Contemporary politics,local and international current affairs, science, music and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
A big screen flashes commercials on the
exterior of an office building in Xi’an in north-west China as the air
quality index reaches 282 due to pollution. Photograph: Mayi Wong/EPA
Some of the world’s top PR companies have for the first time
publicly ruled out working with climate change deniers, marking a
fundamental shift in the multi-billion dollar industry that has grown up
around the issue of global warming.
Public relations firms
have played a critical role over the years in framing the debate on
climate change and its solutions – as well as the extensive
disinformation campaigns launched to block those initiatives.
Now a
number of the top 25 global PR firms have told the Guardian they will
not represent clients who deny man-made climate change, or take
campaigns seeking to block regulations limiting carbon pollution.
Companies include WPP, Waggener Edstrom (WE) Worldwide, Weber Shandwick,
Text100, and Finn Partners.
“We would not knowingly partner with a client who denies the existence of climate change,” said Rhian Rotz, spokesman for WE.
Weber
Shandwick would also not take any campaign to block regulations cutting
carbon emissions or promoting renewable energy. “We would not support a
campaign that denies the existence and the threat posed by climate
change, or efforts to obstruct regulations cutting greenhouse gas
emissions and/or renewable energy standards,” spokeswoman Michelle
Selesky said.
“There may be scenarios in which we could represent a
client that has different views on climate change, just not on this
issue.”
The UK-based WPP, the world’s largest advertising firm by
revenue and parent company of Burson Marsteller and Oglivy Public
Relations, said taking on a client or campaign disputing climate change
would violate company guidelines.
“We ensure that our own work
complies with local laws, marketing codes and our own code of business
conduct. These prevent advertising that is intended to mislead and the
denial of climate change would fall into this category,” the company
said.
However, Fiona McEwan, a spokeswoman for the company, said
the 150 companies within WPP made their own decisions on clients and
would not rule out campaigns opposing regulations to cut greenhouse gas
emissions.
The US-based Edelman, which is the world’s largest
independently owned PR firm, did not explicitly rule out taking on
climate deniers as clients.
“Expanding the dialogue in a
constructive manner, and driving productive outcomes to solve energy
challenges are the key criteria for evaluating client engagements,” said
spokesman Michael Bush.
He said Edelman takes on clients on a case-by-case basis.
The PR firms were responding to surveys conducted independently by the Guardian and the Climate Investigations Centre,
a Washington-based group that conducts research on climate
disinformation campaigns. This could have a knock-on effect on the
advertising and lobbying campaigns targeting Barack Obama’s regulations limiting carbon emissions from power plants, and the international negotiations for a climate change treaty, now entering a critical phase.
“The
PR industry is a major component of the influence peddling industry
that stretches across Washington and the world, and they are making
large sums of money from energy companies and other important players
that have businesses connected to fossil fuels and energy policy,” said
Kert Davies, the founder of Climate Investigations.
Davies said
his group took on the research to try to get a better grasp of the
mechanics behind the framing of messages on climate change – and the
disinformation campaign.
Over the past few years, environmental
groups and scientists have been looking more closely at the messaging
around climate change, in part to examine their own failings to build
broader public support for action.
In the process, PR firms have
grown even more influential in shaping the debate around climate policy,
said James Hoggan, who ran his own public relations firm in Vancouver
and founded DeSmogBlog, a blog that describes itself as “clearing the PR pollution that clouds climate science”.
“I
think that public relations people are right at the elbow of powerful
people in industry and government,” he said. “You are an insider – a
very trusted insider – and you can have a huge influence. It really does
matter. These are influential organisations.”
Some of the firms,
such as Finn Partners, have a strong reputation for taking on
environmental causes. “Finn Partners would not work on any campaigns
that deny the reality of climate change nor would we take on a campaign
that would obstruct regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions or
renewable energy standards,” said managing partner Peter Finn.
WE
said it had worked on campaigns to expand production tax credits for
wind energy. Oglivy Public Relations told CIC that it recognised the
risks of climate change, and that it had worked on campaigns for WWF and
Greenpeace. But it declined to comment on whether it would represent
clients that deny climate change. Qorvis, a Washington DC-based PR
company, and its parent company MSL Group, also declined to answer that
question.
Other companies however appear concerned with trying to
represent environmental campaign groups as well as industry, according
to Davies.
Only 10 of the 25 firms responded to multiple emails,
phone calls and certified letters from the CIC, either directly or
through a parent company.
Firms that refused to comment include
those that have worked for groups calling for action on climate change –
as well as those seeking to block those efforts.
Hill & Knowlton, for example, was hired as the official media sponsor for the United Nations climate conference in Copenhagen in 2009. The company declined to respond to the CIC survey.
Several
of the companies, such as WPP, WE, Oglivy, and Edelman have ambitious
in-house programmes for reducing their carbon footprint. Qorvis
Communications , a subsidiary of Publicis Groupe, said it had been
calculating its carbon footprint since 2009.
But even those firms with robust internal carbon accounting systems, such as Edelman, were reluctant to go on record.
Edelman’s client list includes the American Petroleum Institute, the main energy lobby, which opposes Barack Obama’s climate change agenda.
Edelman also carried out campaigns supporting the Keystone XL pipeline,
a proposed pipeline to carry tar sands oil from Canada to refineries on
the Gulf coast of Texas.
An initial response to CIC from Edelman
inadvertently included an internal email which said: “I don’t believe we
are obligated in any way to respond. There are only wrong answers for
this guy.”
Edelman did in the end respond to the CIC and the Guardian.
Screengrab of Edelman email conversation
Other firms said they had signed on to the United Nations global compact on sustainable business. However, the compact does not explicitly commit companies to policies on climate change.
Seven
of the firms told the researchers their companies saw climate change as
a threat. But a smaller number would rule out taking on clients that
deny climate change is occurring, or work on campaigns that seek to
block policies to deal with climate change.
“For the majority of
them, they would rather remain neutral on any issue,” Davies said. “They
don’t want to have positions on anything because they like to keep
options open to take on any client who walks in the door. They pretend
they are above the fray and they are not involved, and yet they are the
ones designing ad campaigns, designing lobbying campaigns, and designing
the messages their clients want to convey around climate change.”
The
Climate Investigations Centre sent out surveys in April to the world’s
top 25 firms asking them to go on the record about their views on
climate change.
The short survey asked:
Does your
company acknowledge the threat and challenge of climate change as
companies like Walmart, CocaCola, Apple, Google, AIG, Swiss Re, NRG,
Unilever and others have done?
Does your company have any
internal carbon accounting policies or energy use reduction targets?
Have you taken actions to reduce your “carbon footprint”?
Does
your company have an internal Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
policy regarding climate change or the environment generally?
Has
your agency advised any client corporations on communications around
CSR programmes with a specific climate change focus, or on other climate
change related public relations efforts?
The Guardian
followed up by asking firms if they would take on clients that deny the
existence of man-made climate change or campaigns seeking to block
regulations dealing with climate change.
Tony Abbott and Joe Hockey have struggled to sell budget measures. Photograph: Paul Miller/AAP
The government’s budget decisions will have a greater impact on
lower-income earners than higher-income earners, according to newly
released Treasury analysis that reinforces a key criticism the financial
blueprint disproportionately affects the poor. The Treasury figures
are the raw data underlying a graph in a glossy budget document showing
average cash transfers received and income tax paid by low-, middle-
and high-income, working-age families and singles in 2016-17.
Labor has seized on the figures – released after a Freedom of Information application from Fairfax Media – to further its argument the budget was unfair in its targeting of the poor.
Average
cash transfers for the lower-income group would reduce from $13,446
with no policy changes to $12,604 with the budget changes implemented, a
fall of $842. Average income taxes paid by the lower income group would
increase by $2 from $1,836 to $1,838. It can therefore be calculated
that the net impact on this group in 2016-17 is $844.
By
comparison, the higher income group would have average cash transfers
reduced from $381 to $310, a fall of $71, and income taxes would rise
from $47,507 to $47,953, an increase of $446. The net impact on this
higher-income group is therefore $517.
The analysis relates only
to the effects in 2016-17 – the final year of the “budget repair levy”
on people earning more than $180,000 – so critics contend the disparity
will be even greater in later years. The temporary three-year increase
in income tax for high-income earners was sold by the government as an
attempt to ensure everyone was contributing to the task of addressing
the debt and deficit.
Numerous private modelling exercises have
previously concluded the budget decisions have a disproportionate impact
on lower-income groups, particularly when the raw figures are
considered as a proportion of disposable income. The Treasury modelling
is likely to give further weight to those criticisms.
The treasurer, Joe Hockey, sought to dismiss the Fairfax Media story by highlighting the progressive nature of the tax system – whereby higher-income earners are in higher income tax brackets.
“That
story is wrong because it fails to take into account a range of things,
like the fact that higher-income households pay half their income in
tax, low-income households pay virtually no tax, so I think there is a
lot of misinformation around,” Hockey told the Nine Network’s Today
program on Monday.
“It doesn’t take into account the fact that
higher-income households pay half their income in tax and on average
higher-income households fund the benefits that go to an average of
nearly four lower-income households. Every dollar that lower-income
households receive comes from higher-income households.
“It fails
to take into account pensions, which is not included in that table,
which are a substantial payment. It also fails to take into account the
massive number of concessional payments such as discounted
pharmaceuticals, discounted transport, discounted childcare that goes to
lower-income households. So the information, as presented, is
deliberately misleading and it does not represent the true state of
affairs.”
The shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, said Hockey could not
dismiss the “strong data” about the impact of his budget and must stop
“attacking the media for daring to report these figures”.
“These
are Treasury figures, these aren’t the Sydney Morning Herald’s figures,
these are not the Labor party’s figures – these are Treasury figures
which have been released under FOI and they go to the impact of this
budget, the decisions he took,” Bowen told the ABC.
“Of course
there are a range of matters right across the government which impact on
families but this is the direct impact of decisions in his budget.”
The
acting leader of the Greens, Adam Bandt, said the figures proved the
Coalition knew its budget would hit the poor the hardest and was unfair.
“The Abbott government needs to go back to the drawing board, stop
attacking the poor and instead ask Gina Rinehart and the big banks to
pay a bit more,” Bandt said.
The new figures came as Hockey
continued a round of talks with crossbench senators in an attempt to
secure passage of contentious budget measures.
On Monday the
treasurer met the Liberal Democratic party senator David Leyonhjelm, who
suggested the government may gain better acceptance of its proposed $7
GP co-payment if the proceeds were used to secure a matching reduction
to the cost of medicines under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.
Leyonhjelm said Hockey had indicated “he would think about that”.
Leyonhjelm
said he was inclined to agree with Hockey’s arguments downplaying the
Treasury analysis published on Monday. The key crossbench senator said
the issue was ensuring Australia had “a safety net for really needy
people”.
Leyonhjelm further suggested Hockey should use the
savings from cuts to middle-class welfare to cut tax. He said he would
not support the Coalition’s paid parental leave scheme or the Direct
Action climate policy.
If
the capitalist be not profited the world may starve, is the lesson
daily ground into the receptivities of
the workers by the hard pestle of experience. Hunger is a champion
whip, and the dividend swallower never fails to secure him when he
wants to round up the refractory labourers into the stockyard of
reduced wages. In all the conflicts which are now so frequently waged
in the industrial arena the man who can play a waiting game wins in
the end; and who can so well afford to wait so the man who has been
absorbing the immense profits accruing to successful business
enterprises to-day? And who as ill-equipped as the poor devil who has
to sell his only commodity at cost price, viz., for just enough to
enable him to subsist and thereby renew his strength, and who, having
never had anything to put by, has nothing to fall back upon in times
of struggle, and is as clay in the hands of the mammonitish potter.
Banded
together by a bond of common suffering and despair the men are
certainly stronger but even then the union funds, enfeebled by
continued drains made on them by the vast numbers of starving members
(instance the stonemason's union in N.S.W., 500 of whose members are
permanently unemployed) collapse under the strain, and after
suffering all the agonies of semi-starvation the men are forced to
give way and return to their work worse off than before. Hunger has
the whip hand all the time. A prominent case in point is the
Newcastle coal strike, numberless other disputes there are but this
will serve our purpose as well as any. At the Burwood, Lambton,
Waratah, Greta, and other mines in the district the men have received
notice that unless the reductions are accepted within fourteen days
the mines will close down, which is turning on the hunger stop with a
vengeance. The men so far are holding out firmly on the principle, I
suppose, that after having their miserable pittance further reduced
it is just as preferable to play and starve as work and ditto.
Frantic efforts are also being made by some of the men to reorganise
the miner's union which has become much disorganised of late owing to
strikes, disaffection on the part of men, who after all were only
human, and could not bear to see wife and children starve outright,
and internal dissensions.
Altogether
the state of things in Newcastle is appalling. Black misery and
destitution reigns supreme. There in that one little fruitful spot on
the devil's earth is displayed in miniature all the despotism, all
the mammonism, all the misery and starvation that is spread – a
hideous plaster – over the civilised world. And what is to be done?
Nothing! Nothing can be done while bodies of men waste what little
energy they have in feebly fighting individual capitalists without
realising that the system is the whole cause. Until this is firmly
and fully perceived by the mass of workers the efforts of reformers,
their struggles for the betterment of human affairs, will be but as
the “crackling of thorns under at pot” while the fire devours and
the winds scatter the remains. The whole of the evils of our
civilisation are caused by planlessness in production and the private
ownership of the means
of production; substitute for this an orderly system of production
under State control and with State ownership of the means of
production, and material benefits are assured to the vast mass of the
people together with the foundations for intellectual and spiritual
advancement. But this cannot be obtained until the people see the
evil clearly, and as clearly see the remedy. They are incapable of
seeing it to-day for though the effects are around them, and they
having the cause explained daily, they having eyes are blind and
though possessed of ears hear nothing. Yet it is as clear as noonday
to the initiated that Socialism is gradually being evolved, and that
theirs is the cost who in their blindness refuse to hasten its
advent. MAY DAY.
*
* * *
THE
fastest man in Australia over 130yds. and 220yds. is J. Mc.Garrigal;
440yds., J. Atkinson, Sydney; 880yds. and 1760yds., D. Junner,
Footscray.
A
RETURN match has been arranged, to take place in Melbourne on March
21st. 22nd. and 25th, between
Victorian cricketers and Stoddart's English team.
Chief justice Tim Carmody. Photograph: Dan Peled/AAP
Not a single supreme court judge turned up to a public welcoming ceremony for Queensland’s controversial new chief justice.
Tim
Carmody has urged observers not to make too much of the apparent snub,
which follows weeks of controversy over his promotion, saying he wanted a
low-key, informal affair.
But he verged on tears as he spoke of the distress his family had endured as critics attacked his capacity to do the job.
“I
am sorry that my appointment has caused you distress,” he said during
the ceremony in Brisbane’s largest ceremonial court. “I have learnt a
valuable life lesson. To be truly free, you have to forget what other
people think or say about you.”
The 58-year-old former chief
magistrate has enjoyed a meteoric rise under the Newman government. In
June he was promoted from chief magistrate to chief justice, despite not
having served on the supreme court.
Senior legal figures have
been highly critical of the appointment, questioning his experience and
noting his lack of peer support. Some critics have also suggested he is
too close to the government.
Carmody told those gathered for the ceremony that he would seek to build strong relationships and lead with impartiality.
“It is imperative that a proper distance is maintained between the executive and the lower courts,” he said.
“Whatever
general concerns may have been held or expressed in the past about me, I
will, without apology or fear, be a fierce and formidable warrior
against any threat to that independence, whether it comes from within or
without.
“I will work hard every day of my tenure to prove worthy of the trust and confidence placed in me.”
Carmody
was welcomed at the same time as new supreme court judge Peter
Flanagan. Empty chairs surrounded them where supreme court justices
would normally sit for ceremonies.
The new head of the Queensland
bar association, Shane Doyle QC, said Carmody would have the respect of
the bar, many members of which attended Friday’s ceremony.
“It
[the appointment] has not been uncontroversial,” he told the ceremony.
“That controversy is now, or should now be, in the past.
“Public confidence in the court requires it. You have the support of the association,” he told the new chief justice.
Doyle
took over as head of the bar association after Peter Davis QC quit the
role, alleging confidential discussions about the appointment of the
next chief justice were leaked by the state attorney general, Jarrod
Bleijie, or one of his staffers.
Bleijie denied that he or anyone from his office leaked details of that meeting.
Addressing
criticisms that Carmody lacked the experience to be the state’s top
judge, Bleijie told Friday’s ceremony that seniority was an important
factor but he also said such appointments must be made on merit.
“Justice Carmody is well equipped to consider and deliver the next wave of reforms and innovation,” he said.
Opposition Leader Annastacia Palaszczuk says the Newman
Government’s plan to sell off one-third of the Royal Brisbane and
Women’s Hospital site threaten future expansion opportunities for the
state’s biggest health care facility.
“The Treasurer and Health Minister have put the future of the RBWH in the hands of property developers,” Ms Palaszczuk said."
“By failing to guarantee the entire site being offered for
development will be used only for health facilities, Mr Nicholls and Mr
Springborg are failing to guarantee the RBWH will have sufficient room
for expansion in the future."
“The Treasurer’s involvement in this project shows the government’s priority is not health care but a grab for money."
“The Treasurer has struggled to avoid admitting the private sector
will want to own all or part of the 4.8 hectares of the hospital’s
18-hectare site he is offloading."
“Mr Nicholls talks about private developers renting all or part of
the site from the government while investing millions of dollars in new
facilities when he knows they are likely to demand outright ownership.”
Ms Palaszczuk said the re-use of existing Royal Children’s Hospital
buildings on the site represented just a small part of the 4.8-hectare
precinct the Newman Government was offering for development.
“The total area of land being opened up for development includes
landmark buildings such as the heritage-listed Lady Lamington House;
Lady Norman Wing; and the Edith Cavell Building,” she said.
“It is still not clear what the future will be for the Lady Ramsay
Child Care Centre, KidSafe House, Leonard Lodge, the Child and Family
Therapy Unit and the Genetic Health Queensland facility which are all
covered by Mr Springborg’s sell-off."
“The project site covers almost one-third of the 18-hectare RBWH site
which is already land-locked so any loss of land suitable for future
health and hospital facilities will drastically affect the future of the
RBWH and the University of Queensland’s facilities at the Herston
campus."
“This project again highlights the fact the LNP Government is all
about sackings and sell-offs and not about building a better public
health system."
“Former Labor governments initiated major new hospital projects
including the Gold Coast University Hospital; the Queensland Children’s
Hospital; and major rebuilding projects for hospitals in major regional
centres."
“But in almost two years in office it has not started a single major health infrastructure project.”
DOORSTOP INTERVIEW MELBOURNE TUESDAY, 29 JULY 2014
SUBJECT/S: Tony Abbott’s Unfair Budget; Tony Abbott’s GP Tax;
Cuts to Aged Care; Peter Slipper; Work for the Dole; Victorian Politics;
Greg Combet; Joe Hockey’s Biography; Asylum Seekers.
BILL SHORTEN – LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION: Good morning
everyone. It’s great to be in my own electorate of Maribyrnong in
Avondale Heights at the Doutta Galla Age care services. Today with me is
the Chairman of Doutta Galla services, Bruce Mildenhall also local
Member of Parliament, Ben Carroll. It is a privilege to see how hard
Australians are working to look after each other in age care services.
There is 108 people resident here served by great staff. But there is
real anxiety in Doutta Galla age services and thousands of other places
like this across Australia because tomorrow the Abbott Government is
cutting services for residents with dementia. Tony Abbott thinks or
perhaps hopes people have forgotten his unfair Budget. But tomorrow we
are going to see at this place alone, 35 age care residents diagnosed
with dementia, lose a $16 a day supplement. This is a disaster for age
care, Doutta Galla services and throughout Australia. For pensioners who
rely upon the $16 a day supplement with dementia, services which
provide them cognitive support so that they can at least try and arrest
or live with dementia in a more comfortable fashion than they otherwise
would; this is not the only unfair feature of the Budget.
Aged care residents are losing the dementia supplement of $16 a day.
You also have got the pension which is going to be cut. You have petrol
going up with new taxes. You have got a dreadful GP tax. How on earth
are doctors expected, when they do visits here, to ask a patient with
dementia for $7 extra in a Tony Abbott GP Tax. It is a stupid, obscene
idea. Then of course, Scripts are going to cost more, there you have it.
For this aged care centre, petrol up, pensions down, dementia
supplement gone, more to pay an extra $5 for your script, up to $5 and a
GP tax.
This is an unfair Budget and Australians know that Tony Abbott lied
before the last election. The message I’ve got loud and clear today from
staff and families and residents is that no-one wants Tony Abbott’s
unfair GP Tax. It is time for Tony Abbott to run up the white flag,
declare defeat. It was a stupid idea and axe his unfair GP Tax. I might
ask the Chairman of the Doutta Galla aged services board, Bruce
Mildenhall to talk about the real world impact of Tony Abbott’s rotten
and unfair Budget on older Australians.
BRUCE MILDENHALL – CHAIRMAN OF DOUTTA GALLA AGED CARE SERVICES:
Thanks Bill. This is a dreadful attack on some of the most vulnerable
and helpless people in our community. We run a network of
community-based aged care facilities and as of tomorrow, $800,000 is
being ripped out of our annual Budget. These services, these therapies
that help provide a decent and a reasonable quality of life for people
who are severely affected by dementia are going to disappear unless
severe cuts are made to other operating parts of our Budget.
It is a real problem for us and it is a problem right throughout
Australia in aged care facilities. The Federal Government has said this
is – that dementia is one of the top 10 health issues facing the nation.
But they have decided to bury their heads in the sand, withdraw the
money and perhaps hope that the problem goes away. Our message is the
problem is here today, it is here tomorrow and we have got far less
money, far fewer resources and far less access to the specialist
services to look after people who are severely affected by dementia in
our community.
SHORTEN: Thanks. Are there any questions?
JOURNALIST: If elected would you continue with the Coalition’s expanding work for the dole scheme?
SHORTEN: In terms of this work for the dole scheme that the
Government is proposing, this is window dressing. What we see is a
Government talking about how to punish unemployed people or talking
about how unemployed people need to do 40 job interviews. The real
missing link in Tony Abbott’s plan for unemployed people is where are
the jobs Tony Abbott? He is not proposing to create any new jobs. He
won’t stand up for existing jobs in Australia. He ships them off all
overseas. What is point of asking people to apply for jobs when they are
not there to be filled?
JOURNALIST: Would you continue an expanded version of that scheme?
SHORTEN: We believe in empowering people to find work. The way
you solve unemployment or reduce unemployment in Australia is you
create jobs and you keep existing jobs. You also make sure people have
the best skills and training. This is a Government who is taking the
tools away from apprentices and putting them into debt. This is a
Government who will make it harder for people to go to university by
doubling or increasing the price of going to university. This is a
Government who has sold out the car industry, sold out the ship building
industry. They are about to sell out the submarine building industry.
This Government sees its only real job is to create jobs in other
countries.
JOURNALIST: How realistic is it to expect people to apply for 40 jobs a month?
SHORTEN: The people who dreamed up this scheme have never been
in the position of the long term unemployed. Let’s recap what they are
doing. The Abbott Government says if you’re under 30 and unemployed you
get no money for six months, but in the meantime, you have to apply for
40 jobs. There is five working days in every week. People will apply for
two jobs a day. They will be preparing their resumes. This may be in
Abbott-land where you have a theoretical situation where mum and dad are
out there printing on the finest word processors your job applications;
maybe they think it is possible. In the real world where you are
battling to put a roof over your head where you have no money and you
can’t afford the train ticket to the job interview, this Abbott
Government doesn’t care about the unemployed or jobs, they are all talk
and no action.
JOURNALIST: Peter Slipper has been found guilty of dishonesty charges. Was it a mistake for Labor to back him so strongly?
SHORTEN: I think all Australians are saddened and disappointed
when they see elected representatives conducting themselves in the way
that Peter Slipper has been found. Having said that, he still has to be
sentenced, the matter is still before the court. But I completely and
Labor completely deplores the set of circumstances and we completely
deplore what has happened here.
JOURNALIST: Greg Combet is launching his book today. Were you
aware that Julia Gillard offered to hand him the Prime Ministership last
year?
SHORTEN: I welcome Greg Combet publishing a book. He is a
distinguished Australian over decades of service. There is a real
contrast isn’t there? Greg Combet at the end of a distinguished career
talking about the things he has done. Joe Hockey, when he should be
preparing a Budget is co-working on his biography. There is a world of
difference between Greg Combet’s biography and Joe Hockey’s job
application for Tony Abbott’s position. In terms of what happened
before the last election, as far as I am concerned that is all water
under the bridge and I’m not adding anymore commentary to that matter.
JOURNALIST: Did you know of the offer though?
SHORTEN: I’m not going to engage in past history. But I do
say, Greg Combet is a distinguished Australian and I hope his book does
well and about Joe Hockey’s book, it’s remarkable, you would think that
when someone is the Treasurer of Australia, it is a full-time job.
Obviously Joe Hockey sees being Treasurer as a part-time job and selling
his biography is also a priority. Look at this Budget; it is such an
unfair Budget. Joe Hockey says in his biography it didn’t go far enough.
When Tony Abbott has to pull you up and say you’re going too far in
your cuts, you have got to wonder how far Joe Hockey wants to wreak
unfairness in Australia. Joe Hockey has a dreadful few months, he comes
up with a Budget no-one likes. His own colleagues are clearly concerned
about his judgement. I think that the lesson here is when you’re
Treasurer of Australia, stick to your day job and leave the literary
flights of fancy to people who are not as busy as you.
JOURNALIST: Are you satisfied with the way Victorian
Opposition Leader Daniel Andrews has handled himself in the tapes
scandal in recent weeks here in Victoria?
SHORTEN: As the Federal leader, I’m not providing a running
commentary on State politics. Daniel Andrews has taken responsibility
for a series of events that occurred. These events should not have
occurred. But Daniel Andrews has taken responsibility for it. When will
Denis Napthine take responsibility for the complete atrocities which are
occurring in the aged care and health system in Victoria?
This is an unfair Budget. The GP Tax is an unfair tax. What we have
is millions of Australians and hundreds of thousands of Victorians will
be hurt by this unfair tax. It is time for Tony Abbott to axe his unfair
GP Tax. He should run up the white flag, recognise that it is a bad
idea and go back to the drawing board.
JOURNALIST: Glenn McGrath and Brett Lee signed cricket bats
for Indian officials reportedly to help Australia secure the asylum
seeker deal, is that appropriate?
SHORTEN: At least Glenn McGrath and Brett Lee can play a straight line and length, all Scott Morrison can do is engage in spin.
JOURNALIST: Do you think it is appropriate though that they had a part in this?
SHORTEN: The question is not about the qualities of Glenn
McGrath or Brett Lee but it is that dreadful spinner of the Abbott
Government, Scott Morrison. This is just a debacle. Scott Morrison, if
there was a good news story where he could be sounding tough, you can’t
open your door of the morning before you trip over Scott Morrison
announcing victory, but where has he been in last few weeks when we have
had this debacle of 157 people detained on the high seas?
The State Opposition says the Newman Government will no doubt
embrace the Queensland Plan as an excuse for another massive taxpayer
funded pre-election political advertising campaign.
“The thousands of Queenslanders who participated in the Queensland
Plan process may feel greatly disappointed at its lack of specific
commitments,” said Opposition frontbencher Jo-Ann Miller.
“For example, everyone can all agree on the health goal of being
‘physically and mentally healthy’ but if the LNP is Americanising our
hospital system how are low to average income earners going to achieve
it?"
“How do LNP jobs cuts in our hospital and health sector totalling 4,400 including 1,600 nursing jobs fit with that goal?"
“It’s all very well having long-range plans, but the Queensland Plan
runs the risk of being just a collection of ‘motherhood’ statements
which means its likely to be just another excuse for the LNP to mount a
taxpayer-funded ad campaign in the lead-up to the 2015 election."
“If they are to be effective, plans always rely on having
government’s genuinely committed to listening and not arrogant enough to
think they know it all like the Premier and his LNP Ministers."
“The fact the Premier did a fly-in, fly-out visit to Hervey Bay to
launch the plan shows that on day one he is not bothering to listen to
feedback even from local government conference delegates."
“The only potentially positive aspect of the plan is the new panel of community ambassadors."
“But we will need to wait and see if that works because the Newman LNP Government has a track record of simply not listening."
“What chance have the ambassadors got when the Premier and the LNP
don’t listen to their own MPs, average Queenslanders, or anyone else who
might have a different view to theirs?”
Mrs Miller said the LNP claimed before the 2012 election it had plans for:
economic growth without the need for assets sales
boosting regions
a jobless rate of 4%
cuts to the cost of living including $120 off annual power bills.
“We have never seen any evidence of the plans they already claimed to have,” she said.
“In fact all we have seen is broken promises and a single-minded push for asset sales despite Queenslanders not wanting them."
“The LNP is constantly talking about ‘having plans’ so today’s
release is another excuse it has given itself to dip into the public
purse for an ad campaign to rebuild its electoral stocks.”
