Busting the security and economy myth

Several events in the past week should (but probably won’t) dispel the idiotic belief among voters that the Coalition is better on national security and economic management than Labor.

The first was the great big bucket of cold water poured all over Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Defence Minister Peter Dutton by none other than the head of the Australian Security and Intelligence Organisation, Mike Burgess. Burgess went public to condemn the politicisation of national security – very rare for an ASIO boss.

Not in so many words, but he effectively condemned Morrison and Dutton for accusing Labor leader Anthony Albanese of being the Chinese Communist Party’s preferred candidate. Burgess was followed by a sterner condemnation by former ASIO, Defence and Foreign Affairs head, Dennis Richardson.

Was there any shame, apology or retraction? No. It appears Morrison and Dutton will stop at nothing to win an election, including jeopardising national security by demolishing a hitherto united political front against Chinese Communist Party aggression.

So much for the Coalition being stronger on national security.

Will it work? Possibly, given the ignorance of much of the Australian electorate who do not follow the nuances of politics.

But at least they should acknowledge – 80 years after the Japanese military bombed Darwin – that it was a Labor Prime Minister, John Curtin, who met the greatest threat to national security in Australia’s history.

Until last week there was no difference in national security between the major parties. Now the Coalition should be noted as the compromiser on security.

The second event highlighted the Coalition’s economic incompetence. It was the announcement by Origin Energy that it would close the Eraring coal-fired power station, Australia’s largest, employing 400 people, seven years sooner.

It shows a lack understanding about the strength of market forces. Economics and technology forced this inevitable closure and the Coalition, in office for nine years, has done nothing to ease the transition. 

More will follow, as evidenced by Mike Cannon-Brookes’s bid to buy AGL and close down more of its coal power stations earlier than scheduled.

It should be a turning point for the attitude of coal workers.

These workers (and those who work in supporting services) have every right to feel betrayed by nearly a decade of Coalition governments doing nothing. This power plant was not ear-marked for closure because of Labor-Green policies. Labor has not been in office for nine years. 

Even if the Labor Party and the Greens had some mad reversal of policy and supported fossil fuels, it would make no difference to the timing of this closure.

That being the case, these workers facing redundancy should blame the Federal Coalition Government for their predicament. A government with good economic management would have seen the technological future and planned for it. 

The future for coal workers is not in coal. It is in retooling their overarching skills in the energy industry to be applied to new energy sources.

After all, coal-fired power stations accrue a lot of local ancillary infrastructure (towns, roads, power lines) which could be adapted. An intelligent government with economic management credentials would adapt the workforce with it.

The coal workers are realising this and have every right to question the economic credentials of a government that did not see the writing on the wall and do something to make the inevitable transition easier.

Climate change aside, the new killer-app – solar and other clean energies – would have been seen by a smart economic manager as something to be embraced as a means to improve living standards. That the Coalition did not, and as a consequence thousands of workers see their future as bleak, has to be sheeted home to a decade of Coalition economic incompetence.

Origin chief executive Frank Calabria, who presumably knows a bit about the energy market ,said, “The reality is the economics of coal-fired power stations are being put under increasing, unsustainable pressure by cleaner and lower-cost generation, including solar, wind and batteries.”

The response to the closure announcement by the Minister for Industry, Energy and Emissions Reduction, Angus Taylor, was instructive.

He said: “On-demand reliable power such as coal, gas and pumped-hydro is needed to balance the record levels of intermittent forms of energy such as wind and solar. Closure without like-for-like replacement puts affordability and reliability at risk. It is incumbent on energy companies to step up and deliver like-for-like replacement capacity.”

Why on earth would you build a “like-for-like” coal-fired power station when the CEO of one of Australia’s largest energy companies says it is “unsustainable”. And he is saying it is unsustainable to run an existing coal power station, let alone building one from scratch. 

I can only conclude that Taylor is either stupid or has some other coal-supporting agenda divorced from the market reality that the Coalition has hitherto made the foundation of its economic credentials – which surely by now must be seen to be in tatters.

George Orwell would have been proud of Taylor’s ministerial title.

The third event to reveal underlying Coalition economic incompetence was the release of analysis based on Productivity Commission work by Save Our Schools and the 10^th anniversary of the Gonski report on education funding.

Essentially, Gonski’s aim of needs-based funding school-by-school has been turned on its head.

In the past nine years, the Coalition has engaged in a wilful squandering of money on private-school students at the expense of disadvantaged students.

In 2019-20 the Commonwealth spent $3,246 on each public-school student and an astonishing $10,211 for each private-school student. And the imbalance is getting worse.

Far from private schools relieving the burden on the Commonwealth, the Commonwealth is actually worse off for every student that goes to a private school rather than a public one.

And the result is appalling. Australia continues its 20-year decline in the OECD Program for International Student Assessment that measures the achievement of 15-year-olds in reading, mathematics and science in more than 80 countries.

Countries that took a Gonski-style approach of trying to equalise by putting money where it is most needed – like Poland, Canada and Finland – are shooting ahead of Australia.

It is economic mismanagement to waste extra money on schools which are already doing well – like rich private schools. The economic importance of concentrating on the disadvantaged students is that with better education these students will contribute as adults more to the economy and society.

Instead, we have a national humiliation caused by nine years of incompetence in education funding.

Can we, please, stop believing in myths and instead look at the evidence?

Crispin Hull

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times and other Australian media on 22 February 2022.