Australia’s refugee problem has attracted global attention. This from the New York Times.
Pis-ing up the wall: everyone’s an alcopop loser
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So did anyone emerge from the alcopops saga with credit? Maybe the Big Grog multinationals, who will harvest a $300m windfall when the excise is returned. But they’re embarrassed about such largesse and trying to find ways to give it to a worthy cause, with the Government intent on forcing it down their throats until they choke on it. Maybe the Federal Coalition, which will doubtless benefit from the donations of a grateful alcohol industry for the next election, but which will wear the odium of having brought alcoholic lollywater once again within pocket money range. Maybe the Government, which can look martyred and point to Senate obstructionism, but which has handled what was always a stunt based on a moral panic poorly. But definitely not Steve Fielding, who claims to be the biggest opponent of binge drinking in Parliament and has struck one almighty blow in its favour with his vote. And definitely not Country Liberal Senator Nigel “Solo Man” Scullion, who was having an “impromptu meeting” with, according to Laurie Oakes, former senator Natasha Stott Despoja in a stairwell when the division was called and had to apologise to everyone for missing the vote that briefly went in the Government’s favour before being reversed under the Senate’s “rolls replay” tradition. Sue Boyce, the last Senator to cost the Coalition a division, presumably sent Scullion a bunch of flowers this morning for getting her off the hook. Nor Eric Abetz, who this morning said alcopops were a great way for young drinkers to keep track of their alcohol intake. Yep, Eric, keep track all the way til they pass out. Meantime the Government and the independents are engaged in brinkmanship over the definition of a small business. It seems a minor matter to wreck a bill on. On the one hand, Julia Gillard can say, Labor took the definition of 15 people to the 2007 election and won. On the other, 20 full-time equivalents is the ABS definition of a small business and the real issue, as Nick Xenophon said this morning, is that currently under Workchoices the definition is 100, which is absurd, and whether it is reduced by 80 or 85 seems fairly trivial compared to the goal of fixing it. The Government can afford to hang tough, because if it doesn’t budge, the attention will turn to the Coalition. Either it will get its Fair Work Bill through, or the Coalition will vote it down, handing the Government another Workchoices weapon. The latter is more likely, according to Coalition sources, given the Government hasn’t accepted the Coalition’s amendments. There may not even be a partyroom meeting to make a decision, given the final vote may come on quickly in the Senate. So expect the Senate to reject the bill today, but for it to return in an extended sitting tomorrow. That will be when Xenophon, Fielding and Gillard have to show their hands. As several commentators have suggested, the Government could always turn it into a double dissolution trigger. But double dissolution elections are invariably about anything BUT the bill that initiates them, and however potent Workchoices was pre-recession, it has now lost some of its bogeyman status for middle Australia. If the Government wanted a true double dissolution trigger that would have engaged the public’s support, it should have refused to deal with Nick Xenophon on the second stimulus package. The May Budget might provide some more opportunities along those lines. The Government might also find the Senate more amenable if it organised its legislative scheduling better. It tried to get the ABIP bill through yesterday and had it delayed until the Budget. Today in the Senate the Government also wants passed a bill on the senior’s card, a tax amendment that affects NGOs’ fringe benefits arrangements, an aviation bill, a therapeutic goods bill, some budget bills and the bill that gives effect to the Government’s stimulus package promise to the Greens to double the liquid assets threshold for people claiming unemployment benefits. It insists many of the bills are urgent. The Greens tried to arrange an extra sitting week given Parliament rises this week until the Budget, but the major parties weren’t interested. The focus might be on the brinkmanship and theatrics but sometimes doing the simple things right can make a government’s life a lot easier. |
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20 Comments
So now we go back to giving a tax break to a form of alcohol targeted at young people.
It seems fairly clear that Govt belligerence cost it an alcopops deal. It is a little too early in the New World Order for this government to start throwing its weight around with that level of disregard for the House of Review. So, regardless of the outcome, hopefully a message was delivered to the Govt i.e. “take the Senate seriously or on your bike!”.
Now apropos the Gillard Bill, 15, 20 or 25 is neither here no there because it really concerns the number of part time and casual employees caught up in this. A friend of mine has a market research firm and after being “visited” by BIG UNION was forced to move his interviewing operation offshore. His is not a big business but it is people- intensive. These are casual or part time people who subsequently lost jobs to NZ. This person I might add is no conservative and a fair employer.
Originally, prior to the hijack by the BIG’s, the legislation was an attempt to protect small business from going out of business because it couldn’t afford to play in a game where ability to deal with legislation dictated the outcome. BIG loves other BIG because it keeps out little - small unions are forced to amalgamate and small business has either to sell out or slowly be destroyed by government red tape or other costs of entry.
As Small Business accounts for close to 40% of employment in this country what is the end goal of forcing them to the wall? You see what happens when BIG gets involved, the little people and businesses get whacked! Who will stand up for this group which still carries the bulk of the workforce on its back?
These people are not bankers by the way and were hardly party to this cash grab that has been going on over the last few years.
Love it, good one BK.
I think the ‘stunt’ based on a moral panic was in fact a rapid response to a community ‘moral panic’ that had significant shades of ‘what have we done to our children’ guilt in it, response to which will always look a bit suspect even though necessary.
I believe the government when they say, like all the experts, this is a complex problem and we will deliver a more complex and considered bigger plan. Why be cynical when they have been extraordinarily busy the last 6 months and more. Solving the ‘real’ economy is a tad more serious than the ‘pocket money’ economy.
Like Glen I think Fielding needs to extract his well hidden (where the sun doesn’t shine) 1st Family and think of all the other families.
Brads suggestion should be taken so seriously. The reason why the industry is giving it away is because it’s easier to do that than give it back to industry businesses that collected it who then in turn would have to give it back to the customers who paid it plus they know the hidden factors that have brought on this remorseful guilt. Nothing is what it’s announced to be. They want to hide the truth and your reader Adam doesn’t know.
For Adam’s edification those at most risk from alcopops (designed to be afforded by pre-wage pocket money earners) are drinking it mostly not to get drunk because even kids are so smart they can work out what makes you the most drunk but to be in (peers).
The young can’t stand the taste of most alcoholic beverages so they go for lolly water unconfessingly and say “ thank God it’s less than 5% and tastes sweet like my favourite cool drink while the industry rips them off for their trouble truly earning the title ‘designer drink’ but their peer’s say to them “you’re hot sh-t”.
Psychology, psychology, psychology is everything
Maybe Steve Fielding is actually saying what the “silent majority” have been saying all along. Having read the comments for this article I was disappointed in their content.
What everybody seems to be missing (and the Government hopes they go on missing ad infinitum) is that the Government is slowly and surely taking away the one thing we should be exercising; responsibility. If the younger generation want to give that away then the government will willingly do it for them.
I have family in the alcohol industry. The trend on the alcopops when the tax was introduced ILLEGALLY on 27 APR 08 was a decline (because the price went up) so the younger generation promptly turned to the “real deal” and spirit sales soared. The Government hasn’t lost the 300 million because it has picked that up in full strength spirit sales and have probably done better than that in any case.
Nicola Roxon as a Health Minister showed her own lack of “responsibility” when she introduced the tax because she did it illegally and she knew that. As a Health Minister she is well known for her lack of committment on any front. She can’t even organise a six monthly visit to the dentist for a check up but whinges loudly when she does go because she has more cavities than you can poke a stick at.
It serves her right and she deserves everything she gets including the backlash from the young voter population.
Gee I have been stupid. I did really believe that if I voted for Labor, they would be able to put in place the promises that led me to vote to them. I should have learnt before this as I also voted for Whitlam. This is not true, only the party that is born to rule has this right. Any other party. especially Labor cannot be trusted to government. They must ensure that they will change what they promise if the Coalition says so, as only they, Coalition are fit to government. It is only the stupidity of Labor voters that allowed them to be elected. The Coalition has the god given right to ensure that by their spoiling actions and blocking, that Labor is unable to govern, even if it is in the best interest of the country. If the Coalition keeps saying that whatever this government does will not work, there is a likelihood the governments actions will fail. No matter if the result is a depression, the coalition will not be to blame. How was I so silly to think we lived in a democracy. Stupid, Stupid me.
Can someone explain to me why the 300 million in collected taxes get handed back to the alcohol companies, when they just passed on the extra excise to their customers anyway?
@ Brad. The answer to your question is that the joke that is this Minister of Health a turkey who unfortunately thinks she’s an eagle, set the commencement date of the higher tax rate from: 27 April 2008.
Perhaps he’s simple altogether.
Why don’t you go home, Steve Fielding, lie down and take a Bex, or a slurp of your alcopop.
Shame on you.
Bernard Keanes says: “20 full-time equivalents is the ABS definition of a small business”.
Not so. The ABS says: “The ABS standard definition of a small business is … non-employing and employing businesses with less than 20 employees.” (ABS Characteristics of Small Business Operators, Cat 8127.0, http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/DOSSbyTopic/6842F95F5722DAE4CA256D0200821236?OpenDocument. )
There is no mention of “full-time equivalents” (FTEs) in ABS publications. It would be a nightmare (how would you treat employees who work different hours in different weeks? Is somebody working a 19 hour week 0.5 FTEs, and if so what about somebody working a 57 hour week - is s/he 1.5 FTEs? )
In industrial relations law, on the other hand, 15 employees has been the definition traditionally used, most prominently in the termination, change and redundancy decisions. Again, no mention of FTEs.
The alcopops tax hike was an excise charge on the price of the product. The price increased as a consequence of the anticipated excise charge,and sales were made. Subsequently the capacity of the government to extract the excise from the increased retail price has been thwarted. what should be noted is that the price increase probably reduced the volume and therefore the margins of the producers. On this basis they are probably entitled to the amount notwithstanding the morality of alcopops which are crap product anyway. Alcopops are no different from cigarettes as a means of delivering a specific quantity of a drug of dependence without any of the redeeming virtues of a good bottle of red or a boutique beer.
It was obvious to anybody with half a brain that many consumers would switch to cheaper alternatives, but the elasticity of demand was such that people kept buying the original product to some degree at the inflated price. Hence the excise component goes to the companies selling the product as it is their entitlement in the absence of the ability of the government to act to collect the excise.
This is another example of knee-jerk reactions by the current government in the absence of appropriately researched policy which will eventually destroy it because of the Rudd mania for control in the absence of logic.
Actually according to all IR acts that I can find, and all Awards, including workchoices;
If an eligible instrument would, apart from this section, have the effect of requiring a relevant employer that employs fewer than 15 employees to pay redundancy pay, the eligible instrument does not have that effect.
15 is a small business in terms of redundancy. (except in Queensland where it is 550hrs which is 14.7 employees) so what is the big deal??
Oh, and the IR Act 96 (cth) Guarantees unions right of entry to an employer who employs union labour…
What drugs are these Liberal nutbags on- these are both their legislation- they seem to have very short memories…
@Simon. The Government has a 12-month deadline to pass legislation validating an excise change. The excise is levied on those manufacturers and importers as excise and customs duty.
What they charge for their goods is their business and not the governments. However as the expected (and did) pay higher excise they charged suitably higher prices. However they have indicated that they would prefer the funds not be returned but be used for social programs rather than pocket it themselves.
Although for political purposes that apparently does not suit this shyster led government.
Only a kooky chomskyite Rudd drooling pathetic could whine maudlin self-pity when their ‘Redeemer’ has actually been in power for 15 months and the Opposition does not have a majority in the Senate.
Still……… this where you’d find such snivellers. It has to be Peter Costello’s fault…….
The fact that Rudd is a flaky self serving chiseler, all spin and no substance, lacking both character and temperament has absolutely nothing to do with it
Please…. so the kids will move from Passion Pop to tins of Jim Beam again? If kids want to get drunk they will get drunk. Whether it is rocket fuel from their dad’s top shelf, or a $12 cask of Fruity Lexia. a tax on ready to drinks did little more than make the adults who enjoy a Bundy or Bourbon from a can on a weekend pay an exorbitant price for the privilege.
Who the hell is Steve Fielding,?
I didnt vote for him, now he’s made society just a ittle bit worse with a simple wave of his hand. (and I do mean simple)
Democracy just doesn’t work does it…………..
Brad rightly asks why there’s talk about handing the collected tax back when, as he points out they pass it all onto consumers anyway (we know this because all the talk today has been about alcopops dropping dramatically in price over the next weeks as the failed tax is removed). So in effect, it’s consumers who should be getting the money back — not the distillers who simply passed the “tax” they levied on consumers to the gvt and don’t deserve a cent of it. Surely this is a gifthorse waiting for a plaintiff lawyer firm to turn into a class action where one would hope the court’s remedy would be to order the money to be handed to an alcohol education foundation
Insiders are pointing at $900 levies to be applied to Australians who are returning home, after living overseas for longer than 5 days. “We expect that this will be a fair and just levy, considering that Australians will be keen to return home to an economy that Kevin and Wayne have engineered to beat the global recession. It is an economy that just keeps giving” an un-named source from the Treasury was quoted saying.
With Quantative Easing the new world economic buzzword, the Australian Government has decided to fly in the face of the New World Order, and instead fund its spending the old fashioned way, by spending the kids inheritance. “Why should Gen XYZ’s expect to get everything handed to them on a platter. We should make them work for it” said the Treasury insider.
“With the rest of the world going to hell in a hand-basket, we will be the shining beacon of fiscal responsibility. We may even extend the Returning Home Levy to all economic refugees who are holidaying in the fiscally responsible nirvana that we have created” he said.
Another possible remedy to help avoid the QE that is now rampant worldwide will be to encourage Western Australia to seceded. It is believed that Treasury is pushing the secession of WA so that they don’t have to continually return much needed GST monies to a state that is so obviously a burden to the rest of the Commonwealth. “If we didn’t have to continually prop up the Liberal Government in that state, we would have enough money to create 4th, 5th and 6th stimulus packages” the source was quoted as saying. Imagine if we didn’t have to spend your GST over there, and further more, have to spend any of the stimuli in the west. There would be more for everyone. And more than enough to see us through the Global Financial Crisis.”
WA Premier Colin Barnett has declined to comment, with staffers citing he is too busy organising the May Daylight Saving Referendum.
Opponents of Daylight Saving are suggesting that the trial should not
Surely even you Crikey staff can see that this is nothing. A mere glitch in an otherwise glitchy Rudd Socialist regime.
Try this on for size. Off topic but who cares…
This Rudd Government must have conjones the size of watermelons.
The Rudd Government put http://www.betfair.com on the secret Internet Filter ISP mandatory blacklist, meaning that Australians won’t be able to access that site soon. And won’t know that they can’t. It’ll just not be there.
However, Betfair.com clearly state that “Betfair Pty Ltd is licensed and regulated to offer Australian Markets (gaming) by the Tasmanian Gaming Commission.”
So betfair.com legally pay money in license fees to Tasmania (a state of Australia) to provide a gaming service to Australians yet the Federal Government will secretly block their website from Australians.
That’s like charging some-one for a taxi license and then saying they can’t have passengers.
I’m off to vomit, Australia must look like some sort of Sth American Socialist republic in the eyes of the international community. And it’s almost certainly illegal.
love this government!
Opponents of Daylight Saving are suggesting that the trial should not be made a permanent fixture as it is damaging to the economy. “Do you realise how many blokes can’t go for a surf or a paddle before work? The sun doesn’t even rise until well after 7am, ruling out an early morning, before work, sojourn to the coast. The local cafe economy is missing out on a lot of coffees that would otherwise be drunk in the search for the perfect spot to surf.” the Say No to Daylight Savings spokesman said.
ENDS
“Rudd Government announces 3rd stimulus package. Due to overwhelming demand from Harvey Norman, oops, retailers, The Rudd Government today announced a 3rd stimulus package. “We are very happy to announce the return of your money to you, the taxpayer, again” the PM said today, while presiding over the opening of the newest Dan Murphy’s liquor store.
“We had a windfall recently with some shady tax grab, and instead of keeping it for ourselves, or spending it on the fractured health system, we have decided to give it back. This way, we can make around 20 cents in the dollar when you go out and buy more alcopops. WET and GST will help us to recoup some of the millions we illegally grabbed before the legislation was passed.” the PM said.
The PM would not rule out further stimulus packages, but was not divulging which taxes he would be returning to the populous. “Let’s just see who wins the Queensland election first” he said.
more to follow…