The Peril Of Intergenerational Theft

In his speech to the Press Club on 2nd February, Tony Abbott once again called up the spectre of intergenerational theft:

And reducing the deficit is the fair thing to do – because it ends the intergenerational theft against our children and grandchildren.

We’ve never been a country that’s ripped off future generations to pay for today.

And under my government, we never will.

http://www.liberal.org.au/latest-news/2015/02/02/prime-minister-address-national-press-club

"Intergenerational theft" has been a catchcry of the Prime Minister and other ministers such as Joe Hockey and Eric Abetz.  It has invariably been used in defence of the Government's budget and its cost-cutting measures.  According to them we should suffer some pain now in order to leave the nation in a sound state for our children and grandchildren.

On one level this seems eminently commendable.  But it completely misses the point of another area of government policy where today's Government is severely ripping off future generations. Our children and grandchildren and their descendants are being ripped off because of the Government's tepid and ineffective policy on climate change.  There is no Government understanding of a need for urgent action and of the impact ineffective action now will have on the economy of the future and the health and lifestyle of our descendants as well as the health of the natural world.

And the truly amazing thing is that no-one in the Government seems to recognise the inconsistency of their position on inter-generational theft.  A cynical person could claim that at least some Government MPs do see this inconsistency – and just choose to ignore it. After all it would be decidedly awkward to concede that climate change is a really important and urgent issue and therefore know that not taking effective action will severely penalise future generations.  It's much easier to pay lip-service to the climate problem with a shonky "direct action" plan and to claim that the government will do more when other major emitters take more action.  Interestingly, the fact that many other major emitters are starting to take more action appears to have escaped the attention of the Abbott Government.

Obviously the Government's tepid climate policy suits those dinosaur Liberals and Nationals – and there appear to be quite a few of them - who are climate change deniers.

I suspect that the inconsistency about intergenerational equity/theft probably is seen by very few, if any, government MPs. After all, many of them still don't seem to understand that a great number of people oppose their budget because it is inherently unfair – that it places all of the pain on the less well-off in our society. The Prime Minister, the Treasurer and many others just don't get it.  Many Coalition MPs still seem to believe that the policies can be delivered if they improve their communication strategy. In their self-centred view those benighted electors just don't understand.  In reality very large numbers of electors understand only too well.

The core of their problem is that they are out of touch with ordinary Australians.  They are purblind inhabitants of a series of ivory towers.

Until the Government starts to take effective action on climate change, it should stop using the argument of intergenerational theft to justify other aspects of policy.  That would eliminate one of the areas in which it renders itself ridiculous.

Hildegard

Northern Rivers

*  Guest Speak is a North Coast Voices segment allowing serious or satirical comment from NSW Northern Rivers residents. Email ncvguestpeak at gmail dot com dot au to submit comment for consideration.

Tony Abbott: from political rooster to feather duster in seventeen months?

Tony Abbott during his unsuccessful bid to rally backbenchers & voters behind him

National Press Council Address

2 February 2015 

The anglophile who only became an Australian citizen for personal financial advantage, the aggressive bully who thought his divine destiny was to rule the country, the intellectual lightweight who believes good policy is a quiverful of three-word slogans, the man whose sense of entitlement has him dipping his hand deep into the taxpayer's pocket, the right wing ideologue without a decent bone in his body, the sole author of his own misfortune  - has Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott  finally morphed into a political feather duster?

West Australian Liberal MP for Cowan, LukeSimpkin, signalling the party leadership spill scheduled for 10 February 2015:

@latikambourke, 6 February 2015

The Daily Telegraph, 6 February 2015:

An angry Mr Abbott yesterday called a press conference to stare down his backbench, before sending out cabinet ministers to back his leadership publicly.

Tony Abbott’s Press Statement, 6 February 2015:

As you know, two of my colleagues have called for a leadership spill of the two senior positions in our Party. They’ve called for a spill of my position as leader and they’ve called for a spill of Julie Bishop’s position as Deputy.
The first point to make is that they are perfectly entitled to call for this, but the next point to make is that they are asking the Party Room to vote out the people that the electorate voted in in September 2013.
I want to make this very simple point: we are not the Labor Party. We are not the Labor Party and we are not going to repeat the chaos and the instability of the Labor years.
So, I have spoken to Deputy Leader Julie Bishop and we will stand together in urging the Party Room to defeat this particular motion, and in so doing, and in defeating this motion to vote in favour of the stability and the team that the people voted for at the election.
We have a strong plan. It’s the strong plan that I enunciated at the Press Club this week and we are determined to get on with it – and we will.

Julie Bishop's position as deputy leader of the parliamentary Liberal Party will also fall vacant if the spill motion is successful.

The Sydney Morning Herald, 6 February 2015:

On Friday evening, after a spill motion to oust the Prime Minister was moved, Channel Nine's political editor Laurie Oakes reported the Prime Minister's office "was so concerned about the optics of them appearing together looking like a unity ticket", it asked Ms Bishop to cancel her attendance at the fundraiser with Mr Turnbull but she refused.

UPDATE

Abbott blinks?

Quotes of the Week

“it’s a classic example of what goes wrong when, in a fit of absent-mindedness, people elect Labor governments.”

[Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott during 2 February 2015 National Press Club question period on the reason voters reject his political party]

Abbott over-reached when telling his audience that removing a Prime Minister is the preserve of the public come election time.

Party room colleagues who take pride in their right to cast a vote for or against a leader won’t have liked hearing such an arrogant observation from Abbott, who they already believe takes them for granted.

The right of party MPs to choose their leader is what makes a Prime Minister a first among equals. John Howard always respected this. It is how MPs can ensure a leader listens.

While Abbott used his speech to (again) promise to consult and listen more, the obvious disdain Abbott showed for his colleagues right to remove him suggests that he won’t.

[Peter Van Onselen writing in The Australian, 2  February 2015]

The Prime Minister spent much of last week calling around his backbench trying to quell the anger of those frustrated by his leadership.

But MPs are still angry that Mr Abbott changed his personal mobile number late last year, leaving backbenchers unable to contact him directly with their concerns.

“We wanted to talk to him directly and none of us had his number. It’s just not a genuine consultative style.”

[Herald Sun, 3 February 2015]

Dr Jensen is from the WA electorate of Tangney. He was involved in calling the first of the Liberal spills in 2009 with Wilson Tuckey that ultimately saw Mr Abbott installed as the party’s leader.

Speaking on 7.30 tonight, Dr Jensen said he informed Mr Abbott on January 23 — three days before the disastrous Australia Day knighting of Prince Phillip — that he no longer supported the Prime Minister. [Federal Liberal MP Dennis Jensen, Herald Sun, 3 February 2015]

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott: 'out of touch', 'arrogant', 'narrow-minded' and 'erratic'

Five days before the September 2013 federal election which saw him become Australia’s 28^th prime minister, Anthony John ‘Tony’ Abbott’s chief personal attributes (according to Essential Research polling at the time) were ‘hard working’ and ‘intelligent’.

Seventeen months later, he is primarily seen as 'out of touch with ordinary people', 'arrogant', 'narrow-minded' and 'erratic'.

For over half those polled he remains ‘hardworking’, but is also viewed as ‘superficial’ and ‘intolerant’.

The percentage of poll respondents who consider Tony Abbott as ‘intelligent’ has dropped from 63 per cent prior to his becoming prime minister down to 50 per cent at the beginning of this week.

Tony Abbott, when compared with Bill Shorten, is considered by more respondents to be ‘erratic’, ‘out of touch with ordinary people’, ‘arrogant’, ‘narrow minded’, ‘intolerant’, ‘aggressive’ and ‘superficial’.

Bill Shorten, when compared with Tony Abbott, is regarded by more respondents to be someone who is ‘intelligent’, ‘hardworking, ‘understands the problems facing Australia’, and ‘a capable leader’.

'Someone else' still has more support than Tony Abbott as being the best leader of the Liberal Party - as does Malcolm Turnbull and Julie Bishop at 24 per cent and 21 per cent respectively.

This poll indicates that if an election had been held on Tuesday 2 February 2015 Labor would have taken back federal government by roughly the same percentage as the Coalition won it in 2013.

Essential Report* of 3 January 2015:

* This report summarises the results of a weekly omnibus conducted by Essential Research with data provided by Your Source. The survey was conducted online from the 30th January 2015 to 2nd February and is based on 1,019 respondents.