The past couple of weeks have seen some shockingly bad ideas come out of the Federal Coalition. First there was the paid parental leave scheme; now there’s this soup of a policy, employee ownership. Marxism for the 21st century! Workers and bosses can all hold hands and chant “Workers united will never be defeated.”
Did these people sort of get put into the Liberal Party on some kind of work release program, and were told to invent a policy a day? Are they playing a bizarre game of “spin-the-policy” wheel?
I’ve decided to help. Here are sixteen policies that Abbott should adopt.
1. Repeal repeal repeal.
This one is easy. Half their platform should be rollbacks of bad ideas.
The mining tax, obviously. But also the “Building Education Revolution” and any other residual vestiges of the stimulus package.
2.Nix the NBN
This monstrous white elephant will cost $2000 for every man, woman and child in Australia, and $5000 for every house. Most people, if you said “would you like the government to spend 5000 dollars putting fast internet to your home?” would reply, “no thanks, my internet is fine already.”
45 billion (or whatever it is) right there.
3. kill the filter.
Conroy’s internet filter is not only impractical, it has made us an international laughing stock in the IT world (just as the RSPT did in the resources industry). It smacks of moralism and is a worrisome slide toward state control of information and overbearing socialism. Kill it.
4. Restore relations with India.
Rudd has royally screwed things up with India. It’s time to mend the friendship. India are a natural ally. They’re an English-speaking capitalist democracy, just like us, they have a problem with terrorism, and they play cricket. Mending things may mean, among other things, selling them uranium, but Abbott need not promise that right now. he can promise a visit to India as a priority though.
5. Free Stern Hu.
Rudd threw Hu to the wolves. Abbott should express outrage at the treatment of this Australian citizen and demand his return.
6.Let universities charge for undergraduate positions.
Currently only overseas students can buy their way into courses. Locals used to be able to do it but Rudd stopped them. That move was naked class warfare. it doesn’t benefit local students. Paying students were not “taking places away.” they were buying extra places, that simply disappeared.
7. abolish tenure.
Right now, Australian academics jobs start as tenure. this means that someone walks into a new job with a guarantee for life. Talk about a union cartel! Get rid of it.
8. Deregulate land use
Maybe there will be a property bust, maybe not. Either way, deregulation of land use will play well. If there’s no bust, then clearly moribund laws are keeping Australian prices high. If there is a bust, then the laws are creating a boom-bust cycle.
of course we all like our towns to be pretty as a picture; but there’s a price for that. Excessive regulation keeps land price high; makes small player entry difficult (hence the rise and rise of Westfield, for example); restricts the number and variety of commercial operations; and homogenises our towns.
But what about urban sprawl? That’s just a polite way of describing the horror of working class people living in nice homes. According to the planning elite, they should live in apartments and narrow terraces in ‘vibrant’ city centres.
9. Expand the Active After School Care program.
The Australian Sports Commission runs a very successful program where kids play sport after school. right now it’s not available to all kids in all schools.
10. Fund grass roots sporting participation
such as clubs, rather than elite sport. My hunch is that the Australian obsession with Olympic medal counts is over-estimated by vested interests. It certainly smacks of elitism, and personal indulgence at public expense.
11. Make the Northern Territory a free trade zone.
This is an idea of economist Terje Peterson who comments at catallaxyfiles.com; it makes sense on all kinds of levels.
12. Build a National freeway system.
We could take inspiration from the american interstate system. Okay, we can’t have a latticework of freeways covering the entire continent, but we can have some things; dual carriageway between Sydney and Brisbane for instance, or even take it all the way to Cairns.
To keep the Westralians happy, we could build a bit of freeway up the WA coast as well, maybe Perth to Broome.
13. Take the first steps toward nuclear power.
Labor ran ads against Howard on this very issue in 2007, but public sentiment is drifting the other way. Abbott seems to not be afraid to resurrect supposedly dead policy ideas (like ditching the ETS), and this is another one he could capitalise on.
A little known fact… Australia’s coal powered stations are ageing; many are operating past their official use by dates, the life spans that they were predicted to have when they were built.
14. Abolish the department of climate change ( I think they’re going to do this one anyway)
15. End Film Subsidies.
Promise to stop subsidising rubbishy Australian films. Locally made movies are a disgrace.
16. Sell SBS
Do we really need two public broacasters?
Don’t thank me, Tony.
But if I’m watching the news and I see you make the following announcement:
“The coalition will build a freeway system connecting nuclear power systems with a running track for school kids, paid for from the profits of selling SBS, canning film subsidies and abolishing the Department of Climate Change”
Then you can expect an invoice to my paypal account.
And please, no more renditions of “Workers united”.
(update: really should have mentioned deregulating child care somewhere. It’s hideously expensive and hidebound with needless regulation, in the name of giving all kids the best possible care. Hey, if you want something to be ‘beyond market forces’, then fine but the state should pay. If it’s user pays, let us choose what kind of care we want our kids in.)