BILL Shorten currently enjoys a substantial numerical lead in opinion polls over Prime Minister Tony Abbott.
But the Labor leader knows his lead is soft, and that in a volatile electorate many voters may in time drift back to the Coalition.
Presumably that is why, in an attempt to impress Labor’s base and to lock in the welfare vote, Shorten has recently esalated his frantic class war rhetoric.
“We will fight to the last drop of our breath the brutal attack on the poor in Australia,” Shorten told Labor’s caucus yesterday. “We will put social justice back up the political priority.” Shorten claimed the Coalition government was “inflicting an extreme ideology through their own unfair budget”.
He was at it again during Question Time on Monday. “You are an extreme government motivated by an extreme ideology,” Shorten railed, looking like a furious, slightly less orange Oompa Loompa.
Given that Shorten’s knowledge of money mostly comes from marrying it, he could perhaps use some remedial economic education.
It is by no means extreme to seek a balanced budget or to aim for a budget surplus.
The next time Bill Shorten wants to discuss social justice and unfairness, he ought to first consider his own actions.
He should also consider the damage committed against future generations of Australians by his Pontius Pilate-like, cynical refusal to assist the government in reducing our national debt — a ruinous Labor legacy far more extreme than anything proposed by the Coalition.
"fight to the last drop of our breff" -