Morrison and Abbott stay down; Hockey joins them

So today apparently Scott Morrison and Tony Abbott came out and apologised for the remarks they made yesterday. I know this because I read it in The Oz:

Liberals seek to heal rift on boatpeople, as Morrison admits his comments were insensitive

The SMH:

Funeral fallout: 'we did go a little bit too far' says Abbott

And the ABC:

Morrison climbs down in funeral row

Well I am sorry, but that is all just complete and utter bollocks.
Morrison did not admit his comments were insensitive, he admitted the “timing” of his comment were insensitive. Abbott did not say “we went a little bit far”, what he actually said was: “I want to thank Scott for being man enough to accept that perhaps we did go a little bit too far yesterday.” So actually it was not Abbott admitting it, but praising Morrison for supposedly accepting it (which he didn’t – he only thought his comments were ill-timed, the content itself? Nothing wrong at all).

Tory Shepard at The Punch however was not fooled by any of Abbott’s or Morrison’s bulldust. She got it spot on:

Oh, wait – hold on. He’s not sorry he made the comments. Just about the timing. That timing being on the day of the funeral, when people were burying their loved ones.

He said today – a day later – he’s definitely still angry about the money being spent.

“I have to show a little more compassion than I did yesterday, I am happy to admit that,” Mr Morrison said.

Sounds like something he was told to write on the blackboard 100 times. Must show more compassion. Must show more compassion. Must show more compassion.
…
Saying sorry means accepting blame. But when politicians - and sportspeople, and others with something to lose - apologise, it is usually to dissipate blame. To try to regain the high ground, to get out of the headlines.

So what Mr Morrison has done here is try to ameliorate the effects of his insensitive comments, which were broadly condemned by people, including some within his own party.

But then he’s stayed aligned with the right-wing rage against asylum seekers by heavily qualifying his apology.

It comes across as forced, insincere, cynical.

Perfectly said.

Let’s have a look at what Morrison actually said in his “apology” in his interview with Ray Hadley

RAY HADLEY:
You want to clear up some confusion apparently my staff tell me?

SCOTT MORRISON:
Well look Ray I think you summarized it well. No one is ever going to accuse me I think, of not taking this matter up to the government and holding them to account but timing in terms of comments I think is very important and the timing of my comments over the last 24 hours was insensitive and was inappropriate. I know probably more than anyone how strongly people feel about this issue, how angry they get about the costs that are involved and I share that anger and I want to see that changed but there is a time and a place. I rarely leave things on the field when it comes to this issue Ray as you know, but if you step over the mark I think you have got to say so and I am prepared to do that but the government shouldn’t take that as a leave pass.

Wow, I just love the “clear up some confusion” intro by Hadley – and you see from Morrison’s opening line that Hadley has set the table for him. But as you can also see Morrison doesn't think his comments themselves were insensitive or inappropriate – just the timing. And Just in case you’re not clear on that here is how the interview ended:

RAY HADLEY:
Ok so you resile from what you, you back away from what you said yesterday…

SCOTT MORRISON:
I back away from the timing of it Ray.

RAY HADLEY:
The timing of it ok.

I guess Morrison thinks with insensitive comments, like with comedy, timing is everything. Except actually the timing only served to compound the insensitivity. Were Morrison (or Abbott) to make these comments next week or next month they would still be gutter-dwelling-shite merchants. Because regardless of when either of them were to make the comments they would still be seeking to make political hay out of the funerals of children.

The interview with Hadley demonstrated just why Morrison’s comments were so offensive – they tapped into the most xenophobic and selfish sections of our culture and milked them. Take this from Hadley:

RAY HADLEY:
…. I have emails here saying did they pay for the deaths of the 4 young men they killed in the insulation process? Returned servicemen who can’t afford to bury his wife and has the government intervened there? but because it is illegal boat people the government has fallen over themselves, I know people have that debate but I think it is a debate for another time, not a debate on the day they are burying their kids.

SCOTT MORRISON:
I think that debate is well made Ray and I agree with it

Hang on, what?? Morrison agrees with the debate over whether the Government should pay for the deaths of the 4 men who died putting in insulation? These deaths would I guess include that of one man whom his employer was charged and fined $100,000 for operating an unsafe business and failing to ensure his company complied with its safety obligations?

And returned servicemen who can’t afford to bury his wife? Well Ray, how about you hop over to the Centrelink website and have a look at a page called “Bereavement Payments” where you find this:

You may be eligible for a Bereavement Payment if:

• your partner dies and when they died you were both receiving either:
  • a pension from Centrelink or the Department of Veterans' Affairs^[1], or
  • a benefit such as Newstart Allowance^[2] or Parenting Payment^[3] for at least 12 months, or
• you are caring for an adult or child who dies and you were receiving Carer Payment^[4] for them; or
• you are the carer or parent of a child who dies; and
  • you were getting, or were qualified to get, Family Tax Benefit^[5], Baby Bonus^[6] or Maternity Immunisation Allowance^[7] for the child who died.

You also need to be an Australian resident.
And the payment is:

Members of a couple

If your partner dies you may qualify for a lump sum Bereavement Payment, usually equal to the amount you would have received jointly less your single rate for up to 14 weeks. The amount paid depends on your individual circumstances.

Now I may agree with you that the payment could be more, but that’s a different issue. No one (at least no one with any intelligence) is suggesting the Government could have raised the bereavement pension but decided instead to hold this funeral in Sydney. But let us not also talk about old diggers who can’t afford to bury their wife being left high and dry. If they were both eligible for the pension they likely get the payment.

And let’s also get away from the bullshit you are hearing on radio and blogs that the Government is giving these people special treatment, and that they were treated with more compassion than say was given to Corporal Richard Atkinson.
First off, let’s have a bit of history: the remains of Australian soldiers killed in action did not always get returned. A rather disgraceful series of events occurred during the Vietnam War, which is related in Paul Ham’s excellent history. He writes how when the first soldiers in Vietnam were killed in action the Menzies Government refused to pay for soldiers remains to be be flown home due to the policy that such dead should be interred in the nearest commonwealth cemetery which was Terendak Barracks in Malaysia.

Yep you read that right.

When the father of the first conscript to die, Errol Noack, was told his son would be buried with full honours in Malaysia, as you can expect he took some exception to this and only through his very strong exception was he was able to get his son’s body returned.
It was only when there was such a public outcry over the same fate befalling the winner of the first VC in Vietnam, Kevin ‘Dasher’ Wheatley, that the Holt Government finally changed the policy and paid for the return of the remains and the funeral.

Things have certainly changed for the better.

When Corporal Atkinson’s remains were flown home, not only did they go to his home in Launceston, but they stopped at Darwin along the way, because that is where his unit was stationed and his fiancée lived, and where a “ramp ceremony” was held. His funeral held in Launceston was attended by 60 members of Cpl Atkinson's unit travelled from Darwin, as did two mates serving in Afghanistan.

Now on Melbourne’s MTR was heard:

Caller Ted asks if the government paid for Soldier [Corporal Richard Atkinson’s] family members to fly to the funeral? Host Martin King doubts it. He says it would not have happened if the asylum seekers did not come here in the first place.

Martin King say he “doubts it”; I say bullshit, Martin. I will bet anything that not only did the Government pay for his family members to fly from Darwin but also for the 60 members of his unit and the 2 from Afghanistan to attend.

I will happily admit I am wrong. But ask yourself – when the diggers in Afghanistan had to pay full price for a beer at Christmas there was an outcry in the media –you don’t think there might have been some word if his fiancée had been forced to pay to fly from Darwin to Launceston?

I am sure the Government paid, and I am bloody proud that they did.

Just as I am proud that the Government paid for the funeral yesterday.

But faux apology or no, the damage of Morrison’s statements were done because the talk back radios were full of hate and stupidity. Take these examples recorded on Crikey:

Caller Lenti says Asylum seekers should be sent to North Korea.

Caller Aaron says paying for the funeral for the asylum seekers is encouraging more to come.

Yes, paying for the funeral is such a big incentive for asylum seekers, because they of course all hope a family dies on the way…

There was also this:

Caller Cody thinks Federal Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey should pay for the funeral transport costs of the relatives if he supports it.

Well Caller Cody, don’t worry, Joe is back on your side.

Yesterday I praised Joe Hockey for showing decency and leadership.

Well that lasted a day.

In an example of utter jelly-back weakness, this morning (no doubt after some telephone calls with Abbott and Morrison last night) he quickly rang up Alan Jones to recant.

Jones set the interview up by talking about how Joe obviously was saying nothing much, and was sure Hockey was in full agreement with Morrison…

ALAN JONES:
Deep ideological divisions? You have slapped down Scott Morrison? What the hell is going on?

JOE HOCKEY:
I think there is a lot of commentary on this. Let me say this: we are the only party that has a strong border protection policy that will, in the end, prevent these sorts of tragedies occurring.

ALAN JONES:
That is the humanity of it, is it not?

JOE HOCKEY:
That is the humanity of it. Somehow people are suggesting that if you have a conservative view that you are without heart, and that is just dead wrong. That is the point I am making, obviously as Scott Morrison said, and was right to do, he was right to question why the funerals were not held on Christmas Island, and that is what he did. It is right for an opposition spokesperson to ask the question. It is also the case that we as a nation - and no one has suggested this – we are not so inhumane as a nation that we would prevent an eight year old newly orphaned child from attending the funeral of their father, no one suggested that, no one suggested that that child should have to pay. The issue is have the government got border protection policies right? The answer is no, emphatically no. They have got it wrong and that is why these sorts of tragedies are occurring.

That sound you hear is that of Joe Hockey’s credibility being trampled under his own boot (yeah I know, it’s not a loud sound; not much to crunch).

Yesterday he was the man who wanted to show compassion and be above politics. Today he was neck deep in backtracking, political vomit.
He then brings out the big canard:

JOE HOCKEY:
I think the issue here is Alan, firstly why are the funerals being held in Sydney?

ALAN JONES:
Correct, an unanswered question

JOE HOCKEY:
And that is unanswered. I think the Minister for Immigration cannot hide behind yesterday’s events without explaining why the funerals were held in Sydney.

Unanswered??!! Err boys, maybe you should have listened to the radio yesterday as you would have heard Chris Bowen say this:

Speaking on ABC Local Radio in Sydney this morning, Immigration Minister Chris Bowen defended the Government's decision to accede to relatives' wishes for the funerals to be held in Sydney.

"The situation is the Australian Federal Police has responsibility for the bodies and the Department of Immigration has responsibility for the survivors obviously as people who are detainees in our system," he said.

"Now the Federal Police consulted with the families I think appropriately about where they would like the victims buried, whether that be in their homeland or in Australia and which part of Australia.

"It's appropriate then that the Department of Immigration took the decision that close and direct family members - not everybody who expressed an interest in coming to the funeral by the way, because there were more people who wanted to come to the funerals - but a decision that direct and close family members be able to attend those funerals, which I think, in these tragic circumstances, is appropriate."

So the reason the funerals were held in Sydney is because that is where the families wanted them to be.

Now as to this argument that they could have been buried on Christmas Island. Geez, how bloody heartless can you get? Does Morrison or Abbott or Hockey or Alan Jones or Ray Hadley or anyone else think that perhaps a father may actually wish to visit his three month old child’s grave occasionally? Now does anyone think that any of these asylum seekers are going to set up home on Christmas Island? No, of course not. They will most likely settle in Sydney because that is where they have either friends, relatives or at least a sense of community.

“The humanity” as Joe would have it, is not just about the cost of the burial it is about the place. Imagine the outcry if the Army had said it would only pay to bury Corporal Atkinson in Darwin because that’s where his home base was, and that’s where his fiancée lived? My God, there would have been a riot (and rightly so).
Anyone who thinks they should have been buried in Christmas Island, has to ask themselves who will tend to that grave; who will visit it; who will weep there?

You want to think of the tragedy of a dead three month old? How about we put on top of that pain the grave of a three month old that is never visited because it is on an island thousands of miles away from where the dead child’s father is. And that the reason for that is because the Government decided that is the way it should be – you know to save on costs.

Sorry, but you can have that society if you want; for mine, I am quite glad I live in the one now.

***
Barrie Cassidy on The Drum swallowed Morrison’s and Abbott’s apologies completely (even if he needed to do some nice use of ellipses to make it seem Abbott was sorry) and then decided the real bad guy was Chris Bowen for not allowing the nine year old orphan Seena to stay in Sydney with his uncle. Cassidy related the transcript of an interview Bowen gave with the ABC’s Jon Faine in which every other statement Bowen makes ends with Faine cutting him off.

Now I have to say I agree with Faine and Cassidy that common sense would suggest Seena should stay with his family in Sydney. But life is not always that easy.

For a start Seena’s aunt and cousin are also on Christmas Island – in fact as a report in The Australian yesterday noted, the aunt has been taking care of Seena. So while it would seem good to let Seena go with his relatives in Sydney I can understand why the Department of Immigration and Citizenship would think keeping him with his aunt is the right thing to do for the time being. The other point is that while it would seem common sense to let Seena go with his uncle, the fact remains the Government can’t just let a 9 year old under its care go off and live with an adult just because the adult says they’re willing to do so.

How would it be if it turns out the uncle really doesn’t have the space to house Seena, and so he’s sleeping on the floor, or that he’s not getting enough clothing, or food? And what about education? On Christmas Island he’s attending school – can his uncle get Seena to school? As a parent I know that dropping kids off and picking them up is not easy to do with work, so can someone do that with Seena?

Now I am actually pretty sure that all of these concerns can be allayed or overcome, but I see nothing wrong with the Government doing the checks first.
My issue is that these checks surely would not take too long and it would be much, much better were Seena to be kept in Sydney under the care of say a community organisation while they are being carried out.

To my mind that would be the Government showing both due care of the child’s welfare, and also compassion for the unusual circumstances Seena must face. Flying him back to Christmas Island, only to fly him back to Sydney in a week’s time certainly does seem to be a waste, and also pretty lacking in compassion and sense.

Morrison goes for the gutter; Abbott is gutless; Hockey steps up

The opening paragraph by Kirsty Needham says it all:

SEVEN survivors of the Christmas Island boat tragedy will travel to Sydney today to bury family members. Among them, Madian El Ibrahimy will bury his eight-month-old daughter, Zahra and Hussein al-Husaini will lay to rest his three-month-old son Sam.

Both men's wives drowned, or are missing.

The sadness contained in those three sentences is palpable, and as tragic as anything written about the Queensland floods. In fact were you to replace “Christmas Island boat tragedy” with “Queensland floods”, and you’d be hearing both sides of politics offering statements of deep mourning.

Back when the tragedy occurred, Opposition Immigration spokesperson Scott Morrison, came out with this statement:

"What has occurred today off the cliffs of Christmas Island represents our worst fears realised. This is a terrible human tragedy."

"The lives of the men, women and children on these boats are as precious as our own, and we mourn their loss.

"Our thoughts and prayers are with their families and loved ones. For those injured and in need, we pledge to take care of them as they recover from this tragedy."

Well I am pleased to announce that the families and loved ones are now completely recovered and we can stop caring for them or treating them as we would our own.

For here was Morrison today, on the news that the seven survivors would be flown to Sydney to attend the funeral:

"The Government had the option of having these services on Christmas Island. If relatives of those who were involved wanted to go to Christmas Island, like any other Australian who wanted to attend a funeral service in another part of the country, they would have made their own arrangements to be there.

"This is a Government whose failed border protection policies have increased the cost of asylum seeker management by more than seven-fold in just the last three years.

"They need to understand the value of taxpayers' dollars in this area.

"Are you suggesting, you know, that other Australians don't find financial cost pressures when it comes to getting to these types of events that they dearly want to go to?"

Yep, using the funeral of (among others) an eight-month old and a three-month old child as a means to talk about waste of taxpayer dollars.

How classy.

Really, can you get any lower? Think about it. A father is burying his three month old child. Can you conceive of anything more horrible? How about the fact that the man’s wife will not be there because she is drowned – her body lost. Even attempting to imagine myself in his shoes brings horror to mind, and tears to eyes.

But not for Morrison.

Morrison likes to think he can be leader of the Liberal Party one day. Well all I know is I will remember his words today; and so should we all.

Was he the lone ranger on this issue? Nope try this bit of compassion from National’s Senator Fiona Nash:

"It's not really an appropriate request I don't believe for the government to say to the taxpayers of Australia, we want to pay for all of this," she told Sky News.

"We need to make sure that government decisions are made on the right basis, they are not made on an emotional reaction, they are made on a well thought out policy basis."

Yeah, we really want a Government department that has no emotional reaction when dealing with the death of a three month old child… Honestly, where do they find these people, and how do they get on the Senate ticket?

Tony Abbott was on MTR this morning getting a nice old pleasure rub from Steve Price and Andrew Bolt. How tough was the interview? Well Price started off by asking Abbott about his rise in the polls: “Are you starting to cut through or does it just mean the Government is doing a really bad job?” Oh tough question Steve, you really got him on the back foot there! There hasn’t been such a tough question asked a politician since Lisa Simpson asked Mr Burns “Mr. Burns, Your Campaign Seems To Have the Momentum of a Runaway Freight Train. Why Are You So Popular?”

Abbott was asked about Morrison’s comments. Do you think he stood up and showed some of his Christian compassion (a trait which was actually raised by Andrew Bolt earlier in the interview)? Abbott stand up to right-wing talk show hosts? Yeah right, you’ve been asleep for a few years haven’t you…

“I mean, look, (it's) a terrible tragedy and I think everyone shares the grief of people who have lost loved ones - particularly in these horrible circumstances - but you're right, it does seem a bit unusual that the government is flying people to funerals.”

What a weak-arsed pathetic response by an empty suit of a leader. Abbott is so locked into disagreeing with everything the Government does (even before they do it), that he cannot bring himself to agree with them even when common decency would suggest this is not an issue worth politicising.

But dog-whistle politics is far too often the stock in trade of those on the right, demonstrated nicely by Senate Gary Humphries who announced today he will table a petition calling for an end to any Muslim migration.

Humphries says he is tabling it only because he believes in free speech but that he doesn’t agree with the petition itself. I have to say, sorry Gary, what a pile of dung. This petition is signed by three people. Yep three. Those three people are free to say it, they are free to publish it (heck, they could start up a blog), they can send their thoughts to newspapers. That is freedom of speech. Freedom of speech does not mean any old bigot can get his petition tabled in Parliament.

Senator Humphries tabling this petition gives it a veneer of legitimacy, and also means any crank organisation (or three friends) can sign something and send it on to Humphries for it to be tabled in parliament.

Personally I think Humphries should have sent it back and said, sorry guys I can’t support it, and given you can only get three signatures, neither does anyone else.

Thankfully for the Liberal Party there was one person ready to show the country it has not departed the field when it comes to compassion. Joe Hockey stepped up to the plate and said what should have been said by his leader:

“I would never seek to deny a parent or a child from saying goodbye to their relative.”

“No matter what the colour of your skin, no matter what the nature of your faith, if your child has died or a father has died, you want to be there for the ceremony to say goodbye, and I totally understand the importance of this to those families.”

“I think we as a compassionate nation have an obligation to ensure that we retain our humanity during what is a very difficult policy debate.”

Well said that man.

It comes on the back of Julie Bishop announcing she would consider the views of her electorate on the issue of same sex marriage. To me this suggests there are some very deep tensions in the Liberal Party at the moment – tensions on issues that have been mostly buried for many years (in fact most of the period of Howard’s rule).

The question remains, will the moderate wing of the Liberal Party finally (after so many, many years) live up to its name, or will it give out a yelp and then cower back under a rock like it did from 96 to 07?

It is an important question, because if the moderate wing gains a voice, it will force the ALP to also show what it stands for on such issues.

On today’s funeral, Immigration Minister Chris Bowen responded:

“At the time of the tragedy there was an appropriate degree of public commentary from the opposition, which rose above politics. I think it would be better on the day of the funeral that that continued. It is perfectly appropriate for the Department of Immigration and the Australian Federal Police to make the arrangements that they have.

I think it is unfortunate that Mr Morrison would choose to politicise these arrangements.”

An understated response – and I guess it was the tone that needed to be taken – you can’t really tear strips off a guy while also at the same time trying to say the issue shouldn't be politicised. But the Government will need to watch out – if the moderate wing of the Libs gets vocal, then the ALP taking the neutral, above-politics stance won’t be enough. It has already lost many votes to the Greens because of this position; losing more to the Liberals will be death.

Valentine’s Day: Where’s the political love?

So the ALP and Julia Gillard had a pretty good week, it’s Valentine’s Day, love is in the air, so time for a bounce in the polls? Eh, that’d be a no.

The Nielsen comes out today showing the ALP taking a 3 point hit, and now down to a Two Party Preferred of 46-54. Worse still for the ALP, its primary is on 32%. That ain’t a winning proposition, no matter what the Greens polls and send their way in preferences. Oddly the flood levy gets a 52 per cent approval rating, which more than a few have suggested means the government is now less popular than a tax.

Peter Hartcher suggests there is no panic from the Government, which if true is about bloody time given the concern the ALP since 2006 has placed on every damn poll. In the SMH, Phil Coorey, when writing about the results of some focus groups (names that no one really gives a damn), also noted that “Labor is expecting no significant poll shift for at least a year until its work program is delivered.”

That is probably just as well. I still think we only need to really worry about the polls after the NSW election – at this point most NSW voters would not be discriminating too much between state and federal when asked in a poll what they think of the ALP.

But that doesn’t mean the ALP can ignore them. They should take note of them; just not do anything about them. The Government and Gillard did have a good week last week. Yes most of the population actually have lives and so didn’t notice, but that doesn’t mean they should get the shakes – keep up what they did, in time the voters will notice and respond.

The same can be said of the Health agreement. It got some decent headlines from both Fairfax and News.ltd papers. But will it bring about a big change in polling fortunes? Of course not. It doesn’t matter how big a change the deal is (or is not if you want to agree with Abbott), the voters will never think it is all that big because they won’t change one thing about how they go about doing things.

Medicare changed the way people did things – and they also got a nice Medicare card to remind everyone that life was different. That type of massive shift is never going to happen again. Sure we might get better wait times at emergency rooms and less waiting for elective surgery but individually it probably won’t change too much how we go about things – it might just mean we go about it a bit quicker. And so any health reform is never going to be a “game changer” in the polls, because why change your vote as a result of a policy that doesn't seem to affect your life?

But it still needs to be done (though to be honest I do think we in Australia get a little bit “first-world problem” about our health care. It’s not as though our health system is laughed at by other countries. No tourists ever worries about getting sick here, like you do if in America).

So what was the reaction to the deal? Pretty good:

The Oz was running with a positive Page One, and over on Fairfax (after you got past the Nielsen Poll), was likewise positive.

The theme was definitely one the ALP would want – because it is one they have themselves put out. Lenore Taylor gets straight to it:

Julia Gillard said 2011 would be her year of ''delivery''.

Mathew Franklin at The Oz also is on it:

In Gillard's "year of decision and delivery", failing to win agreement for national health reform was not an option.

The meme of this year as being the year the Government will “deliver” has certainly taken hold, but I’m not sure it is such a good thing. Yes it is good to reinforce that picture, but the phrase also carries with it the implication that they haven’t done anything since 2007. Franklin notes this:

Had Labor gone to the next federal election with nothing to show on health, voters would have been entitled to see the Prime Minister as a dud and a fraud.

This political reality explains why Gillard has been so intent on accommodating the state and territory leaders on health reform.

I have to agree with that – having set the table, Gillard now needs to serve up the dinner. Thankfully she hasn’t gone over the top like Rudd was want to do and make us think we were about to be served a meal fit a Michelin 3 Star restaurant, but she still needs to make sure the voters don’t go policy-hungry.

Annabel Crabb was pretty cynical about the result:

Last night, when the premiers were still in with the Prime Minister agonising over their health decision ("Hmmm. Let me see. Money? Or no money?")

Obviously the Premiers didn’t stay in the room for 7 hours just for effect, and most reports highlighted that the deal will lead (or at least hopefully will) to greater transparency – a scary thing for Premiers given they know it will inevitably lead to comparisons across states, but despite any praise for the deal, most commentary also quite rightly pointed out (as The Oz stated in its headline):

Devil will be in the detail of deal

And so while Gillard has done well to get all the Premiers signing off on the heads of agreement, when it comes to the health reform, I think we can say we have conception, but delivery is still a ways off (but you can’t have the later without the first).

***

There wasn’t much love in Paul Sheehan’s latest column.

Border security shemozzle proves Gillard unfit to govern

Essentially Sheehan, displaying zero political awareness, thinks Abbott should move a motion of no-confidence because our borders are unprotected from hoards of asylum seekers (yeah that’ll work). The entire article is all pretty untasteful, but it contains some lovely unintentional humour. Take this line:

That's why the phrase ''we will stop the boats'' were the first words of the mantra constantly repeated by Tony Abbott when he outperformed the robotic Julie Gillard in last year's election campaign.

So constantly repeating a statement created by a spin doctor is what it means to outperform someone? Wow, we really are setting the bar high aren’t we, Paul?

If an Australian government is perceived to be capitulating to the tactic of fait accompli on its borders by people demanding a right of entry, the government faces political death.

Except Sheehan believes the Government was perceived that way, and yet, here’s the thing, they are still in Government. If that is political death, the ALP wants more of it.

I used to assume that the Department of Immigration was rigorous, impartial and transparent.

Oh dear. Sheehan must have been asleep during that whole Cornelia Rau thing.

It does not automatically reject anyone who arrives without identity papers. Instead, it follows policies laid down by the United Nations Convention on Refugees and other UN protocols.

Yep, Sheehan is criticising the Government for adhering to the UN convention.

Normally on such pieces the best advice is to ignore the comments, but I have to say some of them were spot on:

Could the Herald just save us all time and just print the words "I hate the ALP" or "I hate the Greens" on alternate weeks in place of Paul Sheehan's column?

Well put.

Friday Night Relaxer: Covers of my life

I am not by nature a hoarder. Sure I have never thrown out a novel, but that is more due to my book addiction than anything else. I’m not one for keeping too many things “just in case”. If I haven’t thrown out something old and long since unused, it is more likely due to my laziness at walking the approximately 23 steps to the wheelie bin outside than to any hoarding tendencies.

Pretty much the only collections I have are of books, DVDs CDs and magazines.

Now the magazine collection I have however is pretty limited. I don’t keep every magazine I buy. A Who magazine will find its way to the trash pile just as quickly as will yesterday’s newspaper. But I do find it hard to throw out movie or music magazines. I keep them because I find them fascinating sources of popular history. The New Weekly types of magazines are for the most part instantly trashable (and to be honest they rarely find their way inside our house in the first place), but magazines like Rolling Stone, Mojo, Empire and the dearly departed except for on the web, Premiere, offer wonderful snapshots of culture through my lifetime. I keep them not only because I will occasionally flick through them (though this is rare) but more so because I figure my daughters may one day like to read them. I know I would have loved to read old magazines of my parents about The Beatles or The Rolling Stones, or the latest release film from the 1963.

I don’t know if they even had such magazines, but if they did I would have liked them to keep them. And so even when I was in my early 20s and in no way thinking about having children I kept these magazines. It was actually a precipitous decision because when in my early 30s I did a PhD on Hollywood satires, I actually cited some articles from my old collection of Empire and Premiere magazines.

I don’t buy the Empire magazines anymore – I did buy about the first 20 of the Australian edition, but found it was a bit lightweight, and too much a fan boy mag. There’s only so often you can talk about how great is Star Wars… And Rolling Stone? I can’t remember the last time I bought it – 2003 maybe?

The other magazine of my teenage and early 20s was Time. Before the internet, this was my best source of international news, and when I lived in Japan for a year in 1989, each week I used to catch a  train to the next town over which had a large bookshop that sold English magazines, and got my copy. I didn’t keep that many, which is a shame because 1989 was a year in a 100.

Do you know where you were when you heard the Berlin Wall came down? I remember exactly.

It was at the Isehara train station in Japan. I was there waiting to meet a Canadian mate who was fellow exchange student. We were off to Tokyo for the night (Shinjuku to be precise). When he got off the train he had a copy of The Japan Times (the best English newspaper, in my opinion). I asked him if there was any news. He said not really; talked a bit about the hockey scores, mentioned some info about the lasted Sumo tournament, and then, “Oh yeah, the Berlin Wall came down”.

As two fairly politically aware teenagers who took life and world affairs oh so very seriously we then proceeded to shout and scream and jump up and down celebrating right there on the platform of the train station, with Japanese staring at us and edging ever so slightly away from where we were.

We then spent the rest of the evening drinking Kirin Beer and talking about what it all meant. (Is there anything better than to be young and oh so very serious?)

That week I bought this copy of Time, and knew I was never going to throw it out. Growing up I couldn’t conceive of the Wall coming down, and given what had happened in China only a couple months earlier that year, it still seemed inconceivable. This cover still bring out the giddy, politically serious youth in me. It is an odd feeling as well, because I had always wanted to get to Berlin and see the Wall, and at this point I knew that dream was never going to happen.  What is stunning now is that the Wall had been up for 28 years, and it has now been down for 21. That means there are people at university who were not alive when there was a thing called the Cold War. Amazing.

It also reminds me of another thing I thought back then – those Berlin youth take their fashion very seriously. These guys on the Wall could have been getting ready to pose for a Benetton advert. The citizens of Cairo this week will never have a hope of being so well dressed!

I bought the People magazine on the right from Camp Zama Army Base. I was there as guests of a couple Americans who had got us passes to watch an American Football game played between the base team and a local team (the score was not close). I bought it at the PX – which might as well have been a 7-Eleven in America – not one bit of Japanese merchandise was for sale.

At the time I thought the 80s were the greatest decade ever. The 60s? Pah, get in your box, baby boomers. Looking back I now prefer the 90s (because of course you need to rank these things) – but that is more because my life was more interesting in the 90s (oh and the music was better).

I kept this mag and re-read it quite often, and could never bring myself to throw it out if only because it had lots of trivia about the 80s – such as the fact that in 1980 only 37,000 Walkmans had been sold, but by 1988 there had been 25 million sold. I mean honestly, how can you throw out something like that?

It is now an historical relic, and thus I keep it tattered cover and all. And how scary is it that of the people featured on the cover, Donald Trump is the one who has arguably had the best last 10 years?

Ah Madonna.

Now I have to say growing up I was huge a Madonna fan. And in 1991 she turned it up a notch an outraged the censors (well sort of).

The Hot issue of Rolling Stone that year featured her in a photo series taken by Steven Meisal that saw her doing all sorts of outrageous things – dressing as a man and dancing with a woman! How decadent and boundary pushing!!!

What is most sad though is I probably bought this magazine as much for the article on Ratcat as I did for the Madonna interview with Carrie Fisher.

Oh Ratcat, you just never really kicked on did you?

Pity.

Looking at he charts at the back of this issue I see the top 5 albums that month were Ratcat “Blind Love”, James Reyne “Electric Digger Dandy”, Jimmy Barnes “Two Fires”, REM “Out of Time” and Daryl Braithwaite “Rise”. Ahem.

It was August 1991, Nirvana’s “Nevermind” would be released in September, and the music world would be changed.

This issue is thus like a last gasp of the 1980s. But it also gave us an insight into the future with an article on Philips latest new thing – the Digital Compact Cassette: “DCC is a thoroughly researched project with high consumer appeal and a pile of potential in the marketplace” . Yep. Good luck with that.

My God the world changes in 16 years.

Back then, there’s fresh, all jokey Mel Gibson bringing on the laughs behind the set of Maverick. How’s that image going Mel?

I started reading Premiere in 1993, but I can’t find the first copy I bought which featured a cover story on the movie Hero starring Dustin Hoffman and Andy Garcia.

I loved the issues that came out featuring the summer movie preview. They used to try and work out which films would be hits, and which would bomb. Rather bravely they would rank 20 films according to their predicted box office.

This year in 1994, they believed that True Lies would be Number 1 (it came 3rd), The Lion King to come second (it did), and Maverick to come 3rd (it finished the year 12th). Worse still it had the stinkers, I Love Trouble, Renaissance Man and City Slickers 2 to come 4th, 5th and 6th. They ended up 44th, 57th and 32nd).

The Number 1 film that year, Forrest Gump, they had coming 11th, with the suggestion it could be “the summer sleeper”.

One of the main reasons I kept the issue, and re-read it often, was the excellent article by Peter Biskand on the making of Chinatown. The article would later be reproduced pretty much word for word in his book, Easy Riders, Raging Bulls. It was brilliant journalism, and the lack of that type of writing is why I don’t bother with film magazines anymore.

As the character in the dreadful Generation X film, Reality Bites, played by Winona Ryder says with great understatement, “Melrose Place is a really good show”.

Of course it was. No, I’ll go further: it was THE great show of the early to mid 1990s. Before Friends and Seinfeld took over the zeitgeist, you needed to watch this show. A spin off from Beverly Hills 90210, it was such a guilty pleasure that it even crossed over into Seinfeld, with the great episode where Jerry takes a lie detector test to try and prove he has never watched it (tip from George – “It’s not a lie if you believe it”).

Many a Monday night (OK I’m guessing there, I am pretty sure it was Monday night) was spent with friends watching it and bagging the show the whole time. It was a show that demanded to be watched with a group of friends. Oh Alison, you useless pushover! Give up, girl, Billy is never going to want you. Oh Michael, you’re so bad. Jo? C’mon, Jake is not for you. And Oh. My. God. Did you just see the scar on Kimberly’s head??!!!

My sister during the early-mid 90s lived in London, and in my letters to her I used to give her updates on MP – in fact I think they were the only reason she wanted me to write. In the years before the web and sites like Television Without Pity, my relating the adventure of “I-need-a-man-Amanda” (played by Special Guest Star, Heather Lockear) and the others living at the apartment complex were the only way she could keep tabs on her favourite show. It truly is a different world now.

That issue also listed the Hot Actor and Actress of the 1994 as 19yo Leonardo di Caprio (hard at work on The Basketball Diaries) and Gwyneth Paltrow. The Hot Band was Green Day. I guess you can say they were on the money there.

Looking at my collection of magazines, I see it pretty much runs out around 2004, the time when I had my first child. I guess my kids can use the internet to find things from the past, but for me, these have been with me now for so long, that even if all of the articles within can be found online, they’ll be staying on my shelves. Tattered and dog-eared memories, yes; but precious all the same. 

By the way, for those interested, Time does have all its old copies online – all the covers can be found here.

Have a good weekend.

On the QT: Tin hearts and uranium breath

On the last day of the first week (a pretty short week Question Time wise) most of the best action was prior to and after Question Time.

The morning was full of wonderful lines, the best of which by far was Bob Katter when commenting on the Radio National about the cyclones and floods: “Even in a well-run disaster, things go disastrously."

That’s the one to beat for line of the year, folks.

Greens Senator Scott Ludlam also came out with a good line in response to a story in Fairfax papers that wikileaks cables had revealed Martin Ferguson had apparently said to US Officials that a deal to supply India with uranium could be made within year. Ludlam, channelling former New Zealand PM David Lange said:

"I swear some days you can smell the uranium on Martin Ferguson's breath”.

The interesting thing for me was that the leak was foreshadowed by a question yesterday in QT by Julie Bishop. She asked Ferguson:

Ms JULIE BISHOP (3.11 pm)—My question is to the Minister for Resources and Energy regarding his recent meeting with Indian External Affairs Minister Krishna. Did the minister reaffirm the government’s ban on sales of Australian uranium to India while India remains outside the nuclear non-proliferation treaty? Has the minister, in discussions with foreign governments, canvassed the possibility of a nuclear deal with India outside the treaty within the next few years?

So it seems fairly likely that Bishop was given a heads up on the story – which is worth noting if only to make sure we pay attention to the questions Bishop asks in the future.

The subject of Julie Bishop and the leaking of her disagreement with Abbott on the cutting of aid funding to Indonesian schools also produced a pearler of a line by Eric Abetz. Abetz said he knew who the leakers were and had some advice:

"I think we all know who the leakers are and as happens with leakers they carry neither the respect of their colleagues nor, if I might say, of your profession," he told journalists.

"People who leak are people who cannot be trusted."

From the man who trusted the leaks of Godwin Grech that has to be the overwhelming favourite to win the 2011 award for line said by a politician most lacking in self-awareness.

Stephen Conroy also gave a press conference to announce a deal had been reached with Telstra on the NBN. It also seemed to be that he gave the press conference so as to absolutely flay the Economist Intelligence Unit:

"It starts off with a serious factual error, and then descends into what can only be described as ideological dogma.

"It uses a ranking system that says public investment is bad, you get zero marks for public investment and you get 10 out of 10 for private investment. So, surprisingly, Australia ranks poorly in that particular criterion, given that this is a public investment.

"It ignores the fact that [the NBN] gets a commercial return, it ignores the fact that we'll privatise it down the track."

Apart from that, it’s pretty good!

The EUI released a statement, which was pretty bloody lame:

Data was based on officially-released government plans containing targets for speed, rollout, cost and coverage. This methodology was consistent across the report for all countries analysed.

Yep, consistently bad, is about the sum of it.

There was also an issue that supposedly is a “constitutional crisis” all because the Libs in the Senate with the independents passed a Bill to change the Youth Allowance – in effect passing a Bill that would cost $317m in revenue. The Government will recommend to the Governor General not to allow the Bill to be debated in the House of Representatives, because “money bills” cannot originate form the Senate. How do we know this? Good old Section 53 of the Constitution lights the way:

53. Proposed laws appropriating revenue or moneys, or imposing taxation, shall not originate in the Senate.

Now I ain’t some big-city lawyer, but I can read, and that’s about as explicit as it gets.

Yeah, it’s a “crisis”

And so on to Question Time, and of course the floods.

Abbott started with this slow medium pacer:

Mr ABBOTT (2.02 pm)—My question is to the Prime Minister. With the cost of living skyrocketing for Australian families and electricity prices tipped to double in just four years, why is the Prime Minister planning three new taxes—a carbon tax, a mining tax and now a flood tax? Shouldn’t the Prime Minister be putting her hand into the government’s pockets to fund flood reconstruction, not putting her hands even deeper into the pockets of Australian families?

Gillard responded the fallacy of his argument, that cuts to Government expenditure are somehow not connected to the public:

Ms GILLARD—I thank the Leader of the Opposition for his question because it enables me to explain something he clearly does not seem to understand. First and foremost, the government’s budget is composed of money that has been given to the government by taxpayers, and we take that trust very seriously.

She ended with what remains the biggest problem for Abbott’s current line of attack – that he supported a levy not 6 months ago:

I say to the Leader of the Opposition that I am still waiting for an answer to my question: why is it that he could support levies in the past, that he designed his election policies based on a $6 billion levy, that it was good enough for him to seek to levy $6 billion for his election policies, but it is not good enough for him to support a levy to rebuild Queensland and rebuild the nation? The Leader of the Opposition has no philosophical objections to levies. We know that. He has supported them in the past and he has designed them himself. Now is the time to step forward and to show some leadership. I am still calling on the Leader of the Opposition to find it within himself to look beyond political interest at the national interest, and that requires supporting the package the government has outlined for a $5.6 billion expenditure on rebuilding.

Gillard was in a good mood, and so too were her front bench. The obvious break down of unity on the other side (made abundantly clear by Julie Bishop’s body language – I tell you I want to play poker against her!) had them all feeling pretty chipper.

This feeling was no doubt helped by the announcement today that unemployment remained at 5%. Total hours worked did decline, which is not great, but the decline in 8,000 full-time jobs was offset by the increase of 32,000 part0time jobs. Obviously, however,  in the long run, you want full-time jobs to rise.

Scott Morrison came in for his first delivery of the year – it was about “teh boats” of course, and asking why:

How does the Prime Minister explain to Queenslanders why $155 million in flood mitigation works for the Bruce Highway has to be cut by the government, yet it can find over $290 million more for blow-outs in the immigration department?

Gillard didn't use the occasion to talk about the Indonesian school funding – a leap which I thought could have been easily made. Her answer instead was nice and direct:

The member who asked the question also asked me about the Bruce Highway, and I thank him for that. We have allocated $2.3 billion to the Bruce Highway over six years. The Howard government allocated $1.2 billion over 12 years. Let’s do that maths again: $2.3 billion over six years versus $1.2 billion over 12 years. We have effectively doubled the effort in half the time. So, if the member wants to come to the dispatch box and say, ‘Yes, the Howard government was remiss. Yes, it was a government of poor choices,’ and then say, ‘This government has made better choices,’ that would be an accurate reflection of the facts.

But, of course, the facts will not ever cross the lips of those opposite, because this is about their political interest, not about the national interest. It is time they lifted their sights. It is time they recognised this nation has come through a summer of natural disaster. The nation needs rebuilding. We have a plan to rebuild it. It is time to stop the cheap politicking and endorse our plan.

After that you would think Abbott and Co would keep quiet, but no, Abbott stood up and delivered a supplementary question:

Mr ABBOTT—Mr Speaker, I ask a supplementary question. On the Prime Minister’s logic, is the government now planning a boats tax to cover the unforeseen additional expenses of border protection?

He should have kept very quiet:

Ms GILLARD—I have contemplated a tax on three-word slogans but thought that it would bankrupt the Leader of the Opposition so quickly it would be inappropriate, so I have changed my mind—but I have contemplated that tax. Maybe we should just put a swear jar on the table here and by the end of each question time we could send some dollars to the Queensland flood relief appeal. But, knowing the Leader of the Opposition, he would say, ‘Send them to the Liberal Party instead,’ if we were collecting those funds.

I say to the Leader of the Opposition: we will do what we stand for, and that is managing the budget carefully; that is making the fiscal decisions to get the budget to surplus in 2012-13; that is stepping up to the national interest and making sure that we rebuild Queensland. We will leave you with your three-word slogans and your cheap politics—it is all you know.

At this point the ALP side of the house was in joyous spirits. Never let it be said the performance of the house counts for naught. If you can’t win the house, you’ll struggle to keep your leadership. The next question demonstrated Gillard’s supreme feeling of confidence as it was given by Rob Oakeshoot, who over the summer has grown a beard. On Tuesday at a press conference Gillard had also noticed that The Oz political editor Dennis Shanahan had also grown a beard – she had referred to his “Bee Gees’ look”. Today, in response to Oakeshott she had some more fun:

Ms GILLARD—I thank the member for his question. I do think I should take this opportunity to record my objection to the beard too—it is something I have said to him face to face. I do not know what has happened over the summer season, but we have Rob Oakeshott here and Dennis Shanahan up there and they are both very poor judgment calls, Mr Speaker! We will see what happens by the time the parliament sits next.

She and the ALP were laughing and all watching knew they were seeing someone born to strut the floor of the House.

Two other performance on the Government side were of note. Kevin Rudd made good use of the material given him by the Libs and once again bashed Abbott over his suggestion to cut funding to the Indonesian schools:

The supreme irony is this: here we have the Leader of the Opposition and today we are debating his policy, which is absolutely opposed to sound counterterrorism policy in Indonesia. What is the Indonesian government doing today? It is putting on trial Abu Bakar Bashir in Indonesia for charges concerning terrorism. The Indonesian government is doing the right thing on counterterrorism. The Leader of the Opposition is doing precisely the wrong thing on counterterrorism.

The other good performer was Bill Shorten. Shorten last year was woeful at the dispatch box. And though when he came to answer his question the Libs yelled “Leader in waiting!” it was all a bit weak, because after this week there is one party whose leader is wobbly, and it ain’t the ALP. Shorten’s answer was on insurance, and while it wasn’t scintillating, it did show him in command of the policy –and for Shorten policy depth is what he needs, not showy one liners.

The rest of the questions by the Libs were trying to bring up the saddest cases they could to justify asking fro more exemptions to the levy. Take Scott Buchholz:

Mr BUCHHOLZ (2.34 pm)—My question is to the Prime Minister. One of our key volunteers in the flood affected areas of the Lockyer Valley in my electorate is Gerry Keogh from the Sunshine Coast. He saw the devastation on TV, dropped everything and took four or five excavators to Murphys Creek. He has worked for nothing for the past month and has got Humes pipes and Rocla pipes to donate hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of concrete culverts as well. But, because his own home was not flood damaged, he will have to pay the new tax. Prime Minister, how can that be fair?

So I’m guessing all volunteers should get rewarded now? It kind of challenges the reason for volunteering in the first place doesn’t it?

Or how about this example via Halls Gap:

Mr TEHAN (2.43 pm)—My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to a letter to me from Cheryl Schuyler from Halls Gap, who runs Grampians Gifts and Souvenirs, a business that has suffered from the Victorian floods. She said:

We have only been affected by loss of trade and downgraded income—many families and businesses have lost loved ones and have no income at all and yet the Federal Government’s response is to kick people while they are down by proposing another TAX. It never fails to amaze me that a lazy government’s easy solution is just to add another Tax! People are hurting badly; adding to their burden is not the right or just solution.

What is the Prime Minister’s response to Cheryl Schuyler?

Well my first response to Ms Schuyler is to stop reading Andrew Bolt columns. Secondly I would say, if your business has no income at all, you won’t have to pay the levy (no not even the TAX)

Sigh. This is the best the Opposition can come up with. No wonder Julie Bishop spent most of the time looking at the notes on her lap.

***

After Question Time Tony Abbott moved a Motion of Public Importance on:

The adverse effect of the flood levy on Australians.

His speech was notable for two things. The first in which he displayed this wonderful bit of macroeconomic idiocy:

It [the Government] did not hit us with a levy for the National Broadband Network. It did not hit us with a levy for the BER.

I seriously hope Abbott doesn’t think the way you stimulate the economy is to put in place a levy. The BER was spent to put the budget into deficit to stimulate the economy. The levy is to help get us back into surplus – you and I might disagree that it will do any such thing, but to suggest that they didn’t put on a levy to pay for the BER is a logical reason why they need not do it now, is just one more stick added to the fire that burns away Abbott’s economic credentials.

The second part was when he said this:

I said this week that the Prime Minister has a decent heart, but I tell you what: she has got a tin ear. She sure does not understand anything about mateship, because if she understood anything about mateship at all she would know that mateship is not taxing people; mateship is helping people. She would know that mateship is not what you are taxed to give; mateship is what you choose to give. She would know that mateship does not come from governments; it comes from people and communities.

Abbott speaking from notes delivered this line thinking it a blow. A few of his front bench gave “hear hears” (though not Julie Bishop). Julia Gillard did not forget the line when she stood to give her response.

A good Prime Minister needs to be able to be Prime Ministerial, and she (or he) needs to be a party leader. It is sometime hard to do both,. This week on Tuesday Gillard gave a speech purely as Prime Minister. It was magnificent. Today she flicked the switch to party leader and it was just as good:

Ms GILLARD (Lalor—Prime Minister) (3.50 pm)—We have been through a dreadful summer, a summer where Australians have turned to each other, a summer where Australians have shown that they want to look after each other. Australians have acted to help each other. Australians are now looking to this parliament to give them the leadership the nation deserves at this time. Australians know that the nation needs to rebuild from the devastating summer that was. When Australians turn to this parliament they do not expect to see this tragedy being used for cheap politicking.

They do not expect to see this parliament degenerate into a rabble around what needs to be done to rebuild the nation. Instead, they expect decisions to be made and action to be taken, and as Prime Minister I am going to do just that.

That is why I have outlined a $5.6 billion funding package. That is why I have outlined plans to start the rebuilding now. That is why we are prepared to make a $2 billion payment available to Queensland. That is why we have set in place measures to make sure value for money is obtained, including a reconstruction inspectorate, including audited accounts, including a national partnership arrangement and including the involvement of people like Mr John Fahey and Mr Brad Orgill. We want to get on with the job of rebuilding the nation. That is what the national interest requires. And the national interest requires this burden to be shared.

She starts with a nice PM-style remark – the leader of the nation. She is the one responsible. She is strong and in command. But get ready, because now she is about to turn her attention onto Tony Abbott:

Unfortunately, what we have seen on every occasion from the Leader of the Opposition is the national interest cast aside in pursuit of narrow political interests. At a time when Australians were turning to each other, urging each other to dig deeper for flood victims, the Leader of the Opposition was out there asking them to dig deeper to fund the Liberal Party. The Leader of the Opposition is very keen to throw insults around; let me say this: I have never seen such a tin heart.

Of course, the Leader of the Opposition may have been let down by his party organisation, but what he needed to then do was say they had done the wrong thing. But he was asked by Barrie Cassidy:

But to do it in that way, to attach it— the fundraising request— to a letter detailing information about the floods—you don’t think that was just a little insensitive and in poor taste on the part of the party?

And the Leader of the Opposition replied: Well people will make their own judgements.

Never a truer word was spoken. People will make their own judgments on a man who did not condemn fundraising for the Liberal Party when the nation was turning to fundraising for flood victims. On the question of the national interest versus narrow political interest, what we have seen on each and every occasion is the Leader of the Opposition out there seeking to pursue narrow political interest.

Take it from me, at this point Gillard had a completely scornful tone of contempt for Abbott in her voice, and it was slicing through all in the House. Brutal.

Did you hear his speech at the Gold Coast to a group of Young Liberals, when the nation was still reeling from the shock of these natural disasters, before we were even touched by the cyclone and there was more devastation to come, when the people of Queensland and Brisbane were looking at their houses filled with filthy floodwaters and wondering how they were ever going to clean up? There was the Leader of the Opposition on the Gold Coast in front of the Liberal Party faithful, trying to work out how he could surf these floodwaters into Kirribilli. That was the main thing on his mind—all about his political interest. Could he use this somehow to put pressure on the Independents to make a different decision about the composition of the government?

“Surf these floodwater into Kirribilli” Wow. That’s a line I wish I had written. Brilliant.

It is narrow political interest every step of the way.

I say to the Leader of the Opposition: people would take him more seriously if the narrow political interest had also not been on display in putting together his so called alternative package. When we laboured over the $5.6 billion funding package, we laboured in the interests of the nation. The Leader of the Opposition and his team laboured over the reports of focus groups to help them work out what was in their political interest, as reported in the newspaper. Were they studying documents to work out the national interest or studying documents to work out his political interest? We all know the answer to that.

Wow. She delivered all of that, hardly looking down, only when quoting Barrie Cassidy did she pointedly use a piece of paper. It only serves to remind myself to never ever let Julia Gillard get angry at me.

She then outlined just how much the Howard Government used to tax, and then she moved on to the number of levies under that Government:

When the Leader of the Opposition was in government, he was very, very pleased to support levies. He gave the superannuation surcharge levy the tick. He gave the gun buyback levy the tick, though someone on $60,000 paying that levy in 1996-97 was being asked for a bigger dollar contribution than we are asking them for today. Have a think about that—a bigger dollar contribution than we are asking them for today, but he gave that one the tick. He gave the stevedoring levy a tick, the milk levy a tick, the sugar levy a tick, the Ansett Airlines levy a tick and the proposed East Timor levy a tick. Indeed, he was so fond of levies that he went to the last election promising a $6 billion levy to fund his election promises.

Now, of course, he comes into this parliament and says he could not contemplate a levy to rebuild the nation. What hypocrisy is this? It was good enough for the Leader of the Opposition to propose a levy to fund his election promises but it is not good enough for him to support a levy to rebuild the nation. It is all about the political interest, not about the national interest—not at any point.

She played the “I am Prime Minister and in charge of the country and you are just in charge of a party” card perfectly – it is one of the biggest advantages a PM has over the opposition leader – incumbency. From this week on, she has finally taken on the incumbency mantle.

I would relate the rest, but it is a long speech, and so I’ll cut to the end. At this point after going through the proposed cuts Abbott has suggested and shown them to either be unsupported by his own party or economically foolish, she ends:

Ms GILLARD—This levy is responsible, it is fair, it is temporary, it is in the national interest and I support it. I believe the Australian people will understand why we are asking them to make this contribution. I say to the Leader of the Opposition that he should support it too. He has no alternative. He has no credibility. His own frontbench do not agree with the figures he put out earlier this week. In those circumstances, it is time for the Leader of the Opposition to say: ‘I made an error on this one, I am a man capable of acknowledging that and I will support the federal government’s levy. I will support rebuilding the nation.’ That is the right thing to do. It is what Australians are looking for.

Do not go mining for the political interest; act in the national interests. Australians are better than the Leader of the Opposition thinks. They will support this levy—it is the right thing to do—and so should he.

The week ended with the parliamentary scene much changed from Monday: The Libs got themselves into a dumb tangle over budget cuts which they won’t even have to carry out(!) and Gillard gave a great speech, and looked better in Parliament than she has at any time since becoming PM.

If any ALP MPs were wondering where Julia had gone, they found her this week on the floor of the house.

On the QT: My constituents suffered more than your constituents.

Question Time for the year began in a very sombre, very quiet, very artificial mood. Sure maybe the floods and cyclones have had a massive effect on the attitudes of politicians, who have all now become kindler and gentler. But we all know it was act, because when finally the opposition began to shout and the Government yelled back, it all seemed real.

Not good, of course; but at least real.

The theme of the day was the floods, and as a result aside from Tony Abbott and Tony Crook, all question were asked by someone whose electorate had in some way suffered from flooding or the cyclone – all the better for each to reference how bad things are.

For the Government it was all about talking about the rebuilding; for the opposition it was about asking why this person or that small business should not have to pay the levy (oh sorry – “flood tax”).

After only a few questions we discovered that the standard of delivery was not going to see any great upward shift from last year. Joe Hockey rumbled up to the box to show the results of his net practice over the summer:

Mr HOCKEY (2.18 pm)—My question is to the Treasurer. How many Australians will have to pay the flood levy and how many Australians who would normally be responsible for paying the flood levy will not have to because of specific circumstances?

Yep how many, because that’s what is important. Hockey wanted Swan to give him a figure for how many people were going to claim flood relief before they have claimed it. Swan rightly treated the question with derision:

Mr SWAN—I thank the Shadow Treasurer for this very important question. It really goes to the core of who will pay this levy and who will not. We know, for example, that everybody under $50,000 will not pay this levy. We also know that those over $100,000 will pay more. We also know that those that are receiving payments under our disaster relief arrangements—

Mr Dutton—What about the figures?

[Ah Dutton is back. Oh good, we missed him so much over the summer]

Mr SWAN—I am going through them. We also know that those that are receiving payments under our disaster relief arrangements—those adults that have received the $1,000 and those with children the $400—will not be paying that amount of money.

Now normally at this point Swan would obfuscate, but he actually gives a direct answer:

I cannot tell you how many of those there are. I cannot tell you, but the Prime Minister before did give you a quantum. Of course we cannot give you a final figure about that. I am more than happy to provide you with estimates later on. I cannot give you a final figure and neither is it realistic to give one.

Exactly right. When Treasury works out how much tax they will raise, they estimate how many will pay. Does Hockey think there’s a figure going around that Swan could use down to the last individual? Does he think he needs to know it? Does he think Swan goes door knocking around to everyone to get the tax and if he doesn't have the precise number he might miss someone? Moreover, the fact is, it doesn’t matter to people in the slightest how many have to pay because all we really need to know is who pays and who doesn’t. If Swan had stood up and said everyone who earns over $40,000 will have to pay, then you would have a gaffe, because it would show he’s not really across his own policy. This? Well this is just answering a dopey question honestly.

Hockey bounded on in for a supplementary:

Mr HOCKEY—Supplementary question, Mr Speaker. To the Treasurer again: given that the government estimates are that it will raise approximately $1.8 billion from the flood levy, exactly how many people does the Treasury estimate will have to pay the levy.

Exactly how many people? Oh dear Joe, you think an estimate comes in with Treasury suggesting 4,504,324 people will pay? Hockey wants an exact estimate? This is the guy who fronted up at the last election with a Excel spread sheet masquerading as a audit, and one which went from $50 billion in savings to around $11 billion once Treasury had a look at it. He really should stay away from demanding exactness in budget figures. 

Late in the session Luke Hartsuyker got up to make sure Hockey’s question wasn’t the dopiest of the day:

Mr HARTSUYKER (2.53 pm)—My question is to the Prime Minister. On 31 March 2009, thousands of residents in my electorate of Cowper were severely impacted by a major flood event. Despite the flood being declared a natural disaster, the government never provided victims with one-off Centrelink disaster payments of $1,000 per adult and $400 per child. Will the Prime Minister now ensure that people who suffered a substantial loss as a result of the floods of 31 March receive those payments and be exempted from the government’s flood tax?

Yep, Hartsuyker wants people whose houses were flooded in a previous financial year to be exempted from paying a levy in the next financial year. And these people who he wants exempted are those who did not even qualify for disaster relief in that previous financial year! Geez, if we let them get out of paying, we’ll be having to exempt people who were around for the 1956 floods in South Australia.

It’s not that such a question is so dumb that is astonishing, it’s that it got through the Liberal’s tactics committee. Unfortunately for Hartsuyker, the Primer Minister had had enough of playing nice, and she danced down the pitch and put this ball somewhere in the upper deck of the stands:

Ms GILLARD—I thank the member for his question and I am very happy to answer it and, as I answer it, to clear up what is clearly becoming a set of misapprehensions on behalf of the opposition which I do not think we should allow to run unchallenged. The guidelines under the natural disaster relief and recovery arrangements are the same guidelines operated by the Howard government.

Eww, don’t you hate it when it turns out the Howard Government did the same thing…

They are the guidelines that the Leader of the Opposition called on me just before Christmas to make sure applied to natural disasters this summer. So any question about the natural disaster relief and recovery arrangements guidelines we are operating are the very guidelines the Leader of the Opposition called on me to have for natural disasters this summer.

Oops. Nice one Luke, I’m betting Abbott just loves being used as a baseball bat with which to slap you around the head.

I know consistency of purpose is not the Leader of the Opposition’s strong suit, so if he has changed his mind—other than on the question of additional assistance for people in Cyclone Larry that he has raised in parliament today and raised in the Sunday newspapers—generally about the architecture of natural disaster relief and recovery arrangements and he now believes, as the questioning of his members would seem to imply, that they should extend to meeting all losses sustained by every business and every householder then the Leader of the Opposition should say that, we will have it costed for him and he should nominate matching savings. I think he is going to find that pretty hard to do.

Ouch. A question on people being exempted from paying the “flood tax” becomes a tool for Gillard to slap down Abbott for being one to go back on his word. This answer needs a point of order quick smart:

Mr Hartsuyker—Mr Speaker, on a point of order: I would like the Prime Minister to be directly relevant to the question, which related to the Centrelink disaster payments that existed in 2009.

Good of Hartsuyker to ram home the illogical aspect of his question. It was 2009 Luke, let it go!!!

The SPEAKER—The Prime Minister is aware of the requirement to be directly relevant to the question.

Mr Martin Ferguson interjecting—

The SPEAKER—It was a frivolous interjection by the Minister for Tourism. The Prime Minister has the call.

Ms GILLARD—So let us not hear anything more about natural disaster relief and recovery arrangements other than the call for additional assistance for small businesses as outlined by the Leader of the Opposition, unless the Leader of the Opposition articulates what it is and then we will have it costed.

On the question asked by the member, the triggering of Australian government disaster relief payments is being operated by the current government in the way it has been operated by governments past. It has never been the practice of the Australian government—under Mr Howard or any other Prime Minister—to trigger those payments for every weather event or natural disaster. It always has been the practice of the Australian government to respond with those payments when natural disasters are of a size that the view is formed that it is beyond the capacity of the community and the state to deal with it. There is not one factor that is put into decision making by this government that was not a factor in decision making by the former Howard government. So let us, once again, not listen to an analysis that says somehow we are less generous with AGDRPs than governments past have been.

A nice recap of how things are done, and then she ends with…

Finally, I have taken questions today about the operation of the levy. I am still waiting for the answer as to why it was good enough for the Leader of the Opposition to say a $6 billion levy was necessary to fund his election promises but it is not good enough to have a levy to rebuild Queensland and the nation.

Gillard didn’t mention that line much today. I bet though it will get more of a work out in the days ahead.

One of the best other answers was the final one given by Kevin Rudd in response to a Dorothy Dixer asking in effect why it was so stupid for Abbott to suggest cancelling the funding for the Indonesian schooling assistance. Rudd ended Question Time by announcing:

“There would have to be one person in the world who would be happy with the new policy adopted by the leader of the opposition and that's Abu Bakar Bashir, because he supports militant Islamism continuing in the Indonesian education system.”

Spot on, and that the Libs didn’t see that coming when they decided to cut that bit of foreign aid shows how ramshackle a process was their “cuts”. It leaves them defenceless when attacking the Government on any tough on terrorism line. It also is just stupid policy.

***

Speaking of stupid, once again today we saw evidence that the media just swallows in one gulp any media release of a study down by anything that looks learned without ever questioning the findings.

The Australian and Fairfax papers splashed large with a report by the Economist Intelligence Unit (seriously, that name alone should deem it for the bin) that showed the NBN was going to cost 24 times as much as the equivalent scheme in South Korea!!

Yes I know! 24 times!!

The SMH even had the dopey lead of NBN Study Reveals Shock Figures

Well the only shock was that anyone was taking them seriously.

The Economist Intelligence Unit is a branch of the Economist Group (ie those who also put out the magazine The Economist) and in this study of broadband schemes it had decided to create an “index”. Now whenever you rank things you need to put in some assumption of what is good and bad. Well for the EIU anything related to Government ownership or expenditure is bad. Private sector? All good. Take their blurb of the study:

Australia, the country with the highest-profile and most controversial public-sector scheme, also falls in the bottom half of the index, mainly because it is spending a colossal 7.58% of annual government budget revenues on its National Broadband Network

So the “main” reason it performs badly is because the government is spending a lot on it. Well grab that feather and knock me down. Right wing think-tank favours private sector. Hold the front page.

And just ask yourself as well, when was the last time any infrastructure spend in Australia was compared to that in South Korea. Do we say, well you know it cost the South Korean Government a lot less to build all the highways in their country compared to how much we have to spend? Err no, you don’t. Why? Well maybe (and I’m going out on a limb here) because South Korea has a area of 100,210 km² compared to Australia's 7,617,930 km². To put it in context – Tasmania alone is just over 90,000km². In total, Australia is about 76 times larger than South Korea, and yet we’re only paying 24 times as much? Sounds like a bargain to me.

Unfortunately it wasn’t just the media that fell face first into this pile of broadband stupidity, Malcolm Turnbull left his sense at home as well:

"Now the Economist Intelligence Unit joins the long list of expert observers, both international and local, who are utterly dismayed by the reckless spending of the Gillard Government on the NBN," Mr Turnbull said.

"The study confirms, yet again, that this NBN project should be the subject of a rigorous cost-benefit analysis by the Productivity Commission."

You almost have to feel sorry for the guy sprouting crud he knows is ridiculous. Had a lawyer opposing him in court said just what he did, Turnbull would have destroyed the argument with more venom and sarcasm than would seemingly be possible for one person to muster. He must hate himself saying these things that he know can be so easily demolished, but such are the joys of being in opposition and given the task to “destroy” the NBN.

Good luck Malcolm, for your sake here’s hoping this isn’t your best shot.