Essential Research has two-party preferred at 50-50, with both major parties up on the primary vote: the Coalition by a point to 43%, Labor by two to 38%. The Greens are down a point to 8%, the Palmer United Party down one to 3% and others down to two to 7%. Also covered:
• Only 4% rate Peter Cosgrove “not a good choice” for Governor-General, with 30%, 34% and 11% respectively rating the choice excellent, good and acceptable.
• Forty-three per cent are happy for the Governor-General to be appointed by the government, with 40% favouring direct election.
• Sixty-one per cent think unions “important for Australian working people today”, compared with only 30% who think them not important, with 45% thinking workers would be better off if unions were stronger compared with 27% for worse off.
• In response to a question which first explains the specifics of the government’s policy, including the $150,000 ceiling and 1.5% levy, only 23% favoured the government scheme over 36% for the current policy and 32% for neither.
• There are also questions on the prevalence on various forms of intolerance, which you can read about in the report.
Dave
So learn. Make the next style Accord more balanced.
mb
The PNAS article quotes a 95% confidence interval.
Those that missed Howes at NPC can see for themselves.
@abc730: #abc730 tonight: calls for more support for anorexia, @howespaul interviewed, #SpringSt’s eventful wk, & Bruce @Springsteen’s dedicated fans
guytaur@693
See above. It “worked” because businesses benefited the most.
When the trouble past, employers again came after the unions.
Keating was very critical of such and I think hawke as well.
If anyone thinks abbott or the employers can be trusted on anything after work choices, car industry, SPCA etc etc they are deluded.
@rummel/692
And Turnbull will never be again a Leader ;P
I noticed Treasury today revealed that in 2023 1% of GDP is forecast to be $26Billion.
Firstly i think that is unlikely as i suspect the economy will have a GDP close to 2 Trillion than 2.6 Trillion.
Even so if the forecast is right the budget position looks somewhat better than and may not require as deep cuts as Joe seems to think we need.
dave
So you think its impossible to learn from past mistakes.
We know the approach works because Germany is using it to great effect.
[ citizen
Posted Wednesday, February 5, 2014 at 6:17 pm | Permalink
On the other hand, companies like Google know that their future prosperity depends on a prosperous population.]
It helps if you pay next to no tax on Billions of income ?
The Accord did work but Dave is right (see we do agree 😉 the Accord benefit business as it keep wages down, for a period real wage growth was close too if not actually negative but overall it set benefit the economy in the long run as it helped to break the back of inflation which helped create 22 years of growth.
@MB/706
Much is dependent on China/USA, unfortunately.
You also have to take into account the fact that many farmers are elderly, and the ABS tables show that elderly men have the highest suicide incidence. The most likely reason Old MacDonald hangs himself on his farm is that he’s 80, Mrs MacDonald has died, all the kids have moved to the city, and he has been diagnosed with cancer. Maybe a drought makes his despair worse, but there is no reason why younger, mentally healthy farmers would kill themselves because there’s a drought. There have always been droughts, and all Australian farmers experience them. When there’s a drought, they get relief payments – it’s not like they’re watching their children starve.
rummel@692
howes would agree with that.
Not me.
pseph
given that guns are the preferred form of suicide out here, many of the deaths are recorded as ‘accidental’ or ‘hunting accidents’.
mexicanbeemer@699
The problem is abbott and the BCA want to reduce existing condition and restrict any future pay rises after swearing fifty ways to sunday prior to the election that it wasn’t the case.
The Accord on paper looks like wages did not rise, but only if you are too dumb to ignore the superannuation guarantee levy, which was in lieu of wage rises.
guytaur@701
How is trust re-established ?
Who in their right mind would even consider trusting abbott – or howe for that matter? He was bragged about knifing when he didn’t have the brains to shut up.
Not foreman material by any means.
Dave
Evertime you mention trust you nention Abbott.
Abbott is irrelevant. As Centre will tell you business will tell Abbott to get lost when it suits them.
ruawake@715
Spot on. Then as things improved business didn’t want to pay the super but couldn’t get out of it.
They still rant about “paying it”.
Another trade off was reduced tax on workers pay in lieu of pay increases.
But business took the relief then went back to putting in the boot. Nothing was ever enough for them.
Add abbott to the equation FFS.
[ guytaur
Posted Wednesday, February 5, 2014 at 6:53 pm | Permalink
Dave
Evertime you mention trust you nention Abbott.
Abbott is irrelevant. ]
He is at the centre of it all.
Believe otherwise, up to you – sit back and see what unfolds.
Yes actually Paul Howes made the very valid point that if the issues are criminal in nature then we already haev the policy and the ACC and raised the point that if it would be better to invest extra resources into the ACC rather than setting up a Royal Commission.
Zoidy
The GDP results are based on the measures of Consumption, Investment, Government Expenditure and Net Exports.
There is more to Asia than China and over the next view years we will need to look more across the region.
I can’t see the economy growing between now and 2023 from 1.5Billion to 2.6Billion but as we have seen in recent years forecasting is no easy task.
[Maybe a drought makes his despair worse, but there is no reason why younger, mentally healthy farmers would kill themselves because there’s a drought. ]
The person who was mentally healthy becomes mentally unhealthy due to financial stresses during a drought.
People who lose their jobs are at a higher risk of suicide for the same reason.
policy = police
dave
For now
I also heard Abbott say they would make decision on Sydney’s second airport in their third term.
I guess that’s as good as saying never from a one term guvmint.
1.5Billion to 2.6Billion should be 1.5 Trillion to 2.6 Trillion
mikehilliard
[I also heard Abbott say they would make decision on Sydney’s second airport in their third term.]
Unless of course he actually said “..in their Turd term” in which case it could happen any moment now.
The 2nd Sydney airport is a interesting public policy challenge.
We have the NIMBY crowd, epitomised by Ed Husic who is looking for votes and not much more. We have Albo, ho wants traffic over his electorate minimised. We have the Daily ToiletPaper rooting for ‘development for the West’, and O’Barrell not wanting to scare the horses as his main political strategy.
Abbott wants a signature achievement to defray his gaffe-a-day prime minister-ship fast descending into the #WorstGuvmintEver.
Dio
I don’t know whether stats are going to do it. You need some genuine feelpinions. Or maybe you could call in the Oracle at Delphi for some real guesses.
Or maybe you could get Howes to opinionate some facts.
Some more ABS stats, comparing urban and regional suicide rates —
http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Products/3309.0~2010~Chapter~Geography?OpenDocument
One confounding factor in any analysis would be whether Indigenous suicides are included in ‘rural’ suicide stats.
The cited paper also says that the suicide rate declines in rural females > 30 during droughts and that, distinct from Europe, the rural suicide rate rises in spring. Making conclusions from this data is risky.
BUT if we do assume that farmers facing financial stress are at higher risk of suicide is this unique or a special case distinct from other males facing financial ruin and why have the Nats turned it into a cliche in their attempts to featherbed their constituents?
z
This is a good review paper on rural suicides in Australia.
I do hope that all those people who insulted the Bali police, etc, etc, etc, have now learned what scombroid poisoning is, have got an inkling of the possible interactions between scombroid poisoning and the many, many prescription medicines found in the bedroom of the deceased, and have apologised for their nastiness and their racism.
Oops
http://www.riverinabluebell.org.au/files/Suicide-in-Rural-and-Remote-Areas-of-Australia.pdf
OC
[BUT if we do assume that farmers facing financial stress are at higher risk of suicide is this unique or a special case distinct from other males facing financial ruin and why have the Nats turned it into a cliche in their attempts to featherbed their constituents?]
Well, that is a variation on my original question which was about what would be an appropriate way to consider suicide as an outcome of policy implementation.
BW
[have got an inkling of the possible interactions between scombroid poisoning and the many, many prescription medicines found in the bedroom of the deceased,]
Perhaps you could educate us about possible interactions between scombroid poisoning and the prescription medications?
Boerwar
Damn good point. They would swamp any other demographic.
OC
[BUT if we do assume that farmers facing financial stress are at higher risk of suicide is this unique or a special case distinct from other males facing financial ruin and why have the Nats turned it into a cliche in their attempts to featherbed their constituents?]
I agree that it’s likely that the rise in suicidal behaviour in financially struggling farmers would probably be much the same as for any group facing financial ruin.
OC
I did outline it earlier — can’t get out of the situation, can’t stay there without taking on more debt, throw in isolation (can be miles to the next farm; can’t afford to travel if money’s really tight), in a really bad drought there’s absolutely nothing to do…so the farmer sits in the living room staring out at dirt all day.
When there’s a drought, the small business owners and rural suppliers also face financial hardship, of course – but they don’t have to go into debt just to stay where they are (they have the option of just closing the doors, farmers don’t have that) and they’re not isolated.
I once visited a thirty something guy whose mother had just died. He lived on a farm 2 k from his nearest neighbour and over 30 k from the nearest town (one pub, we couldn’t get a meal there after 6 pm) and 100k from the nearest regional centre of any size. His only outing was the sheep sales.
I went away wondering how he’d ever find a wife. He probably spent days at a time without seeing another human being.
Re: 2nd sydney airport – so the government have made the decision to make a decision – some time.
Perhaps that is an improvement over the ALP that, in recent times, seemed to regularly announce they would make a decision, but only the wrong decision.
I actually don’t think air traffic will grow as they project and thus a 2nd airport is probably unnecessary, but the actual experts say it is necessary, and that Badgerys Creek is the only sensible choice.
But the ALP simply couldn’t make that decision, and that is a big black mark against Albo in my book.
The stupid thing about NIMBYism over Badgerys Creek is that it has been the obvious choice for 25 years hasn’t it? Who could possibly be legitimately “surprised” if it is announced as the site?
Dio
Not me.
It was the people who were immediately convinced that foul play was afoot and that the Bali police were going to cover it up. These people already knew that the many drugs in the rooms and the some that had been ingested and had made absolutely no difference to the deaths.
If you want to know about figures on farmers committing suicide I think Bob Katter would be a good source.
I do not agree with him on lots of issues but have no doubts as to his commitment to this issue.
Diogenes
Not just financial stress. Many of them are custodians of farms that have been in the family for decades/generations. They have the added pressure that they are to “blame” for losing that legacy.
Howes on 7:30 now
Possum Comitatus @Pollytics 15m
RT @[Protected]: Watch this clip to see the damage that arseface Paul Howes is doing: http://cl.ly/0O410Y0s023S
Stephen Koukoulas @TheKouk 13m
@Pollytics like an under 7 rugby player. Not sure which way to run and unable to listen when told
I suggest that one of the difficulties for farmers has the same wellspring that causes many farmers to be climate denialists.
If you have rugged individualism as your core ideology, then failure is not only financial it is failure of the self.
The link to denialism for this mob is, I believe, ideological rather than scientific. The ideology says that climate science must be wrong because it is socialism dressed up as science.
Ellis makes a good point………
Re Ian Thorphe he says that forcing young kids barely of school, age to a decade or more of the daily grind of work needed to make them successful in the harsh world of competitive swimming…. is little short of child abus
BW
[These people already knew that the many drugs in the rooms and the some that had been ingested and had made absolutely no difference to the deaths.]
My point is that the medications the ladies had did not contribute in any way to them dying of scombroid poisoning. If anything, their asthma meds and antihistamines would have helped.
I think they got very unlucky. It seems their asthma made their airways hypersensitive to histamine.
poroti
[Not just financial stress. Many of them are custodians of farms that have been in the family for decades/generations. They have the added pressure that they are to “blame” for losing that legacy.]
Very true.
Diog
the report on the deaths on ABC AM this morning said that, because they were asthmatics (as indicated by the medications) they were more likely to have a severe reaction.