As one might expect, in the leadership debate, Howard made a few claims about the IR "reforms". Lets examine the veracity of some of these claims, remembering of course that one does not need to tell an outright lie to be untruthful. For example, when Howard was asked whether, under his WorkChoices laws employees could be deprived of all their redundancy entitlements, he didn't tell an outright lie - he did not say "no". He also didn't tell the truth (ie "yes they can be and the so-called fairness test won't help them"), instead he launched into an irrelevant tirade about some old reforms to preserve entitlements of employees whose employer went into liquidation.
So what about some of the less obvious untruths? Let's take Howard's statement that Australia has the second highest minimum wage in the developed world. There are several ways that one could measure how high the minimum wage is. A raw dollar value is not particularly useful as the dollar will have different purchasing power in different countries. Wage adjusted for purchasing power ("purchasing power parity") is a better measure, as is percentage of average income.
Let's take a look at the OECD figures of minimum wage as a percentage of average income:
The first thing that is obvious is that in 2000 Australian minimum wage was indeed the second highest in the OECD. In 2006, this was no longer the case. While, at about 53% of the average wage, Australia's minimum wage is higher than the OECD average, it now ranks fifth, with NZ and Hungary following closely behind it. Another thing that cannot escape notice is that Australia is one of only 5 countries where the minimum wage has fallen vis a vis the average wage, and one of only 3 countries where this fall was quite significant. The other two countries are US (whose IR system Howard seems keen to emulate) and Mexico.
Lets look at the Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) adjusted wage:
It is the same story - Australia was second, or maybe even first, in 2000, but slipped to fourth place by 2006. Minimum wages have been getting lower, not higher under Howard government.
If Howard had been truthful he should have said "in 2000 Australia had the second highest minimum wage in the OECD, however the last six years of my government saw a fall in the minimum wage, putting further pressure on low income families". But perhaps Howard wasn't trying to mislead - perhaps, as has been his habit, he was looking wistfully to the past rather than facing the present and planning for the future.
And while we are on the subject of the IR untruths. During the debate Howard told the nation that he believed unions had a legitimate role to play. This may have been comforting to those of us who don't think a teenager looking for her first job can effectively bargain with an employer, if it wasn't for Hockey saying completely the opposite just a few days earlier. In an interview on AM radio on the 18th of October Hockey stated that the role of unions in Australia is "essentially over". It is not quite clear whether it is meant to be a statement of fact or of Howard government aspiration, but it does not sit easily with Howard's statement in the Leadership debate.
October 22nd, 2007
Posted by
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Howard government, Industrial relations, Unions, Australian election, Minimum wage |
2 comments
I was at the Law Institute of Victoria Workplace Relations Section debate yesterday. The topic was "AWAs: Should they stay or should they go?" and the two combatants were Jeff Lawrence of Liquor, Hospitality & Miscellaneous Union (LHMU) and next secretary of ACTU and Christopher Platt from the Australian Mines & Metals Association (AMMA).
I don't propose to give any sort of a detailed account of the debate. It was what you'd expect - Platt was arguing that AWAs are wonderful and are good for employees, at the same time as revealing that, even in the mining industry, employees on AWAs earn less than those on collective agreements, Lawrence was extolling the virtues of collective agreements and freedom of association, Platt was countering that by arguing that freedom of association includes freedom from association, which he seemed to interpret as depriving everyone of opportunity to associate.
A slightly disturbing aspect of the debate was that Lawrence came across as a rather unconvincing speaker. He did not do a great job dismantling Platt's arguments and often did not address those arguments at all. His speech came across as poorly structured, poorly researched and poorly presented. One would expect more of the next secretary of the ACTU. Platt was a much more engaging speaker, even if his arguments were full of holes and based on made up data - for example he misrepresented the content of the latest report into AWAs by Professor Peetz by asserting that AWAs increased wages in hospitality and retail industries, which is not the case.
But the crux of the AWA debate was summed up in Platt's response to a question from the audience regarding his assertion throughout the debate that AWAs allow employees and employers free choice of how their employment relationship will be structured (in his words allowing them to achieve "a meeting of the minds"). In response to the question Platt elaborated on that choice: if a potential employee is told that he can have a job on the condition that he signs an AWA because that is how the particular workplace operates he has a choice - he can sign an AWA or he can look for another job. The choice, according to Platt, is that of the employee!
It was a perfect illustration of the fallacy of the rhetoric of choice in the employment sphere. If the potential employee has valuable skills that are in short supply and the employer has no better candidates, sure, there is a choice. Of course if AWAs become the standard practice in the particular industry even an experienced and skilled employee may find that his choice of whether to sign an AWA becomes illusory (because the prospect of finding an employer that doesn't use AWAs is greatly reduced).
But if the employee is young, inexperienced, without highly sought after skills, is a migrant, a mother re-entering the workforce after an absence, an older person or any one of the many vulnerable groups (ie precisely the groups that require protection in the IR sphere) the "choice" is between taking the position on an AWA or selling Big Issue on a street corner. Let's not forget that if a person on welfare turns down the job, chances are they'll be in breach of Centrelink rules and will find themselves with no welfare payments for a number of weeks or months. Their "choice" is thus between abject poverty and signing the AWA.
Free choice implies a range of real options. A person faced with an ultimatum "your wallet or your life" may make a "choice" to hand over the wallet, but no one in their right mind would argue that it is a real or free choice. The outcome of that choice is pre-determined by our sense of self-preservation. So why is it that we accept the rhetoric of choice when it comes to AWAs? A potential employee is placed in a similar situation to a robbery victim - they can starve, they can beg on the streets or they can sign the AWA. Their sense of self-preservation dictates only one possible outcome. The more normative AWAs become, the more predetermined that "choice" is.
The only true choice regarding AWAs will be the choice we exercise at the ballot box in this year's election and, if we are not careful, this could be the last true choice in the IR sphere for a very long time.
Update: please see Christopher Platt's response in comments
July 24th, 2007
Posted by
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Australian politics, Industrial relations, Unions, Business groups |
4 comments
The Howard government has been very vocal about so called union "thugs" - using incidences of inappropriate behaviour on part of a couple of union officials to attack Labor's affiliation with the union movement and to run a scare campaign about union "thugs" taking over Australia should Labor win the election. Those suggestions are of course arrant nonsense, but truth and rationality are not pre-requisites in scare campaigns.
But perhaps Mr Howard would have done better looking a bit closer to home - because if (as it may very well be) a bit of abusive language is unacceptable behaviour for union officials, the conduct of Howard's liberal party mates if not any better.
Jim Aitken
Let's start with the Liberal party member Jim Aitken who was just convicted of assaulting a union media officer. The incident history is quite interesting. Apparently Mr Aitken, as a principal of a real estate agency, put one of his workers on an AWA, which reduced her take-home pay by as much as $30,000 a year. In response, the local Your Rights at Work Committee staged a peaceful protest outside the real estate agency. The protesters were greeted with a multitude of photographers, video surveillance and police. Mr Aitken declined to explain his actions, preferring to threaten legal action and sneer "this is much bigger than you people" when asked for a response by Workers Online.
The matter did not end there, however. One of the protesters was a National Union of Workers union officer Mark Ptolemy. About a month later, as Mr Ptolemy was working at a community fair stall, he was approached by Mr Aitken who reportedly verbally abused him for about an hour, calling him "a paedophile, homosexual and a union thug." (this is also a good example of Liberals' views on homosexuality), physically pushed him around and threatened to send thugs to his house to break his legs. Ptolemy, who feared the incident may escalate contacted the police and charges were laid. That Aitken acted like a thug has now been proven in a court of law.
It is as yet unclear whether Howard will take action and move to expel Aitken from the Liberal party as Kevin Rudd, rightly or wrongly, forced the expulsion of misbehaving union members.
Bill Heffernan
When it comes to consistently inappropriate behaviour, Howard's close friend, Bill Heffernan surely takes the cake. Few can forget his outrageous abuse of parliamentary privilege when he used forged documents to make very serious and completely false allegations against Justice Michael Kirby. He got away with having to resign as Parliamentary secretary and an apology. Close personal friendship with the Prime Minister is obviously useful in avoiding more serious sanctions (notably, Coalition sentaors all voted against a censure motion).
Not so long ago he alleged that Julia Gillard is unfit for leadership because she is socially "barren". Again, he got away with making an apology, which he undoubtedly did not mean.
Lets not forget a host of other incidents, such as gatecrashing a Labor party press conference given by Senator Conroy, interjecting repeatedly and standing behind Conroy and pulling faces, having an altercation with a Nationals Senator Fiona Nash, during which he told her to "blow it out her backside" and stealing how to vote cards from Greens volunteers at this year's NSW election and standing for four hours outside the polling booth stirring up trouble, including shouting "If you want to decriminalise drugs for your children, vote Green.'' Heffernan would not return the how to vote cards until police were called. His excuse? He wanted to have a bit of fun because "Sydney is as boring as bat shit".
A week ago Heffernan admitted to impersonating an ASIO officer and Senator Barnaby Joyce in a number of telephone calls concerning Cubbie Station. Under the Criminal Code Act (Cth), impersonating a public official is a criminal offence (see Divisions 142 and 148). So what is Heffernan's defence to breaking the law - he was just having some fun! "Can't a bloke have any fun any more?" he said. Needless to say, "having fun" is not a defence to any offences he may have committed.
So will Howard move to expel Heffernan from the Liberal party for his behaviour? I wouldn't count on it.
And the others…
Former Howard government minister, Gary Hardgrave and another Liberal party MP Andrew Laming are under investigation and are facing possible charges for rorting taxpayer funds to pay for campaign material. The alleged rort of some $67,000 pales into insignificance when compared with about $2 billion of taxpayer money used by Howard to advertise himself.
The Libs have had other more mundane incidents, such as the resignation of Aged Service Minister Senator Santoro earlier this year after "forgetting to disclose 70 parcels of shares and Human Services Minister Ian Campbell being forced to resign after admitting to a meeting with Brian Burke.
The Liberals are not short of "thugs" themselves, and some of these remain very close to the party power base. Despite this the Howard government is hypocritical (and desperate) enough to impute to the Labor party the misbehaviour of a couple of union members and to continue running its "union thugs" scare campaigns, but it would be foolish to forget the maxim that those living in glass houses should be careful with casting stones left right and centre.
July 1st, 2007
Posted by
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Howard government, Unions, Misconduct in politics |
4 comments
These days The Australian often reads like it is edited by the Liberal party. Today's editorial regarding Labor's IR policies is no exception. The backhanded compliments to Labor for "fine tuning" its IR policy do little to disguise the fact that the Australian apparently believes that the only way that Labor's IR position is going to be "acceptable" is if it mirrors that of the Liberals. The arrogant attitude that the only way that thinking of "the left" can be respectable is to become the same as ideology of "the right" was revealed in previous the Australian editorials.
This misleadingly complimentary editorial is perhaps more dangerous than the previous diagnosis of non right-wingers as "psychotic". Let consider the following statement:
The elephant in Labor's IR room, however, remains Ms Gillard's pledge to scrap AWAs. The Australian accepts collective agreements may be a beneficial safety net for low-paid workers. We accept that collective bargaining should be a right for those who seek it, but we fail to see the need for intrusion into the lives of highly paid workers who want to enter an individual non-union contract. To us, the Government's no-disadvantage test for workers earning less than $75,000 a year appears to be a reasonable compromise.
Let's forget for a second that the government doesn't have a "no-disadvantage test" - that's the test that it scrapped when it introduced WorkChoices. What it did introduce is the so-called "fairness test" (which is unlikely to remain for long should the government win the next election). Not only is the operation of the test uncertain, it is unreviewable by either the employer or the employee (except via the High Court). What is "fair" is decided by a government agency and there are no avenues for appeal or review. A right is not a right at all if it can't be enforced.
It is good to know that the Australian accepts the right to collectively bargain if an employee wants it, but that acceptance does not address the problem that employees face if their employment is made conditional on signing an AWA. The right to collectively bargain is meaningless if an employee has to chose between waiving that right and unemployment.
What the Australian editorial also seems to overlook is that, with or without AWAs, there is nothing stopping an employer and employee negotiating an individual non-union contract which is more favourable than award or collective agreement. What is objectionable about AWAs is that they can be used to undermine award or collective agreement conditions because they prevail over those agreements. Ie. AWAs remove the safety-net. An individual contract cannot prevail over collective agreements, but it will not stop "highly paid workers" negotiating more favourable conditions than the award safety-net.
The apparent reasonableness simply serves to conceal the disingenuousness of the stated position. The need to abolish AWAs stems not from "demands of unions", as the editorial suggests, but from the need to protect workers, especially vulnerable workers from exploitation. It is about our rights in the workplace.
By the way, yesterday I had the good fortune to attend a function where Julia Gillard gave a speech discussing, among other things, the impact of AWAs in the workplace, especially the impact on women. It was a very impressive speech and I'll do one or more posts about it in the next few days.
Thanks for reading.
June 27th, 2007
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Industrial relations, Media, Rudd and Labor, Unions |
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Every time I think that the Howard government has reached the pinnacle of hypocrisy and dirty politics, I'm in for a surprise. Today is no exception.
Joe Hockey accused the unions of using dirty "tricks to get workers to vote against the Howard government at the next election". Now that of itself is nothing new, the Howard government can't go a day without accusing the unions of something. But what have the unions done this time to upset Joe?
Well, they are engaging in the heinous act of "trying to persuade migrant workers to become citizens so that they can vote."
How absolutely dreadful! Encouraging people who are entitled to become Australian citizens to actually take up citizenship - a "dirty trick" indeed! While Joe was huffing and puffing about unions, he obviously forgot about the ads that the government has been running, encouraging people to do exactly the same thing.
Remember those advertisements that "there has never been a better time to become an Australian citizen"? The ones sponsored by the federal government and paid for by the Australian taxpayers? How about the Australian Government Citizenship Initiative website - http://www.citizenship.gov.au/, which reminds us that the Australian citizenship is "much more than a ceremony" and tells us that:
"Australian citizenship symbolises our unity as a nation. It represents commitment to Australia and its people, the values we share and our common future. It also symbolises the sense of belonging to the country where we have been born or where we have decided to make our home."
How very inspirational. Also inspirational are the Department of Immigration media releases following citizenship ceremonies which state that "taking up the privilege of citizenship was a great expression of loyalty and commitment to the Australian way of life".
But when it is a union encouraging migrants to show their "commitment to Australia and its people", "the values we share" and "to the Australian way of life" - it's a dirty trick, according to Hockey, an unworthy attempt to throw out the Howard government. Citizens can vote, you see. And if they can vote, they might vote against the Howard government. And that's just not on!
Thanks for reading
June 23rd, 2007
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Howard government, Industrial relations, Unions, Australian election |
no comments
OK, lets face it, no one can be in the least bit surprised to learn that the intended advertising campaign by business organisations to promote WorkChoices is not quite independent of the Howard Government. The $11 million dollar ad blitz will be directed by a Liberal party pollster Mark Textor of a firm called Crosby/Textor, which does a lot of work for the Liberal party. A number of other personalities associated with the Liberal party are involved, including former advisers to Kennett and to Peter Reith. One would have to be really naive to believe that the big business advertising plans had nothing to do with the government.
There is nothing objectionable to the Business Council running ads, provided they are not misleading. Unlike the Howard government, they will not be using taxpayer funds. Personally I'd even welcome their advertising. It will highlight big business interest in maintaining unfair IR laws, it will highlight the links between big business and the government and it will make the government look even more hypocritical when it criticises advertising by unions.
It is not the plan to advertise itself that is disconcerting, but the reaction (or rather lack of reaction) to it from the Labor party. Howard government has been running a smear campaign against the unions and their connections to the Labor party. The government has, quite misleadingly, been using the spectre of "union power" to scare voters into believing that, should Labor win government, the whole world will be ruled by thugs in cricket pads.
From leaked material it appears that at least some advertising by the big business will be in the same vein - making voters afraid of reversing WorkChoices because of "control" it would give back to the unions. Naturally control by big business is much more palatable (not to mention more conducive to larger profits and executive salary packages). Other messages reportedly include "the old wharf strikes of the '70s" (wonder why they couldn't come up with any events less than forty years old) or "union leaders … having a BBQ in the backyard at Kirribilli" (not nearly as classy or acceptable as dinners for Liberal party supporters) - all of which is supposed to convince the voters that having any rights in the workplace will bring about the end of the world as we know it.
So why do we hear nothing from the Labor party about the cosy relationship between the Libs and the big business? Why was there no outcry to threats made by industry groups to undermine Labor if it persisted with plans to boost employee rights? If a union acted in such a manner Howard would be talking about it from now till election. Why is Labor not expressing outrage over the arrogance of business groups who claim to be non-political at the same time as making statements such as "this issue would be off the agenda if the ALP changed its industrial relations policy." (ie. we wouldn't have to advertise if the damn Labor party just did what we want!)
Is Labor simply unwilling to engage in this sort of slimy politics? That's doubtful - they must know that this election campaign is going to be dirty, very dirty. Is Rudd saving his best for later? Or is Labor too afraid to give an impression that they are attacking business? Is it because big business and business groups have so much power that Labor does not dare to punch back?
If unions are fair game for scare tactics and smear campaigns because of their support for Labor, but business groups cannot be touched even if they are clearly lobbying for the Liberal party, then it is clear who has too much power and whose power we should be concerned about.
June 20th, 2007
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Howard government, Industrial relations, Rudd and Labor, Unions, Australian election, Business groups |
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Can it be a coincidence that we are being treated to all these exciting tapes, videos or photos of a few union members "behaving badly" at the same as Howard is leading a fear campaign against unions? There are was the semi-nude photo, foul language caught on tape and some more foul language caught on video. Did the union members in question behave inappropriately? Probably. Are there hundreds of people who do the same or worse every day and who are not unionists. You bet. And a few of them are in parliament, don't believe me, just watch Question Time.
So is it just a fluke that these random bits of misbehaviour are being publicised in the advance of the election? Somehow I don't think so. Fear campaigns are just a bit more effective (not to mention colourful) if they are occasionally punctuated by pictures of someone who supposedly supports your opponents dressed in nothing but cricket pads. Which means that we are likely to be treated to more "union members behaving badly" publicity. Don't hold your breath for "politicians behaving badly" publicity though or you'll turn blue. 
June 19th, 2007
Posted by
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Unions, Australian election |
no comments
In a post yesterday I contended that the government (with the help of right-wing commentators) has manipulated public discourse to stigmatise expressions of opinion adverse to their ideology. The post contained a few examples from the day's newspapers.
Well, how about some more evidence from today's papers:
First, there's Wilson Tuckey, a Liberal party MP from WA. Tuckey came out with wild claims that unions would intimidate people into voting Labor and were "going to kick their door in and threaten their kids" and would "start elbowing the Liberal and Greens and other how-to-vote card workers" outside polling booths. "There won't be enough police in the countryside to protect them." he ranted.
It is incredible that Tuckey (who incidentally is famous for threatening to run over a union official) can make these sorts of statements without arousing public outrage or earning a reprimand from the government. That is because this sort of conduct has become entrenched in public discourse. When the electorate has been conditioned over the last decade into believing that dissent is an act of evil, this sort of baseless, hateful rant ceases to astound. It is ok to portray a legitimate democratic activity of lobbying as something dark and evil - doesn't matter that the assertions are ridiculous, doesn't matter that they are not backed up by a single fact or the most minute shred of evidence, never mind that Tuckey predicts the unions will engage in very crude public unlawful behaviour at the same time that Howard is complaining about the sophistication of their campaigns. Liberals don't need to be consistent to be a great tool for inspiring fear.
Not to be outdone by Tuckey's paranoid rant, the ultra-conservative commentator Piers Akerman had a few gems of his own. I have previously written about the depth of Akerman's delusions and so it is no surprise that the prospect of ACTU lobbying against the government (ie exercising its democratic rights) sent Akerman's conspiracy theorising into overdrive. His article, creatively titled "Bully boys and bodgie barbecues", is a prime example how far the conspiracy discourse has come.
Just consider Akerman's language:
"Union HQ has authorised its stormtroopers to zero in on the nearly quarter of a million members who live in marginal seats - and work on them to ensure they vote the union line.
Using computer programs rather than the brick-through-the-window terror favoured by groups such as Hitler's Nazis, Stalin's communists and Mao's Red Guard, union activists have been told to home in on church groups, faith organisations and family members."
Wow - in two sentences a legitimate democratic activity of lobbying has been compared to military operations, terrorism, Nazism, Stalinism and the worst excesses of Communism.
The fact that unions know the details of their members (Akerman seems surprised by the fact that unions would know the details that the members themselves volunteer to their union) suddenly becomes a threat: "We know who you are and we know where you live, we know how many are in your family and even if they are entitled to vote."
Hmm, every time I receive promotional mail from the Liberal party or have a lobbyist call at my door, I'll have to feel really threatened too. They obviously know where I live and who I am and that I'm entitled to vote. Never quite saw it that way before, but when the Liberal party pre-election propaganda arrives, instead of putting "return to sender" on it and dropping it back in the mail box, I'll take it to the police.
But sarcasm aside, how has it become acceptable for democratic activity to be portrayed as "an affront to democracy"?
Why is initiating an actual discussion about government policy offensive, when spending billions of taxpayer money on misleading advertising isn't?
Why aren't we hearing talk of conspiracies when a building group threatens Labor in an attempt to modify its policies or when big business lobby international organisations on behalf of the government or employer groups run advertising campaigns in support of the government?
When opposition to government is defined as an act of evil, democracy withers. The question is are we going to allow this erosion to continue?
June 14th, 2007
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Australian politics, Howard government, Media, Rudd and Labor, Unions, Australian election, Democracy |
6 comments
A healthy democratic society thrives on debate and discussion of the merits of different view points. In a healthy democracy a multitude of voices can clamour for attention, each as entitled to be heard as the next, each equally entitled to persuade and lobby.
There are several ways to undermine a healthy democracy. One is by crude show of force, for example a government arresting or assassinating those opposing it. A society used to democratic ideals wouldn't react very well to such an unsophisticated attack. A government that took such action would find itself facing strong and unrelenting opposition. Another way is gradual and subtle - stigmatise the opposition, demonise the opposing viewpoints, paint all opposition to your ideological standpoint as a dark shadowy conspiracy. You have to have patience, you have to do it gradually, you can't rush it or you'll give away the gameplan.
There is a highly sadistic experiment that illustrates the difference in effectiveness between the two approaches. Take one live frog. Put it in a pot of boiling water. The frog will jump out of the pot, it will know that it was in mortal danger. Now put a frog in a pot of cold water and heat up the water to a boil. The frog will sit there passively slowly boiling to death, unable to perceive the gradual temperature changes as a threat to its existence.
It is this latter approach that the Howard government has adopted. It has gradually, with great patience and subtlety boiled the Australian democracy. It has managed to stigmatise all opposing view points. Any opposition to the government or its policies has become a dark conspiracy, any lobbying opposing the government a con on the voters. Voting out the government at the next election is no longer seen as an exercise in democracy, but as an attempt to destroy Australia. The government has made itself the country and any opposition to it a hatred of Australia itself.
You can see this daily in public discourse. For example, consider the government's portrayal of the ACTU plan to campaign in support of Labor. Today's newspapers (at least the Australian) and parliamentary debate were full of claim of "secret campaigns" (how secret can it be if Hockey spent half the day waiving around the so-called campaign manual), and "dirty tricks". There was talk of "union apparatchiks" (yep, its that threatening Communist word) who would "infiltrate" community groups (like KGB agents, no doubt) so that the corrupt union bosses could seize power.
A perfectly legitimate democratic activity has become a conspiracy. Democratic discourse has been portrayed as dirty, illegitimate tricks. Unions that are the enemy of the government have been portrayed as the enemy of Australia. Similar lobbying or advertising by big business is ok. It is not a dirty trick, it is not a conspiracy. Australians can trust organisations whose only aim is increasing their profits. But organisations whose aim is to protect Australian workers must be seen as evil. Government lies, lack of transparency, scaremongering or two billion dollar taxpayer funded advertising campaigns are legitimate. Lobbying for the Labor party is not. It is a conspiracy to "trick" the voters into supporting Labor.
In the same vein, and again, today, Julia Gillard's questioning about the governments undisclosed plans to force 20% of the Australian workforce on AWAs and about the deliberately misleading economic "studies" commissioned by the government (designed to give the answers the government wants) is nothing more than "visceral hatred of AWAs". The government does not have to account for its underhanded activities or plans that it neglected to share with the electorate. The challenge to the government is nothing more than hatred, not an exercise in democracy by an elected representative of the Australian. people.
If you read the newspapers regularly, you'll see examples of this erosion of democracy almost everyday. And it is working. The government's popularity in opinion polls (for all that they are worth) is rising.
We have allowed the government to convince us that opposition to it is an illegitimate conspiracy. We have allowed the government to brainwash us into believing that exercising our democratic choice in a way it doesn't approve of is nothing more than falling victim to deception. We have allowed healthy democracy to become a taboo.
It is not my contention that we should all chose Labor, only that we should chose. That our choice should be based on merits of competing discourses and not in a deluded belief that by not supporting the government we are partaking in a conspiracy to destroy Australia.
Thanks for reading, and please jump out of the pot, before the water comes to a boil.
June 13th, 2007
Posted by
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Australian politics, Howard government, Political advertising, Rudd and Labor, Unions, Democracy |
one comment
Would you trust someone who constantly asserts things without a shred of evidence to back up their assertions and who throws around accusations that cannot be supported? There is a vast gap between assertions and the truth, a gap that can only be bridged by evidence that one's assertion is based on something more than one's imagination.
Either the Howard government has not grasped that distinction or, more likely, they believe that if their assertions create sufficient fear the voters won't care that the governments' claims are completely unsupported. Fear tactics have worked for this government in the past, so their use should come as no surprise.
Let's examine some of the more recent assertions made by senior members of the government:
Employment figures released yesterday suggest that the unemployment rate is presently quite low. The government immediately claimed credit for the fall in unemployment. Let's ignore for a moment that half the job "growth" is in fact attributed to different measurements employed by the bureau of statistics (that's the great thing about stats - you can change the outcomes without changing the numbers), let's ignore the fact that a person is considered employed if they work as little as an hour a week and that the figures do not include persons who are not actively looking for work (eg. those who have given up). The employment rates are putting pressure on interest rates and inflation, with speculation that the interest rates may rise. Now, rather than telling us how the government plans to address that issue, Costello chose to make unsubstantiated assertions to frighten voters:
"The biggest risk at the moment is (that) on such low unemployment, one miscue, one misfire on industrial relations will set off inflation and bring all this to an end"
"This is like a highly engineered racing car. You take one corner a foot too wide and it will crash"
"You need a good experienced driver in control of this highly calibrated economy."
"And I'll tell you what I wouldn't be doing: I wouldn't be putting an 'L' plate driver in the cockpit at the moment."
The comments are clearly designed to scare the voters off voting Labor. They are somewhat reminiscent of the "L-plate Latham" campaign. Is there any evidence that Labor's economic or industrial policies would cause the crash Costello is warning about? No. If there was, Costello would no doubt be happy to tell us in excruciating detail. Quite apart from being unsubstantiated, his assertions are extraordinarily self-serving. Having apparently admitted to creating an economy so fragile that one tiny miscue will bring it all crashing down, Costello goes on to assert that only "a good experienced driver" - ie him, can control this extremely fragile machinery that he himself created. If Costello is not there for ever and ever, the entire country will come crashing down. We should suspend all further elections and appoint Costello a perpetual ruler of Australia!
Lets take a look at another "Labor will kill the economy" assertion
A few days ago Howard asserted that Labor's proposed greenhouse gas emission reductions would lead to a "Garret recession". Therefore Howard's own environment policy is better (we'd have to take his word for it as he's not telling anyone what it is) and, more importantly, voters should be really, really scared about voting Labor because the whole (fragile?) economy will come crashing down. And what evidence did he give to substantiate his assertion? None. There's actually a reason for it. A report prepared by the same group that the government retained to do the environment policy numbers for them shows that Labor's environmental policy targets are sound and are unlikely to have a significant economic impact. It also suggests that economic impact increases the longer we wait to do something about environmental damage (which is exactly what Howard has been doing and will continue to do if given the chance). The government telling porkies - how surprising!
And then there are the highly unoriginal "Labor and unions" assertions.
Joe Hockey was somewhat upset by the fact that the ACTU president Sharan Burrow dared to lobby to bring the Howard government's attacks on workers rights to the ILO standards committee (if anyone's wondering - he was not at all upset by the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry lobbying to block the case). So he decided to utilise the tried and true Howard government tactic, asserting that Burrow's conduct "was proof she stood to become the most powerful non-elected person in Australia if Labor won the federal election." How exactly is it proof of anything other than that Burrow is doing her job? If there was some convoluted logic that explained the proposition, Hockey was certainly not sharing it with us. Bare assertion is enough. Hockey did not say who the most powerful non-elected person is now - possibly Cardinal Pell, judging by his recent conduct.
Speaking of Pell, when Howard was defending Pell's interference in political decision making, he made yet another extraordinary assertion - stating that it was ironic that NSW Labor MPs were complaining about alleged direction from Cardinal Pell when "on a daily basis they are directed by trade union bosses how to vote''. Howard's evidence of that fact? Once again none, but who needs proof when running a scare campaign.
Thanks for reading
June 8th, 2007
Posted by
Unsilenced |
Howard government, Rudd and Labor, Unions, Australian election |
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