Biggest BS claims of the election campaign
Campaign Confidential: Everyone’s got a different take on claims made during the election, but these are the statements that really seemed to fail the pub test over the past few months.
Federal Election
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When it comes to promises and statements on the election campaign, there’s a spectrum. Some people may see statements as porkies and white lies, but there are also honest mistakes and lots of selective quoting of facts. Partisan hacks will rip into their opponents’ every utterance, claiming outrage and deceit everywhere – but the reality is most of these claims are just noise for most voters. Everyone will have their own opinions, but this list is an attempt to compile things we don’t think will pass the “pub test”: moments that just don’t seem true or fair or honest to people who aren’t party faithfuls.
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1. “Max home loan rate 3% for five years” – United Australia Party billboard
The United Australia Party’s claim that they would cap interest rates on all home loans rates as the single biggest falsity of the federal election campaign, for two main reasons. Firstly, capping interest rates is not in the federal government’s power; they’re set by the Reserve Bank, which is independent from government. Secondly, even if the government could pass a law to this effect, it would probably prove unworkable very quickly. Monash University economics lecturer Isaac Gross wrote in The Conversation: “If banks can’t make a profit on mortgages – if, for example, it costs 4 per cent to borrow and they can only charge 3 per cent – then lending doesn’t make financial sense for them. The banks will just stop writing mortgages entirely.”
2. “The Coalition will move all pensioners onto the Cashless Debit Card” – Various Labor MPs
Labor claims that a returned Coalition government would move all pensioners onto the Cashless Debit Card were swiftly rejected by the Social Services Minister, Anne Ruston. “We never have and we never will have a plan to force age pensioners onto the cashless debit card,” she said in a radio interview during the campaign. Labor had seized upon comments she had made in 2020, when she talked about wanting to initiate a “conversation … about the broadening of the use of the card,” but never mentioned forcing pensioners onto the system.
3. “Net zero is dead” – Matt Canavan
The outspoken Nationals Senator Matt Canavan caused a major problem for his moderate Coalition colleagues when he claimed during an interview that “the net zero thing is all sort of dead, anyway,” citing an apparent rethink in the UK government’s approach to some fossil fuel projects, in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But the claim was bogus. No country that has committed to a net zero emissions target, including Australia, has stepped away from such a goal. Last year Australia’s two main political parties reached consensus on a net zero goal, and a bunch of countries adopted their own net zero target, including big emitters like India and Russia. And the reasons why emissions need to come down to net zero only grow more apparent, as Spring heatwave conditions in India and Pakistan recently showed.
4. “Under the Liberals, Medicare is always under threat” – Labor policy slogan
This line formed the basis of Labor’s ‘Mediscare’ campaign in 2019 and it got traction again in this election cycle, especially after Labor unearthed some quotes from Anne Ruston that Medicare was “not sustainable”. In the 2014 Budget, Tony Abbott tried to introduce a “Medicare co-payment”, but the idea was wildly unpopular and it eventually had to be dumped as a policy – but its spectre has lived on, enabling Labor to suggest that if only the Coalition could get their way, they would seek to weaken Medicare. In fact, Medicare is guaranteed through legislation, and its funding is set to grow to $35.5 billion by 2025-26, according to the Liberal Party.
5. “Labor will introduce death taxes” – Various Coalition MPs
A recycled version of the scare campaign the Coalition ran in 2019, various MPs expressed this idea again in 2022. Treasurer Josh Frydenberg described an estate tax as a “30 year project” for Anthony Albanese. Certainly, the Labor leader had advocated for one prior to entering parliament, but the party slammed it as “fake news … completely without merit … just a desperate and pathetic lie”. Death taxes are not part of Labor’s policy platform.
6. “Labor will stop the Morrison government’s unfair cuts to NDIS plans” – Labor Party ad on Facebook
Liberal Party headquarters hit back over this one, pointing out the number of people on the NDIS had grown from 275,000 in March 2019 to 519,000 now – and funding under the Coalition had increased $39.6 billion in the past 12 months.
7. Climate 200 Independents are Greens members – Unidentified vandals
Midway through the campaign, corflutes for independents backed by Climate 200 were adorned with stickers that made them seem they were candidates for The Greens. Liberal Party spokespeople denied they were responsible, and The Greens themselves said they had nothing to do with it. The AEC commenced an investigation but have not yet found a culprit.
Later in the campaign, corflutes showing ACT Senate Candidate David Pocock and Warringah independent MP Zali Steggall wearing clothing adorned with The Greens logo produced by the group Advance Australia were deemed to be in breach of the Commonwealth Electoral Act.
8. “You people see everything through the lens of politics. I don’t.” – Scott Morrison
The Prime Minister was clearly exasperated when he admonished political reporters for their interest in politics, while being quizzed about the significance of a Reserve Bank rate rise. For a man who was NSW director of the Liberal Party between 2000 and 2004, and who has been in parliament since 2007, and who got to the top of the greasy pole in his party, this was rich indeed.
9. “I became an economics policy adviser to the Hawke government” – Anthony Albanese
Let he who hath not burnished their CV cast the first stone, and all that, but the Labor leader was caught inflating his credentials with this remark. It turned out that as a young party hack, Anthony Albanese was employed as a research officer to Tom Uren, who was not a cabinet minister in the Hawke government, and who had no role in economic policy.
10. “Our next Prime Minister” – UAP press ad featuring a photo of Craig Kelly
Five different polling companies have been tracking the voting intentions of Aussies this year, and at no point in any of the published polls did the support for the United Australia Party rise about 5 per cent. More often the UAP was bouncing around the 3-4 per cent range. Craig Kelly will mostly likely not be Australia’s next Prime Minister.
And a bonus one:
11. “(An electric vehicle) won’t tow your trailer. It’s not going to tow your boat. It’s not going to get you out to your favourite camping spot with your family.” – Scott Morrison
We know, we know: he said it during the 2019 campaign, not this one. But it’s worth mentioning, because for someone who won’t shut up about “technology not taxes,” Scott Morrison could not have been more wrong about the rapid advance in electric vehicle technology. We now have EV buses on the streets of Australian cities, and Linfox chose this election campaign to launch its new EV trucks for supermarket giant Coles.
Originally published as Biggest BS claims of the election campaign
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