Coronavirus: PM gets it about right on all counts with JobKeeper package

The Prime Minister will hand out $130 billion in wage subsidies to protect an estimated six million workers for six months. Picture: Adam Taylor

Scott Morrison has spent the most amount of money of any prime minister in history. He has committed Australia to a lifetime of debt. He has refused to go down Boris Johnson’s path of giving high-income earners 80 per cent of their wages. And, it seems, he has got it just about right.

The Prime Minister’s new JobKeeper allowance — a flat $1500 a fortnight for those thrown out of a job by the coronavirus, to be paid via the Australian Taxation Office and their employer — is astronomical in its proportions, but ­admirably egalitarian in its aim.

Morrison may not get an ­endorsement from “true blue” ­Liberals who think he’s gone pinko by not looking after the bigger end of town, but he has already ­declared in The Australian on the weekend that there are no “red or blue” ­divisions in this crisis.

Australia needs an Australian solution that not only reaches out to all our citizens — even Kiwi residents — but will be endorsed by all levels of Australian society.

Anthony Albanese and Labor Treasury spokesman Jim Chalmers have indicated that Labor will support the package and facilitate its speedy process — which means there will be no three-day bickering, as was the case with the ­Democrats in Washington.

There may still be questions about the amount and those who will miss out. But the key with this $1500 figure is that it is essentially the minimum wage in the areas hit hardest: retail and hospitality.

It’s not bad to get a replacement for your already low wage. And, let’s face it, just because somebody has over-committed, there’s no reason why their fellow taxpayers should help out above and beyond the minimum assistance for everyone who has lost their job through no fault of their own.

This is also a key step — along with Morrison ensuring Albanese is included in briefings and discussions, but outside the national cabinet — towards securing union and opposition support.

Morrison has demonstrated that he is prepared to junk Liberal theology to achieve an Australian outcome, and there’s little doubt that Labor will do the same.

The recall of parliament and its inclusion in a weekly briefing and meetings is also a chance for Labor to recalibrate its tone and ­attitude in dealing with the ­crisis.

So far, federal Labor has ­appeared niggling, driven by gotchas and hindsight — behaviour not worthy of an opposition that is still required to do its elected duty and call out, as Chalmers said on Monday, where there is fault.

It’s not a place for cheap shots and silly lines.