Newspoll seems to have taken the week off, but there’s always Essential Research, which has Labor’s lead up to 61-39 from 60-40 last week. Also featured are questions on becoming a republic within the next few years (52 per cent support, 24 per cent oppose – the latter sounds a bit low), whether Australia should agree to allow Japan to conduct whaling if it limits its activities to the northern hemisphere (10 per cent agree, 81 per cent disagree), “how would you rate your loyalty to your employer” and “how would you rate your employer’s loyalty to staff”. Furthermore:
• The silly season endeth – Kerry O’Brien and Lateline are back, and parliaments federal, Victorian and South Australian resume today.
• The Australian Workers Union has released a comprehensive survey of workers’ attitudes to the global financial crisis, derived from 1016 interviews conducted by Auspoll. The headline finding is that 40 per cent fear losing their jobs in the next year.
• Parties’ disclosures of receipts, expenditure and debts are available for perusal at the Australian Electoral Commission, at least so far as donations of over $10,500 are concerned. Siobhain Ryan and Imre Salusinszky of The Australian and Bernard Keane of Crikey sift through the evidence; the latter also opens fire on the Coalition over its obstruction of legislation reversing the 2005 disclosure threshold hike. Keane notes that one travesty can’t be pinned on the previous government: that we have had to wait until February 2009 to find out what went on at an election held in November 2007. Anyone who imagines this has something to do with logistics should consider the practice in New York City, where donations have to be declared before election day and “made public immediately on a searchable, online database”.
• Antony Green returns from a fortnight in the wilderness (literally) with a belated post-mortem on the Liberals’ defeat in South Australia’s Frome by-election. As I suspected, independent Geoff Brock owes his win to a peculiarity of the state’s electoral system that saves ballot papers with incomplete preferences by assigning them the preferences officially lodged by their favoured candidate. Without this provision, 258 ballots that were thus admitted the day after polling day would have been informal, leaving Brock 38 votes behind Labor at the second last count rather than 30 votes ahead. Another issue has been brought to my attention by Kevin Bonham, who points to the fact that a certain number of Liberal voters harmed their candidate’s chances by voting Liberal rather than Labor. If 31 such voters had tactically switched to Labor, Brock would have been excluded and the distribution of his preferences would have given victory to Liberal candidate Terry Boylan. Public choice theorists call this flaw in preferential voting “non-monotonicity”, which is elaborated upon here (although Bonham reckons “some of their worked examples are wrong”).
• Antony also gets in early with a preview of Western Australia’s May 18 daylight saving referendum, which combines customary psephological insight with a keen eye for the state’s lifestyle peculiarities.
• Former Labor MLA Kathryn Hay will run as an independent for the Tasmanian upper house division of Windermere (extending from the outskirts of Launceston north to the proposed site of Gunns’ Bell Bay pulp mill), challenging independent incumbent Ivan Dean at the poll likely to be held on May 2. Peter Tucker at Tasmanian Politics reports that one of the the other two seats up for election, the Devonport-based division of Mersey, looms as a clash between Latrobe mayor Mike Gaffney and Devonport mayor Lyn Laycock. Mersey is being vacated by retiring independent Norma Jamieson.
• Staying in Tasmania, a recount has confirmed that the last remaining Labor candidate in Franklin from the 2006 election, Daniel Hulme, will assume the lower house seat vacated by former Tourism Minister Paula Wriedt.
• Mining magnate and former National Party director Clive Palmer is making himself visible as the Queensland state election approaches, having been profiled last week on The 7.30 Report and in a cover story for The Weekend Australian Magazine. The latest salvo in Palmer’s charm offensive is a demand of $1 million in damages for defamation from Anna Bligh, who said there was “something just not right about one billionaire owning their own political party” (the annual financial disclosures discussed previously list $600,000 in donations from Palmer to the Liberal and National parties). Sean Parnell’s Weekend Australian piece describes Palmer as a “notorious litigant”, who “once listed it as a hobby in his Who’s Who entry”. Palmer’s 18-year-old son Michael has been preselected as the Liberal National Party candidate for the safe Labor seat of Nudgee.
• Rick Wallace of The Australian reports that Nationals-turned-Liberal Senator Julian McGauran will face a number of challengers in his bid for one of the two safe seats on the Victorian Senate ticket, with other incumbent Michael Ronaldson “widely expected to claim top spot”. The field includes prominent Peter Costello supporter Ross Fox, barrister Caroline Kenny and solicitor Cate Dealehr. Other names mentioned by Andrew Landeryou’s VexNews are Terry Barnes, a “former Tony Abbott adviser”, and Owen Lysaght, who ran as an independent in Chisholm in 2004.
David Speers is most impressed with this package and thinks it will cause Turnbull some difficulty.
Finns
Rainwater tanks would be a great thing to subsidise in SA, Vic etc. I agree the solar system rebate being changed back is a good idea. Garrett and Swan really stuffed up on that one when they made it means tested.
But I’m more referring to large-scale renewable energy projects, like wind farms or Ron’s MegaSolar Farm.
[Several money market economists were calling for up to 2% of GDP.]
Speers says it is just that.
I thinkmost of the 42b is to be done in the first 2 years
You would not believe the whingeing on the MSM blogs about the package. The main gripe is “I did the right thing and put in insulation. Now all these people who were irresponsible are being rewarded for it. Now just watch the price of insulation go up.”
Someone did make the point that the insulation bonus targets only one industry when the stimulus should be broader based. Still, it’s not the only part of the package.
Laura Tingle on ABC calling it clever – “who’s going to criticise building a new science lab”?
Socrates
Spears and Gilbert on Sky just said that is does work out at 2% of GDP which is what the IMF was recommending.
Also said that Turnbull will have trouble opposing package and that it will be interesting to watch the politics as Turnbull has been running around saying cash handouts don’t work so he can’t now say it’s OK . Which means he will have to oppose package and the people getting handouts (farmers included) wouldn’t be to happy.
Gary Bruce, you beat me 🙂
Unemployment:
09/10 – 5.5%
10/11 – 7%
By 2;30pm this afternoon, Interest rate will be at the record low under a Labor Govt.
I love this Rudd guy,
The trick is to find the right balance – you need to be a Pensioner, worker, sole parent with 2 kids and study 😀
It really is adding up to a lot for me now after the last payout as well since I’m all those things
Cheers Ruddster 😀
what do you think – a 1% cut or 1.25%?
Groggy, will not be surprised if it were to be 1.5%, min 1%.
GB and Vera
Yes I withdraw my comment. The bulk of spending is in the first two years which works out at 2% of GDP as you say. That fits exactly the formula Krugman and the IMF have advocated.
So looks like they got the size pretty right and it looks well targetted too. I also think it is broader than some have given credit for. The bulk of money is going for:
– education and school maintenance – that means builders, painteers, tradesmen etc
– libraries and science centres in schools – builders again plus lab equipment, books
– solar hot water is a good whole of life investment anyway; most locally made
– small business investment tax break means IT, business services etc
– training $ helps TAFE sector (activity) and reskills those who actually lose their job
– basic road maintenance and black spot $ – will provide work for Councils all over regional Australia; Turnbull wouldn’t dare oppose this.
Excellent; nothing grandios and all basic stuff that is obviously needed.
OK two ticks for me – right total $ and well targetted.
Methinks David Speers hair also had a bit of stimulus lately.
As per yesterday, it’s the 3 Amigos again. Go boys.
Finns you better give him a new hairdo like you gave me!
Finns, I have to agree with you… we live in strange times…
Rudd presser on now – running with the schools spending upfront.
The school spending is the most clever, politically, socially and economically.
Is Julia still in Europe?
Vera, will this do for Speers?
Finns
that’s a real quacker of a hairdo 😉
A masterful presentation by the Ruddster. I hope you’re all watching.
Rudd has proven to be a very clever politician, he’s fufilled everything needed without over egging the cake and spiked Turnbull and co beautifully, he also looked statesman like, honest and he knew what he was talking about with his delivery, bring on Turnbull and Cossie combined.
72 – absolutely….keeping it all within his education revolution and nation building. Beautiful work.
Has just compared the schools infrastructure spend to nation building work of the 40s.
Love how Rudd talks “We been chugging away ay this through the summer”
Adam but all that cash doesnt mean we’ll avoid a recession…
They dont even have forecasts for when they expect to see 3% growth…
Grog they’ve done nothing with their education revolution that has been the biggest farce in political history…
Annabel Crabb is suitably articulate on Rudd’s protracted spendathon:
[Kevin Rudd calls this gush of spending an economically conservative orthodoxy.
Which is odd, because John Howard did it, Rudd called it “spending like a drunken sailor”.
Maybe the definition changes when the ship’s going down.]
Crabb: http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/bannabel-crabbb/2009/02/03/1233423194378.html
Glen – Rudd dealt with all that stuff. Read the transcript.
GP – Welcome back. This is not the year for cheap partisan oneliners. You’ll need to do better now.
No 76
Glen I agree. Government deficit spending will not do anything other than lurch us further into economic oblivion.
I think Michael Stutchbury’s analysis of Rudd’s war on capitalism is excellent:
[But outside Third World bookshops and anti-globalisation protests, what does neo-liberalism or the Washington consensus have to do with Moonee Ponds or Bankstown? If he’d have gone to Davos, Rudd could have attended a specific lunch on the Washington consensus, the term coined by US economist John Williams for the policy cure for the early 1980s Latin American debt crisis.
These were International Monetary Fund orthodoxy: stop running huge budget deficits; get rid of wasteful subsidies to instead fund basic health and education; fund tax rate cuts by broadening the tax base; remove controls over interest rates and foreign direct investment; get rid of import protection; and privatise state-owned businesses.
While painful, the new model was more effective than the old one of ill-disciplined economic management, intrusive state control and import-replacement industrialisation. South American success stories today, even Lulu’s Brazil, have not junked its essential measures. ]
And wait for it:
[Greedy Wall Street bankers were happy to take on too much risk because the bubble hyper-inflated their bonsuses. American financial regulation was fragmented and ineffective.
But this is not an Australian problem. Our banks mostly stayed away from financial engineering. Our banking regulators have been diligent. We don’t need to reregulate the financial system.]
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24999160-5017771,00.html
[Grog they’ve done nothing with their education revolution that has been the biggest farce in political history…]
That would be Workchoices Glen
[Which is odd, because John Howard did it, Rudd called it “spending like a drunken sailor”.]
Probably because when Howard did it it was right before an election, and targeted at marginal and conservative seats
[Government deficit spending will not do anything other than lurch us further into economic oblivion]
lol what tosh
No 79
Adam, the partisan one-liners continue to come thick and fast from the leftards, so I will not be easily dissuaded. 🙂
[Which is odd, because John Howard did it, Rudd called it “spending like a drunken sailor”.]
Come off it, we are talking about a different economical time.
No 83
Dario, if the economic situation of Australia is that bad, no amount of government spending is going to stop an impending recession. It’s delaying the inevitable, so to speak, just like spending $95,000 per worker to bail out the increasingly uncompetitive auto industry.
More on the cash splash. Last week the Japanese Govt announced that it will give A$250 cash to every person in japan. Japan’s population is 128m, that makes A$32B. Rudd’s cash splash is about A$12.7B that makes A$600 to very person in OZ (21m pop). So who is the pretty boy now?
I just want to see turnbull committ political suicide and oppose this package.
As for the deficit – no deficit debate, name one economist or country for that matter, that has argued that keeping a healthy surplus to avoid recession is the way to go. Don’t bother looking, you won’t find one.
GP, I have no more time for leftards than you do. But neither the leftards nor the rightards are in power. The Ruddster is in power. If you want to pick any holes in his strategy for dealing with the GFC, you’ll need to come up something more substantial than petty pointscoring. So far Turnbull has failed to do so. I’ll be interested to see if you can.
Interesting package. With regard to Annabel Crabb’s comment as reported by GP@77.
As i see it, Rudd is spending up big, in as planned a way as is possible given the somewhat fluid circumstances, as a response to the global financial crisis. His reasons are to try and support the economy and jobs.
My job as well as his.
Howard’s spending was purely to support himself and his nefarious mob of losers in the Liberal party keeping their jobs, while attacking and undermining the pay, conditions and job security of people like me.
Howard actually failed as he was definitively and unceremoniously turfed the last time the voters had a say in the matter, and worse, he left his party to whom he owed it all, in tatters.
From what i can see at the moment, Rudd, Swan, Gillard and Tanner have been doing as well as can be expected given the magnitude of whats happening.
Stupid, “Gotcha” comments like that from Annabel Crabb are just that and largely irrelevant. Particularly in the current context.
[Dario, if the economic situation of Australia is that bad, no amount of government spending is going to stop an impending recession. It’s delaying the inevitable, so to speak, just like spending $95,000 per worker to bail out the increasingly uncompetitive auto industry.]
GP, its not necessarily about preventing recession, its about making it shallower and less protracted than if the government sits on its hands and does nothing
No 85
Gary, Howard was always criticised for giving out too much middle class welfare, yet here we have Rudd giving out hundreds of dollars to people earning $100,000 per year.
I love Professor Willem Buiter’s conclusion:
[The hypocrisy and chutzpah of politicians knows no bounds.]
http://blogs.ft.com/maverecon/2009/02/yes-we-can-have-a-global-depression-if-we-really-contintue-to-work-at-it/
No 90
[Stupid, “Gotcha” comments like that from Annabel Crabb are just that and largely irrelevant. Particularly in the current context.]
They’re irrelevant for you because you don’t like the cold hard facts.
Rudd’s spending is worse than a drunken sailor’s I’d have to conclude. From a $22 billion surplus (funded by a tax binge on luxury cars, fuel concentrate & alcopops), we are now in a $22 billion deficit. Breathtaking in size and incompetence.
Adam is right. Rudd has snookered them all. No, it will not stop a recession, but it lessen the blow.
Of course no one will say no to another check in the mail.
Insultaion ties in with the greenhouse stuff.
SChool infrastructure (Public school) is a definite must do. Especially to fit in all the new computers. 😉
And tax breaks for small business.
Ao no winging about budget deficits.
Checkmate.
[Grog they’ve done nothing with their education revolution that has been the biggest farce in political history…]
they had a big mess to clean up…
GP,
The fact the rest of the planet is in recssion, thus less money coming in to Australia of course has nothing to do with it….
yeesh.
No 91
Let me quote Rudd:
[A recession involves two successive quarters of negative growth but Mr Rudd said yesterday the Government would “move heaven and earth to try and keep growth positive”.]
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/rudd-reveals-tax-revenues-to-plunge/2009/02/02/1233423135909.html
The argument you’re using Dario is the one the government will use if the economy does turn into recession, as Dennis Shanahan concludes:
[The Labor Government is trying to “save the furniture” during a disaster and if it does fail to prevent a recession it will be able to argue that the situation is much worse overseas and would have been much worse if it hadn’t acted.]
Not that Rudd’s argument would be particularly persuasive.
More AC:
[There’s to be none of this “play the ball, not the man” nonsense.
With steely deliberation, the PM kicked the ball to the sideline yesterday and went straight for the squirrel grip.]
lol
[A recession involves two successive quarters of negative growth but Mr Rudd said yesterday the Government would “move heaven and earth to try and keep growth positive”.]
GP, stop being a tool. He’s not going to say “bring on a recession!”.
GP, the comments are irrelevant because of the CONTEXT of the spending programs is completely different.
While the political consequences will i think, be positive for the ALP in the short to medium term, i think that if Howard was still in power he would hold off on the spending too long so that he could do it closer to the 2010 election.
Rudd is nailing his colors to the mast on this one and will sink or sail in 2010 based on the ALP’s actions now. That’s good because if this spending is going to lessen the effect of the downturn (and that remains to be seen, although i think it will), action needs to be taken now, a ways out from the next election.