https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/lining-their-pockets-salvos-fired-over-brisbane-s-new-housing-strategy-20230831-p5e0w5.html
Brisbane City Council has been accused of lining developers’ pockets in its latest attempt to increase housing supply, with warnings ratepayers would pay the cost of discounts in major project infrastructure charges.
That headline confused me, I thought the Salvation Army had been given the job of managing the housing strategy and they were being fired for corruption!
They're reducing infrastructure charges by 75%, not that long after they were whinging in Council about how the State Government had capped what the infrastructure charges were allowed to be.
To quote Elizabeth Watson-Brown, federal Member for Ryan:
Remember this next time Council says ‘oh sorry we don’t have budget for that new bus route’, ‘we can’t afford that upgrade to your skate park’, ‘there’s no money for expanded public parkland’.
I read the article and I still don't understand what a "salvo" is? The Greens are right though, this isn't going to benefit anyone except the developers.
Its technical meaning is:
a series of shots by an artillery battery with each gun firing one round in turn after a prescribed interval
But derived from that is its common usage outside of military contexts. Particularly in the phrase "opening salvo", which means:
the first in a series of questions, statements etc that you use to try to win an argument
It's that usage which is being used here, only not necessarily with the "opening" part.