IN response to State Scene's column of October 2, 'Bailing out for a soft landing', a reader has suggested something should be done to stop the ongoing practice of politicians vacating their seats after general elections.
SINCE I wrote my piece on Tony Sage a few weeks ago, two of his companies - Cape Lambert Iron Ore Ltd and International Goldfields Ltd - have lodged annual reports.
SO far, so good...in fact, better than expected.
The Barnett-Nationals partnership government seems to have comfortably ensconced itself into power, which means those big white chauffeur-driven ministerial automobiles now have new passengers.
IT'S not surprising a clever wordsmith some decades ago suggested using skydiving terminology to colourfully describe an increasingly widespread political practice.
IT'S difficult when assessing elections not to immediately reach for statistics - size of swings, percentage of preferences gained by parties, levels of various majorities, and other such measures that help assess how well or how badly parties and candida
THE formal swearing-in this week of the Barnett ministry marks the start of what should be an exciting period of government in Western Australia, though there will be no shortage of tough challenges.
THERE are many things likely to change following the recent state election, not just as a result of a new government but also due to the circumstances in which it took power.
TEN-YEAR government bonds effectively set a risk-free rate of return for investors, since these government-backed securities guarantee an investor's initial capital investment.
WHILE critics have been quick to jump on the Labor-bashing bandwagon after the state election, there hasn't been much reflection on some of the strategic challenges that will face the next state government, whoever leads it.
THE standout feature of Saturday's panic-driven premature election was that neither Alan Carpenter nor Colin Barnett pulled their party over the line to govern Western Australia in their own right.
As so often happens in the unpredictable hurly-burly of party political rivalry, while you're looking one way there's something happening elsewhere that's at least equally, and often far more, important.
Western Australia is in the middle of a once-in-a-generation boom, but you'd struggle to know that if you had closely followed the state election campaign.
Long-time State Scene readers may recall advice offered in this column to the Gallop government back in May 2002 on the best way to administer the then-emerging but now blossoming lobbying industry.
With three Liberal leaders - Matt Birney, Paul Omodei, and Troy Buswell - humiliatingly dumped since Colin Barnett's resignation after his failed bid to oust Labor's Geoff Gallop in 2005 - the Liberals have Mr Barnett again leading them.
In halls of power around the world, some very worried politicians and public servants are beginning to realise that peak oil production is real and it is happening right now.
After each federal election, State Scene scans the new ministerial line-up to see if any political maddies were appointed to head the foreign affairs and defence ministries.
Labor's most recent factional fracas over who will contest the safe seat of Morley - former ministerial rising star John D'Orazio or TV reporter Reece Whitby - had several interesting twists before Mr D'Orazio rejoined the ALP and then resigned to contest
With Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in danger of being dubbed 'Media Stunt Kev' due to his obsessive releasing of pie-in-the-sky plans, it's encouraging that one of his ministers has his feet firmly on the ground and a clear vision of how things should be acro
