In the last of these posts on Rudd’s New Labor, I wrote that a trend was emerging. It’s now clear. Ruddian Labor is rebranding itself on the right. As today’s instalment (welfare reform) shows, this might be more about rebadging and positioning existing policy than anything else, but the emphasis is obviously being applied to be read in the right way.
The politics is about removing most areas of contention from play, by rehashing the rhetoric so that Labor sounds as “mainstream, middle Australia” as Howard. The idea is that the punters will feel relaxed and comfortable, and the points of difference will be about values – the “fork in the road” stuff. IR and WorkChoices are supposed to illustrate family values and morality rather than workplace justice.
(Maybe that’s a recognition that with the labour market as it is, the non-choices imposed by some employers might seem remote to many.)
That appears to be the electoral strategy. In a way, it’s an acceptance of the Howardian ground that all is rosy. But giving so much rhetorical ground away, and moving to Howard’s right, makes it harder, or more dangerous anyway, to paint Howard himself as extreme. Ronald Reagan had a response to Carter’s scare campaign about the fork in the road America was going to take under Ronnie the extreme – to laugh at it – “There you go again…” he said with a big smile on his face in the Presidential debate. Reagan presented as avuncular and non threatening. Expect Howard to try the same strategy to deflect Rudd.
As A DSP recipient, I note that later reports qualify the changes by saying that people won’t be forced to into work/education/training, which is different from Howard’s methodolgy of NEW DSP recipients (those prior to July are Grandfathered) being denied the DSP if they are deemed to be able to do 15 hours per week, and they will consult with Welfare Groups before it releases the final policy.
Even though I’m in a wheelchair and can in theory do some sort of office work, the fact that I get totally exhausted after even going out for a day socially, and suffer from a sore shoulder and various aches and pains from just pushing my way around. Oh and you can add being over 40 to the mix as well.
And how many employers will modify their workplaces to facilitate a person with with a disability and allow latitude when one suffers “accidents” from un-coperative bladders and bowels, plus any absences due to skin breaks etc.
I think both sides have been listening to the Disability mafia who are their own enemy when demanding their “rright to work”, which results in Govtrs assuming that disability employment is a one size fits all.
I wait to see the finished policy before we decide how bad these “Reforms” will be, must be rupert writing it in such a way to ensure Howard gets back in, as only News Ltd, the SMH and Ch 10 and 9 ran the story.
Like I said, Frank, I think it’s in the presentation – there are still differences between Labor and the Government on disability/welfare policy – but the Labor side are now dressing it up as “harder on welfare to work” as their spin.
You can bet Rudd’s spinmeister elves are hocking that line around.
I note Howard’s Attack Dogs are out – http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20980454-2702,00.html
I do think this comment from a Cerebral Palsy Sufferer says it all:
Oh, and I forgot to mention I was born with Spina Bifida, hence the problems with my plumbing – even eating chocolate and anything spicy, plus drinking Orange Juice can trigger accidents, plus I get migranes to boot.
These pollies are dreamin’, to quote a famous film. Not only are some people unable to work, but for many DSP recipients, working part-time (which is often possible) sees them sacrificing a considerable part of their pension through sky-high effective marginal tax rates (EMTRs). The LDP is presently working through the policy implications of this rather important factoid, something that both Rudd and Howard seem to have neglected. I’ve blogged on the issue here.
Unfortunately, all this posturing on “Welfare Reform”, has been confounded by the fact that Mundoo(Sp) Habib, was recieving the DSP, when he was caught allegedly fighting for the Taliban (I could be wrong – can someone clarify this bit), and other high profile DSP “Fraud” stories in the Meeja – Adriana Xenedis is a recent case in point.
Add to the mix Shock-Jocks and trash “Current Affair” shows constantly showing stories on people with “Bad Backs”, rorting the system, and of course the govt are going to crack down on Welfare. This is at the expense of genuine recipents, especially those with a hidden disability like a psychiatric illness.
I’m not opposed to people on the DSP being encouraged to work if they are able, but to target ALL DSP recipents with the same broad brush with a one size fits all solution is offensive in the extreme, especially to people like me who were born in the last 40 odd years, who were foreced to attend “Special Schools” and were “encouraged to live in institutions, which forunately for me, my Italian born Mother resisted such pressures saying that being in such care wekly (and onlyu going home at weekends) would affect my relationship with my family.
Agree both on the EMTRs and the “one size fits all” approach. If anything is an argument for decentralisation of policy, it’s this area.
Shorter Sharman Stone:
The government won’t bother with that hifalutin trainin as the aim of “welfare to work” is to force people off pensions and into low wage low skilled work.
Howard’s aspirationals are driven by self-righteousness. Rudd understands that he must win their votes in a relative handful of electorates if he wants to become prime minister.
There is nothing new about the electoral power of self-righteousness. Back in the 19th century English property rate-payers, local property-owners who funded workhouses, could look over the fences of the local workhouse to check they were getting value-for-money.
And that did they see? They saw the aged, shiftless, half-witted, injured and moribund working at one of the more irksome tasks of the early industrial revolution. Workhouse inmates cut up old rope into short lengths and mixed it with pitch to make oakum. Oakum was used to caulk wooden ships.
But the real purpose of oakum was twofold:
1. It was exceedingly tedious, messy, and painful to make. It was supposed that only the most aged, most shiftless, most moribund would remain at public expense in the workhouse. The rest would seek refuge in a real job.
2. Local property rate-payers, upon spying conditions in the workhouse, could experience a frisson of vindication and moral superiority that they were on the outside looking in rather than on the inside looking out. Thus the most important product of the workhouse was middle-class self-righteousness.
Keynsian economics disputed the validity of this moral economy.
But we now live in a post-Keysnian world.
There are many sophisticated economic arguments against Keynesian propositions about structural causes of unemployment and the agency of the state in ameliorating the effects of economic dislocation.
But to a large degree post-Keysnian social policy isn’t driven by sophisticated economic thinking. Rather it is driven by old fashioned self-righteousness. We can’t walk down the street any more to peer over the wall of the local workhouse. Instead, “A Current Affair” does it for us.
Rudd understands that it is much more politically astute to stand with the rate-payers looking in rather than with the oakum-pickers looking out.
And he’s correct.
You’re very busy here at the moment, Kim!
I think the Carter/Reagan comparision is a good one – you could definitely see Howard taking that line.
Frank, you’re of course right that every DSP recipient shouldn’t be targetted, but their unwieldy “one size fits all” nature is an inherent problem with massive government programs like the DSP – to hope for precision combined with compassion and good judgement is simply asking for something it can’t deliver.
And, with all due respect, Katz, rather than self-righteousness, I think the resulting poor performance in many areas of so many major welfare programs is a greater driver of the push for reform.
Kim,
one wonders whether Pixieâs âspinmeistre elvesâ? will be able to match Johnnyâs Goebbels-goblins while the former Eumundi Mandarin farmer flirts Right field. Tin-Tin and Gillard were pitched as a team, so that Julia Prole could broaden the ALPâs electoral appeal. Her unabashed working class accent is a powerful, to many subconsciously so, bog whistle to Johnnyâs âbattlersâ? who are demographically top heavy in key marginals.
For the record, âThere you go againâ¦â? was a perfectly timed homile by The Gipper that destroyed Michael Dukakis, not Jimmy Carter, during one of the formal nationally televised pre-presidential election debates. And Howard as convincingly avuncular? Heâs a bit too well known for his non-core shiftiness for that to work, wouldnât you say?
Katz, you write:
“Howardâs aspirationals are driven by self-righteousness.â? Ainât that the truth. These people understand how strictly supervised hard yakka will set a citizen free. Free to buy more like Cartesian consumers who purchase, therefore they are.
Of course you’re free to think what you like Tony.
But ever since the second half of the 1970s, when the Fraser government discovered electoral gold in identifying and condemning the “dole bludger”, the conservative side of politics concluded that there were very few votes to be lost by treating welfare recipients as if they were prima facie guilty of moral defect.
At first the ALP attempted to counter with Keynesian arguments about structural unemployment, and with communitarian arguments about moral responsibility. But by 1995 the electorate stopped believing those arguments.
Neoconservative arguments now dominate*. These arguments were first generated in the US as critiques of LBJ’s Great Society welfare programs. The Neocon argument is one based on a specific moral framework: that government largess demoralises and undermines self-respect. The explicit neocon message to taxpayers is: “Look! Your taxes are being spent on making people worse! If government stopped spending this money dole bludgers would be forced to be more like you, and you’d be richer.”
So the metrics used to measure “poor performance in major welfare programs” are themselves deeply imbued with aspirational values. And those values are very closely related to the values of English rate-payers who funded 19th-century workhouses. This shouldn’t be at all surprising because neoconsevativism is simply repackaged 19-century liberalism.**
Australia is still a democracy. Voters are much more driven by claims that their taxes are being wasted than by arguments about the marginal effects of one program over another.
In exactly the same way voters are motivated about claims about crime waves more than they are about sober statistics that prove nothing of the sort is happening.
______________________
*At least neoconservatism continues to dominate in social policy. In other areas, including fiscal policy it is being quietly shelved.
**It is perhaps worth noting that liberalism didn’t work in the 19th century and neoconservatism is showing the same signs of wear and tear today.
EC
Reagan never ran against Dukakis, Bush I did.
Err, my recollection is he won the last election on “trust”.
Kim,
from the short tv. bio’s on rudd after becoming opp. leader, he apparently headed back from DFAT to steer Goss into power as chief adviser, then he headed up the QLD Govt/public service.
After donkey’s years of neglect under the Nationals, I can imagine QLD’s state services were lagging behind at that time?? As many of youse LP’ers are/were QLD residents – what were the practical and lasting policies that Rudd brought in, during his time running QLD, behind the throne?
I can imagine Howard and co. are searching the archives furiously to drip-feed us, every stuff-up…but it would be good to hear about the type of long lasting structural changes he/they enacted at state level from locals, at some stage. All I’ve heard about so far, are budget and staff cuts when he took over – which/whom may have re-deployed to better use….. or not??
I forgot to mention about the impact these “Reforms” will have on support services such as personal care and access to suitable and RELIABLE Transport, as there are an acute shortage of Multi-Purpose Taxis, and even with the subsidy and the mobility allowance, the cost of GETTING to Employment/Training/Education, plus the fact that we have to get up at the crack of dawn to be toileted, showered and dressed take a LOT longer than a “normal” person would need, and there is also a chronic shortage in care aides and HACC are already looking at ways of cutting the number of hours for funding said people.
Don’t you love Economic Irrationalists
From the Wikipedia article on Reagan:
“Reagan’s showing in the televised debates boosted his campaign. He seemed more at ease, deflecting President Carter’s criticisms with remarks like “There you go again”"
If “the metrics used to measure âpoor performance in major welfare programsâ? are themselves deeply imbued with aspirational values”, then why aren’t the “sober statistics…(about)… crime waves”? Or is it only some metrics that get imbued?
“EC
Reagan never ran against Dukakis, Bush I did.”
Kim,you are correct, my mistake.
Said I:”Heâs(Mr. Howard) a bit too well known for his non-core shiftiness for that to work, wouldnât you say?”
Said thee: “Err, my recollection is he won the last election on âtrustâ?.”
Sez me: That was last time, next year’s a different poll. In 2006 Mr. Howard has “overseen” that handful of interest rate rises, so “trust” is a far dodgier proposition for the PM next time around. Unless, of course, Honest John’s spin doctors discover a method to ameliorate inflammed hip pocket nerves. Lots of them.
EC, looks likely that the next movement in interest rates will be down rather than up.
Unfortunately, I don’t think that the government is in nearly as much political trouble as it should be. What concerns me is I also don’t think that the Rudd line of political attack is going to do anything to make more for them.
jo, in fact one of the main criticisms of the Goss government was that it didn’t increase funding enough or re-jig services on which Queensland spending had traditionally lagged far behind – ie education, housing, social services.
Goss’ government did some reasonably good things in terms of accountability and law reform. Which is interesting – because there was a huge obsession with process. Maybe that’s partly Rudd’s thing.
The failure to invest in service delivery contributed to the government’s defeat, and also left huge problems down the track for Beattie. For instance, in infrastructure. Bugger all was done about roads in the years when the SEQ population really began to explode. Then in 95 Gossie finally decided to build a new road – but it was badly politically mishandled and led to the loss of several crucial seats.
Many sacked public servants might also remember public service “reform” as one of Goss’ legacies.
I also believe that, as Noel Pearson commented recently, Rudd was a key player in Qld’s attempt to frustrate Keating’s Mabo implementation plan.
Anyway, hence the reasons lots of lefty Labor supporters and Greens here in Brisneyland aren’t joining the “he’s one of us” parochial Rudd fanclub.
With the election of Goss, Rudd became responsible for the âCabinet Officeâ?. He had a Cabinet Legislation and Liaison Officer (CLLO) position created in every department at a fairly senior level (just below SES). Immediately that caused tension with the CEOs of all Departments. It was a tension that was never resolved until the demise of the Goss Government. Borbidge then âdepoweredâ the Cabinet Office.
The Cabinet Office became large in number and very powerful. It could even take Treasury to task. Initially the cabinet officers would consult, and then decide, but soon âconsultationâ became a farce. A departmentâs policy making role was drastically reduced. I suspect that Howardâs way of doing business is much the same.
Under Goss, Cabinet consisted of three people, Goss, Tom Burns (Deputy Premier) and Rudd who met for an hour or so before cabinet and âmade the decisionsâ which were then rubber stamped. All departments had to provide copies of briefings that had been given to their ministers. There were to be no ambushes.
Goss and Rudd cleared out the senior levels of the Public Service, which to be fair, was clearly politicised. Nevertheless, the public service did not like Goss/Rudd.
Rudd is extremely hard-working and those who worked in the Cabinet Office worked long hours also. Many people in his shadow cabinet are in for a shock. I suspect he will have formal structures; that all shadows will have tasks to do, timelines to be met, reports to write, media appearances to make etc. Many will be told to do it again and get it right..
Rudd arranged for Ken Wiltshire, an acknowledged Liberal, to do an extensive review of education but it had little effect. Tertiary entrance arrangements were changed and those arrangements continue.
Rudd had good relations with the church groups. He gave more structure and certainty to their funding arrangements.
Rudd was strong on the teaching of Asian Languages. Initially ALL children at a particular year level had to learn a language. Queensland has now backed away from this position using the Commonwealthâs decision to stop funding as a way out. Rudd will revive the teaching of Asian Languages.
Rudd does not have a traditional Labor background (union) and Goss stayed out of the factions also. The AWU had influence but it was somewhat muted.
Rudd is very much âmiddle of the roadâ. His interpersonals were terrible, but I understand he has improved.
People who worked with Rudd rarely ‘liked’ him, but they all respected him.
Frank, Mamdoo Habib was not even accused of fighting for the Taliban – basically he was accused of just thinking about it. And his behaviour before and after that was consistent with his having serious mental health problems (hence the DSP).
Australian DSP, like age pensions, is paid to recipients resident overseas so that their medical bills won’t be paid by the Australian taxpayer; for these groups these bills are likely to dwarf the pension payments. Far from being a benefit it’s a cunning calculation, introduced when John Howard was Treasurer in the Fraser government (he hasn’t changed).
On the arbeit macht frei approach to social policy, I don’t agree with Katz’s economics, but his social psychology about this stuff is spot on. Instead of the politics of envy we have the politics of blame.
I thought that was the case, but there were sections of the media who used that to deride DSP recipents, by linking the DSP to Terrorists.
Oh and don’t rely on so-called Disability Advocates to be on your side, I was banned from a Physical Disability Yahoogroup cos I called them a “bunch of softc*cks” for not taking to the streets and protesting about Howards original plans.
As I said earlier, the Disability Mafia are afraid to stir trouble cos they’ve been condition to toe the corporate line and behave like good little “Cripples”, lest these organisations will lose their funding.
The whole thing stinks.
Do you want to hear of the BIGGEST Welfare Rort ??
May I present to you the “Blind Pension”, which is Asset and Imcome Test Free and are exempt from the new reforms.
This is due to the backlash and STRONG lobbying from the Blind Citizens Federation of Australia.
Yep, a visualyy impaired person can have fulltime employment with a good wage/salary and STILL get the pension, hell, they can even be a multi-millionaire, PLUS they can travel for FREE on Public Transport to boot.
Yet the average person with a physical or mental impairmen t has to jump so many hoops to get any benefit, PLUS risk getting it reduced for every dollar earned over a certain amount.
This proves there is a class system of disability.
Don’t think I’d expect anything less if I was blind. I really fail to see that as a rort.
Anyway if the health system in this country ever got itself out of the dark ages and we saw some positive recovery for people with disabilities and Mental illness then maybe we could expect them to work.
Italy for one has far better rates of improvement in these two areas than Australia and consequently more are able to work. By adopting the American model and giving all the power to Doctors,psychologists and nurses with an unrealistic faith in the power of the magical pill, Australia has fallen well below world’s best practice. Penny pinching does not make people well.
There’s a lot of work to be done before policies to get people back to work can be successful.
“Don’t think I’d expect anything less if I was blind. I really fail to see that as a rort.”
Boom Boom.
Anyone who is interested in why just dumping people with a disability or mental illness into the workforce has not and probably will not be successful can read the basis of the problem here.
From my reading here it seems that you generally appreciate the game plan. For Rudd it is to gain government. In the past 3 elections labour has picked some spectacular injustice and allowed it to dominate their election strategy despite the reality that the issue was not particularly important in the minds of the electorate. Gillard and Rudd appear to finally realise that it is right to fight for the good cause but better to actually do something about it as a government, rather than issue torrents of press releases to no effect. This election is the crucial one to win. Howard, having lost, will quickly step aside and possibly exit completely (as he has some clubs to frequent and friends to visit in the US) and the coalition will dissolve into a kaos of infighting as their members have been suppressed for so long by Howard’s “tow the party line” bully tactic. This will make them an ineffectual opposition for 2 elections.
Many of the ALP policy releases will be designed to bolster popular support. The angel will be in the detail which will be worked out in “robust” caucus meetings after the election. I see a lot of power in a left/right leadership team. The promise of balance, which when applied to the reality of quantified decision making, will yield good government. I don’t think that there will be a Rudd/ Gillard explosion. The sense of common purpose along with the pressure to deliver will suppress that long enough for a true working relationship to form. I think Gillard is now in training to be Australia’s first female prime minister and I think that Rudd will facilitate that at the appropriate time. The reality is that he left has to look more like the right to be electable in Australia and this is an automatic outcome of being in government.
As to Howard’s economy he has been a disaster. The real scandal is that throughout his tenure interest rates in Japan and the US have been zero. So why were we paying 5 and 6 percent? Simply, 5.5 percent sounded low enough and Howard’s mates were doing very well, thankyou. You know that this is true because we all received endless phone calls from idiots offering lower mortgage interest rates. The world was awash with money so cheap that any fool could swing a deal when the institution rates were so high. The other reason is that there had to be some deterent to skyrocketing property prices in an environment of nil regulation and zip strategic regional planning. Yes, Howard has been an economic disaster. My kids have no hope of affording a house to live in (how do you buy a half million dollar house on a $16 an hour income) until they are in their forties. Most kids being born today to young working class (the people Howard cons with talk of beer, sport, and mateship [all things that I suspect he hates]) parents face a life of desparate struggle. But the real REAL scandal is that the ALP did not pick up on this. So interest rates can go up and down, Howard is still a crook.
The real pressure issue of this coming election is environmental concern. The concern for being swamped by a tsunami of illegal imigrant/refugees has been replaced by discalm for environmental security. If Labour fluff this election it will be because they play their traditional health and education hand where they should be assuring the public that the environment is to receive urgent and primary attention. People are coping with all of the other horror shows, this is the one (environment) where they see no way out. Howard has no real believable answer to this. Rudd has to be the man who will deliver. The good news is that there are complete deliverable proven working solutions perfect for Australia in the ethanol/biodiesel/solar thermal/wind/geothermal package that can be fully functional within 15 years leaving Australia 80 percent independent of fossil fuels and allowing people to continue their lives unaltered driving the same vehicles using the same airconditioners without guilt.
This is the crucial election. Stay on task.
Before Rudd was elected ALP leader I expressed concern that he had was tainted with a slightly Wet (ie cultural constructivist) odour. This compared unfavourably with Beazley’s stout cultural conservatism, more popular with the mortgage belt voter.
Happily Rudd has made some deft crab-like scuttles towards the conservative ideological hempisphere. This will increase his electability: conservative social democracy is the ideological sweet spot of the Australian electorate.
As a bonus this also confirms my “Decline of the Wets” thesis and refutes the Larva Prodders denial of same. You folk could do with a spell in the much derided “Strocchi-verse” as it appears to be more closely modelled on the real thing than what ever it is that rattles around in your heads.
I quite agree. It’s about time the awesome power of Big Blindness was exposed.
Tony:
Unintentionally correct!
The metrics for alleged failure of social programs adopt a complex taxonomy of client behaviours. Whether these behaviours represent success or failure depend to a huge degree on viewpoint. Read Frank’s posts above for a concrete example of this. One measure of success is that cases cease to be counted as cases.
The metrics for crime rates, while not absolutely objective, rely upon complaints to the police. The police then decide whether or not a crime has been committed. Crime rates are simply the sober quantification of all these reports.
Thus social program metrics are deeply “imbued”, whereas crime metics are not.
Personally I believe the Labor Party should show, and be unafraid to show more compassion for disabled workers. In my case it was the failure of State labour laws that caused my disablement, through 21 years of intimidation, haresment, and bullying, which was not prevented by law. The Labor Party does not need to bo on the right to win, we need to remember why we came about in the first place. 12 shearers under the tree of knowledge, wanting to improve wages and conditions for working people.
Something taken for granted these days, however there are plenty of well educated people in the ALP who could point to stark differences if they choose to, but they can’t communicate with ordinary people because they don’t have any ordinary working people in parliaments, this needs to change, or the ALP will cease to exist.
Re my earlier rant on lack of transport, this is a timely story on the matter.
http://www.thewest.com.au/aapstory.aspx?StoryName=344202
‘Worst transport for disabled’ in Sydney
29th December 2006, 13:00 WST
Sydney is one of the worst cities in Australia at meeting the public transport needs of its disabled community, the Macquarie Bank-owned Lime Taxis says.
There are fewer than three wheelchair accessible taxis for every 1,000 people, prompting Lime Taxis – which established 10 weeks ago to fill this void – to offer free rides during January.
Oh and unless you have a good relationship with a particular driver and can do a direct booking with him/her, try ringing for a taxi in peak times, especially with people with disabilities needing taxis for hospital appointments and school, sometimes the wait is up to 4 hours and beyond.
This is another issue that needs to be addressed.
And don’t think that the Queensland situation is much better. A huge conference booked for Townsville this year had to be moved to Jupiters on the Gold Coast because the infrastructure for people with a disability in Townsville was inadeqate for the conference to be held there. Taxi transport was a major factor in the transfer to the Gold Coast.
How come services are so lacking when the Tories have held seats like Leichardt for so long and they loudly trumpet what great economic managers they are?
Let’s be bipartisan about it. The Brisbane Convention Centre, when built by the Goss Government, famously lacked any access for people with mobility problems. The Minister, Glen Milliner, when it was pointed out to him that this broke state legislation said “people in wheelchairs can use the goods lift in the carpark”.
Makes you wanna cry really.