The winter Olympics are on and the world’s focus will be on record breaking. But here in Australia we have a new record breaker, our PM Tony Abbott who has broken more than 24 promises he made in just 150 days.
Cheer Tony for his duplicity and mendacity. The bloke makes Howard look like an amateur.
Abbott lied to Australians in one of the most grubby and well orchestrated campaigns of disinformation we have seen in Australian politics since, aided and abetted by the Murdoch press. Lets’ count them down:
24. Towing boats back. Said he wouldn’t now he does.
23. Infringing Indonesian sovereign waters. Minister Scott Morrison tolda press conference that Australia ‘respects Indonesia’s territorial sovereignty’, now he doesn’t.
22. Said he would increase funds for foreign aid. Cuts $4.5 billion to foreign aid.
21. Promised to send a customs ship to monitor Japanese whaling, sends a plane.
20. Tells business not to expect government subsidies, gives Cadbury $16 million in subsidies.
19. ‘No cuts to education, and no cuts to the ABC or SBS’. Promise broken. Begins inquiry into ABC aimed at finding ways to nobble its independents.
18. Last August, Abbott insisted emphatically that he would never ‘do cheap and tawdry deals with the Greens’. Barely in office, the government swooped on the chance to cut a deal with the Greens to remove the debt ceiling.
17. School attendances On Indigenous education, Abbott said before the election ‘What I’d like to see done very early on, should there be a change of government, is get figures published on a regular basis for school attendance’. As with all promises to Aborigines, nothing has been done.
16. ‘I can assure your listeners that there will be no cuts to health, no cuts to education, no cuts to pensions’. Finance minister Mathias Cormann said in December that cuts to the disability pension were underway.
15. ‘We will restore accountability and improve transparency measures to be more accountable to you’. Now, routine reports on the arrival of asylum seekers, treatment of refugees and the state of the budget are withheld.
14. Spending his first week with the Yolngu.
13. Stopping the boats.
12. National broadband network.
11. Relations with the region. Indonesians stop co-operating with border protection dues to Australia’s bad policies of turning boats back.
10. Foreign minister’s first trip abroad.
9. Seat on the UN Security Council.
8. Returning the budget to surplus.
7. Reducing debt.
6. Justifying the debt ceiling.
5. Reporting the budget position.
4. Toowoomba Range bypass plan.
A new world record? Probably. But that’s not the problem. The worry is that there are plenty more to come:
3. Freedom of information.
2. Respecting the government’s mandate.
And finally, with bitter irony:
1. No broken promises. From Abbott in December, ‘There have been no broken promises and there will be no broken promises under this government’.
Tony Abbott is a practised serial liar of the first order. You have all been had.
M Mizzi, Tabulam
Abbott is taxing 8,000 pieces of legislation which he calls red tape so Australia is open for business, e.g. Tassies forests open for business so get ready he hasn’t even started yet. Sad an mad
This government is a disgrace. $4.5 billion is subsidies to the miners and other corporate welfare rorts. Chocolate gets 16 mill bit fruit cannery gets zip! Hockey’s increased our credit card to 500 billion. That’s debt creation they said they ousted Labor to stop and many believed it. There’s more, the so called “free trade” ie Trans pacific pac is about removing any regulatory barriers to rampant corporate excesses, read it and weep. It spells difficult times for all but the privileged, the worker … well collateral damage. The government is not broke (at least in the way most people know it).
This all fired pursuit of returning to a surplus is political grandstanding that serves to pander to incomplete public knowledge about how Governments can operate. This Liberalism style, similar to Thatcherism is a simplistic economic ideology that does work for all. The Government coffers look good but the regular person on the street suffers. Where are the jobs coming from Messrs Abbott and Abetz?
One sign of a glimmer of hope comes from the Australian Industry group who is warning government of a backlash to reducing the deficit too quickly. The “business” model of Government the Liberal way has some serious flaws. Lack of clarity about education or just telling the truth is a place to start.