Red Rag

Don’t listen to the Westpoll (nobody else does) — there’s no Coalition landslide.

In December, Newspoll reported that 37% of electors would give their first preference to Labor. Last weekend, the figure was 42%. The Coalition fell from 49% to 44% in the same period. On a two-party preferred basis, there has been a 6% swing to Labor, and it’s now a dead heat at 50/50.

Importantly, the poll shows a lift in Labor’s primary vote, the supposedly low level of which was the reason for various doom-and-gloom predictions around the traps.

Sol Lebovic says the swing is not really 6%, because the previous Newspoll was an aberration due to “a lot of federal implications coming though, which muddied the waters.” I think he’s right. Morgan’s December figures showed a fall in support but nothing like that of Newspoll. Perhaps their face-to-face approach means people are less distracted when they respond?

So now that we’ve got a reasonable poll, we know that Labor is still the underdog, but it’s early days yet.

When Mark Olson joined Colin Barnett’s campaign team, he said he would be encouraging nurses to endorse the deal by voting Liberal, and he was “supremely confident” that ANF members would “whole-heartedly endorse this initiative by the Coalition.” Unfortunately, it seems the nurses disagree, and now he is back-pedalling hard.

The LHMU, which represents some nurses and other hospital staff, reminded nurses of the Liberal Party’s record:

Under the previous Coalition Government, nurses should remember that they lost their accrued days off, senior nurses were forced onto workplace agreements, they saw the introduction of seven hour shifts and the loss of handover time. Every second nurse was an agency nurse.

The memory of Graham Kierath’s terrible reign seems to have struck a chord. According to the West Australian (p7):

But after Mr Barnett escaped [the LHMU's protest] to the safety of a private meeting to promote his pay offer to ANF nurses, the Liberals’ public relations exercise did not go entirely to plan either.

Sceptical ANF nurses at the meeting asked Mr Barnett if the coalition could afford the generous pay offer and also demanded an assurance that Mr Kierath would not be returned. “When Graham Kierath was health minister he wreaked havoc, it was not a happy time,” one ANF nurse told Mr Barnett.

By the end of the meeting, Mark Olson had changed his tune completely. “The ANF doesn’t tell its members how to vote,” he said. This afternoon he was on talkback radio getting the message out that he no longer wanted to have Colin Barnett’s babies.

This is a victory for common sense — and nurses. Labor should release its counter-offer soon, so that it can finally put the issue to bed.

Update: Other public sector unions demand similar promises from Colin Barnett.

Meanwhile, Olson responds to criticism by sledging his comrades as a “pack of misogynists” who don’t want to see women succeed. Interesting. The strongest criticism has come from the LHMU, whose membership is predominantly female — especially its health sector membership.

In the Summer 04/05 issue of Dissent, Paul Mees explains that the problems facing railways on t’other side (typified by derailments and scheduling problems in NSW) were entirely preventable. Due to historical circumstances, railways departments embraced the ideological shift towards managerialism and privatisation more than other government departments. He also explains that Perth bucked the trend and has the best railways department in the country:

Rail managements became very good at closing lines, withdrawing services and reducing staff numbers, but were much less able to deal with the challenge of expansion, when it was presented. The situation was further complicated by endless corporate restructures and, in Victoria, privatisation.

The main exception to this rule is the railway revival in Perth. The state’s rail bureaucracy was as wedded to decline as any in the country: in 1979, the Fremantle line was closed as the first stage of a plan to shut the whole rail network. A strong community campaign, led by the local council and supported by key academics and Labor Party figures (many of whom lived in Fremantle), saw this decision reversed the following year. …

The Western Australian government electrified the Perth rail system by 1991, then built a completely new line to the northern suburbs. Patronage expanded from around 6 miullion annually to 30 million in less than a decade, and the rail system in Perth is again undergoing dramatic expansion to cope with a predicted doubling of patronage by 2010. Along the way, the government managed to assemble a new team of rail planners and builders untainted by the previous defeatist management culture. Perth’s rail planners are able to build lines at a fraction of the cost of their interstate counterparts, open them on time and run efficient, safe, well-patronised services.

Every step of the way, the Liberal Party has opposed the development of Perth’s railways. They tried to shut the whole rail network down in 1979, before they were turfed out. Labor Government reopened the Fremantle line, electrified the system, and built the northern line, which now runs as far as Clarkson. It is Labor that has just completed the Greenwood Station — neglected by the Liberals since the need for a new station became apparent in 1996 — and it is Labor that is building a new rail line south to Mandurah.

But most importantly, the previous Labor Government managed to overcome the defeatist attitude of the bureaucracy, turning our railways department into an efficient, visionary organisation.

A return to the Liberal Government will undermine that hard work. Colin Barnett is a firm believer in the managerialism that has caused so many problems for the NSW rail system, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he wanted to privatise rail assets, either. We know the Liberals intend to slash the public transport budget, increasing fare revenue from 25% of operating costs to 40%.

They want to pass those costs on to concession pass holders, like old age pensioners, veterans and school students. Under the previous Liberal Government, concession fares increased by 50%, well above the inflation rate. They aim to set concession fares at half the full rate which, combined with their recovery rate goal, would mean a massive fare increase.

By contrast, Labor is making it easier and cheaper to use public transport. In order to reverse the Liberals’ attacks on public transport, fares have not increased by more than the inflation rate, and concession fares were frozen for four years. Fares did not increase at all in 2004. When the new smart-card ticketing system is introduced, fares for school students will be fixed at 50c irrespective of the distance travelled (pdf).

The benefit to families with school-aged children will be significant. When I was in Year 12, my two brothers and I caught the train from Warwick to Perth and back again every day. Assuming we remembered to use Multiriders, here is the cost breakdown for a similar family:

The choice is clear.

If you take public transport, you can’t afford Colin Barnett.

Both the Police Minister and her Shadow say they don’t support a police decision to allow bikies riding in a funeral procession to do so without helmets. This is a big fuss over nothing. The bikies applied for a permit in accordance with the relevant legislation, and their request was granted. Who cares?

Here’s an interesting report on Mark Olson’s decision to jump into bed with the Liberal Party:

[ACTU President Sharan] Burrow said she had tried to end the long-running dispute three months ago. On behalf of Mr McGinty, she offered the ANF a 15 per cent pay rise with a commitment to negotiate on conditions.

The deal offered by the Liberals is 14% and a commitment to negotiate. Mark Olson has taken his members backwards in order to support the Liberals. This, I hope, will be the end of his career as a union official.

In explaining why the ANF-Liberal deal is not the end of the world, I wrote:

This will be contrasted with Labor’s health promises, which have yet to be made. … Firm commitments to improved conditions, alongside a continued commitment to the AIRC’s 14.7% recommendation, would trump the Liberals’ lower pay offer and vague promise to negotiate.

It seems that this is exactly what the Government intends to do:

But Health Minister Jim McGinty told The Weekend Australian his Government intended to offer a superior package, a position backed by Australian Council of Trade Unions president Sharan Burrow.

“I think he (Mr Olson) may have jumped into bed with the Liberals too quickly,” Mr McGinty said. “We had worked out a package of conditions. It well and truly exceeds the $50 million deal.”

I’m looking forward to those announcements.

This just in from our imaginary friend and Diana Elgar’s television industry colleague, Brett Kleinitz:

Hello Webloggers,

As co-recipient of the Best Post award in the Australian Blog Awards, I’d like to thank all of those who voted for us. It was, of course, a team effort and so I’d also so like to thank my fellow winners; Mr. Simon Hollins, BA, LLD, Ms Miranda Airey-Branson, Mr. Alexander Lew and Mr. Andrew Bolt.

I am very proud to have played my own small part in exposing to the many reader’s of the Blogs and of the Herald Sun one of the many depraved minds who populate this Nation’s television and film industries and seek to brainwash the minds of our children with their so-called “creativity”. The vile and foul-mouthed Ms Elgar has thankfully moved on from MacLeod’s Daghters, leaving more than one ruined relationship in her wake, and moved on to a more “adult” programme about young urban professionals at channel 7. I can only imagine these sorts of characters would be more suitable to her style of filthy “humour” that she’d like to put in they’re mouths, and leave the dialogue of the sensible rural characters of MacLeod’s Daghters to those less “sophisticated” writers who can string a sentence together without feeling the need to always including expletives which others have to spend hours and prescious dollars censoring, and can create storylines that don’t involve scenes of need to be completely rewritten.

Australian television is what it is today thanks to the hard work and dedication of dozens of executives and other, more junior, financial and legal minds, the unsung heroes who work behind the scenes with little or no recognition for their efforts, unlike a lot of manky, selfish-indulgent, little fame-whores cock-teasers whose only contribution is a bit of creative talent and a sense of humour.

Thank you for this award. It is truly a vindication.

Yours truly,
Brett Kleinitz.

I’d like to add a few words, if I may.

Pandagate was the strangest experience I have ever had in my life. I’m sure there are many people who still don’t understand exactly what happened (friends of mine who stumbled across it via Crikey said they couldn’t make head nor tail of it), so I’ll try to summarise it briefly.

Read the rest of this entry…

The biggest news of the campaign in the last couple of days has been the “Faustian pact” between the Australian Nursing Federation’s Mark Olson and the Liberal Party. Olson is urging nurses to vote for the Coalition, and is running nurses in certain seats in order to funnel preferences to the Liberals. This is obviously a spanner in Labor’s works, but I’m not convinced it’s a particularly damaging one.

Read the rest of this entry…

When Colin Barnett’s not struggling with basic arithmetic, he’s accusing gay teenagers of being mentally retarded and making jokes at their expense.

In Liberal Governments the Premier is usually also the Treasurer, and Colin Barnett says that tradition would continue if he is elected. That means Barnett’s economic credibility is especially important, but it leaves more than a bit to be desired. His very first policy announcement of the campaign has a black hole of $11 million per year.

Mr Carpenter said Treasury had examined the policy costing and found that instead of $45 million a year, it would cost $56 million a year — a mistake he said cast doubt on the credibility of all Coalition policy costings.

“So this costing is $44 million short of the mark as described to us by Treasury,” Mr Carpenter said.

[...]

Mr Barnett has so far declined to reveal who is carrying out the Coalition’s policy costings, and today Mr Carpenter said that was a problem.

“The first time we have had the opportunity to have the figures that he has released analysed by Treasury, his figures are shown to be wrong which I think shows a major flaw in his whole campaign strategy,” he said.

$11 million per year is a lot of money — a full quarter of the funds allocated by the Liberals. Barnett apparently thinks it’s okay to base your policy costings on data that’s three years old, and if there’s a problem?

Mr Barnett said he would stand by his commitment even if there was a cost blow-out.

That’s right, “Bugger the cost.”

We can’t really expect anything different. When Colin Barnett was Education Minister, he blew out his budget by almost $400 million, and left over $29 million in unfunded commitments.

That was just one portfolio. Now that he’s got his fingers in every pie, we can expect the blowouts to be much bigger.

Since Barnett declared that the on-again-off-again position statements would be election policies, Labor’s gone through them with a fine-tooth comb. From the West (p7):

The Opposition’s 76 position statements contain about 450 commitments, but Labor claims just 42 promises are costed, already totalling $1.768 billion.

This month, Opposition Leader Colin Barnett declared the position statements should be viewed as coalition policies. Mr Barnett has resisted Labor pressure to release the Opposition’s costings, promising an assessment later.

Colin Barnett has already told us what this “assessment” means. “We will add them up for you,” he said. The first policy he tried to add up was out by $11 million a year!

This criticism is not coming only from the Labor side. The Chamber of Commerce and Industry, a strong Liberal Party supporter and which Barnett once ran, says “undisciplined election promises could threaten WA’s AAA credit rating and put upward pressure on interest rates,” and “accused Mr Barnett of making promises with no regard to the budget.” Even his own side doesn’t trust him with the economy!

Four nominations, four victories: Best WA, best design, best political and best post. Thanks, everyone. But that stuff is a sideshow — the real joy of these awards is discovering new blogs through the lists of nominees.

When you’re trying to work out whether to vote for someone, it helps to find out what the people closest to them think about them. Late last year, Colin Barnett’s wife Lyn was interviewed on 6PR, and this is what she said:

Mario D’Orazio: How do you approach that? You know, let’s hammer you a little bit here, the life of a political wife, it’s like a political widow, isn’t it, really? Do you see much of this guy?

Lyn Barnett: No, which is probably a good thing. It keeps the marriage working along quite well.

It’s a metaphor for the election. Colin Barnett’s absence from his wife keeps their marriage working along quite well, just as his absence from the treasury benches keeps WA’s economy working along quite well.

The claim.

The reality.

Colin Barnett’s trying to bag the Gallop Government for raising taxes during this term of government. The fact is, though, taxes were raised because the economic forecasts were poor. The choice was between raising some charges, or running a deficit budget.

Barnett knows this, which is why he attacked the former Under-Treasurer John Langoulant (now head of the CCI) as responsible for the taxes:

“No one would have played a more significant role in those tax increases than the Under-Treasurer.”

Here, Barnett has admitted that the decision to increase taxes was based on advice from the Treasury. It was based on the economic forecasts and was the most responsible decision to take under the circumstances.

As soon as the economic forecasts were revised upwards, Geoff Gallop apologised for the mistake and gave back a billion dollars in tax cuts.

But for all his criticism of the government, Colin Barnett won’t rule out tax hikes if he is elected (West, p7):

But while he attacked Dr Gallop’s record on taxes, Mr Barnett refused to categorically rule out any tax increases under a coalition government.

Refused to rule out tax hikes? Come on, Colin — put your money where your mouth is!

Well, well, what’s this on the WA Liberals’ website?

Deputy Coalition Leader Max Trenorden says the Gallop Labor Government is attempting to erase history by removing all of the party’s 2001 election policies from the State ALP website…

Oh, this is funny. A press release complaining about disappearing policies, on a website whose policies are suddenly absent the minute the election is called!

When Labor updates its campaign promises after four years, that’s “erasing history.”

When the Liberals delete their policy platform after four days, that’s “making firm decisions and sticking by them.”

Update: The policies are back — though they’re still called “position statements” when you download them. Flip-floppers.

I feel like a change, but don’t have time to redesign, so I’m reprising my previous stylesheet. If you prefer the new one, there’s a link in the sidebar to change it.