Our next Treasurer? Pffft!

[i-need-a-martini]

Interview about the Paid Parental Scheme funding. "It's covered. It's not covered. It's covered. It's not covered. I'ts covered" - well which is it Mr Hockey?

How can you announce the biggest policy of the campaign and not know the details?

And I love the bit when Mr Genius refutes the interviews claim that only half is going to be funded. He reckons the interviewers got it wrong cause actually "at least 50-60%" is going to be funded. Erm...OK...so maybe maths isn't his strong point?

This level of clarity (or lack of it) prompted Mitchell to inquire how much would come from the levy, and how much from these other sources.

''Ah, well, it will be about (pause), I haven't got the exact numbers in front of me. I'm in a car on the central coast of New South Wales. But it will cover. The total costs are covered.''

Mitchell: ''But is it correct, as reported today, that only half of the initial cost will be covered by the levy?''

Hockey: ''No.''

Mitchell: ''So, what's the percentage, roughly?''

Hockey: ''Well, it would have to be at least 50 to 60 per cent, 60 or 70 per cent, but I'm not going to speculate because I haven't got the numbers in front of me in a car, but I'd just say to you, the costs are totally covered. You'll see the absolute details prior to the election.''

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/coalitions-lack-of-detail-on-cost-is-da...

[catsnknots]

Having spent the day at a seniors expo and chatting to many people I can tell you that more are very concerned about the "wonderfully" low interest rates... Many have had to cut back on every day essentials because their cash is not getting as much interest. 

hm.... as the next treasure has said.... historically low interest rates are not a good thing...... 

considering that only about 32% of the population have a mortgage I think that more people will be hurting rathre than rejoicing... 

anyway... the shortfall will be taken up mostly by the loss of centerlink payments for many and the loss of Federal government maternity payments.... 

[azureline**]

The paid parental leave scheme will make more problems for self supported retirees and investors too.

[purplecarrot-top]

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@azureline** wrote:

The paid parental leave scheme will make more problems for self supported retirees and investors too.

---

Exactly Az.

I did post a link to this subject yesterday.

[purplecarrot-top]

A big chunk of Tony Abbott’s parental leave scheme will be paid for by retirees and those saving to retire.

The slug to retirees has been engineered by the Coalition backroom and joins the Reserve Bank’s lower interest rate drive in the inter-generational attack game, which the older generation is losing.

That fact that very few media outlets picked up the fact that retirees and those saving for retirement would pay a slice of the parental leave bill shows that the inter-generational game is not widely understood.

But it explains why Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey was correct in saying the scheme was revenue neutral and laughed off the latest ALP claims saying it was not funded. Like the bulk of the media, the ALP did not understand what Abbott, Hockey and Co. had done.

Read more: http://www.businessspectator.com.au/article/2013/8/19/economy/retirees-will-pay-paid-parental-leave-...

[not_an_eloi]

21.4 percent interest rates a good thing, you reckon, madcat.   bloody 'ell  

the inconvenient truth about interest rates and john howard

During the last election campaign, on August 30, 2004, Mr Howard was interviewed by Steve Liebmann on Channel Nine's Today show and said, "Everybody knows that if the interest rates that prevailed when Paul Keating was prime minister prevailed now the average Australian would be paying hundreds of dollars more a month on their mortgage bill. Now that is not a scare tactic, it is a fact. They went up under Whitlam, they went up under Keating, they went up under Hawke."

Anybody who cares to look at the Reserve Bank's records of government interest rates from the past few decades would find very different results. What John Howard did not want to admit then, and still continues to hide, is that when he was the treasurer in the Fraser government the interest rate was as high as 21.4 per cent - in April 1982. To use Mr Howard's own words "that is not a scare tactic, it is a fact".

http://www.smh.com.au/news/letters/the-inconvenient-truth-about-interest-rates-and-john-howard/2007/...

[cherry*135]

Thanks for the link purple-ct..  we need to know about the finer details of proposed changes.

[polksaladallie]

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@poddster wrote:

Polonius, in Shakespear's play Hamlet summed it up pretty well

"Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry."

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Should we go back to living in caves, then?

Name one government since 1788 which hasn't borrowed in order to further the country.

[not_an_eloi]

hockiedonian-speak:    "i grossly exaggerated the figures"

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-20/joe-hockey-exaggerates-difference-between-labor/4898968