If the board of a corporation appoint a CEO under whose direction the share price falls to record lows what should they do?
Do they decide to stick with the CEO and stand by the direction he is taking because they are fearful that shareholders will criticise them for having appointed him in the first place? Would they rather see the company go under than admit they were wrong and appoint someone to change direction and save the business?
To follow that course would be a dereliction of duty and an abrogation of their responsibility to their shareholders. It would show the ultimate hubris in deciding their reputation was more important than doing their job.
And this is where we find ourselves, with the Liberal Party more interested in “stability” for its own sake rather than recognising that we, the shareholders, have rejected the direction they are taking our nation.
Sure, Tony Abbott is an embarrassment, but that could be endured (barely) if the people endorsed the performance of the government.
They want us to forget the broken promises, forget the obvious unfairness of the budget, forget the increase in debt, deficit and unemployment under their watch, forget the attacks on our hard-won entitlements that are being proposed, forget their facilitation of tax avoidance by the wealthy, and be content with “stability”.
They want some clean air for Tony to try and buy back some votes with a childcare package and a tax cut for small business.
If you were hoping that Abbott’s address to the National Press Club would give some detail about these or an outline of his “strong family package”, you would have been sadly disappointed. Tony doesn’t really do policy detail. He only has so many fingers to count slogans on. But he does promise to consult… again.
After a process which involved 468 initial submissions, a 90-page draft report, a 60-page technical modelling supplement, 455 post-draft submissions, 1100 brief comments via a website, eight public hearings in five cities which heard from 140 expert witnesses and three months to consider the final report of the Productivity Commission Inquiry into Childcare and Early Learning, all that Tony Abbott could say about Australia’s childcare mess at the National Press Club is that they’ll consult.
Sussan Ley had also commissioned PWC to review childcare. How many reports do they need to actually come up with a policy?
They have three months to come up with their next budget. The bribes will be coming and it will be very interesting to see what we must lose to pay for them. Suffice to say, this budget will receive more scrutiny from the voting public than possibly any in our history.
Half-way through their term and they are still talking about Labor. Tony is still talking about the carbon tax and is back to photo ops in high viz vest and hard hat. Sticking with him will see the LNP lose the next election. Switching to Malcolm this early would give us time to see if he had a new direction which, from everything I have heard, he does not.
This is no longer about “selling” a message, it’s about changing the message. If the Liberal Party ignore that and choose “stability” they will bear the consequences come election time.
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