Stimulus

I have a confession to make. I have a soft spot for the Australian Workers Union.

Before anyone gets too excited, let me explain. My great, great aunt was Dame Mary Gilmore, the first female member of the AWU. Dame Mary was one of Australia’s greatest ever poets who now graces our ten dollar note.

Dame Mary edited the women’s page of the Australian Worker before heading off to South America in 1900 to be part of William Lane’s ‘New Australia’ commune in Paraguay.

Continue reading "The unions were complicit in Garrett’s insulation failure" »

GONE are the days of burning the Midnight Oil and singing about the dangers of environmental degradation.

Peter Garrett is beginning to learn it’s not easy being green when you are in Government.

After originally singing the praises of his $2.5 billion insulation program, the Environment Minister is now at risk of finding himself in the political wilderness over the accident-prone rebate scheme which he unceremoniously dumped on Friday.

Continue reading "Pulling the scheme hasn’t insulated the Government" »

Ahhh, now we get it. Lindsay Tanner is smarter than that “freak show” Barnaby Joyce.

In case we didn’t get the message in parliament last week (we can be a bit slow sometimes) Mr Tanner spelled it out again on Meet the Press on the weekend. Not only is Senator Joyce “off the planet”, his team mate Joe Hockey is a “lightweight”.

Yesterday in parliament he repeated the lesson again for those who’d wagged the last one or drifted off while doodling on our pencil cases. Mr Hockey is “out to lunch”, and again he filled us in on Barnaby. According to Mr Tanner, Senator Joyce is evidence of “a very big question mark over the leader of the opposition’s judgment for appointing him in the first place.”

For someone who’s so much smarter than his counterpart, Mr Tanner seems to have skipped the chapter in Politics for Dummies called “Australians don’t like smug politicians who reckon they’re smarter than everyone else.”

Continue reading "Political snobs risk turning Barnaby into a martyr" »

The Rudd Government claims to be superior in economic management. How so?

The real reason Australia did better than most developed countries in the recent financial crisis was that the Coalition had by 2006 repaid the $96 billion debt run up by Labor, left a $5 billion Education fund, a $60 billion Future Fund and a $22 billion surplus!

Add to this a virtually strike free environment, whereby employment grew, wages grew and exports grew.

Continue reading "Who’s the real economic freak show?" »

Well what can I say about the first parliamentary week as shadow finance minister?

Tony wanted a speech and I delivered it at the Press Club. It would not have mattered if the speech had categorically disproved the theory of relativity, the issue would be the slip and when the question came where I had to, on my feet and in my head, quickly add up Labor party expenditure via MYEFO for the next four years, I said billion when I should have said trillion.

In that split second my head said trillion my heart said you have got to be joking that is enormous. My head was right but the result is for all to see on YouTube.

Continue reading "Freak show? At least Barnaby didn’t blow the budget" »

Research indicates that many lottery winners revert to their previous levels of happiness within a year of winning. Sometimes it’s a case of water finding its level and individuals returning to their normal state of contentment.

Other times, the money is blown on failed business ventures, opportunist gold digging relatives or the vulgar excesses that often accompany easy cash.  In such circumstances, it’s not uncommon for winners to end up worse off than before they won.

Two years ago the Federal government had money in the bank. Howard and Costello had built up a massive buffer of savings to pay for an ageing population, retired the entire Commonwealth debt and budgeted for - if not already delivered - eight years of income tax cuts.

Continue reading "What will we do when the fastcash euphoria is over?" »

Access to capital and finance is the single biggest issue facing the resources industry at the present time.

There’s not a single exploration company in this state that is struggling to get a project going for want of a desert power circle but there are plenty struggling for cash.

The state government has worked with the chamber in an orderly and disciplined fashion since the SACOME sponsored infrastructure conference in 2006. However, the best thing any government could do to get exploration spending moving would be to introduce a Flow Through Share (FTS) scheme.

Continue reading "Pulling mining out of a big black hole" »

MALCOLM Turnbull is wasting his breath, and opportunities to land some punches in question time, by attacking the Rudd Government’s commitment to maintaining its economic stimulus spending.

Put simply, there’s no political gain to be had by taking Turnbull’s advice - or being seen to be taking his advice - and turning off the stimulus tap.

The point is not about whether maintaining the current proposed level of spending is the right thing to do.

(Join The Punch team here at 2pm for live coverage of Question Time).

Continue reading "No political gain for Turnbull in attacking stimulus" »

Whilst Australia’s economy is facing enormous challenges arising from the impact of the global recession, there is another story emerging.

It’s a story of consumer spending holding up, of the housing market remaining strong, and of companies sharing around the burden by shortening hours to keep employees in jobs.

We are not out of the woods yet, but in the short-term the savage downturn that’s hit many other countries so hard, has been averted here in Australia.  I believe this has happened because the Government has displayed two important strengths in a time of crisis: political courage and long-term vision. 

Continue reading "We have the chance right now to build a better nation" »

September 2008: Malcolm Farr writes in The Daily Telegraph that Kevin Rudd is considering taking on net debt for the first time in 12 years. Government goes ballistic in its denials. Newspoll shows ALP 55% - Coalition 45%

October 2008: Rudd announces the first stimulus package and says the cash will be distributed by Christmas. Punters are comfortable with the $10 billion bottom line. Newspoll shows ALP 54% - Coalition 46%.

November 2009: Rudd spills the worst-kept secret in Government - that the Budget will go into “temporary deficit”. Newspoll two weeks later shows ALP 59% - Coalition 41%.

December 2008: Harvey Norman reports bumper Christmas sales, up 9 per cent on previous year. Kevin Rudd Santa Clause jokes start. Newspoll shows ALP 59% - Coalition 41%....

Continue reading "The deficit became funny but Rudd’s not laughing" »