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Pope Francis' message to the World Economic Forum at Davos developed the Catholic understanding that government and business economic actions should be governed not by trust in the workings of the free market, but by care for the good of the whole human community. Coincidentally the Australian Government announced a review of welfare payments.
'Don't mention the war!' admonishes John Cleese as the hapless hotelier Basil Fawlty in the classic television comedy series Fawlty Towers. With a string of war-related anniversaries to take place over the next four years, beginning this year with the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War, we may soon find ourselves sharing Fawlty's sentiments.
Those who campaign for more humane treatment of asylum seekers cannot keep assuming that the elements of the debate that matter to them most are the most persuasive. The hardest thing to accept may be that the socioeconomic anxieties for which immigration serves as proxy, as well as the insecurity and resentment generated by state impotence and political opportunism, do not necessarily make for 'bad' people.
It is now weeks since any asylum seekers arrived in Australia, and under the Abbott Government there have been no reported deaths at sea involving Australian border protection interception action or failure to act. This is a striking improvement on the high death rate under the Rudd and Gillard governments. Tony Abbott has kept his pre-election promise to stop the boats, but at what huge cost!
This week began with Australia Day and ends with the Chinese New Year. The juxtaposition suggests pertinent questions about Australian identity, especially the ways in which Australians have alternately included and excluded those seen as outsiders. This is most evident in the relationship between Australian settlers' attitudes to Indigenous Australians, but it is also seen in Australian attitudes to Chinese and other Asian peoples.
I'm fifth generation Australian, but I don't have a word to describe the emotional malnutrition I feel at our leaders' lack of vision. Maybe there are words for such feelings in Yamatji, or Eora, or Noongar, but most of us wouldn't know. This was a place with more linguistic individuation than Europe, before our boat-people ancestors arrived, but they didn't take the time to learn its words or hear its stories.
New Zealand, our partner in the Anzac legend, has no problem commemorating the Maori Wars of 1845–1872. Yet the Australian War Memorial refuses to honour Aboriginal warriors who fought and died defending their lands and their people against white invader settlers in the Frontier Wars of 1788–1928. This is a moral issue, and has the effect of excluding a whole people from commemoration based on a trifle.
The WA Government recently acquired 3414 hectares at James Price Point near Broome, in the continuing saga to develop the region's liquefied natural gas reserves. Meanwhile, the building of four LNG processing plants on Curtis Island, off Gladstone, Qld, is proceeding smoothly. While the traditional owners of James Price Point have received international attention, traditional owners in Gladstone have barely been heard.
The Greens have called for the dropping of the Lord's Prayer from the opening of each day's sitting of federal parliament. Because Australia is not a Christian country, they are right to question the exclusive use of a Christian prayer. But any change should reflect a multi-faith society, not a no-faith society.
The new TPV is harsher than the version introduced by the Howard Government, mainly because it has no pathway to a permanent visa — once granted, it is likely that the best you will ever get in Australia is a TPV. The TPV is a punishment, not a deterrent; a cruel visa that reflects the cruelty of the politicians introducing it.
Dr Maurice Newman, chairman of the Prime Minister's Business Advisory Council, last week cautioned the Government against listening to certain interests at the expense of the common good. His criticism of the former Government as 'reckless' for establishing and funding the National Disability Insurance Scheme reveals an upsetting indifference and a lack of awareness of the benefits of such a scheme both to individuals and to society as a whole.
Kevin Rudd says we need a 'new politics' or a 'new way'. Tony Abbott says we'll only get a new way by electing a new government. What is missing in both statements is the recognition that what we actually need is a new kind of economic democracy: a reconfiguration of our economic prioritising away from individualism towards the common good, and towards the participation of all rather than the exclusion of many.
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