The AIM Network

Coalition Announces That They Will “Meet And Beat” (Not About Prayer Room!)

Ceci n’est pas un chien. Image: Daniel Munoz

Ok, I can’t help it but every time a Coalition MP says that they “meet and beat” their targets, I can’t help but think of that staffer and the minister’s desk.

I know, I know, it’s juvenile when we’re dealing with an important issue like climate change… Or rather, it’s juvenile when we’re not dealing with climate change.

For the first time in my memory, Barnaby Joyce seems to have summed up the government position better than anyone: Australia is not committing to spending money until they’ve seen the plan and until they have an idea of the cost they can’t possibly put a plan together.

This is so much clearer than Scott Morrison’s: “We must take action, as we indeed are, and continue to take action, as we will continue to, in developed countries, in advanced economies.” And, of course, Morrison did refer to the plan: “Our commitments are backed up by plans, and we don’t make them lightly. We consider them carefully.”

Yes, they’re considering their plan carefully. Just like their Car Pork Plan. Ok, the announcement of the intention to develop a plan did seem a little rushed but they needed to get the spreadsheet in place before they went into caretaker mode because you can’t allocate new funding to such a blatant bribe, if you’re in caretaker mode. Or something like that, but now they’ve been re-elected, they’re taking their time with the plans which is why only a couple of carparks have been built when nearly fifty were promised. No, now they’re taking their time and saying: “That carpark you were promised, do you still need it now that there’s no longer a station where you were planning to build it?”

At which point, Josh or whoever the local MP is, can say, “Now let’s consider this. We can build the car park where the station isn’t and then promise a few million dollars to build the station. That’s a win/win.”

Of course, some of you want to see the detail of the plan, but that would be contrary to everything this PM stands for. Remember when he took over as Minister for Immigration and announced that they wouldn’t be telling us how many boats were arriving because that only helped the people smugglers? When he was asked why his party had been helping people smugglers for years by announcing boat arrivals under Labor, he had a very good answer but he wasn’t prepared to reveal it because that would have only helped someone else and why should he help someone who isn’t in the inner circle.

So, we can relax because the government is going to respond with a careful plan and they’ll know how they can get there and what it will cost… Or to put the way Scotty and the guys working on climate change action into a different context, let’s imagine that they’re building a house.

First we need to have some land, and luckily they’ve been able to purchase some for less than ten times its market value. Next we need to decide how soon we can get the house onto the land and, as the PM said about climate change and the vaccine rollout, “We can’t get there until we do, but we’ll get there when we do and it won’t be a moment too soon or too late, it’ll be the finish of the race…”

Ok, that’s not an exact quote but his exact quotes are just giving me a headache lately because I’m having lots or trouble creating someone more banal while still having all the meaning of a song where the chorus consists of some sort of “Doo Whoop Ron Ron baby yeah!”

Anyway, now that we’ve established that the house can’t be built until it is, we need to look at our next step and we can’t rush that. We need to know how we’re going to actually manage to build the house before we can start working out costs. I mean, there’s a lot to take into account, like will certain things be better to use because technology changes things and until we know that we can’t possibly start a plan for how to actually start the house. However, we do have a plan and it’s to get the house there even if we don’t know what sort of house it is, how many bedrooms, the building materials and when we’re actually going to engage an architect. And until we have the blueprint, we can’t go around issuing blank cheques to our future expenditure because we need to remember that the future is uncertain and, anyway, I believe in miracles…

Tempted to write, “You sexy thing”, but Hot Chocolate haven’t had a hit since the seventies and it might make me sound old, and even more out of touch with this century than the Coalition…

Now, it’d be interesting to compare the “We can’t commit till we see the plan” on climate change with “You want to apply for a change room for girls for your men’s only yachting club? Well, I don’t see a problem there, have some money and work out the girls later!”

I’ll let someone else do that. I’ve decided I need a hot chocolate…

Oh, did anyone else notice that Josh leaked to the media about Morrison dropping the “F” bomb on a call to the NSW Treasurer? One article was at pains to point out that Frydenberg was on the call too. Maybe they were just protecting their source but apparently Josh leaks more than The Titanic...

 

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