We can’t let Mal-aise boost Bill into power

UNLESS there is a dramatic change between now and the July 2 federal election, Australian voters will be presented with a choice between a fairly moderate centrist government led by Malcolm Turnbull and the most left-wing government the nation has ever had the misfortune to suffer under, led by Bill Shorten.

UNLESS there is a dramatic change between now and the July 2 federal election, Australian voters will be presented with a choice between a fairly moderate centrist government led by Malcolm Turnbull and the most left-wing government the nation has ever had the misfortune to suffer under, led by Bill Shorten. Yet, given such a stark choice, the polls would indicate the election result will be extremely close. It need not be but Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will have to address some fundamentals in his approach to campaigning if he is going to resoundingly smash Labor. By any international comparison, Australia is in better shape than almost every country in the world and the Australian people are better off than those elsewhere. These are realities which are owed in large part to the policies of the past Hawke-Keating government, and the Howard and Abbott-Turnbull governments. Almost all the current fin-ancial problems are due to the wanton profligacy of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd governments, of which current Opposition leader Bill Shorten was not only a key member but was also a principal strategist and fundamental to its ­inherent ­instability. Add to those woes the overwhelming sense in large sections of the community that their expectations remain ­unfulfilled. This disappointment is only to be expected given the utterly shameless pie-in-the-sky promises made by the former failed Labor governments of Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard. The Sugar Candy Mountain, with its streams of whisky, was never going to eventuate. The big promises like the Gonski education plan and NDIS were unfunded. Labor didn’t put money aside for them. It couldn’t. It never produced a surplus. It was only capable of spending. It spent the Howard-Costello surplus, and it rapidly ran up the deficit through spending on gimmicks, investing in lethal pink batts, shade cloths for schools (some of which have already been closed), on an NBN rollout that was little more than a boondoggle. The most dangerous thing Labor did though was to bequeath Australia with a growing population who would turn their back on self-help and turn to the government for help. Though Rudd campaigned as John Howard-lite, he buckled to union pressure and embarked on wasteful programs which would only boost union membership though not fast enough for the union leaders, like Shorten, who replaced him with a far more committed trade union booster in Julia Gillard. Now, Shorten has become even more populist and retrogressed even further into the socialist morass. When he leaves Yarralumla with his election writ in hand, Turnbull will have to sound more convincing than he has over the past week. The brouhaha over 10-year economic forecasts which so seized Labor and some in the media was ridiculous in the ­extreme. No economist would place any weight on a forecast or projection 10 years out, yet Labor, and its predictable media lapdogs, treated the prospect of a guesstimate of the state of the economy in a decade as if such a fantasy should be carved in stone. But Turnbull should have been nimble and agile enough to make that point when first questioned on it by Sky’s uber-professional David Speers. So, too, should Turnbull and Morrison have been better placed to explain their ret-rospective hit on some wealthy ­superannuants. Even though both have ­fallen back on the excuse that only 4 per cent of those with super will be affected, the retrospectivity of the change sticks in the craw of conservatives. The last time retrospective tax laws were introduced was when the Fraser government (Treasurer John Howard) moved against bottom-of-the-harbour tax avoidance schemes. Bottom-of-the-harbour was a favourite with criminal org-anisations like the notorious Painters and Dockers Union but was also used by some legitimate businesses with clever accountants. The problem with the manner of dealing with it was the retrospectivity. As Australian Democrats leader Don Chipp said in 1982: “I do not trust politicians to legislate retrospect-ively. One of the few protections that the ordinary citizen has is that he knows the law.” The attack on those superannuants, albeit a small number, as they stress, makes Turnbull and Morrison look as though they are treating superannuation in the same way Labor has promised to do — as a huge piggy bank when the money runs out. It was a smack in the face for aspirational Australians and there has been disappointment and anger among root-and-branch Liberals, numbers of whom feel that the Turnbull government is doing too much to woo the Green-Left than ­reassure its traditional supporters. The next eight weeks will be fascinating for political buffs but most Australians will not give a toss till the final week in June or July 1. Quite a few will waken on July 2 still ­unsure of how they will vote even though the choice is clear. That choice will have to be dramatically demonstrated by Turnbull, in his first election campaign as leader, by the ­Nationals Barnaby Joyce, in his first election as leader, and by Liberal director Tony Nutt, who is also running his first federal campaign. Shorten has the wind in his sails, throwing out inducements like Father Christmas from the back of the sleigh, but with no plan to pay for any of them. The Liberals will have to convince voters they can pay for the modest offerings in the Budget and restore the nation’s fortunes for the next generation to enjoy and prosper.