Critical lessons from the mill debacle

Opinion piece by Mike Bolan posted Friday, 21 December 2007 in The Forum. One serious problem facing Australians today is the declining quality of service from State governments. Many (or all) of these governments appear to have lost the ability to provide efficient and worthwhile services. There are many reasons for this, but one of the core reasons is a loss of focus on what the taxpayers need, and a growing focus on what lobbyists argue for. Our representative system is intended to represent taxpayers’ needs to decision makers so they can be considered, and hopefully included, in the decision process. First must come some dedication to actually considering and meeting taxpayer requirements. In Tasmania this is a serious problem as the state government seems to believe that it determines what’s in the taxpayers’ interests, rather taxpayers themselves. See the full article by Mike Bolan at The Forum Stephanie and Paul