Showing posts with label Liberal Party of Australia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Liberal Party of Australia. Show all posts
Tuesday 23 April 2019
Australian PM Scott Morrison acting as an IPA stooge on the 2019 election campaign trail
The hard-right
lobby group the Institute of Public
Affairs (IPA) told the Liberal Party of Australia to jump to it……..
IPA, on 12 April 2019, the day after the
federal election date was set:
20 POLICIES TO FIX AUSTRALIA
15
policies the Coalition should implement but will not and 5 policies they should
not implement but will
John Roskam, Executive Director and Daniel
Wild, Director of Research PARLIAMENTARY RESEARCH BRIEF A research note from
the Institute of Public Affairs distributed to all Australian parliamentarians
12 April 2019
For more information
contact Daniel Wild, Director of Research at dwild@ipa.org.au
15 policies the
Coalition should implement but will not
1. Remove all references
to race in the Constitution Martin Luther King, Jr stated “I have a dream that
my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be
judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character.” But
Australia’s Constitution currently divides Australians by race. Section 25 of
the Australian Constitution, titled “Provision as to races disqualified from
voting’, while today redundant remains an affront to Australians’ sense of
egalitarianism. Similarly, Section 51(xxvi) of the Australian Constitution
gives the Commonwealth government the power to make laws on the basis of race.All
Australians are equal and should be treated as equal before the law. Therefore,
both provisions should be discarded and references to race in the Constitution
must be erased.
2. Repeal Section 18C of
the Racial Discrimination Act (1975) Free speech is inextricably linked to the
Australian way of life. Australians should be able to enjoy and participate in
open and unfettered discussion about issues of import to the future of our
democracy and our nation. Section 18C stops this from happening. It is an
unconscionable and egregious limitation on the free speech rights of all
Australians and must be abolished.
3. Withdraw from the
Paris Climate Agreement The Paris Climate Agreement will increase the cost of
electricity production by at least $52 billion by 2030 without making any
noticeable difference to the environment. The four largest greenhouse gas
emitters in absolute terms are not in the Paris Agreement (the United States)
or their emissions are not constrained by the Paris Agreement (China and India)
or are not on target to meet their obligations under the Paris Agreement (the
European Union). It is not in Australia’s national interest to remain party to
the Agreement.
4. Implement a flat
income tax Australia’s income tax system punishes success and discourages
upward economic mobility. Its interaction with the welfare system also creates
welfare traps through high effective marginal tax rates which keeps too many
Australians poor and trapped in a poverty cycle. To reduce poverty, expand economic
opportunity, promote equality, all Australians should face the same income tax
rate.
5. Reduce the corporate
tax rate to below 20 per cent, in line with competitor nations The top marginal
company tax rate in Australia of 30 per cent is the third highest in the
developed world, and well above the OECD average of 24 per cent and competitor
nations such as the United States (21 per cent), the United Kingdom (17 per
cent from 2020), and Singapore (17 per cent). Australia’s high corporate tax
rate is a key reason why business investment is just 11.5 per cent of GDP,
which is lower than the rate that prevailed during the Whitlam years.
6. Appointment of High
Court Justices to be rotated between the six states and the Commonwealth The
Commonwealth Government is too big, powerful, and interventionist, and state
governments have too small of a role in the operation of Australia’s
federation. A key reason for this is that the Commonwealth alone is responsible
for appointing Justices to the High Court of Australia. This has unsurprisingly
led to the appointment of Judges who favour an expansion of Commonwealth power
at the expense of state governments. To correct this imbalance, state
governments should play a central role in appointing High Court Justices.
7. Double the size of
the House of Representatives, and halve the size of the Ministry Canberra is
too detached and removed from the concerns of mainstream Australia.
This is
partly a reflection of the size of individual electorates. Almost every Federal
electorate contains more than 100,000 voters. This is too many. To get
government closer to the people there should be a larger number of electorates
with fewer voters, resulting in each voter having a louder voice. In addition,
the number of Members of Parliament who are a part of the Ministry at any point
in time has grown rapidly over the past two decades. Appointing members to the
Ministry, the Outer Ministry, and as Assistant Ministers is a deliberate
strategy to silence debate and reduce the influence of backbenchers. For
Australia’s democracy to become more robust as in the United Kingdom and the
United States, the number of Members of Parliament in the Ministry, Outer
Ministry, and as Assistant Ministers should be reduced from 41 to 20.
8. Privatise the ABC In
a free society the government should not own and operate its own media company.
The media market in Australia is highly competitive. Online platforms have
transformed and disrupted traditional approaches to media. Consumers have never
had more choice about where to source their news and opinions on current
affairs. Moreover, the ABC is unremittingly bias. Its staff are five times more
likely to vote for the Greens compared to the general population. The ABC is
beyond reform. New leaders will not fix the problem, regardless of their
experience or intention. The ABC must be privatised.
9. Re-introduce the debt
ceiling Gross government debt is currently $546 billion, all of which must be
paid back by today’s young Australians via higher future taxes. One approach
policy-makers can take to reduce government debt, or at least reduce its
growth, is to re-introduce the debt ceiling. A debt-ceiling places a limit on
how much the Australian government can borrow. Raising the debt ceiling
requires an Act of Parliament, which ensures the issue will be debated and
receive the public attention it deserves. A debt ceiling was implemented by the
Rudd government in 2007 and it was set at $75 billion. With the support of the
Greens, the Abbott government with Joe Hockey as Treasurer abolished the debt
ceiling in 2013 as debt approached $300 billion.
10. Hold a Royal
Commission into the Bureau of Meteorology’s tampering with temperature and
climate data The Bureau of Meteorology appears to have tampered with
temperature and climate data and to have re-written history to make it appear
as if the temperature is higher than it actually is, and that is has risen
faster than it actually has. Australians deserve to know the truth about their
public institutions. The only way to find the truth about potential temperature
data manipulation is to hold a Royal Commission into the Bureau of
Meteorology’s activities.
11. Abolish compulsory
superannuation Compulsory superannuation is a tax on workers’ wages which is
coercively redistributed to the Unions. Australian workers should be free to
decide how much of their own income they are willing to defer until retirement,
and how much they need in the present to spend on items such as housing,
education, and health care. For more information contact Daniel Wild, Director
of Research at dwild@ipa.org.au
12. Abolish the
Renewable Energy Target and end all subsidies to wind, solar, and
hydro-electricity generators Subsidies to renewable energy generation in
Australia are expected to reach $60 billion by 2030. The Renewable Energy
Target at the Commonwealth level, as well as state-based targets, have been the
main contributors to this subsidy blow-out. Because renewables are
uncompetitive, expensive, and unreliable, Australia’s electricity prices have
increased by 120 per cent over the past decade – around double the rate of
inflation. This has a disproportionate effect on the lowest income earners who
spend a higher portion of their income on energy than others. Moreover, this
cost comes at no noticeable benefit to the environment. For example, over the
period of 2001 (when the RET was first implemented by the Howard government) to
2014, the RET resulted in 0.005 per cent fewer carbon emissions globally from
human sources which in turn account for just three per cent of total
emissions.
13. Introduce a
one-in-two-out approach to reduce red tape Red tape is the single biggest
impediment to business investment, job creation, and economic opportunity in
Australia. Each year red tape reduces economic output by $176 billion, which is
equivalent to 10 per cent of GDP.12 This cost represents all of the jobs which
are never created, the wages which never rise, the businesses never started,
and the dreams which go unfulfilled because of red tape. Governments should cut
red tape by repealing two laws for every new law introduced.
14. Repeal the Fair Work
Act The Fair Work Act denies hundreds and thousands of Australians the dignity
of work. There are currently 1.7 million Australians who are either unemployed
or unable to work the number of hours they want. This is largely due to the
Fair Work Act which prevents employers and employees from reaching mutually
beneficial employment agreements. The Fair Work Act is too complicated and
broken to reform. It must be repealed in full. 15. Legalise nuclear power in
Australia Australia has 30 per cent of the world’s uranium deposits, some of
which we export to the rest of the world for power generation. Yet we forbid
ourselves from using nuclear power for domestic energy generation. Meanwhile,
Australia has the fourth highest electricity prices in the world. Section
140A(1) of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (1999)
states there is to be “no approval for certain nuclear installations” including
“a nuclear power plant”. These four words – “a nuclear power plant” – should be
removed from the Section to legalise the development of a nuclear power plant
in Australia. For more information
contact Daniel Wild, Director of Research at dwild@ipa.org.au
5 policies the
Coalition should not implement but will
1. Do not hold a
Referendum to divide Australians by race The proposal to establish the
Constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders Peoples
would irrevocably undermine national unity and is a regressive throwback to the
days when race played a central role in Australia’s Constitution. Similarly,
the proposal to establish a separate entity in the Constitution to be ‘The
Voice’ of Indigenous Australians is divisive and false - all Australians are
represented by the Commonwealth parliament and are equal before the law. Race
has no place in Australia’s Constitution.
2. Do not raise taxes
Australia is a high tax nation and workers and families pay too much tax. Over
the past decade real taxes per capita have risen by 11 per cent. According to
the Reserve Bank of Australia, over the past year taxes paid by households
increased by around 8 per cent, more than double the rate of growth in
household income.15 This means more money is going to the government and less
money can be spent on household essentials such as housing, child care, and
education. The Coalition should not raise taxes, and ideally should reduce
taxes.
3. Do not raise spending
The true cause of high and rising taxes is high and rising spending. Every
dollar of spending must be paid back with higher taxes, either today or in the
future via the accumulation of debt which is a tax on the next generation of
Australians. Government spending has increased from 23.1 per cent of GDP at the
end of the Howard-era to 24.6 per cent today (not including off-Budget expenses
and liabilities such as the NBN).16 In absolute terms spending has increased by
approximately 80 per cent, which is the equivalent to 6 per cent per year.17
This is well above the average rate of inflation of around 2 per cent per year.
4. Do not proceed with
Snowy 2.0 The Snowy Hydro 2.0 project will be remembered alongside the NBN as a
costly, ineffective, outdated, and inefficient bureaucratic program which won’t
solve the underlying public policy problem of high and rising electricity
prices and unreliable supply. The project will cost at least $4.5 billion, it
won’t become operational until at least 2024-25, and it will be a net energy
user, meaning it will be a drain on the energy grid. Instead, governments
should provide policy settings which allow for the development of reliable and
cost-effective coal-fired power generation.
5. Do not introduce new
anti-discrimination laws In the context of the Religious Freedom Review, it has
been suggested that new anti-discrimination laws be introduced to protect
freedom of religion. However, adding new restrictions through religious
antidiscrimination laws would constitute a significant threat to the freedom of
conscience of all Australians. Freedom, whether exercised for a religious
purpose or not, should only be limited where the exercise of that freedom
impacts another person’s freedom or peaceful use and enjoyment of their own
property. The only way to sufficiently protect religious freedom is to remove
laws that currently place restrictions on religious thought and practice.
Prime
Minister Scott Morrison asked how high he should jump, then realised he had
exposed the pathway he preferred if the party won at the 18 May 2019 federal
election and quickly dissembled………
The
Canberra Times,
18 April 2019:
Prime Minister Scott
Morrison says he has no plans to reverse a ban on nuclear energy, despite
earlier saying he was open to the industry if it could "pay its way".
"It's not, not on
the agenda ... but it's got to be self-sustaining," he told Tasmania Talks
LAFM on Thursday.
"I'm not going to
roll out tens of billions of dollars in subsidies, that's not the future for
energy efficiencies."
Labor's environment
spokesman Tony Burke took the chance to remind Mr Morrison nuclear power is
against the law.
"It is
extraordinary that Scott Morrison is now contemplating changing the law to
allow nuclear power stations in Australia," he said.
Mr Burke said Jervis
Bay, Townsville, Bribie Island and Mackay have all been flagged as locations
for nuclear power.
"Where is Morrison
proposing to put his nuclear power plants? Which coastal community is under
threat?"
But the prime minister
later on Thursday took to Twitter to step away from his earlier comment.
"This is not our
policy and we have no plans to change that," he tweeted.
Labels:
IPA,
Liberal Party of Australia
Monday 22 April 2019
Morrison & Co can’t guarantee delivery of promised tax cuts this year if they win May 18 federal election
The
West Australian,
17 April 2019:
Scott Morrison has been
forced to explain why his promise to deliver immediate $1080 tax cuts for low
and middle-income earners from July 1 may not happen.
Treasury officials today
confirmed a key plank of the Morrison Government’s re-election platform –
immediate tax cuts for 10 million workers when they receive their 2019 tax
returns – cannot occur without Federal Parliament’s support.
Treasury officials said
the tax cuts had to be legislated before the end of this financial year – on
June 30 – before workers could receive the rebates with their 2019 tax returns.
With the Federal
Election on May 18, it means the Coalition has little time – if it wins the election
- to pass the tax cuts through Parliament before June 30.
The Coalition has
promised rebates of up to $1080 for low and middle-income earners, and up to
$2160 for dual-income families, who lodge their tax returns from July 1.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg,
when he released the Budget weeks ago, claimed the timing of the Federal
Election would be “no impediment” to the tax cuts being delivered quickly.
But Treasury officials
appeared to contradict that claim today.
They said the tax
rebates would require “the relevant legislation to be passed before the
increase to the low and middle income tax offset (LMITO) can be provided for
the 2018-19 financial year.”
They also warned if the
tax cuts were not delivered by June 30 the revenue cost of the measure would “need
to be reassessed.”
Friday 12 April 2019
Morrison’s plan to use whatever is left in Coalition MPs and Senators electoral communications parliamentary allowance to fund his national election campaign has been scuttled
REGULATIONS AND
DETERMINATIONS Parliamentary Business Resources Amendment (2019 Measures No. 1)
Regulations 2019 Disallowance Senator FARRELL (South Australia—Deputy Leader of
the Opposition in the Senate) (21:29): I move: That item 4 of the Parliamentary
Business Resources Amendment (2019 Measures No. 1) Regulations 2019, made under
the Parliamentary Business Resources Act 2017, be disallowed [F2019L00177]. The
PRESIDENT: The question is that business of the Senate notice of motion No. 2,
standing in the name of Senator Farrell, relating to the disallowance of item 4
of the Parliamentary Business Resources Amendment (2019 Measures No. 1)
Regulations 2019, be agreed to. The Senate divided. [21:34] (The
President—Senator Ryan)
Ayes
......................34 Noes ......................26 Majority.................8
The New Daily, 4 April 2019:
The Morrison government
has lost a bid to allow MPs to use taxpayer-funded electoral allowances to pay
for TV and radio advertisements during the looming federal election campaign.
Late on Wednesday night
– in one of this parliament’s last votes before the election is called – the
Senate dumped a government regulation allowing $22 million of public
money to
be used for political ads in the lead up to May’s federal poll.
MPs have a budget of
about $137,000 for electorate communications, while senators have up to
$109,000.
Under existing rules,
they cannot use office expenses money to pay for content on television or
radio. The government’s changes would have allowed them to use printing
entitlements to buy TV and radio ads for the first time.
The Coalition had argued
lifting the ban on TV and radio promotions would have put Australian media on a
level playing field by ensuring all communities had the same access to
information from their federal MP.
But Labor frontbencher
Don Farrell, who moved the disallowance motion in the Senate, accused Prime
Minister Scott Morrison of wasting taxpayers’ money in a bid to save his job.
“Publicly funded office
budgets are for members and senators to communicate with their constituents –
not for spamming voters with hollow election slogans from the ad man, Scott
Morrison,” he said.
With the support of the
Greens and a handful of crossbench senators, Labor won the disallowance vote....
The heroes of
the hour who saved us all from what was clearly an attempt to create a lasting
rort at taxpayer’s expense were:
Bilyk,
CL. Carr, KJ. Chisholm, A. Ciccone, R. Di Natale, R. Dodson, P. Farrell, D.
Faruqi, M. Gallacher, AM. Griff, S. Hanson-Young, SC. Hinch, D. Ketter, CR. (teller) Kitching, K. Lines, S. Marshall, GM.
McAllister, J. McCarthy, M. McKim, NJ. O'Neill, DM. Patrick, RL. Polley, H.
Pratt, LC. Rice, J. Siewert, R. Smith, DPB. Steele-John, J. Sterle, G. Storer,
TR. Urquhart, AE. Waters, LJ. Watt, M. Whish-Wilson, PS. Wong, P.
Well
done one and all!
Thursday 4 April 2019
Scott Morrison just can't resist the urge to meddle in Liberal Party candidate selection
Latest version of Scott Morrison on the Net |
Yet another 'captain's pick' is on the cards.....
The
Canberra Times,
31 March 2019:
A Liberal vying to become the party's
candidate for Craig Laundy's old seat has delivered an astonishing condemnation
of the closed-door selection process, just as Prime Minister Scott Morrison
prepares to name his captain's pick for the hotly contested Sydney electorate.
Controversial psychiatrist and writer
Tanveer Ahmed - who is among a number of people under consideration for the job
- slammed the process as unfair and undemocratic, arguing he had been denied
the opportunity to confront his challengers.
It is expected Mr Morrison could
recommend a candidate to replace Mr Laundy in the inner west seat of Reid as
soon as Sunday, to be rubber-stamped by the party's state executive on Monday.
The Sun-Herald understands Dr
Ahmed met with Mr Morrison's principal private secretary Yaron Finkelstein and
factional powerbroker Alex Hawke, the Special Minister of State, and has been
positively vetted.
But Mr Morrison is said to be
considering other options including two women and failed state election
candidate for Kogarah, Scott Yung. Liberal pollsters have also gauged
support for Coca Cola executive Tanya Baini.
Wednesday 3 April 2019
It is likely to be tears before bedtime for many regional communities as Berejiklian Government restructures government departments
Government
News, 2 April
2019:
The NSW government will abolish key
agencies including the Office of Local Government, the RMS and Jobs NSW under
sweeping changes to the structure of the NSW public service.
A memo from the Department of
Premier and Cabinet obtained by Government News says the Office of
Local Government, along with the Office of Environment and Heritage, will cease
to be independent entities and their functions will be absorbed by a Planning and
Industry Cluster.
The cluster will cover areas such as
long term planning, precincts, infrastructure, open space, the environment and
natural resources.
The RMS, coming under the Transport
Cluster, will also be scrapped as a separate agency and as will Jobs NSW, which
will be merged into the Treasury Cluster…..
Local Government NSW President Linda
Scott said the peak would be seeking assurances from the new local government
minister, Shelley Hancock, and the Premier, that local governments would be
appropriately resourced within the new cluster.
“We’d hope, for example, that the
inclusion into a larger cluster will facilitate real analysis of the massive
amounts of data collected by Government, which should be shared with the sector
to help them deliver great outcomes for the public good,” she told Government
News.
“Local governments welcome a new
opportunity to work with the State Government to set housing targets with
local governments, not for them – to rebalance planning powers by working in
partnership with councils and their neighbourhoods on planning decisions that
affect them.”
However she said the appointment of Ms
Hancock was a stand-alone Local Government Minister was welcomed and had long
been advocated for by LGNSW.....
The memo says the structure of the
public service will also incorporate the following clusters: Stronger
Communities, Customer Service, Health; Premier and Cabinet, Transport,
Treasury and Education.
The following clusters will cease to
exist by July 1: Finance, Services & Innovation; Industry; Planning
& Environment; Family and Communities; and Justice.
The Secretaries Board will be expanded
in members to accommodate more senior public servants to “effectively drive
implementation of the Government’s priorities”.
New appointments under the
restructure:
Michael Coutts-Trotter – Secretary,
Families & Community Services & Justice
Jim Betts – Secretary, Planning and
Industry
Glenn King – Secretary, Customer
Service
Simon Draper – Chief Executive, Infrastructure
Australia
NOTE:
The Grafton Loop of the Knitting Nannas Against Gas
and Greed will be holding a knit-in on Thursday 4 April 2019 at 1pm to peacefully
protest the abolition of the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage. It will be
held outside the electoral office of Nationals MP for Clarence Chris Gulaptis
at 11 Prince Street, Grafton and interested people are welcome to attend.
Tuesday 2 April 2019
Morrison Government still refusing to tackle rising greenhouse gas emissions
The
Guardian, 31 March 2019:
Cuts to carbon emissions
from vehicle efficiency standards have been left out of government projections
for meeting Australia’s Paris climate commitments, indicating the policy has
been shelved.
The office of the
transport minister, Michael McCormack, said the government had not made a
decision on “how or when” standards to cut carbon pollution from vehicles might
be implemented.
After almost five years
of submissions a spokesman said the government “is not going to rush into a
regulatory solution” with regards to vehicle emissions.
New data shows
Australia’s emissions from transport are soaring and projected to be 82% higher
in 2030 than they were in 1990.
Australia lags behind
the rest of the world in setting vehicle efficiency standards, with most
countries in the OECD adopting policies to reduce emissions and improve the
efficiency of cars.
The ministerial forum on
vehicle emissions was set up under the Turnbull government in 2015, and
stakeholders are frustrated at the lack of progress.
Fact sheets produced by
the government that set out how it intends to reach Australia’s emissions
reduction targets under the Paris agreement suggest any policy on vehicle
emissions standards has been abandoned.
In 2015, the government
produced a
graph indicating it expected to achieve cuts of about 100m tonnes
between 2020 and 2030 through vehicle emissions standards.
The government’s latest
climate package contains no mention of this, and projects only about
10m tonnes of abatement through an electric vehicle strategy, with no reference
to vehicle emissions standards....
Monday 1 April 2019
PROPAGANDA: When Murdoch media asset joins with a hard right lobby group & inhouse commentator to run a line from the Liberal-Nationals election campaign playbook
“It would not be impossible to prove with sufficient
repetition and a psychological understanding of the people concerned that a
square is in fact a circle. They are mere words, and words can be molded until
they clothe ideas and disguise.” [Attributed to Joseph
Goebbels, German Third Reich Minister for Propaganda 1933-1945]
Daniel Wild: I think the Greens are much more extreme and a much greater threat to the Australian way of life than One Nation. Why hasn’t anyone from the Labor Party come out saying the Greens are a threat and they will preference them last?— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) March 29, 2019
MORE: https://t.co/SHDZ2CeIUB pic.twitter.com/Pil7kKm0pC
.@GemmaTognini: The Greens are drunk on their own urine. Thousands of jobs would be lost if their renewable energy targets were met. They are reckless and so ideologically driven that they don’t care about the implications of their policies.— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) March 29, 2019
MORE: https://t.co/eus3trsWJH pic.twitter.com/nsHtgUixMI
Thursday 28 March 2019
“Every year, the world's five largest publicly owned oil and gas companies spend approximately $200 million on lobbying designed to control, delay or block binding climate-motivated policy”
Forbes, 25 March 2019:
Every year, the world's
five largest publicly owned oil and gas companies spend approximately $200
million on lobbying designed to control, delay or block binding
climate-motivated policy. This has caused problems for governments seeking to
implement policies in the wake of the Paris Agreement which are vital in
meeting climate change targets. Companies are generally reluctant to disclose
such lobbying expenditure and late last week, a report from
InfluenceMap used a methodology focusing on the best available records
along with intensive research of corporate messaging to gauge their level of
influence on initiatives to halt climate change.…..
The research also found
that the five companies listed support their lobbying expenditures with a
financial outlay of $195 million annually for focused branding activities which
suggest they support action against climate change. The most common tactics employed
are drawing attention to low carbon, positioning the company as a climate
expert and acknowledging climate concern while ignoring solutions. The report
said that the campaigns are misleading the public given that the companies
listed continue to expand their oil and gas extraction activities with only 3%
of spending directed to low carbon projects. Both Shell and Chevron rejected
the report's findings and reinforced their commitment to reducing greenhouse
gases and addressing climate change.
Since 2013
these tactics appear to have been quite successful in shaping the political
debate within the Liberal and National parties in Australia.
One again the Liberal-Nationals Coalition goes into a federal election campaign without a genuine climate change policy or a viable energy policy.
The fact that the fossil fuel industry made political donations to the Coalition of an est. $270,717 in 2016-17 and the top 10 fossil fuel donors gave a further est. $512,261 in 2017-18 can not be ruled out as a factor in the continuing absence of genuine climate change policies on the conservative side of politics,
The fact that the fossil fuel industry made political donations to the Coalition of an est. $270,717 in 2016-17 and the top 10 fossil fuel donors gave a further est. $512,261 in 2017-18 can not be ruled out as a factor in the continuing absence of genuine climate change policies on the conservative side of politics,
Wednesday 27 March 2019
The Great Australian Ugliness: how supporters of conservative political parties act on polling day
so at lunchtime I stopped at an IGA this is in the semi-rural seat of Hawkesbury on the very fringe of north-west Sydney and it has all these fridges and freezers stacked with south Asian food dahl and curries and samosas. The man at the counter is maybe 60yo wearing a turban— Ingrid M (@iMusing) March 25, 2019
A few hours later I am back on duty and the man from the IGA in the Sikh turban and his wife (I assume) who is also wearing clothes from her culture arrive and the Liberals and SFF who are all sitting together say go home Mohammad hahahaHAHAHA— Ingrid M (@iMusing) March 25, 2019
Thursday 21 March 2019
Will Australian voters swallow Scott Morrison’s hypocritical volte-face?
In opposition or in government it didn't matter to Australian Prime Minister and Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison, he happily hammered home the message that boat people, asylum seekers and Muslims migrants were or could be a threat to the nation and to every Australian.
This self-confessed admirer of Donald Trump began his faux election campaign the day he took office shortly after the palace coup removed then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and, almost from the start there has been speculation that he was hoping that his rhetoric would goad someone into committing a violent act of terrorism.
These snapshots below are taken from 15 March 2019 televised remarks by Morrison barely hiding his glee that he finally had the pre-federal election terrorist attack he had been dog whistling for - even if the fact that this muderous attack was made on people at prayer in two New Zealand mosques allegedly at the hands of an Australian meant he had to do a 360 turn on who he could blame.
Snapshots by @sarah_jade_ |
The
Sydney Morning Herald,
17 March 2019:
Something the Prime
Minister said
on Friday has been gnawing at me. For the most part, his statements in
the immediate aftermath of the obscenity in New Zealand were admirably clear.
He identified the victims: those of Islamic faith. He also clearly labelled the
attack for what it was, a “vicious and callous right-wing extremist attack”…..
But another of the Prime
Minister’s comments warrants attention. Speaking of the Australian gunman, he
said: “These people don't deserve names. Names imply some sort of humanity and
I struggle to find how anyone who would engage in this sort of behaviour and
violence … He’s not human. He doesn't deserve a name."
I can well understand
Morrison’s reaction. Watching him respond, it was clear he was moved, and
disgusted. And of course I share that disgust.
But think for a moment
about the implications of such rhetoric. This man is not even human, the Prime
Minister tells us. He is alien, almost literally another species, and therefore
illegible to us, the humans. He is not like us.
Perhaps, at the moment
he fired the gun, that became true. But what about just before that moment -
was he human then, and inhuman afterwards? Did he go from being comprehensible
to incomprehensible in the blink of an eye? Of course the implication of Morrison’s
words is that he was always different: never one of us, always already
separate.
But this is a fairytale
– and like most fairytales, it is there to comfort, with its suggestion that
such violence must have nothing to do with the rest of us. The Prime Minister
meant well. But what he said was absolute rot.
The point has been made
elsewhere that anti-Islamic sentiment is rife in our politics, and that
violence is its logical endpoint. It is a crucial point, it can’t be made
enough,…. But right now I want to briefly examine another dominant strand of
Australian politics.
A few weeks ago, the
political world was aflutter with a single question: was this Scott Morrison’s
Tampa moment? And we know, because Morrison told
us, that he wanted it to be: “Australians will be deciding once again - as
they did in 2013, as they did in 2001 - about whether they want the stronger
border protection policies of…” and you can guess the rest.
The phrase "strong borders"
is heard often in our political debate, but much of the time, especially when
you live on an island, borders are abstractions – imaginary lines drawn on
literally shifting seas. The vague and nonsense phrase is of course a
euphemism, meaning "we are very good at keeping people out". And when
is this an important skill? When the people to be kept out pose some threat.
The beauty of "strong borders" is that it says all of that in two
words.
The same goes for
"Tampa moment", which in fact includes three separate events: Tampa,
then September 11, then children overboard. Howard’s election campaign blended
these events into one overarching
narrative. The demonisation of refugees as ruthless people who would kill
their own children and who might kill you was not a side-effect of the
strategy, it was the strategy.
Howard argues that he
would have won without Tampa. But it doesn’t really matter, because the real
damage was not done at that election. As people like Peter Brent have argued, the
real damage is the lingering belief that this is how elections are won.
Emphasise strong borders, emphasise the threat.
Morrison’s absorption of
that lesson is there for anyone to see. It was there in his comments in 2012
that asylum seekers might
cause a typhoid outbreak. It was there last week when he warned that asylum
seekers might be paedophiles
or murderers or rapists, and when he
backed Peter Dutton’s assertion that they would take housing and
hospital spots from Australians. And it was there in his recent security
speech, when he introduced the section on terrorism with reference to just
one, specific type: “radical extremist Islamist terrorism.”
If our political leaders
remain intent on depicting a world in which people from other countries bring
disease, hatred, and violence to our shores, can they really be so shocked when
it turns out that is precisely the world some people believe in?
[my yellow highlighting]
There’s been less
reflection on the fact that any 28-year-old in Australia has grown up in a
period when racism, xenophobia and a hostility to Muslims in particular, were
quickly ratcheting up in the country’s public culture.
In the period of the country’s enthusiastic participation in the War on Terror, Islam and Muslims have frequently been treated as public enemies, and hate speech against them has inexorably been normalised.
Australian racism did not of course begin in 2001. The country was settled by means of a genocidal frontier war, and commenced its independent existence with the exclusion of non-white migrants. White nationalism was practically Australia’s founding doctrine.
In the period of the country’s enthusiastic participation in the War on Terror, Islam and Muslims have frequently been treated as public enemies, and hate speech against them has inexorably been normalised.
Australian racism did not of course begin in 2001. The country was settled by means of a genocidal frontier war, and commenced its independent existence with the exclusion of non-white migrants. White nationalism was practically Australia’s founding doctrine.
But a succession of
events in the first year of the millennium led to Islamophobia being
practically enshrined as public policy.
First, the so-called Tampa Affair saw a conservative government refuse to admit refugees who had been rescued at sea. It was a naked bid to win an election by whipping up xenophobia and border panic. It worked.
In the years since, despite its obvious brutality, and despite repeated condemnations from international bodies, the mandatory offshore detention of boat-borne refugees in third countries has become bipartisan policy. (The centre-left Labor party sacrificed principle in order to neutralise an issue that they thought was costing them elections.)
The majority of the refugees thus imprisoned have been Muslim. It has often been suggested by politicians that detaining them is a matter of safety – some of them might be terrorists.
Second, the 9/11 attacks drew Australia into the War on Terror in support of its closest ally, and geopolitical sponsor, the United States.
Australian troops spent long periods in Afghanistan and Iraq, fighting and killing Muslims in their own countries. The consequences of this endless war have included the targeting of Australians in Jihadi terror attacks and plots, both at home and abroad.
The wars began with a deluge of propaganda. Later, the terror threat was leveraged to massively enhance surveillance by Australia’s national security state. Muslim Australians have frequently been defined by arms of their own government as a source of danger.
Two years after the war in Iraq commenced, the campaign of Islamophobia culminated in the country’s most serious modern race riots, on Cronulla Beach in December 2005, when young white men spent a summer afternoon beating and throwing bottles at whichever brown people they could find.
First, the so-called Tampa Affair saw a conservative government refuse to admit refugees who had been rescued at sea. It was a naked bid to win an election by whipping up xenophobia and border panic. It worked.
In the years since, despite its obvious brutality, and despite repeated condemnations from international bodies, the mandatory offshore detention of boat-borne refugees in third countries has become bipartisan policy. (The centre-left Labor party sacrificed principle in order to neutralise an issue that they thought was costing them elections.)
The majority of the refugees thus imprisoned have been Muslim. It has often been suggested by politicians that detaining them is a matter of safety – some of them might be terrorists.
Second, the 9/11 attacks drew Australia into the War on Terror in support of its closest ally, and geopolitical sponsor, the United States.
Australian troops spent long periods in Afghanistan and Iraq, fighting and killing Muslims in their own countries. The consequences of this endless war have included the targeting of Australians in Jihadi terror attacks and plots, both at home and abroad.
The wars began with a deluge of propaganda. Later, the terror threat was leveraged to massively enhance surveillance by Australia’s national security state. Muslim Australians have frequently been defined by arms of their own government as a source of danger.
Two years after the war in Iraq commenced, the campaign of Islamophobia culminated in the country’s most serious modern race riots, on Cronulla Beach in December 2005, when young white men spent a summer afternoon beating and throwing bottles at whichever brown people they could find.
Cronulla was a milestone
in the development of a more forthright, ugly public nationalism in Australia.
Now young men wear flags as capes on Australia Day, a date which is seen as a
calculated insult by many Indigenous people. Anzac Day, which commemorates a
failed invasion of Turkey, was once a far more ambivalent occasion. In recent
years it has moved closer to becoming an open celebration of militarism and
imperialism.
Every step of the way, this process has not been hindered by outlets owned by News Corp, which dominates Australia’s media market in a way which citizens of other Anglophone democracies can find difficult to comprehend.
News Corp has the biggest-selling newspapers in the majority of metropolitan media markets, monopolies in many regional markets, the only general-readership national daily, and the only cable news channel. Its influence on the national news agenda remains decisive. And too often it has used this influence to demonise Muslims.
[my yellow highlighting]
Every step of the way, this process has not been hindered by outlets owned by News Corp, which dominates Australia’s media market in a way which citizens of other Anglophone democracies can find difficult to comprehend.
News Corp has the biggest-selling newspapers in the majority of metropolitan media markets, monopolies in many regional markets, the only general-readership national daily, and the only cable news channel. Its influence on the national news agenda remains decisive. And too often it has used this influence to demonise Muslims.
[my yellow highlighting]
BACKGROUND
The
Sydney Morning Herald,
9 February 2011:
SCOTT Morrison, the
Liberal frontbencher who this week distinguished himself as the greatest grub
in the federal Parliament, is the classic case of the politician who is so
immersed in the game of politics that he has lost touch with the real world
outside it…..
The point of this story?
Morrison is a cheap populist, with form. On that occasion, he was being
irresponsible with the national economy. For him it's just about clever lines.
Morrison was powerless
to influence the bank, of course. John Howard and Peter Costello gave the
Reserve Bank independence to free it from people like Morrison.
The bank raised
rates three days after Morrison's comment.
This week it was race.
Morrison decided to see if he could win some political points by inflaming
racism and resentment. More specifically, he zeroed in on some of the most
vulnerable people in the country for political advantage. Indeed, is there
anyone more vulnerable than a traumatised, orphaned child unable to speak
English, held in detention on a remote island?
Morrison publicly raised
objections to the government's decision to pay for air fares for some of the
survivors of the Christmas Island boat wreck to travel to Sydney for the funerals
of their relatives.
Some were Christian
funerals, others were Muslim. But all of them were foreigners, all of them were
boat people, all of them were dark-skinned, and to Morrison that made them all
fair game. Unable to tell the difference between the Coalition mantra of
"we will stop the boats" and his emerging position that "we will
vindictively pursue boat people suffering tragedy" he went on radio.
As the survivors were
gathering to mourn their dead, Morrison said that with the government paying for
the 22 air fares, "I don't think it is reasonable. The government had the
option of having these services on Christmas Island. If relatives of those who
were involved wanted to go to Christmas Island, like any other Australian who
wanted to attend a funeral service in another part of the country, they would
have made their own arrangements to be there."
All of them were
dark-skinned, and to Morrison that made them all fair game
Again, for Morrison it's
just a tricky game of politics and clever lines. A former director of the NSW
Liberal Party, he inhabits a world where consequences for himself and his
political party are all that matter. There is no other reality. He didn't care
about the boat people, and - being as charitable to him as possible - he mightn't
even have stopped to think about the consequences.
And again, there is a
national interest at stake. Forty-four per cent of Australians were born
overseas or have at least one parent who was born overseas. Australia is an
immigrant society. Australia is a multicultural country. That is a simple fact.
To foment ethnic, racial or religious frictions or resentments is deeply
harmful to the national interest.
Kevin Dunn, professor of
geography and urban studies at the University of Western Sydney, who next week
is to publish a study on racism in Australia, says: "Research has shown
convincingly that geopolitical events, political events and political
statements don't affect Australian attitudes on race very quickly, but they do
affect behaviour. People with a grudge feel more empowered to act on it."
Racist abuse and discrimination follow. So again, Morrison was toying with a
deep national interest, but this time, his remarks could carry real force. The
Reserve Bank governor knows his business and ignores Morrison, but the
vindictive and the vicious may feel emboldened to act on their hurtful urges.
Who does this help?....
Morrison next day
conceded that his timing was insensitive, but didn't retract his complaint. He
denied that he had been influenced by One Nation, even though One Nation had
been busily emailing and lobbying politicians on the matter.
[my yellow highlighting]
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