Bligh shows her true form - lie, lie and then lie some more to the people of SEQ ...

Finally, the main stream press comes to the same conclusion formed by the blogs over 18 months ago - the local and state government authorities in Qld will do anything and say anything to force people to adopt their preferred water source options.

People expect politicians to lie. In fact, Premier Beattie legislated so that it is a legitimate past-time of government members in Parliament. However, the electorate is still shocked when a politician is caught out - as Deputy Premier Bligh has been caught red-faced with deceiving the people of Qld.

Any remaining credibility with the electorate is now in tatters. And with the CMC angry at her dismissive comments and breathing down her neck, how long is her place as Deputy Premier assured?

Excerpt from the Courier Mail:

Lies, dam lies and statistics

14 May 2007

It was a fascinating week, watching Kevin Rudd trying to seize and hold the middle economic ground without appearing to be John Howard with hair and Peter Costello without the smirk. Hallowed Labor planks are being prised from the party platform and jettisoned by the day as anything seen as an impediment to the ascension of St Kevin to the great tabernacle which is The Lodge is cast aside.

In Queensland, however, there are some Labor Party traditions which shall be forever cherished and one of these has been to "vote early and vote often", a strategy still embraced, it is said, in some party branches to ensure that one of the "mates" is endorsed.

It is an exhortation which would seem to have been heard by persons unknown within the State Government when National Party MP Rob Messenger posted an online poll seeking opinions on the construction of the divisive Traveston Crossing dam.

Messenger could reasonably have expected that those facing resumption of their properties would dominate the voting and skew it against the Beattie Government's plan.

How surprised he must have been when his modest little exercise in public opinion sampling showed that 85 per cent of the respondents to the survey thought the dam was the most marvellous project ever conceived.

He had barely had time to digest this news when Deputy Premier Anna Bligh all but tripped over the hem of her frock in her haste to leap to her feet in State Parliament and spruik the results of the Messenger poll.

"The result of that poll – which polled 537 people – is 85 per cent of the people who replied said yes, they support the Beattie Government," she cried triumphantly. At this point Messenger must have chastised himself for not following the practice of Queensland governments of the past 150 years which has been never to conduct a poll, survey or referendum unless you load the questions asked to guarantee the result you want.

As he sat and pondered this, Messenger's nostrils began to twitch. He could smell something and it wasn't the Deputy Premier and Infrastructure Minister's perfume. It was a rat.

There was something definitely odd about the result and how did Bligh almost seem to know in advance that his innovative little online poll which he had hoped would highlight opposition to the dam site had imploded?

Guided by his intuition, Messenger engaged technicians to find out if there was anything untoward in the responses to his poll.

It did not take them long to find the source of the rodent-like odour which was bothering him, for 175 of the votes lodged in favour of the dam site had come from three computer addresses within the State Government.

One was located in the third level of the Executive Building in George St, the same floor occupied by Bligh's Infrastructure Department. Imagine that?

Bligh has subjected her staff to the Beattie eyeball test – the one where you ask them if they have transgressed and if they say they haven't, you believe them.

The legal system is yet to embrace this test and persists with judges and juries but I'm sure it's but a matter of time before it realises its worth.

Bligh's staff pleaded innocence so apparently the computers whirred into life and voted 175 times without being guided by human hands. The minister's initial reaction when confronted by Messenger's rat was to dismiss it as an example of some unknown person's stupidity.

When the stakes began to rise, she tried the dismissive approach, saying a complaint made to the Crime and Misconduct Commission was "laughable".

She then took a swipe at the CMC for bothering to investigate the claims, saying it should be out there "fighting crime", all of which tends to overlook the most important element of the entire issue and it is this: Has the Government become so arrogant that ministerial staffers think it's acceptable to manipulate a poll and then present the falsified results to their minister to trumpet in Parliament?

If they would do this, what else would they do to advance the Government's cause?

Where do the cheating, duplicity and lying stop?