The final two leadership debates reminded us of the ever-present contradictions at play in the state’s politics.
The hosts of Monday’s two final leadership debates in Tasmania’s state election are in keeping with the contradictions at play in its politics: one the Tasmanian Council of Social Services (TasCOSS), the other Sky News.
TasCOSS doesn’t beat around the bush with its acknowledgment of country — acknowledging, among others, Tasmania’s original tribes wiped out by “brutal invasion” — before a distinctly 2021 sort of event. It’s conducted online, with Premier Peter Gutwein, Labor leader Rebecca White, Greens leader Cassy O’Connor, TasCOSS CEO Adrienne Picone and a tireless AUSLAN interpreter all tiled on the screen like The Brady Bunch.
The audience has to mute and turn off their cameras, so of course we get a series of latecomers through the early questions, appearing and looming in the centre of the screen obliviously — I imagine the office manager who put this together screaming: “Turn off your fucking camera, Noeleen!” — sometimes for minutes before realising what’s happened.
Read more about the impending Tasmanian election…
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