‘Posh Labor’ caters to the demands of a socialist nation

In the 1920s Evelyn Morris, my great-grandmother, lived with her husband John on a small holding near Avoca, a small town in the central highlands of Victoria. John was a miner and in 1925, aged 54, he died from “miner’s complaint”, a disease of the lung.

At the time of John’s passing, there were seven children. David, the second oldest, was my Pa.

Two months after Evelyn lost her husband, death touched the family again. Nine-month-old Mary was taken by meningitis. At the time, my Pa was 14.

Pa was the oldest boy. Shortly after his father died, he had to care for the family. He left school to join the workforce as an apprentice in Melbourne in the trade of glass silvering and bevelling. Pa’s first pay packet was 12 shillings and sixpence for a week’s work. This is $1.25 in today’s money.

In those days, there was no such thing as welfare. If you didn’t work you starved, so people worked. Pa kept a diary through these years. This document contains a record of the payments he sent home every week so the family could eat.

Evelyn cared for the children, and kept chooks and a milking cow, grew vegetables and preserved the fruit off her trees. There was no horse or carriage. At regular intervals, Evelyn pushed her pram into town. The pram was loaded with eggs, vegetables and fruit, which Evelyn sold or bartered in exchange for other goods.

Every time Pa came home to visit he went on a rampage with his gun, killing rabbits. The family ate this “underground mutton” every night of the week. Rabbit was grilled, braised, roasted, stewed and fried, to vary the menu.

In 1929, the Depression came. All the married men were kept on at Pa’s work, but he was put off because he was single. When Pa came back home he did any work he could. He did plumbing for the council, he cut firewood, he cut eucalyptus leaves to make oil, he dug trenches with a pick and shovel, he laid water pipes from Avoca to the railway station, and he hunted rabbits and sold them. Each week, his wages kept the family alive.

Were these the good old days? No, but today things have gone too far the other way. Now this country embarrasses me; I find myself slowly backing away.

Last week, a friend of mine divulged some financial information on a mutual acquaintance. This man is from an extremely wealthy family. He lives in a grand home at no cost, which is owned by their family trust. His wife doesn’t work; they have two very nice cars, owned by the family business. He is employed in that business, and he admitted his salary is kept low, at exactly the right amount, so he can receive tens of thousands a year in family payments, childcare subsidies and other financial assistance for his six children.

This is what Australia has come to. The welfare state is so entrenched, our entitlement mentality so prevalent, and our system so easy to rort that even the rich connive to get their snouts in the trough.

This week, the government released its budget. With regards to the new bank tax, National Australia Bank chief Andrew Thorburn said, “It is not just a tax on a bank. It is a tax on every Australian … these people include: the 10 million NAB customers, depositors and borrowers; the 570,000 direct NAB shareholders, retirees and mums and dads who are building their nest egg for the future, as well as the millions of Australians who own shares in NAB through their superannuation; the more than 1700 suppliers to NAB; and the 34,000 people who work at NAB and serve our customers …

“A tax cannot be absorbed. This tax is borne by these people. It is not possible to impose a tax without an impact on people, and therefore the wider community.”

Thorburn is right. In this society, we are all connected. Tax a business owner, the customers pay. Tax the rich, the poor pay in the end. When taxes rise, we all lose. Tax one, tax all. It is a crying shame that the people do not revolt against the representatives of the state.

The budget will be popular. It is designed for the majority, the 60 per cent of households that live off the 40 per cent that pay; those who have bought the line that someone else can be taxed to pay for things they think they need. In our society, those who vote for a living now outnumber those who work for it. This is our biggest problem and it appears unfixable. This budget is proof of that.

Disappointed Coalition types are calling the government Labor-lite, with good reason, although I prefer to think of it as posh Labor, or Labor with pearls. Yes, this is a Labor budget, designed to cater to the infantile demands of a socialist country. Australia, if the shoe fits, then wear it.