Former assistant health minister Tony Stewart was today blocked by the Supreme Court from continuing a legal challenge against the NSW Government.
Stewart was sacked from cabinet after allegedly touching and verbally abusing a staff member. He denied the allegations and launched legal actions against the Government for firing him.
The court ruling is being spun as a “win” for Premier Nathan Rees. My opinion is that any relief Rees will feel from winning the court case will be outweighed by the resurgence of the Tony Stewart fiasco in the minds of the public.
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Alas poor Tony – will the State of New South Wales seek costs against the plaintiff ? If not on what basis will it decide not to recover its costs?
Good question! Frank Sartor was on Stateline tonight suggesting that the Government was out to get him. He looked a bit stunned when Quentin Dempster reminded him that he was a member of the Government.
Oz how about these Rees its tough but I am hanging in there interviews with the SMH and the Australian? Any comments?
Watched that Stateline interview with Sartor – he kept saying that Quentin should ask the Government about the Catherine Hill Bay stuff – like he wasn’t part of the Govt. I did think he gave a spirited defence of his position, but it didn’t diminsh the smell of donations for development.
As to Rees hanging in there – I don’t think he’s got much of a choice, and neither does NSW Labor. The cupboard is pretty bare for both Ministers and Premier aspirants, so Rees needs to “hang in there”, get a few runs on the board and hope things improve by March 2011. They will point to things like the Iron Cove Bridge Duplication being built as an “achievement” (even if it costs them Verity’s seat). As Stateline made the point – they might not be winning in the opinion polls, but they still have an 11 seat majority in the Assembly (yeah, lets not talk about their problems in the Council!).
Pat Hills, I’m still trying to get my head around the fact that the loss of the Health Minister (arguably the most competent minister in government, though not saying much) and a former minister contemplating continuing to take legal action against the government are being spun as “wins” for Rees.
The interviews seemed to be more of the same. Eg:
“Why did you scrap the north-west rail links?”
“We replaced it with more buses…”