The Abbott Government

[Tisme]

What's your answer then on polling day ?

At the booth you have two choices. Vote for a party (or individual) whom you feel is best (or put another way, least worst) or vote informal.

I think polling day is too late. It is true we put our welfare in the hands of the few, but that doesn't mean we then rely on the media to keep them on the path they were tasked to follow. We should be using unstacked media like forums to voice our concerns at the calibre and honesty of the elected.

It is really hard to stop blindly supporting a political organisation when it's in our collective DNA to do so. We know we are encoded to be tribal and have a sense of belonging, but how many tribal layers are enough and how many no no conditioning receptors have to be kept switched on?

We continue to be in a meta self flagellation mode when it comes to politics, even by protest voting for startup parties, rather than actually force change on the prevailing parties to at least communicate the pros and cons of what they are doing without squinty eyes and lizard lips.

We should be encouraging open forums. The ABC, which is under attack, itself was guilty of censorship when it setup the QANDA discussion board and then proceeded to limit freedom of speech, falsely implied it channelled into the TV program and limited the discussion to it's own topics.....one could only assume there was political interference happening and not of any particular branding.

Social media could be great if it wasn't for the shallow generation who dominate it with likes, disingenuous compliments and flakey commentary. Once again the beacon of fifth estate democracy, the ABC, limits discussion via no conversations and restricting the topics..... it is merely a programme aid rather than democracy in action as it purports.

So my solution is to encourage people to step back and ponder why they vote, what their own wants and needs are, how the community benefits and do we want progress or stagnation? Does the comfortable pair of slippers we have been wearing exclude the newer improved versions and are our feet suffering?

 

[SirRumpole]

I think polling day is too late. It is true we put our welfare in the hands of the few, but that doesn't mean we then rely on the media to keep them on the path they were tasked to follow. We should be using unstacked media like forums to voice our concerns at the calibre and honesty of the elected.

It is really hard to stop blindly supporting a political organisation when it's in our collective DNA to do so. We know we are encoded to be tribal and have a sense of belonging, but how many tribal layers are enough and how many no no conditioning receptors have to be kept switched on?

We continue to be in a meta self flagellation mode when it comes to politics, even by protest voting for startup parties, rather than actually force change on the prevailing parties to at least communicate the pros and cons of what they are doing without squinty eyes and lizard lips.

We should be encouraging open forums. The ABC, which is under attack, itself was guilty of censorship when it setup the QANDA discussion board and then proceeded to limit freedom of speech, falsely implied it channelled into the TV program and limited the discussion to it's own topics.....one could only assume there was political interference happening and not of any particular branding.

Social media could be great if it wasn't for the shallow generation who dominate it with likes, disingenuous compliments and flakey commentary. Once again the beacon of fifth estate democracy, the ABC, limits discussion via no conversations and restricting the topics..... it is merely a programme aid rather than democracy in action as it purports.

So my solution is to encourage people to step back and ponder why they vote, what their own wants and needs are, how the community benefits and do we want progress or stagnation? Does the comfortable pair of slippers we have been wearing exclude the newer improved versions and are our feet suffering?

Well said old chap !

Tezzles would have been proud of you, as am I.



Q&A Facebook page is rubbish. Too many people saying little of substance. At least here we can discuss instead of just opinionate.

 

[drsmith]

So my solution is to encourage people to step back and ponder why they vote, what their own wants and needs are, how the community benefits and do we want progress or stagnation? Does the comfortable pair of slippers we have been wearing exclude the newer improved versions and are our feet suffering?

It's perhaps a little ambitious to think one might change the course of national politics from a general chat section of a stock forum. The political discussion is largely light entertainment and banter typically amongst the usual regulars which I imagine many passers by would find boring if for no other reason than a lesser interest than those regulars (including myself) who post.

You would more likely have greater influence by joining a political party of your preference but again there, you have to make a choice or start your own with all the purity of an angel if you wish.

 

[Tisme]

It's perhaps a little ambitious to think one might change the course of national politics from a general chat section of a stock forum. The political discussion is largely light entertainment and banter typically amongst the usual regulars which I imagine many passers by would find boring if for no other reason than a lesser interest than those regulars (including myself) who post.

You would more likely have greater influence by joining a political party of your preference but again there, you have to make a choice or start your own with all the purity of an angel if you wish.

There are plenty of clichés to draw on in regarding to small things :- breakings faggots instead of sticks, acorns, butterfly effect, etc., but perhaps you are right, maybe your opinions are of no consequence in the scheme of things and merely froth and bubble as you imply?

I have no desire to start a political party. I have been actively courted by many political organs in my time and I have a strong public political DNA that courses through my veins...which is why I have the low regard for many who warm their bums on taxpayer seats.

Whether your "purity" comment is meant to be condescending or inflammatory or neither, it is still an aspiration riddled with self serving and egotistical negatives impinging on all sides, but an aspirational benchmark nonetheless. Designing a product with flaws and low quality might make a few quick bucks, but some of us like to know we are buying something approaching good.

 

[SirRumpole]

If Nick Xenophon started a party instead of remaining a one man band I think he would be very successful.

He would have to be prepared to aim for government and have some clear policies and a vision for the future.

People are getting sick of "spoiler" parties and independents that you don't really know their thinking until they have to accept or reject other's policies.

 

[drsmith]

Whether your "purity" comment is meant to be condescending or inflammatory or neither, it is still an aspiration riddled with self serving and egotistical negatives impinging on all sides, but an aspirational benchmark nonetheless.

Without purity, how do you address your own argument ?

The lesser of two evils mantra doesn't excuse the fact that wrong is wrong no matter the degree of wrongness.

 

[Tisme]

If Nick Xenophon started a party instead of remaining a one man band I think he would be very successful.

He would have to be prepared to aim for government and have some clear policies and a vision for the future.

People are getting sick of "spoiler" parties and independents that you don't really know their thinking until they have to accept or reject other's policies.

Like the Airline industry, eventually a startup will gain traction and have some life in it, until the internal factions of the ALP and the LNP starting acting on unity tickets within each organisation.

 

[drsmith]

I have no desire to start a political party. I have been actively courted by many political organs in my time and I have a strong public political DNA that courses through my veins...which is why I have the low regard for many who warm their bums on taxpayer seats.

I get the impression from the above that you've looked and haven't liked what you've seen. That doesn't surprise me.

Another option for getting your political views into the broader electorate might be letters to the editor of major newspapers. If it to the editor's liking, that may broaden your reach well beyond this forum.

 

[SirRumpole]

I get the impression from the above that you've looked and haven't liked what you've seen. That doesn't surprise me.

Another option for getting your political views into the broader electorate might be letters to the editor of major newspapers. If it to the editor's liking, that may broaden your reach well beyond this forum.

There are other options. The IPA seems to have a lot of influence over the LNP, whereas GetUp boasts 600,000 members, 10 times more than the Labor party and they claim to be progressive.

Being an individual party member just doesn't seem to cut it any more, you need to be a lobby group (preferably with money) to get the ear of the people that matter in any party.

 

[Julia]

How about some even handedness. People on this forum repeat ad nauseum a lot of untrue things about Labor, yet that seems to be acceptable.

sptrawler has asked you to expand on this which I'd echo. Endless repetition even of something that might be more or less true seems a bit pointless to me.
Syd, you do repeat the same things over and over again. That's your right, I guess. Just seems a shame that when you have such a good grasp on so much and your posts are well researched, people might be put off reading them because of the same mantras all the time.

sptrawler has also offered a comprehensive response to the rest of your points, much better than I could have come up with, so I'll just say I agree with what he says.

It is really hard to stop blindly supporting a political organisation when it's in our collective DNA to do so.

Is it though? I don't think I can agree with that, tisme. Most people are able to think for themselves and only a small proportion (some of whom are represented here) blindly support their 'side' thoughtlessly.

We should be encouraging open forums. The ABC, which is under attack, itself was guilty of censorship when it setup the QANDA discussion board and then proceeded to limit freedom of speech, falsely implied it channelled into the TV program and limited the discussion to it's own topics.....one could only assume there was political interference happening and not of any particular branding.

Social media could be great if it wasn't for the shallow generation who dominate it with likes, disingenuous compliments and flakey commentary. Once again the beacon of fifth estate democracy, the ABC, limits discussion via no conversations and restricting the topics..... it is merely a programme aid rather than democracy in action as it purports.

All true.

Somewhere else you seem dismissive of fora like this. I don't see it as any different from any other environment of social discourse. It's more convenient in that we can all contribute as we wish at times that suit us, rather than making tedious arrangements to meet somewhere to carry out the same discussion.

Mostly the discussion is civil and reasonably constructive. I reckon I've learned more during my years here about many things than in various other environments combined. A well expressed view that disagrees with our own can be a genuine impetus to rethink long held opinions and if nothing else, give us the opportunity to see if our own opinions really can hold up when exposed to criticism by others.

And our very own Logique did have a comment from this forum published in the mainstream media a few years ago. Someone will remember what exactly it was and where it appeared. Was it in "Strewth" in The Australian?

If Nick Xenophon started a party instead of remaining a one man band I think he would be very successful.

Agree. He's sensible, experienced and thoughtful, able to disagree without being personally insulting or rude.

 

[noco]

There are other options. The IPA seems to have a lot of influence over the LNP, whereas GetUp boasts 600,000 members, 10 times more than the Labor party and they claim to be progressive.

Being an individual party member just doesn't seem to cut it any more, you need to be a lobby group (preferably with money) to get the ear of the people that matter in any party.

And who is a foundation member of "GET UP".......the good old Fabian Bill Shorten!!!!!!!!!!

 

[IFocus]

We didn't sink into recession because we didn't have the exposure to the CDO's and associated toxic debt.
We were actually on an upward investment cycle ,trying to keep up with China's demand for raw materials.

Nope, a little reminder during the GFC mining laid off 19% of the work force the up swing came much later drives me nuts when people say mining saved us.

If the retail sector did the same (Australia's biggest employment sector) then game over recession on steroids.......why didn't retail collapse oh thats right that wasteful spending we didn't need.

 

[sydboy007]

Can you be a bit more precise, what generally do you think has been untrue, I'm not asking for specifics.
But genarally what slur is missdirected

That labor was a big spending Govt when they spent far less than Howard.

That Howard was some economic miracle worker when he set up the budget for the terminal structural imbalances we are now seeing. Howard oversaw the largest narrowing of the taxation base with his halving of capital gains tax and tax free super for the over 60s. You could also argue his permanent fix to fuel excise has also robbed the budget of billions.

A budget surplus seems to be some sort of magic card waved around that covers up all the bad policy Howard introduced. Whitlam, who also produced a budget surplus every year, is reviled as an economic vandal.

Since the halving of CGT the housing sector has made a loss in aggregate terms every year. The cost to the budget is now substantial - up to $8B in a year. Other taxes have to make up the shortfall ie income and corporate taxes.

The other perverse effect of the CGT changes was that it turned the Australian banks into giant building societies. Howard was supposedly running a Govt for the businss sector, yet there was no loan growth for businesses because they were crowded out by the property investors.

The removal of RBLs on super with tax free super for the over 60s has turned the whole system into a massive tax minimisation scheme for the wealthy. You’ll argue that it doesn’t benefit many people, and that’s true, but the billions in assets now tax free means there’s an ever growing drain on the budget.

Well the obvious answer to that is, there wasn't a budgetary problem left behind.
You can talk it up as much as you like, but the fact is, they inherited a surplus.
The mining boom was rising for a further 5 years, we had a massive shortfall of skilled labour.
Gillard gave the o.k for Gina to bring in thousands of construction workers, for Roy Hill, on 457's.

Howard set the budget up for a structural deficit. His spending was set at levels requiring the highest ToT this country has had in the last 60 years. If he was such a great economic manger, why did Govt expenditure rise every year. Surely with a booming economy, and a conservative Govt that believes that Govt should only step in when absolutely necessary, why did spending increase every year. Labor was able to reduce real expenditures in 2 of 3 years and that was during the beginning of the ToT decline. Surely that shows a level of economic management that should be applauded. It’s only been done 5 times in 40 years and the Liberals have never felt the need to do it.

Why did a great economic mnager, with inflation outside the RBA comfort zone of 2-3%, rising interest rates, continue to act against the RBA and increase spending and cut taxes? Should the budget and the RBA work together to maintain stable inflation? Howard oversaw the highest interest rates in over 20 years!

Firstly the result of the last election, is a result of Australians sense of humour, a dry response to an unsavoury choice.
You're probably too young to remember the work choices reality, you are probably remembering the hysteria surrounding it.
In reality, it is probably in force now and has been since Labor were in office.
The basis for Labors scare campaign was, unions couldn't be involved in workplace deals.
Well most workplaces in W.A are on individual contracts anyway.
Can you tell me if you are on an individual agreed contract, or a union agreed wage?
It's just hype, to wow and stun, the gullible.

I'm 42. I remember work choices very well. Employers able to average hours over a full year and not pay over time if they made you work 50 hours some weeks. The erosion of working conditions was real. My friends in the retail service industries started to feel the brunt of it just before the 2007 election. The fact that productivity declined during the work choices years is often glossed over as well.

By the sounds of it Abbott's scare campaign over the carbon tax was just hype as well then? I don’t seem to remember the economy going backwards to it, or electricity bills doubling as he claimed in parliament.

So when does criticise, extend to block legislation because you don't agree with a payrise. I'm confused.

So when the Abbott opposition blocked most of Labors revenue raising initiatives that was OK? Surely after the opposition had their say they should have let all the legislation through unopposed with no modifications?

i do agree Lambie is begin petty and stupid. Living in NSW I feel the Australian senate system is Grosely unfair. NSW and Victoria shoudl have far greater say in the senate, but the whole senate setup was designed to allow the smaller states some power against NSW and VIC. I'd be happy to see senate seats based on population.

What legislation is currently held up that would actually help reduce the deficit?

The only one I can think of is the fuel excise increase. if the Govt was increasing it by a certain level tot he next election I'd fully support it. I don't support the automatic indexation as I believe a Govt should make the case for their revenue and expenditure each budget. Keeps them far more honest.

the GP tax doesn't
it's questionable if the changes to UNI funding and allowing UNIs to charge what they like will reduce the deficit by much. It may cause it to increase if the education levels in the economy get reduced because of it.

Howard inherited a deficit from Keating, the main reason Keating was thrown out was because workers were screwed over.
Having said that, in retrospect it had to be done, because wages were high and unemployment were high.

Getting back to Howard, he ran a tight economy, one of my sons was enjoying life surfing, when Howard changed welfare, my son got fed up with jumping through hoops and got a job. Needless to say he hates Howard.lol

Howard/Costello reduced the deficit and then ran a surplus, rather than just keep running an ever increasing surplus, they reduced personal income tax rates.

The mining boom hadn't really got a head of steam by 2006, so Howard/ Costello started the future fund to mitigate the ballooning cost of commonwealth supperannuation obligations.

These costs are compounding beyond belief, to start the future fund has saved the taxpayer zillions.

So what is the Rudd, Gillard, Rudd legacy?

How about answering that, Syd, with some substance.
That will take some time.

See above as to the structural deficit that Howard left.

Also around half of the Keating deficit was bequeathed to Keating by former Treasurer Howard. Around ¾ of the budget deficit was paid off via asset sales, so in real terms the finances of the Govt were not changed. None of the deficit was paid off due to policies designed to reduce spending.

The Howard Govt presided over the best part of the mining boom in terms of taxation revenue. The surge in commodities saw national incomes surge. Labor got the slow taxation growth phase of the boom as the miners had by that time ramped up their investments which saw depreciation absorb large amounts of the tax payable. Labor also had to deal with the decline in Govt finance of nearly 25% due to the GFC. A deficit of some sort was unavoidable, unless you believe Christopher Pyne with the Liberals able to produce a surplus when Govt revenues have plunged nearly $40B in a year??

Will you be castigating Joe Hockey in a month or so when he comes out to say Govt revenues are $10B lower than expected and the deficit has blown out.

 

[sydboy007]

It is good to see you agree with me, instead of with the Labor manifesto.

Common sense breaking through. yeh
We may get you to vote Liberal yet.

But the Liberals are a big Australia party as well. Howard has admitted to it and unless you can point to something from Abbott saying he wants to see a reduction in immigration.

I'd love the population ponzi to be shut down over the next few years. The whole focus on GDP growth when real per capita incomes are stagnating and falling is not a good way forward.

But to blame Labor as the sole big Australia party is factually wrong.

 

[sptrawler]

But the Liberals are a big Australia party as well. Howard has admitted to it and unless you can point to something from Abbott saying he wants to see a reduction in immigration.

I'd love the population ponzi to be shut down over the next few years. The whole focus on GDP growth when real per capita incomes are stagnating and falling is not a good way forward.

But to blame Labor as the sole big Australia party is factually wrong.

Rudd stated, it was Labors belief that the population needed to be increased to 50million. He was gagged and backtracked soon after.

 

[sptrawler]

That labor was a big spending Govt when they spent far less than Howard.

That Howard was some economic miracle worker when he set up the budget for the terminal structural imbalances we are now seeing. Howard oversaw the largest narrowing of the taxation base with his halving of capital gains tax and tax free super for the over 60s. You could also argue his permanent fix to fuel excise has also robbed the budget of billions.


The removal of RBLs on super with tax free super for the over 60s has turned the whole system into a massive tax minimisation scheme for the wealthy. You’ll argue that it doesn’t benefit many people, and that’s true, but the billions in assets now tax free means there’s an ever growing drain on the budget. .

The CGT was changed from an extremely cumbersome and time consuming behemoth, called cost base indexing, to the current system.
It was a nightmare for all concerned, to administer and oversee, if the new system required modifying Labor should have done it.
From your statements, Labor presided over falling tax reciepts, it's there responsibility to sort it, if indeed it needed sorting.

The same applies to super, Howard came into office in 1996 and was chucked out 2007, the super system was introduced in 1992.
Therefore Howard oversaw the very early days of the super system, and had to address the 'baby boomers' starting to retire.

The balances that people had in super was minimal, even now the majority have very low balances.

In March 2006, Costello allowed people to place a one of $1million deposit into their super, before July 2006.

This was to allow the first 'baby boomers' to top up their super, before retirement.

It made sense really, it would basically take them off the pension system.
Unfortunatelly for them the GFC cleaned a lot out. Therefore post GFC the cost of the super burden would have been relitively low.

Then Labor took over the reins and responsibility, did they change the taxing on super, they were in charge when the post GFC recovery happened.
Therefore it stands to reason, they oversaw the super cost blow out and did nothing about it.

How come you lay the responsibility at Howards feet?

 

[sptrawler]

Syd I suppose in summary.

You blame CGT, superannuation and negative gearing as the main culprits for our fiscal situation.

Why didn't Labor address any of them, in two terms of office?

 

[sydboy007]

The CGT was changed from an extremely cumbersome and time consuming behemoth, called cost base indexing, to the current system.
It was a nightmare for all concerned, to administer and oversee, if the new system required modifying Labor should have done it.
From your statements, Labor presided over falling tax reciepts, it's there responsibility to sort it, if indeed it needed sorting.

The same applies to super, Howard came into office in 1996 and was chucked out 2007, the super system was introduced in 1992.
Therefore Howard oversaw the very early days of the super system, and had to address the 'baby boomers' starting to retire.

The balances that people had in super was minimal, even now the majority have very low balances.

In March 2006, Costello allowed people to place a one of $1million deposit into their super, before July 2006.

This was to allow the first 'baby boomers' to top up their super, before retirement.

It made sense really, it would basically take them off the pension system.
Unfortunatelly for them the GFC cleaned a lot out. Therefore post GFC the cost of the super burden would have been relitively low.

Then Labor took over the reins and responsibility, did they change the taxing on super, they were in charge when the post GFC recovery happened.
Therefore it stands to reason, they oversaw the super cost blow out and did nothing about it.

How come you lay the responsibility at Howards feet?

So basically you're saying if Govt A introduces bad policy and Govt B is unable to remove it that Govt B is now fully responsible?

The capital gains calculations pre 2000 were not a night mare. Accounting s/w pretty much did in automatically, and the ATO had easy to use tables to see what the cost base increase was. Certanlyf or an investor used to doing their sums on potential returns between different investments it wasn't rocket science.

Look at how hard Abbot fought to stop the relatively small changes to car FBT. Are you saying he would have not run a massive scare campaign if Labor had decided tobring in RBLs again and to stop promoting the conversion of income into capital gains by removing the halving of CGT? Abbott couldn't even bring himself to support changes to super pensions affecting just 16000 people.

The one off $1M into super in 2006 is of minimal concern. You've avoided the whole issue of tax free super and the fact that for a small minority it is allowing them to minimise their tax on a massive scale. When some SMSFs have over $100M in assets it's no longer about saving for retirement but shelter assets from taxation. Shouldn't Howard wear teh blame for this since it was his changes that allowed it to happen?

The post GFC recovery has been extremely weak. The current Govt is going to face an even worse situation, though in relative terms the downward trend will be similar to what Labor faced when compared to the Howard Govt.

In terms of the facts, the average annual growth in real government spending in five years from 2000-01 under Howard was 4.3%; for Labor in the five years since 2007-08, the average annual increase has been 3.4%, so if Howard was running a tight budget as you say, what would you describe Labor's efforts then?

In simple terms, in the five years from 2000-01, the Howard government increased real government spending by around 23%. In the five years from 2007-08, when Labor had controlled the budget purse strings, growth in real government spending was a tick over 17%, including the 12.7% increase in 2008-09 when the GFC was bearing down on the Australian economy, threatening a recession. So once again how do say Labor were big spenders when Howard was outspending them by a significant margin?

See the below Govt and private debt graph. That pretty much explains the Howard Govt magic. The private sector was on a debt binge and the Govt was able to save. Greece and Spain are examples where both rivate and Govt sectors are both deleveraging. It doesn't work.

For the Howard years Fed Govt revenue averaged, over those 11 years, 23.3% of GDP, some 1.7 percentage points above the average of the Hawke/Keating years. In today’s dollars, that is about $25 billion a year or a total of about $275 billion over the course of the Howard government when compared to the tax take under Hawke/Keating.

Since Labor took office in November 2007, in the three completed years of budgeting, the tax to GDP ratio averaged a comparatively tiny 20.7% – a stark number highlighting the revenue loss from the GFC and the income tax cuts that were delivered in its first three years of office.

If you think that 1% of GDP is small, it isn’t. Even 1% of GDP in todays dollar terms is a whopping $17 billion. The 1.9% of GDP lower tax take Labor experience in their first 3 years was over $96B. Imagine the deficit levels if they'd spent like Howard.

Or think of it this way, if the Labor government were to raise the tax take to the peak level under the Howard government, it would have been the equivalent of $4,000 a year, every year, for each household. Do you think Abbott would have supported tax increases like that to balance the budget?

Tax revenue fell by 2.9 percentage points relative to GDP for Labor when compared to Howard. That's where pretty much where all the deficits come from.

The budget papers estimate that the Abbott government will drop spending to an average of 24.9% of GDP over the forward estimates period. That's a mere 0.2 percentage points below Labor's spending... clearly not enough to close a deficit of 1.4%. The lowest spending in the forward estimates is 24.7% of GDP in 2016-17; at 0.4 percentage points below Labor spending that's still not going to close the deficit. In fact if you compare the difference between Labor's biggest-spending year (2009-10 at 26.0% of GDP) and the Coalition's lowest-spending year (2016-17 at 24.7% of GDP) it's still not enough to close the gap.

Or to put it another way: if Labor cut spending by as much as Tony Abbott's government is cutting, we still would have been in deficit.

Certainly I believe Labor should have implemented far more of the Henry Tax review, but honestly how much of that do you believe Abbott would have supported? Why hasn't Abbott used some in his first budget to tide him over to the tax white paper is released? If the argument is they were good policy options then they're likely to still be good options now. Abbot has wasted his first year in office and burnt massvie amounts of political capital over PPL and the GP tax.

It'll be very interesting to see what excuse are rolled out during the upcoming MYEFO. Certainly anything true for the current Govt in terms of revenue short falls was also true for Labor.

So how do you continue to call Labor profligate when the facts show they weren't.

 

[sptrawler]

So basically you're saying if Govt A introduces bad policy and Govt B is unable to remove it that Govt B is now fully responsible .

Absolutely, if Abbott failed to remove the carbon tax or the MRRT, you would be screaming their failure from the roof tops.
You say Labor were bleeding tax income, therefore it is up to them to stem those bleeds.

The main tax bleeds, in your words, weren't even canvased for change, during Labors two terms.

The one off $1M into super in 2006 is of minimal concern. You've avoided the whole issue of tax free super and the fact that for a small minority it is allowing them to minimise their tax on a massive scale. When some SMSFs have over $100M in assets it's no longer about saving for retirement but shelter assets from taxation. Shouldn't Howard wear teh blame for this since it was his changes that allowed it to happen?.

No Howard isn't responsible, because most of the money has been put in under Labors watch, why didn't they stop it.
Howards major changes were introduced in 2006, he was chucked out in 2007. The crap you are talking about has manifested since then.

The post GFC recovery has been extremely weak. The current Govt is going to face an even worse situation, though in relative terms the downward trend will be similar to what Labor faced when compared to the Howard Govt..

And they will be judged on how well they handle it, the same as Labor was.

In terms of the facts, the average annual growth in real government spending in five years from 2000-01 under Howard was 4.3%; for Labor in the five years since 2007-08, the average annual increase has been 3.4%, so if Howard was running a tight budget as you say, what would you describe Labor's efforts then?.

Woefull, Labor did nothing but promise more spending on non productive thought bubbles, while tax returns were plumetting.

In simple terms, in the five years from 2000-01, the Howard government increased real government spending by around 23%. In the five years from 2007-08, when Labor had controlled the budget purse strings, growth in real government spending was a tick over 17%, including the 12.7% increase in 2008-09 when the GFC was bearing down on the Australian economy, threatening a recession. So once again how do say Labor were big spenders when Howard was outspending them by a significant margin?.

They spent comensurate with their tax take, Labor didn't.

Since Labor took office in November 2007, in the three completed years of budgeting, the tax to GDP ratio averaged a comparatively tiny 20.7% – a stark number highlighting the revenue loss from the GFC and the income tax cuts that were delivered in its first three years of office..

And what did they do to to fix the tax to GDP?
Did they address the tax free super to over 60's, no.
Did they increase the CGT rate, no.
Did they address negative gearing, no.
What did they do in 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, very little, just increased spending.

Or think of it this way, if the Labor government were to raise the tax take to the peak level under the Howard government, it would have been the equivalent of $4,000 a year, every year, for each household. Do you think Abbott would have supported tax increases like that to balance the budget?.

Who knows, they had the Henry report and acted on hardly any of it.
The only bits they cherry picked were sections which didn't effect their re election chances.

Tax revenue fell by 2.9 percentage points relative to GDP for Labor when compared to Howard. That's where pretty much where all the deficits come from..

Well why didn't they address the fundamental structural problems, I'll tell you why, because they were more worried about hanging on to their pensions, than the Australian economy.

Certainly I believe Labor should have implemented far more of the Henry Tax review, but honestly how much of that do you believe Abbott would have supported? Why hasn't Abbott used some in his first budget to tide him over to the tax white paper is released? If the argument is they were good policy options then they're likely to still be good options now. Abbot has wasted his first year in office and burnt massvie amounts of political capital over PPL and the GP tax..

There you go blaming Abbott for Labor doing sod all.
How much do I believe Abbott would have supported? who knows Labor never floated any of the required tax measures you talk about.
With the Greens and the three amigos, Labor had the numbers in both houses. Why didn't they try and get tax reform to super, CGT and negative gearing through?
Better still, why didn't they ever sugest it.?

It'll be very interesting to see what excuse are rolled out during the upcoming MYEFO. Certainly anything true for the current Govt in terms of revenue short falls was also true for Labor.

So how do you continue to call Labor profligate when the facts show they weren't.

No one said they spent too much, just spent unwisely, without first checking how much money is coming in.
They were cut some slack on the first term, but continued on their merry way through the second term.

 

[Julia]

They spent comensurate with their tax take, Labor didn't.

No one said they spent too much, just spent unwisely, without first checking how much money is coming in.
They were cut some slack on the first term, but continued on their merry way through the second term.

Two very fundamental and important points.