I’d like to start by offering my condolences, and surely those of all who read this to Bruce Nicholson whose father passed away earlier this week.

I don’t know anything about Bruce’s dad except that he raised a son who was willing to put up his hand to stand for political office - something that's not easy and that most of us will never do. My thoughts and prayers (and no doubt yours) go out to Bruce and his family at this time.

With that in mind, we might keep it a bit light here today.

You may remember that I’ve mentioned a few times (at the beginning of the campaign and again last week) that I wanted to deduct points from anyone mentioning that Hume was bigger than Belgium.

I raised that point mostly because that phrase copped a flogging in the last federal election. Strangely I don’t remember hearing it in previous federal elections… maybe we can thank Wikipedia for that fact.

But why Belgium? I mean, nothing against the Belgians (the Belge?). They make great chocolate so I’m predisposed to loving them from the get-go. It’s just that there are so many other places that Hume can be compared to.

With that in mind, my research staff (ok, some colleagues here at the Post – I have no staff) and myself also had a look at Wikipedia and with that and the aid of a calculator we can pass on that Hume is, after all:

- slightly bigger than the African nation of Lesotho

- the size of the European nation of Moldova

- the size of the Hainan Province of China

- the size of Juliet, an inner moon of the planet Uranus

- one third the size of Tasmania

- 14 times the size of the ACT

 - the size of 4,671,805 rugby fields

Now, what you choose to do with that information is up to you… I just wanted to let you know that we are leaving no stone unturned in bringing you the most thorough information about Hume while fighting our never-ending war against clichés (and yep, I know the whole “stone unturned” thing is a cliché… but you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette… dammit, there I go again).

So keeping it brief this week, there were two press releases – one from James Harker-Mortlock and one from Angus Taylor – each relating to petitions for improvements to the Barton Highway. Two different petitions to be exact. Angus refers to the Yass Valley Council’s petition, while JHM’s is a petition of his own.

It’s hard to figure out exactly what to say there. A petition is a good and appropriate step for the Barton. Two on the other hand may be confusing and counter-productive. I don’t know if “the more the merrier” works when it comes to rival petitions.

Maybe it’s just a case of great minds thinking alike. I don't know if the Council, or JHM, came up with the idea first. In the absence of that information (and without trying to assign blame) perhaps the best course of action might be one unified petition with united support. In any event, it’s an attempt to address a genuine and significant problem, so kudos from that perspective.

So that’s press releases for the week.

Itineraries… and for once it’s not just Angus who has submitted an itinerary. James has also sent one in – mind you it’s a bit lengthy because it goes back a ways but since I haven’t been specific about what info to include, I’ll take the blame and run the lot.

In general, what we’re looking for in the itinerary is what you will be doing in the net week or what you have done in the past week… possibly both. Some candidate have concerns about giving a heads up on their plans to opponents… and I guess I can understand that even though personally I’d love to be able to bring our readers  the candidate’s calendar for the coming week.

Anyways, that’s up to them… from next week we’ll just include the week in review and the week in preview in that section.

King of the week? I do like to reward improvement so for (finally) submitting an itinerary and for a press release, JHM can wear the crown this week. Incidentally, does someone have a spare crown lying around the house they aren’t using? No? Just a thought.

So that’s it for now. Have a good week, cuddle your family, and we’ll see you in 7 days.

Oh yeah… 29 weeks to go.

PRESS RELEASES:

ANGUS TAYLOR (Liberal Party)

- Yass Valley Council petition on Barton Highway

JAMES HARKER-MORTLOCK (Independent)

- Petition on Barton Highway

ITINERARY:

ANGUS TAYLOR (Liberal Party)

Sat Feb 16. Taylor family participated in Macarthur Cystic Fibrosis Swim-a-thon at Wollondilly Leisure Centre.

Sun Feb 17: Angus Taylor at Gunning Show

JAMES HARKER-MORTLOCK (Independent)

Fri Feb 1: Attended funeral of long serving and very well respected National Party member and friend, Graeme Drew, in Cowra.

Mon Feb 4: Attended and spoke at Local Land Serviced meeting in Yass.

Sat Feb 9 & Sun Feb 10: Manned tent at Crookwell Show – great feedback from locals.

Mon Feb 11: Canberra, policy development.

Tues Feb 12: Grenfell visiting shops and talking to locals plus attending Local Land Services meeting.

Wed Feb 13: Campaign Committee meeting.

Friday Feb 15: Cootamundra – policy development re rail/freight and visiting local shops and talking to locals.

Sun Feb 17: Manned tent at Gunning Show. Local issues discussed.

Tues Feb 19: Queanbeyan – met with Regional Development South East Inland in regard to connectivity issues in the region.

Wed Feb 20: Delivered petition calling for the duplication of the Barton Highway to locations where people can sign the petition in Yass, Murrumbateman, Gundaroo, Gunning, Bowning, Bookham, Binalong, Galong and Boorowa.