Australian Financial Review
November 2014
Dissent, disarray strike Tony Abbottโs government
As the political year draws to a close, Liberals are not panicking but they are scratching their heads as to how it all went wrong so quickly.
...While Abbott spent Friday in Sydney commissioning a new warship, the HMAS Canberra, the final push was left to the ever-popular Bishop. One Labor strategist says the unpopularity of Abbott in Victoria could be worth as many as 4 percentage points in the state election.
...For the Abbott government the culprit is the May budget, a document so laden with broken promises, surprises and excuses and, crucially, perceived as unfair, it has sent the government reeling in the polls and crippled its credibility.
..This weekโs barnacle debacle, the broken promise on the ABC funding cuts, and Defence Minister David Johnston insulting the Adelaide shipbuilders who he promised in May last year would build 12 new submarines if the Coalition won the election, have ensured 2014 is ending even worse.
While there is no panic inside the Coalition, there is panic among its traditional supporters โ the inner-city conservative commentariat and elements of the business community. The reality-show politics of the past six years, in which leaders were booted at the first sign of trouble, has created a mentality that some find hard to shed.
Those baying for Shorten to start releasing policies and alternative budget solutions forget that oppositions traditionally leave that until the final year, if not months or days, of a term.
Columnists who would throw themselves under a bus for the Liberal Party, such as Andrew Bolt and Janet Albrechtsen, have started to call for drastic action. Given these people generally reflect the views of the Liberal Party base, their collective cri de coeur is considered significant.
But not entirely credible.
Bolt criticised Joe Hockey as a weak Treasurer. Albrechtsen said he should be replaced by Immigration Minister Scott Morrison. The Prime Minister is not going to dump his Treasurer. It would be a massive admission of failure by the government as a whole and would spark a civil war.
Yes, Hockey has had a tough year trying to sell a miserable budget while balancing playing host to the G20. With the G20 gone, there is some optimism that Hockey will be able to focus on his day job.
If he falls short, nothing can be done.
Marcus Moufarrige, the chief operating officer of Servcorp, Australiaโs second-largest exporter of services, says the governmentโs intentions are worthy โbut itโs not communicating effectively enoughโโ
โBusinesses are .โ.โ.โtired of hearing about the governmentโs plans to reach a budget surplus, with more than half [54 per cent] preferring that the federal government focus on investing in strategies to increase business competitiveness rather than balancing the budget [35 per cent].โโ
If business is not hearing the message, then there really is a problem.
http://www.afr.com/p/national/dissent_disarray_strike_tony_abbott_CgSXb33skvcGRktDYEYBpI
