Election speculation #742: An AEC worker from the north coast told me today that bookings had been made for polling sites for September 25.

Hughie’s move on Albo. Labor Party hacks in Queensland are furious union dinosaur, Transport Workers Union branch secretary Hughie Williams, has enlisted National Party leader Warren Truss to assist him in an attack on federal transport minister and so-called factional ally, Anthony Albanese, over an upgrade to the highway in Gympie. With a federal election around the corner, some hacks think Williams is showing his senility by boosting the former roads minister over a road Truss himself refused to upgrade in 2005.

Not content to let it end there, Williams and son Greg were pictured in today’s Gympie Times with a grinning Truss, along with Liberal Party state MP David Gibson. Williams has refused to take the party’s calls over the issue and is fast losing whatever support he has had left.

Qantas’ paper trail. I work for a government department and we use Qantas for travel. Since they married themselves to AMEX, every month we now get a nine-page invoice, even if the balance is zero. Multiply this times however many separate accounts times however many departments, agencies and non-government organisations in the country and you get a whopping great waste of paper and lots of dead trees. As the national carrier, Qantas should do better for the environment, don’t you think?

The airport security holes. When travelling domestically in Europe or North America, there are checks on things such as your ID, and the bits and the liquids you’re planning on taking on board. Not so in Australia if last week’s flying from Sydney to Brisbane and back is any indication. Book online, check in online, collect boarding pass, through security and onto the plane without anyone verifying who I might be. Heading through security in Brisbane, with the same lack of ID checks, I whipped out my bag of liquid bits and the security guard said: “Don’t worry, we only check that if you’re flying international.” And yet we’re terrified of a threat offered by a blunt knife being wielded in the cabin …