News Corp has gone on the attack against the thrice-elected Queensland Labor premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk. The conservative media outfit spent last weekend aggressively promoting claims she is “more interested in treading the red carpet than knuckling down to the grind of governing”.
The story first appeared in the Australian on Saturday – quoting Labor “insiders” who went stubbornly unnamed. It was then picked up by the Courier Mail, news.com.au and Sky News, who added various levels of their own reporting, but all repeated the key allegations from the Oz: Palaszczuk had “checked out”, becoming “part-time premier” as she attended ever more “red carpet events”. Stories included a photographic parade of the premier in colourful attire, some accompanied by her new partner wearing a bright suit. A super-dooper-scientific poll asked: “Do you think Annastacia Palaszczuk has checked out?”
