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Large swathes of the budget haven't passed the senate and likely won't... fail.
The budget is immensely unpopular and has further trashed the low esteem in which the government was held, making them look more and more like a one term disaster. The last one term government was that of James Scullin who had the misfortune to win an election just prior to the great Wall St crash and the Great Depression. Scullin's government was brought down by forces beyond its control. Abbott's will be brought down by gross incompetence... fail.
And the budget punishes the poor (and was designed to do so)... monumental fail.
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Hockey has defended this by descending into class warfare. There is more to the story according to Joe - 'higher income households pay half their income in tax. Lower income households pay virtually no tax.' A completely disingenuous statement as a more appropriate figure would be how much different households were left with in the form of disposable income. Low income households are left with nothing or are left to rely on borrowing to make ends meet. This is reflected in the impact this is having on savings.
Hockey doesn't understand what it is like to live from paycheck to paycheck and he clearly doesn't care. But the good news for Smokin' Joe... he can now blame Recalcitrant Gordon - the dole bludging Ibis.
Of special interest is the comments by Ross Gittins as to why no one from the Economic press is backing Hockey's budget... basically it is not worth backing because it reduces equity, its assumptions are wrong-headed (like on Uni fee deregulation) and it doesn't fix the fiscal issues Hockey claims it does (it doesn't end the age of entitlement to miners).
Hopeless.
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Despite operating behind a wall of secrecy, information is thankfully still filtering through. Recent revelations at a human rights inquiry into detention centres have provided alarming testimony about the harm to which children are coming while in our care. This comes on top of the unsolved murder of Reza Berati. This testimony has included evidence that suggests the department of Immigration has been complicit in keeping information from Australians.
Morrison refuses to believe that the secrecy of his government has filtered into the department of immigration despite the precedent being set during the Cornelia Rau debacle and the facts revealed by the subsequent Mick Palmer inquiry. Interesting how we tend to see the Immigration at its worst under Coalition governments.
But Morrison is unmoved... by concerns about immigration and by the plight of children in detention. It seems it is enough that there are fewer children in detention, even if it seems we are now doing them far greater harm. On Insiders Morrison indicated he was happy to do very little (other than business as usual) and to wait for the inquiry to conclude, all the while keeping important facts from Australians in whose name he is acting.
Morrison is also using the 157 asylum seekers he couldn't send back to Sri Lanka or India (despite trying to influence Indian officials with signed Cricket bats) as political footballs.... moving them to Nauru before they were given any opportunity to speak with legal representatives.
There was a time when I considered Scott Morrison's behaviour to be that of an incompetent Minister, with a failing policy, under serious pressure... but now it seems more likely he is just morally bankrupt.
Bob Ellis believes Morrison has a mental illness... too kind by a long shot. His behaviour is consistent with that of Hockey, Cormann and the rest of our lamentable government.