Talk:Tony Catanzariti

Funding of Oakeshott and McGrane

Re the sentence referring to payments to Oakeshott and Mcgrane:

• Is this sentence included in this article purely to provide context to the Catanzariti allegation, or is it suggested that Catanzariti organised these payments and/or knew about them?
• If the latter, what evidence is there for this claim? The footnoted article does not make this link.
• If it is purely to provide context, given that Catanzariti has denied that he offered payment to Neville, does its inclusion in an otherwise very short article give rise to 'guilt by association' and imply that Catanzariti is lying?

As you can possibly gather, I am contemplating whether the sentence should remain in the article. I am posting this here rather than simply removing the sentence to seek consensus.

Comments welcome from anyone who has read WP:AGF, WP:CIVIL and WP:MASTODON. Jeendan 02:47, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

You know I had to read WP:MASTODON to post here. My reasoning in adding this information is that given Labor's track record of supporting independent campaigns, the allegation against Catanzariti rises above the level of the usual campaign scuttlebutt. This was no doubt the reason for the source, the SMH, to include the two pieces of information together, even though any support to the late Tony McGrane must have stopped a while ago. I wouldn't have thought readers would see Catanzariti as being implicated in the Oakeshott/McGrane funding... but if that's unclear, a couple of words to spell that out would solve the problem. Joestella 06:02, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

Everyone should read WP:MASTODON. I think I will link it to my user page. I'm happy with the current wording of this article. Jeendan 21:05, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

I propose to remove this sentence from the article. It has little relevance to Tony Catanzariti, except that the incident is mentioned in the same SMH article that is used as the reference for the other material on this article. If anyone feels it is relevant, they can add it to the Oakshott or McGrane pages, but I fail to see its relevance here. Recurring dreams 01:33, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

You should read the discussion above first. The question to be answered by both this article and that in the SMH's is "does this rise above the level of the usual campaign scuttlebutt?" The sentence you removed does this. Joestella 01:41, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I have read the above discussion, and my criticism stands. The allegations themselves and the given reference should provide enough information to allow the reader to decide whether this "does this rise above the level of the usual campaign scuttlebutt." It is not our place to make such judgements.Recurring dreams 01:51, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Only the reader can form a judgement as to whether the wider context is a sufficient answer. But without the sentence you keep removing, the reader may conclude that Wikipedia was being used for campaign-trail name-calling. And nobody wants that. Joestella 02:05, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

During the 2007 election campaign, the opposition National Party of Australia accused Catanzariti of offering to fund independent candidate Mike Neville's campaign for the Nationals-held seat of Murrumbidgee.

Catanzariti admitted he had suggested Neville stand for the seat, but denied that funding had been offered or provided. Neville was easily defeated in Murrumbidgee by sitting Nationals MP Adrian Piccoli.

I don't see how this can lead the reader to think "Wikipedia was being used for campaign-trail name-calling." It is simply documenting an incident that occurred in NPOV language, with an adequate reference provided. Please point out how the reader can form a biased judgement from these statements. Recurring dreams 02:10, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

Simple. The Coalition accused Labor of supporting indies, which is counter-intuitive. Labor denied it. This is the sort of flash-in-the-pan controversy that normally gets forgotten soon after and is reasonably dismissed as unencyclopaedic. See the campaign trail article history for examples of such stories we ended up deleting. The fact that such allegations were proved in other seats shows that this is no ordinary campaign-trail attack, it seems to have more substance.

So now you tell me, what's wrong with keeping it? Joestella 04:52, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

If you believe there are wider allegations about the ALP supporting indies, then please document them in the general election article. However I don't believe information about Oakshott and McGrane belong in this article. "The fact that such allegations were proved in other seats shows that this is no ordinary campaign-trail attack, it seems to have more substance." If it is not an ordinary campaign trail attack (and where's the evidence for this?), then the reader should be able to make the assessment from the article, and the source given. You seem to be trying to replicate the structure of the referenced article, "ALP banks on a state of independents," which is itself an article on the general issue of the ALP supporting indies. The wider issue belongs in the general election campaign article, not this page.Recurring dreams 07:57, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I understand where you're coming from, but we're talking about a small amount of contextual information that, so far as I can see, does not detract from the article. Joestella 16:33, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Instead of mentioning individuals, perhaps add a phrase like in the context of allegations against Labor of supporting independants in rural areas? That's poorly worded, I'm sure you can do better. Recurring dreams 01:32, 14 April 2007 (UTC)