Christopher Pyne: Will ALP emulate 2017 Crows and trip at the finish line?
In the 2017 Grand Final, Crows fans felt we had one hand on the trophy. Then it all went awry. The election has all the same hallmarks of the favourites losing at the last minute, writes Christopher Pyne.
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Kate Ellis and I are both Crows tragics. Kate is on the board of the Adelaide Football Club (quite possibly the best board in South Australia – especially after last Saturday’s Showdown with Port Adelaide).
I am a humble Crows Ambassador. It’s one of the few things that unites us.
I was devastated, along with my entire family, when the Crows were bested in the 2017 AFL Grand Final by the Richmond Football Club.
That hideous day is seared in the memory of every Crow fan. There the boys were, lined up with their arms at their side, all ready to go. We could taste victory after finishing as minor premiers. It had been a superb season. The betting was all the Crows way. The whole Crows tribe felt we had one hand on the trophy. But then it all went awry. Richmond had other ideas. They were going to make us work to win and we saved our worst game of the season for the most important day in the season. Well, that’s history – onwards and upwards.
Nobody wants to go there again, and yet …
This Federal Election could be a rerun of the 2017 AFL Grand Final. All the commentators, political pundits, the bookies, the pollsters – they are all telling us that Bill Shorten is going to win. That its inevitable. But is it?
FINAL PODCAST: CHRISTOPHER PYNE AND KATE ELLIS
As expected, the key election issue is the Australian economy. The central question about the economy is how will it withstand the “kidney punch” of Bill Shorten’s $387 billion of new taxes on housing, retirees and pensioners, small businesses, families and individual taxpayers? He can’t tell us. He also can’t tell us what the impact on the economy will be of Labor’s 45 per cent carbon emissions reduction target. Some economic modellers have put the hit on the economy as high as more than $500 billion. Mr Shorten either doesn’t know or won’t tell us.
In 1993, former prime minister, Paul Keating said of the Liberal Party’s Fightback! Platform: “If you don’t understand it, don’t vote for it; because if you did, you wouldn’t”.
The same can be said right now of Labor’s two signature economic policies – a $387 billion tax increase and a 45 per cent carbon emissions reduction target. We don’t know what either means to cost of living increases, wages, jobs, the growth of our gross domestic product, housing prices, rents, retirement incomes or what we have left in our pockets after the tax is taken out.
But we can be sure of one thing – the government is going to get bigger, it is going to take more of our money and spend it. In Mr Shorten’s world, the government knows best.
Labor already has its hand on the trophy. Mr Shorten can taste victory. But plans for his victory celebrations might be premature. Tomorrow has all the hallmarks of that memorable grand final in 2017, when the unfavoured team beat the favourites.
If you aren’t certain that Mr Shorten’s policies will be better for you financially, don’t vote for them.
Defence Minister Christopher Pyne is the retiring Liberal member for Sturt
Prepare for a summer of discontent
The timing of the next federal election is likely to condemn us to an excruciatingly long unofficial campaign, sapping all the fun to Christmas and beyond, writes Patrick Carlyon.
Campbell: Why are Australians so bloody miserable?
It’s taken a Pom to point out that we are richer – much richer – even than countries we think of as our peers. But it’s not something we really grasp let alone celebrate.