Extract from The Guardian website:
Backbenchers have a lot riding on the treasurer's rising boats. Economists are understanding but voters want more jobs
Joe Hockey is sticking to his “lift the tide so all boats rise”
economic plan, an understandable strategy for a liberal treasurer, but
also a brave one given the immediate economic news leaves the distinct
impression that quite a few boats are sinking.
Hockey called it a “plan for jobs” as he addressed the media on Thursday after the release of figures showing unemployment is already higher than for more than a decade.
Presumably that is because Liberal focus groups are saying worried voters want a “plan for jobs” given the news that keeps rolling in about the demise of the car industry and other manufacturers shedding workers.
But it is not a jobs plan in the vein of Paul Keating’s “Working Nation”, with direct incentives to employers to engage more staff or to the unemployed to get back to work faster and lots of extra spending on retraining.
It’s a traditional get-the-economy-moving-and-the-jobs-will-come type plan, which includes, the treasurer says, the need to repeal the mining and carbon taxes and spend money on infrastructure.
But the mining tax – as the Coalition so often reminded us – raises very little revenue. And the carbon tax has not been cited as a significant factor by any of the struggling manufacturers announcing job cuts or closures. As most employers know, it is likely to be repealed soon after the new Senate sits in July. And the impact of both taxes pales into insignificance when compared with fluctuations in the currency and commodity prices.
The policy the Coalition would most dearly like to employ – fundamental reform of workplace relations legislation – it ruled out for this term of office before the election campaign.
The policy it had intended to employ – deep cuts to government expenditure – is also becoming complicated precisely because of sluggish growth, with a major business group warning against rapid cuts to government spending.
Hockey’s rhetoric shifted somewhat on Thursday. The May budget, he said, would be “focused on growth” with “some fiscal consolidation”, which sounds a bit softer than the dire warnings of a few months ago.
And Hockey’s new “line in the sand” on industry policy apparently stops at the Murray river, since the Victorian Liberal premier, Denis Napthine – who funds a good portion of his budget from the GST raised by his federal counterparts – found $22m for SPC Ardmona, the same company Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey said didn’t deserve a dime.
Hockey repeated on Thursday the criteria he will use to try to explain why it also does not apply to Qantas, whose chief executive, Alan Joyce, is back in town looking for a federal government debt guarantee, and appears very likely to get one. Qantas’s main competitor, Virgin, is predictably not happy.
Economists understand the “rising tide” plan for jobs creation. But voters, who wear the human costs of big structural shifts in the Australian economy, often look for something a bit more pro-active and specific.
So do concerned government backbenchers, who are pinning their hopes on the $60m package under construction for Victoria and South Australia and the infrastructure-heavy May budget to give them something to point to when they try to convince voters the government has this economic transformation in hand. They have a lot riding on Hockey’s rising boats.
Hockey called it a “plan for jobs” as he addressed the media on Thursday after the release of figures showing unemployment is already higher than for more than a decade.
Presumably that is because Liberal focus groups are saying worried voters want a “plan for jobs” given the news that keeps rolling in about the demise of the car industry and other manufacturers shedding workers.
But it is not a jobs plan in the vein of Paul Keating’s “Working Nation”, with direct incentives to employers to engage more staff or to the unemployed to get back to work faster and lots of extra spending on retraining.
It’s a traditional get-the-economy-moving-and-the-jobs-will-come type plan, which includes, the treasurer says, the need to repeal the mining and carbon taxes and spend money on infrastructure.
But the mining tax – as the Coalition so often reminded us – raises very little revenue. And the carbon tax has not been cited as a significant factor by any of the struggling manufacturers announcing job cuts or closures. As most employers know, it is likely to be repealed soon after the new Senate sits in July. And the impact of both taxes pales into insignificance when compared with fluctuations in the currency and commodity prices.
The policy the Coalition would most dearly like to employ – fundamental reform of workplace relations legislation – it ruled out for this term of office before the election campaign.
The policy it had intended to employ – deep cuts to government expenditure – is also becoming complicated precisely because of sluggish growth, with a major business group warning against rapid cuts to government spending.
Hockey’s rhetoric shifted somewhat on Thursday. The May budget, he said, would be “focused on growth” with “some fiscal consolidation”, which sounds a bit softer than the dire warnings of a few months ago.
And Hockey’s new “line in the sand” on industry policy apparently stops at the Murray river, since the Victorian Liberal premier, Denis Napthine – who funds a good portion of his budget from the GST raised by his federal counterparts – found $22m for SPC Ardmona, the same company Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey said didn’t deserve a dime.
Hockey repeated on Thursday the criteria he will use to try to explain why it also does not apply to Qantas, whose chief executive, Alan Joyce, is back in town looking for a federal government debt guarantee, and appears very likely to get one. Qantas’s main competitor, Virgin, is predictably not happy.
Economists understand the “rising tide” plan for jobs creation. But voters, who wear the human costs of big structural shifts in the Australian economy, often look for something a bit more pro-active and specific.
So do concerned government backbenchers, who are pinning their hopes on the $60m package under construction for Victoria and South Australia and the infrastructure-heavy May budget to give them something to point to when they try to convince voters the government has this economic transformation in hand. They have a lot riding on Hockey’s rising boats.
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