The carbon price debate: a little light relief

September 14, 2011

The debate on the government’s Clean Energy Bills package (the so-called ‘carbon tax’) is in full swing. We’re two and a half hours into what’s promised to be a 35 hour debate – and we can already identify some recurring themes. Let’s take a look.

First up, we have Forward to the future! This government arguments boils down to: ‘first a trading scheme, then flying cars!’ Well, not exactly – but it’s a relentlessly utopian view. Here the emissions trading scheme is held to be the key to all forms of future energy innovation – which then, apparently, leads to Australia entering a new Golden Age of Wonder. Presumably with a Kitchen of the Future!

To counter that, we have Back to the Stone Age. This one relies entirely on the idea that we’re all basically addicted to electricity, and our lives will fall apart when the trading scheme kicks in. We won’t be able to turn on our air conditioners! We will freeze in winter because we can’t use our heaters! Worst of all – we might have to ration our television viewing!

The horror.

Next up, More capitalist than thou. This is one of my personal favourites. We should depend on the market! The market will save us from dangerous climate change! The market will stop the ice from melting! Bow down to the god of the market! A tried-and-true conservative argument.

Except it isn’t the Coalition saying this – it’s the government.

(Oddly, I couldn’t find a humorous video for this one.)

Not to be outdone, the Coalition retaliate with Greens under the bed. The government is at the mercy of those Socialist Luddite Extreme Greens, who want to take away our freedom and spit on our flag! Comrade Brown is the only one who wants this ‘carbon tax’, and he’s blackmailing the government to get it! Run for your lives! We must protect Our Way of Life and Our Right to Pollute!

And just in case all that’s a bit too esoteric, there are the old standbys.

Liar, liar, pants on fire! Everyone, sing along with me now: Gillard lied to us! She said there wouldn’t be a carbon tax and now she’s got one! Never mind that these bills are not a bloody carbon tax (as some of us have been screaming for months, and Malcolm Farr finally recognised this morning.)

And finally, But all the cool kids are doing it. California’s doing it! Canada’s doing it! South Korea says it’s going to do it! If we don’t do it, we’ll be left behind! We’ll be … we’ll be … carbon dorks. Muuuuum …

All of which is by way of saying that there are no new arguments in this debate. We’ve heard them all before – ad nauseam. So here’s my proposal. How about the Coalition simply tables its leaked ‘confidential’ talking points, the government tables a few Gillard’s press releases, and we all just get on with it?

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Open Thread – our own Afghanistan debate

October 21, 2010

Coming soon: a report on the Q&A with the Australian Sex Party’s Fiona Patten at La Trobe University this week. But first …

This week saw the first Parliamentary debate on Australia’s involvement in Afghanistan. This was one of the key elements in the Labor Party’s agreement with the Greens, and welcomed by Independents Andrew Wilkie and Rob Oakeshott. Thanks to the wonders of technology, anyone who cares to has been able to follow the debate.

Most of the speakers are fairly predictable. This is a ‘just war’, we have to ‘stay the course’, etc. There were a few highlights, though. Julia Gillard kicked off the proceedings by announcing that our troops would be in Afghanistan until at least 2014, and that Australia would likely be ‘engaged’ there for the rest of the decade. Tony Abbott urged us to be careful that we didn’t execute a de facto ‘Western takeover’. Sussan Ley, unexpectedly, called for future military engagements to be subject to a Parliamentary vote. Adam Bandt said we should get our troops out as soon as possible, and Andrew Wilkie nearly broke down while reading the names of every Australian soldier killed while serving in Afghanistan to date.

It can be enlightening to hear what our politicians have to say on the matter – especially when, in effect, they’re committing us to the longest war we have yet participated in, outstripping the Vietnam conflict.

But what about the rest of us? You know, us – the ‘Australian public’, the ones our politicians are supposed to listen to and represent. We’ve heard a lot this week about what ‘Australians want’, mostly from people who, I suspect, neither know nor care what we do want.

So let’s have our own mini-debate. Let’s talk about why we’re in Afghanistan.

What are we hoping to achieve?

Have our objectives changed over the years?

Should we have gone there in the first place?

Are we really ‘denying terrorists a safe haven’?

Do we have the right to impose our political system on another country?

Should we talk to the Taliban and other factional powers in the region, instead of propping up the increasingly shaky and corrupt Karzai government?

What if our actions there are making the situation worse?

And what about next time?

Please, encourage people to add their feelings, engage with each other – get a real discussion going. This may be only one small forum, but it’s a forum that wants to hear what everyone thinks.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Greens back Labor for government

September 1, 2010

The Greens have just announced that Adam Bandt will throw his support behind the Labor Party in its bid to form government.

This takes Labor’s seat total to 73, although Senator Bob Brown was careful to point out that this is not a formal coalition arrangement. Bandt will support Labor in any no confidence motion, and not vote to block the Budget. If we count Crook as supporting the LNP Coalition (although this is by no means certain), the count is tied up – again.

In order to get the Greens’ support, Labor has signed off on a long list of undertakings.

In the area of parliamentary reform, there will be:

* Restrictions on political donations, that would effectively undo the changes wrought by the Howard government.

* Introduction of legislation to ensure truth in political advertising.

* A leaders’ debates commission, presumably to prevent the sort of nonsense that went on in this campaign. These debates may well include the leader of the ‘third party’ – as it stands, of course, this would be the Greens.

* Two and a half hours for parliamentary debate on private members’ bills. This is a significant win; under the current system, the party Whips make all the decisions on how much time is allotted, including whether to allow debate at all. Obviously, then, any ‘unpopular’ bill can effectively be killed before it gets a decent hearing. We saw this happen to Senator Sarah Hanson-Young when she introduced a bill amending the Marriage Act to allow same-sex marriage in February this year.

* A ‘move’ towards fixed three-year terms. From the language, it’s clear that Labor has not agreed outright to support the idea, but at least it would be discussed.

* Establishment of a Parliamentary Budget Committee, accessible by all federally elected members. This committee appears to be an expansion of the Charter of Budget Honesty, in that it would have the ability to provide information and costings on all proposed programs.

* Treasury documents to be accessible to the Greens. This one is likely to cause alarm in some quarters.

Other undertakings include:

* A parliamentary debate on Australia’s role in the war in Afghanistan. Incumbent Defence Minister John Faulkner signalled his support for such a debate during the campaign, and it would become a reality under a new Labor government.

* A referendum on Constitutional recognition of indigenous peoples as the first Australians. Both parties listed this in their election policy statements.

* The formation of a climate change committee, made up of elected representatives and experts on climate change. Brown stressed that membership was dependent on a belief in the reality of climate change and a commitment to a carbon price. The committee would investigate options and present its deliberations and recommendations to Parliament. This effectively replaces key parts of both Labor and Greens policy, including the highly-criticised ‘citizens’ assembly’ proposed by Labor during the campaign.

The glaring absence here is any undertaking on same-sex marriage. Asked about that, Brown confirmed that the matter was raised, but that no agreement could be reached.

Brown went on to say that, should the LNP Coalition form government, the Greens would not automatically take an obstructionist stance. He did state unequivocally, however, that his preference was for a Labor government, which he believed was more able to deliver both stable and effective good governance. He also absolutely ruled out any support for Temporary Protection Visas for asylum seekers – a stance that puts a major hole in the Coalition’s asylum seeker policy.

With Bandt now declared for Labor, pressure now falls even more heavily on the four Independents and Tony Crook. Andrew Wilkie has already stated that he is prepared to consider supporting neither major party, if he considers them incapable of forming good government. He may find that he has sidelined himself, however – if the three country Independents vote as a bloc, his support may well becoming meaningless.

Crook is playing it close to the chest. All we have from him is a stated wish to be considered a cross-bencher, and complete rejection of a mining tax.

As for the country Independents? Part of Bob Katter’s wish list appeared on the front page of the Townsville Bulletin. He’s asking for 10% of all mining royalties to be directed towards infrastructure in north Queensland, indigenous health funding, new dams and weirs for irrigation purposes, effective broadband for the bush, commitment to the CopperString power line project, and a ban on cheap imports of bananas.

The first deal has been struck, and now the horsetrading begins in earnest.

* * * * *

A postscript – the Coalition are already taking to the media attacking the Bandt-Labor deal, exactly as Bob Brown predicted. Scott Morrison, their spokesperson on immigration, slammed the Greens for not making asylum seeker issues part of their arrangement with Labor. He also referred to the ‘Labor-Greens Coalition’ several times, despite knowing full well that there is no formal coalition arrangement. This might be pure spin, a misguided attempt to panic the electorate and the Independents. The economy is in danger! The Greens want to destroy us all, and now Labor wants to help them!

It could also be an indicator. If the LNP Coalition really do see the Bandt-Labor deal as a formal alliance, perhaps that’s also how they view any pledged support to form government. In that case, Katter, Wilkie, Oakeshott, Windsor and Crook might well take that into consideration – none of them want to enter into a binding coalition, but Abbott’s government just might expect them to act as though they have.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Rooted – the failed ‘people’s forum’

August 12, 2010

The public doesn’t expect much from political debates anymore. It’s rare that someone will get caught out on their own words, or turn in a performance so woeful that people forget everything they say and focus on their lack of poise. For that, we have to turn to an interviewer of the calibre of Kerry O’Brien (who’s racking up an impressive list so far this campaign – Kevin Rudd, Joe Hockey, Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard all discomfited, tripped-up, and off-message). So it’s fair to say that expectations were not high about the so-called ‘People’s Forum’ held at the evocatively-named Rooty Hill RSL Club.

The idea was that Galaxy pollsters would randomly select 200 ‘undecided’ voters via phone calls, who would spend two hours grilling first Gillard, then Abbott. They’d get to ask their own questions, which apparently wouldn’t be vetted beforehand by either of the media organisations sponsoring the forum – Sky News and the Daily Telegraph.

Right about there was when the wheels fell off.

Of that 200, three were quickly ‘outed’ in the Twitterverse as committed Liberal voters or actual members of the Young Liberals. One even had a media profile confirming it – Joel, who was a former housemate on Channel Ten’s Big Brother reality show. Another was known to live well outside the Rooty Hill area, and yet another confided that he was ‘not really’ a swinging voter, but had participated in Galaxy focus groups because he enjoyed the work.

This took less than 15 minutes to discover by ordinary people watching and commenting online. Why couldn’t Galaxy find out the same thing? Did they do any background work at all on their chosen group?

Four out of 200 with dodgy backgrounds? That’s not much, you might think. These weren’t just audience members, though. They were up at the microphone questioning Gillard and Abbott.

And about those questions.

Sky said repeatedly last night that they had no part in selecting what would be asked – in fact, no one did. They would have us believe that they allowed people to simply file up to the microphone and say whatever was on their minds. In a live broadcast. No mechanism in place to prevent obscenity, outright abuse, wingnuttery or any one of a dozen possible problems.

Maybe they did. But maybe they should have done. Because what we got was a series of very hard questions thrown at Gillard. Here’s a sample, stripped of preamble:

* Are the people who orchestrated the ‘knifing’ of Rudd going to be rewarded in government?
* What responsibility do you bear for the failure of the ETS, insulation and BER? (The ETS turned up twice.)
* Where’s the money coming from? (This one turned up twice).
* Can you give a guarantee you won’t backflip on your promises?
* How can you guarantee you’ll stay a full term as Prime Minister?

It’s worth singling out two questioners in particular. One was a young woman extraordinarily well-informed on legal issues, who hammered Gillard on the question of same-sex marriage. She quoted Act after Act to illustrate how nonsensical the major parties’ position was, and finished up with the bitter observation, ‘The Bible says we can’t have sex, and you ignore that, but you won’t let us marry’.

The other was a woman who took issue with the Labor ads featuring footage of former Treasurer Peter Costello express his opinion that Abbott did not understand economic issues. ‘We know it isn’t true,’ she said. ‘Peter Costello went on Sky News and said it wasn’t true. That’s blatantly dishonest … if you have no integrity on this, how can I give you my vote?’ She remained unconvinced when told that the entire series of quotes were freely available would confirm that Costello was not taken out of context.

At least some of the questions appeared to have been very well-written – even to the point of using well-worn phrases common to Liberal tirades against Labor. It’s possible that was a coincidence.

But then there were the questions they asked Abbott:

*How bad will it be if Labor gets an ETS?
* Why would it be good for me to vote Liberal? (This came from the Big Brother Young Liberal.)
* How are your policies superior to Labor’s?
* Why shouldn’t private enterprise build a broadband network with some help from government? (This questioner substantially restated the Coalition’s announced policy.)
* Superclinics are bad, so what will you do about primary health care?

These are incredibly ‘soft’ questions. Most people commenting online described them as ‘Dorothy Dixers’ – referring to the parliamentary practice of giving leading questions to backbenchers so that Ministers can spruik their own achievements and lambaste the Opposition. Having watched innumerable hours of Question Time, I can confirm that the questions Abbott received were suspiciously similar to Dixers.

He received one apparently tricky question on the subject of asylum seekers. ‘They’re not illegal … why would you treat them with a lack of compassion?’ She received some applause for this, but Abbott’s answer – that it’s really about treat people smugglers as criminals – was much more warmly received. It seems Abbott’s ‘love the sinner but hate the sin’ argument goes over well in western Sydney – which makes me wonder just how hard that question really was.

Many people online wondered if Abbott would get the same harsh treatment on same-sex marriage as Gillard. He didn’t. The questioner, who had been seated in the front row, was nowhere to be seen for much of his session. She did try to talk to him afterwards, but he brushed her off.

The whole forum had the atmosphere of a US Tea Party – thoroughly astroturfed, from start to finish. There were just enough people in there who weren’t in step to make it look authentic, but viewers are more politically-savvy these days, and quickly smelled a rat.

It’s fair to say that Sky was barraged complaints via emails and tweets during and after the forum. The commentators afterwards were at pains to point out that Sky had nothing to do with choosing either the participants or the questions. There was clearly some embarrassment about Joel’s appearance, but that’s as far as it went.

Online, speculation is still running hot that the whole forum was a set-up. The two media organisations involved were both owned by Rupert Murdoch, whose support for conservative politicians is notorious. (We’re talking about the man who owns Fox News in the US, after all.) Abbot’s questions appeared to have been written by the same people who prepare Dorothy Dixers in Parliament, and Gillard’s appeared to have come straight out of the Coalition’s attack-politics playbook.
There were even suggestions that Galaxy was part of the conspiracy.

I don’t think it’s necessary to look for shadowy deals in back rooms. Never ascribe to malice what can be adequately explained by incompetence, after all. Galaxy either didn’t cast its net wide enough (given the inclusion of experienced focus group participants) or simply took people at their word when they said they were ‘undecided’. Certainly, they appear to have done no background research. Someone should also have vetted the questions, to ensure a ‘soft-hard’ mix for both leaders.

Admittedly, it’s difficult to find really undecided voters at this late stage of the campaign. It’s also difficult to tell if someone is lying about their political affiliations to get selected. This is why there should have been background checks. It only took minutes to find Joel, after all. Ditto on the questions: the imbalance was so obvious that even my self-confessed ‘politically naive’ friend was spluttering with indignation. If there was an astroturfing attempt in progress, at least something could have been done to prevent it.

So maybe it was just a monumental screw-up. But it was somewhat alarming to find that an email had been sent to the tweeter who exposed two Liberal supporters, demanding that the relevant tweets be immediately deleted unless they could provide ‘photographic evidence’. it seems someone was watching the Twitter feed and moving quickly to squash this story. Apparently that ‘someone’ doesn’t really understand Twitter – there had already been numerous re-tweets of the original information, and the same thing happened to the ‘take-down’ announcement.

I leave speculation on who that ‘someone’ was to you.

The media have universally declared a ‘win’ for Abbott, and Sky is congratulating itself on a job well done. Personally, I feel confident in declaring a complete loss. The forum should have been a vehicle for people to access their politicians directly – people who aren’t part of political parties, or the media, or lobby groups. The participants were supposed to be our representatives from across the political spectrum, asking the questions we wanted to hear about issues of real concern. Instead we got a well-scripted and decidely partisan staged event, at which we heard nothing new and were thoroughly disenfranchised.

It was a lot like Question Time, really. A failure – from start to finish.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Ozvote 07 – the Health debate (repost)

August 11, 2010

With the Health debate between Minister Nicola Roxon and Shadow Peter Dutton looming on the agenda today, I thought I’d repost my analysis of the 2007 debate. Remember, at that time, the current Opposition Leader Tony Abbott was the Health Minister. Looking back can be enlightening sometimes.

_____________________

The National Press Club has been the scene for two crucial debates in the upcoming Federal Election. Yesterday, Treasurer Peter Costello debated Opposition Treasury spokesperson Wayne Swan. The worm handed the prize directly to Swan (with nearly 60% approval rating), although most commentators gave it narrowly to Costello – based, it seems, more on Swan’s nerves than any real difference in economic policy. The hold-out was Channel Nine’s 60 Minutes phone poll, which – as with the leaders debate – came down squarely in favour of Costello (65%).

Today was the Health debate. Health Minister Tony Abbott versus Opposition Health spokesperson Nicola Roxon. It looked like it was shaping up to be a good stoush, even without the worm – who, no doubt, was recovering from a good deal of fatigue. It’s done a fair bit of climbing and diving lately.

But then Tony Abbott didn’t turn up to begin.

Or bother sending a message explaining why he was late.

Or when he might make it, if at all.

Or apologising.

In his absence, Nicola Roxon held what can only be described as a highly genial press conference, marred only by a moment of mud-slinging when she described Abbott as a consummate buck-passer whose highest priority was keeping John Howard out of trouble. Every time a question was asked, she spoke directly to the reporter and thanked him/her for it – which gave the whole process a slightly surreal air reminiscent of ‘Dorothy Dixers’ during Question Time. She even offered, when one journalist mentioned his question had originally been for Abbott, to do an impersonation of him – an offer which was greeted by a great deal of laughter from the press corps.

Roxon’s policy announcements bring the Labor commitment to Health up to $2 billion. This is largely concentrated on preventative medicine, lowering elective surgery waiting lists, equitable pay for nurses (with the inevitable dig at WorkChoices) and providing dental care for 1 million people. The press corps didn’t let her off, either – but she seemed cool, and had answers readily available.

Abbott finally turned up 35 minutes late and apologised, but ‘even in an election campaign things go awry’. The apology was perfunctory, and, judging by the reaction of the press corps, not well received.

His opening statement lost a lot of steam – largely because many of his points had already been attacked by both Roxon and the press corps. In the face of the huge criticism levelled at private health insurance gap and loss of Commonwealth public hospital funding, his roll call of Coalition health achievements sounded pretty hollow. It wasn’t helped by his insistence that the problem with public hospitals was solely the fault of ‘State Labor governments’ and attacks on both Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, while claiming to want to end ‘the blame game’.

Abbott’s response to questions was completely different to Roxon’s. His manner was hectoring, there were no ‘thank yous’, and every answer was prefaced by an extended attack on Federal Labor. Most often, the target was Kevin Rudd, which struck this writer as slightly bizarre, given the presence of Roxon sitting right next to him. Abbott’s treatment of her tended to give the impression he considered her ineffectual and hardly worth his while to notice, but if it was a strategy, it backfired badly. Coming on the heels of his failure to arrive on time for the debate, it looked like rudeness.

His other main strategy was the time-honoured politician’s tactic of refusing to answer questions directly. In this, he contrasted poorly with Roxon, whose answers – while somewhat long-winded (which didn’t always play well with the press corps) – tended to be directed at the substance of the question. Policy announcements were difficult to pick out of the rhetoric, being bounded around with equal parts Coalition-praising and Labor-damning. In fact, in both his opening statement and in answer to questions, the only policy he even mentioned was the much-criticised ‘local boards for public hospitals’ idea.

Finally, the question for which this writer had been waiting came. Why hadn’t Abbott taken better care when making his travel arrangements, and why didn’t he have a deputy available to take his place, if necessary? Abbott’s response? He had to be at a campaign launch, and – ‘given the speed of planes’ – it was impossible to be there any earlier than he actually arrived. The inference could be drawn, then, that Abbott considered the debate of minor importance, able to be sacrificed in favour of a campaign launch, without even the courtesy of an explanation via Airphone.

In closing, Abbott rang the bell of ‘our record, our record (which was, by then, becoming something of a broken record). Roxon picked up that refrain, but showed the negative side of an 11-year Coalition government. That was a particularly dangerous strategy, but she concluded with what is becoming Labor’s clarion call in this election – the appeal to the ‘ordinary Australian with everyday worries’.

Lacking a worm, I’d have to conclude that the debate was a clear win to Roxon (as did the majority of Sky’s commentators). Many of the points on which she outstripped Abbott had nothing to do with policy, and everything to do with respect – respect for the press corps, the opponent, and the desire of people to hear direct answers to direct questions. Coming on the heels of Abbott’s sledging yesterday of asbestosis sufferer and campaigner Bernie Banton, this counts heavily against him. Roxon’s policy announcements came across as sound and well-considered, with a big emphasis on specific programmes (although she didn’t speak specifically as to how Labor planned to increase the workforce of skilled hospital workers). Abbott’s were vague, consisting largely of attacks on State Labor governments and a sketchy plan for a massive increase in hospital bureaucracies at the local level – while all the while insisting that Australia has, apparently, never had it so good.

It was pretty clear that Abbott knew he’d lost, too. As the two debaters shared the traditional handshake for the cameras afterwards, Roxon commented that Abbott could have made it to the debate on time. Abbott’s response was to snarl out the side of his mouth, ‘That’s bullshit, you’re being deliberately unpleasant. I suppose you can’t help yourself, can you?’ while maintaining a fixed smile.

There couldn’t be a greater contrast with yesterdays’ debate. Costello was clearly the polished politician, and Swan a nervous nelly. Today, Roxon was relaxed, chatty, serious where she needed to be and solid all the way through. Abbott, despite his long experience as Health Minister, came across as rude, out of touch and a political novice.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Fear & buildings at the Press Club – the population debate

August 10, 2010

It was with heavy heart that I tuned in to the Population Debate held on August 5. With all the xenophobic dogwhistling from both parties, I fully expected that the ‘debate’ would actually turn out to be a series of arguments about whether Nauru or East Timor was a better place to put those dangerous asylum seekers, and just how many immigrants would be turned away. The presence of Scott Morrison – the Coalition’s spokesperson on Immigration – as the debating partner for the Minister for Sustainable Population, Tony Burke, seemed to confirm my worst fears.

So I was pleasantly surprised by Tony Burke’s opening argument. Immigration, he said, was only a short-term fix to the problem of creating a sustainable population environment. Making promises to reduce the total national number of immigrants does not address the real problem – that Australia’s infrastructure and population needs vary wildly all over the country. People in Western Sydney face intolerable traffic jams, people in regional areas face skills shortages. What’s needed is an approach that looks at decentralisation and regional solutions, not a one-size-fits-all solution.

He listed a series of government achievements: doubled roads funding, increasing funding for rail, decentralised housing programs. Then came a list of proposals to address the problem of our ageing population – increased superannuation guarantee, increased retirement wage and re-skilling programs.

Scott Morrison’s argument could not have been more different. Immigration, he said, has made us what we are today. When managed well it is a fair and orderly process, and the Rudd government inherited a program that ‘Australians trusted’. Then, out it came – ‘illegal’ boat arrivals.

Every boat that arrives takes the place of a refugee waiting patiently in the ‘queue’. Morrison painted the latter as bearing up with saint-like serenity while moustache-twirling people on boats took advantage of their purity for their own evil ends. These poor people in the queue are ‘orderly’, they deserve our first choice, Morrison said.

At this point protesters, who had somehow made it into the National Press Club, started shouting, ‘fair go for refugees’. Morrison’s response was to become louder and more strident, until he was nearly yelling to be heard. It was a stark contrast to Gillard’s calm, measured reaction to the protester in Queensland who broke in to her media conference on climate change.

At the top of his voice, Morrison laid out the Coalition’s plan for dealing with asylum seekers. Temporary Protection Visas for everyone, universal offshore processing on Nauru, and turning back the boats. ‘This is a battle of resolve and we intend to win it as we did before,’ he shouted.

Our population is rising, for which Morrison blamed the government. He gave no reasons to back up his statement. The problem is immigration; and infrastructure development won’t fix that. He finished by quoting Howard: ‘We will decide who comes to our country, and in what circumstances they come’.

Given the disparity in their opening arguments, it was predictable that many of the questions they faced would be about the asylum seeker issue. Asked about towing back the boats, Burke replied that although former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had backed that idea, they now knew that ‘no country would accept a boat’, and that the boats would be scuttled. Morrison said a boat would be turned back if seaworthy, and pooh-poohed Burke’s response. It’s no great secret, he said, that people smugglers would ‘do and say anything to try to frustrate govt policy’.

When it was pointed out that a 1994 study on population reached 27 million, our quality of life would degrade sharply, Burke admitted that both sides had been way behind action on the issue, and that ‘we need to ‘fess up’ and address the issues. Morrison claimed he had raised the infrastructure issue as Shadow Minister for Immigration, but that the Minister had to decide how many people were going to come to Australia.

Burke also suggested that we should look at whether we can continue to put suburbs on top of our best soils, given our needs for food and water will increase. There was no response from Morrison.

Pushed to justify why asylum seekers were a threat to Australia, Morrison backed off. ‘It’s about the fairness and integrity of our immigration program,’ he said. The Coalition would rather see people from (for example) the camps on the Thailand/Burma border come here. ‘We’ll ensure the refugees come from the people in the greatest need’. Settlement in Australia was not guaranteed, he added; anyone in Nauru would be required to make applications for settlement in other countries. He went on to note that although the total number of acceptances were falling, people are still here because of the appeals process.

Burke tried to bring the debate back to infrastructure and decentralisation. Mining and agricultural areas need more people to fill skills shortages, while congested areas can’t handle what they have now. Encourage decentralisation, tailor the approach by the region and listen to what people on the ground need. Predictably, Morrison was having none of that. It’s about immigration, he said. Up to 30% of new immigrants settle in urban centres, and that won’t change in the short term. He also alleged that there would be no new infrastructure or services to deal with current problems.

Finally, in closing arguments, Burke stuck firmly to his ‘no immigration content’ plan. It’s not enough to say that it’s difficult to decentralise – ‘we can do this … we have to be willing to say we can deal with issues differently to how we did it in the past’. The mining boom, retirees moving to regional areas and the National Broadband Network will all assist decentralisation.

Morrison, too, stayed true to this theme. ‘Immigration has everything to do with it,’ he said. (Morrison’s emphasis). The Coalition would not surrender to people smugglers, it was committed to put Australia on a sustainable population path and had a real plan. He finished up by observing that Chris Evans, the Immigration Minister, was not there to debate him. Unsurprising, given it was a population debate.

So let’s break it down.

The Minister for Sustainable Population talked about upgrading Australia’s roads and rail, decentralising the population, looking at new suburban planning based on agricultural needs, better communications networks and a tailored, regional approach to the challenges of our diverse settlement patterns. He remarked that cutting immigration would do nothing to solve the existing problems or the problems of the future, and that asylum seeker policy was irrelevant to this debate.

The Shadow for Immigration talked about asylum seekers. And asylum seekers. And asylum seekers. He blew the dogwhistle so hard, and so often, that it’s a wonder we didn’t get reports of an outbreak of canine deafness in the immediate area of the National Press Club.

And what was he doing there, anyway? Who thought Morrison was a good match-up for Burke? It’s no wonder he didn’t speak to questions of infrastructure – his portfolio is Immigration (although you might be forgiven for thinking he was the Shadow for Stopping the Scary Boat People).

It was a completely mismatched debate. The question is, why? Did the Coalition not have anyone shadowing Tony Burke, who could speak on the issues? Nope – Cory Bernardi is the Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for both Population and Infrastructure. He would have been ideally suited to stand up with Burke.

Maybe Bernardi wasn’t available and they sent Scott Morrison along instead. Nope, still doesn’t make sense. Why would you send your Immigration spokesperson to take the place of your specialist on population and infrastructure? And if there was a replacement, why was it not announced as such at the start of the debate?

It certainly looks like the substitution was deliberate – as if the whole point were to drag Labor into an asylum seeker debate, so the Coalition could try to jam them up on the East Timor policy.

If so, it sends one of several bad messages to the electorate. Either: the Coalition has no policy for infrastructure and sustainable population; they have dismissed the issue as unimportant; they are unprepared to debate Burke; or they are trying to push this election so it is fought solely on asylum seeker policy.

And just on that last possibility? Today’s announcement of the Coalition’s communications strategy was overshadowed by an earlier media conference at which Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison announced the result of talks with Nauru about offshore processing of asylum seekers. When the broadband policy was announced by Tony Smith and Andrew Robb, the latter responded to forceful questioning by evoking – again – the spectre of the boats.

Add to that Abbott’s refusal to apologise for appropriating the image of an unseaworthy boat on which five Australian citizens died – not even an asylum seeker boat – for the Coalition’s scare ads, and the picture becomes depressingly clear.

The Coalition had a real opportunity to bring out some forward-looking policy. Instead, they chose to play the fear card. They could have looked at targeting immigration to areas looking for skilled workers – instead, they told us about Temporary Protection Visas and Nauru. You don’t do that unless you’ve got an agenda – and this debate clearly shows their hand.

The debate was a clear win to Tony Burke – and a big gain for Labor, since they showed they are able to separate asylum seekers from every other issue in this election.

It’s a pity the same can’t be said for the Coalition.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Flashback – the 2007 leader’s debate

July 22, 2010

Back during the 2007 Federal campaign, I decided to write a running commentary on the single leaders’ debate between John Howard and Kevin Rudd. It was an … interesting experience, and so I’ll be repeating that performance here on Sunday, July 25. Notes will be made in real-time, and the final piece published just after the first pundits’ decisions come in.

But first … step into the wayback machine with me for a while, and relive 2007 – the Rise of the Worm.

____________________________________________________________________________________________

2007 Leaders’ Debate – the Rise of the Worm

The stage is set. The Great Hall in Parliament House, Sky News’ political editor David Speers, five journalists, a split audience apparently picked 50/50 by both Liberal and Labor representatives … two would-be leaders of the country …

And …

Ladies and gentlemen – we have a worm!

Yes, folks, the plucky lad has managed to wriggle his way into the debate, despite a firm ‘NO’ from John Howard and several rounds of tut-tutting from the National Press Club. Responding to the twirling fingers of 50 voters (described by Channel Nine as ‘swinging’), Our Hero has defied PresidentialPrime Ministerial wrath and made an appearance.

(For them as doesn’t know, the worm provides a visual representation of approval/disapproval in a selected audience watching the debate, measured by turning a dial and displayed on the TV screen.)

Yes, I watched the Channel Nine feed. And I’m glad I did.

It was widely trumpeted last week that John Howard hates the worm. Last night, it became clear that the worm hated Howard. Both The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald reported the worm’s verdict – Kevin Rudd was the clear victor, coming in with 65% of the vote, compared with Howard’s 29% (a drop from his Latham debate score of 36%). Tony Abbot was quick to pooh-pooh the result, saying that the worm was rigged to display only audience preconceptions, rather than a true reflection of Mr Howard’s performance.

But is that true? Let’s have a look.

Right from the beginning, Rudd came across as more comfortable, forthright and respectful. Howard looked grumpy – in fact, more than a little put out by something. Howard’s opening statement ran overtime and necessitated two warnings, but he seemed determined to get in every last word.

Running overtime became a recurring phenomenon for Howard. While Rudd went over time once, in a response to a question regarding the leadership of the Liberal Party (‘isn’t a vote for the coalition really a vote for the unknown’). Mr. Howard, on the other hand, ran over seven times, and o two occasions was verbally warned by the moderator not to do it again. Each time, he subsided with obviously bad grace.

Mr Howard made direct, personal attacks at Mr Rudd on several occasions, describing him as ‘dishonest’, ‘pathetic’, ‘hypocritical’, and an ‘appeaser’. Mr Rudd indulged only in one such attack – but it was a doozy.

The first round of questions came from the journalists.

Asked how he would manage the economy, Howard immediately went on the offensive, citing the Dread Spectre of Imminent 17% Interest Rates and making pronouncements of doom should a Labor government be elected.

Asked why we should change governments in the midst of an economic boom, Rudd pointed out that booms inevitably end no matter who is in power and suggested the real emphasis was on managing life afterwards. Howard attacked Rudd again, attempted to educate the public as to the ‘truth’ about fiscal conservatism, and brought up Peter Costello’s record as Treasurer.

Apparently, the worm hates Costello. Every time Costello’s name was mentioned by Howard, the worm dipped – in one case, ‘all the way to Antarctica’, as Tony Wright from The Age put it .

Curiously, an attack on Mr Howard’s record as Federal Treasurer was well received. Mr Rudd’s approval climbed to near the top of the chart for his entire speech, despite the fact that he pulled a fast one with the numbers.

On the vexatious issue of union representation (or over-representation) in the ALP, Mr Rudd fronted up to it – then got cheeky by suggesting the high number of lawyers in the Liberal front bench was similarly unbalanced. He followed it up with the recent James Hardie case, in which union representatives accomplished a good deal in terms of compensation for asbestosis sufferers among Hardie employers, and the approval jumped up. Not even Howard’s ‘scary unions’ riff managed to get much of a rise.

It was particularly interesting to see Rudd cop to the ‘70% of your front bench are union’ charge. Rather than downplaying or denying it, Rudd chose to make it a badge of honour. It seemed to work – a slight dip in approval came when asked how much the ALP owes the unions, but the reverent mention of former Prime Minister Bob Hawke (himself a former President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions) cancelled it out.

The issue of tax relief played reasonably well for Howard – he riffed on it several times throughout the night, to a fairly good effect. Rudd’s contention that tax relief did not address what he called ‘real costs’ in terms of day-to-day living was much more popular, though.

Interest rates have been a big bug-a-boo in this campaign (which only feels like it’s lasted several months already, honest). Last night, it seems that ennui had finally set in with the audience and the commentators. There were minor responses to Howard’s warnings and invocation of the ghost of Paul Keating, but for the most part, it looked like it was no longer an effective Coalition weapon.

When asked to apologise for recent interest rates, Howard said he would only apologise for things which he considered himself accountable. This, at least, is consistent with his stance on indigenous reconciliation.

Industrial Relations – which has played well for Kevin Rudd so far – surprisingly didn’t make much of an appearance in the debate. Rudd’s opening statement contained the unequivocal promise to ‘abolish WorkChoices’, but after that, it was Howard who brought it up several times as an example of successful policy. The worm, apparently, wasn’t listening to that – but it was listening when Howard was asked how he could guarantee no further changes to WorkChoices, given his own front bench had been supporting the idea. Howard’s reassurances that he felt there was nothing more that needed to be done for industrial relations reform were unconvincing, especially after Laurie Oakes (who did a splendid job as devil’s advocate for the night) pointed out he’d said something similar last election – and then ‘lo and behold’, WorkChoices appeared.

The one big stoush of the night came over OECD figures that showed Australia’s woeful record for education spending compared to similar countries. We are, in fact, the only such nation to have cut education spending, in a period when other developed nations rose by up to 48%. Rudd pounced on these, only to be slapped around by Howard – who, it has to be said, appeared petulant in his insistence that Mr Rudd was dishonest, had misrepresented the figures and was ‘pathetic’. Rudd’s response was to smile at the audience and say he’d stand by the OECD report.

Climate change was an area where Howard chose to make a policy announcement – the establishment of a ‘climate change fund’ which would run on the revenue from carbon trading permits, and financial assistance to low income earners who would ‘inevitably’ bear the brunt of ‘inevitable’ higher electricity charges. As policies go, it was pretty well-received. His refusal to ratify Kyoto or go any further than to say ‘we all accept that mankind has made a contribution to global warming’ but ‘must be sensible’ got a lukewarm reception, though.

Rudd didn’t fare much better on climate change. Although the promise to ratify Kyoto was popular, his repeated dodging of specific early targets on emission reduction clearly irritated the worm, and gave him his lowest ratings of the night. It’s a clear weakness for a man who describes himself as ‘passionate’ about addressing issues of global warming.

A supplementary question to Mr Howard asked if he felt it was possible to change President George W. Bush’s mind on climate change. (Let’s leave aside the apparent idiocy of asking this about a President on his way out for a moment). Howard asserted that Bush’s attitude was changing – and the worm expressed its most immediate response of the night. Straight to the bottom. The US President’s unpopularity at home seems to be mirrored here.

Iraq was a particularly telling issue. Asked whether he felt the threat to Australia from terrorism had increased or decreased since our invasion of Iraq, Howard made another policy announcement – this time, that our troops in Iraq would ‘evolve’ to take on a training-based role for Iraqi forces. Pushed on the question, he said things were getting better. Pushed again, he gave ground just far enough to confirm that terrorism was ‘still a real threat’. His failure to answer that question played very badly with the audience.

Rudd gave a firm commitment to bring home the troops, and (in the grab of the night) described the invasion of Iraq as ‘the greatest single error of Australian national security policy-making since Vietnam’. The worm loved him for it – as, no doubt, did the media for that sound-bite.

In follow-up questions, Howard went on the attack again, described Rudd as not serious about the commitment to withdraw from Iraq and calling him hypocritical. During this response he was warned for time twice.

Rudd suffered when trying to defend his record as a bit of a flip-flopper on issues like Commonwealth land for housing and the Medicare Safety Net. His firm statements on working to end capital punishment on a global scale, however, played well.

On the thorny issue of reconciliation, Howard got some approval for his Northern Territory intervention, but repeated that he would never say sorry. It was interesting to note that, for the most part, the worm was fairly content with this. Rudd, pushed on why he’d agreed to the NT intervention, responded ‘we backed it because of the kids’, and followed up with emphasising the value of an apology for bridge-building. This was warmly received by the worm.

The second round of questions were from the leaders to each other. The only real moment of note here was Howard’s continual refusal to answer the question of whether an employee, under WorkChoices, can be stripped of his right to redundancy payments.

By contrast, Howard’s attempt to poke Rudd about his commitment to climate change came off looking like something from the schoolyard. Why didn’t Mr Rudd talk longer to Bush (who he described as the ‘most powerful man’ in the world) about it, if he’s so all fired up, accused Howard. Rudd’s response – that Bush wasn’t about to change his mind – was clearly unexpected by Howard, and there was evident chagrin on his face.

Closing statements were pretty much a recap, and the worm’s responses stayed consistent.

In the entire debate, Rudd dipped just below the midline on only two occasions. Howard spent much of the debate there. At the top end, Rudd hit the peak – and went off the top of the chart – on several occasions. Howard almost got to the top once, but only for a few seconds.

Now, there’s a lot of talk about whether the worm is a true reflection of what happened. To read and listen to the commentators, however, the worm spake true this time. Sky News’ post-game show handed the debate to Rudd without even seeing the worm, and today’s media has been largely unequivocal in following that trend. It’s worth pointing out that, despite the poor showing Howard makes in these debates, he keeps getting elected. Rudd’s team, no doubt, devoutly hopes that is going to change.

Finally, an interesting little note about the worm in action last night. Howard had insisted that the worm not make an appearance in this ‘one and only’ debate – he won’t agree to any more, and he didn’t want the worm anywhere near it. The ABC was happy with that. So was Sky. Channel Nine took a feed from the ABC via the National Press Club, and used the worm with its studio audience. According to Channel Nine, they never agreed to do otherwise.

It appears someone at the National Press Club had other ideas. When it was discovered that the worm was in residence, the ABC made a decision to cut Channel Nine’s feed. An ABC technician with a sense of fair play warned Channel Nine, who went to their back-up feed when it happened. The back-up feed was then cut. Channel Nine scrambled around, and – through the use of a cable box not unlike the ones that sit on top of the TV at home – picked up Sky’s feed, and the worm moved house.

Mr Howard denies authorising any such move, and says no one in his party would have done it. Kevin Rudd wanted the worm – even to the extent of getting a petition going on the Kevin ’07 website to ‘Save the Worm’. Everyone is pointing the finger at the National Press Club, who are angrily saying that Channel Nine were ‘told’ not to use the worm.

Ray Martin summed up my feelings on the matter last night, in his wrap-up : ‘So much for free speech’.

My verdict? It was no contest. Rudd may have won the debate, but the Worm Conquered All.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Ozvote ’07 – Defence Debate

November 19, 2007

The head-to-head debates organised by the National Press Club and other organisations finally wrapped up last week. Despite Mr Howard’s apparent willingness to debate Mr Rudd on economics ‘any time’, it doesn’t look like we’ll see anything of that sort.

The final debates were Brendan Nelson and Joel Fitzgibbon on Defence, held at the Lowy Institute, and Helen Coonan and Stephen Conroy on Communications. The latter wasn’t so much a debate as it was a moderated interview in the Sky Australia studios – and perhaps that accounts for the appalling behaviour demonstrated therein. I’ll get to that in my mext post.

The first thing that has to be said about the Defence debate is that the quality of the audio was truly horrendous. Rather than take a direct audio feed, the broadcast relied on camera microphones – the result was a muddy-sounding, echoing mumble. Accordingly, this report is going to be a little less detailed than others, I’m afraid.

The Coalition have a formula, and they’re sticking to it – a recap of the wonderful things they’ve done for Australia. In the case of Defence, this largely came out as Labor-bashing. The Coalition, on gaining office in 1996, inherited a huge debt, which they’ve systematically eliminated – and all without cutting defence spending at all. The number of combat-ready troops is up, our ocean borders are comprehensively defended, and vague assertions of efficiency were made. Nelson’s opening also included a tribute to the 4100 defence personnel currently serving in the capacity of ‘protecting the Australian people on our borders, in the region and in the world’. Tribute made, the room was treated to a few minutes of jingoism – that there are some truths in Australia by which we live, and which are worthwhile to defend. Just what those truths were went unspecified.

Moving on to plans for the future, Nelson gave the audience a shopping list. Under a Coalition government, there will be new helicopters, new planes, new destroyers, and new contracts for defence projects. The defence sector will employ 7000 more people over the next five years. Two defence technical colleges, in Queensland and Adelaide, will be up and running, as will a ‘National Defence Skills Institute’, that will train 1100 students in university and vocational training positions. There will also be a $450 million increase in funding to Army reserves.

He wound up by warning that the challenges posed by defence were increasingly diverse – population shifts, pandemics, terrorism and maritime security were all mentioned. Then the bogeyman was let out of the wardrobe – the ‘global struggle against extremism’, which, he said, was ‘essentially a global movement of Muslim extremism’, was our biggest challenge. For this reason, it is necessary to maintain troops in both Afghanistan and Iraq. ‘We owe it to our children to stand up for the values that made Australia great’, Nelson said, and it was important that we didn’t ‘allow terrorism to change the shape of our country and our world’.

Questions zeroed in on the Coalition’s lack of meaningful natural security policy, the lack of an exit strategy from Iraq, and the possible increasing of Australian forces in Afghanistan to make up for the probable withdrawal of Dutch forces. Nelson’s answers were largely inaudible. What could be heard were broad statements about having spend $10 million on intelligence, the fostering of ‘fledgling democracy’ in Iraq, Afghanistan and Timor, and the inevitable accusation that Labor had failed to spend ‘enough’ money on its policies. This last was in response to the questions about Labor’s dental/health care plan – a plan which the Coalition does not, apparently, have in its own policy.

There was a fair amount of sledging going on in answering questions, too. Labor in government was, he accused, was unable to keep planes in the air, and half our our trains and trucks were broken down. He also asked, somewhat petulantly and disingenuously, ‘How come we can fight Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and not Iraq?’

Fitzgibbon, too, was reading from his party’s playbook, thanking everyone present and sharing a joke with the audience – in this case, ‘I bet you’re all grateful the election is coming up soon – especially the advertising blackout’.

His initial approach was oblique – a general denial of the ‘me-too’ label that the Coalition has attempted to attach to the ALP’s policies throughout this election. Drawing the differences between the parties on health, education, climate change and industrial relations, he also acknowledged that common ground between the parties should not necessarily be surprising – a nod to the oft-repeated ‘economic conservative’ strategy.

He went on to give the list of common ground – and carefully pointed out the small but (he believes) significant differences in their policies. The US-Australia alliance is critical to national security – but Labor would push for a greater level of independence. Greater procurement of defence materiel is important – but it must be part of a systematic program, not a series of ad hoc decisions. Higher numbers of recruits are important – but retention of personnel is a greater problem – and he announced the extension of health and dental care for families of ADF personnel.

The only area of complete agreement with the Coalition was on Afghanistan. We have to stay, said Fitzgibbon, and ‘we commit to that’.

Common ground dispensed with, Fitzgibbon got down to the criticism. He alleged the Coalition’s spending programs were full of cost blowouts, that the recruiting program was without structure, and that their failure to produce a Defence White Paper (which draws together all the facts and figures on defence spending, commitments and logistics needs) amounted to a ‘lack of strategic direction’. A Rudd government, he said, would immediately commission such a White Paper.

Finally, Fitzgibbon got to the issue for which the room had, undoubtedly, been waiting – Iraq. It was ‘sad’, he said, that the parties could not be bipartisan on it, but in Labor’s view, Australia simply does not have the capacity to lock up so many resources in this war (which he added in an aside was a mistake in the first place). Praising the troops, he said we needed to focus on the ongoing problems in Afghanistan and the region, rather than in the Middle East.

Fitzgibbon’s questions were somewhat kinder, although he repeatedly failed to come up with concrete policies on just how Labor would provide incentives to new recruits other than health care. His answers were as vague as Nelson’s, but where Nelson appealed to nationalism and ‘values’, Fitzgibbon – in keeping with Labor’s ‘looking after ordinary Australians’ focus – championed what he called ‘kitchen table needs’.

The single most telling point made in an otherwise largely uninspiring and uninteresting debate (even without the audio problems) came from Fitzgibbon. When Australia was asked to make a small contribution to peacekeeping and protection duty for aid workers in Darfur, the Howard government was forced to decline, because of our troop commitment in Iraq. This, Fitzgibbon said, was bad enough – but what about next time, especially if that ‘next time’ was in our region?

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Posted by theconsciencevote

Ozvote ’07 – Foreign Affairs & Education debates

November 16, 2007

The debates are coming thick and fast. So is the increasingly strident rhetoric. Sadly, the policies are pretty thin on the ground.

Good examples of this came in yesterday’s two debates – between Alexander Downer and Robert McLelland on Foreign Affairs, and Julie Bishop and Stephen Smith on Education. Far from anything concrete which the voter could use to assess real prospects for the future, we got a combination of lies, damn lies and insults.

You’ll have to forgive me if my tone gets a little flippant or scornful. What I saw yesterday was – unequivocally – the low point of the campaign. So far.

First, the Foreign Affairs debate.

Downer opened with some stirring nationalism – our single pillar is Australia. (He didn’t explain what this meant.) After asserting that Labor had 3 pillars (again, not explained), he went on to give us the now-familiar Shiny List of Good Stuff the Howard Government’s Done. We have good relationships with countries in the region. We have doubled our exports. We have Free Trade agreements with the US, Singapore and Thailand, which helps us lift people out of poverty in other countries.

Then came the whoppers. According to Downer, the following can also be listed among the great Coalition achievements. We have secured our borders. We are fighting effectively against terrorism – in fact, we are dealing major blows to Al Qaeda in Iraq, and we have caused a ‘dramatic decline’ in terrorism in Indonesia. (In an aside, he mentioned offhandedly that he wouldn’t be making submissions to the Indonesian government to have the condemned Bali bombers’ death sentences commuted.) And we are leading the fight against climate change.

(I pause for the picking up of jaws from the floor.)

Labor, in Downer’s view, doesn’t like trade. It doesn’t like helping foreign governments. Its priorities are wrong. Labor wants countries to be dependent on us. It’s inexperienced. It’ll send us into an uncontrollable decline on the world stage. Only the Coalition can save us now.

McLelland’s opening–- again, now familiar with Labor speakers – was delayed by his detailed thanks to the Chair, the audience, his opponent and Mrs Downer, who was apparently present to support her husband. He commented on how governments of both ‘persuasions’ had helped build Australia’s international reputation. Pleasantries over, the knives came out.

The Howard government acts contrary to Australian values. We don’t lead the way in climate change – in fact, we are international pariahs for our failure to ratify Kyoto. We are not succeeding in Iraq – it’s a disaster, said McLelland, and rolled out the appalling statistics of civilian deaths, military deaths, displaced people and overall cost. He quoted former Australian commander in chief Peter Cosgrove and Australian Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty, who have both said publicly that they believe our involvement in Iraq has increased the likely threat of terrorism.

McLelland warmed to his subject, condemning the Howard government for never clearly defining our objectives, for not supplying clear direction to our troops, for being the only government in the ‘Coalition of the Willing’ without an exit strategy, and for using the excuse that sanctions had failed to invade Iraq – when in fact, the Australian Wheat Board (whose export license was granted by Downer) was undermining sanctions with its kickbacks and rorts. Having delivered this indictment, McLelland used the last minutes of his speech to say that Labor would lead in global negotiations on climate change, and implement an exit strategy on Iraq.

Question time followed, whereby Downer repeatedly stated that the Iraq war is succeeding – or at least, getting rid of Saddam Hussein was a good thing, that he didn’t ‘deep-six’ a proposal for worldwide nuclear disarmament, that the techniques used by our intelligence and federal law enforcement agencies in interrogating detainees are ‘consistent with our human rights standards and civil liberties’–- and that his government objects if they see others not applying the same standards. (He did not, of course, mention the US government’s redefinition of ‘torture’.) McLelland reiterated his Message of Doom – the Asia-Pacific region is self-destructing, Iraq is a disaster, Iran has been emboldened by our meddling in the Middle East, and the sky is falling.

A moment of levity relieved an otherwise tedious debate of ‘is so! is not!’, when a journalist asked Mr Downer to speak French (a sly poke at Downer’s previous criticism of Kevin Rudd’s greeting the Chinese leadership in Mandarin at APEC). Downer obliged by introducing himself. McLelland, not to be outdone, quipped, “I can’t speak Mandarin – although I have eaten one or two in my time”.

The only other moment of interest was the question that utterly blindsided Downer – did he now accept that Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam war was a mistake, and did he accept that there were parallels with the situation in Iraq as regards military action based on deliberately distorted intelligence? Knowing what he knows now, did he regret Australia’s involvement in Iraq?

Downer, clearly unprepared for the question to come in that form, floundered for a bit, laughing about ‘Oh no, I’ll be asked about the Battle of the Somme next!’. When he did answer, however, he reiterated his party line – Saddam=bad, invasion=good – without once answering the question.

McLelland’s response was stronger. On Vietnam, he was unequivocal – it was a mistake. On Iraq, he pointed out that even the US Secretary of Defence had questioned the decision to invade – and then he repeated his party line – invasion=bad, Iran=scary.

There was very little in the way of policy announcement during the debate – in fact, nothing we didn’t already know. The Coalition will stay in Iraq, and pursue Free Trade Agreements with many more countries, including China and India. Labor will pull 1/3 of our troops out of Iraq, leaving the rest in ‘overwatch’ and ‘support’ positions, but out of combat. Downer was self-congratulatory, McLelland was the Voice of Doom. And so it went.

Commentators noted afterwards that the two had been ‘playing for a draw’. The only difference was that Downer simply couldn’t avoid scoring an ‘own goal’ on Iraq – after all, he was hardly likely to undermine the party line.

The Education debate wasn’t much better.

Julie Bishop opened with the Shiny List, and the Dream for a Better Tomorrow. Mixed in with the ‘imagine this’ motif were the lies. In this case, however, her lies were even more outrageous than Downer’s. Australia is ranked in the ‘top handful’ of OECD countries that invest in their education system. The Coalition has increased funding for schools and universities every year since gaining power. It has ‘rekindled an interest in Australian history’. Universities are in the best financial situation ever.

(I pause again – are your jaws getting sore yet? Mine were.)

Bishop segued effortlessly from happy-fluffy land to warnings of Teh Evil on the horizon. ‘We’ must get away from ‘state parochialism’. ‘We must break the nexus between unions and schools and the “one-size-fits-all’ approach to teachers”’. ‘We’ must liberate universities from the Dawkins/Labor ‘straitjacket’ of mediocrity. Most alarming of all, ‘we must move on from the fads and ideologies of the past twenty years’.

Smith’s opening, too, followed the predictable path. Thanks Chair, thanks Opponent, thank you linesmen, thank you ballboys. (Dear me, I am getting flippant.) Like Bishop, he rhapsodised about the Possibilities in Our Future – and immediately followed it up with the counter-statistics. Australia does not lead the world in education in any way – in fact, we’re either stagnating or going backwards. Our secondary school retention rate has not increased from its current figure of 75% in the last decade, we have rated last or equal last for investment in early childhood education in the OECD for the last six years, university funding is down while HECS costs are up, teacher qualifications are declining, etc.

With all the sledging, it was hard to pick out the policies – more often, both debaters criticised each other’s ideas or challenged their figures. This is the best I could do.

Bishop – technical colleges will be increased by 100. Universities will be encourage to seek sources of funding from business, so they are not ‘dangerously reliant’ on one form of revenue. The ‘progressive curriculum’ developed to date in secondary schools will be systematically removed and a national curriculum, controlled from Canberra and approved by Federal politicians, put in its place. Teachers will be paid using ‘innovative salary models’ that ‘reward excellence’. And she reiterated the ‘parents deserve a choice’ rap – adding, this time, the nasty implication that applying a means test to education-spending tax rebates would prevent parents from choosing private schools for their children.

(I’m just going to break in here. This is an utterly outrageous lie. Means testing would not prevent any parent from making the same choice of schools. What it would do is prevent the wealthiest parents from gaining yet another tax break on something they’d be doing anyway. To suggest that means testing would somehow hurt ‘ordinary Australian parents’ is nothing short of deceptive.)

Smith – full-fee domestic places at university will be abolished. Absolutely no deregulation of fees with low-cost loans schemes to fund universities. A national school curriculum is absolutely necessary, but must not be written by politicians – under a Labor government, the curriculum would draw on the existing good programs and be mutually agreed to by State, Territory and Commonwealth governments as well as representatives of Catholic and independent schools. Existing teachers will be retrained and upskilled, and the image of the profession will be rehabilitated.

Smith also did something that rated highly with many commentators. When Bishop brought up the notorious ‘hit list’ of the Latham leadership (in which Commonwealth funding would be taken from private schools and given to government ones), Smith unequivocally stated that he accepted the policy was ‘wrong’ and ‘divisive’ – and guaranteed it would not be reinstated.

(Breaking in again. I liked the Hit List. I thought it was a bloody good idea for government funding to go to government schools, rather than supplementing the already comfortable financial position of private ones. Nonetheless, a willingness to own up to past mistakes counts for a lot.)

Yes, those were the highlights. Sad, huh?

The stand-out from both these debates was the level of lying that was undertaken by the Coalition speakers. Both Downer and Bishop flew in the face of all reports about the dire state of both our education system and the war in Iraq – and they did so without apology and without regard for the Australian people. Whatever the intended message, I think it’s fair to say that viewers came away from those debates with a sour taste in their mouths. No one likes being lied to – and no one likes being taken for a fool.

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Posted by theconsciencevote

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