Jeremy Cordeaux does not often tell a premier he has got it wrong quite so plainly. But on this Garage edition of the Court of Public Opinion, he had a direct message for South Australia’s Peter Malinauskas, usually a politician with a sharp feel for the public mood: on the felling of Adelaide’s parkland trees, he has completely misread the room.
The Trees And The Tournament
The issue is the removal of trees in the parklands, done, as Jeremy described it, to make way for an elite golf course and an elite golf tournament, which may or may not go ahead, and what he called a MotoGP-style motorcycle race through the city streets.
Lots of people, he stressed, simply do not like it. Adelaide loves its parklands and its trees, and the sight of them being cut down for a sporting event that might not even happen has struck a nerve the Premier, in Jeremy’s view, failed to see coming.
A Rare Misjudgement
What made the episode notable, for Jeremy, was that it came from Malinauskas. He is told, he said, that the Premier is the most astute politician in the country, and while he added, with a smile, that the competition for that title is thin, he clearly regards him as usually shrewd about public sentiment.
That is what makes this misstep stand out. A leader with a normally acute political antenna has, this time, misjudged how strongly people feel about their green space. Something is wrong here, Jeremy said, and the something is a gap between what the government thinks matters and what the public actually values.
It Is Not Too Late
Unusually, Jeremy’s message came with a way out. He was not merely condemning the decision; he was urging the Premier to reconsider it. Back up, he said. It is not too late.
That framing matters. Jeremy’s point was that a good politician, having read the room wrongly, has the sense to change course before the damage sets in. The parkland trees, in his telling, are exactly the sort of issue where a government can still recover if it listens, and which hardens into a lasting grievance if it does not.
Listen To The Room
For Jeremy, the parklands row was a lesson in political humility. Voters, he argued, will forgive a great deal, but they notice when a government treats something they cherish as an obstacle to an elite event. Trees in a beloved parkland are not just landscaping; they are part of the character of a city.
His advice to the Premier was simple and, for once, almost warm: love the parklands and the trees the way the people do, and reconsider while there is still time. Read the room, Jeremy suggested, and a misjudgement becomes a chance to rebuild trust rather than lose it.
Listen To The Full Episode
Catch the complete Garage edition of The Court of Public Opinion, recorded live around the dining room table.
Watch The Full Episode
The Court of Public Opinion streams live every Friday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. (ACST), right here at jeremycordeaux.com. Download the podcast anytime on your favourite podcast app, and join the conversation with your calls and comments.
