Long before the Convention Centre and The Belltower, the brunt of ugly Perth comments were taken by Parliament House. I went up there to look at it again close-up for The Worst of Perth this week. It is a beautiful building, restrained and composed with a very nice use of the light stone. The inside is a different matter, as the chambers look like tatty lounge rooms. However, what people usually mean when they say “Parliament House is ugly”, is the unbelievably horrible concrete fountain out the front, which obscures and distracts from the building itself. My father, (and I believe many others) always referred to it as the “Parliament House toilets overflowing.” I didn’t even get that, as the people’s cistern was dry as… well you know how dry. Adding this to category vanished worst, as the beautiful tree pictured has been chopped down.