The parliament was back and Tony Abbott was playing the game like a footballer in the peak of his career, save for the odd case of ‘foot in mouth disease’ that his finance spokesman, Senator Barnaby Joyce seemed to be suffering from. If the H1N1 vaccine could be used as a cure, Barnaby would surely be the first in line for a strain. In the meantime, his discomfort continued, with Abbott declaring only that he would be “part of the team” that would be representing the Coalition in the lead-up to the federal election.
But why all the fuss over Joyce? Well, it seemed the man from St.George, a small country town in Queensland, population around 2,000, had been questioning the level of public debt and the government’s ability to repay it. An accountant by trade, he had a ‘small town’ view that was based on the need to prove the ability to service a loan, that is, any debt should be measured against the debtor’s ability to repay it.
Mind you, this was also the view of the four major banks as well as practically every other reputable lending institution in the country, so ‘small town’ may not be the best term to use – ‘sensible’ may be a better fit. He brought this view to his role as finance spokesman for the Coalition. It was sensible...but not popular. Especially with the government of the day. “Hock to our eyeballs” was a term he used on radio in early February.
It had been decided Joyce was a target the Rudd Government would continue to deride. The last thing any government likes to see is their economic management brought into question, especially by a National Party Senator who had no problem speaking his mind. You see, Joyce was popular with rural voters. He had a personality and a way about him that was easily understood. So maybe sometimes he went too far. Maybe sometimes he needed to think before he spoke. But it made for interesting times and publicity beyond his expectations. If he survived in his role (and this was a big if), he would learn to wear the government’s and the media’s scorn like a badge of honour.
Yet scorn can lead to loneliness and loneliness was something rarely welcomed. A schoolboy always the last one chosen for the football team, an apartment dweller with friends living far afield and a family overseas, a businessman at the highest level of the company’s corporate structure, a father of two, divorced and on bad terms with his ex-wife, with access to his children only once a fortnight. A politician who’s risen to great heights only to fall and be surpassed by those he used to lead.
It was not Senator Joyce but rather Malcolm Turnbull who was the definition of loneliness in Canberra.
Turnbull cut a lonely figure in the Lower House, and only in part because the newspaper’s photographic editor had done a fine job of making it look like he was speaking to an empty chamber.
Turnbull, the forgotten man, was explaining his reasoning behind his support for the ETS. Eloquent, articulate, his speech was too little too late, and given in the same week as he would cross the floor of parliament, it was a sure sign his time had passed. The successful businessman come merchant banker with assets beyond the imaginings of most of the electorate, had failed to impact on the federal political scene.
A media ‘darling,' they were at pains not to write him off completely. But had power ‘corrupted’ him? His success in self-promotion far outweighed his ability to successfully lead the Coalition back from the wilderness and to a position where they would be seen as a true alternative to the Rudd Government. That would be left to Tony Abbott to achieve.
And achieve it he would, in ten weeks as leader. By mid-February, Federal Parliament was seen as a true house of debate. No longer was there an opposition in search of common ground with the government of the day. Instead it had been replaced by an opposition doing a fine job in holding the government to account.
In the corridors of power, Malcolm Turnbull cut a very lonely figure indeed!
The ETS, however, was again on the government’s agenda. Rudd maintained a keen interest throughout the week to berate the opposition for its ‘counter-offensive’ whilst continuing to espouse the ETS as the ‘cure-all’ for our perceived global warming problems.
As Dennis Shanahan said in The Weekend Australian on the weekend of February 6-7, Kevin Rudd could not answer questions about likely levels of compensation. As Shanahan put it: “Small Business Minister Craig Emerson blustered about ‘the most stupid question’”, Justine Elliott, Aged Care Minister, “could not address a concern about pensioners in nursing homes”, and Greg Combet, assistant to Penny Wong, Climate Change Minister, had said low to middle-income earners would be fully compensated for the introduction of the ETS when this was by no means clear.
The government was ‘on the ropes.'
Abbott began comparing Rudd to John Hewson, former Leader of the Liberal Opposition in the early 1990’s. Abbott’s words were harsh. There seemed to be no love lost between himself and his former employer. Abbott thought “Rudd had started to sound much like John Hewson trying to explain the impact of the GST on the price of a birthday cake." Some may still remember Hewson’s befuddling approach to queries about how much a birthday cake would cost if a GST were introduced. His failure to explain it correctly, if at all, was a public relations disaster at the time.
Abbott went on to say that Labor could do as much for the people and the environment with the introduction of an ETS as derivative traders have done for the world banking system. This was meant as anything but a compliment. His sentiment was clear.
The government had clearly lost the week. A bad start, to be sure. It was only to get worse.
If Joyce and Turnbull felt lonely, they were about to find out they had nothing on Peter Garrett. By the middle of February, Garrett would be yearning for a Midnight Oil Reunion Tour, or an opening at the top of the Australian Conservation Foundation. An ‘out-clause’ from the political world beckoned.
But this was just a dream. In the real world, the government’s insulation program was in chaos. There had been loss of life as well as a sudden increase in the number of house fires associated with the program’s introduction. The enticement offered by way of the federal government’s undertaking to insulate 2.7 million homes as part of its $42 billion stimulus package, not to mention the $1600 rebate offered, had led to inexperienced installers potentially taking risks of which they may well have been unaware.
Why should Garrett be targeted? Was it his fault the program was less than successful? Was it his fault that installers lives had been lost? Was this due to shoddy workmanship or shoddy regulatory requirements? The fact of the matter was that Garrett was Federal Environment Minister, he was responsible for the program’s introduction and successful operation. He knew there were deficiencies. He was walking a fine line. But where did the buck stop?
As President of the Australian Conservation Foundation, Garrett had been able to criticise others without the need to propose solutions to alleged problems. He could make speeches about issues for which he knew he would never be held to account.
But as Environment Minister, he had suffered an incident or two of foot-in-mouth disease. A quick comment at an airport during the 2007 federal election in which he had been quoted as saying that no matter what promises the Labor Opposition made during the campaign to offer the Australian people ‘more of the same,' once elected they “would just change it all."
This was anything but helpful to Rudd’s cause and he knew it. The outcome? Senator Penny Wong, previously unheard of by many, was appointed Climate Change Minister, a demotion of sorts for Garrett. She would now be the one with the opportunity to attend overseas junkets, speak on behalf of the Government at press conferences and take responsibility and kudos from her public persona. Garrett had been left out in the cold, to quietly but diligently work away behind the scenes and away from the public gaze.
But diligent may be misplaced when discussing Garrett. The government’s insulation program was front and centre and his resignation was being called for from the opposition benches. His career was at a crossroads.
Was the boat that was the federal government ‘Rudd-erless’? Was there a ‘quick fix’? Only time would tell...
The rebate seemed to be the core problem with the insulation program, of a philosophical kind. A government rebate is a way for government to artificially create popularity for a product by reducing the purchase price. The problem being, however, that the end-user’s discounted purchase price will be funded by the taxpayer. In most cases, the end-user will be a taxpayer and therefore will indirectly be funding the rebate gained by the purchase. Swings and roundabouts – what you don’t pay for at the front-end you will end up paying for at the back-end.
Garrett’s insulation program had been introduced as a result of the perceived need to counteract climate change. Remember, Rudd had said it was the moral challenge of our time. It was becoming clear that this was a saying that would be unlikely to pass his lips again anytime soon. But the media would use it many times over in the months to follow.
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