First up, please note the threads below this one dealing with state politics in South Australia and New South Wales.
The BludgerTrack poll aggregate continues to inch in the Coalition’s direction with the addition of the Essential Research poll, the only one published this week. Whereas Labor finished 2018 with a lead of 54.4-45.6, the latest result has it at 53.1-46.9, which is a 0.4% shift compared with a week ago. However, this only makes one seat’s difference on the seat projection, with a projected gain for the Coalition in New South Wales. No new results for the leadership ratings this week.
Full results are available through the link below. There is a bit of bug here that often stops the state breakdowns from loading when you click on the tabs – I will get around to fixing this one day, but for the time being, it should work if you do a hard refresh.
sprocket_ @ #957 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 1:04 pm
Sprocket
Agreed by whom
The corrupt Razak PM/government.
You obviously have missed the whole bloody point of the ussue and WHY the HC rejected it. The deal had so many legal holes it did not stack up
FFS these people were going to Malaysia FOREVER. You need more than a handshake with a bribery enthusiast to guarantee safety. They had no bloody WORKING rights. How the hell were they supposed to LIVE. Sure we would educate thir kids and help with medical costs but if they cannot work that is pretty bloody useless.
There probably are a small number of people who will be significantly affected by the franked credits policy, maybe 5%. Couldn’t Labor bring in a policy allowing the first $10K to be a tax credit and the rest not a credit?
Player One says:
But why would any of them be sent here ? Didn’t all those government people tell us how medical facilities/treatment available to AS are as good as that for Australians?
Peter Stanton @ #829 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 11:25 am
Hi peter,
Just spent two weeks at Cabarita Beach north of Byron Bay . Wandered down there and had a couple of nice cold ales at the pub overlooking the Beach. Byron seems very commercial. But we enjoyed anyways. We had a terrific time overall and enjoyed traipsing around a lovely part of the world.
From the people we met, there is a high level of environmental awareness and pride.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/one-in-three-nauru-refugees-to-seek-medical-help-in-australia-under-phelps-bill-expert-says-20190208-p50wg9.html
lizzie @ #950 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 1:36 pm
Lizzie.
That sums it up. Most of them would not know an amendment from cement mixer.
And they are paid heaps. It is a good gig for very little work.
TPOF: “For the vast bulk of people on a defined benefit pension, including myself and everyone on a defined benefit pension that I know, the value as determined by the super fund and reported to the ATO is below $1.6 million.”
I’m sure that you will agree that the calculation which the ATO uses for this – that $1 in pension is equivalent to $16 in accumulated assets – is generous to those who have defined benefit pensions, particularly those who are under 65 years of age. Financial advisers tend to suggest that you need accumulated assets of around $25 to generate $1 of retirement income.
It is of course a complex policy area. Defined benefit super and accumulated super are two completely different beasts. People with accumulated super have the opportunity to significantly supplement their recurrent investment income by steadily whittling down their assets, knowing that – at a certain point – they will land on the safety net of the aged pensions. People with defined benefit pension incomes are generally stuck with that income in real terms until the day they die. And they will have no ability to leave any of that asset to their offspring.
It is for this reason that some investment advisors – including that barefoot bloke – advise people that accumulated super taken as a lump sum is in many ways a good thing and might enable them to retire earlier than they could on a superannuation pension. And the same thing applies to the people who are living off their share investments and drawing on the dividend imputation credit who, as several posters have suggested, would probably do better to start gradually divesting themselves of their portfolios. And I would be strongly in favour of a policy change that gently and gradually pushed them in that direction.
And, more broadly, I think both sides of politics would do well to promote better understanding of the retirement income system more generally. Turnbull’s reforms a couple of years back were not well presented or explained, and Labor has done even worse with this proposed change IMO.
Retirement incomes are a complex policy area in which questions of what is/is not fair and appropriate are not as clear to most affected people as they appear to be to the gung ho element among the posters on PB. And that’s why any government looking to change things in this area would always do well to adopt a considered, consultative and holistic approach.
Instead, Labor has put forward a swingeing, isolated policy change, and has adopted a sales pitch along the lines of “it’s a rort, it’s got to go, we’re tough, we’re not going to back down, suck it up self-funded retirees.”
I don’t think this is ever going to be a good way of going about reform.
DTT
It is precisely hysterical responses like yours, which shipwrecked a principled approach to a wicked problem – and led to years of misery and death.
Diogenes
says:
Sunday, February 10, 2019 at 2:12 pm
There probably are a small number of people who will be significantly affected by the franked credits policy, maybe 5%. Couldn’t Labor bring in a policy allowing the first $10K to be a tax credit and the rest not a credit?
____________________________
sounds fair to me.
Player One @ #962 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:05 pm
Indeed. The Storer/Phelps bill hopefully gets enough support to pass parliament.
There are 9 councillors on the Byron Shire Council, four of which are Greens: Martin, Richardson, Lyon and Nydiaye.
Five are not Greens affiliated, the majority are not Greens affiliated.
Rex Douglas @ #934 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 1:42 pm
Nope. That just gives you a Leave Pass to keep behaving the way you have been, which is not good for the blog, as people other than I have attested to.
I lay at the feet of the Greens the fault of sabotaging the Malaysia deal and the result which has been a living Hell and death for refugees and asylum seekers in Australia’s off-shore detention centres. Any chance of me voting Green was lost forever.
The Greens are the enemy of Labor. Given the chance to have 60% of a good deal they will always opt for 100% of kicking Labor in the guts.
Exactly but tinkering around the edges is all that ever happens. For example, you only have to look at how the Henry Tax Review and its recommendations were basically ignored.
Short-termism in action.
lizzie @ #963 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 1:55 pm
Lizzie,
The normalisation of race hatred in Australia, as role-modelled by those outstanding humanitarians known as the Coalition, is a modern tragedy. We could have been so much better them the race-baiting and hard right anti-human polices green-lighted by that war criminal John Howard.
I despair at times.
Diogenes @ #965 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:12 pm
I notice you have changed your avatar. I must admit that George Orwell is an improvement on Silvio Berlusconi.
Last night was one of those occasions where I felt really bad to be the publisher of this blog. The Christopher Pyne thing was only part of the issue, and matters have certainly not improved today. So I’m of a mind to be more interventionist moving forward. I’m far from clear this will actually do more good than harm, but I at least have to try something. So if your comment is abusive towards another commenter, or part of a boring personal spat of no imaginable interest to anyone other than the two people engaged in it, don’t be surprised if it gets chopped; and if it does, please deal with the fact like a grown-up who understands whose blog this is, unlike some ex-commenters I could name.
WeWantPaul @ #905 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 11:49 am
I’ll just leave this here:
“On 1 January 2017, more than 330,000 Age Pensioners had their Age Pension entitlements cut, with at least 100,000 of those affected Australians losing all Age Pension entitlements.”
https://www.superguide.com.au/smsfs/300000-retired-australians-to-lose-some-or-all-age-pension-entitlements
Puff
I have been watching quite a lot of SBS 33 lately, and it is one area where different cultures are celebrated.
Perhaps anyone who dislikes migrants and ‘ethnics’ should forswear any of their foods. 😀
Rex & Player One
“Christopher Pyne admits that all those in offshore detention require urgent medial attention”
ALL … REQUIRE!
Is there some reason you are compelled to misquote people?
Payne said “They could all qualify,” he told the ABC’s Insiders program.
From your own ABC link.
Could qualify isn’t the same as your attribution in the slightest.
Greens .. expert in verbaling.
“veteran #CBR journalist, now deceased, once told me that most journalists have no idea how the rules of Parliament and the #APS work, and care less, they are there for the political drama”
As was demonstrated by the comments on Insiders this morning that there was nothing to stop the Government introducing legislation in the next few weeks to implement some of Hayne’s recommendations. And the example of national security legislation – which has sometimes passed through parliament very quickly – was raised.
In the real world, national security legislation is drafted quickly only in the event of a clear and present threat. No government in its right mind wants to rush through the legislative drafting process, given the ever-present risk of 1) loopholes which can let the intended targets of the legislation off the hook and 2) unforeseen and unintended consequences that can make the whole situation even worse than it is now.
But, of course, if – like the Press Gallery – you are preoccupied with the daily drama, then the current state of play is that Labor holds an advantage re banks and the best way for the Libs to counteract that is to be seen to be doing something immediately.
I have to say that, with of all of her faults, the one journo I have observed over the years who has taken the time to try to understand how the governmental process (as opposed to the political process) actually works is Michelle Grattan. And I’d give honourable mentions to Jim Middleton and Chris Uhlmann.
You’d think that the ‘superior money managers’ might take notice of this, but they are more intent on torture by confinement.
chuckle.
WB: “Last night was one of those occasions where I felt really bad to be the publisher of this blog. The Christopher Pyne thing was only part of the issue, and matters have certainly not improved today. So I’m of a mind to be more interventionist moving forward. I’m far from clear this will actually do more good than harm, but I at least have to try something. So if your comment is abusive towards another commenter, or part of a boring personal spat of no imaginable interest to anyone other than the two people engaged in it, don’t be surprised if it gets chopped; and if it does, please deal with the fact like a grown-up who understands whose blog this is, unlike some ex-commenters I could name.”
Dear Blog Overlord. I support your comment 100%
I personally find any ad hominem attack directed towards me rather comical, given that my cyber identity is a fantasy and – to the best of my knowledge – I have never personally met anybody who posts on this blog. However, it is clear that some posters do find these sorts of attacks to be hurtful. And any one ad hominem attack tends to start a spat of them.
As for potentially defamatory posts about public figures: I would suggest you should always delete them asap. They are dangerous both for you and potentially the person who made the post.
The no tax paid franking rort has blown out from a few hundred million a year to several billion. Grandfathering such excess would jut reward people who have plenty if assets.
The scenario seems to be that people want to uncover their family tree, and being entrepreneurial you start a DNA lab that accepts samples and specialises in finding others just like them. To do this your company must entice lots of people to submit samples. So you start by offering general incentives to your customers, such as the thrill of getting a 3% Neanderthal result, or double checking that they’re not about to marry a half-sibling.
After time there are lots of records in the your database, and your sales pitch gets better as you get better matches, so the samples keep coming. Then law enforcement comes knocking on the door. They want your help to find the relatives of a person or the actual person who they suspect did a bad thing. So you treat the law as any other entity and help them too. Then your customers find out. Now what?
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/salvadorhernandez/family-tree-dna-fbi-investigative-genealogy-privacy
Sceptic @ #972 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:42 pm
Well, I’m not a Green, but I don’t see any substantive difference between “qualify” and “require” medical attention.
Are you trying to say that someone who qualifies for medical evacuation might not actually require it?
Don’t forget that we’re not talking about simple cuts and bruises here – we’re talking something sufficiently serious to qualify for medical evacuation to another country.
Can you give an example?
Spence @ #977 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:54 pm
And will get bigger if left unchecked.
The Budget can’t afford this John Howard inspired rort!
I don’t have a problem with the concept of imputation which simply means the owners of a business, the shareholders, pay tax on company profits distributed to them at their marginal tax rate.
Simply a company earns a before tax profit of $100, pays $30 tax, and then distributes the $70 to a shareholder fully franked. The shareholder declares the grossed up amount of $100 as income, pays tax at their marginal rate on the $100, and receives the franking credit of $30 as a reduction of their tax calculation.
The problem arises where people arrange their affairs so their income is tax exempt and therefore get a full refund of the franking credits. However there will be a lot of other people, who are not wealthy, earn modest incomes, have a marginal tax rate below 30% and who will lose some of the value of their franking credits. It’s these folks who are being ignored in all the rhetoric over this issue.
“Can you please explain clearly what is wrong with my analysis”
Malaysian solution would have been a start at cutting things off at the head of the pipeline, having genuine model start to go in place for regional processing. Perfect solution…no…but better than anything else that has gone on the table.
To say that anyone should be thankful to the greens for their part in that ridiculous.
And no, i often dont read all your posts. Experience shows they are generally too long and full of crap, but occasionally a response other than scroll past is justified when they are almost too stupid for words…almost.
Player One @ #979 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:55 pm
The issue for the Government is that it would be used a s a wedge. Because it’s an entitlement, patients would need to come to Australia for assessment (regardless of whether they succeed or not). Once here, then, there are plenty of lawyers to stop them going back.
“and if it does, please deal with the fact like a grown-up who understands whose blog this is”
heard that. All good and sorry if i have been a bit cranky of late. 🙁 Will try to make more use of the scroll wheel than keyboard in the future..
Grandfathering is not a solution unless it has a time limit on it however means testing should be considered.
Greensborough Growler says:
Sunday, February 10, 2019 at 2:14 pmHi peter,
Just spent two weeks at Cabarita Beach north of Byron Bay . Wandered down there and had a couple of nice cold ales at the pub overlooking the Beach. Byron seems very commercial. But we enjoyed anyways. We had a terrific time overall and enjoyed traipsing around a lovely part of the world.
From the people we met, there is a high level of environmental awareness and pride.
————————————–
I agree Greeny, Byron is a very nice place. I have had quite a few cold ales at the Beach Hotel, there a few better places to have one. It used to have great bands on the weekends as well. We used to spend time there regularly, it was our preferred “get away from the rat race” place. In the last 10 years or so it has steadily lost its alternative character. The Greens, supported by a few green inclined others have controlled the council for some years. Since then there has been little spent on local infrastructure. Roads are crumbling into chains of potholes. Traffic has become chaotic and many of the unique small business have closed and been replaced by national chain stores. Maybe I am judging it a bit harshly because I compare it with what it was 25 years ago.
Player One
Please just read the quote in ABC link or listen to the interview, no one other than Rex/ yourself implied ALL would require urgent medical attention.
What is happening to the refugees is a tragedy not helped by misquoting people.
Better to stick to the truth & the facts
WB , heartily support your proposed actions. Lost count of the dead hours spent scrolling past interminable pissing contests!
The amazing thing about Pyne’s interview this a.m. is his basic admission that there are a large number detainees with medical problems that can’t be treated where they are and the Government is completely unapologetic about denying them treatment.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-10/all-refugees-on-manus-nauru-qualify-medical-transfer-coalition/10797592
meher baba @ #989 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:53 pm
It’s not just that abuse/bullying is hurtful to the victim – and it can be to some victims – but from a blog administrators point of view, it’s a terrible look for the blog. There should be enough respect for the administrator from users to not have him required to moderate such posts.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-47187604?ocid=socialflow_twitter
Dog’s Breakfast
Look on the bright side. You have an index finger that can snap 4x2s.
Greensborough Growler @ #983 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 3:00 pm
That may indeed be the case. But I still don’t see sceptic’s point 🙁
If “all could qualify” for medical treatment (and that’s a direct quote), doesn’t that imply that they all require some kind of treatment?
What medical condition qualifies you for an international medical evacuation but doesn’t require treatment?
An example might help.
lizzie: “You’d think that the ‘superior money managers’ might take notice of this, but they are more intent on torture by confinement.”
With respect, I would suggest that Phelps – like many others who hold strong views against the current policy re unauthorised boat arrivals – subscribes to the school of thought that they are all people fleeing particular adverse circumstances and there will always be a limited number of these.
The opposite point of view, consistently held by the Coalition and quite often by Labor (but not early in Rudd’s first term and possibly not at the moment), is that the boats departing Indonesia to Australia are part of a racket and, unless we take action to disrupt it, this racket will bring ever-growing numbers of asylum seekers to our shores, with a substantial and rising cost to government across a range of areas of expenditure.
I have sat through enough dinner party arguments about this issue to know that most Australians are firmly on one side of this debate or the other and are not going to move. Arguably, the majority of all Australians are on the Government’s side and the majority of educated, middle class people are on Kerryn Phelps’s side. The fact that, these days, the majority of White, educated, middle class people are supporters of Labor or other left-of-centre parties makes it a particularly difficult policy issue for Labor, which -unlike Dr Phelps – needs to gain the support of a broad range of Australians in order to be elected.
Prof Kerryn Phelps AM
@drkerrynphelps
6h6 hours ago
It costs $400k a year to hold an asylum seeker in offshore detention
$239k to hold them in detention in Australia
less than $100k for an asylum seeker to live in community detention
around $40k for an asylum seeker to live in the community on bridging visa https://www.kaldorcentre.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/Factsheet_Cost%20of%20Australias%20asylum%20and%20refugee%20policy_Aug2018.pdf …
____
I think Phelps might be a better medico than an accountant. Those per head costs are bases almost all upon allocated costs from fixed overheads and fixed operating costs. Most of the costs offshore would remain if half of the refugees there were removed.
Barney in Go Dau @ #988 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 2:04 pm
Perhaps the reasoning is that were they to do that it would open the door to admitting fault.
Re Virginia and what’s going on over there.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/yes-politicians-wore-blackface-it-used-to-be-all-american-fun/2019/02/08/821b268c-2b0d-11e9-b011-d8500644dc98_story.html?utm_term=.9dfb7827b75a
Player One @ #993 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 3:06 pm
Everyone in Australia qualifies for medical attention. But, I only go to the doctor a couple of times a year.
Apart for treatment for insanity. Everyone knows it’s hereditary and you get it from your kids!
Barney in Go Dau @ #989 Sunday, February 10th, 2019 – 3:04 pm
However, Malcolm Farr correctly notes the bind it puts Bill Shorten in (which is exactly where the Coalition wants him);
https://www.news.com.au/national/politics/scott-morrison-has-just-10-days-to-save-himself-with-a-long-list-of-political-bombs-to-juggle/news-story/2d43c63fb2add11d75dbbb083e02e28c
Mb and BK
I’m more concerned about the torture aspect of confinement without hope. Perhaps that’s because I know that my own reaction would be severe.