farmdoc's blog post number 675

The State of Victoria has fixed 4-year electoral terms. Thus, unless the 2010 Federal election’s held on Saturday 27 November, this’ll be the date of the next Victorian election. That’s about eight months after the Sunday 28 March date of the 2010 Australian F1 Grand Prix – which is a mere 32 days from today. Last Saturday Peter Logan, media officer of Save Albert Park, kindly copied me in on his letter to State and Federal politicians. I’ve edited his letter thus:

The Grand Prix problems for Victoria are getting worse. With the costs out of control and the loss of the naming rights sponsor, we’ll be hearing more about this problem in this election year. Since it came to Victoria in 1996, the event has clocked up an operating loss each year, to a total of A$204.36M. The GP Corporation’s annual reports show, damningly, that the taxpayer costs far exceed the reported operating losses. Save Albert Park claims total taxpayer support of the 2009 F1 Grand Prix alone was A$86.6M.

What an economic disaster the Australian F1 GP is. Environmental and social too. And the cruellest irony is that the politicians continue to obliviously shrug off rational criticism and obliviously hype the event up. It’d be Grand if the voters got rid of these Prix come 27 November. But I’m too old and wise to think they will, The Wisdom of Crowds notwithstanding. Ho hum.