Extract from The Guardian
Labor is set to attack Tony Abbott’s government for “two years of
lies, dysfunction and infighting” when parliament resumes on Monday on
the second anniversary of the Coalition’s election victory.
The prime minister nominated the three free trade agreements as his proudest accomplishment, although the deal with China remains at the centre of political dispute over whether the legislation should include greater safeguards on Australian jobs.
Abbott – who signalled on Sunday that Syrian and Iraqi refugees would comprise a greater share of Australia’s humanitarian intake – also said “stopping the boats” was a very significant achievement for the Coalition.
The parliamentary sitting week is expected to be dominated by the government’s forthcoming decision on joining air strikes against Islamic State in Syria, and the controversial citizenship legislation.
But the government’s performance on the economy is also likely to be a political flashpoint as MPs return to Canberra for the first time since growth figures showed an increase of just 0.2% in the June quarter.
The former Howard government treasurer, Peter Costello, warned his former colleagues that the Coalition needed to “pick up its story quite considerably” and get “into top gear” to win the jobs and growth argument. The Coalition has been lagging behind Labor in major opinion polls since last year.
“We’re within a year of this election now and there is no time for wasting and they have to get much more powerful at defending the argument,” Costello told Ten’s Bolt Report on Sunday.
The Labor leader, Bill Shorten, said unemployment had increased from 5.7% to 6.3% on the Coalition’s watch and economic growth was below trend.
“For two years, the Abbott government has been mired in lies, dysfunction and infighting,” Shorten said.
“Instead of dealing with the real issues facing Australia, Mr Abbott and his ministers have spent the last two years awarding a knighthood to Prince Philip, defending the ‘right to be a bigot’, talking-down the NDIS, indulging in bizarre attacks on wind farms and the ABC, leaking from cabinet and briefing journalists about their colleagues’ woeful performances.”
In a sign of continuing disquiet within the government about its economic salesman, News Corp’s Sunday tabloids cited “senior government sources” as saying that the deputy Liberal leader, Julie Bishop, had raised concerns about Joe Hockey’s performance as treasurer late last year.
Bishop reportedly conveyed concerns of some MPs in a face-to-face meeting with Abbott in Sydney before Christmas, several months before the prime minister faced the leadership spill motion in February 2015.
Bishop did not deny the account on Sunday but dismissed it as “gossip” and “rehashing an old story” and said Hockey was “doing a good job in tough circumstances”.
“I’m not going into private conversations I have with the prime minister in particular. If someone has leaked this story they didn’t get it from me, they didn’t get it from the prime minister, and I’m not going to add to the Canberra gossip,” she said in Perth.
Abbott was asked on Sunday to reflect on the past two years in office. The prime minister said there were 335,000 more jobs in the economy than there were in September 2013 when the Coalition was elected, and the abolition of the carbon and mining taxes and cuts to red tape had been “very important”.
“I’m probably going to leave the people of Australia to make a second anniversary judgment. What I will say, though, is that I think this is a government which does have very significant achievements to its credit,” he said.
“Obviously stopping the boats was a very significant achievement given then human catastrophe, given the scale of the death and suffering which happens when the people smuggling trade gets under way.”
Abbott said he was proud of the finalisation of free trade agreements with South Korea, Japan and China because they were “historic changes that will set Australia up for decades to come”.
He added that he would have “much to say in the days ahead” about the China deal “given the fact that Bill Shorten is still trying to sabotage it”.
Labor has been pushing for concessions from the government, which could include enshrining in legislation a requirement for employers to try to find local workers before hiring workers from overseas for major projects worth more than $150m.
The trade minister, Andrew Robb, played down the prospect of such a legislative amendment, saying the 457 visa program arrangements were “very complicated” and were “designed by Labor to be governed by regulation under overarching legislation”.
But the government has not shut the door to talks. Robb’s office confirmed that he regularly spoke to his Labor counterpart, Penny Wong, who has been calling for a negotiated compromise.
Wong, meanwhile, has indicated that Labor plans to push ahead with a proposed Senate motion to send a message to the governor general, Peter Cosgrove, asking him to dismiss the head of the trade union royal commission, Dyson Heydon, over bias perceptions.
The Greens have agreed to support the motion, meaning Labor requires support from four of the eight crossbenchers to pass it, but many of those crucial senators raised concerns about the proposal last week.
The Coalition has dismissed it as an “unprincipled” stunt because the governor general acts on the advice of government ministers
The prime minister nominated the three free trade agreements as his proudest accomplishment, although the deal with China remains at the centre of political dispute over whether the legislation should include greater safeguards on Australian jobs.
Abbott – who signalled on Sunday that Syrian and Iraqi refugees would comprise a greater share of Australia’s humanitarian intake – also said “stopping the boats” was a very significant achievement for the Coalition.
The parliamentary sitting week is expected to be dominated by the government’s forthcoming decision on joining air strikes against Islamic State in Syria, and the controversial citizenship legislation.
But the government’s performance on the economy is also likely to be a political flashpoint as MPs return to Canberra for the first time since growth figures showed an increase of just 0.2% in the June quarter.
The former Howard government treasurer, Peter Costello, warned his former colleagues that the Coalition needed to “pick up its story quite considerably” and get “into top gear” to win the jobs and growth argument. The Coalition has been lagging behind Labor in major opinion polls since last year.
“We’re within a year of this election now and there is no time for wasting and they have to get much more powerful at defending the argument,” Costello told Ten’s Bolt Report on Sunday.
The Labor leader, Bill Shorten, said unemployment had increased from 5.7% to 6.3% on the Coalition’s watch and economic growth was below trend.
“For two years, the Abbott government has been mired in lies, dysfunction and infighting,” Shorten said.
“Instead of dealing with the real issues facing Australia, Mr Abbott and his ministers have spent the last two years awarding a knighthood to Prince Philip, defending the ‘right to be a bigot’, talking-down the NDIS, indulging in bizarre attacks on wind farms and the ABC, leaking from cabinet and briefing journalists about their colleagues’ woeful performances.”
In a sign of continuing disquiet within the government about its economic salesman, News Corp’s Sunday tabloids cited “senior government sources” as saying that the deputy Liberal leader, Julie Bishop, had raised concerns about Joe Hockey’s performance as treasurer late last year.
Bishop reportedly conveyed concerns of some MPs in a face-to-face meeting with Abbott in Sydney before Christmas, several months before the prime minister faced the leadership spill motion in February 2015.
Bishop did not deny the account on Sunday but dismissed it as “gossip” and “rehashing an old story” and said Hockey was “doing a good job in tough circumstances”.
“I’m not going into private conversations I have with the prime minister in particular. If someone has leaked this story they didn’t get it from me, they didn’t get it from the prime minister, and I’m not going to add to the Canberra gossip,” she said in Perth.
Abbott was asked on Sunday to reflect on the past two years in office. The prime minister said there were 335,000 more jobs in the economy than there were in September 2013 when the Coalition was elected, and the abolition of the carbon and mining taxes and cuts to red tape had been “very important”.
“I’m probably going to leave the people of Australia to make a second anniversary judgment. What I will say, though, is that I think this is a government which does have very significant achievements to its credit,” he said.
“Obviously stopping the boats was a very significant achievement given then human catastrophe, given the scale of the death and suffering which happens when the people smuggling trade gets under way.”
Abbott said he was proud of the finalisation of free trade agreements with South Korea, Japan and China because they were “historic changes that will set Australia up for decades to come”.
He added that he would have “much to say in the days ahead” about the China deal “given the fact that Bill Shorten is still trying to sabotage it”.
Labor has been pushing for concessions from the government, which could include enshrining in legislation a requirement for employers to try to find local workers before hiring workers from overseas for major projects worth more than $150m.
The trade minister, Andrew Robb, played down the prospect of such a legislative amendment, saying the 457 visa program arrangements were “very complicated” and were “designed by Labor to be governed by regulation under overarching legislation”.
But the government has not shut the door to talks. Robb’s office confirmed that he regularly spoke to his Labor counterpart, Penny Wong, who has been calling for a negotiated compromise.
Wong, meanwhile, has indicated that Labor plans to push ahead with a proposed Senate motion to send a message to the governor general, Peter Cosgrove, asking him to dismiss the head of the trade union royal commission, Dyson Heydon, over bias perceptions.
The Greens have agreed to support the motion, meaning Labor requires support from four of the eight crossbenchers to pass it, but many of those crucial senators raised concerns about the proposal last week.
The Coalition has dismissed it as an “unprincipled” stunt because the governor general acts on the advice of government ministers
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