With few surprises to any either side of politics Tony Abbott is now Australia’s Prime Minister. From the time of the previous election Abbott whined that “this is an illegitimate government”. Abbott promised a “kinder, gentler” incarnation of himself – and promptly set about proving the exact opposite. With promises not worth that which they are not written on will Abbott also prove himself to be “illegitimate”? Will his convictions sustain the same 5 minutes as they did following the previous election? I suspect that they will, as long as no one has any expectations of Tony Abbott. This time around in victory, Abbott promises nothing more than to dismantle with two things being his main objectives: the NBN and the price on carbon. He promises to do this within 100 days. Yet Abbott promises to be the “infrastructure Prime Minister”, all the while promising to dismantle probably the most important infrastructure initiative since the Snowy Mountain Scheme or the overland telegraph . . . the NBN. He promises to start sacking public servants, not all of whom reside in Canberra. As Abbott has refused to produce any details, so who knows which areas which cities, which regional centers might see valuable jobs gone. He promises that a starting point will be 12,000 persons which at his own stated time frame will amount to close to 900 people a week who will lose their jobs. He has promised that this will be achieved via natural attrition, however, at the promised rate is clearly not feasible. However, and all the while promising a more prosperous Australia. I have never known an employment squeeze to benefit any community. Abbott has promised Indigenous Constitutional recognition which is to be applauded. However, let’s hope that isn’t just a token gesture and nothing further is achieved to bring equality of opportunity to Indigenous Australia. On Abbott’s support of Indigenous issues, I remain a sceptic recalling the time when Tony Abbott gave staunch support to Keith Windschuttle’s essay titled “Why there were no stolen generations”. Abbott also dismissed the historic Tent Embassy last Australia Day as now irrelevant saying that it’s job was done. Here is Abbott’s first effort on the issue: The Coalition has announced a cut of $42 million to the Indigenous Policy Reform Program, which provides funding to the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Legal Services across Australia. The article is titled,‘Not a good start for PM for indigenous Australians’. Abbott has promised to spend a week each year in an Indigenous community, as was breathlessly reported by the mainstream media. Good god, that’s almost 1/10th of the time that he spends on his bike and buffing the body beautiful, that’s a real commitment. He has also promised “modest” industrial relations reforms. I have never known Abbott to show much modesty. Abbott’s major pledge is to “stop the boats”. Operation Sovereign Borders starts today and it is reported that this involves giving “new orders” to Navy and (presumably) customs personnel. Is this Abbott’s stated plan to turn boats back to Indonesia? The plan which Indonesia have already stated categorically they will not countenance. We will not know, as this plan was toned down considerably during the election campaign to a far more benign idea of putting a senior military official in charge of border protection (isn’t there one already?), and the somewhat odd arrangement of buying boats off people smugglers. Hey, I’m a people smuggler, come and buy my boat. Abbott has also pledged to remove the 30% mining tax. Here ya go Gina. Ta. Don’t mention it, my pleasure. On education: On The long-term fate of another signature Labor policy – the school funding reforms commonly known as Gonski – remains unclear under the Coalition Government. Mr Abbott has guaranteed the reforms for at least four years, but plans to change the legislation underpinning the reforms to axe the powers of the federal education minister. The Coalition will also seek to make public schools more independent, which according to its Real Solutions booklet, would provide “simpler budgeting and resources allocation and more autonomy in decision making”. Or might this interpret to mean “force” schools to become independent schools. Autonomy in decision making could mean anything, good and bad. Good, internal selection of staff . . . bad, you’re on you’re own and if the Kindy class needs spare knickers and Kleenex, then it’s up to the school community to provide it. Come on parents, you too can raise $5,000 per Grade 6 child just get off your backsides and onward with those lamington drives. **Note, fortunately many schools now have school halls which help with raising revenue. Our ABC describes Abbott’s opportunities as: At any rate, the Australian people have voted to give Mr Abbott the opportunity to bring his vision of a fairer, freer, more prosperous nation to fruition. Fairer, freer are doubtful in the extreme and even those who have some faith that Tony Abbott has the capabilities of delivering would admit that fair and free are not approaching a priority for this man. They are therefore basing their faith on the word “prosperous”, pining their hopes that some of the largess which is to be handed over to the wealthy and influential might trickle their way. As a sometime country person my observation is that trickles mostly dry up from source to supposed destination. I will close with this quote via the Australian Politics Forum: Hypocrisy = Tony Abbott… Ambition without a real man! As we all know, this political cycle has been well documented, and will go down in Australia’s history, as one of the most divisive and appalling political chapters in living memory. There are many reasons for this, including ; The longest dummy spit in history, by Abbott and his LNP, acting like spoilt brats and sore losers. The lies and spin from Abbott and his LNP, and regurgitated ad-infinitum by the MSM , led by that paragon of mendacity, Murdoch. There have been numerous attempts at trying to remove a duly elected government by underhanded, deceitful, dishonest and dare I say illegal means, all of which appear to have Tony Abbott and his LNP’s grubby mitts all over them. Murdoch’s mendacious MSM fawning over Abbott like he is Australia’s own messiah! And from an unnamed Liberal source via the Sydney Morning Herald: “This is politics. There are people to sack and promises to break. It happens with every new government, and it will be the same with us,” the source said.
Posted on: Sun, 08 Sep 2013 10:01:34 +0000