NSW meltdown roundup

I hear that Costa's speech after being sacked pointed out to all the problems with the NSW Government's budget black hole.

A few Aus journos have commented on the NSW ALP situation after the meltdown late last week.

Here's some I gathered for your reading pleasure:

Janet Albrechtsen

If NSW was a company, shareholders would have bailed out long ago. The CEO would have been booted out. Directors would have had to call in the administrators. An administrator would be forced to lay off staff, sell assets and close unsustainable businesses. A sovereign state is of course different. Sovereigns can always raise more revenue by increasing taxes. But raising taxes - a standard Labor tactic to boost the coffers - won’t save NSW. more

Imre Salusinszki

FOR the second time in three years, there has been a change of government in NSW.

For the second time in three years, neither the people nor the parliament have been consulted in the process.

And for the second time in three years, Labor will try to use a "cleanskin" premier to pull the wool over voters' eyes and distance itself from its own 13-year history in government.

In one sense, the rolling of Morris Iemma is unprecedented - never before has Labor in NSW executed a leader while in government. more

Brad Norrington

Sacked Costa is defiant to the end, pointing out a hole in the state budget

MICHAEL Costa issued a damning assessment of his Government's finances after being sacked as NSW treasurer yesterday, warning that the state's triple-A credit rating was under serious threat.

In a parting shot, Mr Costa pointed to a huge hole in the state's budget that he said could be fixed only by spending cuts or asset sales.

Editorial

AS a former garbage collector and green keeper, NSW's new Premier, Nathan Rees, should understand recycling. So does the long-suffering public of Australia's largest state, who will recognise yesterday's leadership change for what it was: the recycling of an old card trick. It worked once before, in August 2005, when the backroom boys of the NSW Labor machine installed Morris Iemma as premier after the resignation of Bob Carr. It was a job Mr Iemma had never sought, he admitted yesterday. Nineteen months later, Labor took its "new" team to an election, relying on the strategic expertise of Mark Arbib and Mike Kaiser. At every turn, the campaign distanced Mr Iemma from the Carr years. Light on policy substance but heavy on political spin, its slogan was "more to do but heading in the right direction". While voters were desperate for a change, the fact that Labor won a historic fourth term reflected the fact that a well-funded, slick campaign made Mr Iemma look marginally less incompetent than the hapless former Opposition leader Peter Debnam. more