“Australians have a great piece of vernacular once commonly applied to someone who talks a big game but never delivers on it...bullshit artist, but it’s a term we don’t use so much anymore”

@NickFeik⁩ shows why it applies to ⁦ @ScottMorrisonMP⁩ https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2020/october/1601474400/nick-feik/announcement-artist

Example 1 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced a Covid plan in March: “the Australian Government will be responsible for residential aged care facilities”

654 aged care residents have now died. “Counsel assisting the Royal Commission Peter Rozen QC disputed there even was a plan.”

Example 2 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced a $1 billion fund for tourism in March. The fund never appeared.

“...the $1 billion fund became a ‘not tourism’ $1 billion fund,” Margy Osmond, head of the peak tourism industry group, told the Senate’s #CovidCommittee

Example 3 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced on 15 March that cruise ships would arrive under “bespoke arrangements that we put in place directly under the command of the Australian Border Force to ensure that the relevant protections are put in place”.

4 days later: #RubyPrincess

Example 4 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced on 30 March the $130bn JobKeeper program, “the biggest stimulus package on the nation’s history.

Courtesy of a $60 billion “administrative error”, JobKeeper also became the nation’s biggest ever accounting mistake.”

Example 5 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced on April 2 “free childcare for all!

That ended in July after barely two months, when childcare workers were also left high and dry – most were excluded from JobKeeper.”

Example 6 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced on 26 April a smartphone app for tracing the spread of infection, COVIDSafe. It was our ticket to freedom!

To date the app is plagued with problems, doesn’t work very well, & the NSW Opal card has identified more contacts than the app.

Example 7 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced in May the “JobMaker” program - some sort of unspecified collaboration with the states to create jobs.

Months later, no one in Dept of Employment could tell the Senate #CovidCommittee what JobMaker is, who is in charge or what it does.

Example 8 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced National Cabinet in May

“Within weeks, premiers & Commonwealth ministers were taking pot shots at each other...the prime minister’s office was backgrounding....and aged-care & quarantine responsibilities were universally disavowed.”

Example 9 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced HomeBuilder in June “to support 140,000 direct jobs & another 1,000,000 related jobs in the residential construction sector.

Expecting 27,000 applicants “by mid August it had received only 247 applications & had not paid out a single cent.”

Example 10 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced “a $250 million arts rescue package in June

but it didn’t have guidelines or application forms until mid August, and no money would be disbursed until November at the earliest.“

Example 11 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced a $1500 pandemic leave payment for workers without sick leave – initially for Victorians, but said he’d give it to others states if they asked for it.

They did. Scotty said no.

Example 12 - @ScottMorrisonMP announced in August he had “locked in a coronavirus vaccine deal” with AstraZeneca for all Australians.

It wasn’t a deal, but rather a letter of agreement so loosely worded that AZ’s local spokesperson told the media there must be some mistake.

One thing you can say about @ScottMorrisonMP - he’s all about art of the announcement.

He talks a big game, but never delivers.

And he’s leaving millions of Australians behind.