The column that has fun with the smaller mistakes and missteps of Australia’s mainstream mediocre; that pays homage to those sweet little fishes that individually don’t amount to a full meal but collectively can cause a tummy upset over the overall state of the once great and noble craft of journalism in this country.

This column has always appreciated the ability of Channel 9 Brisbane state political reporter Tim Arvier to give credit where credit’s due.

In last night’s report on the Queensland Budget, Arvier dutifully ran through a whole heap of government initiatives in a big cash splash across many areas, with the state treasurer Cameron Dick pointing out the Budget was a “reflection of the hard work of all Queenslanders”.

But Arvier quickly added: ” … but Queenslanders also have coal mining to thank for the payments – the state’s record $12.3 billion surplus driven by more than $15 billion in coal royalties.”

And it’s true. As Arvier pointed out, a tiered royalties system meant that the more mining giants made, the greater the cut for Queensland. Those additional royalties were already more than $10 billion ahead of forecasts.

The only criticism Mediocre Bytes might make is this: if Arvier thinks the industry deserves thanks for its hefty contribution, did he perhaps not have a duty to disclose that the Queensland Resources Council on that industry’s behalf has been fighting tooth and nail for months now, with a widespread advertising program predicting widespread job losses in the coal industry if the government persists with the scheme?

Should Queensland really be thanking an industry that has been crying blue murder and who had no desire whatsoever to fork over any additional money above what they were already and most likely unhappily used to paying?

Arvier last night once again gave the council’s spokesperson, the gravel-voiced Ian Macfarlane plenty of air time to press that exact case: that the Palaszczuk government royalties decision have “put the golden goose on its last legs”.

And he almost sounded disappointed when he added that the treasurer “does look like winning this one against the mining companies”, seeing the effects of any coal mining job losses might not be felt until after the next state election. What a devious, cunning, state Labor government!

Mediocre Bytes will stick with the view that it’s only the State Government who should be thanked for the royalties windfall. The mining industry wanted no part of it.

And would it be churlish on this column’s part in thinking that there’s nothing too much wrong in a State Government grabbing what it can off an industry that’s dying anyway?

To get some much-needed cash to address horrific cost of living pressures on so many Queenslanders?

***

Arvier’s piece also gives us another chance to have a dig at that absurd Nine News design feature it has now persevered with for months: filling the entire screen with a map of a reporter’s location, and then repeating the map in the corner of the reporter’s cross, no matter how useless the map is in locating anything, really.

We’ve had it used for obscure courthouses, small towns in norf queensland, road crashes in the country, suburban cop chases of youth offenders, etc, etc. They rarely make any sense at all or help in any real way of identifying the scribe’s location.

You’ve got to admire Nine’s tenacity in keeping a laughably flawed visual gimmick that we so wrongly predicted would be ditched by the end of the first week.

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