Why Tony Abbott should sack Joe Hockey as Treasurer for Christmas

OPINION: There’s a reason why Tony Abbott should pluck Joe Hockey for Christmas. He’s stuffed.

Pre-Budget: Job ID PD462490. Treasurer Joe Hockey during a pre-budget press conference at Parliament House in Canberra.Pic by Gary Ramage

OPINION

TONY Abbott should sack Joe Hockey as Treasurer for Christmas.

Trouble is, nobody thinks he has the savagery to do it and use a looming reshuffle to install Scott Morrison in the job. Or Malcolm Turnbull, the only Liberal who would deliver instant economic credibility.

It is what’s known in politics as the turkeys voting for Christmas.

The refusal to come to terms with the fact that Hockey is a lame duck is a real shame, because the last Treasurer with any authority was in 2007, when Peter Costello exited the stage.

Imagine, if Abbott actually wins the next election, it will be 10 years since there was a Treasurer who could cut the mustard in question time.

Oh, what a time to be alive.

Remember Wayne Swan, the Labor Treasurer Hockey taunted would never, ever deliver a budget surplus? Hockey was right of course.

Only problem is it’s a club Hockey now shows every sign of joining.

Swan still sits in Parliament on the backbench. Sometimes I wonder if he sticks around purely just to smile across at his tormentor and what an ineffective treasurer he is.

Hockey has entered that political dead zone where nobody is interested when he talks about tax cuts. What sort of Treasurer is that?

There was some silly criticism this week that the tax cut debate sunk like a stone in the media cycle because Hockey failed to provide enough detail to his tax plan.

Rubbish. It’s just that the bloke sounds like a flog.

When did a lack of policy detail ever stop Paul Keating or Peter Costello or John Howard prosecuting an economic argument? Never.

Also, Hockey’s best tax lines about average earners hitting the second highest tax bracket were stolen from Martin Parkinson. Who? He’s that widely respected Treasury boss that the Abbott Government sacked.

Hockey has long reigned as the Dyson Heydon of the Liberal Party, the man the ALP most want to stay in his job because it gives Bill Shorten another excuse to get away with murder.

Ask any Labor MP and they will tell you. The only way they reckon they can win the next election is if Abbott and Hockey stay in the job.

They don’t think they can beat Scott Morrison or Malcolm Turnbull.

Still, there’s certain ministers who are prepared to conduct their own decapitation strategy if strategy brains like Eric “Dolce & Gabbana” Abetz decide they would rather risk Bill Shorten than Malcolm Turnbull.

Morrison could decide to throw his lot in with Turnbull to become Treasurer, but that is a political alliance that would send his conservative backers including Sydney radio host Ray Hadley apoplectic.

Witness this week’s kerfuffle over Hockey’s decision to join a parliamentary friendship group for Republicans. Hockey later tried to respond to conservatives unhinging about this frolic when he couldn’t nail his day job, by explaining that it was just “drinks in an MPs office”.

Republicans, raise your glasses! Your hopes of constitutional reform are safe with Joe Hockey, as he drinks a VB with two mates in an empty office and smashes a packet of Doritos. Onya, mate.

Many Liberals would feel more relaxed and comfortable if his banker wife Melissa Babbage, who foresaw the GFC, was pulling the economic levers. But last time anyone checked we elected him, not her. Pity.

The other alternative, allowing Scott Morrison to continue in his role as the Phantom Treasurer, is not viable. It’s also rather emasculating for poor Joe. Still, there are some Liberals who are not convinced Morrison can count.

Watch out though for Morrison to kickstart the housing affordability debate again soon.

It should provide a fresh opportunity for Morrison to go all Rain Main on us again as he whips out data, graphs, economic modelling and associated Treasury fetish wear.

Dithering is in Hockey’s DNA, witness his last minute call for a conscience vote on climate change during the 2009 leadership ballot that rolled Turnbull. A conscience vote on climate change? What a wally.

It was a political suicide note that saw Tony Abbott elected as Liberal leader by one vote.

Maybe that’s why the PM still thinks he still owes Hockey one.

For being such a big idiot that he managed to go from front runner to getting Abbott elected in a three way contest?

Six years in the treasury portfolio when you’ve never landed a blow anyone can remember seems like a pretty good go.

Particularly when Hockey only got the job after Julie Bishop was the subject of vicious undermining by Hockey’s boosters and little minions.

How funny is that now? Extremely funny. Laugh Out Loud.

The karma bus is coming for Joe Hockey.

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Originally published as Why Tony Abbott should sack Joe Hockey as Treasurer for Christmas