Tag: ALP

Novice Kneebone …

PM “What we need, Sir Humphrey, is a boonga … They’re killing us up there in the Territory. A celebrity boonga, that’ll do the trick.”

Sir H “But what about the incumbent senator, Prime Minister?”

PM “What has she ever done for us? And a Rudd supporter at that, we can safely nail her arse to a tree.”

Sir H “Well, she has worked hard for the last fifteen years, she is the co-convener of Emily’s list, much liked … ”

PM “Yeah, by K Rudd, stuff’er”,

Sir H “The local branch won’t like it …”

PM “Stuff them, too. Not likely that they’ll come up with a boonga is it?”

Sir H “Well, in fact they were thinking of doing just that, Marion Scrymgour has thrown her hat in the ring”

PM “But she’s been in and out of the ALP and in again …”

Sir H “… Well you can’t hold that against Ms Kneebone, she’s yet to join”

PM “But she’s a celebrity, we’ll fix it. Just remind me to keep her away from pink batts, oh, and education.”

Sir H “And the branch?”

PM “Bunch of hicks. Just tell them, Humphrey, Captain’s Pick … what’s Crossin up to today? I’d better let her know”

Sir H “Well, the lady you just dumped for not being black enough is in Melbourne today chairing the enquiry into the new anti-discrimination laws”

 

No ifs, no buts …

… and no surplus.

A sigh of relief from the business community, grateful that we are not going to stop the economy in its tracks just to make the treasurer look less of an idiot. A sigh of relief turned into praise from the ABC for a treasurer ready to make the tough choices. In reality, though, just further evidence that we are governed by a bunch of raving incompetents, left to them we will end up as financially bankrupt as they are intellectually and morally bankrupt.

Remember that the promise of a return to surplus was made at a time when Labor were throwing money around fresh from the printing press. It’ll be alright we will be delivering a surplus … That promise was made over and over again.

When elected Labor stumbled upon a $20 billion surplus, no net debt and $70 billion in commonwealth net assets. The Treasurer of the year has had nothing but praise for the economy that he has managed ever since, it’s the best money can buy. Even this morning he was boasting of anticipated growth, low unemployment and low interest rates. True commodity prices have slipped back … presently they are only three times higher than they were when Labor got in! They have raised completely new taxes. How did they ever run out of money?

The reason is simple, Labor has done what Labor does – spend. This Labor government has spent very enthusiastically and delivered less in return than even Whitlam’s.

Everything they have actually done has gone wrong … from frying apprentices installing insulation in houses that later burn down to an Education Revolution that has seen us plummet to new levels of illiteracy.

To play safe they have replaced action with unfunded promises – the Gonsky spend, the Disability scheme.

Since it took office a government that promised to take “a meat axe” to an already bloated public service has appointed an extra 10,000 public servants. It has increased spending from $271 billion a year to more than $370 billion.

The debt on the nation’s credit card now stands at $144 billion.

Slush puppies …

The HSU scandal moves at a glacial pace towards the courts …

While Mr Thomson may have been in technical breach of some of the union rules, it is expected he will argue he was acting within the normal ethical flexibility given to officials, and that the same practices occurred in every other union.

Spending union funds on prostitutes would require considerable ethical flexibility and surely there can’t be other unions displaying such flexibility. Well, setting aside the AWU, of course in the famous case where a female lawyer provided (free) legal assistance to her boyfriend of the time, in order to set up a slush fund. The lady in question is on the record as saying it was for re-election purposes of said boyfriend, she did not benefit from it, she didn’t know funds were being diverted to such ends as buying houses etc. She is not on the record regarding the answers to some questions put to her about these events.

The ALP is in no rush to set up an enquiry regarding the flexibility to be found in every other union. This is no great surprise when you consider that the Union movement provides almost all the funds for the government’s electioneering and virtually all the members of the parliamentary party. This sorry affair is still not over, but even as the Prime Minister ducks and weaves hissing slime and sleaze, more evidence of flexibility floats to the surface …

AWU Victorian secretary Cesar Melhem has reportedly confirmed that a non-profit company he runs, called Industry 2020, has raised some $500,000 since 2008 to help fund the political activities of the Right faction sub-group within the ALP.

Among the organisation’s spending was a “significant’ outlay of funds during the bitter Health Services Union (HSU) election in 2009, according to Fairfax.

As workplace relations minister at the time, Ms Gillard reportedly served as a guest speaker at Industry 2020’s inaugural fund-raising lunch, which raised about $250,000, nearly half of which was profit.

Goodness, AWU Mark ll. Senator Abetz suggests that …

“What this shows is that the Labor party are fully immersed in this culture of slush funds. That is why they are so paralysed in dealing with the HSU (Health Services Union) scandal and the (1990s) AWU scandal – because they basically know that everybody’s into it and they’re all into it together.”

Senator Abetz said it was “unbelievable” that some of the current AWU slush fund was used to finance an HSU election campaign in 2009.

While such behaviour might be technically legal it was morally wrong, he said.

“For the deputy prime minister of the time to be so associated with such an inappropriate fund is completely unacceptable”.

 

The sweet smell …

Michelle Grattan in today’s Age …

LABOR Senator John Faulkner can always get public attention when he talks about party reform. But as he’d be the first to admit, it’s quite another matter to get something meaningful done.

In his devastating critique this week, Faulkner homed in particularly on New South Wales, where appalling tales of misdeeds in the Labor years have been aired at the Independent Commission Against Corruption. His messages about loosening the factional system and the like, however, are also relevant to Labor nationally and follow the post-2010 election review of which he was co-author, with Bob Carr and Steve Bracks.

Faulkner’s argument that factions should not be allowed to bind MPs in caucus votes is a no-brainer.

The NSW problem should be separated from the wider reform debate. It’s urgent that Labor there must not just change but be seen to have changed.

This week the Left in NSW, at Faulkner’s instigation, took the extraordinary step of issuing a public apology for preselecting former Labor state resources minister Ian Macdonald, accused of colluding in the granting of coal exploration licences to benefit the family of Eddie Obeid, former upper house member, by up to a staggering $100 million.

Getting a lot of reform done quickly in NSW matters for federal Labor, facing an election next year. Big anti-Labor swings in 2010 have left a swag of seats on very thin margins. The corruption stench gives swinging voters one more reason not to vote Labor.

Reform nationally is a more complicated issue. Corruption is not the problem.

Corruption is not the problem? The ALP and the Union movement is riddled with corruption … one of Julia’s former boyfriends stands accused of ripping off the AWU via a slush fund that Julia helped through its birth process. One of the rising stars that helped Julia succeed Kevin Rudd, senator Mark Arbib, resigned unexpectedly back in February 2012. He is linked with the Obeid scandal currently before ICAC. By an odd coincidence when in Canberra Mr Arbib shared a residence with Alexandra Williamson, a staffer in the office of the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard,and the daughter of  Michael Williamson of HSU fame and recent National President of the ALP. Who in the ALP would like to see the rest of the iceberg exposed?

Which fearless reporter will turn over a few rocks? Clearly not Michelle Grattan.

Petards ready …

There will be no principles in a government I lead …

PROSTITUTES in Asia! PM on Monday:

LET me remind you who Mr Blewitt is … Mr Blewitt admits to using the services of prostitutes in Asia.


Prostitutes in Australia. ABC News, August 23, 2011:

JULIA Gillard has been again forced to defend Labor backbencher Craig Thomson, amid new allegations which appear to cast doubt on his denial that he used his union credit card to pay for prostitutes.


Stand by your man. Neil Mitchell, October 20, 2011:

HOST: Do you stand by Craig Thomson as a member of your team?

PM: I certainly do…


Company they keep! PM yesterday:

THE Deputy Leader of the Opposition has confessed during those interviews to being in the company of Ralph Blewitt on Friday – I’m now dealing with the lack of standards of the opposition and the company they keep.


Company they keep. Channel 10’s Meet the Press, Sunday:

NICOLA Roxon: I think the most substantive allegation is maybe she didn’t choose that wildly – wisely, her boyfriend. Now, all of us, I reckon, have chosen boyfriends and girlfriends in the past.

Hugh Riminton: Oh, I’ve had some terrible boyfriends. I’ve had some terrible boyfriends over the years.

Roxon: We may not always be, you know, on reflection, think we’re wise choices. But that is, I think, the only real issue here.


Lewd comments! PM on Monday:

MR Blewitt has published lewd and degrading comments and accompanying photographs of young women on his Facebook page.


Lewd comments. PM on October 9:

ON the conduct of Mr Slipper and on the text messages which are in the public domain – I have seen the press reports of those text messages and I am offended by their content … but I also believe that, in making a decision about the speakership, this parliament should recognise that there is a court case in progress and that the judge has reserved his decision. Having waited for a number of months for the legal matters surrounding Mr Slipper to come to a conclusion, this parliament should see that conclusion.

Double standards! PM on October 9:

WHAT I will not stand for – what I will never stand for – is the Leader of the Opposition … peddling a double standard.


Double standards? Leigh Sales on ABC 7.30 on Monday:

MR Blewitt, you just heard what the Prime Minister had to say about you in the parliament today. Why should anybody believe what you say?

Blewitt: Well, in response, I would say this: Julia Gillard has been labelling this a smear campaign. I think it’s a bit hypocritical of her to now come out and try and smear me to detract people from the main event here.


Gerald Moses writes to the Sydney Morning Herald, November 26:

WHEN I began my professional life in 1958, the senior partner of the firm I worked for used to say: “You lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas.”

Rescued (filched) from behind the Australian’s paywall.

B & D …

Which, of course is short for bimbos and douchebags.

Misogyny is such a difficult concept …

“Libs are led by a gutless douchebag and a narcissistic bimbo who aren’t fit to be MPs let alone PM and Deputy. Both should be sacked.” Steve Gibbons, Labor MP.

Not fit to be MPs, mmm …

More charges …

2009-2010 National President for the Australian Labor Party, Unions NSW Vice President and Finance Committee Member, and member of the ACTU executive. The very epitome of a Labor man …

Former Health Services Union boss Michael Williamson has been charged with 28 more offences that include defrauding the organisation of $620,000 paid to his wife’s company for services never provided.

More charges are expected and more senior union staff will be charged in the coming weeks, police say.

The 59-year-old appeared briefly in a Sydney court on Wednesday charged with a total of 48 offences, following his arrest on October 4.

Court documents allege CANME Services, registered in Williamson’s wife’s name, received 47 cheques totalling $620,326 from 2001 and 2009 for work not performed.

He has also been charged with dealing in the proceeds of crime, or money laundering, in relation to $400,000 of that money.

NSW Fraud and Cybercrime Squad commander Colin Dyson said investigations by Strike Force Carnarvon are far from over.

‘These are the first charges of what I believe will be a series of charges in respect of allegations of fraud committed upon the Health Services Union,’ Detective Superintendent Dyson told reporters outside Waverley Local Court.

He said at least two other senior union staff members will be charged in coming weeks with fraud and hindering the police investigation.

Handing out the mirrors …

What has come over the Fairfax Press … ?

Paul Shehan in the Sydney Morning Herald …

After sending out two attack dogs, Gutter and Sewer, to do the dirty work, after hiding behind two political zombies, Insufferable and Unspeakable, to stay in power, after using the Minister for Innuendo and the Compromise-General to play the gender card, the mask has finally dropped away to reveal the driver of the politics of hate in Australia.

The mask fell at exactly 2.42pm in the House of Representatives. Looking on were the member for Gutter, Anthony Albanese, the member for Sewer, Wayne Swan, the Minister for Innuendo, Tanya Plibersek, and the Compromise-General, Nicola Roxon, and the independents who will do anything to avoid facing their electorates, Mr Insufferable, Robert Oakeshott, and his fellow regional zombie, Mr Unspeakable, Tony Windsor.

Someone had to set Gutter and Sewer loose. Someone directed Innuendo and Compromise to play the gender card. Someone paid the bill for Insufferable and Unspeakable. Someone’s authority still rests on the vote of Craig Thomson. And someone had to approve making Peter Slipper the Speaker despite his being manifestly disrespected by either side of the house, a low point of political opportunism.

At 2.42 pm on Tuesday that someone rose to speak. The mask fell away. Julia Gillard came out snarling. The Parliament had before it a great issue, the dignity of the house itself, which had been traduced by the scandal that had attached itself to Slipper.

Instead of directly addressing the issue of a discredited speakership which had become engulfed in an expensive and degrading legal action that did no credit to anyone involved, least of all the Attorney-General, the Prime Minister wasted no timing in using misdirection and personal abuse.

She even invoked the name of dead father: “My father did not die of shame!” she thundered across the dispatch box.

No one in the Parliament ever said he did. Tony Abbott had said exactly the opposite when he spoke of her father.

Why tip a bucket of bilgewater into a fierce wind? Why invoke the accusation of misogyny, hatred of women, against an Opposition Leader whose chief of staff, Peta Credlin, is famously one of the most formidable woman in politics, whose mostly female staff is devoted to their boss and who has raised three daughters?

But then why did she mislead the Australian people before the last election on the carbon tax? Why did she leave her law firm under a cloud? Why did she shaft her own leader? Why did she depose a prime minister who had a mandate from the people? Why has she methodically deployed the politics of personal abuse?