Tag Archives: Morrison

Australian Politics

Morrison’s economic plans reflect his lack of life experience

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While he plans to line the pockets of his mates and the wealthy with ridiculous tax-cuts, we have all read the reports that, with the cuts to Jobseeker and Jobkeeper, Morrison and his sorry acolyte Frydenburg, will be throwing millions of Australians into poverty, and even hunger.

Poverty seems more palatable, pardon the pun, but hunger? Are we really being led by people who think it is in any way acceptable to deny children, single mothers, the unemployed, (whether it is their own fault or not) the disabled, and even those who do not own a house to go hungry? Let us not forget homelessness, either. The pandemic economy will not be kind to the poor, deserving or not.

Scott Morrison lacks the intellect, the life experience and the character to lead this country, during a time when we need to rely on government.

It has already started to bite

I volunteer for a food-bank type operation in regional Victoria. During the short period when the Jobseeker payment was double its previous amount, the food-bank saw a drop in demand. It has now shot up again, because of the cuts; people have had to ask again for help, if they want their children, and themselves, to eat properly.

If we picture Morrison we see a man who has apparently never missed a meal in his life. We see a man so pleased with himself that the smirk may well be permanent. Criticise him for a lack of empathy, and he wants to know who will fund it. Ask how his supposedly Christian faith allows him to visit cruelty so casually on the weak, and he answers that the Bible is not a policy handbook.

Have you ever wondered if he ever had a real job, where he maybe made things that people wanted? Did he start at the bottom, or was it all handed to him? Did he develop a range of skills which would prepare him for running a country? Let us investigate.

All his jobs have been meaningless

Morrison seems to have been a manager all his life. He may have been born wearing a suit and tie. His list of jobs is interesting. He seems to have gone into every job at the top, or if not, just close enough to make the boss nervous. The jobs were not connected to making anything. He has not run a business, nor has he risked an investment in his own business. He is a classic member of the managerialist class.

So he has worked for the Property Council of Australia, a lobby group for property developers. He then moved into tourism, here and in New Zealand. When working in that sector, he left a string of disappointed colleagues behind him, amid stories of ruthless ambition and endless politicking. He has made something of a habit of causing trouble with the organisations which employ him, while relentlessly scheming to advance his career. He then departs, abruptly.

Next stop the Liberal Party, where he became the State Director. Such a meteoric rise, from leadership position to leadership position, without learning anything about co-operation, or collegiality, or even about that funny old thing, our society. When you run with wolves, there is little time for empathy.

Of course there were unsavoury tales surrounding his next step up the ladder. His pre-selection to Parliament was fraught. His opponent won the contest, outpolling Morrison by 80 votes to 8. The organisational wing of the Liberal Party disallowed the result, and a re-run was ordered. This had never happened before. They clearly recognised a managerialist of class, when they saw one.

How will this play out?

Back in some far off ‘golden old days’, the Liberal Party boasted members who had some form of decency, a social conscience even. The so-called Liberal ‘wets’ have been hunted out of the organisation, however, and it is now filled with neoliberal spivs. They cultivate a type of objective disdain for the less well-off, and dress it up as economic rationalism.

If you ever see the job title ‘policy director’ run away. Morrison was a policy director once, for a lobby group. Tim Wilson was a policy director for the IPA. So that is the sort of job many of the Liberal Party did before they got their big chance. And you can see how policy directors turn out!

Think tanks like the IPA don’t actually think. They import their silly ideas from the U.S. – all they have to do is unwrap them. Right wing think tanks provided Trump with his playbook. Pretty well all populist governments follow the same agenda. Increase inequality at the expense of the 99%.

Cut regulations, no matter whatever the cost. Cut welfare, except to corporations and the wealthy. Cut services, especially to indigenous communities and the aged care sector, privatise everything you can get your hands on. Ruin the environment, gut the public service while enriching multinational cartels, let the poor starve.

The worst part is that Morrison has amassed all this power at a point in history when Australia, and indeed most of the world, need real leaders. Not tin-pot dictators like Trump, Johnson and Morrison. Look at the way Morrison’s heroes have handled the pandemic. Scotty from Marketing has followed public opinion so far, but you can see him chafing at the bit to sacrifice ordinary people in the interests of business and commerce. We need to tell him that we won’t stand for being a smaller version of the failing American Empire.

As Oscar Wilde said, a cynic is a man who knows the price of everything, and the value of nothing.

Australian Politics, COVID-19

2 neo-lib clowns

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Josh Frydenburg showed his true colours during the second wave of coronavirus. He ripped into the Victorian Premier almost daily, and blamed him personally. Obviously if Daniel Andrews is in charge, and the outbreak occurred on his watch, then at some point in time, he will be held to account.

The major problem is that Andrews did a creditable job, trying to save the situation from becoming even worse. The people know there will eventually be a reckoning, but they are content to see it AFTER the crisis has passed.

Frydenburg proved himself to be as naive and gung-ho as we suspected, by allowing himself to be used as Morrison’s cats paw. Morrison knew that it was too dangerous for him to attack the Premier, because he continues with the fiction that the two of them have a good working relationship. So he rolled out the ambitious Victorian to deliver the attack.

Victorians do not like this Prime Minister, as a rule, but they tolerate him, while he is seen to be doing a passable job of leading the country. And when Victoria is being treated equitably. But Frydenburg, in his juvenile ardour, kicked Victoria, while he was kicking Andrews.

He started to harp on about the cost to the national economy, being spent on one state. That didn’t sound like we are all in this together. We all eagerly await the speedy apology from Head Office. It will probably come from the Treasurer, similar to that offered by Dan Tehan, when he railed against the Premier. Sorry, but not very.

Frydenburg showed the poverty of his neoliberal soul as well. He sounded aggrieved, as if it is his money, and Victorians are greedily sucking it away from his unlamented surplus. If there is one pleasure to be gleaned from this crisis, it is in watching the neoliberals squirm, as they spend OUR money. It goes against their grain, because these people do not really like the great unwashed. They would rather that we all suffered in silence.

He also implied that he values the economy above human life. In this he came close to joining those other beacons of callous stupidity, those leaders who have so stuffed up their responses to the pandemic that their names will live in infamy forever – Trump, Johnson, Bolsonaro. He must ensure that he does not appear on that particular list.

During some of his earlier car-crash interviews he fumed about the lack of a road-map out of lock-down. No body knew Josh! We had to wait and see, to be cautious, because as you all parrot every day, when it suits you, listen to the medical experts. Not the economists, the epidemiologists.

And while Victorians’ lives are being turned upside down, and our livelihoods decimated, he wants a plan. Sitting up in Canberra and sniping. To cover up for a Government which actually does need a plan. A plan on fixing inequality, a plan to cut greenhouse emissions, a plan to re-start the economy, a plan to house the homeless, and especially a plan to fix the Aged Care crisis, for good.

He wants to give tax cuts to businesses, while reducing the benefits to citizens, who are all facing hardship. As we know, Frydenburg and Morrison are not getting a pay cut. If you want an idea of the depth of Frydenburg’s intellect, and his commitment to Australia’s future, please study this statement:

“We are comfortable with the fact that people are accessing their money when they need it most.”

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg responds to fresh figures from the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority showing that 64 per cent of superannuation withdrawn early is going on discretionary spending and 11 per cent on gambling.

So the next time they speak about the future, you know what they are thinking. We deserve what we get, because we are a feckless lot, and if the best thing we can do is fritter away our retirement, well at least the deficit will look better. Very like the sentiment behind asset sales – let’s take the sugar hit now, and forget about the future.

“Let them eat cake!”

Australian Politics

Privatisation – who is it good for?

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Privatisation is one of those terms which politicians avoid using. That is because the public does not like the idea, or its outcomes. It can be used in a number of ways, but most of us regard it as meaning “selling off a publicly owned asset, usually to the detriment of good government”. In other words, selling off the silver.

Most politicians are unable to explain the benefits of privatisation, either because they are illusory, or because they know there are seldom any benefits. Privatisation is usually marketed as “increasing consumers’ competition and choice”. 

The stated reasons for the sale of a public asset are usually ‘increased productivity’, or ‘enhanced efficiency’, or some such other unquantifiable benefit, which might happen, in the near future. Generally it is the product of neoliberal ideology, which pushes the belief that the market will fix any problem, even when there is no problem. It also relies on the myth that private companies are more efficient than any public service. 

Although the idea of privatisation has been around for a long time, it was only when Mrs Thatcher and Ronald Reagan actually went through with it in their own countries, that the trend took off. As with most fashions, it has outstayed its welcome, but not before Australia got in on the act. 

Privatisation is unpopular

In 2016, before Scott Morrison became Prime Minister, Treasurer Morrison instructed the Productivity Commission to begin an inquiry into extending ‘competition and choice’ in the human services sector. Of course that was code for “let us privatise more of the Government’s services”.

The People’s Inquiry  People’s Inquiry into Privatisation ran parallel to the Productivity Commission Inquiry, but instead of looking into ways to further marketise and privatise public services for the benefit of business, it asked how privatisation had impacted people, their lives, and the common good.

The report concluded, from public submissions, that there were multiple faults in the process, and that the outcome was negative in most areas, and that the public did not like the idea, nor its implementation.

 Some of the findings are below, but the full report is readily available. Peoples Inquiry Report.indd

In the electricity sector there were: 

  • job losses in the electricity sector
  • increased costs for consumers
  • service disconnections  
  • profits from assets going overseas instead of going back to the public  
  • reduction in research, development and maintenance of these assets  
  • reduced investment in apprenticeships and training  
  • loss of accountability, transparency and control 

This sector, amongst many others, has been privatised to within an inch of its life. These results are of particular interest now, because the electricity sector’s problems are a large part of the reason that Angus Taylor has continued to peddle the line that high energy prices are the fault of renewables, and that taking no action to mitigate climate change will keep energy prices low. This is obviously untrue, and the privatisation of the sector is a Government own goal. There seems no way to get them out of the mess, short of admitting they were wrong. I cannot see that happening.

In the Aged Care sector the following was observed:

  • reduction in care hours  
  • reduction of staffing and skill mix 
  • profit motive outweighing delivery of quality care 
  • erosion of pay and conditions for staff 

The case of the Aged Care sector is similarly topical. It outlines, and indeed anticipates, the difficulties in the sector, post John Howard’s opportunistic ‘selling off’ of the sector in 1997. It is all there – opportunism and staff cutting, profit-taking instead of caring. The industrial relations disaster which exacerbated the second wave of Covid-19 in Victoria, has its roots here.   

The reasons why privatisation fails to deliver

Most targets of privatisation have been in the area of utilities. These can be gas, electricity, water, telephony and communications. Recently the education, health, aged care, child care, prisons, welfare and really any government function have been included. 

With such a diverse range of services targeted, it is compelling to note that the reasons for failure are common to many of them.

  1. The public utilities were nationalised originally to serve the public interest. The utilities are products and services that are essential to all members of the public. A private company, motivated by profit, is likely to close down unprofitable operations. This means that services will inevitably be cut. (Telstra removing call boxes.)
  2. Most public utilities were natural monopolies. If you, for instance, sell the water supply industry, the new suppliers will not need to compete, as each is the monopoly supplier in its area. So the quickest and easiest way to maximise profit is to shed staff. Efficiency gains will be minimal, while maintenance suffers.
  3. Governments regulate public utilities. Pollution and environmental issues are more difficult to police, as the companies operate at arm’s length.  
  4. The 1980s saw a rise in income and social inequality. This was often blamed on privatisation. The transfer of assets owned by the many (public utilities) to a small group of wealthy investors (the few) made the gap greater than it had been.
  5. One major advantage of nationalised utilities is that their size permits them to take advantage of economies of scale. Privatisation usually involves the break-up of a large entity into many smaller ones. This is not conducive to financial success, although there is a case for an agility dividend. 

There is a good reason why the public has never warmed to privatisation. It is sold as a matter of competition and or choice, which it seldom is.

It rarely delivers a dividend, because it is a figment of neoliberals’ imagination. It is not the case that the market delivers. We all know that governments need to regulate the market when it fails, because markets do fail.

As Nancy Pelosi said this week, we can’t treat the U.S. Postal Service as a business which is failing. It is a service. We as a society need services, so don’t take our services away. They are sometimes too important to lose. 

Australian Politics

Is our alliance with Trump’s America worth it?

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Almost eighty years ago Prime Minister John Curtin prepared a New Year’s Eve message for the Australian people. It was written three weeks after the war with Japan had begun. It was published in the Melbourne Herald on 27 December, 1941: 

‘Without any inhibitions of any kind, I make it quite clear that Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom.’

With this message he informed the world that Australia’s foreign policy direction must change, in response not only to the military situation with Japan, but to Australia’s location in the Pacific. From then on, he states, Australia will be proactive, the architect of her own interests. 

Australia disengaged from the ‘general war’ to concentrate on the Pacific conflict. Both Churchill and Roosevelt were surprised, and dismayed, but the die was cast. Australia survived the war, but only with massive assistance from the U.S. America has been the cornerstone of our foreign policy ever since.

Eighty years later, are Australia and the U.S. still a ‘perfect match’, or is it time to re-consider the partnership? Although America is the pre-eminent power on earth, does Australia need its protection, and secondly, does America provide said protection, and at what price? Is there a credible threat to us, or would we be more sensible to take a leaf out of New Zealand’s book, and be no-one’s enemy, and no-one’s target? It is important to look at our similarities, but also at the areas where we diverge.

Shared history, shared values?

For years, at least until President Trump was elected, there was a type of consensus that what we had in common far outweighed our differences. Recent events, particularly in America’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic, and then the Black Lives Matter protests, have thrown some doubt on that shared vision. 

Many have used the “shared history, and shared values” argument to justify our continued relationship. Others question the value for Australia, which has stood loyally by its mighty ally, through its many wars, with not much to show for the effort, except in terms of lost lives, and wasted military resources. We were never there as equal partners. 

We supported American wars whenever we were asked

Australia joined the U.S. in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the First Gulf War in Iraq, the Afghanistan War, the Second Gulf War in Iraq. When push comes to shove, Australia is expected to step forward, no questions asked. Perhaps the debt from 1941 – 1945 has been paid?

Democratic standards

Australia and the U.S. are both nominally democratic societies, and yet there is in the U.S. an active campaign to suppress the vote for minorities, and to rig elections by gerrymander. There are efforts to outlaw postal voting, even when in the midst of a pandemic. 

Australians are used to electoral matters being decided by independent umpires. We are not only encouraged to vote, but we are punished if we do not. So is America still a democracy, and worth defending?

Guns in America

Probably the most contentious right Americans possess is the right “to keep and to bear arms”. Covered by the Second Amendment, and intended to permit the personal use of arms as a defence against state tyranny, it has mutated into a violent and uncontrolled gun culture. 

In 2017, gun deaths reached their highest level since 1968, with 39,773 deaths by firearm, of which 23,854 were by suicide and 14,542 were homicides. see here  Another side of this tragedy is that suicide accounts for almost twice as many deaths as homicide. 

By comparison Australia’s gun deaths in 2017 were 189. It is incomprehensible to Australians that Americans insist on their right to kill, and to be killed. The USA had a death rate from guns, in 2017, that is effectively 14 times that of Australia.

This situation is exacerbated by the militarisation of the various state police forces, and the sheer number of mainly gun-fuelled deaths. Most of those deaths are of Black men, arguably by overzealous police. Do we share the values of a nation which practices officially sanctioned, racially based murder? 

Health system 

There is no universal healthcare in America. If you get sick in the U.S. someone has to pay, and there are tales of patients treated for Covid19 who have been charged as much as US$34,000 for testing and treatment. Estimates of costs usually range from US$9,000 to US$20,000.  

A recent study published in the American Journal of Medicine says the biggest reason for bankruptcy in the U.S. is medical debt. President Trump appears to be fixated on abolishing Obamacare, which is the closest many Americans come to being covered for illness and treatment. 

In Australia we have universal health care. Many see it as a basic human right. Some people opt for private insurance, but it is increasingly seen as a poor option, driven by elitism. The U.S. is actively pushing to remove any health insurance, and any welfare support, from its most vulnerable citizens. Do we share those values?

Is Morrison committing us to a war with China?

Recently our Prime Minister has ramped up the hysteria and the rhetoric concerning China. He even committed a sum of $270 billion to defence, which included funding for long range missiles. These are presumably to warn China that we are deadly serious about defending ourselves, militarily, against our largest trading partner. 

This can be traced back to a slavish desire, on Morrison’s part, to please Donald Trump. The President, in an attempt to divert attention away from his own criminal negligence toward handling the pandemic in America, has sought to demonise China for somehow ‘inventing’ Covid19. So by jumping on Trump’s bandwagon, Australia is going to be ‘protected’ if China reacts badly to our belligerence.

The logic behind that approach to foreign policy defies belief. If America was once a trusted ally, the Trump presidency must cause us to reconsider where we stand. A buddy this week, maybe not so much next week? We need to tread carefully until the U.S. has a leader who can be trusted, and we need to consider whether we actually do share values suited to a common future. Or is the American Empire heading toward its inevitable end? In Australian terms “have we backed the wrong horse?”

Australian Politics, Biographical

Arise Sir Tony! We’re not sure why.

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At the risk of beating the same old drum, this current Government seems to be heading steadily down the ethical and moral drain, ever since the unexpected election win. So much of the country’s malaise, however, can be traced back to the ascension of one Tony Abbott, firstly as Opposition Leader, and then, unbelievably, as Prime Minister.

As Opposition Leader

He was a surprise, because no-one believed he would ever be elected to lead anything. He was almost universally derided for his open and unashamedly pugnacious Catholicism, and his awkwardness with language, and his seeming inability to move into the 21st century. He was the polar opposite of progressive, and seen as something of a likeable dinosaur.

He had an unexpected skill, however. This special skill lay in his ability to focus on a single, simplistic theme, and then to carry the fight on, daily, against both his own moderate fellow-Liberals, but also against Julia Gillard, until the death. This ‘theme’ was the carbon price, still the best and only successful mechanism so far tried in Australia, to combat climate change. So it became his mania, and we still suffer from his short-term-ism, his willingness to throw Australia under a bus, in pursuit of his own political advancement.

He came to embody opposition; he lived the dictum of the (British) Whig Mr Tierney, “the duty of an Opposition was very simple—it was to oppose everything and propose nothing.”

He was in the right place at the right time – Kevin Rudd and Abbott, between them, destroyed Gillard’s Government, and allowed the election of Abbott, as Prime Minister.

As Prime Minister

Tony Abbott set about dismantling Australia’s pact with its citizens, from day 1. Perhaps his most unpopular act was to break an election promise NOT to cut the funding to the ABC. Of course he did, because he had warned us, back in his Opposition Leader days, that he was somewhat flexible with the truth.

Now if there is one thing Australians hold dear – it is the ABC. If you want a simple test as to whether someone despises the people of Australia, see who wants to dismantle, or hobble, or sell, or just remove funding from, the ABC. Read more about their really reprehensible moral vacuity here https://askbucko.com/2020/04/29/the-abc-is-the-latest-target/

The reason is that we all value information, and we expect it to be delivered without bias, and we don’t want Rupert Murdoch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Murdoch or Kerry Stokes to have had a say in what form, or how, it is delivered.

It is profoundly undemocratic to stifle the voice of the public broadcaster, and cutting its funding is just another way to bell the cat, to keep us all in ignorance. And it removes oversight; it allows the political class to escape scrutiny. Which in this country these days can mean all sorts of chicanery.

The list of assassins is long, and it includes people like Eric Abetz, Cory Bernardi, Simon Birmingham, Matt Canavan, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, Mitch Fifield, Bridget McKenzie, James Patterson and Anne Ruston, to name a few.

Oddly, the names are eerily similar to the list of middle aged people, who are very angry with Greta Thunberg, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greta_Thunberg because she dares to have an opinion, and because she is a leader. And she is 17 years old.

Many of these ‘young fogies’ believe that schools are for learning only, and not about thinking. They also disapprove of same-sex marriage. One can only wonder at the double standards shown by the Nationals on the list, because they know full well how much regional Australians value their ABC.

As a backbencher

Of course we all rued the days of Abbott, and we were all desperate to escape him; we were all hugely relieved when someone apparently adult took over. But he never could, really. Abbott held Turnbull as a virtual prisoner, and he led his posse of wreckers on a kamikaze mission to destroy Turnbull, all the while trying to dismantle the renewable energy industry, and to hamstring Australia’s efforts to deal with climate change.

This was not necessarily because he did not believe, (although it is still impossible to know where he stands on the issue), but purely for reasons of personal vindication, and simple revenge. So much for service to the community.

His successor fought the good fight, for as long as he could, but a combination of his own political ineptitude, and his opponents’ bloody-mindedness, finally did him in. It appeared to be a coup, by Abbott’s supporters, at the expense of the Australian people. How depressing to discover that we had a choice between the devil, and the deep blue sea: Peter Dutton, or Scott Morrison.

Abbott had the gall to then state that he was finally satisfied, because Turnbull was no longer PM. He behaved as if removing Turnbull was a noteworthy achievement. Remember that Abbott had promised, “There will be no wrecking, no undermining, and no sniping.”

If there is an individual who bears responsibility for Australia’s recent ‘fall from grace’, it is Abbott. He is shameless, a self-confessed liar and a man who seems to have jumped on the gravy train early, and who continues to ride it. He lacks the personal insight to reflect on his legacy, which is threadbare at best. Many struggle to find a single achievement to honour him for.

He was removed from his leadership role, and coincidentally the Prime Ministership in 2015, and then he got the ‘bum’s rush’ from his own electorate in 2018. He did manage to get back onto the public payroll in October 2019, when he was appointed to the council of the Australian War Memorial.

Post politics

In an attempt to retain some sort of relevance he has continued to travel the world, making speeches to anyone who will listen. Recently he has excelled, giving support to reactionary and oafish world leaders, including Boris Johnson and Viktor Orbán of Hungary, https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/sep/13/tony-abbott-doubles-down-on-praise-for-hungarys-far-right-pm-viktor-orban.

He also believes that the world is in the grip of a climate cult https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/australia-wildfires-bushfires-latest-tony-abbott-climate-change-scott-morrison-a9268801.html.

He has stated that he remains ready to serve. Today Tony Abbott was made a Companion of the Order of Australia. Some may remember the public outrage when he awarded a knighthood to Prince Philip on Australia Day in 2015. What irony that he is awarded a gong, on the Queen’s Birthday Honours list, five years later. Could it be a ‘quid pro quo’?

This article has been updated to include changes, including the awarding of the AC to Tony Abbott in the Queens Birthday 2020 Honours List

Australian Politics

Scomo wrote us a letter of regret – you wish

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Why did he write the letter?

I dreamed that Scott Morrison woke up one day, very recently, and was filled with regret. He was so overcome with regret that he wrote a letter of apology to the people of Australia. The gist of his imaginary letter went something like this:

It is clear that the country needs to be re-set. We have at last done something right, and I feel a sense of pride, and achievement, as I have never felt before. We have flattened the curve of the virus. The people have banded together, and helped us through this turbulent time. They are chafing at the bit now, but we are confident we have done the best we could.

There are many areas that, on reflection, I should work on, though. Firstly, I need to stop thinking like my great friends, Donald and Boris. They both took a holiday when the virus arrived, and look where that took them. Thousands of unnecessary deaths.

I remember my own holiday. It did not turn out well. It seems that this is a full-time job. And I DO hold a hose, if required.

Education often appears, alongside health, as the biggest issue in people’s minds. I must remember that! My education was provided to me by the state. It was free, and secular. It was excellent, and I cannot imagine why I persist in funding wealthy private schools more generously than the state sector schools. It seems so counter-intuitive, to give taxpayers’ funds to people who choose to sequester their children, away from the common herd. Sydney High had it all, though. Free, but selective. Elitism, without the price. Anyway, I must have a word to Dan (Tehan). Maybe we can try to govern for all in the future.

I actually have a science degree, with honours. So the ‘daggy dad’ persona is a crock, or to put it in more seemly terms, a construct. I do feel great shame about the position my Government takes on climate change, because I know I have further enabled the terrible degradation of this beautiful country, and even its international reputation.

My area of expertise is in economic geography, but a science degree is built on the scientific method, and I know that I can, and I should, trust the scientists, when they tell us we are wrecking the planet. It is just that once I tasted success, and power, I lost my head. I felt that if I did the right thing, it might cost me the big job, but it is not too late. I must sack Angus, and put someone else in the job; someone who actually wants to help us save the earth.

Of course there are the refugees. Wow. What was I thinking? To demonise a thousand people, and to then torture them for years. I can’t even remember what it was I was trying to fix. I do remember saying something about keeping the sugar off the table. That was a reference to gaining entry to Australia through Indonesia. Considering my own family’s arrival here, it was really lacking in insight. But, it’s never too late to change. I sometimes look back on statements like that, and I cringe.

It can’t have been to save lives at sea, by ruining lives on land. That sounds like a false equivalence. What would my tutor in Economic Geography think? Perhaps it was to save money? But then, look at the money I wasted on ‘sports rorts’. We could have slung some of that money at the refugees. We could have put them up at the Hilton for the last seven years, and saved plenty.

Not to mention what Paladin has made from us over the journey. We don’t even check their invoices, so you know they have made a motza. Which brings me to Pete (Dutton). I keep buying him off, by increasing his powers, but nothing works. He craves more, and more. I never sanction him, I allow him to run his own line on Foreign Affairs.

He insults Lebanese-Australians by suggesting that they are more prone to committing crimes. He believes there is a criminal gene, I suppose. Doesn’t he even know that my great great grandfather was on the First Fleet, a convicted criminal. He might as well accuse me of having the same criminal gene. I think it is time I stopped Pete’s reign of terror, and put someone in who likes people. I will probably dismantle his department, while I think of it. It is one of Malcolm’s dopiest errors, and then I made it worse, by keeping Pete on.

I really need to apologise for that statement “A fair go for those who have a go”, which even I know is one of the most divisive phrases ever uttered in Australian history. I know better now that I am in this position. It is not a contest. We’re all in this together. Life is not a game, with winners and losers.

If I am going to stop Pete torturing refugees, I must stop torturing the poor. I want to ‘man up’, swallow the fact that I was wrong all along, and acknowledge that Newstart was degradingly low, and that the majority of Australians support it being substantially raised, permanently. So when the time comes to reduce it, I will remember that I serve the people. And I will leave it where it is.

That would not only make moral sense, but it would serve as a continuing economic stimulus. And while I am here, I would like to unreservedly apologise for ‘robodebt‘, which we know was unlawful and unenforceable for years. Again, what were we thinking? It has been suggested that that scheme may have caused between 800, and 2000 deaths.

Wow, deaths caused by a Government’s deliberate cruelty. Again, while I am seeking redemption, perhaps we could abolish the dreaded ‘cashless card’ for those who are already struggling. That is the one where we assumed that everyone on Newstart was buying grog, cigarettes and maybe even porn with their $290 a week. Now that it has been temporarily doubled, I can only hope that their lives have been improved. After all, that is supposed to be my main aim.

I am beginning to see the benefits of confession. It really does lighten the load. With such a brilliant population to work with, we can actually do anything. I think the extra $60 billion that Josh just ‘found’ could come in handy. I know, I will include the visa holders, and the artists, the performers, the casuals and anyone else excluded from JobKeeper. Let’s actually treat them with dignity, rather than sending them to food-banks. Food-banks, in Australia! What were we thinking?

Then I woke up.

Australian Politics

Religious over-represented?

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This country is constitutionally secular. Not atheist, but secular. S116 of the Constitution reads thus: “The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.”

Parliament is more religious than we are

As the country becomes less religious, the Parliament becomes more so. Why is this? One would expect that the Parliament would reflect us more closely than it does, and by definition it would reflect our declining interest in religion.

There have always been outliers in the Parliament, those who consciously and publicy brought their religious beliefs to the table. But they always seemed to be a little extreme for most of us, slightly unbalanced when it came to matters such as abortion, or de-criminalising homosexuality. Vince Gair and Brian Harradine spring to mind; men of principle, but quaint and embarrassing. They were essentially lone wolves, not a part of a dangerous pack.

Are overly religious politicians dangerous?

Fast forward to today. Where did all these right wing warriors come from? Why are people voting them into power, and why are there so many members of Parliament who profess such strong religious convictions? On face value Eric Abetz and Kevin Andrews are relics of a bygone age, Conservative Catholics, social traditionalists, old fashioned, lacking media skills, but successful, in election after election.

Even the high flyers who reached the top of the pile are strangely uncomfortable with modern mores, but somehow they have succeeded. Their beliefs are surprisingly uncommon. What is it about Kevin Rudd, and Scott Morrison, and Tony Abbott? All out and proud, professing a belief in the Christian god. Absolutely a private matter, most of us would think.

One of the great mysteries of life is how religious and political leaders are able to contort and twist the messages of their faiths, so that they become self-serving, self centred and frankly inhumane, especially when considering those of other faiths. Think of the major religious communities around the world, and their interaction with other faiths in their areas. There you will find examples of man’s inhumanity towards man. All of them do it. Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus and any other faith you can think of, guilty of persecution, of someone, somewhere, and happening right now.

A local act of social vandalism.

In 1997, Kevin Andrews, a resident of Victoria, succeeded in pushing a private member’s bill through federal parliament, overturning the first legislation to permit assisted suicide in Australia, which had been enacted in the Northern Territory. To reiterate, Kevin Andrews wilfully caused a Dying with Dignity Act to be repealed, after it had become law, in another state of Australia. His private members bill still disallows assisted euthanasia, in the Commonwealth Territories ie. the Northern Territory, Canberra and Norfolk Island.

How many dying Australians have that religious warrior to thank for their unnecessary suffering? How many Australians have cursed his interference, as their relatives wasted away in pain? Did it occur to Kevin Andrews that his act was inhumane, and incredibly selfish, and did he reflect that the overwhelming majority of Australians support at least some version of dying with dignity. The latest poll taken in 2017 showed 87% support throughout our nation. So on whose behalf did he act when he pushed that private member’s bill?

Our leaders have been found wanting.

Scott Morrison took the treatment of refugees to previously unexplored depths, which, to many Australians with a conscience, is and continues to be, inhumane, cruel and definitely goes against anything the nuns would have taught me. His continued insensitivity towards the unemployed, (aka the poor) forever memorialised by the “You’ll get a go if you have a go” absurdity, is compounded by his active refusal to permanently increase NewStart. He also said, in 2015, that he would never support voluntary euthanasia. He didn’t support same-sex marriage, either.

Morrison is still friends with, and fully supportive of, Brian Houston, who is being investigated after the Royal Commission censured him, firstly for his failure to report the sexual abuse allegations against his father. Secondly, he had a clear conflict of interest, in investigating his own father, while serving as National President of the Assemblies of God in Australia.

In 2006, Barnaby Joyce, who was the catalyst for the ‘bonking ban’, argued against the introduction of Gardasil, a vaccine which would prevent the spread of human papilloma virus (HPV). To be truly effective, girls must be vaccinated before they become sexually active. Joyce felt that making it available to girls would encourage promiscuity. Read Jenna Price’s article here https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/barnaby-joyces-other-betrayal-20180209-h0vurf.html He had no problem with boys receiving the vaccination.

It is perhaps not their fault. I have always thought that those who publicly profess strong religious beliefs seem to be searching for something, for validation perhaps, or recognition of their virtuous path?

Notwithstanding that most of those named have risen to positions of great power and influence, they are like lost children. Perhaps they need to study Matthew 16.26 again,
“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?”

Australian Politics

Scott Morrison Should Resign and Call an Early Election

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Looking for a renewed mandate has been done before

It has become clear that this Government is illegitimate. The stench of corruption is overwhelming, and any decent Prime Minister should acknowledge that fact. In order to re-establish his relationship with the people of Australia, Morrison should resign, and call a general election.

It has been done before, and it can actually re-invigorate the political environment. In 1963 the then Liberal Prime Minister, Robert Menzies, called an early election for the House of Representatives because the government were struggling to govern with their narrow 2-seat majority in the chamber. The government succeeded in gaining an extra 10 seats. There was no discernible sense that the Prime Minister of the time was corrupt.

What is so wrong now?

The situation is vastly different now, in that there is almost a complete lack of trust in this Government. The personnel, from the very top, are so far outside the expectations of rational and honest voters that many of us feel we deserve some sort of refund, if not of our time then of our taxes.

How should the election be conducted?

If Morrison was able to conduct the election campaign as convention dictates, he would serve as a caretaker, and he would not spend millions of taxpayers’ funds on advertising his party’s policies; he would not bribe seemingly every coalition seat with unnecessary and cynical ‘grants’, and he might even stop lying about his climate policies. He should stop claiming illusory climate and emissions achievements, to appease his backbench rump. And additionally, he should allow the people to pre-select their own candidates, rather than intervene. This might lead to the omission of knuckle-draggers like Craig Kelly from the parliament. This would be a win for everyone.

If no election, what could change?

Further immediate improvements to consider include answering legitimate questions from the press, being open and transparent enough to release suppressed reports on ministers, and to promise not to protect those in his party room who have lost the trust of the Australian people. Imagine if he had actual standards which included not handing power to racists, to homophobes, or to those who have put personal advancement above the country’s interests. We know who they are, but he merely closes ranks when questioned. Sometimes he “rejects the premise of the question”.

Imagine if he apologised for the statement “A fair go for those who have a go”, which is one of the most divisive phrases ever uttered in Australian history. And imagine if his Government stopped torturing the poor. He could ‘man up’, swallow the fact that he has been wrong all along, and acknowledge that Newstart is degradingly low, and that the majority of Australians support it being substantially raised.

That would not only make moral sense, but it would serve as an immediate economic stimulus. And perhaps apologise for ‘robodebt‘, which we know was unlawful and unenforceable for years. Why don’t we rise up in revolt when it is suggested that between 800 and 2000 deaths have occurred because of that program. Who will take the responsibility for that?

Wow, death caused by a Government’s deliberate cruelty. That is to leave out the unimaginable monstrosity of our treatment of asylum seekers. Two names are enough. Scott Morrison, and Peter Dutton. A weeping sore for decent Australians.

As for other current issues, as an added latest twist of the knife, they want everyone who receives Newstart to have a cashless card, so that they have very limited access to cash. So firstly they assume everyone on Newstart is buying grog, cigarettes and maybe even porn with their $290 a week; after rent of course! Good luck with that. And secondly the idiots in charge of this have not even researched whether the card can be used in all parts of the country.

The main cause of the current dysfunction is Tony Abbott

How did it come to this? It is impossible to look at the decline of Australian democracy without looking at Tony Abbott. John Howard was mean and tricky, Kevin Rudd was a boring control freak, Julia Gillard was an effective legislator, but hopeless at presenting herself as a likeable achiever. And of course she encountered good old Aussie misogyny. Which brings us back to Abbott.

Serial liar, seemingly out to get the poor, hopelessly stuck in a misogynistic 1950s, elitist and yet so sloppy with language, so annoying and in the end so vengeful that we all knew he would take Australia down with him, if necessary, in his pursuit of Malcolm Turnbull.

Turnbull came to power as our saviour. Finally an adult in the room, urbane, sophisticated, he would treat us as adults. No more slogans, he would conduct a dialogue with us. But he turned out to have no convictions. He was over-turned, or actually complicit, on the issues of climate change, obstructing gay marriage, gutting the NBN, tax cuts for the rich (including himself), and even slogans – Jobs and Growth is notorious for its sheer meaninglessness, and he used it a lot. He also became very focused on National Security, and he was the fool who handed the keys of the ‘Interior Ministry’ to the most dangerous man in Australia, Peter Dutton.

Back to the re-set button

It is clear that the country needs to re-set, because this Government is NOT delivering on anything tangible, and there is a very strong argument that says it arrived in power by fraudulent means. It lied to every voter, and it bribed its way to a razor – slim majority.

The purpose of governments can be seen as being comparable with the underlying mission of families: To improve lives.

Governments are not elected to further their own interests, either politically, or materially. They are tasked with looking after the interests of their citizens, by advancing them along the road of progress.

So go on, Scott. Call an early election. See if God wants to reward you again, after all the shenanigans. I bet you don’t. But you should.

Australian Politics

Waiting for the climate change replay

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Scott Morrison is now having to deal with the two very distinct wings of his party, as they gird themselves for the culture war which will probably erupt at any moment. This culture war will not be about indigenous history, or the date of Australia Day, or even immigration. It is about climate change.

Since the election there seems to have been something of a re-birth of ‘wet’ liberals, or as they sometimes call themselves, Modern Liberals. Tim Wilson, Dave Sharma, Jason Falinski, Katie Allen, Angie Bell and Trent Zimmerman have even gone as far as joining the Parliamentary Friends of Climate Action group.

Now it is difficult to gauge the sincerity of several of the members, especially Tim Wilson and Jason Falinsky, because they have proved in the past to have a skittish relationship with the truth, but it just might be a sign of change. The group includes people from the other tribes, such as Labor and the Independents, so the Libs might even learn something. Apparently their ‘modernism’ is predicated on their acceptance that something is afoot with, you know, the weather, or the climate, or some-such.

Knowing whether any of them are prepared to ‘go to the barricades’ for the climate is another matter, entirely. Tim Wilson is a hard man to categorise. One day a thinker, the next wilfully awful, and a shameless self-promoter. His electorate expects something of him, however, and he is something of a weather vane (pardon the pun). They will be joined by others, eventually, but for the majority who do join them it will not be a matter of principle, but more one of crude survivalism, where instead of preparing for the climate catastrophe, they will be preparing for electoral Armageddon. Australians MUST run out of patience soon. If the bushfires in rainforests don’t prompt a wake-up, the smoke will.

We know that Malcolm Turnbull is the major casualty of the Climate Change War, versions 1.0 and 2.0. Will Scott Morrison be the next one? I think not, because Scott Morrison is playing a clever game, wherein he acknowledges the science behind the change, but then he slinks away, calling out such evasions as “our position will evolve, over time”. He has even had his Science Minister call for an end to the discussion, and for action! A mere diversion, I fear.

On the other side of this culture war are the usual suspects. Craig Kelly, George Christensen, Matt Canavan, Barnaby Joyce, Michael McCormack and even David Littleproud. There have been two prominent recruits to their ranks since the election; Gerard Rennick and Samantha McMahon, and they distinguish themselves with the strength of their denialism, and some of their creativity regarding the “climate change conspiracy”. Senator Rennick believes that the Bureau of Meteorology is in on it, and has been using a dodgy thermometer.

But their spiritual leader must be the formidable Peter Dutton, he who made that terrific joke about water lapping at the feet of citizens of the Pacific. Perhaps we need look no further than that notorious film clip, to see where Morrison really stands – with Tony Abbott and Peter Dutton. And it is Scotty from Marketing who spots the microphone. Always on the lookout to protect his image.

But back to the culture war. Morrison is desperately trying to re-fashion his image, and to move on from his odd coal-clutching moment in Parliament, but he is either the creature of the right, or he is their hostage. Considering that keeping his job is the main game, and the perception that the electorate is indeed waking up, and will at some time demand climate action, he is indeed caught between a rock and a hard place.

What exquisite irony! Morrison could suddenly wake up, smell the smoke, and reverse a decade of lies, deceit and wilful blindness concerning the climate emergency, and undertake a belated transition to a low carbon future. Presumably he would have the Greens, the Labor Party, the Independents (the sane ones) and even the Modern Liberals on his side, as well as the Australian public.

The question is would he survive the inevitable reaction from what can fairly be called the Alternative Government? Craig and George, Barnaby and Samantha, Michaelia of ‘lost utes’ fame, and Dutts? I think he would, but I doubt he has the ticker, or the commitment to our future, to even try.

Australian Politics

Why Labor Lost

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As this year’s election result became clear, Bill Shorten stated, “We were up against corporate leviathans, a financial behemoth, spending unprecedented hundreds of millions of dollars advertising, telling lies, spreading fear – they got what they wanted.” That is the voice of a hapless victim, complaining about forces beyond his control, and not the alternative leader of the country.

Politics can be a dirty and brutal business, but the outcomes are real, and they have a real effect on the quality of people’s lives, so it is absolutely necessary to approach the contest prepared, and to deliver your best efforts. That includes fighting for your beliefs, especially if you are the party of reform, because you represent the needy and the disadvantaged, and the parties of the right will, by nature, and choice, represent vested interests.

The report into why Labor lost, by Craig Emerson and Jay Weatherill, really states the bleeding obvious, in that the party did not respond to the change of leader, from the failed toff to the shameless marketer; that it had too many, detailed, costly policies, which merely played to the Coalition’s perceived strength re. economic management; and it had an unpopular leader. What is not stated is that the party let down its constituency, by being unprepared, superficial, and self-satisfied.

Malcolm Turnbull is an inveterate waffler. He can’t help himself, but Shorten’s verbal awkwardness is equally excruciating, so they sort of cancelled each other out. As a contrasting attraction, Morrison is good on his feet, he is pithy in his communications, and he relates to the common man. Shorten could never match him in punchy messaging, so Labor needed to simplify, dare I say to shorten, and sell, the message. They also needed to modify their response to Morrison. He was not ostensibly from the ‘big end of town’, but his ambition and his duplicity were legitimate areas of concern, as was his penchant for rashness, and a reputation for callous disregard to those less better off than himself. Even Turnbull had the grace to display a modicum of ‘noblesse oblige’.

Oppositions are not Governments. They don’t have to prove anything, because they have been out of power, in this case for six years, so anything which looks or feels wrong, is by definition, the Government’s fault.

The drover’s dog could have won this election if Labor had merely turned up on the day, not scared anyone off with badly explained and overly complex policies, and bothered to relate to their base. Fighting the Greens in the inner cities was a waste of resources, and merely reinforced the impression that they had lost touch with their natural constituency, the Working Class.

And let us not forget the absolute rabble that the Government had become before going into the election. They knew it, and they were busily selling off the silverware, resigned to the fact that they were almost universally despised, and whoever had managed to accrue a decent pension, or a reasonable sinecure, was jumping ship. Remember the election launch, where the ‘joke de jour’ was that most of the cabinet ministers were in witness protection. Labor should have capitalised on that community disdain; Barnaby, Dutts, Shameless Angus and Melissa the Missing (Environment Minister), to name but a handful.

The Coalition’s lack of policies was a strength for them. It allowed the relentless sloganeering and the personal targeting of Shorten to proceed unhindered, and unchallenged. Labor looked like the nerd in the playground, who felt superior and smug, but would not bother to explain why, or respond.

Climate change was the elephant in the room, and was both Labor’s greatest strength, and its greatest vulnerability. Win Victoria and lose Queensland, or vice versa. Did no-one realise that the climate-denying rump of the Coalition was, and still is, calling the policy shots in the Coalition? Why not attack the Coalition’s disunity on the matter, exploit their confusion, dazzle them with economic arguments as to why renewables are so attractive, a real win-win solution.

It is hard to believe the lengths to which seemingly grown men and women will go to display confected outrage and disgust at something as innocuous as a paddock of solar panels, or wind turbines. Have they never seen a photo of a power station, let alone one in real life?

Why was no policy formulated, and sold, which explained the economic benefits of de-carbonising the economy, so that coal was, rather than being the saviour of mankind, explained as being too dangerous to use, and able to be economically phased out.

The argument about Shorten is correct. No matter the quality of the offering, you must sell it. And with Labor’s mix of impenetrably complex economic measures, a scare campaign was inevitable. What was needed was someone credible to discredit it. Imagine the “death tax” in the hands of Hawke or Keating; what we got was Shorten bleating that it was misleading.

Strangely both major Australian parties have moved to make it nearly impossible to remove a party leader, at the expense of good sense, or changing circumstances, or even voter preference. Look at the example in Britain. Jeremy Corben is firmly in control of his party in the Commons, yet almost universally loathed throughout the electorate. Ditto Bill Shorten. Hard to vote for a person who has stabbed not one, but two of his leaders in the back, and then to add insult to injury, he is irremovable.

The final mistake was to leave Morrison’s hucksterism unchallenged. His footy following, beer chugging, curry cooking persona was so obviously at odds with his Holy-Roller, bible bashing personality, he was almost as laughable as Peter Dutton trying to smile for his tilt at the Prime Ministership. But as the experts in Behavioural Economics tell us, in moments of doubt or uncertainty, we naturally return to the ‘default’ position. In this case better the devil you know, than the one you don’t. And see where that has got us all!