1 Apparently, after being soundly defeated at the election, the Coalition still thinks there is mileage in continuing to oppose climate change while supporting coal. This sort of talk takes us back to the Neanderthal age. It’s flat Earth stuff.
Wouldn’t you think that after a thrashing at the election, mainly because of lousy policy on energy, anyone with a scintilla of intelligence might have admitted defeat and quietly backed down? No, not this mob.
Most normal people would accept the loss and back away. Even with the loss of “Wentworth, North Sydney, Mackellar, Kooyong, Goldstein, Curtin, Bennelong, Higgins and Ryan,” they still think they can front up to the next election with the same policy. It goes to show how far right they have gone. Having said that, I still believe that Labor has a lacklustre target for 2030.
Traditional economic thinking says that it is the less well-off who will have to forgo wage growth to bring inflation under control: Cap on wages or cap on profits.
Why not a Resources super profits tax? I’m in favour of real wage growth rather than wage stagnation. Just a thought.
I still believe that the tax cuts for the more privileged should be cancelled as part of an economic crisis plan. You can hardly expect others to have their wages held down when the more advantaged are getting tax cuts. Use it to cut the deficit. The rich don’t need it. As Abbott said about the ‘carbon tax’, if it can be legislated, it can be unlegislated. Well, words to that effect.
2 The new Minister for Workplace Relations, Tony Burke, has promised:
“More than eight million Australians will have access to 10 days of paid family and domestic violence leave by the end of the year as the new government pledges to make workplace equality reforms a priority.”
3 The final two-party preferred count has Labor on 52.1 per cent of the vote and the Coalition on 47.9. How that many could vote for the Coalition astounds me. And guess who gave it victory? It was the better educated, the under 55s, and women.
4 The government confirms it will terminate the controversial Cashless Debit Card trial across Australia.
5 In 2015 Bill Shorten asked:
“… if we were drafting our Constitution today, does anyone seriously dispute that we would require our head of state to be an Australian?”
That is just as important today as it was in 2015. Indeed, the Monarchy belongs to our past, not our future.
The same can be said of our flag. It also speaks of our past and says nothing of our future. Most of it contains another nation’s flag, and the balance is a few stars. Nothing in it recognises our First Nations People or our future. And contrary to some views, we don’t fight for a flag; we fight over right versus wrong.
6 Peter Dutton doesn’t understand that not everyone acts in a grubby self-interest.
I just saw Peter Dutton accuse me of acting because I “want a job on the Reserve Bank board”! He doesn’t understand that not everyone acts in grubby self-interest. I’ve already got a job thanks! #insiders
— Sally McManus (@sallymcmanus) June 25, 2022
7 The new education Minister, Jason Clare, has decided to do away with the compulsory religious element of the national school chaplaincy program and open up the program to allow schools to choose either a chaplain or a professionally qualified student welfare officer.
8 America may be the most advanced technological nation on earth. However, its social progress on matters of great moral importance is still fighting its way out of the Dark Ages when mysticism was rampant.
9 Cross benches advisor allocation has been reduced from 4 to one. The parliamentary Library will be given more resources to assist them. I expect it will finish at two.
10 Prime Minister Anthony Albanese continues to repair our international relations. (It was, of course, in dire need of much repair.) Big kudos also for our Foreign Minister, Penny Wong, who looks quite at home on the world stage.
11 A new budget on October 26. Parliament reconvenes next month and a jobs summit shortly.
My previous article: Dutton and Speers: That pathetic interview.
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Wow, lord, such a good read this morning that I will hit the exercise pool despite Darwin icy spell at 17. A couple of queries is 47.9% – “astounds me” – the lnp won the regions and lost city teal seats which they can reasonably expect to regain? So dutton has 3 years to tweak enough???
ps It was disappointing for labor not to regain townesville and it would be great for analysis if we could see the distribution of preferences. Wonder why the AEC are not releasing it??
Too cold, lord, I couldn’t last the hour.
In the windy month when we don’t see clouds we have had two windless days of cold showers where the solar panels haven’t seen enough sun to heat the water.
I expect the paper to have anti-renewables and anti-global warming letters from the clp coal and oil twits.
ps
remember juliar? Alb said there will be no new taxes and federal Labor’s only tax proposal was to crack down on multinational tax avoidance.:
Of all the mediocre, non-achieving, mind-numbingly dull and boringly predictable knuckle heads in the LNP, the contemptuous, universally despised, bald-headed badger, aka Mr Potato Head Dutton, is probably the worst! This callously inhumane, sadistic fascist, along with his like-minded, born-to-rule colleagues, are nothing more than a pack of smug, non-achieving and totally incompetent undemocratic political parasites (which includes the pompous bible-thumping hypocrites: Abbott and Morrison). Just about every member of the arrogant, totally mundane LNP are, indeed, completely self-serving, corrupt to the eyeballs and about as useful as screen doors on a submarine!
This is why these BOOFHEADS in the LNP are also widely known as the CONSERVATIVE party! The correct definition of the word: “Conservative” is “afraid of change”, “fearing change” and establishmentarian which translates into a deep-seated fear of advancement and/or progress! The LNP have always been – and will ALWAYS be – rigidly STUCK IN THE PAST.
When you look back through Australian history, the ONLY times our nation has ever advanced, introduced new vibrant policies that benefited ordinary Australians, done something innovative or achieved something creative, is when this nation is being lead by the progressive LABOR PARTY !!!!
the proposed tax cuts for the wealthy should be “postponed” until better economic times, thus allowing a modest increase for pensioners and those looking for work
meanwhile….. oh how we look forward to a federal ICAC…
fun times ahead
pierre:
I would prefer to see the proposed tax cuts be postponed until the end of life on Earth. In fact, I’d be ramping up the number of income brackets as well as making corporations (especially the multinationals) pay an appropriate level of tax.
i always struggled understanding the role of the RBA. Its say one thing and something else happens. Its forecasts are always wildly off mark.
Then it occured to me, the single biggest failure of the capital markets is the rising vale of non productive assets. The mantra is ” we want to encourage business growth ” yet all the RBA policies treat these two classes as one. As we have all seen, the low cost of loans has accelerated the cost of buying a house. The bare minimum we in the lucky country aspired to is now out of reach for a far greater number of people. Now that there is a squeeze on, businesses which hardly need a new expense will be squeezed even more.
Yet if you need a personal loan, usually to get over a period, your squeezed at the margins, ie Credit cards are still at 18% or greater.
If we are to truly become a clever society, maybe somebody should look at a more nuanced approach to lending that facilitates businesses and suppresses our desires to increase the value of assets to the point where Banks re imagined as facilitors but no longer an industry thats too big to fail or fail to support society.
what is required of the housing market? Cheap and quick to build. It needs to be sustainable. It needs to stay CHEAP over its whole life. Cheap and quick is relatively easy to do. We need to get rid of some of our most precious gold plated standards. A lot of people are prepared to live in a caravan because it provides a modicum of security and shelter. A lot of people are happy to live in a 20sq apartment. It beats a tent. Modular apartments, bedroom, shower/toilet, kitchenette and room for a table. You could fit 4-6 on your typical block of land. Hot water is great but there is no need for it to be available at all tap locations. Gas looks like its gone, good. If you can buy a caravan for $70,000, why would a modular house be more expensive, after all your getting rid of the suspension. Land needs to be given back to the government to develop at cost. Get rid of developers who make a shit load of money and spike the cost of land in doing so. Cheap over its life cycle. Penalties for selling beyond natural cpi prices, ie tax the shit out of profits beyond the cpi. Land lords get a tax break for keeping rents low or a new build but nothing else. would i be ruthless? shit yes. Its time we took the housing market back to the people as a basic necessity instead of a way to make retirement comfortable. That’s what the friggin pension was for. I call it a directed form of capitalism. Markets should not be about basic survival, but a way to improve ourselves Somewhere over the past 100yrs we have lost sight. Super is a case indeed. thats another story
Keeping the cost of living low is a great way to suppress wage spikes. Instead of trying to suppress wages, why not go to the heart of the problem? The greatest cost of living is housing, by a PHENOMINAL margin. Dropping the cost of housing by say $200/week is like how many billions in tax cuts and wage rises? Instead we have blindly jumped off the cliff.
John: How about getting ALL of the mining sector to pay tax first and then add on the “Resources super profits tax” where appropriate.
Stop giving $29 billion a year subsidies of Australian taxpayers money to petrol, oil, gas and coal companies for a start.
Then tax the shit out of them to force fossil fuel billionaires to share their million dollar an hour growth in wealth with the rest of Australia.
What are they going to do? Stop drilling for oil and gas and shut down their coal mines in protest?
If you think the Darwin Port is the only thing owned by China think again.
Ausgrid, Australia’s biggest electricity supplier, was wholly owned by the Government of New South Wales from 2011 to 2016.
In 2016, the New South Wales Government offered the effective sale of a 50.4% stake in Ausgrid, through a 99-year lease.
Initial bidding was won by a consortium of State Grid Corporation of China and Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings.
The wholesale price of electricity has only gone up about 1c per KWh on average due to the “energy crisis”.
https://www.aer.gov.au/wholesale-markets/wholesale-statistics/annual-volume-weighted-average-30-minute-prices-regions
But retail electricity suppliers across Australia are set to raise their prices significantly.
In New South Wales, the default market offer will increase by a maximum of 9.6 per cent, 11 per cent or 18.3 per cent, depending on your distribution zone.
That works out to be an increase of between $210 and $469 annually on average.
Stop letting retail energy companies rip you off.
Join localvolts.com where you can buy electricity at the average wholesale price, and even less if you design your portfolio in favour of buying renewable energy.
Just as Labor tells the world that Australia is back in the renewable energy game Albanese comes along and makes a provocative speech that torpedoes any useful cooperation with the worlds highest emitter, China. Neutrality and cooperation is needed to fight the real enemy, climate change. Leaders with cool and conciliatory heads are needed not puppets looking for imaginary enemies perpetuating fake fear mongering propaganda.