Graham this notion that money does not grow on trees and a scorched earth economic policy that brings in austerity is absolute rubbish.

Money is like oil to an engine. It facilitates the smooth interaction of its parts. The big differenced being, money costs nothing to produce but our system charges us a fortune to use it.

When even our inflationary money gets created as debt,any advantages in growth are quickly eroded. We are paying to have our currency depreciated via inflation and even our growth gets expressed as debt by the private banking system. It is total economic slavery.

Unless we move back to Govt own banks, we will never pay off the debt as China has slowed and strategically they want suppliers not aligned with an imperialist USA/West. Even our Ex PM Malcolm Fraser say we need to grow up and become independent.

Abbott has done the Greens and Clive Palmer a big favour. The Major Parties will have less power.

re: Abbott has done the Greens and Clive Palmer a big favour. The Major Parties will have less power.

Yes. Bring it on. Australia needs an Idi Amin to collapse the whole ediface and then re build the country by some other party.

Graham, your analysis while interesting is perhaps tinged with a degree of optimism for the future of the Liberal Party that it will struggle to achieve. I commend to your attention the comment by Hugh McKay in yesterday's SMH. He points out how this budget fails on a number of perspectives. Perhaps most importantly it betrays a vision of a future Australia that is at odds with the type of country most of us would wish it was.

Few of your respondents refer to "lies" or "broken promises" because we have come to see that as the norm for politicians.

There is and was scope for radical changes in our financial structure, but this Budget gave no hint that the government was willing to grasp the necessary levers. Instead, we have seen a mean spirited attack on the most vulnerable groups in our society, while the privileged minority continue to get a blessed ride.

I would add that the medical research grant that is being much trumpeted does not disguise the fact that this government is the most anti-science retrograde government in living memory. No money (or even mention of climate science) but $250 million for school chaplains! Give us a break.

Call for Election Action over manifestly unfair budget 2014. Would you support this or not?

The 2014 budget is manifestly unfair for the vast majority of Australian voters and could even cause a recession.

Unless the following are addressed we voters will campaign in the 2016 Federal election to replace each federal MP (regardless of party) who votes for the budget as it is or for any expansion of GST, with priority given to the most marginal seats:

1. Whilst it needs to be rectified sensibly, the national debt & deficit were justified as well recognised economic strategies for fending off the Global Financial Crisis
2. It is quite okay for our children and grandchildren to help clear debt that was created in protecting their interests and providing assets they will use, like schools, hospitals and roads.
3. Companies are separate legal entities just like people and should be taxed accordingly. The tax rate on companies earning under the personal threshold of $18,000 should be nil and on those earning over $200,000 should be 45%, just as for individuals, not a mere 30% (the rate paid by individuals over $37,000 p.a.) as now. This would vastly increase debt-clearing tax revenue.
4. Companies should remit all GST collected to the ATO instead of keeping most of it for themselves as they do now. They already get a tax deduction for GST paid on income earning expenditure (as should all individuals) but should not be able to offset GST paid against GST collected for the ATO.
5. Tax minimisation and minimisation advice should be outlawed.

Voterland, Call for Election Action over manifestly unfair budget 2014. Would you support this or not?

YES

Graham. thank you for your article. My own personal opinion is that over the past six years Australia has been governed by a government that would do anything to stay in power, anything. What I wanted out of the new government was stability and honesty whilst re-building the economy. I did not want to look up the news daily to see what was happening to day. It seems to me that too many decisions were made by an unstable government on the run.
What I expected from the present government was stability, honesty and well thought out plans that would suit the entire nation not just specific areas or easy marks. There is a whole range of areas where savings could be made before attacking medicare and the poor. For instance nobody has mentioned capturing the cash economy, trusts and superannuation where the rich can do whatever they want to.
I know $2.00 co payment is going to medicare but I would like to ask where the $5.00 co payment is going - is this money going to private research facilities? Who will own any patents that come from this research, the taxpayers of Australia or the private research companies? Medical research patents are worth millions, has anyone in government discussed this?

Well, there are other fairer options,including widening the base of the GST, and then more than adequately compensating the most disadvantaged?
Also available, was/is the removal of tax breaks on the wealthiest super, a saving to the budget bottom line of around 30 billions per!
After that, repealed negative gearing, a saving to the budget bottom line of around 5 billions per!?
Then health insurance rebates could go, a further 3 billions per.
15 billions per could have been removed from states health and education funding, leaving them with no other choice, but to finally means test all Govt funded services?
Which could have started at incomes of 80,000.00 with a 1% co payment, rising to 15%, and exhausting at 180,000.00 per, who would pay for all their services.
Which would have sent more to underutilized private providers and taken some pressure off of the teetering public system!
More as bracket creep forced more and more above the free or partly free service line?
30 billions+ 5 billions +3 billions + 15 billions, is 53 billions; or around 13 billion more than the current deficit.
That said, there'd be a much fairer sharing of any pain, if we just broadened the GST to include all goods and services, and then more than adequately compensating pensioners!
And given the extra funds, this single measure would provide, pensions could be virtually doubled, along with the post code economic activity, where the majority of that demographic live.
i.e. around 80% of our small town population are old age pensioners, living here given they have had to move this far out, for affordable housing.
[I mean, Sydney rents for just a bedsitter, are currently more than a single pension?]
I would offset that enlarged generosity, with a much more ridged assets test, which must finally include the family home!
Rhrosty.

Actually this budget is indeed the sum of its parts. The Coalition has manufactured a phoney budget 'crisis' and has revealed its commitment to increased inequality by attacking people on lower incomes and undermining the so-called 'socialised' health system.
If there were indeed a genuine fiscal crisis, taxes would be raised and middle class welfare eliminated, instead the real agenda is the destruction of social democracy.

The "budget crisis" is crap.

I'm adding to James' comment about "lies and broken promises" being the norm for politicians.

What an alarming steady erosion of the moral values on which our society is formed when telling a lie can become an accepted norm!
Any attempt to argue for or against an idea demands supporting facts - the truth - not opinion reinforced by lies.

The credibity of our smarmy patronising prime minister is shot to hell by a huge doubt which surrounds any statement he makes, irrespective of whether it is a "core' or "non-core" promise.

Truth and honesty are the components of the social contracts expressed in electioneering.
Major beneficiaries of lies and flasehoods will be the advertising media companies which will be used, and over-used, in increasingly saturated, strident attempts to convince the public of the truth of lies.
What a diminution of the concept of a man's being as good as his word.
Let's shake on it.

Well you have to give them points for guts, the same type of guts that Howard showed when he took the very unpopular GST to an election.

They could have done a Labor. Bought some votes with handouts booked up on the credit card. Hell that cost wouldn't come home to roost before they have retired.

They could have tried to get their name into history, with fool projects like the NBN, or the National Disability Insurance Scheme, but they resisted.

Instead they went about half as far as needed in reining in runaway expenditure, & stuck their necks out to be chopped off. It will certainly say a lot about Ozzies when we see their ultimate reaction at an election.

Will they dig more dirt out of the debt hole Labor created that is their kids grave, or will they forgo a few handouts & fill in the hole, to put a decent foundation under their kids future. It will be interesting to see what we have become, with all the recent additions to the population.

I guess this is about all the repair work we will get from them this term. We need much more of the same medicine. If we reelect Labor we will know we just don't care about our kids future, & that are just hoping we don't become the Greece of the South Pacific before we pass on.

Good luck with that folks. I hope we have stock piled those people smugglers boats, we just might need them for all those financial refugees to use again, to search for somewhere with better prospects. Six more years of the previous & current Labor attitude will have them desperate to get back to Indonesia

Hasbeen, I suspect that the repair work is counter productive.

Sooner or later Labor will get back in, it's clear from the attitude of many here (and history) that Labor and their supporters are generally keen on far higher levels of government debt than Coalition voters generally are. They will run the debt up again at the same time retaining the extra tax/charges hits on those who actually work (or self fund).

Wondering if there is any benefit in trying to get government debt down while so many are so determined that government debt is a good thing (mostly those who I suspect find ways of avoiding the consequences of higher taxes etc themselves).

R0bert

RObert,

From the comments I have read, I don't think people support the idea of running up bigger and bigger debts. Our taxes have to pay for the interest, after all, and it diverts money from other things that we want. What they object to are the lies and the unfairness, because low and middle income earners are being squeezed hard and permanently by the budget, while the impact on high income earners is modest and temporary.

For just one example where the Abbott government could have made cuts, there is the cost of superannuation tax concessions:

"The age pension currently costs $39 billion and superannuation tax concessions will cost the budget around $35 billion in 2013-14. These concessions are projected to rise to $50.7 billion in 2016-17, an increase of around 12 per cent per annum. By this time superannuation tax concessions will be the single largest area of government expenditure. The overwhelming majority of this assistance flows to high income earners. Low income earners receive virtually no benefit."

http://www.tai.org.au/content/sustaining-us-all-retirement

The Australia Institute calculates that it would be far cheaper to eliminate the superannuation tax concessions and just have a universal non-means-tested pension, even at a higher rate. Fears that the better off would stop saving are ridiculous, as they would want a far better standard of living in retirement than can be afforded on the pension.

Divergence, I'm disgusted by the lies. I had hoped for better with the view that the pain Gillards carbon tax lie brought to Labor should have been a useful object lesson. Apparently not.

I'd far rather that they had gone back to the electorate with a clear plan for what they intended to do than to push ahead and hope people were over it by the next election.

R0bert

Exactly Divergence!
Rhrosty.

What a bunch of shortsighted whingers.
Come the next election.
The carbon tax and its effects will be gone.
The debt will be reduced.
The spending will be under control and deficits will be a thing of the past.
Taxes will be lower as will unemployment and a sensible funding model will be acheivable for the NDIS.
The boats will be stopped.
And major infrustructure projects will be underway.
The state liberal governments will have sorted out the problems in education and health and funding for the ABC and climate change research will produce results agreeable to liberal voters.

The Commission of enquiry into unions will totally discredit the current cohort of labor politicians and the ructions within labor will destroy it as a prospective government


Who will then vote to retur n to Labor mismanagement until Shortens replacement?

@Rhrosty and Divergence. Some good ideas there that should form the basis of an intelligent debate about future tax reform, and I use "reform" in its true sense of being an improvement. The Henry Report also had a mass of suggestions that have been almost completely ignored, first by Labor and now the Coalition.

I would add a few other suggestions, such as ensuring that foreign companies such as Apple and Google pay a fair rate of tax on their Australian earnings instead of using foreign tax shelters to pay only a derisory amount.

Unlike Nutter and his mates I do not think that the electorate will forget everything by the time of the next election any more than they forgot Labor's broken promises. Abbott has the additional problem of a likely hostile Senate for the next three years.

Anybody (including some of the commenters here) who think the problems will have been solved over the next 28 months are simply delusional.

Excellent post, Divergence. (In fact, most of the comments here have been excellent.)

That same research you cite has found that 'Every $1 billion extra we spend on tax concessions for super saves less than $200 million off the age pension budget.'

The government superannuation contribution scheme needs to be completely scrapped - not overhauled, not reformed - scrapped.

However, it's a $1.5 trillion industry, much of which is syphoned off into commissions and profits for the banking industry. Its only other accomplishment has been to use the public purse to finance the early retirement (55 years) of a generation of well-paid salary earners, who could have easily financed their own retirement at age 60-65 without taxpayer help anyway.

At the same time, it has seriously failed low-income earners and completely overlooked those who fall outside the permanent salary-earning system - casual employees (mostly male labourers and low-skilled women), the self-employed, carers and homemakers (mostly women) and the disabled.

These are the people who are being forced to retire at 70, not the taxpayer-funded superannuants. How many more times does the retirement age have to be raised before we realise what a monster Keating created?

We should scrap the GST and simply have a small turn over tax. The total turnover of all shares, derivatives and currencies in Aust is $135 trillion. Just a 0.1% tax or $1 in $1000 tax will raise an extra $135 billion. There will be no need for all this austerity nonsense.

I did a job for a Prof of Taxation some years ago.He said the whole system needs to be scrapped but powerful interest groups like it that way so they can evade paying tax.

The big corps pay almost no tax and a turnover tax with no input tax credits,catches almost everyone.

Thanks Robert. It is good to know because the vast majority of Australian voters are disadvantaged and the minority (mainly big business executives) will do well out of it.Thus the budget rests in the hands of the majority of voters. Trouble is that majority does not seem to understand the power it exercises in a democracy. All it takes to change bad budgets is voters prepared to remember for a couple of years and replace the MPs who offended them. Votes rule in democracy. People earning $200k do not have to pay a 50% higher tax rate than companies earning like Westpac's $3.6 billion. But they do need to adopt the slogan "don't complain, campaign". First in marginal electorates. This applies to all parties not just those in government now. They tend to govern for their party members and supporters rather than for the Australian people. Hardly surprising, but voters can over-rule it if they act wisely at elections.

"Well you have to give them points for guts, the same type of guts that Howard showed when he took the very unpopular GST to an election."

Howard did show guts, he stood on what he said what he was going to do and got elected. What a joke to put Abbott on the same pedestal when he lied his absolute tits off to get elected.

Some people here are such glove muppets. Next we'll have him compared to the Dalai Lama in his godliness.

Fairgo.org/ There is no democracy unless there in monetary sovereignty and we no longer have it.

We have a $1600 billion economy with average inflation of 3%.This means that $48 billion created by private banks as debt is depreciating our spending power,unless there is an increase in wages/salaries. So when banks create this money as debt,we lose 3% + another 3% to repay the principal + the interest.

Now we only have 3% growth but the inflationary money is 3% + 3% principal + growth. So 3% growth is totally swamped by inflation created as debt. This is why we need Govt banks. Inflationary money created as debt depreciates our spending power and savings. It would be better that our Govts created this money as debt free infrastructure so we pay less tax. We are being taxed to pay for contrived debt. The banking system creates this money from nothing.

Arjay

'This means that $48 billion created by private banks as debt is depreciating our spending power,unless there is an increase in wages/salaries.'

Unfortunately, the last thing we need, now that we've been forced to compete in a globalised economy (without ever being asked if we wanted to), is an increase in wages/salaries. With all this artificially manufactured growth flowing through to the cost of living and driving up wages and salaries, we're shooting ourselves in our collective foot. We can't go on competing with populations who will work for $4 per hour.

One of the many things that has to be tackled, if we only had a major party willing to do so, is to bring our real estate prices down - because that's where most of our expensive cost of living flows from. The reasons are complex, but it's widely recognised that the main driving factor in our overinflated housing market over the last 20 years has been negative gearing. There is just no two ways about it - negative gearing HAS to go. It's a rort and a rip-off that has done far more harm than good (except for landlord investors).

Once the housing prices are brought down - whether by market forces or getting rid of tax rorts like negative gearing - we have to implement a partial mortgage write-off policy to compensate those who will be left in negative equity.

If this is not implemented at some stage in the next 5-10 years, then the global market will call the shots, and it will be brutal. If (no, when) that happens, we'll really be in deep doo-doo.

Yes Killarney, it will all eventually collapse in an almighty dung heap. Never before in our history have we had so much money printing that is temporally quarantined by this enormous derivative market which is 10 times the GDP of the planet.

The share market will collapse again but this time the money printing ie QE won't save it. I'm reading predictions of a 90% devaluation in the next 2 yrs that won't rebound.

So take control of your super and savings if you can,as our leaders are trying to defy the laws of mathematics and the lessons of history.

http://cecaust.com.au/

Agree with much of your post Killarney, except where you say we can't compete with $4.00 an hour!
Let's look at steel production, i.e?
We who invented the direct reduction method, can make quality steel in one single process
We only need to rail the best iron ore across the continent; China needs to load it from the train, ship it halfway around the world, offload it at a Chinese port, rail it to one of a number of loss making steel mills.
Then process it twice, using relatively expensive coal, and a significantly larger workforce, than the largely automated process we use here, and just once!
Many American firms are relocating back to America, because wages inflation in China is running at around 10%; plus tax breaks and cheap energy at home, makes it cheaper to produce/manufacture there.
We can do even better than that, with a single stand alone expenditure tax, that gives everybody, except those who live off of extreme complexity, a much fairer go!
Even an 18% expenditure tax, is effectively an 11% tax, given it hands back compliance costs, due to the inherent simplicity.
We could also roll out cheaper than coal thorium power stations; and by locating them adjacent to industrial estates, more than halve current energy costs!
Complete that picture with really rapid rail and purpose built roll on roll off ferries, preferably submersible and nuclear powered that swallow whole trains, and we would then posses the lowest manufacture and transportation costs of anywhere in the world, as well as the most efficient!
This combination would have the high tech corporations of the world queuing to relocate here, along with millions of cashed up self funded retirees.
Always providing we get really busy dramatically increasing affordable housing roll outs.
We could get our economic performance back to the fifties, when we were the third wealthiest nation on earth and a creditor one at that, and where even 1% unemployment was considered shameful.
We just need a government, not criminally hogtied, by its on asinine ideology!
Rhrosty.

Another lie admitted, Mr Abbott now admits that the effects of the budget cuts on Hospitals will be felt in June/July instead of what he had stated before that it would be 2017 before they were felt ! Now either that was a blatant lie or this government is totally incompetent! which ever way you see it you must admit they have to go ! Q&A on ABC had Joe Hockey trying to convince people they all somehow are going to be better off after the budget is implemented than they were before, that includes students, families,unemployed,Disabled and the old age,He really believes his own spin, problem is what happens when reality does hit and these changes come through ? Liberal will be history for a very very long time !

Another sobering note, Abbott was claiming that if his policies were blocked it would put at risk our triple A rating, Not so says moody s apparently it would take a lot more than that according to them ! So what does that tell you ? The only conclusion you logically come to is that this whole financial crisis that we are in is nothing more than another lie perpetrated on Australian people by this Abbott Government ! When do the lies and deception stop and the truth begin ? This Government won an election on lies and they continue to lie to the Australian public over and over again, to me their win is null and void and for the sake of this country a double dissolution should be called,that way we can have an election based on real policies and not lies ! Being a swinging voter I am so so angry and so very very bitter !

The Coalition govt practiced "wholesale" deception upon the Australian electorate. That is really the beginning and end of the story.

To misrepresent their intentions on such a scale is unprecedented - and to reinforce the rancor, they are now lying about their lying.

While we may accept that politicians occasionally lie or change their minds, to have an entire election strategy resting on the bedrock of deceiving the electorate is beyond the pale.
The federal LNP has damaged its brand immeasurably by their actions - swinging voters who fell for Abbott's blarney will "never" trust him again.

The Coalition appears to seek to dismantle the social fabric of Australia, in the face of many prominent economists who repeatedly remind us that Australia's economy in the wake of the GFC is one of the envies of the world.

Their plan in first targeting those who can least afford the impost, together with their trickery buried deep in the budget and the double-crossing of the states, is almost a political obscenity given their pre-election reassurances.

‘morning Graham,

Options, carrots and sticks!

I’m increasingly seeing strategy from Abbott & Co. I think Abbott has the measure of things because he has known for a long time he cannot do much about popularity, as evidenced by the polling. The better the strategy the harder it is to detect!

If Abbott accepts he cannot be popular he won’t care because he has a different objective, he will try to earn respect which is totally immune from rhetoric.

Every element of his budget has options, carrots and sticks. I’ll cite just two .

The CSIRO will have a cut of about $110m.

But they have choices. They can continue to do lots of research on CAGW issues if they want.

The Carrot. If they chose to continue with CAGW research they will potentially miss out on the pool of medical research funding but they will no longer have the resources to do both.

The Stick. The government has the Australian Research Council (ARC) to approve research grants, so the likes of funding the “Ship of Fools” to the Antarctic will be off the table.

University funding. By shifting to a competitive model, Universities will face the prospect of competing on both costs and the type of product they produce, the degree subjects. To be able to offer the degree course and the post graduate follow up they will need ARC funding for that subject.

Their choices are to deliver courses that are competitive, cost effective, quality and valued. Because if they don’t, one of their competitors will. Or they might have to reduce the volume or the cost of say Teaching/Humanities degree’s.

The Carrot. If they shift focus to degree’s that are matched by ARC funding and compete they can thrive.

The Stick. If they want to depend on public funding to do what they want, they might have to carry say 50% of student funding until those students find work in Australia, otherwise they carry that cost of failure rather then the public.

Likewise the ABC and the States so far.

Popularity in the polls? Nah.

Good analysis Spindoc.

I wonder how many of our lefty organisations still think he's a dill, or if they are waking up to the fact that he runs rings around them when it comes to planning, & getting the desired result.

Unfortunately we are subject to that old Chinese curse, "May you live in interesting times". I'm afraid in the not too distant future many of us will be living in far too interesting times, & a damn sight more interesting than we would like.

"....when it comes to planning, & getting the desired result."

No, getting the "desired result" does not justify any means. Lying his tits off to get elected was something you (Hasbeen et al) applaud in Abbott while a carbon price tipped you into hypocritical and apoplectic rage.

Abbott has zero integrity. His lies and denial of lying are unforgivable and I worry for my country with such duplicitous scoundrels in charge. http://imgur.com/m4t8CZZ

The hate the unelectable Abbott campaign failled. Now we are seeimg the jste liar Abbott campaign will have the dame fate

so luci

don't vote for him... oh that's right you didn't now you are just having a hissy fit.

I think you and your mates hate-filled rants overlook the obvious.

Abbott has never been involved in the dumping of an elected PM and when his treasurer predicts a surplus it will happen. When he's asked if he stopped the boats, got rid of the carbon tax, cut government waste and reduced the debt and started realistic and fully funded infrastructure projects he will say yes and all reasonable Australians will acknowledge he honoured his promises to them.
he will increase his margin because of that.
It is they who will re-elect him ... over and over. I have great faith they won't be hoodwinked by the charlatans supporting the fools soon to be exposed by the royal commission into unions.

So the ends justifies any means, eh, 'nutter?

If any amount of deceit is fine where to draw the line? Would you support a military coup, say, backing the right wing parties? Would you justify that too on the basis we need good strong governance that accords with your outlook?

There are two aspects to this. What a government does and how it got into the position to do it. I'm keeping these matters separate.

The ends does not justify the means. Abbott had a responsibility to inform Australians of his true intent, and to sell his reasons before the election. The surprise ideological thrust in the budget after the election, is based on a bigger crock than selling the Brooklyn bridge, a concocted budget emergency.

Abbott is a bald-faced liar, full-stop. From your (et al) overt backing of this, and of his blitzkreig of the economy since elected, I worry for my country because I believe there are enough with your mindset in powerful places to threaten our democracy.

luci

ends and means? rubbish. Those were his promises, repeated over and over.

Remember how your mob sneered at them.

Remember how your mob carried on that
he can't stop the boats.
he can't get rid of the carbon tax.

The only threat to our democracy is from the clowns who won't accept he won the election and are wanting to sabotage his mandate.

Most of the polls today don't focus on these promises. They are focusing on the budget reduction of the increase in spending in health and education as well as the return to the indexation of the petrol price.

Like with the tax on higher incomes people will return to supporting him as they discover the true effects of the other aspects of this budget and weigh the budget measures up against all his promises.

When they realise both health and education funding is actually increasing and the other measures are not as they are being portrayed by the leftist media and the student ratbags they will return in their droves. In the mean time watch the royal commission into unions to learn about ends and means.

spindoc,

"If Abbott accepts he cannot be popular he won’t care because he has a different objective, he will try to earn respect which is totally immune from rhetoric."

I'm afraid Abbott is a dud. Peta does her best to prop him up in situations he's barely capable of handling (usually stationed within signalling distance)...just barely he goes - and even then he manages to fumble and er..ah...um...through.

I'm fascinated that any of you "righties" can take this guy seriously. Not only is he inarticulate and brutish - he can barely make a statement without twisting and obfuscating - and that's when he's not outright lying.

Notwithstanding the effort that has gone into this theatrical masterpiece, I think it's time to bring down the curtain on the deception and face up to the ineptitude of the great Coalition saviours.

(That's not to say that I don't appreciate the daily entertainment provided so fulsomely by these bozos)

Will just add that I'm somewhat gobsmacked at the ability of this mob to lie in your face without even flinching.

It's remarkable!

Listen if you will to Abbott being interviewed by Faine this morning - here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MU3x1iWHny8&feature=youtu.be

Faine plays Abbott a replay of himself stating before last election that if he went back on his word after the election that he'd be just like the Gillard govt - assuring Faine's audience that he would never do such a thing.

So Abbott listens to the replay of his words and proceeds to deny he's not lived up to them. Even though it is so obvious that he has in fact done the "opposite" of what he said before the election.

Abbott doesn't flinch in the interview - he maintains he has kept his word - even though he and the listeners have just heard otherwise.

Unbelievable!

Block supply and force an election and let the AU people decide.
There are other ways of doing this without such a budget. If the AU people decide to go with Abbott so be it. If clive is the vote we can't do any worse.
This budget is to big not to have the consent of the voters.

579
I agree. I wish Abbott would call one as soon as he's scrapped the carbon tax.

And the first questions would be asked:
Bill, are you going to re-inflict the Carbon tax, continue to push the nbn? How are you going to fund ndis and gonski. How are you going to fund the increaded health funding promises of gillard and rudd? Are you going to continue the borrowing? And what is going to be your immigration policy if you need support of the greens? Are you going to reverse the cuts in federal public service jobs?

Voters, do you want to return to a labor government that is the same as rudd and gillard and rudd and greens coalitions governments again?

Guess who will win?

IMJ, judging by your stance you'd even defend a right-wing coup to get your way. Yes, only you and your glorious leader know what's best for Australia and the rest of us should just suck it up, eh?

imajulianutter,

"...Are you going to continue the borrowing?..."

The Abbott Govt is.

You may be interested to know that the net interest cost of Govt was $8.3 billion in 2012-13. After the Hockey budget, interest cost rises to $12.9 billion in 2017-18.

Abbott Govt full of wind, water, swagger and lies...(unfortunately)

Luci and poirot

Yes and yes.

Isn't Abbott great.

Hang over from labour stupidity. Watch both debt and deficits fall over the next three years.

You people painted Howard as a liar and hated.
You spend the last 4 years saying Abbott was unelectable. Now you are calling him a liar and spreading hatred.

Ho hum the witch is dead.

imajulianutter,

"You spend the last 4 years saying Abbott was unelectable. Now you are calling him a liar and spreading hatred."

A man of his calibre "should" have been unelectable.

He is a liar...and not just any liar, but a serial liar who appears to have absolutely no scruples in that regard.

You think a man like that (and his cohorts) is someone to look up to?

Says it all....

What says it all is 'nutters belief democracy should be trampled whenever the right wing is not elected to power.

'nutter has no right to call himself Australian if that's his position.

Go live in Asia, 'nutter.

Conversation over.

Luci no wonder you and poirot support censorship.

You'd support the socialist Hitlers concentration camps and Stalins gulags not to mention maos cultural revolution and giant leap forward. Ask you mate kevvy about the100 flowers spring. You two would be entheusastic in your support of that. Kevvy doesn't support that.

Lol you two are either Jonny come latelys or the children or grandchildren of them.

imajulianutter,

"You'd support the socialist Hitlers concentration camps and Stalins gulags not to mention maos cultural revolution and giant leap forward. Ask you mate kevvy about the100 flowers spring. You two would be entheusastic in your support of that. Kevvy doesn't support that."

Whir...boing...pop...splutter...

Goodness me, mate, looks like you need to get the oil can out!

Oil can?

Beats the hell out of the petroleum you're sniffing.