The Big Chopper deployed this week to douse the Sussan Ley travel expenses spot fire. And yet somehow it continues to burn.
Meanwhile, Centrelink’s fraught robo-debt-recovery campaign has now sent out 270,000 letters. Because those trips by Ministers to the AFL Grand Final and the Portsea Polo aren’t going to pay for themselves.
Confused and concerned about your Centrelink debt notice? Visit Not My Debt.
(The Canberra Times, 11 & 12 January 2017 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce (true!) is the latest government minister to defend Centrelink’s troubled $4.5 billion debt recovery mission, following the Social Security Minister’s assurance that it was all working “incredibly well”.
The Minister for Health has also been digging in on the issue of entitlements.
(The Canberra Times, 7 January 2017 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
Centrelink’s error-prone automated compliance system is causing a lot of grief. It feels a lot like the census debacle – make cuts, but reassure everyone that IT will bridge the service gap.
The dalek-shaped cyborg here is supposed to have a passing resemblance to the Minister for Human Services, Alan Tudge (Dickens himself could not have come up with a better name!). But given that no-one knows what he looks like, and given the theme, it seemed more important to capture the likeness of something mechanical than something human.
(The Canberra Times, 3 January 2017 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
My Fairfax colleague James Joyce (true!) has written a survey of my cartoons for 2016 to accompany a gallery of the year that was (I picked the first 7, and wrote a couple of comments, James picked the rest).
I’m having a short break but will be back drawing in the first week of the new year. Best wishes to you all for 2017.
My cartoon on the cover of the Turkish national daily Cumhuriyet, in the panel where their cartoonist Musa Kart’s cartoon should be.
Musa was arrested and jailed pending trial in early November, along with a number of his journalist colleagues, as part of President Erdoğan’s post-coup crackdown on critical voices in the media.
While he remains in jail, Cumhuriyet is filling Musa’s panel with cartoons of solidarity from around the world.
“At least 81 journalists are imprisoned in Turkey, all of them facing anti-state charges, in the wake of an unprecedented crackdown that has included the shuttering of more than 100 news outlets. The 259 journalists in jail worldwide is the highest number recorded since 1990.” A special report from the Committee to Protect Journalists by Elana Beiser.
At this rate, the climate policy review table looks set to be cleared even faster than the tax reform one.
(The Canberra Times, 7 December 2016 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
(The Canberra Times, 24 November 2016)
“The decision will be handed down in the Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook on December 19”
Funded by cutting Landcare, a risible fig leaf for the Coalition’s nakedness on climate policy, and underfunded as a proper employment program, there were lots of reasons to facepalm Tony’s Green Army plan. But I can’t celebrate its demise. “It is not an environmental program. It is an employment program, and a bad one at that” said Greens leader Di Natale, Shouldn’t we be trying to develop programs that are both? Sounds like it was a good experience for many participants; was there scope to improve it? A voluntary scheme for unemployed kids, working with local groups, add a little more citizen science training to the environmental remediation work, and improve the pay rates?
(The Canberra Times, 6 December 2016 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
…from 154 scientists: There is no Planet B.
(The Canberra Times, 26 August 2016 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
B52s in the skies over Canberra, and the last-minute cancellation of the Vietnamese memorial service on the 50th anniversary of the battle of Long Tan.
(The Canberra Times, 19 August 2016 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)
Drifting in the polls and facing a fractious crew, the Captain launches his 15 week voyage in search of political authority.
(The Canberra Times, 19 March 2016)