central office overheads in Canberra.

I previously gave the example of the Department of Veterans' Affairs. So why isn't The Hon. Dan Tehan MP, Minister for Veterans Affairs leading the charge to the country and sharing the jobs, the much needed employment, around? It would immediately provide jobs for indigenous.