Opinion

With election day 2007 just more than a day away, State Scene now offers a last look at what the likely outcome may be.

One of the major roles of newspapers is to shine a light on the communities they serve and highlight some of the important trends and issues.

I may be one week premature on this, but with just more than a week to go before the federal election, I thought it was worth discussing the poll.

Wall-to-wall Labor government in Australia and flat-management theory do not appear to have much in common.

State Environment Minister David Templeman has set tongues wagging after he effectively vetoed one of the final decisions handed down by acting Environmental Protection Authority chairman Barry Carbon.

This column is not about the forthcoming election, but I do have to kick off with a story about voting.

On Monday last week, Ric Stowe’s private Griffin Group released a statement claiming success for an experiment to reduce salinity levels at Wellington Dam.

It’s not often a really fascinating tip-off falls into a journalist’s lap.

There is a lot of debate about whether the state government is doing a good enough job to manage us safely through this current boom.

The word ‘sustainability’, which has entered the business lexicon in recent years, is normally applied in the context of environmental management.

Australia’s skills shortage is, for most people, a nuisance rather than a serious problem.

Whether or not Kevin Rudd – Kevin07 during the campaign – takes Labor into power on November 24, nobody will ever be able to take from him that he has managed to make a very average mob look like winners.

State Scene’s $20 Ozcall rechargeable phone card worked overtime last weekend.

The Corruption and Crime Commission released its report on the controversial Canal Rocks development near Yallingup last week.

Business, if opinion polls are a guide, reckons a Rudd win at the November 24 election will be bad for the economy.Rubbish.

With the federal election campaign officially under way, the business community should start planning for the prospect of a Labor government in Canberra.

With so many of State Scene’s leftie mates looking increasingly dour as election day approaches, I’ve felt compelled to reconsider my long-held view that Labor will form the next government.

Spending on minerals exploration in Western Australia has grown strongly in the past financial year.

The Construction Mining Forestry & Energy Union’s Western Australian boss, Kevin Reynolds, said something the other day that intrigued me.

Several years ago, nearly all of State Scene’s left and right-of-centre political pals and contacts suddenly began using the term ‘urban legend’.

A friend bought a pair of shoes last week.

“A coordinated approach to common-user infrastructure development and stakeholder relations is vital to unlock the full potential of Australia’s fastest growing new iron ore province.”

This month, a page two advertisement in The West Australian, paid for by the WA Labor Party, carried a head and shoulders photograph of Liberal MP Julie Bishop, alongside a headline that read: “Is she staying? Or is she going…”

A few weeks ago I wrote about the big plans the City of Perth has and how frustrated many councillors are about any perceptions they are to blame for the current inactivity.

The price of wheat is at an all-time high, the share price of AWB Ltd (once known as the Australian Wheat Board) is at an all-time low. Why is this so?

Hats off to the Local Government Managers’ Association for pushing the debate on local government reform in a positive and constructive manner.

Regular viewers of the ABC’s Sunday morning program, Insiders, will have noted that two occasional guest commentators – Sydney’s Daily Telegraph and Melbourne’s Herald-Sun columnists, Piers Akerman and Andrew Bolt, respectively – long ago conceded Labor w

Just how important is Perth in the scheme of things?

Since about April, when Liberal strategists began realising they were unlikely to shake-off Kevin Rudd as easily as initially anticipated, they’ve resorted to using a new phrase.

There have been many headlines in recent weeks about foreign investment in Australia, especially with so many key foreign leaders in Sydney for last week’s Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting.

Inverse yields in the money market are a telltale sign of a future recession and are high on the watch list of US economists.

The annual survey of major resource and infrastructure projects featured in this week’s WA Business News provides plenty of support for those who have a ‘stronger for longer’ view on the state’s economic outlook.