It’s official: Senator Conroy will remain as Minister for Broadband, Communications, and the Digital Economy. We made some noise, hoped for the best, but always had a feeling we’d be served up more of the same. That was confirmed today with Gillard’s decision to keep to a very minor adjustment in cabinet.
Geordie Guy, Vice Chair, Electronic Frontiers Australia, offers the enticing analogy that Senator Lundy is like Google and Senator Conroy is like Apple. Will Apple win this battle, too?
If you want to show your support for our campaign to see the Labor government introduce a communications minister worthy of the portfolio, login to Facebook and join our Kate Lundy for IT page.
What stuck out to me this morning was Kate Ellis revealing that Labor members of parliament had Australians in their electoral offices saying that the Prime Minister wasn’t reflecting their wishes, and this was the impetus for considering a change of leadership. This week a petition that 19,000 Australians have signed was tabled in the Senate and 48,000 Australians have participated in the Time to Tell Mum campaign, all evidence that Senator Stephen Conroy’s censorship proposal isn’t reflecting their wishes. We hope the similarities between both situations are as apparent to the government as they are to us.
The election by Caucus of Julia Gillard as Prime Minister is an opportunity for the government to reimagine the ministry and the way Cabinet is run. Under Kevin Rudd, the “kitchen cabinet” that made up the Strategic Policy and Budget Committee, cutting decision-making out of the responsible Ministers’ hands can be remedied, with power rightly back in the hands of portfolio Ministers with appropriate expertise.
So the federal government #spill is done and we have our first female PM in Julia Gillard. Wow. Kevin Rudd, we hardly knew you. If this is to change what matters to people like us, we want to see Conroy follow Rudd to a seat up the back [UPDATE: or move him up to Finance now Tanner is leaving... -ed] . Give the Broadband, Communications, and Digital Economy portfolio to someone who really understands how important and exciting the future of the BCDE portfolio really is. We want the job to go to Senator Kate Lundy — unquestionably the best person for the job.
