Australian Federal Election 2022: giving Wilcox, Moir and Rowe the last word before polling day

Cathy Wilcox

Alan Moir

 

David Rowe

Cartoons of the Week

Cathy Wilcox

John Shakespeare

Peter Broelman

It's far too early to count Australia's 2022 federal election chickens

Since 13 February 2022 there have been 11 voter intention surveys published by the four major political survey companies – Newspoll, Ipsos, Resolve and Morgan Research.

None of these 11 surveys predicts that the Morrison Government will get re-elected in 2022.

However, investing in the idea that surveys indicate exactly what est.17,228,900 voters will decide as their pencils hover over ballot papers is dangerous for all concerned.

Nothing is a foregone conclusion. Every voter needs to make a well considered choice, because every voter has to live with the consequences of their vote.

On Saturday 18 May 2019 the national electorate went to polling booths all around Australia to elect a federal government.

The Australian, 8 May 2022
Click on image to enlarge

The day before “The Australian” newspaper published a Newspoll voter intention survey result which indicated that there was a 3 percentage point difference between Labor and the Coalition which – given the consistent poll results since 4 February 2018 favouring Labor – was considered by many political pundits to firm up the likelihood that Labor would form government the next day.

That didn’t happen. The Liberal-Nationals Coalition formed government with 77 out of the 151 seats in the House of Representatives, leaving the Labor Party Party holding 68 seats, Independents 3 and The Greens, Centre Alliance & Katter’s Australia Party all holding one seat each.

Right now the nation is just 11 days out from the 21 May 2022 federal election and, since 27 June 2021 consecutive Newspolls have developed a wide gap between Labor and the Coalition similar to the gaps that existed on Newspoll graphs in the lead up to the 2019 election.

Thirteen days out from the 2022 federal election there was an 8 percentage point difference in Labor’s favour in the Newspoll survey published last Sunday.

Expect the difference to tighten as election day gets closer.

Expect the predominately right-wing mainstream media (with a few shining exceptions) to take leave of its collective senses over the next 11 days as it fights to keep Scott Morrison in government.

Cartoon of the Week

David Rowe

Australian Federal Election 2022: inflation and cost of living a live issue 23 days out from polling day

Australia recorded its largest quarterly & annual inflation increase in 21 years in the first Quarter of 2022.

The Cost of Living Index (CPI) rose 2.1 per cent cent in March 2022 quarter and 5.1 per cent annually - again largest annual change in 21 years. 

That 5.1 per cent exceeds the 2021 annual rate of 3.5 per cent, as well as the overly optimistic projected inflation figure of 4.5 to 4.6 per cent floated by some economists for the March quarter.

Australian Bureau of Statistics, media release, 27 April 2022, excepts:

The most significant contributors to the rise in the March quarter CPI were new dwellings (+5.7 per cent), automotive fuel (+11.0 per cent) and tertiary education (+6.3 per cent)…..

Notable rises were also recorded across the food group (+2.8 per cent), reflecting high transport, fertiliser, packaging and ingredient costs, as well as COVID-related disruptions and herd restocking due to favourable weather. Main contributors to the rise in food prices included vegetables (+6.6 per cent), waters, soft drinks and juices (+5.6 per cent), fruit (+4.9 per cent) and beef (+7.6 per cent)…..

The grocery component of the group, which excludes meals out and takeaway foods, rose 4.0 per cent in the March quarter." Ms Marquardt said.

Prices for other grocery items, such as non-durable household products (+6.7 per cent), which includes products such as toilet paper and paper towels, also rose in the March quarter….

The price of goods (+6.6 per cent) rose more strongly through the year than that of services (+3.0 per cent)…..

It appears that cost of living increase is now running significantly ahead of wages growth in Australia.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison's one-off election campaign bribe of $250 for eligible Centrelink/DVA recipients won't even touch the edges of the yawning gap which has developed between income and costs due to the broad base of rising prices. In fact the positive impact of this so-called Cost of Living Payment is unlikely to last beyond polling day in many low-income family households.

Candidates standing in Page Electorate at 21 May 2022 Federal General Election - Part 5. One major party & 5 minor parties reviewed

 

Liberal Democratic Party (LNP) – registered by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) in September 2007.

This is a political party which for the purposes of progressing itself is blatantly chasing the “freedoms” vote, with its “Policy One” of eight policies listed being “FREEDOM FROM COVID ALARMISM”. A document not updated since 2021 and redolent with the echo of that motley collection of white supremacist, QAnon, anti-vaccination and other conspiracy theory nutters who rallied and protested during 2020 and 2021.

It is not considered a parliamentary party as it had no elected member as at March-April 2022.

It appears to be standing 16 candidates for Senate positions and 101 candidates for House of Representatives seats.

PAGE candidate: Thomas Searles

The Australian Federation Party (FED) – although this party was first registered by the AEC in 2011, by 2022 it was firmly in the ‘freedoms’ camp of anti-public health measures resistance spawned by that same motley collection of white supremacist, QAnon, anti-vaccination and other conspiracy theory nutters who gave us collective action such as this:

Video from today’s #freedomday protest. Anti-lockdown protesters with police hot on their tails at Elwood Beach. Melbourne. Victoria. #melbournelockdown #WWG1WWGA pic.twitter.com/glMj8YJRi4

— precursor (@occupy_now) September 19, 2020

The party has subsequently dressed up in smart suits and penned fine words, however it remains a largely untested entity.

It is not considered a parliamentary party as it had no elected member as at March-April 2022.

FED is standing 47 candidates at the 21 May federal election – 11 for Senate positions and 38 for House of Representatives seats.

PAGE candidate: Heather Smith

United Australia Party (UAP) – registered by the AEC in 2018. The brain child of rather notorious mining magnate Clive Palmer who as the leader of the Palmer United Party was a rather desultory member of the Australian House of Representatives for one term marked by his absences – retiring prior to the 2016 federal election.

Currently he is standing for a Senate position representing Queensland.

He is using what is alleged to be his personal wealth to run 22 Senate candidates and 151 House of Representative candidates in the 21 May federal election. Although rather oddly, the party’s official list of candidates seems to number 152.

This is a classic disruptor party, out to “Make Australia Great Again” because there is a need for “freedoms” - with at least one notable Trump-QAnon-Antivaxx supporter in its ranks, Craig Kelly.

It is considered a parliamentary party as it had one member as at March-April 2022 - Craig Kelly being elected in 2019 as the Liberal Party MP for Hume but resigning in February 2021 and, moving to the cross benches until joining the UAP in August 2021.

PAGE candidate: Ian Williamson

TNL – register by the AEC in March 2022. Has approximately 1,527 members. It coyly insists on reminding the general public that it was formerly “The New Liberals”, a party formally deregistered on 7 December 2021 in part based on the potential for name confusion with the Liberal Party. 

On 13 March 2021 it rather quixotically sought to have the Liberal Party of Australia deregistered. 

Presidency and leadership of the party appears to be a family affair.

It is not considered a parliamentary party as it had no elected member as at March-April 2022.

TNL is fielding 19 candidates at the 21 May federal election – 7 for Senate positions and 12 for House of Representatives seats.

PAGE candidate: Serge Killingbeck

Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (ONP) – registered by AEC in 2004. A political party with an unashamedly resentful, far right and racist worldview plucked straight from the ugly underbelly of 1950s Australia.

It is a parliamentary party as it had two elected members as at March-April 2022.

One Nation is standing 9 candidates for Senate positions and 69 candidates in the House of Representatives in the 21 May federal election.

PAGE candidate: Donna Pike

National Party of Australia (NSW) (NAT) – registered by the AEC in 1984. 

A party which has proudly followed a regressive policy path of cronyism, isolationism, environmental vandalism and what, in practice, has been crude climate change denialism which left Australia vulnerable to the worst climate change impacts.

It was also a party which during the 26 months to date of the global pandemic has been in favour of doing the bare minimum when it came to the public health response and which did not favour lockdowns - with some MPS quietly muttering about individual freedom.

The AEC lists it as a parliamentary party, having 7 NSW MPs out of the 9 National Party elected members in the House of Representatives (the remaining 2 are from Victoria) and 1 NSW Senator out of the 3 Nationals in the Senate (the remaining 2 are from Qld & Vic) as at March-April 2022.

It is fielding 11 NSW candidates - 1 for a Senate position and 8 in the House of Representatives, as Coalition partner to the Liberal Party of Australia.

PAGE candidate: Kevin Hogan

Australian Federal Election 2022: what do political funding rorts look like and are they part of a corrupt process?

Looking at past Liberal Party of Australia political rorts may help to assess Scott Morrison's current election campaign promises which have a dollar amount attached when first announced and/or a specific electorate is included in the announcement.

So what has all the Liberal Party's much touted "individual freedom and free enterprise" delivered since 2013?

Well between 2013 and 2018 it appears to have delivered federal regional grants totally $714,563,851. With 57.62% of this funding directed to 77 Coalition-held electorates and, the remaining 26.92% going to 74 other electorates - 68 ALP & 6 minor party/independent.

Some electorates such as Hinkler (Qld) held by Nats-LNP since 1993 received well in excess of $26 million in regional grants. Mallee (Vic) held by Nats since 1972 and Capricornia (Qld) held by LNP since 2013 received over $24 million each. While Dawson (Qld) held by LNP since 2010 received over $31 million - and on it went over the approximately six year span.

Has this brazenly partisan allocation of Treasury funds lessened under the prime ministership of the Liberal MP for Cook?

Apparently not, because the bulk of the billions listed in the next paragraph were distributed on Morrison's watch.

According to The Sydney Morning Herald on 16 April 2022, taxpayers have funded $55.6 billion in federal government grants over less than 4 years (including a hefty $20 billion last year) under rules that give ministers sweeping powers to decide payments, often without any criteria or reporting & against departmental advice. From January to March this year another $1 billion was distributed as grants.

So where might some of those $55.6 billion dollars have found a home?

Nor being a forensic accountant I am not up to the task of tracking that down, but there are some clues to be found.

Take the joint Federal-States Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Grants Program.

The “Black Summer” bushfire season actually ran from July 2019 through to early March 2020 and during this period est. 2.9 million adult Australians had their property damaged, their property threatened, or had to be evacuated, often along with their families.

This Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Grants Program funding pool held $390,893,779 – with $296,746,274 allocated and $94,147,508 still unspent in February 2021.

Over 100 local government areas in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria were listed in the grant eligibility criteria.

A total of 57.63% of all grant allocations worth est. $171,035,576 went to Coalition electorates, 31.33% worth $92,994,495 to Labor electorates and, 11.02% worth $32,716,230 to Independent/minor party electorates.

In December 2020 it was revealed that one of Australia's richest men who happens to be a Liberal Party donor had received $10 million in bushfire recovery funding - to expand a paper mill not directly affected by fire.

In February 2022 the Morrison Government announced that the Black Summer Bushfire Recovery Fund had received an additional $110 million for 524 "broad recovery projects" with unspecified recipients. The this grants program is now listed as closed.

Just in case a reader might think that the nature of that 2019-2020 mega bushfire season might have skewed funding allocations, here is another example which clearly indicates bias.

Round 5 of the Building Better Regions Fund – Infrastructure Projects Stream.

There it is in glorious colour.

A total of 73. 23% of this grant round, worth est. $215,281,617 going to Coalition electorates and 26.76% worth est. $78,678,728 going to electorates held by Labor and the cross benches. Liberal & LNP MPs receiving the bulk of this largesse held federal seats in New South Wales and Queensland.

Then there is the National Commuter Car Park Fund.

The Urban Congestion Fund (UCF) was established in the 2018–19 Budget. Total funding for the UCF had grown from $1 billion to $4.8 billion as at 31 March 2021.The National Commuter Car Park Fund is a component of the UCF.

This is what commuter car park funding allocation looked like in February 2021.

A total of 77 Liberal Party electorates received a whopping 81.75% of the total funding pool worth $575,890,000. Among the Liberal Party luminaries lining up for the prime minister’s largesse were; Josh Frydenberg (Kooyong Vic), Alan Tudge (Aston Vic), Tim Wilson (Goldstein Vic), Michael Sukkar (Deakin Vic), Jason Wood (La Trobe Vic), Angus Taylor (Hume NSW), David Colman (Banks NSW), Stuart Robert (Fadden Qld), Bert Van Manen (Forde Qld) Peter Dutton (Dickson Qld) and Andrew Hastie (Canning WA).

In June 2021 the Australian Auditor-General handed down a performance report titled “Administration of Commuter Car Park Projects within the Urban Congestion Fund”.

The performance report found numerous inadequacies, including:

• at 31 March 2021, there had been 44 commuter car park projects announced involving upgrades at 47 identified sites with a total Australian Government funding commitment of $660.4 million;

• assessment work had been completed for 10 car parks resulting in $100 million of Australian Government funding being approved for the full project (including delivery of construction work). Construction had been completed at two sites and had commenced at a further three sites;

• The Department of Infrastructure’s administration of the commuter car park projects within the Urban Congestion Fund was not effective;

• The department’s approach to identifying and selecting commuter car park projects for funding commitment was not appropriate. It was not designed to be open or transparent. The department did not engage with state governments and councils, which increased the risk that selected projects would not deliver the desired outcomes at the expected cost to the Australian Government. Departmental advice did not contain an assessment against the investment principles or policy objectives and it was not demonstrated that projects were selected on merit. The distribution of projects selected reflected the geographic and political profile of those given the opportunity by the government to identify candidates for funding consideration; and

• The selection of 47 commuter car park sites for funding commitment were decisions of government taken over the period January to July 2019 and:

• effected in 38 cases (81 per cent) by the written agreement of the Prime Minister to a written request from Ministers;

• effected in seven cases (15 per cent) by the election commitment process; and

• in two cases (four per cent) the department had not evidenced how the funding commitment was effected, beyond email advice from the Minister’s Office and a media announcement by the Prime Minister. [my yellow highlighting]

By 2022 it was apparent that most of 47 commuter car parks which had funding allocated were no longer considered active proposals and at least 5 proposed car parks appear to have been scrubbed from the original list – 4 in Labor electorates and one in a Liberal Party electorate.

Lack of transparency, across the board poor record keeping, no apparent accountability for decisions made and politically partisan use of public money - are all indicators of corrupt processes in this particular grant fund. 

This next chart demonstrates funding allocations for sports infrastructure.

A breakdown of full details can be found at:

https://www.thevogfiles.com/uploads/1/3/5/1/135189168/copy_of_sporting_grants5_1.xlsx

To say that voters are not happy with the Liberal Party is an understatement. This was one voter in the Australian Capital Territory......

“Firstly, the biggest misdirect, perhaps lie, perpetrated by the Liberals is that they are a Federal Political Party - a single administrative & policy unit like the ALP. They are a bunch of independent Fiefdoms, ruled in what looks like a Feudal system with a truly byzantine organisation…..

I’ve looked at the Liberal Federal Secretariat & "Liberal Party NSW" sites and they don’t publish any “Values”,

They publish some very rubbery & loose “Beliefs”. Untestable, and unaccountable motherhood statements. Summarised at the end as:

“In short, we believe in individual freedom and free enterprise"

Tony Abbott around 2013 clearly annunciated both Liberal Party Values & Purpose: “We are not Labor”.

Nobody in their right mind would invest in a company with the absence of proper Governance & Accountability embodied in the many “Liberal” party Fiefdoms in Australia, nor would they tolerate the absence of consistent Values, Priorities and Policies.” [Voter from Kippax, ACT, 3 March 2022]

SOURCES

The VOG Files, Rorts Central at:

https://www.thevogfiles.com/rorts-central.html

Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) at:

https://www.anao.gov.au/work/performance-audit/administration-commuter-car-park-projects-within-the-urban-congestion-fund

Parliament  of Australia, Members at:

https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Members

Headline of the Month

 

SNAPSHOT: Financial Review, 14 April 2022
click on image to enlarge

Australian federal election campaign 2022: employment promises

The 2022 federal election campaign has begun in earnest. Prime Minister & Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison promises "to create1.3 million jobs over the next five years" [Sydney Morning Herald, 11 April 2022] and Opposition Leader & Liberal MP for Grayndler Anthony Albanese pledges "to support a road map released by Tech Council Australia (TCA) to reach 1.2 million jobs in the industry within eight years" [NEWS.com.au, 24 March 2022].

Perhaps before considering competing promises and any future claims one should look back on employment and jobs growth year-to-year for the four years since that regime change occurred.

Australian Bureau of Statistics- ANZ Research: National Job Vacancies(work available), Unemployment, Underemployment & All Hours Worked

6 September 2018: 178,322 advertised jobs available in August prior to Morrison becomes prime minister 24 August 2018

Seasonally adjusted in August there were: 

est.12,631,300 people listed as employed; 

est. 708,800 listed as unemployed; 

the unemployment rate was 5.3% and underemployment rate was 8.1%.

Total hours worked all jobs that month - 1,750.9 million.

6 September 2019: 156,978 advertised jobs available in August

Seasonally adjusted in August there were:

est. 12,926,900 people listed as employed; 

est. 716,800 people listed as unemployed; 

the unemployment rate was 5.3% and underemployment rate was 8.6%;

Total hours worked that month - 1,782.6 million.

Compared to August 2018 there were fewer available jobs, more people listed as unemployed and the underemployment rate was higher. More people were recorded as being in employment and national hours worked had risen.

7 February 2020: 149,544 advertised jobs available for January pre-COVID

Seasonally adjusted in January there were:

12,988,400 people listed as employed; 

725,500 people registered as unemployed; 

the unemployment rate was 5.3% and underemployment rate was 8.6%.

Total all hours worked that month - 1,778 million.

6 September 2020: 109,103 advertised jobs available in August

Seasonally adjusted in August there were: 

12,583,400 people listed as employed; 

921,800 people registered as unemployed; 

the unemployment rate was 6.8% and underemployment rate was 11.2%.

Total all hours worked that month - 1,683 million.

Compared to August 2019 there were fewer jobs available, less people were in employment, more people unemployed, the underemployment rate was higher and national hours worked had  fallen.

6 September 2021: 195,995 advertised jobs available in August

Seasonally adjusted in August there were:

13,022,600 people listed as employed; 

617,100 people listed as unemployed; 

the unemployment rate was 4.5% and underemployment rate was 9.3%;

Total all hours worked all jobs that month - 1,714 million.

Compared to August 2020 there were more jobs available, more people in employment, less people unemployed, the underemployment rate was lower and national hours worked had risen.

Between August 2018 and August 2021 all cited indicators fluctuated. However, by the end of that four year month-to-month comparison: the number of available jobs had risen by 17,673 in a resident population which had grown by est. 570,000 persons; people in employment had increased by 391,300; the unemployment rate was 0.8% lower; the underemployment rate1.2% higher; and national hours worked had fallen by 36.9 million.

4 March 2022: 228,170 advertised jobs available in February 

In February there were: 

13,372,000 people listed as employed; 

563,300 people registered as unemployed; 

seasonally adjusted the unemployment rate was 4.0% and underemployment rate 6.6%. 

Total all hours worked that month - 1,183 million. Most recent ABS data for 2022

Definitions

• Any person in the labour force who did paid work or who was only temporarily absent from paid work is considered employed. 
• Any person in the labour force who didn't do paid work and wasn't temporarily absent from paid work is considered unemployed.
• Any unemployed person who is no longer looking for work is considered not participating in the national labour force.
• Any person in paid employment who is not fully employed and is looking for and/or available to start work with more hours is considered to be underemployed.

SOURCES

https://media.anz.com/search-results?key=job+ad

https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour