Politics

[wide eyed and legless]

I think the whole of the opposition should go and keep him company then, they could unify in the corner.

 

[TasChris]

Shorten or Albanese? bit of a rock and a hard place if you ask me. I'd like to see Jason Clare leading the ALP, he seems like a straightforward no bullshit kind of person.

I'd prefer Julian Clary to Jason Clare to lead the ALP

 

[Black Devil Dog]

What the ALP members have to decide, is which one has the greater celebrity status.

 

[labels]

My small business (employs 6) went very close to the edge under Labor. Since a change in government it has been brought back from the brink (quite literally, we were as little as 2 weeks off closing down). We now have more work than we can throw a stick at.

It's an amazing transition. Six families now feel more secure of their future.

The election result is not so much a distrust of Labor as a brand of government but more that a minority government with independents and small parties (Greens) does not work and creates instability which clearly happened. A lot of self interest by those people that was not in the national interest.

Back to the point, as a small business operator (manufacturer) I speak to a lot of other small business people - and larger ones as well and the picture is all the same, a massive pick-up starting from the Monday after the election and is getting stronger and stronger day by day.

I feel good for a change. We put all our savings back into the company to keep the employees on and now we have virtually nothing in the bank but at least we have work. We can start again now.

-S

 

[Liam_snorkel]

Has anything policy-wise changed that affected your business since the election, or was it more a change in confidence from your clients/customers. People believe things are better, therefore they are?

 

[labels]

Has anything policy-wise changed that affected your business since the election, or was it more a change in confidence from your clients/customers. People believe things are better, therefore they are?

I don't know Liam. Policies have not really changed since the election, they haven't had time to make any noticable changes and Parliament doesn't meet for another few weeks yet. You're probably right, people think things are better, but then sometimes that's all it takes - a different attitude and a renewed level of confidence. I'm not anti-Labor but sit slightly to the right generally. The Gillard/Rudd thing wasn't good for Labor, the country or consumer confidence. It hurt small business big time with a lot going out of business. We had a world-wide recession and are well aware of that but the last complex, messy administration made it much worse in Australia than it needed to be IMHO.
-S

 

[manticle]

Things in AU were pretty good compared to the rest of the world under Rudd/Gillard.

Like you suggest, it might be perception and confidence. Don't want to denigrate your first hand experience either.

 

[Liam_snorkel]

I don't disagree with anything you said labels. It annoys me that public confidence can be swayed by personality and a media obsessed with drama, instead of policy and big picture discussion.

 

[wide eyed and legless]

Australia has done better than most other countries while riding on the back of China that is why the recession was very mild here compared to the rest of the world. Confidence is what drives not only an economy but an individual need to succeed, if we didn't have confidence in our ability we would never have a go, confidence and a good business plan equals success

 

[TasChris]

Things in AU were pretty good compared to the rest of the world under Rudd/Gillard.

Not a personal attack Manticle but the above statement gets on my wick.
I don't care how Australia is going compared to the rest of the world or any other grab sample of countries.

The comparison should always be "how is Australia going compared to how we should or could be going".
Either side of politics will always find a country as an example that proves their point of view. ie we are going much better than Botswana or we are not going as well as Germany

Was Australia going as well as it could have under Rudd/Gillard/Rudd?
I think we all know the answer to that question.

Cheers
Chris

 

[Forever Wort]

The leadership mess from 2010-13 was ridiculous and unfortunate but I sincerely believe Australia did better from 2007-13 than it would have done under an Howard or Abbott government.

Of course, my criteria may be different to yours.

 

[Liam_snorkel]

There was certainly some lack of confidence. This is evidenced by the immediate boost in business confidence this month and a slight boost in consumer confidence immediately following the election.

How much of that was to do with the minority govt, media obsession with drama over policy, or opposition claiming that there was a "budget emergency", "wrecking ball to the economy", "great big new tax" other such BS week in week out and people believing it, is another question. The fact that the LNP fiscal outlook is virtually identical to the previous government tells me that all the posturing over debt was purely that; posturing.

 

[OzPaleAle]

The comparison should always be "how is Australia going compared to how we should or could be going".

By that comparison we are doing very poorly in my books.

I still have to go to work each day and can't eat food thats bad for you!
I want the government that lets me sit at the beach all day drinking beer and eating potato cakes with lots of salt!

 

[manticle]

Not a personal attack Manticle but the above statement gets on my wick.
I don't care how Australia is going compared to the rest of the world or any other grab sample of countries.

The comparison should always be "how is Australia going compared to how we should or could be going".
Either side of politics will always find a country as an example that proves their point of view. ie we are going much better than Botswana or we are not going as well as Germany

Was Australia going as well as it could have under Rudd/Gillard/Rudd?
I think we all know the answer to that question.

Cheers
Chris

keep in mind the context was Labels' statement "We had a world-wide recession and are well aware of that but the last complex, messy administration made it much worse in Australia than it needed to be"

 

[TasChris]

keep in mind the context was Labels' statement "We had a world-wide recession and are well aware of that but the last complex, messy administration made it much worse in Australia than it needed to be"

Yep I acknowledge that, however the phrase " compared to X,Y,Z, Australia is doing...." is often used in media and politics and is essentially a meaningless throw away statement .

 

[pat_00]

My work is still dead as. It looks like it will pick up in a few months though.

I don't think it is specifically anything to do with Labour v Liberal. It's just the dip in confidence that happens around an election. It is more severe than usual I think due to the increased viciousness of the media campaigns surrounding the election. Media has such a huge sway over consumer confidence, which filters through to general business confidence. And some media outlets (Murdoch, I'm looking in your direction you slimey ****) really ran riot scaring the shit out of everybody.

It's kinda stupid cause people in my industry hold off on placing orders until after the election, and nothing usually changes till the next financial year anyway.

 

[Forever Wort]

On that note of how the election more generally is affecting workplaces, since the change in government my office has had three resignations and made two redundancies. It has also let agency staff go and restructured a number of employees' hours, including my own. I now have to cycle to work at the chipper time of 6AM, just as the sun is peeking out from the hills east of my place.

The reconstitution of departments and ministries has directly affected our business; this is not to say it would be any different if the Greens had won the election instead of the Coalition, it is just a fact of life when the majority of your clients are government.

 

[manticle]

Yep I acknowledge that, however the phrase " compared to X,Y,Z, Australia is doing...." is often used in media and politics and is essentially a meaningless throw away statement .

Only a meaningless, throwaway statement if it's not contextualised which in any decent article it will be. Same meaningless bunkum is applied to the notion of 'economic mismanagement' being applied only to Labour Governments and sensible handling of an economy being applied only to conservative governments.

There were far greater failures of the last government than their economic management.

Having a point of comparison is not a bad thing - keeps people grounded. I accept what you are saying but not as a dogmatic truth - just as a perspective. "Is this as good as it could be?" is an important question but so is "is this as bad as it could be?"

 

[pcmfisher]

The reconstitution of departments and ministries has directly affected our business; this is not to say it would be any different if the Greens had won the election instead of the Coalition, it is just a fact of life when the majority of your clients are government.

If the Greens won the election? WTF?

We can only pray to God/Allah/Buddha that the Greens never again have any more power than they had with our previous Government.

 

[Liam_snorkel]

They didn't have much, really.