By Bruce Haigh Friday 24 April 2015
Photo: Most people are fed up with Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten isn't much better. (AAP: Lukas Coch)
We have become a nation of individuals with a sense of entitlement, and are prone to narcissism, jingoism and chauvinism. What's more, there's no political leadership of any colour to turn this around, writes Bruce Haigh.
Brace yourselves: things are not going to get better in Australia, at least not for some time.
It is to do with our collective moral fibre - or lack of it - as exhibited by our politicians, public servants, captains of business and industry, senior military officers and the media. And the reason is selfishness, greed and immaturity.
The last budget, roundly condemned and rejected by all but the top end of town, was a poorly disguised attack on low-income Australians and those on welfare. Talk of Joe Hockey introducing a "moderate" budget is an admission that Tony Abbott's scorched earth policy has failed. To compound matters, no real alternative vision has been offered to voters, either by the Coalition or Labor.
The collapse of Australia's mining exports will see the economy decline in the absence of other revenue streams developing to overcome the shortfall. Australia is moving into recession and there is nothing the Reserve Bank can do about it, armed with only the crude instrument of adjustments to the interest rate. Insufficient provision was made for the future by the populist Howard government.
The same lack of forethought and planning has given rise to the current crisis in health care and education. Enter any Medicare office in a major centre and witness the confusion and anger. Talk to the staff to see how services and payments are being reduced. It is nonsense to argue a case that costs are spiralling out of control compared to 10 years ago. Together the costs have risen along with the population and proportion of aged people needing care.
The problem lies with a revenue base that is not keeping pace with the needs of the community. Cutting spending on health, education and research will not solve budgetary problems; it will only create further difficulties. Paranoid politicians and public servants should/must consider cutting defence funding, ideologically driven and exorbitant expenditure of keeping Australia free of the contagion of refugees arriving by boat, and the continued subsidy of wealthy elitist private schools.
The national debate about the use and conservation of water and best use of productive land is absent. The National Party should be leading this debate but it is devoid and bereft of ideas and policies to the point that it has seemingly welcomed coal seam gas mining. Its interest has focused on the chauvinistic concern of seeking a register of foreign ownership, which is irrelevant when laws do not exist to govern and protect the sustainable use of land.
There is no leadership toward empowering Aboriginal people. There has been no examination of the decline in social infrastructure that sees even the smallest country town affected by the ravages of ice, leading to dislocation and brutal acts of violence. We and our leadership seem incapable of coming to grips with child abuse, whether by institutions, government or dysfunctional families and predatory individuals.
Church leaders have failed to provide ethical or moral leadership, apparently more concerned with protecting their flock than with helping to support what should be our sectarian democracy.
Climate change denial by the Abbott Government will see Australia become part of the problem rather than helping find solutions. It has resulted in there being no national strategy for the handling and deployment of human and materiel resources for significant national and regional disasters as a result of climate change.
The media, now embedded in the political elite, has failed to adequately call the political process and leadership for what it is. Compared to how earlier generations of journalists would have handled it, Howard wasn't really called for being a racist, nor for being fast and loose with the truth. Rudd was hardly castigated for his arrogance and selfishness. Gillard wasn't called out as a hypocrite for selling out on what she maintained were her Left credentials, and Abbott wasn't really called out for being a bully, a racist, a misogynist, dissembling, erratic and an intellectual lightweight.
Myths have been woven to hide our weaknesses, to boost our low self esteem, to overcome our national inferiority complex. These myths have become self defeating in light of the need to honestly face our shortcomings and renew ourselves and our leadership. The myth of the Anzac is just that, and not something to build or sustain a nation on.
Are we really a nation of volunteers? I doubt it. We have become a nation of individuals with a sense of entitlement leading to ever increasing levels of corruption. We are prone to narcissism, jingoism and chauvinism.
It would seem that things will get worse before they get better. Already, Australians have turned away from mainstream politics; most are fed up with Tony Abbott. They see him as a clown; they are waiting for Malcolm Turnbull to take over. Few, with the exception of hard-core Labor supporters, see much prospect of Bill Shorten addressing basic and outstanding issues.
Until the Liberal Party can find the courage to replace Abbott, the country is adrift with the very real prospect of them handing power to Shorten, who hasn't a clue what to do with it. Abbott has managed, in a short space of time, to alienate many who otherwise might have been expected to vote for the Coalition.
Are we in for a growth in radical movements and expression of political opinion on both the left and the right?
Bruce Haigh is a political commentator and retired diplomat.
If we were ever the lucky country, we aren't now - The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
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