MORRISON A FAILURE IN FIELDS HE CLAIMS TO HAVE MASTERED: JURY STILL OUT ON LABOR
0Morrison a failure in fields he claims to have mastered: jury still out on Labor
April 23. 2022 — 5.00am Save Log in. register or subscribe to save articles for later. Share Normal text sizeLarger text sizeVery large text size 236 View all comments If you stand in front of Old Parliament House in Canberra. looking across Lake Burley Griffin. you’ll see that there’s an unobtrusive yet serious looking office building on each flank. The building a few hundred metres to your left was created for the Treasury. The one on your right was for the Department of External Affairs. later renamed Foreign Affairs and relocated. Illustration: John ShakespeareCredit:SMH The design of the capital conveys the essence of national government. The parliament embodies the sovereignty of the people. It is served on one hand by the Treasury. symbolising the power to raise revenue. On the other. Foreign Affairs asserts the nation to the world. The Liberal Party claims unique competence in operating both of these fundamental functions of the nation state. It’s Scott Morrison’s greatest boast: “Strong economic management is more important now than it’s ever been – and we have the runs on the board here.” he told Sky in February. “That is at stake – what else is at stake is the security of our nation and the safety of Australians. Now. no one doubts my resolve when it comes up to standing up to those who are going to have a crack at this country.” And. as you stand looking straight ahead with your back to the parliament. your eye is drawn by design to the sobering reminder of the awful price we’ve paid when other countries do have a crack. Or when Australia joins its allies to have a crack at others. The distinctively domed War Memorial stands at the culminating point of the ceremonial Anzac Parade. at the foot of Mount Ainslie. It contains the bronze honour roll of Australia’s war dead – 102.980 men and women in all conflicts since 1885. Labor. he tells us. can’t manage money. It’s weak on national security. he claims in increasingly shrill tones. and even goes so far as to accuse Labor’s leaders of treachery. of being “on China’s side”. Morrison does have some serious accomplishments to his credit. In economic policy and foreign affairs. and credit to his government for supporting the veterans’ wellbeing centres too. His government did open the fiscal floodgates to buoy the economy through the pandemic. and it was right to do so. Morrison did harden Australia against Chinese government subversion. defy its trade bans. denounce its 14 demands on Australian sovereignty. rally other nations to Australia’s side. increase defence spending. actively promote the elevation of the Quad partnership with the US. Japan. India and Australia. and initiate the AUKUS arrangement to get access to US technology for nuclear powered submarines. He’s not making any of that up. But Morrison is now guilty of abject failure in the two fundamental federal functions where he claims to be so masterful. One was confirmed a little over three weeks ago in the federal budget. The other was confirmed in Beijing and Honiara. The man who accuses Labor of being unable to manage money has put Australia under its heaviest debt load since 1956. Not in dollar terms. because that would be an unfair comparison. but as a share of GDP. Worse. the budget shows that this will only increase in the years ahead. In 1956. Australia was still paying down the extraordinary debts incurred in fighting World War II. In 1956. the debt load was on its way down. The Morrison Frydenberg budget is post pandemic and the emergency spending. they tell us. is over. yet still the debt load is still going up. And they can’t use COVID 19 as their excuse. Before we’d even heard of COVID 19. before the first Wuhan bat had shed its first viral load. this government already had the worst fiscal record of any postwar government. Morrison’s debt run up makes Whitlam. Hawke. Keating and Rudd and Gillard look like skinflints. The Coalition inherited...
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