I'm sure Robert Gottliebsen had a merry chuckle when writing in his spray on the public sector today that "Cynics say the current definition of productivity in Canberra is related to lifting staff numbers and expenses."
In fairness he went on and said "[Treasury secretary] Parkinson must move outside the public service barons and find simple ways to measure government productivity. It will not be easy."
He then flays around looking for 'measures". The first is a simple intent measure - how much does self-reporting show a gap between saying productivity is important and having a project to do something about it. he then holds up two miners as places where productivity is well measured.
Parkinson's Minister is responsible for both the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Productivity Commission. I don't think he has a shortage of measurement capability at his disposal.
What he does have is a definitional one. Productivity measures how much output per unit of input. If you are producing a commodity measuring output is relatively easy because it is well defined.
If you are producing "policy" it is much harder to judge. Is a productive department one that sends out lots of discussion papers per employee. Is the ABS best measured on the number of excel spreadsheets issued per month?
The simple answer is no.
I've already criticised BOF for his argument about public sector wage freezes. He has used simple (labour) productivity measures of students per teacher, nurse per hospital bed. But productivity here will be measured in the quality of the output not its quantity.
Of course, productivity in its widest sense should mean total factor productivity, not labour productivity, but that itself is another issue for another day.
The worrying fact is a new agenda being waged from the right/business community that asserts that there is productivity improvement required in Government - and to make that an excuse for its own inefficiencies.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Showing posts with label BOF. Show all posts
Showing posts with label BOF. Show all posts
Monday, July 04, 2011
Monday, June 06, 2011
Mandates and wages
I really don't know why I, or the SMH, waste my time on Paul Sheehan.
This morning's diatribe.
He accuses the speakers in the debate against BOF's IR changes to give Government direct control of public service wages of being engaged in denial, of having falsely claimed that BOF "has just engaged in one of the greatest acts of vandalism ever perpetrated against public servants in NSW, even vandalising the democratic process."
Strangely I agree with Sheehan that the resort to the "mandate" question is erroneous. The various speakers said BOF had no mandate to introduce the laws, the coalition maintained they had such a mandate because they had been elected to be financially prudent.
The concept of the "mandate" was in my lifetime first advanced by Gough in trying to force the Senate from 1973-74 to pass his reforming legislation, but in reality he used that as a debating technique to heighten public support for the more realistic objective of a Double Dissolution.
We practice representative democracy with frequent elections. All promises are meaningless, we empower elected representatives to vote however they want to. The judgement is meant to come at the next election. (That quite simply is the best and briefest case I can make against four year terms too).
The correct charge to lay at BOF is that of deception, not lack of mandate. Like many class warriors Sheehan likes to imagine public servants as a class vote Labor. Certainly at the last State election many if not most voted Liberal, seduced by the vision of a stable responsible Government committed to improving services.
The second charge laid at BOF is that the law itself is "undemocratic" by removing the arbiter. But he hasn't removed the rights of unions. The reality is he will make the unions stronger because the ONLY way to bargain will be direct industrial action.
The real attack of Sheehan is that capping public sector pay rises was something Labor wanted to do anyway.
Unfortunately none of this debate questions whether the underlying claims, that public servants have received pay rises above productivity improvement and above private sector wages is either true, or if true, has any merit.
The primary source of these claims was a report by Henry Ergas for the Menzies Research
Centre in 2007. This was a campaign by the Liberals to claim that economic prosperity was being wasted by states by increased wages rather than additional infrastructure, a strategy designed to deflect the criticism of the then Howard Government for its failure to so invest.
The three public service sectors Ergas most focussed on were policing, teaching and health. His study actually showed wage movements in line with private sector wages. This is one trick to remember - public sector wages never have above award components while private sectors do - so it is the movement of wages not awards that need to be followed.
The phrase "labour market" is often used but ignores what it means. If you pay these public sector jobs poorly you struggle to hire people, especially people of the calibre you want. All of teachers, health workers and police have highly valuable and mobile skills for which they can be paid more than public sector employment generates.
The second is to ask the question of whether there are massive productivity improvements possible in these three labour intensive areas? What is a productivity improvement in teaching - larger class sizes? In nursing or allied health - more patients per health professional?
In fact productivity improvements are easier to achieve in health support (the clerical jobs) - should that benefit go to the health support workers or the front line professionals.
But finally there is the real democratic question. What would an opinion poll say in response to the questions "Do our teachers/health professionals/police deserve more pay?" The answer to that question would probably be yes - and hence the reticence of BOF to tell the electorate beforehand of his plans.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
This morning's diatribe.
He accuses the speakers in the debate against BOF's IR changes to give Government direct control of public service wages of being engaged in denial, of having falsely claimed that BOF "has just engaged in one of the greatest acts of vandalism ever perpetrated against public servants in NSW, even vandalising the democratic process."
Strangely I agree with Sheehan that the resort to the "mandate" question is erroneous. The various speakers said BOF had no mandate to introduce the laws, the coalition maintained they had such a mandate because they had been elected to be financially prudent.
The concept of the "mandate" was in my lifetime first advanced by Gough in trying to force the Senate from 1973-74 to pass his reforming legislation, but in reality he used that as a debating technique to heighten public support for the more realistic objective of a Double Dissolution.
We practice representative democracy with frequent elections. All promises are meaningless, we empower elected representatives to vote however they want to. The judgement is meant to come at the next election. (That quite simply is the best and briefest case I can make against four year terms too).
The correct charge to lay at BOF is that of deception, not lack of mandate. Like many class warriors Sheehan likes to imagine public servants as a class vote Labor. Certainly at the last State election many if not most voted Liberal, seduced by the vision of a stable responsible Government committed to improving services.
The second charge laid at BOF is that the law itself is "undemocratic" by removing the arbiter. But he hasn't removed the rights of unions. The reality is he will make the unions stronger because the ONLY way to bargain will be direct industrial action.
The real attack of Sheehan is that capping public sector pay rises was something Labor wanted to do anyway.
Unfortunately none of this debate questions whether the underlying claims, that public servants have received pay rises above productivity improvement and above private sector wages is either true, or if true, has any merit.
The primary source of these claims was a report by Henry Ergas for the Menzies Research
Centre in 2007. This was a campaign by the Liberals to claim that economic prosperity was being wasted by states by increased wages rather than additional infrastructure, a strategy designed to deflect the criticism of the then Howard Government for its failure to so invest.
The three public service sectors Ergas most focussed on were policing, teaching and health. His study actually showed wage movements in line with private sector wages. This is one trick to remember - public sector wages never have above award components while private sectors do - so it is the movement of wages not awards that need to be followed.
The phrase "labour market" is often used but ignores what it means. If you pay these public sector jobs poorly you struggle to hire people, especially people of the calibre you want. All of teachers, health workers and police have highly valuable and mobile skills for which they can be paid more than public sector employment generates.
The second is to ask the question of whether there are massive productivity improvements possible in these three labour intensive areas? What is a productivity improvement in teaching - larger class sizes? In nursing or allied health - more patients per health professional?
In fact productivity improvements are easier to achieve in health support (the clerical jobs) - should that benefit go to the health support workers or the front line professionals.
But finally there is the real democratic question. What would an opinion poll say in response to the questions "Do our teachers/health professionals/police deserve more pay?" The answer to that question would probably be yes - and hence the reticence of BOF to tell the electorate beforehand of his plans.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, May 02, 2011
Nick Greiner - Infrastructure Tsar - What the f*?#.
The Tele today calls Nick Greiner NSW "Mr Fix-It".
I however join those who have commented on that story in wanting an explanation as to how Greiner's record in Government is meant to give us faith in him as the man to fix transport.
As one comment rightly noted it was a Greiner contract for the M2 that put a guarantee in place there would be no NW rail line till 2014. If you want to know why one hasn't been built, don't ask Labor ask the Liberals!!!!
Greiner is the worst of the pure "private sector" believers, and deespite resigning his directorships of construction companies he is, and always has been, close to the construction firms than Labor ever was to the developers. Just think of the finger wharf at Woolloomooloo.
This appointment is treating the people of NSW with the same contempt that BOF displayed in trying to create a "financial blackhole" and finger the ALP for "cooking the books".
BOF is THE SAME AS THE NSW Right of the ALP. He is all spin, no substance.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
I however join those who have commented on that story in wanting an explanation as to how Greiner's record in Government is meant to give us faith in him as the man to fix transport.
As one comment rightly noted it was a Greiner contract for the M2 that put a guarantee in place there would be no NW rail line till 2014. If you want to know why one hasn't been built, don't ask Labor ask the Liberals!!!!
Greiner is the worst of the pure "private sector" believers, and deespite resigning his directorships of construction companies he is, and always has been, close to the construction firms than Labor ever was to the developers. Just think of the finger wharf at Woolloomooloo.
This appointment is treating the people of NSW with the same contempt that BOF displayed in trying to create a "financial blackhole" and finger the ALP for "cooking the books".
BOF is THE SAME AS THE NSW Right of the ALP. He is all spin, no substance.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, March 28, 2011
BOF vs KK
As a follow-up to my earlier post I want to compare and contrast the two leaders - BOF and KK.
Interestingly for those like me who think the political rot starts with "professional politicians" - BOF is one whereas KK came later to the game.
KK was impressive with her energy though there is no leader in ALP history - other than perhaps Mark Latham - who hasn't been just as committed and eager throughout the campaign. But it really has been a bit rich for KK to talk about the people of NSW not leaving the ALP, but the ALP leaving them. She was, after all, a part of the sub-factional nonsense. Though, if memory serves me right, on the fateful day of Rees decline it wasn't a question of if he was going as who was replacing him and that Frank Sartor thought the prize was his till very late on the day.
But to endorse Walt Secord for the Legislative Council, when there isn't even a current vacancy - only the rumoured one of Eddie Obeid - is reflective of the same degenerate culture that brought the ALP to this place.
All the talk is now of KK heading to Canberra with even Bob Hawke joining the fray. (though there was the antithesis of the Latham/Howard handshake just before polling day, Hawke with Kenneally where you were pretty sure all he was thinking of was bonking her). Why it would be good for either I have no idea - and the words "Carmen Lawrence" should be enough to dissuade everyone of the idea.
And as for BOF. His strength was in getting the Liberals to focus on their opponents not themselves, on being prepared to make unprincipled decisions (electricity, school league tables) for the political value, and to stick to the plan of keeping the message simple.
It is notable that BOF thanked Mark Textor in his speech. So much of the NSW campaign was reminiscent of the last Federal campaign from the Liberals, including the concept of a "contract" with voters and the simple five point plan (previously critiqued here).
This formula has been frighteningly successful and Labor needs to start now thinking of ways to defeat it. The contract part overcomes any amount of counter ads about "real plans". It comes down to the fact that when you are in Government you should talk about (a) your record and (b) how you plan to build on it.
That might have been a problem for NSW Labor, but Bob Carr's piece talked about much of the good they did early. On Saturday KK chose to talk with pride about what had been done for people with a disability.
The ALP needs to fix its internal problems, but also learn the error of the Federal Party in 1996. The job starts now of building the story of a successful Government that got tired.
As Poll Bludger wrote today in Crikey "It has been more than three decades since a government stood before the people asking for an advance on 16 years, something that -- despite Bob Carr's audacious claim to the contrary yesterday -- seems objectively impossible to achieve in modern politics." The public does punish longevity, they want a change, but give them reason and they will come back.
The other thing we know about Mark Textor's campaigning is that in Government he runs a good fear campaign. So in 2015 expect lots of dragged up ads about the perceived disasters of the last four years. The ALP can and must start now convincing voters that really Labor wasn't "so bad" - even good. They need to make that their sole focus for the next six months and largely ignore BOF - the less like an opposition they look, the more he will over-reach (which means the Liberal play book of cut services).
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Interestingly for those like me who think the political rot starts with "professional politicians" - BOF is one whereas KK came later to the game.
KK was impressive with her energy though there is no leader in ALP history - other than perhaps Mark Latham - who hasn't been just as committed and eager throughout the campaign. But it really has been a bit rich for KK to talk about the people of NSW not leaving the ALP, but the ALP leaving them. She was, after all, a part of the sub-factional nonsense. Though, if memory serves me right, on the fateful day of Rees decline it wasn't a question of if he was going as who was replacing him and that Frank Sartor thought the prize was his till very late on the day.
But to endorse Walt Secord for the Legislative Council, when there isn't even a current vacancy - only the rumoured one of Eddie Obeid - is reflective of the same degenerate culture that brought the ALP to this place.
All the talk is now of KK heading to Canberra with even Bob Hawke joining the fray. (though there was the antithesis of the Latham/Howard handshake just before polling day, Hawke with Kenneally where you were pretty sure all he was thinking of was bonking her). Why it would be good for either I have no idea - and the words "Carmen Lawrence" should be enough to dissuade everyone of the idea.
And as for BOF. His strength was in getting the Liberals to focus on their opponents not themselves, on being prepared to make unprincipled decisions (electricity, school league tables) for the political value, and to stick to the plan of keeping the message simple.
It is notable that BOF thanked Mark Textor in his speech. So much of the NSW campaign was reminiscent of the last Federal campaign from the Liberals, including the concept of a "contract" with voters and the simple five point plan (previously critiqued here).
This formula has been frighteningly successful and Labor needs to start now thinking of ways to defeat it. The contract part overcomes any amount of counter ads about "real plans". It comes down to the fact that when you are in Government you should talk about (a) your record and (b) how you plan to build on it.
That might have been a problem for NSW Labor, but Bob Carr's piece talked about much of the good they did early. On Saturday KK chose to talk with pride about what had been done for people with a disability.
The ALP needs to fix its internal problems, but also learn the error of the Federal Party in 1996. The job starts now of building the story of a successful Government that got tired.
As Poll Bludger wrote today in Crikey "It has been more than three decades since a government stood before the people asking for an advance on 16 years, something that -- despite Bob Carr's audacious claim to the contrary yesterday -- seems objectively impossible to achieve in modern politics." The public does punish longevity, they want a change, but give them reason and they will come back.
The other thing we know about Mark Textor's campaigning is that in Government he runs a good fear campaign. So in 2015 expect lots of dragged up ads about the perceived disasters of the last four years. The ALP can and must start now convincing voters that really Labor wasn't "so bad" - even good. They need to make that their sole focus for the next six months and largely ignore BOF - the less like an opposition they look, the more he will over-reach (which means the Liberal play book of cut services).
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Monday, March 21, 2011
Elections and Political Parties
NSW saw the absurdity of the modern campaign when married to fixed four year terms when the ALP held its official campaign "launch" yesterday - just six days from the election.
Meanwhile in the SMH we read that;
Today the Parliamentary Budget Office is due to release its audit of the government's election promises, but not those of the Coalition.
The Coalition has refused to submit its costings to the office, choosing instead to hire the former NSW auditor-general Bob Sendt. It is understood they will be released as late as Thursday, allowing as little as two days for scrutiny.
There is NO DOUBT that O'Farrell is running your classic promise nothing substantial campaign. His latest ad "the contract with NSW" ends with "most important of all - we'll be accountable". he doesn't tell us what that means, and really he will be just as accountable as the ALP - in 4 years time we get to vote.
But O'Farrell is pulling the same stunt as Tony Abbott in not getting his promises "costed" by a body with not only the skill, but also the resources to do so.
The issue for me is that we've completely changed our political system with fixed terms, public funding and the publication of party names on ballot papers and party replacement of upper house MPs without doing much more than requiring 500 membership forms to be submitted.
We really need a slew of reforms, covering party form, published platforms, longer campaigns and independent assessment of platforms.
The first is creating a legal entity called "political party" - so they don't have to decide whether to be limited liability companies or associations. They should be granted limited liability status in return for full disclosure of their financial position. The party rules must be entirely democratic - no party can be controlled by an individual (a la Hanson mark 1) or external bodies (the ALP) - in fact only people who take out membership can vote and it is one vote one value except in so far as the party can make its own rules for how the membership is "subdivided" except that geographic boundaries for election to governing bodies must be based on State and/or Federal electorate boundaries.
The register of political parties provides for a platform to be lodged with Elections NSW (Electoral Commission of NSW). This should be mandatory, the party deemed not to be registered for electoral purposes if it does not publish a platform.
The campaign times are currently designed with the idea of quick elections because they used to occur at times of hung Parliaments or Governments that had lost confidence of the Legislative Assembly. The haste of under three weeks from nominations closing to polling day does not suit fixed terms. Six weeks is a more reasonable timescale for nominations to close.
The cut-off for platforms being submitted would then be the five week period before the election. If the party hasn't submitted by that date then the party loses all other rights of being a party for the election (including invalidation of any nominations lodged by the party as a party).
The Parliamentary Budget Office should be replaced by an Electoral Proposal Assessment Commission to be made up of five commissioners elected using proportional representation from the Legislative Council ( which should result in the fifth person at least representing divergent views). One week prior to the election it is required to produce a report evaluating the budgetary implications of each platform and reporting on the relative "completeness" of the platforms lodged. It cannot evaluate anything promised by a party beyond that included in the registered platform, though it can comment on completeness of the platform in the context of the rest of the campaign.
That way we'd force political parties to start taking elections seriously.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Meanwhile in the SMH we read that;
Today the Parliamentary Budget Office is due to release its audit of the government's election promises, but not those of the Coalition.
The Coalition has refused to submit its costings to the office, choosing instead to hire the former NSW auditor-general Bob Sendt. It is understood they will be released as late as Thursday, allowing as little as two days for scrutiny.
There is NO DOUBT that O'Farrell is running your classic promise nothing substantial campaign. His latest ad "the contract with NSW" ends with "most important of all - we'll be accountable". he doesn't tell us what that means, and really he will be just as accountable as the ALP - in 4 years time we get to vote.
But O'Farrell is pulling the same stunt as Tony Abbott in not getting his promises "costed" by a body with not only the skill, but also the resources to do so.
The issue for me is that we've completely changed our political system with fixed terms, public funding and the publication of party names on ballot papers and party replacement of upper house MPs without doing much more than requiring 500 membership forms to be submitted.
We really need a slew of reforms, covering party form, published platforms, longer campaigns and independent assessment of platforms.
The first is creating a legal entity called "political party" - so they don't have to decide whether to be limited liability companies or associations. They should be granted limited liability status in return for full disclosure of their financial position. The party rules must be entirely democratic - no party can be controlled by an individual (a la Hanson mark 1) or external bodies (the ALP) - in fact only people who take out membership can vote and it is one vote one value except in so far as the party can make its own rules for how the membership is "subdivided" except that geographic boundaries for election to governing bodies must be based on State and/or Federal electorate boundaries.
The register of political parties provides for a platform to be lodged with Elections NSW (Electoral Commission of NSW). This should be mandatory, the party deemed not to be registered for electoral purposes if it does not publish a platform.
The campaign times are currently designed with the idea of quick elections because they used to occur at times of hung Parliaments or Governments that had lost confidence of the Legislative Assembly. The haste of under three weeks from nominations closing to polling day does not suit fixed terms. Six weeks is a more reasonable timescale for nominations to close.
The cut-off for platforms being submitted would then be the five week period before the election. If the party hasn't submitted by that date then the party loses all other rights of being a party for the election (including invalidation of any nominations lodged by the party as a party).
The Parliamentary Budget Office should be replaced by an Electoral Proposal Assessment Commission to be made up of five commissioners elected using proportional representation from the Legislative Council ( which should result in the fifth person at least representing divergent views). One week prior to the election it is required to produce a report evaluating the budgetary implications of each platform and reporting on the relative "completeness" of the platforms lodged. It cannot evaluate anything promised by a party beyond that included in the registered platform, though it can comment on completeness of the platform in the context of the rest of the campaign.
That way we'd force political parties to start taking elections seriously.
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Politics 1 - NSW
I have long been a fan of Cyril Pearl's book The Wild Men of Sydney
.
Writing on The Punch today David Penberthy says:
To this day, it captures the language of Sydney, the culture of government and business, the sense of entitlement which colours the conduct of so many MPs in this State. ...
It’s a culture which revolves around a strong sense of mateship formalised through a robust factional system, the profanity-laden denunciation of opponents internal and external, covert deal-making with threats to ostracise or destroy anyone who challenges or exposes the deal. ...
Little has been done over the years to change the political culture of Sydney. ...
Come Saturday week Barry O’Farrell will be Premier and my tip, based on the culture of this State and, particularly, city, is that we’re in for four years of pea-hearted inertia.
There is nothing remotely brave about Barry O’Farrell. ... Some of the most senior members of his team are the most long-serving and this doesn’t reflect a reassuring depth of talent and experience, rather an inability to recruit.
The factions are still run by old stagers such as the small-l liberal Michael Photios, and the vitriol which emanates from the capital-c conservatives over religious hardliners such as David Clarke suggests that, in government, O’Farrell will struggle to maintain discipline.
Right now though every member of the Liberal Party knows that all they have to do is keep their heads down and they will romp it in. The magnitude of their victory will be amplified by the fact that they should have won in 2007 but didn’t, for the simple reason that they were a rabble with no policies. They look less of a rabble now. Policy-wise they remain a mystery as O’Farrell has made himself such a small target that he has avoided big ideas.
A crueller analyst would say he’s ignored big ideas because he doesn’t have any. If he does, he is keeping them to himself. I don’t know anyone who could identify the one big thing an O’Farrell Government would do, other than not be a NSW Labor Government.
And there you have it in a nutshell.
Let's go through it in more detail. Labor is "on the nose" because of some very low level corruption that it has dealt with, and the fact that it seems to have personal scandals extruding from it like sweat from a triathlete.
Let's look at the claims in the "real change for NSW" ad.
They are.
1. Cut taxes and provide more help for families with the cost of living.
2. We'll provide more beds and more nurses.
3. We'll fast-track public transport and road projects.
4. Our jobs action plan will create 100,000 new jobs.
5. We'll hire 900 extra teachers across the State.
There is precious little explanation of how this miracle of cutting taxes and increasing services will be achieved. The coalition's Jobs Action Plan doesn't appear as a separate policy on their website. The downloadable copy of their Action Plan seems to suggest the full extent of the Jobs Action Plan is to cut payroll tax on jobs added by an employer.
The finance detail seems to be entirely built on a premise that the coalition can and will increase the growth rate of the State economy, hence creating increased government revenue and hence increasing services.
If this sounds familiar it is because it is - it had a name in the 1980s - Reaganomics.
IT DOESN'T WORK!
The 2011 election really should be like the 2007 election. Neither option is particularly good, but maybe the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.
(Note: A good deal more of the economic mumbo-jumbo in the O'Farrell plan is about a "decade of decentralisation" and the "regional kick-start package" - the latter is about paying people $7,000 to relocate to regional NSW and spend 30% of infrastructure funds in regional areas. You know a power station to provide power to Sydney is infrastructure in a regional area!
For good measure the market oriented Liberals are vowing to introduce "Industry Action Plans" for "high performance and high potential industries". As if that's not been tried before.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
. Writing on The Punch today David Penberthy says:
To this day, it captures the language of Sydney, the culture of government and business, the sense of entitlement which colours the conduct of so many MPs in this State. ...
It’s a culture which revolves around a strong sense of mateship formalised through a robust factional system, the profanity-laden denunciation of opponents internal and external, covert deal-making with threats to ostracise or destroy anyone who challenges or exposes the deal. ...
Little has been done over the years to change the political culture of Sydney. ...
Come Saturday week Barry O’Farrell will be Premier and my tip, based on the culture of this State and, particularly, city, is that we’re in for four years of pea-hearted inertia.
There is nothing remotely brave about Barry O’Farrell. ... Some of the most senior members of his team are the most long-serving and this doesn’t reflect a reassuring depth of talent and experience, rather an inability to recruit.
The factions are still run by old stagers such as the small-l liberal Michael Photios, and the vitriol which emanates from the capital-c conservatives over religious hardliners such as David Clarke suggests that, in government, O’Farrell will struggle to maintain discipline.
Right now though every member of the Liberal Party knows that all they have to do is keep their heads down and they will romp it in. The magnitude of their victory will be amplified by the fact that they should have won in 2007 but didn’t, for the simple reason that they were a rabble with no policies. They look less of a rabble now. Policy-wise they remain a mystery as O’Farrell has made himself such a small target that he has avoided big ideas.
A crueller analyst would say he’s ignored big ideas because he doesn’t have any. If he does, he is keeping them to himself. I don’t know anyone who could identify the one big thing an O’Farrell Government would do, other than not be a NSW Labor Government.
And there you have it in a nutshell.
Let's go through it in more detail. Labor is "on the nose" because of some very low level corruption that it has dealt with, and the fact that it seems to have personal scandals extruding from it like sweat from a triathlete.
Let's look at the claims in the "real change for NSW" ad.
They are.
1. Cut taxes and provide more help for families with the cost of living.
2. We'll provide more beds and more nurses.
3. We'll fast-track public transport and road projects.
4. Our jobs action plan will create 100,000 new jobs.
5. We'll hire 900 extra teachers across the State.
There is precious little explanation of how this miracle of cutting taxes and increasing services will be achieved. The coalition's Jobs Action Plan doesn't appear as a separate policy on their website. The downloadable copy of their Action Plan seems to suggest the full extent of the Jobs Action Plan is to cut payroll tax on jobs added by an employer.
The finance detail seems to be entirely built on a premise that the coalition can and will increase the growth rate of the State economy, hence creating increased government revenue and hence increasing services.
If this sounds familiar it is because it is - it had a name in the 1980s - Reaganomics.
IT DOESN'T WORK!
The 2011 election really should be like the 2007 election. Neither option is particularly good, but maybe the devil you know is better than the devil you don't.
(Note: A good deal more of the economic mumbo-jumbo in the O'Farrell plan is about a "decade of decentralisation" and the "regional kick-start package" - the latter is about paying people $7,000 to relocate to regional NSW and spend 30% of infrastructure funds in regional areas. You know a power station to provide power to Sydney is infrastructure in a regional area!
For good measure the market oriented Liberals are vowing to introduce "Industry Action Plans" for "high performance and high potential industries". As if that's not been tried before.)
Novae Meridianae Demetae Dexter delenda est
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)