Shorten’s character has been laid bare

FROM his boasting about Labor’s supposedly “strict vetting process” to his attempts to fire up a class war in his budget reply, Shorten is more and more a gift to Turnbull, writes Miranda Devine.

THE chickens have come home to roost for Bill Shorten.

His duplicity over Labor’s citizenship fiasco has solidified a feeling that has hung around him since he arrived in parliament, that he is shifty, phony and not to be trusted.

He shamelessly declared over and over for the last eight months that Labor’s superior management meant they had no case to answer under Section 44 of the Constitution, despite knowing full well that several of his MPs were dual citizens.

His staff monstered journalists who tried to ask questions.

“We have a strict vetting process” Shorten kept saying. “There is no cloud over any of our people, let’s be straight here”.

The chutzpah is incredible.

Then came Shorten’s budget reply speech, delivered in a bizarre sing song, which set up the class envy parameters for the mini-election he’s brought on himself. He tried to pitch the upcoming string of five “Super Saturday” by-elections as a street-by-street referendum on Scott Morrison’s company tax cuts, but it is all upside for the government.

They get to road test their pitch to voters and have a chance of winning one or two seats, Longman or Mayo. And they get to shine a spotlight on Shorten’s character problem.

Bill Shorten may have given his budget reply the thumbs up, but voters may not be so easily impressed. (Pic: Gary Ramage)

The government went for his jugular last week, led by Mathias Cormann, who has the ability to deliver killer lines with Schwarzeneggerian menace. “Bill Shorten has a persistent track record as a liar… He’s just running a blatant, dishonest, populist political agenda based on the politics of envy”.

Ain’t that the truth.

In his budget reply speech, Shorten characterised the government’s tax plan as only of benefit to the “big end of town”, and trashed their promise to remove the 37 per cent tax bracket.

“How on earth can it be fair for a nurse on $40,000 to pay the same tax rate as a doctor on $200,000?” he said. “For a cleaner to pay the same tax rate as a CEO?”

Apart from the despicable ploy of pitting doctors and nurses against each other, it’s a blatant lie.

Given the first $18,200 of income is tax-free, a nurse on $40,000 will pay only $4492 in tax, which is an average tax rate of 11 per cent.

The doctor on $200,000 will pay $60,007 in tax, which is 13 times more than the nurse pays, and is an average tax rate of 30 per cent. This is a very progressive tax system, in anyone’s language.

Shorten is not really advocating “fairness”, but equality of outcome. He is setting up the higher earner as the class enemy. Taken to its logical conclusion, his rhetoric aims to use the tax system to force the take home-pay for the worker on $200,000 to equal that of the worker on $40,000.

Where is the incentive to put in extra study, take on added responsibility and work longer hours for a higher salary? In Australia, we strive for equality of opportunity, but the blood soaked history of communism shows that equality of outcome is a very dangerous idea.

Shorten doesn’t care. His unscrupulous methods to win power for himself have been evident since he arrived in parliament in 2007. Less than six years later he was Labor leader, having helped knife two prime ministers. He takes “whatever it takes” to new levels.

He recklessly has opened the Pandora’s box of identity politics for his own purposes. He has repeated two of the most inflammatory lies about how Aborigines were treated in colonial times: “We poisoned the waterholes; we distributed blankets infected with diseases we knew would kill.” He cynically used suicide as a weapon during the same sex marriage debate to prevent a plebiscite.

And, apart from watering down border protection, Labor’s latest draft policy platform is riddled with identity politics. Gender appears 126 times, with the promise of “promoting diversity in corporate Australia” and 50 per cent gender quotas for Government boards. Intersex appears 63 times, with the promise of a new “Commissioner for Sexual Orientation, Gender Identity and Intersex Status issues”.

All of which might play well in greenie Batman but is kryptonite to the average voter.

There is a clear choice for voters. Now the budget has restored economic credibility and given them the appearance of a plan, the Turnbull government has a fair chance of winning the next election.

Despite much of the commentary, the polls aren’t bad, considering various own goals and internal sniping, with the latest Newspoll showing Labor only ahead 51 to 49 per cent in two party terms.

In the second year of John Howard’s first term, Labor pulled ahead to 57-43 and remained there until he won the election. And in the two years before Howard lost to Rudd in 2007, Labor was polling as high as 61:39. Julia Gillard and Paul Keating had similarly shocking polls before they lost.

As Shorten’s true character comes into focus, the government is in a sweet spot, despite the doomsayers.