Category Archives: Australian Politics

Labor Shocker!

18 Saturday May 2019

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Vote for a Future
I know it’s too early to call, and I didn’t want to say anything during the campaign that might jinx it, but I think the ALP ran a shocker of an ad campaign. They didn’t focus on vision or a fair go for all Australians, they concentrated on instability in the Libs which Morrison countered very well by changing the party rules and campaigning as a one man show. Why the hell didn’t Labor play to its strength? They had a very talented team that side by side was streets ahead of their Liberal counterparts. I think the current Labor team is the most impressive since the ‘nations best ever team’ that Hawke had around him. Why didn’t we see those ads, instead of the ineffectual voiceover behind the Morrison/Palmer ads.

I cannot see how the ALP message could have cut through. It was full of mixed and incoherent themes. Labor were very bold in laying out an ambitious agenda which was great and unprecedented. There was a lot of vision for a kinder, fairer, smarter, cleaner, healthier, and more prosperous country that worked for the many not just the few. However, they didn’t educate the electorate enough to counter the Libs baseless scare campaign.

There is no way that anyone could have grasped any story that Labor was trying to tell. Where were the very effective Workchoices style campaign ads from 2007 that humanised the Labor agenda. It just wasn’t there. All we saw were lots of micro campaigns on marginal issues that diluted the message.

Two days after Bob Hawke died, I think he would be asking, where was the gravitas? Where was the straight talk? Where was the coherent message? Rather than help Labor win, I think his death only set the contrast between his campaigns and the pathetic campaign that this Labor campaign organization ran.

I’m bloody angry because this was the most important election in our lifetime and you wouldn’t have bloody known it. The Labor party didn’t hammer that home. This was the election that Labor should never have even come close to losing and if they do, and I think they have, they’ve got some very serious soul searching to do and some serious arsekicking to do.

This was the worst Labor campaign I’ve seen in 25 years.

Pissed off!!!

Rant over

Vote For A Future!

18 Saturday May 2019

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Vote for a Future

When I was 17, I was a very undercooked but also very ambitious member of the Australian Liberal Party (I know, I’m shocked too). At that time, 1975, one of the people that inspired me to get involved in politics was an aspiring Liberal senate candidate, Andrew Thomas from Northampton, just north of Geraldton in Western Australia, who entrusted me to organise campaign events for him in places like Carnamah and Mingenew.

We became firm friends and after he was elected in 1975, I started studies at the University of Western Australia and he allowed me to crash nearby at the Crawley apartment, he kept for stopovers on his way home to Geraldton. Quite often he would arrive home on Thursday night, shattered after a long and turbulent week in Canberra. I vividly remember one such Thursday night when, over a couple of stubbies, conversation turned to the Fraser Government’s plans to gradually destroy Medibank (the precursor to Medicare Australia), introduced by the Whitlam Government in 1975. The reason I so well remember the conversation was that as a young Lib, I reflexively joined in the denunciation of Socialist Medicine as we called Medibank. So I was stunned when Andrew said that, although as a Liberal MP, he was required to join the chorus of derision, he was privately full of admiration for Gough Whitlam and his Medibank scheme.

I’m telling this story because this is a pivotal moment in our history. Not only does the fate of Climate change action rest on the outcome of Saturday’s election but so too the fate of our beloved ABC which will be dead within 10 years if the Morrison/Palmer Government is elected.

On top of that, there is a chance to wind back some gross inequities in society that result from past attempts by Liberal governments to shore up their vote by splashing money at their wealthy patrons via measures such as extending franking credit rebates (or gifts) to investors who had not paid any income tax. This is the most contentious of Labor’s economic reform agenda and while the number of people affected by this change is small, the impact on budget savings will be huge, as will Labor’s changes to Negative Gearing.

Liberals are reflexively required to oppose these economic reforms as well as real action on Climate Change. They are also tied to the Murdoch media agenda to destroy the ABC, something he has been pushing for years. Murdoch succeeded in his long campaign to nobble the NBN to protect his Foxtel from streaming services such as Netflix that would benefit from a superfast full fibre NBN. Now he also wants to nobble the ABC because it takes eyeballs away from his paywall protected news outlets and Sky News.

I firmly believe that there are many Liberal MPs who will be privately relieved if a Shorten Labor government is elected. I believe that many of them would be glad to be rid of the albatross of Abbott’s legacy of Climate Change denial; energy policy civil wars; denigration of people on income support; attacks on wage earners via cruel cuts to penalty rates; barely concealed racism; and unsustainable welfare subsidies for the relatively wealthy, like Negative Gearing and Franking Credits.

If I hadn’t heard a Liberal senator say something akin to that to me 40 years ago, I wouldn’t have believed it possible. My friend the Liberal senator, provided me with the proof that politicians quite often say one thing while firmly believing the opposite. Knowing that, I also know there must be decent people who also happen to be Liberal party MPs. I also believe that many of them must be embarrassed that they have been forced into defending an indefensible corner filled with cruelty, corruption and cognitive dissonance.

Help relieve the tortured souls of fair minded Liberal MPs who have a social conscience and are not Peter Dutton, Tony Abbott, Scott Morrison and their like, and…

Vote Greens or Labor on Saturday.

Vale Bob Hawke

17 Friday May 2019

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Bob Hawke PM

Former Australian Prime Minister Robert James Lee Hawke

Yesterday, Australia lost one of its giants. Throughout our short history we have counted a handful of truly towering figures, people whose existence has sharply shaped the destiny of our nation. And towering above them all was Bob Hawke, our country’s 23rd prime minister. He served in that office from 1983 to 1991, an eight year span that enchanted, at times transfixed, and ultimately transformed this country.

It’s hard in 2019 to convey how omnipresent Bob Hawke was in the life of Australia from the late 1960s right through to the 1990s. No one before or since has had such a profound impact on this country (with the only possible exceptions: Gough Whitlam and war-time prime minister John Curtin). In 1970 he was the most popular and respected person in the country and by 1984 he had also become the most popular prime minister in history with sustained approval at an astonishing 75%. No one has come close since.

In the coming days and weeks, many words will be written and even more will be spoken, lauding this wonderful and great man. I don’t have any great insight into his life and work so I won’t add mine to the many eulogies to come, but I would like to relate my brief impression of him.

In 1975 I met (soon to be prime minister) Malcolm Fraser just before he delivered the first Menzies oration at the University of Western Australia and was impressed by how he turned an innate nervousness backstage into a confident and polished performance on stage. Great (and tall) as he appeared, he was all too human and didn’t fill me with awe the way meeting Bob Hawke did.

In 1981 I met ex-prime minister Gough Whitlam and formed an unlikely friendship with him that lasted several years. While my first meeting with Gough was exhilarating, it still didn’t fill me with awe the way meeting Bob Hawke did.

In 1983 when I met Bob Hawke for the first time, I felt my whole body tingle in a way I hadn’t experienced before or since. I know there were a lot of people around me on that day who also had that strange otherworldly feeling. Bob Hawke had that weird effect on people wherever he appeared.

There were some questionable actions that he took both publicly and privately but when it comes right down to it, who could compare with the way he made us all feel. We could sorely use some of that authenticity and electric raw charisma right now.

There’s a very good case to suggest he was our greatest prime minister. I wouldn’t argue with that.

It will be a very long time before we see his like again.

What a life.

Although Bob was out of office for more than 25 years, he was adored by new generations of young people. Who can forget the chant ‘Hawkie, Hawkie’ at the cricket, when he would skol a beer.

Do you have any recollections or impressions of Bob that you’d like to share?

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Australia Days…

11 Wednesday Jan 2017

Posted by in Australian Politics, Gotta Life

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My Aussie Flag

I’d just like to chuck this out there and see what happens…

I know that there is significant and understandable disquiet with the current Australia Day, January 26, a celebration day that might feel like it’s been around forever but hasn’t and a day that causes anguish for many indigenous Australians. The current Australia Day only became generally accepted throughout Australia in 1935 and only came into real prominence when the public holiday shifted from a long weekend to the actual date in 1994.

Of course indigenous Australians are reminded every year that their country (or rather, the colony of New South Wales) was annexed by Governor Arthur Phillip for Britain on that colonisation date. So for many, it is a day of sad reflection on their history after that date rather than a day to celebrate. Imagine a Tanzanian being asked to celebrate, as their national day, the date that they became a British possession rather than, Uhuru Day (freedom day) – 9 December, the day in 1961 that the country gained its independence.

The overwhelmingly obvious celebration day for Australia is the date we joined to become a united Australian federation on January 1, 1901. However, having a dual celebration of a New Year combined with a national day would dilute both (and even worse, deprive us of a cherished public holiday).

An alternative, May 27, would celebrate the day in 1967 that Australians voted to amend the Constitution to recognize the indigenous population (previously they had been excluded from the population census and were not full citizens) and the right of the Commonwealth to make law relating to indigenous Australians (previously that had been a state prerogative). While there might be a compelling case for selecting this day, I believe a strong argument could also be proffered to instead choose the date 3 June 1992 when Mr. E. Mabo won his momentous High Court ruling that overturned ‘Terra nullius‘ (which had previously assumed Australia to be uninhabited prior to British colonisation). Both these days celebrate an unfinished process of inclusion and reconciliation that may never be completely realised but will certainly not be satisfied until an indigenous treaty and/or full constitutional recognition is achieved.

In the meantime I’d like to suggest January 25 and 26 as ‘Australia Days’, with the public holiday shifted to the 25th. These two days symbolise the critical demarcation between ancient and modern Australia while providing an opportunity to showcase indigenous cultural heritage and celebrate the immigrant nation that is Australia. And, as a trivial aside, the days are a lot warmer than a wintery day in May or June and… hell, how many countries devote a whole two days to celebrate their nationhood?

I’d also like to suggest that May 27 be declared Australian Citizenship Day, the day when Australia voted to confer citizenship rights for all Australians, including the first nations. The current Citizenship Day is 17 September, a day which recognises an obscure event in 1973 when the Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948 was renamed the Australian Citizenship Act 1948.

Abbott’s Syrian Messaging Cock-up!

09 Wednesday Sep 2015

Posted by in Australian Politics, International Politics, Religion

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Tony Abbott

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott

Well, a few days ago I saw a report that Slovakia, with its far right government, were going to take in a couple of hundred Syrian refugees. But they would only accept Christians. At the time I thought, what sort of warped, bigoted sense of humanity allows them to think that’s somehow OK? Today I got my answer… I heard Tony Abbott’s colleagues, Eric Abetz, George Christensen and Cory Bernardi say that Christians are the most persecuted people in the world and so Australia would take in 12,000 Syrian Christian refugees. I think these comments reveal the dark entrenched prejudice that exists within the Liberal Party against those who are not pious Christians like themselves. To deflect the obvious howls of derision that this announcement would surely deserve, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop added the fig leaf, saying we’d take in a few other ‘persecuted minorities’, such as Yazidis and Druze as well.

Every ethnic and religious group in Syria is persecuted by another group; no group is safe in that bombed out ruin of a country. So what Abetz and co are effectively saying is that they’d offer non-Muslim Syrians a lifeboat and basically let the rest drown.

So, even when Tony Abbott thinks he’s revealing his compassionate side by doing something good for humanity (apart from exporting the dirty little black rock, that is), he still somehow manages to turn it to his radical right wing Christian ideological agenda and cover his gesture in a big steaming turd.

Let the Bloodbath Begin!

31 Saturday Jan 2015

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Queensland Election drubbing update…
The ALP were routed in Queensland’s 2012 election with only a rump of 7 members returned. Tonight’s stunning turnaround will see them take at least 36 seats from Campbell Newman’s LNP government and consign him to history.

Campbell Newman

Campbell Newman

During the ABC coverage of the election result…
Question to Jane Prentice, federal Liberal member for Ryan (in Queensland):
“Is Tony Abbott the man to lead the Liberals to the next federal election?”
Her answer: “Well that’s the discussion, isn’t it. We need to look at where we’re going…” She went on to suggest that Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s speech to the National Press Club, next week, will be his last chance.

When a member of Abbott’s team openly talks about a leadership change in such an extraordinarily frank and open way, that generally means that party discipline has completely broken down.

Federal Liberal members will be in a flagellating screaming panic tonight. And tomorrow the phones will be smoking hot as they scramble to put as much distance as they can between themselves and Abbott and Deputy Heartless Joe Hockey.

I’m so looking forward to the bloodbath… Abbott and Hockey will be gone in 3 weeks.

You know you want to say it…

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Tony’s Night of the Long Knives Beckons

30 Friday Jan 2015

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A certain foreign minister recently dined with the svengali of Australian politics, Rupert Murdoch. Why is that significant? Because, Murdoch doesn’t do these things just to be ‘sociable‘. I think he did it because he’s formed a view that unless Tony Abbott goes, the Libs will get hammered at the next election. He’s a man who cherishes his role as our puppeteer in chief and was needed to give Julie Bishop the green light to go for it. No worries, the decks are clear; the memo’s gone out to the editors of the Telegraph, Courier-Mail, Herald Sun and Sunday Times…..

Julie Bishop

Foreign Minister Bishop

And the bad news is that Julie Bishop will soon be Rupert’s new plaything and Australia’s prime minister (with Malcolm Turnbull as Treasurer). And the news gets even worse because, unlike Julia Gillard who had the Murdoch press baying for her blood for 3 years, Julie Bishop will get a magic carpet ride from the same propaganda song sheet.

It’ll be interesting to look back on this post in a couple of months to see that I was right.

To those who think Minister for Inhuman Services, Scott Morrison will get the top job, I sincerely hope you’re wrong.
I think even the hard right in the Liberal Party (who are currently in control) will see Morrison as too much of a ‘lightning rod’ for PM but as a ‘can-do’ hardnut treasurer, they’ll love it (that’s if the pragmatists who are currently holding their noses and supporting Turnbull, can’t dissuade them). If they do go for Morrison, it’ll be time to start looking out for fluttering squarish flags with a black motif on a red background.

What do you think? Who do you think will replace Abbott?

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Vale Gough Whitlam

21 Tuesday Oct 2014

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Gough Whitlam
Gough Whitlam, 21st Prime Minister of Australia.

Oh this is a sad day. There’ll be buckets of political tributes to the great man but for me it was personal so that’s what I’ll remember here.

Gough Whitlam was the giant of Australian life who I admired the most. More than that, for a short period of 4 years (1981-85), he allowed me to be his friend. He must have known I was in awe of him (which, don’t worry his large ego didn’t mind) but he had a knack of making me feel his equal even though he was 40 years older than I and so far ahead of my fledgling 24 year-old knowledge. Even though our conversations were very eclectic, ranging across politics, history, art, music, the cosmos and our lives, he allowed me to feel that I wasn’t out of my depth except when he’d occasionally pepper his sentences with classical Greek and Latin which would remind me just how broad the gulf really was. I remember laughing often and loudly because he was also very witty with a wonderfully wry sense of humour. He also didn’t suffer from false modesty and some of his humour recognized his ‘own greatness’. He was fond of the notion that God wouldn’t welcome him warmly to heaven because he wouldn’t like the competition. It seemed he also liked to stir Catholics a little (he was a protestant) and he recounted with mischievous joy a time he’d asked a clergyman, a bishop I think, if he could rent a cathedral crypt space when he died. He got a quizzical look, to which he added, “I’ll only need it for three days”. It seemed it was one of his favourite self-referential jokes and a good one. Curiously, I was reminded of this by Tony Burke’s recollection of a similar story.

Our meeting was typical of him. He was the ultimate elitist – not because he aspired to be or as a conceit but because he really was elite – but he was also completely down to earth. Why else would he have spent several hours after a Labor Party champagne breakfast fundraiser, sitting on the bank of a lake drinking champagne with a young person like me. I remember when his minder, state Labor deputy leader, Mal Bryce, quietly approached the great man and reminded Gough that he had a plane to catch. I think Gough quietly enjoyed playing with people and the look on Mal’s face was priceless when he replied, “You can get me another flight, can’t you Mal?”. I remember leaving that first meeting completely enthralled; we’d talked about anything and everything and that was the first time I could remember having had such a wide-ranging conversation with anyone.

The next time we met was early the following year when he was the guest of the State Labor Executive at Trades Hall in Perth. After he’d done the necessary circulating, he sought me out and we picked up, it seemed, exactly where we’d left off. We sat at the only table against the far wall and chatted and it seemed we were in a bubble of our own. Why he’d chosen me, of all the exalted people in that hall, to spend his precious time with I didn’t know but the way he had of making me feel like I was the most important person in the room, was a wonderful character trait. Despite his immense intellect and achievement he went to great length to make me feel at ease with him and he left me feeling greatly elevated by the experience. Before he left, he signed a copy of his book, The Truth of the Matter for me and gave me his card with his private number scrawled on the back and said, “Call me”. He said it in such a way that I knew he meant it. Over the next year (until he moved to Paris) I did occasionally call him even though I did feel daunted by the prospect. At the time I was a “young turk” on the rise in the union movement and so I always opened with a request for advice which always went over well but he very quickly moved on to other subjects; he also always kindly remembered to enquire (by name) about my wife, (at the time) Judy and and son, Toby (and later, also my daughter, Alison). That was another of his talents, his amazing memory for minutiae: he not only remembered my wife and children’s names but also their birthdays and the details of their lives. The warmth of his conversation was so disarming and engaging and I always came away feeling invigorated and uplifted. In retrospect, I know that there were many people like me, who were singled out and made to feel like they were a friend. This was part of the genius of Gough Whitlam and one of the many reasons he’ll be so mourned today.

Judy often remarked that my head was full of useless knowledge and that I should go on the quiz show Sale of the Century. I only mention this because I think the only time I felt like that large store of useless trivia was of any real use was when talking with Gough. However, whatever topical fact I was able to conjure into the conversation, he was always able to trump and expand upon it. I never minded this because it always broadened my own knowledge and understanding and because he did it with such unabashed joy, seemingly because it allowed him to expound freely on the subjects of our focus.

I think I was very conscious of the privilege that Gough had bestowed on me so I didn’t discuss my conversations with him with anyone; they were my much cherished secret. When he was appointed to UNESCO, our contact became restricted to the few times he returned to Sydney but he still welcomed my call.

As my life spiraled out of control for a time after my family departed and my brother died (1985-87), we sadly lost touch. I so regret that because who knows how much more wisdom I might have acquired from the crumbs of Gough’s enormous insight.

On this day, I’m very conscious of the loss of the greatest man I’ve ever known or will ever know and someone I am so proud and humbled to have briefly called a friend. Such a sad, sad, sad day. Goodbye Gough.

Gough Whitlam governed through a tumultuous period of Australian history.

Do you have any recollections of Gough that you’d like to share?

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Murdoch Trashing Democracy!

31 Saturday Aug 2013

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Anyone who had any doubt that the Libs election campaign has moved headquarters to the editorial rooms at Rupert Murdoch’s Telegraph (Sydney) and Courier Mail (Brisbane), need only have watched Media Watch this week. There, the whole despicable distortion of democracy being perpetrated by that most malevolent of humans and his willing supplicants, dressed as journalists, was exposed. My conscience is clear: I don’t buy any newspaper Murdoch prints (I cancelled my sub. to the Sunday Times) and I cancelled my subscription to his cash-cow, Foxtel, a couple of years ago when it became clear to me just how toxic this megalomaniac had become. How can any party in an election withstand such media carpet bombing, particularly when it’s being churned out in newspapers that have almost 70% of the national readership. Worse, the Courier Mail is the only Brisbane metro daily so Murdoch has an almost unchallenged ability to influence public opinion in that city.
Watch Media Watch (Episode 30, 26 August 2013) here then donate to GetUp please:
Media Watch (ABC Television)
If you share my outrage at what Murdoch is doing, please consider staking a small stand and cancel any of your Murdoch supporting newspaper and Foxtel subscriptions and share this post so it’ll reach as many suppliers of cash to Murdoch’s propaganda machine (subscribers), as possible. Cheers.
Watch GetUp! Murdoch video here

Thinking of possible motivations for Murdoch’s vociferous anti-Labor campaign over the last few years. I think someone had a point when they suggested the biggest threat to Murdoch’s Foxtel pay-tv near-monopoly power in Australia is Labor’s NBN and the multiple HD streaming content providers that will offer streaming services to households. With 100 to 1000mbps download speeds there’ll be no buffering hassles and a true on-demand service, something Murdoch’s Foxtel doesn’t provide. The Libs. crap version of the NBN only offers up to 100mbps download speeds, and that’s only if you live next door to the node, otherwise speeds rapidly drop to 25mbps, the further down the street you go. The Libs version of the NBN is Murdoch friendly because it’s speed limited and very poor competition for Foxtel, while Labor’s NBN could wipe them out. In other words, why would you want to pay Murdoch more than $130 a month for Foxtel when you’ll soon be able to stream huge Hi-Def movie and TV files over the internet for a fraction of the cost or in many cases, for free?

Run Mr. Rabbit!

26 Wednesday Jun 2013

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Tony Abbott

Tony Abbott

Tony Abbott’s body language at tonight’s press conference (where unusually, he answered questions) suggested that he’s worried that he’s got a fight on his hands. I think he hoped some of the independents would desert Labor by supporting a no-confidence motion tomorrow to hasten the election and bring forward his Liberal Party’s resumption of its ‘right to rule’.

It seems the cat’s out of the bag… he knows he doesn’t have the numbers.

 

In response to a question regarding the possibility of a no-confidence vote, Mr. Abbott said:
“Well, look, that’s really a matter for Mr Rudd. I’m not interested in playing parliamentary games. I think the people of Australia are sick of parliamentary games…”
Reading between the lines, it seems he’s recognized that he doesn’t have the numbers to force a no-confidence motion (thanks Bob Katter for your decisive support for Kevin).

Tony Abbott continued, “I am interested in giving the people their say as soon as possible and it was really quite odd that Mr Rudd didn’t confirm the former Prime Minister’s chosen election date – or indeed announce an earlier date…”
Clearly, Tony’s hoping for an early August election (the earliest we could have) but would settle for Julia Gillard’s September date. What he doesn’t want is for Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to have an opportunity to get anything done and build towards an election, perhaps as late as 24 November (the latest possible date for an election) but more likely mid October. Tony strangely implored Rudd to announce an early election date and sounded almost acquiescent in the doing.

What Tony doesn’t want is for the focus to be turned to his paucity of policy and the illogic of many of the Opposition’s pronouncements. Under Julia Gillard, the opposition Coalition has been given a free pass on their many ludicrous assertions, Tony Abbott stunts and carping negativity. Now that the Abbott/Gillard nexus has been broken, Mr. Abbott faces the unpleasant prospect of scrutiny.

Returning to the tired old mantra that has served him so well over the last 3 years, Mr. Abbott attempted to frame the terms of the election as:
“Who do you, the people, trust to stop the boats, to abolish the carbon tax and the mining tax and to get the budget back in the black?”

I think the answer to the first question might be The Age Newspaper and ABC News who just exposed the links between Indonesian people smugglers and allegedly corrupt elements of law enforcement. The Indonesians might be forced to act against the long-suspected rats in their ranks, which in turn might slow the boats. Let’s face it, the only difference between the current government and opposition ‘stop the boats’ policies, is Tony Abbott’s pledge to turn back the asylum seeker boats (after they’ve glued the scuttled boats back together, that is). I’ve got a feeling Rudd will articulate the obvious flaws in Abbott’s policy a lot better than Julia Gillard ever managed. As well, Julia fell into Abbott’s trap of framing asylum seekers as a threat to our sovereignty (border security). Perhaps now, Rudd will be able to refocus the boats issue as a leaky, sinking boats humanitarian crisis. Perhaps he can pressure Indonesia to stop the boats leaving port and also encourage them to work to stem the inflow into Indonesia of asylum seekers who buy visas, enabling them time to transit to Australia bound boats. In return Australia should quietly agree to increase our refugee intake from Indonesia to a few thousand from the present few hundred. There’s been no headlines screaming about breached border security when asylum seekers fly in, so getting the leaky boats off the daily newscasts and asylum seekers into airports instead, might just diffuse Tony Abbott’s racist pandering border security/turn back the boats ‘Labor: death by a thousand cuts’ strategy.

See the ABC story and video here:
• Footage shows Indonesian people smuggler discussing his business and boasts police involvement
(George Roberts, ABC News 25 June 2013)
See the Age video here:
• Hidden camera exposes people smuggler
(The Age, 25 June 2013)
Read the Sydney Morning herald story here:
• Jakarta pushed on people smugglers
(Michael Bachelard, The Sydney Morning Herald 26 June 2013)

Kevin Rudd

Kevin Rudd

I’m also looking forward to seeing Kevin Rudd’s changes in the carbon price that will probably ditch the current 2015 time-table and bring in the ETS a year ahead of schedule, thereby blunting some of Abbott’s shallow rhetoric and turning the spotlight back on his own derided “direct action” policy. Hell, even Malcolm Turnbull, the Liberal Party’s former Environment spokesman, believes that Tony Abbott’s Climate Change policy is a crock of shit. This is what he had to say about it, “…the fact is that Tony and the people who put him in his job, do not want to do anything about climate change. They do not believe in human caused global warming. As Tony observed on one occasion “climate change is crap” or if you consider his mentor, Senator Minchin, the world is not warming, it’s cooling and the climate change issue is part of a vast left wing conspiracy to deindustrialise the world.”

Next: The Mineral Resource Rents Tax (MRRT) is a non-starter. Given that its legislation was practically written by the Mining Industry, and it’s raised so little revenue, it can’t seriously be seen as having any adverse impact on anything other than the government’s bottom line. All Rudd needs to do is acknowledge the tax needs some tweaking and move on. Keep in mind that the predecessor of the MRRT, the Petroleum Resource Rent Tax (PRRT), has operated with little controversy, and barely a ripple of attention, since 1987.

Of all Tony Abbott’s chosen fields of battle, the doozy is going to be watching him try to cogently explain how he’s going to get the budget back into the black quicker than Labor. Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan had failed to adequately enunciate the folly of Abbott and shadow treasurer Joe Hockey’s maths and the diabolical reality of the European style austerity that would be inevitable under an Abbott Administration; inevitable that is, if everything they’ve said they’ll do hasn’t just been a great big new block of fudge to add to their huge black hole in the cooked books from the last election. Sure, Abbott and Hockey can hack the legs off the poor by slashing the public service and the safety net; sure, they can intensify the devastation and violence of American style ghettoisation of ‘working poor’ urban areas like much of Detroit; sure, they can slash investment in Australia’s educated future and continue Australia’s slide down the international rankings; sure, they can reverse the Gillard government’s gains in healthcare; and sure, they can end Labor’s support for struggling parents such as the school kids education payments. This slash and burn austerity will also need to be enacted within a framework of falling revenues as the Carbon Price is terminated, stripping billions from the budget. This dark austerity cloud will also hang in sharp contrast to Abbott’s enormously generous Paid Parental Leave Scheme that will pay according to lifestyle rather than need. Enormously generous that is, if you’re earning up to $150,000 a year, as the scheme matches parental income, confirming that in the eyes of Tony Abbott, an affluent baby deserves a hell of a lot more comfort and pampering than a poor baby.

It’ll be interesting to see how Mr. Abbott tries to wriggle out of this minefield of commitments he has so recklessly laid for himself over the last 3 years.

In the last 3 years, Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan have frustratingly missed just about every point in countering Abbott’s hollow propositions as they inexplicably allowed Tony and his wrecking crew to run rings around them. I can’t see the articulate pair of Prime Minister Rudd and his new Treasurer Chris Bowen, suffering from the same communication paralysis.

It’s going to be very difficult for Kevin Rudd to get even some of the ducks in a row for the coming election (another reason I think he’ll go later rather than sooner) but at least the government wont be rigid with fear as they have been til now. Shuffling so many new bums onto ministerial seats is also going to be a feat of immense engineering. Getting everyone briefed and quickly up to speed might also flash reminders of the heady days just after the 2007 election. Let’s hope Rudd gets a little honeymoon to settle the team in before the election campaign proper gets firing and the media blood-sport starts again in earnest.

The frustrating spectacle of Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan mangling perfectly defendable positions into hopelessly spun quicksand, is over. Now the business of injecting hope into the despairing government and disillusioned voters, begins.

Good luck Kevin 13.

More
See video and transcript of Kevin’s press conference here:
• Kevin Rudd aims to ‘forge consensus’ in politics after victory over Julia Gillard, 26 June 2013

See the transcript of Tony Abbott’s press conference remarks here:
• Tony Abbott Press Conference, 26 June 2013

So sad that Australia’s first female prime minister wasn’t able to translate the relaxed and sometimes witty Education Minister into an articulate and publicly effective Prime Minister. At least she’ll always be the first, so her place in history is secured.

Let’s hope Kevin can pull even a mangy rabbit out of the hat. What are your thoughts on today’s explosive events?

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