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The Abbott Government

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basilio said:
Julia Gilliard kept her minority Labour government operational and effective for a full term. That was in spite of the full press "take no prisoners" assault of Tony Abbott.

The key element in her legislative and operational success was excellent communication and negotiation skills. She managed to work with the Independents and Greens on a daily basis.

I cannot see how Tony Abbott will emulate that feat. Not yet at least. On all accounts he doesn't have the skills and diplomacy to effectively negotiate with the herd of cats on the cross bench. Frankly I think he would be better coming to terms with the Labour Party in negotiations - but after the way he trashed the last Labour government I just can't see any chance of good will.

He poisoned the well and now he has drink from it. Karma.
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Your stetching the truth as per usual, a bit of fact bending :D
 
Stephen Koukoulas

Why the Abbott budget was the perfect political poison

The Abbott government has learned the hard way that a wide-ranging policy agenda of small ticket savings annoys almost everyone.

A striking feature of the Abbott government’s first budget is that it offended just about every sector or interest group in the economy, while doing precious little to return the budget to surplus.

The net savings to the budget over the three years to 2016-17 totalled $18.2 billion – or around 0.3 per cent of GDP each year. Such a puny fiscal tightening leaves the budget in deficit in that time, and the bottom line is worse than the budget numbers left by the previous government in the pre-election fiscal outlook.
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The government’s budget marketing problem is self-inflicted. Given that most of the scatter-gun of budget measures were not flagged prior to the election, voters were surprised to see the government pursue its fiscal objectives in this way. Indeed, during the election campaign in 2013, the words of Abbott and his fellow frontbenchers were the polar opposite for most issues.
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What is it Syd keeps saying

If Labor wants to pursue a constructive agenda, the "tough" policies needed to fund it – yet maintain the balanced budget over the cycle – should be directed at a narrower constituency. Even at this distance from the election, those targets seem obvious: superannuation and corporate welfare. Those areas would deliver huge savings that are not only fair and equitable, but will help to cover the cost of undoing some of the current government’s policy overreach – and could also fast track the budget to surplus.
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noco said:
Doc, that "DUMMY SPIT" with Sarah Ferguson certainly did not do him any favors.......she well and truly painted him into a corner and he did not know to get out of it so he pulled the plug.

Sooner or later this windbag is going to come unstuck......The chows could yet be his down fall.
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The following is perhaps the timeframe in which the government is hoping the wheels come off of Clive Palmer and the PUP cart.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has flagged the possibility of an election within 12 months if the chaotic scenes of this week's Senate negotiations over the carbon tax repeal continue.

After telling radio 2GB on Friday morning that it might be time for a poll if the government's ''difficulty'' continued for six to 12 months, Mr Abbott later told reporters at a media conference that his administration was there to govern, not call another election.
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http://www.smh.com.au/federal-polit...-new-election-speculation-20140711-3bqyf.html
 
Knobby22 said:
The Libs are used to dealing with career politicians. Clive doesn't care. He wants to create mayhem and cause pain. The Libs will have to suck up to him to get things past, not act haughty like Abbott has been doing. In fact, his statement that day that he would get his way was like a rag to a red bull. Clive wants to set the agenda, not the other way around.
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Knobby, I agree that Palmer's motivation is to create mayhem and cause pain. He is determined to wreak his revenge on the Qld LNP dumping him because of his continued demands that his considerable financial contributions to the party over the years should entitle him to favouritism re his infrastructure requirements etc.

I'm not sure if the Libs have been haughty toward Palmer. Perhaps depends on your interpretation of the word.
Certainly they've been premature in celebrating the removal of the carbon tax, been too quick to be jubilant about getting their legislation through, and sure, I can see that this could qualify as haughty. At the same time, I don't think they should actually have to suck up to anyone. One would hope that participants in the parliament come to legislation in a constructive and thoughtful way, rather than just an intent to destroy.

The Coalition need to stand back and reassess how they are going to govern otherwise this term is going to make the Gillard/Rudd previous term look like a picnic.
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Yes, you're right. So far the populist is running the show. The Libs eagerly agree to anything Clive Palmer puts up if it will look like ensuring the carbon tax will be abolished. Business is very worried. eg who is going to be paying Clive's 250% penalty?
No one seems to know.

Meantime, Ms Lambie is calling for Senator Abetz to be sacked!. Oh, my goodness.:banghead:
 
Ms Lambie is certainly forthright isn't she !!

Mind you Senator Abetz is in charge of ensuring the Governments legislation is passed or at the very least not obviously voted down. Didn't seem to do a very good job yesterday did he ?

Perhaps the whole process needs a bit more finesse ?:)
 
basilio said:
Julia Gilliard kept her minority Labour government operational and effective for a full term. That was in spite of the full press "take no prisoners" assault of Tony Abbott.

The key element in her legislative and operational success was excellent communication and negotiation skills. She managed to work with the Independents and Greens on a daily basis.

I cannot see how Tony Abbott will emulate that feat. Not yet at least. On all accounts he doesn't have the skills and diplomacy to effectively negotiate with the herd of cats on the cross bench. Frankly I think he would be better coming to terms with the Labour Party in negotiations - but after the way he trashed the last Labour government I just can't see any chance of good will.

He poisoned the well and now he has drink from it. Karma.
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So why did they kick her out if she was so good?
 
basilio said:
Really ? I thought I fairly summed up the situation of the last Parliament and the current Abbott government.

Perhaps you just have a different opinion to me. ;)
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Didn't Labor and the Greens control the senate, and only required the thre independents to control both houses.

To compare that, to trying to control Palmers crew is a bit of a long bow.
 
sptrawler said:
Didn't Labor and the Greens control the senate, and only required the the independents to control both houses.

To compare that, to trying to control Palmers crew is a bit of a long bow.
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Seriously.

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

Doing deals isn't the NOalition thing.
 
So_Cynical said:
Seriously.

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

Doing deals isn't the NOalition thing.
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HaHaHa, They could always do a deal like Labor did, with the Greens and Independents.

Labor gave them everything they wanted, then grovelled to them to pass what Labor wanted.lol

What a joke, the Greens got all their policies through, Bob Brown is probably still pi$$ing his pants laughing.

That wasn't negotiation, that was Gillard getting slapped from pillar to post, seems like the left is have memory lapses.lol:D
 
wayneL said:
The >>>coalition<<< isn't a deal? :cautious::eek:

Think about what your saying man! :banghead:
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2 Nazis agreeing to be ass holes isn't a deal....what's the last big deal they put together?

The GST deal that ruined the democrat's?
 
sptrawler said:
HaHaHa, They could always do a deal like Labor did, with the Greens and Independents.

Labor gave them everything they wanted, then grovelled to them to pass what Labor wanted.lol

What a joke, the Greens got all their policies through, Bob Brown is probably still pi$$ing his pants laughing.

That wasn't negotiation, that was Gillard getting slapped from pillar to post, seems like the left is have memory lapses.lol:D
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SP both the Greens and Labor sing from the same music book.......THE FABIAN BOOK ON HOW TO RUIN A COUNTRY ECONOMICALLY.
 
Will the Green/Labor socialists and PUP take any notice of this warning in the interest of the Nation.

I doubt it for they are all intent on political point scoring and self interest.

Time to sit up and take notice or we will all have to suffer the consequences.



Fix mess or prepare for deflation, says Don Argus

The Australian
July 12, 2014 12:00AM

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Annabel Hepworth
National Business Correspondent
Sydney
Don Argus says it is time to get ‘back to the basics’ of living with balanced budgets.

Don Argus says it is time to get ‘back to the basics’ of living with balanced budgets. Source: News Limited

THE “nonsense” of budget measures being thwarted in the Senate threatens to undermine Australia’s economy at the same time Joe Hockey is pushing to lift growth in the world’s biggest 20 economies, business community elder Don Argus warns.

Writing exclusively in The Weekend Australian, Mr Argus questions how sustainable growth can be achieved in a developed world “awash with debt” and says that getting back to balanced budgets is crucial to living standards.

The comments by the former BHP Billiton chairman and National Australia Bank boss come ahead of next week’s landmark summit in Sydney of hundreds of the world’s business leaders to finalise recommendations on growth-promoting measures in the Group of 20 nations.

The Treasurer — who, along with Tony Abbott and Trade Minister Andrew Robb, will receive the blueprint on Friday — has used Australia’s G20 presidency to get nations to commit to lift growth by two percentage points across five years.

“I am not suggesting yet that we are heading for an era of deflation, but unless this political nonsense around our budget is resolved quickly, we had better prepare ourselves for a period of declining demand which puts downward pressure on prices for goods and services with a resultant decline in private and government spending,” Mr Argus writes.

“That scenario can unfortun*ately lead to deflation, something we have not seen in this country since the early 1930s.” It is time to get “back to the basics” of living with balanced budgets, he writes.

“It is time to talk about growth initiatives which create real value for our economy, it is time to talk about trade-offs, because we are now at a stage where we cannot afford further government or private debt.”

Business is anxious that next week’s B20 summit reach agreement on the recommendations so that business can influence the G20 summit being held in Nov*ember in Brisbane.

Business Council of Australia president Jennifer Westacott said that if the G20 could meet the target of growth of 2 per cent more than trajectory GDP in the next five years, “we will see more jobs created and increased living standards around the world”.

“The global economy is still suffering from lower-than-expected growth, which strongly impacts on job creation and unemployment,” she said. “The only way to get to this target, though, is through structural reform undertaken by all G20 countries under a collective agreement.”

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...n-says-don-argus/story-e6frg926-1226986285731
 
And here is some more thought to stew over in the National interest.

But do the Green/Labor socialist care?....I think not.

Politicians don’t get it, do they?

Terry McCrann
The Australian
July 12, 2014 12:00AM

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YOU could not have asked for a more stunning, more dismaying and ultimately disgraceful contrast between the brutal reality facing business and the lazy, *utterly promiscuous, disconnect of the Canberra political bubble, than was provided by the events of the week.

For business, the times are a’ continually changing ”” relentlessly, 24/7, on a wide range of fronts. While the changes are always challenging, they also throw up extraordinary opportunities.

Indeed, never before has such a huge premium been placed on the degree and timeliness of business pro-action. Effective pro-action has become the key determinant between extraordinary success and existential threat. In the world of 2014, being reactive is now only a technique for selection of your position in the corporate cemetery.

The overriding message out of Canberra was that the more the people might change, the more things stay so drearily and disappointingly the same. New prime minister, new opposition leader, new Senate powerbroker ”” albeit with the innovative twist that for the first time he or she is not actually in the Senate ”” yet broken and discredited politics as before.

Put aside the specifics of the battles over the carbon tax and the various budget initiatives; each individual proposal or even in aggregate can be a matter or matters for legitimate political and policy disagreement. But there really is precious little sense of that in the gamesmanship we’ve been seeing. And the one thing that has been totally, totally absent, has been any consideration of how it all might impact on business and consumer confidence.

Or further, how not just the final outcomes but the very process of the political game-playing might not only make life unnecessarily difficult for business going forward, but can be doing exactly that, right now. In short, there’s been not the slightest evidence of any consideration by political Canberra that just maybe a rigid political or policy position should be compromised to the greater national good.

On one level it’s obviously been all about Clive. This is the case most obviously with the carbon tax. Only a fool would now conclude that next week he will deliver on his equally solemn version of promising to axe the tax.

And the “all about Clive” applies more generally to his erratic, irrational opposition to almost every budget cut, seemingly “informed” by a unique mix of fiscal fantasy and the objective of just creating havoc for the government and the Prime Minister in particular.

On a more basic and more important level, it’s even more about Opposition Leader Bill Shorten and Labor as the only alternative party of government. You make the country ungovernable for the Coalition you also make it ungovernable for yourself.

Now the counter is to blame Tony Abbott for setting the precedent with the Gillard government. There are three critical rebuttals.

First, Abbott’s aggressive opposition was focused in the lower house where there was a legitimate continuing contest for a governing majority. This is all taking place in the Senate, denying the governing house’s clear majority.

Secondly, Abbott did not cede decision-making to a rump quite so chaotic, irrational and unfocused and so completely irresponsible as Clive and his three PUPpets plus one.

Finally, he could hardly have made the place ungovernable as both Gillard and her treasurer Wayne Swan used to boast about how the overwhelming majority of their legislation went smoothly through the parliament. In any event the times have a’changed; and in the words of a former emperor of the country which is now our best friend in Asia, “not necessarily to our advantage”.

Swan might have been able to genuinely believe that his budget would whirr seamlessly back into balance; that is not even a delusion open to Treasurer Joe Hockey or indeed the alternative treasurer, Chris Bowen.

Then Swan and Gillard could hope that the export of ever more millions of tonnes of iron ore and coal, along with their embedded “carbon (sic) pollution”, to be loosed on the other side of the equator could keep our 20-year unbroken run of growth ticking along.

One doesn’t have to subscribe to the bleakest “dog days” end of the resources boom thesis of Ross Garnaut to yet understand that is not a hope Abbott and Hockey or their Labor successors can any longer confidently cling to.

Yes, we will be selling much greater volumes of coal and iron ore to our north, but the prices will clearly be lower, and when the current raft of major project is completed, there will be precious few new ones in the decade ”” or perhaps even two ”” ahead.

While all the time the volatility and just relentless change of the world keeps pressing in on us. There are the big macro issues, principally what will emerge in China and just exactly how and in what shape will the US emerge from quantitative easing at the end of the year.

And just when you thought you could focus your attention solely to our north and to our east, Europe started to rumble again.

While these macro dynamics are critical to financial markets, we can be very confident about that one thing in the narrower business space: the relentlessness of change.

What happened to education services provider Navitas captured so many themes. Here was a market darling, a great business innovator; it lost one contract and its share price was shredded by one-third. It plummeted from trading at a share price well over the market to at best merely in line with the market.

The most obvious is that one of rapid, continuous and volatile change. No matter how great and original was your business idea, no matter how good your product, you survive only as long as you stay at the cutting edge of price and/or service or innovation.

The real-time globalisation of every business environment dramatically expands and telescopes the growth opportunities but equally the threats. You are now vulnerable every day to a new innovator or innovation, including as was the case with Navitas, when your customer turns competitor.

The overriding theme is of course the globalisation. Operating in the global space is no longer an option for almost every Australian business. If you don’t go after them, they’ll certainly come after you, as we saw ”” fortuitously in this case ”” with Expedia’s bid for Wotif. But in any event we’ve seen time and time again.

Yet in Canberra we have a collective mindset that it can operate politics as usual. We can simply ignore any consequences for the national interface with the rest of the world, otherwise known as reality.

Now, the government, and Hockey very particularly, “gets it”. And indeed Bowen and arguably Shorten also “get it”. But they get it only in government; in opposition they opt out from reality. And what they really opt out of is any understanding of just how corrosive the politics has become.

This is not a call on the opposition to give the government a blank cheque. That would not only be naive but unreasonable.

Further, it would be unrealistic and indeed unrealistic to demand far less expect government and opposition in Canberra to jointly subordinate politics and policy to business convenience.

But for heaven’s sake, surely they can be expected to take some responsibility for the practical good governance of the nation.

To close with another reference from the mid-20th century: in Singapore the guns were pointed the wrong way. In Canberra they are all pointed inward. The consequence threatens to be the same.
 
RBA boss Glenn Stevens weighs in on matters budget,

A failure to tackle the budget deficit would erode confidence and *expose Australia to much greater risk.

“I would fully expect within over the (next) 10-year period, there will be a downturn for some reason of some depth.

“The question is: can we be in a position to do the things that would make it a shallow and short one?’’ he said.

“Having a strong fiscal position ahead of any such downturn, which stood us in very good stead in 2008, would be one such thing and a sound monetary policy framework is obviously another.”

He did not want to comment on delicate *discussions over the passage of the government’s budget through the Senate, however he said there had to be a way of closing the budget gap.

“As a country, we have voted for some quite important things that are in the education, disability and some other spaces. These are all good things.

“We didn’t actually vote for the revenue to fund them just yet and so that’s the kind of fundamental issue that will emerge more clearly in a few years’ time,” he said.

“If we can’t find some way of putting together a set of fiscal *accounts that at least begin the process of addressing these *medium-term issues with measures that start small but then build over time, if we fail to manage to do that here, I’m not sure that this would fill one with great confidence in our capacity to deal with the genuinely serious problem when one day that emerges.

“Sooner or later something will happen that will bring this stuff into a sharper focus, *especially if we delay action,” he said.

“We shouldn’t leave it until the gaps emerge and a time when *financial markets might not be so forgiving as they are now to start the measures that will deal with that. We should be starting in a measured way now.”
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http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...-deepen-downturn/story-e6frg926-1226986292547

http://resources.news.com.au/files/2014/07/11/1226985/947040-aus-file-rba-transcript.pdf

Don Argus weighs in as well,

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...-says-don-argus/story-e6frg926-1226986285731#
 
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