Crispin Hull

BBefore Paul Keating took the leadership 14 months ago, a Liberal drover’s dog could have won the election. The Coalition was miles ahead. Fightback had been well-received because the Hawke Government was too tired or uninspired to tell people about the 15 per cent GST. And Jeff Kennett had not legislated away leave loadings

It was not a case of üif the Coalition would put its program into effect, but how quickly. Then, the Coalition’s spokesman on industrial relations, John Howard, spoke of not tolerating any nonsense over his industrial-relations revolution. If the Senate blocked it there would be a double dissolution within six months. Then the Coalition would have a majority in both Houses, and Fightback in all its purity would be enacted.

There’s no more of that talk. Dr Hewson lost his political virginity with Fightback Mark II and enjoyed it so much he has had another go with the special deal for the five sugar seats. Though the IR policy has not been perforated, there is no more talk of protecting its purity with a double dissolution.
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The Retirement Benefits Office is rejecting nearly all applications by public servants who have resigned for late election to preserve superannuation benefits.

About 600 people have applied late to preserve their superannuation benefits rather than be paid out. Many of these filled out a form at the time of resigning saying they wanted the cash, only to realise later that either there was an option to preserve their fund for greater benefits later.

Most of these came to that realisation since mid-1988 when a new superannuation scheme was introduced and public servants, service wide, were being called upon to elect between the new and old scheme.
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EEarly in the campaign, Queensland was not looking good the Coalition, for one reason: sugar.

John Hewson has effectively diffused that issue and now Queensland looks very promising for the conservatives. Eight seats, enough for government are within range with margins of less than 5 per cent. On the other hand, Labor could only target one, perhaps two, Coalition seats.

Sugar was not only a turning point in Queensland. Nationally, it signalled that Dr Hewson’s lost of purity was not confined to the bringing down of Fightback II. He was prepared to give the cane growers a little on the side as well. And once he had done that, why not promise $30 million for a new university campus at Cairns for research and tourism, to upgrade the present branch office of the Townsville-based James Cook University?
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IIn announcing an election for March 13, Paul Keating has shown again his fundamental political style. Attack is the best form of defence, and surprise is the best form of attack.

Having allowed mutterings about a pre-Christmas poll to keep the Opposition needlessly on its toes, he then allowed everyone to relax a while by saying that Parliament would sit as scheduled on February 23. This made everyone think that an April or May election was most likely.

Mr Keating gave the minimum notice and made his announcement on a Sunday, catching everyone on the hop. It is a Prime Minister’s prerogative under the Westminster system to select the date, and Mr Keating got the maximum advantage of that power. He has toyed with the election date like a cat with a mouse. And now he has sprung, quickly and decisively.

Tactically, the Opposition is slightly on the back foot. Though prepared policy-wise, organisationally its national machine has to now crank itself up to book advertising time, arrange meetings and co-ordinate shadow Ministers’ appearances. On the ground, non-sitting challengers in individual seats who have been sweating on a pre-Christmas poll and then a February poll have now to quickly re-ignite enthusiasm among their teams of volunteers who a week ago had assumed they could rest until April or May.
Continue reading “1993_02_february_polldate”

The piggery companies of the Prime Minister, Paul Keating, made a total of $3.2 million in losses last financial year, according to returns lodged with the Australian Securities Commission.

The losses follow $1 million in losses the previous financial year.

The piggery companies are now worth minus $2.3 million compared to an estimated $1.36 million in 1991. Audits of the 1991 accounts for the companies said they relied on the continued support of the company’s bankers, the Commonwealth, and on shareholders for their continued existence. It would be fair to say that given the 1992 profit that situation continues.

However, the losses and consequent reductions in shareholders’ equity do not seem to translate into Mr Keating’s family company, Pleuron Pty Ltd.

The piggery group has the following companies: Brown and Hatton Group, Brown and Hatton Wholesale, Brown and Hatton Rural, Jensay, Labvac and Olympia Sales. The main business is a piggery in Scone NSW and refrigeration equipment. The companies are in an $80 million joint venture with a Danish company, Danpork. The joint venture hopes to employ some 200 people and sell pork into Asia, using Danish capital and Australian cheaper feed and land.

Above the piggery companies sits Euphron Pty Ltd which is half owned by Pleuron Pty Ltd, the Keating family company.

Pleuron shows its loss for the year at $1072. The company is worth $473,366, according to the annual return, but it is difficult to see how that can be anything but a paper amount given the losses and negative shareholders’ equity of the subsidiary piggery companies.

This financial year the companies were exempt proprietary companies for the whole year. This means that auditor does not have to be appointed. It also means the accounts are much less detailed.

The accounts show that there has been some straightening out since the companies came under fire last year in the Senate and in the press. Last year the accounts and company reports were revised and then audited and revised again. They showed different amounts in different way at different times, especially a debt to former Minister for Tourism John Brown. That amount is not shown in the 1992 accounts, because that amount of detail is not required.

The accounts have corrected the bizarre situation in Euphron whose shareholders’ equity jumped from about $800,000 to $8.4 million in 1991, meaning that the Keating family share was some $4.2 million on paper. The equity for Euphron is now put at $861650.

The best performer in the group was Brown and Hatton Rural which turned in a profit of $1.9 million. However, that was eclipsed by losses elsewhere in the group.

The Leader of the Opposition, John Hewson, questioned last night whether the governmental actions of the Prime Minister, Paul Keating, had given Mr Keating a personal advantage.

Dr Hewson was responding to a question on the ABC’s ü7.30 Report about the Opposition’s attack in the Senate in the past eight months on Mr Keating’s investment in a piggery.

Mr Keating’s office issued a statement after Dr Hewson’s remarks saying: “”The allegations tonight by Dr Hewson that I have corruptly benefited personally from government decisions is an unsustainable and outrageous slur. Dr Hewson who last week claimed factual revelations about his tax minimisation was gutter politics has tonight made a highly defamatory statement which he knows he cannot back up. He should withdraw it and apologise immediately.”
Continue reading “1993_02_february_pigs4a”

A company once owned by former Minister for Tourism John Brown to which the Keating piggery companies once owed up to $4 million has been dissolved.

There are no answers as to whether the piggery companies still owe any money to Mr Brown.

Mr Brown is head of the privately funded Tourism Task Force, one of whose aims is to lobby the Federal Government in the interests of the tourism industry. It has claimed much success in generating more tourism business to Australia.

The Prime Minister, Paul Keating, and his family are the half owners of the piggery companies through his family company Pleuron which half owns Euphron which in turn owns Brown and Hatton Group Pty Ltd (BH Group).
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The legal profession has abused the privilege of self-regulation and is incapable of dealing with complaints and setting its own fees, according a dissenting report on the cost of justice in Australia.

The report was published yesterday by the Senate Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs.

The main recommendations included one for the Bureau of Statistics to collate information about the profession and its costs.

Others included an on-going reference to the committee to monitor the profession; that courts and other legal bodies report annually on costs and that there be an annual public legal forum.
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There was something missing from the Prime Minister’s promise this week to cut company tax and to provide cash rebates for child care. Where was the independent inquiry? Where was the reference to the parliamentary committee? Where was the inter-departmental committee? Where were the public submissions?

Why is it that on some occasions, our politicians can virtually click their fingers and announce major legislative and policy changes, yet on other occasions we get a raft of inquiries and submissions and nothing ever gets done. üYes Minister’s@ Sir Humphrey is right, if you don’t want to do something, have an inquiry. And thus is was with the inquiry by the Senate Standing Committee on Legal Constitutional Affairs into the cost of justice. In effect, it recommended further inquiry. Further inquiry is not needed. The community knows that justice is too costly and is invariably delayed. In other words jusstice is denied.

It is now no longer a question of cost overruns in a fews cases, or a few people not being able to afford access to the legal system. Australia is now at the stage where only the very wealthy and the desperately poor with legal aid can go to court. And the blame for this state of affairs must be squarely laid at the legal profession.
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The ABC was given the site decades ago for nothing for the purposes of broadcasting. It was a worthy, community cause and the Government at the time thought they should get the lease. The long-term aim was to put the ABC’s national headquarters there and to house radio and television reporting teams for Parliament and the national capital. Some of those aims have changed. The ABC has substantial studios at Parliament and will never bring its headquarters here. Further, it has dropped its local television news, so it no longer requires a spacious TV studio at Northbourne Avenue.

Thus the ABC has come up with the idea that a developer could come in and use part of the site for commercial purposes or medium-density housing and on the rest of the site build the ABC a shiny new radio studio for nothing. The Uniting Church did the same thing in the 1980s on a Civic site it had been given for nothing decades before. The old church in town was knocked over. Two-thirds of the site went to commercial offices and the church got a shiny new place of worship and some new offices for itself.

The practice must stop. The ABC was given the site for broadcasting, not for commercial development. If the site is too big, the ABC should hand it back and ask for a smaller, more suitable site elsewhere. The ACT community can understand the ABC’s difficulty. It has a huge site and buildings which cost $300,000 a year to maintain. A smaller site would cost half that to maintain.
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