The big story in polling this week was no story at all, with Newspoll still yet to resume after its summer break. This has inevitably excited the attention of conspiracy theorists, but if Newspoll takes the field this weekend it will be acting just as it did after the 2010 election, when its first post-New Year poll was conducted in the first weekend in February. In an off week for the fortnightly Morgan series, that just leaves an Essential Research to add to the mix for BludgerTrack, which accordingly records next to no change on last week. Labor does at least reach a new high of 39.5% on the primary vote, putting it within a hair’s breadth of the Coalition. The seat projection is entirely unchanged, with nothing significant happening on the state breakdowns for voting intention. It should be noted that there is still no data from any of the big live-interview phone pollsters this year, all observations this year coming from Essential, Morgan and ReachTEL.
[Federal Labor leader Bill Shorten says he won’t engage in the “fantasy” of a new compact on workplace relations, saying he doesn’t believe Prime Minister Tony Abbott wants to work with unions.]
Shorten is Churchill to Howes’ Chamberlain. 😉
“UK weather: Britain battered by 90mph storms – and there’s worse to come”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/topics/weather/10620681/UK-weather-Britain-battered-by-90mph-storms-and-theres-worse-to-come.html
Just as I suspected, Howes’ speech has been a life line to abbott. The SPC/Stone fight is off the agenda, and abbott will be able to paint shorten as ‘unreasonable’ and to the left of the unions. abbott will even pretend that he’s prepared to enter into a compact with employers and the unions, knowing full well that the unions will not agree to some of his conditions – he will then paint them and shorten as the wreckers to his conciliatory/consensus approach. He will make labor look divided over IR.
The original accord greatly weakened union power – I remember during the 1980s wages for many fell in real terms as a result of it. It centralised power within the unions and made it easier for the labor right to form blocs and control unions that were more about power within labor than representing members. The demise of the unions and the lack of platform/principles within the labor party grew out of the accord and centralised power.
Keating’s vision for IR was closer to workchoices than most in the labor movement, and the NSW labor right spawns many more adherents of Hayek (the economist, not the looker), Friedman and Rand, than it does of Obama, Chomsky, Gailbraith, Coombes, Keynes, Robert Reich, Whitlam, Curtain, Uren, Cairns). Labor and the LNP sing from the same dry economic thatcherite song sheet – with labor at least trying to create opportunity for the less well off, but ultimately it is about giving the big end of town free reign regardless of social and environmental impacts and weakening of democracy and social infrastructure (i.e. the will of the people) to achieve this if this contradicts market forces (i.e. the will of those with capital). The long term vision of what Australia will be like in the future of the NSW right and LNP are very close. There is no vision of what a sustainable and fairer community might look like and how we might move toward this. The Gillard government, with the indies and greens, made some steps toward this (carbon pricing, Gonski, NDIS, NBN, etc), and look where that got her.
SF
Abbott the liar is not off the agenda. Neither is SPC. Be sure Shorten will be putting firmly back on agenda in upcoming presser.
Sustainable future
[The demise of the unions and the lack of platform/principles within the labor party grew out of the accord and centralised power.]
There any many former unionists who believe Hawke was the biggest traitor of the worker
guytaur
I doubt SPC workers have now given fhe Abbott govt a free pass because of Howes speech to fhe NPC
[julianburnside @JulianBurnside 6m
Transfield will take over support and welfare services of refugees, replacing the Salvos. A construction company! Not kidding]
[Stilgherrian @stilgherrian 8m
“NBC: All Visitors to Sochi Olympics Immediately Hacked”. Oh good work.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/nbc-all-visitors-sochi-olympics-immediately-hacked_778718.html … HT @clmazin via @skribe ]
victoria
Best line in Howes speech Labor people should be spreading to counter Abbott is
[Penalty rates are the workers safety net]
lizzie
[A construction company! Not kidding]
Sounds good but it’s been many decades since Transfield was just a ‘construction company’.
CTar1
The Salvation Army not the flavour of the month, either.
And then there’s Serco.
I like Syvret’s tweets.
[Paul Syvret @PSyvret Feb 4
Do #SPC allowances include funding personal libraries, book promo tours, expenses for mates’ weddings, and cycling trips? #auspol]
@chrispytweets: This is adorable. A 6yo has organised a bake-off and donated its profit ($40) to the ABC to help ensure its future http://t.co/a94CAjp7Ws
lizzie
So the NSA are also in Sochi then ? 😉
[Penalty rates are the workers safety net
]
If that is what they are they should go immediately.
lizzie
[not the flavour of the month].
That’s for sure.
“@chrisberg: “Joe Hockey could still provide assistance to Qantas saying the government’s edict about ending corporate welfare does not apply…””
[Abbott the liar is not off the agenda. Neither is SPC. Be sure Shorten will be putting firmly back on agenda in upcoming presser.]
I hope you are right, but howes’ timing was terrible.
[There any many former unionists who believe Hawke was the biggest traitor of the worker]
it is what (aided and abetted by the Herald Sun and channel 9 news) turned my extended in-laws and all their friends from factory-working, truck driving and tradiie union members and died-in-the-wool labor voters into Howard ‘aspirationals’. Their kids and grandkids (tight breeding cycle in some branches of the family) are now rabid anti-labor and anti-greens tea-party types. christmas gatherings are fun.
@guytaur/117
Hockey could do alot of things, but acting on it – he ain’t.
109 & 115
Penalty rates are there because not all time is equal.
Weekend time is more valuable than weekday time because that common daytime meeting time for the majority of the population.
Evening and night time are more valuable than daytime because they are family and sleep time.
Overtime is more valuable because it means that more of a week is used up by work.
[His comments that he was clear on in his speech are broad generalisations aimed at business leaders and unions. NOT politicians.
]
Just like Gillards won’t be ruled by men in blue ties comment – how is that going for her. Howes put the spotlight on himself (big surprise) took the heat off Abbott and gave shorten a problem I don’t think he could have done much more damage if he tried.
“@TheKouk: Export values booming. With prices flat to slightly down, volumes must be huge”
WWP
You show you miss the entire point of the speech
Abbott on next 10 minutes. Will he get booed too?
“@TheKouk: Annualised pace of growth in retail sales was 6.5% over final 6 months of 2013. Strong.”
@sspencer_63: Seconds til @chriskkenny explodes? RT @Simon_Cullen ABC/The Australian joint investigation for @4corners http://t.co/L9FYaixC1s
@GrogsGamut: @sspencer_63 bloody advertising. Mark Scott must resign.
[Latika Bourke @latikambourke 2m
ABC’s MD Mark Scott sighs wearily – the media loves talking about the media. Says one newspaper is obsessed. Even QandA spent 30mins on it.]
Well, well!! We’ve been tired of it for years.
Abbott on 24 now
[Abbott the liar is not off the agenda. Neither is SPC. Be sure Shorten will be putting firmly back on agenda in upcoming presser.]
Abbott can just point out that even Howes agrees that workers in some sectors are getting paid too much and say SPC is one of those and that’s made it unviable.
It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not to Abbott.
[ Penalty rates are the workers safety net
]
No they aren’t. They are compensation for working at shitty hours. God I used to hate doing overnight shifts. The penalty rates made it slightly less painful.
Breezway have a committed sustainable housing agenda, I wonder how that fits with Abbott’s philosophy on the carbon tax.
“@latikambourke: RT @steveheraldsun: Ford to make announcement today, sources say hundreds of jobs will go in June”
@BrendanDonohoe7: Napthine govt loses vote on Parliament Budget Office bill. Geoff Shaw votes with Labor to withdraw bill and redraft
BH
Journalists talking to journalists about journalism. Riveting it ain’t. One day the media types will figure out that the rest of the population isn’t nearly as interested in them as they think.
I dunno how many jobs give been lost in the media over the ladt few years … A few thousand? Haven’t seen too much concern out in the streets for poor redundant journos.
How dare this man talk about relentless negativity. I give in on politics.
@guytaur/131
Abbott single handily destroyed a jobs sector under 6 months.
Diogenes
Penalty rates probably helped me buy a slightly better house than otherwise. But that wasn’t much compensation for missing out on family life.
Abbott runs from Ford questions
dtt
[. Always believe what they are saying. The public has an uncanny knack of sniffing out insincerity ]
Yeah, that’s why Tony Abbott got elected.
zoomster @ 138
Touche!
This is where Ford Jobs going, pitty our local media didn’t do anything about it.
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-02-04/news/47004985_1_ford-motor-co-ecosport-product-development
Not sure that extending an olive branch to the government – with the government predictably knocking it back – is that bad a strategy for the unions.
dtt
and – I’ll also point out – you’re confusing good oratory for good government.
I’d rather someone who delivered a bad speech and actually governed well. Your list of ‘good’ politicians is a bit worrying.
markjs
[Howes has demonstrated his lack of judgement and desire to appease the sociopaths running the Liberal party before …when will he learn that appeasement is ALWAYS seen by such people as a weakness to exploit…?]
A bit late but you are absolutely spot on!
z
[Not sure that extending an olive branch to the government – with the government predictably knocking it back – is that bad a strategy for the unions.]
Abbott hasn’t knocked it back in words, but he certainly will in actions later. Shorten has knocked back Howes’ approach.
I did point out earlier that to some hammers, Howes is a nail.
Amused to see how that’s working out so far….
diog
Shorten did not knock back Howes approach. He just knocked back expecting results from Abbott
[Shorten did not knock back Howes approach. He just knocked back expecting results from Abbott]
In other words Howes’ approach wouldn’t work.
Diog
Howes approach was not aimed at Abbott
[@chrispytweets: This is adorable. A 6yo has organised a bake-off and donated its profit ($40) to the ABC to help ensure its future http://t.co/a94CAjp7Ws%5D
The kid is a feminist/Stalinist subversive, indoctrinated by Peppa Pig’s brainwashing. Wait till Piers hears about this!
Abbott response to Howes
http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbott-rejects-paul-howes-proposal-of-an-accord-with-unions-as-very-1980s-20140206-322vy.html