Opinion: Big government rules right now, but big business will help us recover

When the age of coronavirus comes to an end it will not be big government but big business that comes to the rescue of unemployed workers, writes Des Houghton.

I FEAR the COVID-19 plague has turned us all into whimpering socialists eager to spend other people’s money.

Roll up, roll up for a handout. More than one hundred billion here for him and her. Billions more for this and that.

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State and federal leaders are telling us how virtuous they are while doling out your hard-earned.

Along the way they have vastly increased the role and power of the state in interfering in our lives as a new wave of infections tears our community apart.

So I guess we must begrudgingly support stimulus packages and restrictions on personal liberty if we are to slow the gallop of the Four Horsemen.

The coronavirus pandemic is largely a medical crisis but it will become an economic one as more workers are laid off.

Even the Business Council of Australia endorsed the Morrison-Frydenberg splurge.

Advocates of small-state conservatism must be perplexed.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and Treasurer Jackie Trad

In Queensland, ineffectual Treasurer Jackie Trad introduced a modest stimulus package with a modest payroll tax holiday and a few other sugar hits.

Trad and Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk neglected to address the biggest question: How shall we pay for it? Poor economic management by Labor over two terms has left the state’s finances in ruins and limits Queensland’s ability to respond to the crisis.

Surgeries are being cancelled to make beds available for the torrent of fathers and mothers, sons and daughters testing positive for C-19.

Some awaiting surgeries will die, and grieving relatives will accuse the Government of having blood on its hands.

While Palaszczuk limits parliamentary sittings, democracy is on hold. The right of protest has all but been extinguished by lockdowns, social distancing and cross-border curfews.

It seems there is little fiscal accountability in the federal sphere, with Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg postponing the Budget.

ScoMo has become an all-powerful autocrat, just as Winston Churchill was during World War II.

The Prime Minister’s stature is so inflated right now it has left poor Anthony Albanese yapping at his heels like a poodle.

And dear Kevin Rudd, who did seem to enjoy a good crisis, has been throwing mud, although not much of it has been sticking.

Emilie Dye from the influential Australian Taxpayers’ Alliance provocatively said those with the best lobbyists got the handouts.

Tim Stanley, the British writer, this week warned about the rise Big Government.

“Boris Johnson, who we all thought was a libertarian, has signed off on something akin to war communism,” he wrote.

“The Government is about to get big – very big – both in how much it spends and how it treats civil liberties.’’

He said dissenters in the UK can now be sectioned on mental health grounds at the stroke of a pen under the new Coronavirus Bill.

He added: “We cannot suspend our critical thinking just because there is a crisis. Fiscal conservatives have every right to ask questions about the economic plans.

“The problem with leviathans is that once you have created one, they are a bugger to get rid of, which was our experience at the end of the Second World War.

“It took us 40-odd years to roll back the state, an effort for which we have to thank classical liberals like Margaret Thatcher.”

The Taxpayers’ Alliance urged leaders to use the crisis as an opportunity to repair the flawed tax system.

Dye sensibly suggested reducing or abolishing payroll tax and slashing high corporate tax to make goods cheaper.

The system unfairly hurt some more than others.

“Contractors, unlike employees, don’t receive any sick leave,” Dye said.

“The ATO could instantly put more money into the bank accounts of these workers by simply moving the due date for their taxes.

“This slowdown has revealed great inequity in our current tax code.

“Salaried employees don’t pay taxes on large chunks of their compensation including sick leave, consistent pay, and greater job security.

“COVID-19 has revealed just how valuable these benefits are.

“Contractors, however, must pay tax on every dollar, so it is only fair they pay a lower tax rate.

“Businesses in Australia pay some of the world’s highest corporate taxes.

“This gives local businesses a serious disadvantage against large multinational corporations.

“We could both stimulate the economy and make our tax code fairer for Australian businesses but cutting the corporate tax rate.’’

These are fair comments.

When the Age of Coronavirus comes to an end it will not be Big Government but Big Business that comes to the rescue of unemployed workers.

Des Houghton is a media consultant and a former editor of The Courier-Mail and The Sunday Mail