Shorten – My fellow Australians, as I listened to the Government’s fifth budget on Tuesday night, I knew immediately: We can do better than this. The people of Australia deserve better than this. And a Labor Government will deliver better than this.
Better than ten years of cuts to schools and hospitals – in exchange for $10 a week. $10 a week. That’s all the Liberals think it will take, for you to forgive and forget.
Julia Banks – People can live on $40 a week.
Michaelia Cash – Of course they can.
Malcolm – Yeah, $10 is heaps.
Shorten – The Liberals desperately want you to believe this budget is fair.
Malcolm Turnbull – It is, it is. Make him stop complaining. He’s lying, he’s lying, he’s lying. Make him stop.
Shorten – I’m here to outline Labor’s plan to bring the Fair Go back into the heart of our nation.
– A plan to properly fund health and education
– A plan to boost your wages
– And a plan for real tax cuts to help you with your family budget.
Scott Morrison – Unbelieva-Bill… Hey everyone, did ya hear what I called him? Unbelieva-Bill… Hee, hee, let’s all do it.
Malcolm – Unbelieva-Bill, Unbelieva-Bill, Unbelieva-Bill.
Mathias Corman – Liar, liar, pants on fire.
Shorten – It’s a plan we can afford, because we’re not going to spend $80 billion of tax expenditure on big business and the big banks.
Scott – Where’s ya costings?
Malcolm – Yeah, bet you did them on the back of an envelope.
Scott – Oooh, that’s a good one. How do you like that, Unbelieva-Bill?
Shorten – And it’s a plan that will work, because Australia thrives when middle class and working class Australians can get ahead.
Scott – We’ve got a plan too. We’ve got a plan for Jobs and Growth.
Mathias – Yeah, Jobs and Growth.
Malcolm – How do you like that, Unbelieva-Bill?
Mathias – Let’s make him cry. Let’s call him names until he runs home to his mummy. Hey, weak girlie man.
Malcolm – Don’t say that one?
Mathias – Why not?
Malcolm – Coz that’s what Tony calls me and I don’t want to think about him. Let’s just stick to “Unbelieva-Bill”. Hey, Unbelieva-Bill, I’m PM and you’re not. Ha ha. And…and I’m prefered PM so there.
Shorten – Our plan begins with a better and fairer tax system. After years of flat wages, rising power bills and increasing health costs under the Government: it’s a time for a fair-dinkum tax cut for middle class and working class Australians.
Scott – That’s because of Labor. That’s not our fault. It’s not, it’s not. We’re the adults. You ran up debt and we’ve had to try and fix it and we will because we’re awesome and even if the debt is twice is big now that’s not our fault, that’s your fault. It is, it is, it is. And we’re going to fix it next year and then everyone will know how great we are and we are because Uncle Rupert says so and he should know because he’s got lots and lots of money and that’s why we don’t ask him to pay any tax because he’s really good and he gives people jobs.
Malcolm – Let’s all shout Unbelieva-Bill again when Chrissy Pyne gets here.
Scott – Where is Chrissy?
Mathias – I think he and Michaelia are playing hide and seek and they’re both still hiding because they don’t realise that nobody’s looking for them.
Malcolm – Oh, it’s not as much fun calling Bill names without Chrissy. Remember when he called him a grub…
Mathias – No, he actually called him a c…
Malcolm – It was “grub”. He said it was “grub” and it only sounded like that naughty word because the microphone was a bit faulty.
Scott – Unbelieva-Bill.
Malcolm – It’s true. It’s really and truly what he said.
Scott – No, not you. I was just calling out at Bill because I wasn’t sure he heard me while he was speaking.
Mathias – Oh no, he’s finished and all these people in the gallery are cheering.
Malcolm – That’s not fair. Can we get Peter to take them in for re-education?
Scott – We could call it Gonski 3.0 and then people would be pleased that we were spending money on education. Hee, hee.
Malcolm – You’re so funny, Scottie. Let’s go outside and shout out “Unbelieva-Bill” until our friends on the Business Council join in.
EXEUNT…
Yes, gobsmacking, isn’t it? Nothing will obliterate the memory of Barnaby screeching “Caaaarrrp!” “Caaarrp!” in Parliament. Nor the lump of coal with Scomo drooling all over it. This government is a pack of pampered private school boys, used to being told how wonderful they are and that they can do anything they want. Having never learned decorum, decency, fairness, sharing, compassion etc because they were never required to, and this government is the end result.
Brilliant piece of sarcasm…. Yes, that’s exactly the contrast you get when you compare this mob of Neoliberal-Conservative lunatics and Labor….
The question I ask again and again is this: How will we bring the primary vote of the coalition down from 38%? Why doesn’t it move? What can we do?
The LNP, like the GOP in the US, are incapable of articulating constructive criticism let alone evaluation, versus puerile primary school language targetting for influence via MSM less educated and/or oldies who are losing their abilities to make weighted judgement?
And still the question remains why is Mal seen as preferred PM. Something is not quite right here.
I note that they have exhausted all attempts to defend their own ‘policies’.
Great article John, what a revolting trio of toffs…
Most distressing for me is that my derogatory language is failing to adequately describe Malcolm, Scott and Matthias – given the opportunity I WOULD hurl projectiles at them
I cannot believe that Australia has so many people who think this government are doing good things, many of them are employees and small business.
The real question is can they survive. I would say no. They would have to be supported by family, friends, & I suspect charities.
Brilliant! I’ve just watched Bills Budget Reply speech again, and it was even better the 2nd time around. Also watched Turnbull. He was very uncomfortable, like a deer in the spotlight. Bill Shorten’s Formid-a-Bill, Electa-Bill, Prefer-a-Bill, and Unstoppa-Bill !
When Mathias Cormann called Bill Shorten an “economic girlie man”, he was most offended when people didn’t think it appropriate.
“I am not talking about girls. I am talking about economic girlie men,’’ the minister told News Corp’s Sunday papers.
“I don’t think there’s anything gender-specific here. Not girls, girlies; it’s very different. I hope you are not going to say I am a sexist misogynist.’’
“No amount of confected outrage from Bill Shorten, Labor and the Greens can detract from the fact that he is too weak to repair the budget mess Labor left behind,” Cormann said.
“Economic girlie men has come to adopt its own meaning. It is not in any way intended as a reflection on girls, it is entirely intended as a reflection on Bill Shorten.”
He truly said all that. How can you write satire when the truth is stranger than anything you can make up.
Writing letters to the editor or to your local member is useless. If this was France, the pitchfork army would be arriving…
Good stuff Rossleigh. Do the LNP morons have someone on 200k brainstorming these brilliant names for Shorten.
Credit where credit is due, I was impressed with Bill’s speech. He nailed it very well. Also impressed with Richard Di Natale’s speech.
Kaye Lee, you’re right of course! I can’t write satire. I don’t write satire. I just accurately report what the Coalition do and say and leave out the bits where journalists speculate about what these means and how people responded to it. So, for example, when you have Julia Banks telling us she could live on forty dollars a day, once you take away the outrage and the speculation about whether this was a deliberate ploy to distract from something else, the question becomes, then why are we paying you so much more than that AND paying for your expenses as well?
Or let’s place Malcolm Turnbull’s statements about how sure he was that the High Court would find in favour of Barnaby Joyce and place it beside his comments about Shorten’s fitness for leadership when he got the eligibility of Labor MPs wrong.
See, not satire at all. Simply good, straightforward reporting…
Of course, there is the odd time I have tried to write satire by setting something in the future and making it so ridiculous that it’s clearly meant to be fiction. Unfortunately, I’ve been advised that I can’t sue the Liberals because they stole my ideas and made them policy. Apparently, stealing policies is not covered under the copyright laws.
That is why your writing, whilst always making me laugh, also leaves me feeling distinctly uncomfortable. You have a real talent at exposing the ridiculous state of politics in this country.
Speaking of stealing ideas and the ridiculous, when writing this I did a search for “unbelieva-Bill” so I’d ould find the actual quotes from the rhetorical geniuses beh8nd the taunt, they weren’t the inventors of the word.
Apparently there was theme park In USA called ”Unbelieva-Bill’s”,
Are they going to ask Facebook and Google to collect this levy and then forward it to the gubmint? They’ll be laughed at and told “You want it, you collect it.”
“There is a growing expectation the government will also move to make multinational tech and digital companies pay more tax, including the option of a 3 per cent levy on all Facebook and Google advertising.”
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/revenue-decisions-taken-but-not-yet-announced-worth-nearly-3-billion-budget-papers-20180511-p4zeqn.html
Scotties Magic Budget Revenue Wand is really getting a workout.
You can bet that a certain political leech is behind The Perpetual El Presidente of the Democratic Republic of Hanson –
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/may/13/pauline-hanson-written-into-one-nation-constitution-as-effective-president-for-life
These morons haven’t had an original thought amongst the whole rabble that is the coalition, which why they are not shy of stealing all the good ideas that Labor very thoughtfully and after great research, puts out for the Australian public to scrutinize. Then of course there is that bastard Murdoch and his ever loyal minions who rush to demonize and misrepresent everything that Bill says. There is also the reasonable suspicion that Newspoll is skewed to soften the bad opinions people have about the Point Piper hypocrite and his band of dysfunctional dickheads.
An aside: “A spokesman for Mr Frydenberg said the department’s draft report “proposed strict conditions and mitigation measures informed by expert scientific advice”.” Means to me reads more as, “If the donations are big enough then you do what you want.”
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/swaths-of-native-forest-near-great-barrier-reef-set-to-be-bulldozed-20180512-p4zewb.html
Makes you want to be violently sick.
Scumbag’s budget:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/may/13/coalition-says-costings-for-budgets-tax-measures-too-unreliable-to-release
“Morrison is also continuing to resist calls to release detailed, year-by-year costings of the tax measures beyond the forward estimates, contending the figures would be “unreliable”.”
Which means, short and blunt, “We’ve got f*ck all evidence and proof but it should be passed because we say so.”
The “adults are in charge” alright. Unfortunately, they are LNP “adults” https://pazzoredento.wordpress.com/2018/05/10/budget-2018-take-no-prisoners/
Max, I just read your piece, epic rant – love it – I fee like we should go and throw eggs at some Libs together