“For months the most powerful man in Victoria stood aside as Premier after suffering horrendous injuries. Today Michael Warner investigates that fall and reveals…THE STEPS THAT TOOK DOWN A PREMIER" - Sunday Herald Sun, 5 November 2022.

Daniel Andrews led Labor to a third term of government in Victoria last weekend, despite a sustained campaign of vicious vilification by the Murdoch press.

We need only examine one image, in one article, to see what an epic fail News Corp makes of political journalism.

On the 5th of November, the bottom feeding Sunday Herald Sun splashed on the front page an old story about Daniel Andrews being injured when he fell down some stairs at a rental holiday house. When it happened months before, the newspaper and Sky News spun it that: a) he wasn't really injured, b) it was to attract sympathy, c) he wanted more time off, d) the stairs weren’t that dangerous, or all the above. In short, they accused him of lying about the extent of the injury.

If you run a design eye over the images of the steps / stairs published in the newspaper they appear to be poorly designed, poorly made, possibly dangerous and how plausible a fall could be, one that could cause serious injury to a fifty-year-old, even on a small flight of stairs.

The issue is both code compliance and construction.

Two or more risers is considered a ‘flight’ and must meet certain standards. All risers must it be equal in height, between 115 and 190mm, goings (or treads) between 240 and 355mm. From the images (without access to the property with a measuring tape in hand) the design seems to fail: unequal risers and narrow treads. It all seems marginal, especially when the steps connect to a deck and a main door of the house.

The construction also seems dubious. The treads appear to be made from dressed CCA (copper / chrome / arsenate) radiata pine, a porous material that holds dirt and becomes slippery. Any architect or designer could have confirmed that the steps were potentially dangerous, the author only had to ask.

But no, the newspaper plowed on, converting a spurious fiction into an absurd conspiracy theory.

The dodgy steps highlight another design issue the paper missed altogether: the danger of unregulated short term rental properties. Unlike ‘Class 3’ hotels, motels and the like, where standards must be inspected and maintained, there is no quality control in private holiday rentals.

There is a huge discrepancy between the gig economy and the regulated economy. No commercial resort would dare have such a sloppy design and workmanship, yet thousands of private rental properties blithely carry on with dangerous designs.

The Murdoch muck was intended to deflect from real issues, a key one of which is the ‘housing crisis’, raised by Labor and the Greens in their policies. The newly re-elected premier would be wise to take a cold hard look at the way short-term rental housing (Airbnb style) has greatly exacerbated the availability of regular long-term rental. Owners of multiple houses are chasing ‘get-rich-quick’ profits at the expense of the poor in our society.

Maybe the enforcement of standards and regulations, with inspections and penalties, onto privately owned houses used as short-term rental, will bring a level playing field to holiday accommodation. Now that would be an improvement in Victoria’s housing policies, and ensure some good comes from the spurious story of Dan’s stair slip.

Tone Wheeler is an architect / the views expressed are his / contact at toneontuesday@gmail.com

Tone Wheeler

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