The Turnbull govenrment: a thread
What does the Turnbull government stand for? In media discussion and public debate, we often assume Turnbull stands for little
But that's not quite true. Turnbull and his ministers have been quite busy in office. They've pushed through policies in a number of areas
Let's look at 5 policy portfolios under Turnbull: energy & environment, housing, industrial relations, tax and social policy
In each of these areas, the Turnbull government has been neoliberal and conservative. Turnbull has governed for the rich, not ordinary citizens
1. Energy and environment. Exhibit A is a lump of dead coral. The Great Barrier Reef is dying. The Turnbull govt has done nothing.
The scientific data on the Great Barrier Reef is stark: it's dying. Here's the recent paper in the prestigious journal Science by Terry Hughes et. al. science.sciencemag.org/content/359/63…
The Reef employs 70,000 people. It's a looming economic catastrophe. Tourism operators are desperate. brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queen…
How has the Turnbull government responded? By glad-handing a lump of coal in Parliament 
In decades to come, when the politics of the moment have faded, this will be the true legacy of the Turnbull government: they jeered while the Reef died
Cynicism barely begins to describe the dead-eyed psychopathy of the Coalition’s position on energy.
While the Reef dies, the government has postured on a clapped put, broken down coal-fired power plant in NSW
While the Reef dies, Australia's greenhouse gas emissions are rising.
Australia's greenhouse gas emissions are rising because the Coalition wants them to. Rising emissions are Coalition policy.
That's what happens when you abolish a tax on carbon, and abolish all regulations on carbon pollution. That’s what happens when your entire energy policy is anti-renewable
Turnbull government policy: 2. Housing.
You might have heard that Scott Morrison was recently caught out lying about the supposedly apocalyptic effects of winding back negative gearing
In fact, lying to protect the property industry is par for the course for the Coalition. Protecting special interests in property is pretty much a core Liberal value
The entire social fabric of a home-owning nation has been thrown on a bonfire of property speculation, and millennials paying $250 a week for a dingy room in a run-down share house know it.
The rent rage is filtering up rapidly into the middle classes, where university repayments and job insecurity are interacting with sky-high rents and the contempt shown by landlords for tenants to produce a combustible social situation.
The stratospheric rise in house prices in Australian capitals has benefited a class of landlords and property developers at the expense of nearly every younger and poorer person in the nation.
But our political class simply doesn’t care… probably because they all own houses.
Some of them own quite a lot of houses. Most of them take donations from the property sector, especially in the Liberal Party. This is how politics in Australia works.
Make no mistake: badly worsening housing inequality is Coalition policy
Housing is a social volcano that Australia’s elites are happily growing tomatoes on.
The malaise was summed up by the schadenfreude of a Labor federal MP unable to afford a house in his own electorate. theage.com.au/victoria/local…
That seat is the rapidly gentrifying electorate of Wills in inner Melbourne: Brunswick and Coburg.
Few workers in the seat of Wills own houses now. They rent, because they have to.
It would be funny if it wasn’t the fate of an entire generation. It would be funny if it didn’t make you cry.
Turnbull government policy area 3: The workplace.
The Coalition is often derided as a do-nothing government, but no-one could accuse employment minister Michaelia Cash of inactivity.
Michaelia Cash has been one of Turnbull's most effective ministers. Her singular preoccupation? Union busting.
The media has focused (rightly) on Cash's arguably-illegal media tip off of an impending Federal Police raid on the AWU
But in the background, Cash has been busy stacking the bench of the Fair Work Commission
One recent FWC appointment is Sarah McKinnon, a committed union buster and former workplace lawyer for the National Farmers Federation. afr.com/news/policy/in…
Appointments like this have skewed the whole playing field of industrial relations. Employer-friendly Commissioners have issued a string of pro-business decisions
The most infamous FWC decision in 017 was of course the cut to penalty rates - at a time of record-low wage growth
This is what wage growth in the Australian economy looks like: a two-decade low
And this how few strikes are being called in the Australian economy
That might be because Australian workers now lack the legal right to strike, except in very special circumstances theaustralian.com.au/national-affai…
If you need an explanation for the rising income inequality in Australia, the growing imbalance between the power of capital and labour is probably the best.
Union power in Australia is at a post-war low. Just seven per cent of Australians under 24 belong to a union.
Most Australian workplaces are profoundly insecure places, even for employees enjoying the protection of full-time employment.
Casualisation is high, and has been for some time. According to the ABS, there are 2.6 million Australians working in jobs without paid leave
And, of course, Cash continues to turn the screws on union regulations and stack regulators with pro-business lackeys.
In summary, it’s no wonder Turnbull gave Michaelia Cash a promotion. She’s winning.
Coalition policy area 4. Tax.
Tax is one policy where the government likes to claim credit. After all, it represents one of the few legislative victories that the Turnbull government can point to.
In 2017 the Turnbull government managed to get half its company tax cuts through the Senate
The result was a roughly $24 billion hit to the budget, even though the budget is in deficit. Budget emergency? Not for shareholders and CEOs.
Company tax reductions really are one of the Turnbull government's main priorities
Mind you, it's not as though big corporates have to pay much tax as it is. The release of Tax Office data in December shows just how little tax the big guys pay
The ATO transparency data shows more than 700 big companies paid no tax in 2015-16. Zero. Nothing. abc.net.au/news/2017-12-0…
Notorious international commodities giant Glencore booked $22.4 billion in income in Australia in 2015-16. It paid no tax. Not a cent.
.
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Qantas booked $15 billion income. No tax. Not a cent.
Origin booked $12 billion income. No tax. Not a cent.
Energy Australia: $7.8 billion income, no tax. Exxon: $6.7 billion income, no tax. British Gas: $6.2 billion income, no tax. Toll Holdings: $5 billion income, no tax. Bluescope Steel: $4.9 billion, no tax. Vodafone: $4.2 billion, no tax.
Many of these companies are Liberal donors.
Company tax is essentially a discretionary donation, not a legal requirement. No wonder inequality is rising.
And the Turnbull government still wants to reduce company tax further.
Turnbull government policy area 5. Social policy.
It is when we turn to welfare that the government’s contempt for the needy and unfortunate in Australia was most obvious.
2017 was of course the year of #Robodebt, a cruel and error-prone algorithm that imposed welfare debts on tens of thousands of ordinary Australians, often falsely.
I spent the first six months of the year reporting on the Robodebt debacle; it remains one of the worst examples of public policy dysfunction in recent Australian history.
Across 20,000 words I showed that the government KNEW that Robodebt would punish welfare recipients: that was the point
You can read the series beginning with this article, here newmatilda.com/2017/06/21/rob…
Robodebt was the logical extension of the Coalition’s genuine beliefs about those in our society unlucky enough to receive government benefits: that their poverty is a symptom of their failures as human beings.
Robodebt wasn’t the only aspect of social policy where the Turnbull government punched downwards.
Whenever it spotted a disadvantaged group that it judged unlikely to fight back, it attacked them.
That was why we saw more attacks on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders; more attacks on asylum seekers, and as 2018 began, a new scare campaign about fictitious ‘African crime gangs’ in Melbourne.
It shouldn’t have surprised anyone when, on New Year’s Eve, Turnbull waded into the racist beat-up about ‘African crime.’ Cynical opportunism like this is entirely in keeping with his government.
And this brings me to my main point: Malcolm Turnbull is not a moderate.
Turnbull’s chameleonic character has blinded many to the central aspects of his biography: inherited wealth, a precocious, unscrupulous talent, and a career spent circling the nexus of money, media and power.
Journalism, then the law, then merchant banking, then politics: this is a life history characteristic of a politician whose instincts and policies are opportunistic, acquisitive and reactionary.
Turnbull is a representative of capital. He rules for the rich, not just because he is rich, but because he believes in wealth as a motive force in his political philosophy.
The major policy debates of 2017—energy, housing, tax, industrial relations and social policy – all show the government’s desire to rule in the interests of capital, and against the interest of workers.
The idea of a small-l liberal, moderate, progressive Malcolm Turnbull has died hard, but it is dead now.
27 months of government has shown us that what Malcolm Turnbull ultimately cares about is power: gaining it, holding it, and finally using it, in the interests of the ruling class to which he demonstrably belongs.
I've written a long essay on why Malcolm Turnbull is not a moderate at New Matilda newmatilda.com/2018/01/09/unm… @newmatilda
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