Thursday, August 15, 2013

Red Centrism: it's the new black


One underreported aspect of federal politics since Kevin Rudd regained the throne is how much the two sides have moved their policy platform away from extremes and towards the centre. This has not been accomplished just by copying each other's policies, as Rudd did again today with his Northern Territory economic zone announcement.
Rudd spoke of three pillars.
Here they are:
Create a Northern Special Economic Zone focussing on the Northern Territory to attract new Australian and foreign investment through simplifying investment rules, streamlining regulation and application processes for major projects, and introducing new tax incentives with the objective of reducing the company tax rate for Northern Territory based companies in five years.
Expand the Ord Irrigation Scheme Stage 3 by providing $10 million to the Northern Territory Government to help facilitate expansion of the scheme from its current 29,000 hectares to 43,000 hectares. This will increase economic output in northern Australia by an estimated $150 million every year, mainly through expanded sugar production and agricultural crops.
Develop twenty-year growth plans for the regional hubs of Darwin, Cairns, Townsville and Mackay. Infrastructure Australia will oversee these plans, based on the successful Mount Isa to Townsville Economic Development Zone supply chain model, developed in collaboration with the private and public sectors. These plans will target key industry sectors and include strategies for increasing trade, investment and employment in these regional centres.
Labor's Dubai Lite policy now has significant similarities with the Liberals' special economic zone policy to turn everything north of the Tropic of Capricorn into a Middle Eastern hellhole of low wages and FIFO ghost towns, but with key differences to wedge Abbott on his Coalition's internal divisions on foreign investment, as the Guardian goes on to discuss. Since the relevant Ord River project is controlled by a Chinese firm, this is just another aspect of the same issue (hat tip: dd from the Cat).

This gives Rudd a platform with which to talk about the policy but narrow the focus of discussion down to areas with which he is comfortable. This is also the case with the Libs' NBN Lite and Gonski Lite policies, in that they can keep bashing Labor on overspending on the last mile of broadband, and can maintain ideological purity despite pouring money into schools by borrowing from David Cameron's Big Society faff to empower local committees to have power over federal money.

A line can also be drawn with Rudd's announcement yesterday to follow Abbott's line in ruling out a parliamentary alliance with the Greens; the difference there is that Rudd retained the flexibility to direct preferences in individual seats, but overall he has given in to policy pressure from the other side. I didn't really understand Rudd's reasoning on that one, it seemed like he got bullied into a corner when it is still entirely possible that we will have another hung parliament. What would be the solution, keep having elections until one side wins? That favours Abbott, unquestionably. If Abbott wants to limit his options then good luck to him, but that was no reason for Rudd to do the same.

It is understandable to want to make yourself a small policy target. It seems that both Abbott and Rudd want the benefits of opposition - this is not a new insight, of course, but the extent to which they are both pilfering from each other's platforms has reached ridiculous levels. Rudd obviously wants this election to be as presidential as possible, so that he can engage in the same tactics as President Obama and achieve a similar victory over an out-of-touch tool of big business. Neutralising most of the differences in the respective economic policy platforms is one way to achieve this, leaving only personality politics and social issues.

The common thread running through both sides' attempts to move to the centre is that both require large amounts of money spent by government, with the differences restricted to bureaucratic style. So, arguably, this is not moving to the centre at all, or at least it is redefining the centre as the Red Centre. This is the dead hand of Julia Gillard, I think, her legacy writ large in daily headlines screaming that this or that side is going to spend taxpayer dollars to fund one or other of the policies she nursed through the processes, or go even further in Gillardesque fashion to announce boondoggles that can't be funded under present taxation arrangements.

Is there going to be a reckoning at some point during this campaign, where both sides are asked how they are going to fund this ratking of policies? Will any of the debates include a serious discussion of raising taxes, or will the prospect of scare campaigns prove too much of an obstacle to rationality? My money is on the craziness continuing.

13 comments:

  1. Pugsley, what centrist policies are you fucking talking about that the Australian Liars Party is taking to the election?

    ReplyDelete
  2. You fat idiot, M0nster.

    ReplyDelete
  3. More cutting analysis from the best that the loony right can send at me.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I think John Quiggin is teeth grindingly upset about the Rudd "North to Alaska" policy, which gives those of us who argued against his "Gillard must go - Rudd is the one with all the ideas in the party anyway" line a bit of schadenfreude, at least.

    One thing about Darwin I have been wondering about lately: I heard someone on talkback (but ABC) radio a couple of months ago claiming that Darwin was always going to be limited in size because the local geography just did not allow for a big enough water supply dam to be built near it. Sure, they get heaps of rain, which then flows quickly out to sea from rivers which have not formed valleys.

    I wonder if this is right...

    ReplyDelete
  5. "I wonder if this is right..."

    So why can't they access water upstream from the rivers and have small dams as cleaning stations?

    New York's water supply essentially comes from the Hudson river. You're a fucking moron, Steve and always were.

    By hook or crook, the north will be developed over the next 50 years and that is a good thing. A great thing in fact.

    ReplyDelete
  6. And answer the question put to you Monster, don't evade it.

    ReplyDelete
  7. If you can't show reading comprehension from what I said in the OP, I am not going to expend the energy explaining it to you again.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Get your head out of your arse, stop the sneering and answer the question.

    ReplyDelete
  9. You have already failed to accept the premise of the OP, so you are not going to accept anything else I say on the matter.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I don't need to accept the premise to answer the question.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Really stupid policy but M0nty you have made it twice.

    don't worry our foulmouthed friend will go away

    ReplyDelete
  12. Fuck, you're a moron homer. You're the biggest dullard trolling Australian blogs.

    You're even stupider than Fatboy.

    ReplyDelete
  13. shouldn't look into the mirror JC

    ReplyDelete