The wheels began falling off some critical policy initiatives of the Howard government this week.
The moratorium against internet gambling has mostly failed but still the government presses on. Tax reform is in a quagmire. And the policy on health insurance is not working as intended.
After five years of Coalition Ggovernment it is worthwhile assessing the outcome of the policy initiatives against what was intended. It is a dismal comparison.
Let’s start with the health insurance. The Government’s policy of a 30 per cent rebate for private insurance premiums and penalties for older people joining health funds late had a worthwhile aim. The aim was to reduce the pressure on public hospitals. But for what has happened? This week we learnt that the profits of private health funds have gone up by a $340 million, that is a 172 per cent increase on the pre-rebates situation. And still the pressures remain on public hospitals. Conclusion: policy failure.
Digital television. The aim was to give Australians across the nation access to the best and most diverse range of television programing. The Government demanded that the existing five it television networks (the ABC, SBS, and the three commercials) broadcast high-definition digital television. The result has been that people wanting digital television have to pay $20,000 for a receiver. Conversion boxes are rare because Australia is one of the few nations using this digital arrangement. Once obtained, the digital set will receive only a total of five programs from the networks. This is because high definition and digital burns up all the available spectrum. If the government had allowed the five networks to use of the spectrum as they saw fit, each of the networks could have produced up to five program streams in stead of a single one, giving consumers a total of 25 program streams where there is now just five. The result of the Government’s policy, however, has been no additional diversity and exclusion from digital television by all but the very wealthy. It has also entrenched oligopoly by enabling the three commercial networks to concentrate their audience and advertising with enormous cost benefits. Conclusion: policy failure.
Internet gambling. The policy aim was to reduce the exposure of compulsive gamblers to gambling outlets and to make sure that gambling outlets behaved more fairly. The government imposed an outright ban for a year and is now proposing to extend the ban indefinitely on Australian internet gambling sites serving Australian customers, while allowing Australian sites to serve international customers and allowing Australian customers to use international internet gambling sites. During the moratorium Australian sites increased their gambling income, anyway. Under the Government’s policy, Australians will remain exposed to unregulated international sites, rather than having access to sites in Australia which would have been regulated if the government adopted a more sensible policy. Meanwhile, poker-machine, telephone and other betting continues amok. Conclusion: policy failure.
Taxation. The GST was introduced to make the tax system simpler and fairer and it to reduce tax avoidance. What happened? Small business was enmeshed in a quagmire of forms. The cuts in income tax are susceptible to erosion by a inflation as people on modest incomes are pushed into higher tax brackets. On the avoidance front, it is true that some people are finding they have to pay at least some tax for a change (perhaps that is the real cause of the squealing), but avoidance of income tax continues as the Government bows to National Party pressure by refusing to deal with the question of trusts. Conclusion: policy failure.
Decency in government. On coming into office in 1996, John Howard promised a return to decency in government. What did we get? Up to half a dozen ministers caught in breach of the guidelines on decency that Howard himself had set, and we got five years of appointments to statutory bodies of political mates – – the very conduct he had condemned in his Labor predecessors. Conclusion: policy failure.
Reconciliation. The Government’s policy of practical reconciliation was aimed at doing it practical things to bring the condition of Aboriginal people more in tune with the Australian average and hope that when that this took place emotional and symbolic reconciliation would be achieved. What happened? Practical measures still have play long way to go to achieve anything like equality of outcomes. Meanwhile, the emotional and symbolic have been deliberately shunned by the Government so that the Aboriginal people feel aggrieved and isolated, making any change now look insincere. Conclusion: policy failure.
Leadership, vision, national purpose and the Republic. The policy aim of Howard when he came to office was to present national leadership and direction after 13 years of Labor government which chronically overspent and which ignored important parts of the Australian community. When the Republic came on the agenda – – emerging from outside government through the Australian Republic Movement – – Howard put his personal commitment to the monarchy as his primary political aim. He then encouraged a union of direct electionists and monarchists to defeat what many in his own party saw as a moderate, conservative proposal to change the symbols of government without changing the system. He achieved his short-term aim in 1999. But where does that leave us in 2001? Commentators, talkback respondents and a letter writers say they are looking for vision and national aspirations. Those things would be here if the republic referendum had not been a stymied by the Prime Minister. Now, in Shakespearean fashion, he is a victim of his own indulgence. He prevented one possibility of an expression of national renewal and now voters seeking any form of national vision are set to take it out on him. Conclusion: policy failure.
Fiscal responsibility. Howard promised that he would deal with the legacy of Labor’s debt. For nearly five years he delivered diligently on this score. His government delivered successive budget surpluses that resulted in lower interest rates and lower taxation for many Australians. But now the pressure is on in the lead-up to his third election, he has put a fiscal responsibility behind the need to buy the votes with such things as the petrol-excise reduction, the first home-buyers boost and sundry goodies for the bush.
The main redeeming feature of the Howard government is now under threat.
These policy failures are plain unintelligent. Each of them had obvious long-term fall-out that was ignored in preference to short-term populism.
Has ever an Australian Prime Minister been given so much and succeeded in so little?