Yep, as i'd long presumed, too many of the Dickson voters are still fuckheads.

Carn Ali France, Ellie Smith, Vinnie Batten.

https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8909711/election-2025-peter-duttons-public-service-cuts-reach-dickson

QUOTE BEGINS

It's impossible to miss a towering billboard as you round a bend on Gympie Road, just north of Brisbane. It greets you on the drive past what was once the old Petrie paper mill and is now a university campus, in the federal electorate of Dickson.

On it, a grinning Peter Dutton tells motorists he wants to get Australia "back on track".

It's a message reminiscent of the one that got Trump over the line in the United States and for some residents in the marginal seat of Dickson, it is resonating.

Having grown up in the seat that Mr Dutton has held for more than 20 years, I travelled back there to get a sense of how voters are feeling mere months out from the federal election.

Those who are willing to share their opinions give glowing references to Mr Dutton, describing him as decisive, strong and a clear thinker.

"He's got what it takes," says veteran Max Revell who plans to vote Liberal at the upcoming election.

Mr Revell says there is nothing that would change his vote.

"[Peter Dutton] is great for the electorate, people love him, he is decisive, he knows how to call a spade a spade," he says.

"He can talk the talk and walk the walk, which is what is needed in Canberra at the moment."

A woman at the same shopping centre in Strathpine says she likes Mr Dutton because he's genuine.

"He means what he says and there's no mucking about with him," she says.

Mr Dutton's office did not respond to ACM's inquiries for this story.

The strong, straight-talking persona is one Mr Dutton has built within his electorate over more than two decades.

The Coalition leader has held the seat of Dickson since late 2001, after a 10-year career with the Queensland Police Service.

The seat of Dickson, about 25 kilometres north of Brisbane CBD, is a working-class area and a mix of built-up housing estates, industrial parks and more affluent suburbs with acreage plots. Mr Dutton lives in the latter.

The Opposition Leader approaches the 2025 federal election on a razor-thin margin of 1.7 per cent, after a nearly 3 per cent swing to Labor on a two-party preferred basis at the 2022 election.

Labor candidate Ali France is going up against Mr Dutton for the third time and, despite her confidence, admits claiming victory will be "absolutely difficult".

Many Queensland residents would be aware of Ms France's personal adversities, which have driven her to become an advocate for people with disabilities.

Ms France had her leg amputated in 2011 after she was pinned between two cars during an incident in a suburban shopping centre car park. One year ago, Ms France's son Henry died of leukaemia, just months after Henry's father and Ms France's ex-husband also died from cancer.

The Labor candidate and para-athlete is certain Mr Dutton's time is up in the electorate but admits it will be a hard task coming up against such a public figure.

"Especially when you've got the Opposition Leader who's on television every single day," she says.

"But we just focus on speaking to as many people as possible, right across the electorate."

Ms France has some reason to feel confident heading into the election. While Mr Dutton has his staunch supporters, the results from the last federal election show there is plenty of groundswell for change. Mr Dutton went into the 2022 election with a 4.6 per cent margin on a two-party preferred basis, which fell to 1.7 per cent after a fierce campaign by Labor.

On the ballot paper this year is also the independent candidate for Dickson, Ellie Smith, who's received funding from Simon Holmes a Court's Climate 200, and Greens candidate Vinnie Batten who claimed 13 per cent of the primary vote last election.

Ms France and her team of volunteers are spending their days door-knocking the suburbs, which she says is in contrast to the "huge war chest" Mr Dutton has available for flyers and billboards.

When I join her for an afternoon of door-knocking in Strathpine, those who answer the door are keen to hear about Labor's policies. She reminds them about Labor's revised tax cuts, fee-free Tafe and energy bill rebates. One resident thanks her for increasing wages for early childhood educators.

The Coalition's commitment to cutting public service jobs has gone beyond the national capital, despite Mr Dutton's attempts to make the job cuts appear targeted towards "Canberra-centric" roles.

Cuts to the public service are something Ms France discusses with residents as she door-knocks through the suburbs. She believes the idea of shrinking the public service is important to the people of Dickson, even if the "government waste" the Opposition Leader is targeting has been incorrectly pitched as entirely Canberra jobs.

The sacking of more than 12,000 state public servants under former Liberal-National premier Campbell Newman is still fresh in the minds of Queenslanders, Ms France says.

"The ghost of Campbell Newman, it still haunts us here in Queensland," she says.

"So when [people] hear cuts to public service, they know what that means here. And I think as we get closer to the election, people are going to have to take a closer look at that."

When she speaks to residents, Ms France points out what she believes job cuts could mean for Queensland residents.

"It will be to things like people working for the NDIS, people working for Centrelink, people working in Veterans' Affairs, people working in Medicare," she says.

"These are all the services that people in this electorate rely upon."

Voters have their own opinions on public service job cuts. Some say they worry about those who'll be sacked and left without work, while others are concerned about the potential for increased government spending on external contractors.

But others, like Mr Revell, believe cuts are a good thing.

"There's too many people in the public service," he says.

"All public servants, whether it be in Canberra or where it is, you ring up and they say 'I'll pass you onto another person,' and then they put their feet back up on the desk."

If they don't cut jobs, the government should amalgamate departments, Mr Revell says.

Similarly, Peter Aquino says there's room to cut some jobs. Speaking outside a Woolworths in nearby suburb Warner, Mr Aquino says from personal experience, "There's a lot of people that just don't do anything."

"Even if he cuts some I don't think it's going to make much of an impact," he says.

Petrie resident Judy Hughes is indifferent about who the next prime minister should be but praises the Labor government for her cheaper medicines and electricity bills.

"I haven't paid an electricity bill for a year," she says.

But Ms Hughes also talks of Mr Dutton as a nice person, whom she met when he visited her workplace, Meals on Wheels. She says he "treated everyone well" and even offered to buy a new cooker for the kitchen.

Vickie Pentecost is another Dickson resident who has personally met Mr Dutton. She says his strong focus on community engagement is part of his success.

Ms Pentecost believes Mr Dutton would make a good prime minister.

"I just think Albanese stuffed up a bit, I don't think he's ever recovered from losing the Voice," she says.

However, there is plenty of uncertainty in the lead-up to the election, even among those who are certain of their vote.

Mr Aquino says he would put his bottom dollar on Mr Dutton winning the election, but also wants to see more policy detail from the Opposition Leader.

"This nuclear thing, I don't know how it's going to go in Australia," Mr Aquino said.

"It'd be nice if someone could give us a full rundown of how it's going to work, whether it's going to affect people and stuff like that."

But a policy that's light on detail doesn't appear to concern some voters in Dickson, many of whom seem content with the idea of their local member becoming prime minister.

The question is whether his smiling billboards and community-man persona will help him secure his seat for a ninth consecutive term, or if Labor's message of an out-of-touch pollie ready to slash jobs will be enough to change the tide.

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#AusPol #ClimateCrisis #WomensRights #ShitParty1 #ShitParty2 #FsckOffDutton #WhyIsLabor #NoNukes #VoteGreens #ProgIndies #TuckFrump

https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8909494/opinion-its-only-peter-dutton-who-has-a-problem-with-aps-working-from-home

QUOTE BEGINS

There's been a bit of talk this week about flexible work and working from home.

Is it good? Is it bad? Does it work?

The research says that flexible work improves workforce participation, and that people are just as productive, if not more so when working from home. Hybrid working arrangements, which is what overwhelmingly applies in the APS, are positive and productive.

The reality is that flexible work and working from home is important to lots of workers - especially women. Which is why there have never been more women working full-time in the APS, instead of part-time, than right now.

Earlier this week the Coalition, copying Donald Trump's homework once again, announced they would be ordering all public servants back to the office five days a week if they win the next election.

This announcement really is a solution in search of a problem.

Because the real story is that flexible working arrangements and working from home are working well for both workers and public services.

In fact, there are clear and enforceable enterprise agreement provisions that establish both the right to request flexibility and the factors the supervisor will take into account when considering the request.

There is not a problem that needs fixing.

The CPSU's 12th What Women Want survey, which we have released just this week, paints a very clear picture about how important flexible work is for women in modern Australia.

96.7 per cent of women said that flexible work arrangements are important or very important to them and the following stats will clarify why.

68.2 per cent of respondents had caring responsibilities for either dependent children, older parents, partners, adult children or other relatives and friends

And 36.2 per cent of respondents had dual caring responsibilities. That is, they were the primary carer for dependent children and had caring responsibilities for others. And of those with dual caring responsibilities, seven in 10 also worked fulltime.

These figures make it abundantly clear that women are balancing a lot, and that the ability to be flexible about when and where they are working is helping them to keep their heads above water.

This is probably a good time to mention that the monetary value of unpaid care work in Australia has been estimated to be $650.1 billion, the equivalent to 50.6 per cent of GDP.

So, you'd think governments would be bending over backwards to support people to balance work and care. But Peter Dutton took things in the opposite direction and told women that if his return to the office mandate was a problem, maybe they should consider job sharing instead.

The reality is that flexible work is helping women increase their working hours, with benefits for both them and their families, as well as increased productivity.

Indeed, since the introduction of greater workplace flexibility, the proportion of women electing full-time work over part-time has increased. In 2020, 72.2 per cent of women working in the APS were working full-time. And as of June 2024, that had jumped to 79.9 per cent - the highest percentage on record.

It is, of course, not just women who benefit from increased flexibility and working from home. Flexibility has opened the doors of employment to people who have otherwise been shut out, including people with disability and people from regional and rural Australia.

But it must be said that the biggest winner in all of this is the APS. Thanks to flexible work arrangements, the public service is now tapping into talent from right across Australia.

In the past, rigid expectations about where work can be done would have locked many out of pursuing public sector employment.

Fundamentally, it is important for the public service to be representative of the people it serves.

A broader and more diverse public service with connections to communities right across the country is a good thing.

It means our public sector can tap into the talents of all Australians, it makes the public sector more resilient and more representative.

And that's important.

It's important that we have people with lived experience of disability working in the NDIA so that families accessing the NDIS can be better supported.

It's important that we have culturally and linguistically diverse Australians in agencies and departments that contribute to policy development and increase the accessibility of our public services for all Australians.

It's important that we have Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people working in agencies like National Indigenous Australians Agency, informing policy development and the services that impacts them.

It's important that we have people from regional and rural Australia working on the ground in regional and rural Australia, supporting the communities they live in.

Representation matters - and you don't achieve it by shrinking the public service or locking diverse talent out of a career in the APS.

Australians don't want to see the Coalition import yet another anti-public service, anti-diversity agenda from the United States. They want a strong, capable public sector- one that's ready to serve the community when it matters most.

Whether it's supporting veterans, safeguarding our biosecurity, regulating aged care, delivering the NDIS, or responding to disasters like Tropical Cyclone Alfred - with agencies like Services Australia, the National Emergency Management Agency, the ABC, and the Bureau of Meteorology working together to protect and support Australians-a well-resourced public service is essential.

Progress has been made in rebuilding public sector capacity and there is still more to do. But the Coalition's plan to cut one in five jobs and strip workplace rights won't fix anything. It will only weaken the services Australians rely on.

The real question isn't whether flexible work is working - we know it is. The question is why the Coalition is so determined to tear the public service down.

• Melissa Donnelly is the national secretary of the Community and Public Sector Union.

QUOTE ENDS

#AusPol #ClimateCrisis #WomensRights #ShitParty1 #ShitParty2 #FsckOffDutton #WhyIsLabor #NoNukes #VoteGreens #ProgIndies #TuckFrump #misogyny