In response to Nicky Savva’s tell-all book, Tony Abbott issued a press release in which he, unsurprisingly, sang his own praises.
I stopped the boats.
I repealed the carbon and mining taxes.
I signed three free trade agreements.
I approved the Western Sydney airport.
I kept the country safe.
I made a “strong start” on budget repair.
My focus is on getting a Turnbull government re-elected.
Labor has five new taxes.
It is hard to know where to begin but, if I was Abbott, I would have started with an apology to my wife. That aside, let’s examine Tony’s self-proclaimed achievements.
The boats did not stop, we just stopped them from landing here. We closed off one avenue of escape for traumatised asylum seekers. We made noise about taking people from refugee camps but it was just talk.
The repeal of the carbon tax was unbelievably irresponsible and headed us in the opposite direction to the rest of the world. Our emissions have gone up, as has our deficit.
The repeal of the mining tax was inexplicable. If they felt it was too lenient, with which I would agree, then why not fix it rather than can it?
It is obvious that Andrew Robb was willing to sacrifice anything just so he could get signatures on the dotted line for free trade agreements. He refused to make the details public, refused to have a cost/benefit analysis done, and happily signed away our sovereign right to make laws making us vulnerable to legal action from multinational corporations.
Saying yes to the second airport for Sydney with no planning in place was also a grandstanding gesture made without sufficient consultation.
As far as keeping us safe is concerned, I have never felt more at risk with Tony “shirt-fronting” people all over the place. His demonisation of the Muslim community for his personal political gain was reprehensible.
His claim to have started on budget repair is laughable. What he tried to do was make the poor subsidise the rich even more.
And as for his “five new taxes”, which appears to be the new slogan we must endure, could someone please remind him of his increase in the fuel excise and his 2% “temporary” levy on high income earners and John Howard’s GST. Could they also point out that reining in tax concessions for the wealthy does not amount to a new tax. His new slogan is effectively neutering the Turnbull government from undertaking any form of tax reform.
For a man who “doesn’t want to rake over old coals”, he spent an inordinate amount of his time in office doing just that.
As for focusing on getting Turnbull elected … with friends like that, who needs enemies?
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