GrodsCorp

Wayne Swan: budget treasurer

Friday 7 March 2008, 12:23 pm

Ant Rogenous

Categories: Media, Politics

Tags: budget, carers, inflation, TheAustralian, WayneSwan

I don’t recall The Australian ever being this critical when the Howard government (peace be upon it) was busy slashing funding to welfare programs and public services:

Labor razor gang slashes carers’ bonus

LABOR will scrap annual bonuses of $1600 paid to carers as its budget razor gang carves deep into welfare programs to cut spending and curb inflation.

It will replace the payments with a higher utilities allowance but will leave the sick and disabled and their carers hundreds of dollars a year worse off.

But I’ll let that slide for the moment and say I agree that this announcement is disgraceful. Full-time carers have it tough enough as it is, and were barely supported under the previous government.

Wayne Swan, get your fucking act together. Or join the Liberals.

30 Comments

Wah (Friday 7 March 2008, 12:45 pm) #

So let’s continue givning people $4000 when they have a baby, regardless of income, but fuck over carers who lose income and collectively save the government millions by shoulderng the burdeon of their loved one’s illness disability.

They justify negative gearing by saying landlords save the governments from having to build public housing (as if public housing included a $800 a week apartment in Docklands) yet carers keep getting slugged.

At the very least they should give carers health care cards regardless of income and ensure all people in home care get the same medical susbsidies as those in homes.
Jeremy (Friday 7 March 2008, 1:20 pm) #

Would you mind not getting to things I’m planning on posting on before I do, please? Christ.

PS Yes, abysmal.
Jeremy (Friday 7 March 2008, 1:52 pm) #

Seriously, when did the carers last have to sacrifice themselves for others? Isn’t it about time they gave back to the community?
Alex (Friday 7 March 2008, 1:58 pm) #

What a pack of pricks. Carers, many of whom sacrifice future career opportunities, save the taxpayer enormous amounts of money by keeping people out of full-time care facilities.

What a kick in the teeth. Progressive government my anus.
keri (Friday 7 March 2008, 2:39 pm) #

Cocks. That’s all I have to say. Total and utter cocks.
krypto (Friday 7 March 2008, 2:44 pm) #

OK so let’s look at it in purely dollars and cents terms (take human misery out of the equation for a moment), Carers actually SAVE government spending, compare the pittance given to carers as an allowance with the overall cost of similar level care given in residential accomodation (nursing home or similar) which is where the overwhelming majority of care recipients would be were it not for their attendant carers and you’ll see the cost of carers is negligable.
Basically the government knows that carers do it out of love and will break their own backs before they see their loved one go into a home, there aren’t enough of them to be a significant force in terms of voter backlash and besides anything else, there simply aren’t the places in residential care for all the people who currently rely on home based carers to have a viable alternative.
It stinks.
Bron (Friday 7 March 2008, 2:44 pm) #

Speaking of the screechy The Australian, just finished reading Mungo Macullum’s “Poll Dancing” - his memoir of sorts of the lead up to the 2007 election. Very funny stuff. But also encapsulated just why none of us should really be reading that trashy “news” paper (including you, Jeremy. Stick with The Age).
Terry Wright (Friday 7 March 2008, 3:14 pm) #

Full agreement here.
As Wah said, $4000 to have a baby? I personally still can’t get my head around getting paid to have kids but to scrap a payment to carers who do what the government should be helping with is the Howard welfare model.

The carer’s bonus should be raised, not dropped. In relative terms, it’s a piss in the ocean compared to say … military spending.

What about cutting back on the ridiculous amount put into the AFP to fund Howard’s previous pet projects involving drugs. They haven’t made the slightest difference except to give the perception they are ‘tough on drugs’. Scrapping these under performing projects would fund the carers bonus and more. It seems that Howard, now Rudd have moral based policies mixed up. Logic tells me that morally, it’s right to help the carers who do so much for so little but the government thinks it is more important morally to spends millions on being ‘tough on drugs’.
Mao (Friday 7 March 2008, 3:17 pm) #

The ol getting the worst news out early to lessen the blow come Budget time.

The fact it is Lindsy Tanner, Minister for Razers, that is being ruthless.

Too ruthless.
Bruce (Friday 7 March 2008, 3:30 pm) #

Understandably, I’m going to be a tad reserved commenting on this topic lest I reveal too many of my personal details.
The Editor (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:17 pm) #

Bruce, are you Wayne Swan?
The Editor (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:18 pm) #

I understand the need for deep cuts in spending but FOR FUCK’S SAKE let’s get our priorities straight.
Damian (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:19 pm) #

I concur with the above sentiments: abysmal policy from cocks. What can they possibly be hoping to achieve with this? A bigger surplus, so they can give bigger tax cuts? I honestly thought that genuine changes were afoot: this sounds like old times.
Ant Rogenous (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:21 pm) #

What the fork has happened to our avatars today? I feel naked.
Damian (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:26 pm) #

I’m always naked when Grodding, Ant. KG and MK are here, passing around the tropical oils.
THR (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:33 pm) #

That the payment existed in the first-place was a form of neoliberal economics, as it was the Govt taking public funds (i.e. taxes) and placing them in private pockets (i.e. carers), which is in essence an outsourcing of the responsibility of dealing with the problem.

Cutting even these payments is just taking the same economic philosophy a little further down the road.

The other side of the story is that, in Vic at least, parents of disabled kids (to pick one example) are tearing their hair out and threatening suicide if they don’t get support/respite/assistance of any sort from the relevant Govt and non-Govt agencies. In other words, an inadequate Govt response to the problem was being smoothed over with some token payments. With these being stripped, we might reasonably predict even further pressure to be placed on systems that are already overburdened.

Having said that, I’m a little surprised that the Oz (and the ‘libertarians’ at AWH) have criticised this policy, since these characters oppose virtually all forms of welfare (and taxation).
THR (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:36 pm) #

KG and MK are here, passing around the tropical oils.

Are you also with Elijah, showing you all his ‘masculine virtues’?
Damian (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:39 pm) #

Indeed. He’s taken a real, er, liking to me of late.
Ant Rogenous (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:49 pm) #

I’d guess that KG was more in need of topical solutions than tropical oils, Damian.
Ant Rogenous (Friday 7 March 2008, 4:52 pm) #

THR, interesting post — thanks for adding that perspective.
Bridgit Gread (Friday 7 March 2008, 5:09 pm) #

THR is quite right - the carer payments were introduced by Howard to patch over problems that are structural and thus far more difficult to fix. It was the usual Howard solution: throw a few dollars at people in desperation and they’ll probably shut up.

Halve the ‘baby bonus’ and double the carer payments, that’s my suggested answer.
Jeremy (Friday 7 March 2008, 6:02 pm) #

Yes, but that’s what you’d do if you were just trying to fix the inquities. If you’re trying to save money to pay for tax cuts, you do something retarded like just taking money away from all carers.
John Surname (Friday 7 March 2008, 6:08 pm) #

Rubbish news. Hopefully they’ll reconsider.
Bruce (Friday 7 March 2008, 10:32 pm) #

Wayne Swan? My secret’s out!

Nah, it’s just that I don’t want to inadvertently give away any specific details about my status as a carer, mainly because it’s not just a question of my own privacy. That and there’s been an attempt at mining said details here on Grods by some of the readership. ;-)
krypto (Friday 7 March 2008, 10:49 pm) #

why in heaven’s name do we NEED a baby bonus given that the global population now exceeds 6.5 billion?
Mikey (Friday 7 March 2008, 11:04 pm) #

Shouldn’t these fuckers be working or something? After-all we make disabled people capable of working 5 hours+ a week get a job. Why not them?

Says the birds are scrounging…
THR (Friday 7 March 2008, 11:19 pm) #

why in heaven’s name do we NEED a baby bonus given that the global population now exceeds 6.5 billion?

Low-income people are the ones most likely to be swayed by the baby bonus, and they are precisely the target demographic here. They are required to fill the ranks of companies owned by Howard and Costello’s mates.
Jeremy (Saturday 8 March 2008, 8:27 am) #

I think it’s more that there are certain neighbouring countries whose populations are exceeding at vast rates, and certain people were concerned at the long-term effect of that on OUR PRECIOUS AUSTRALIANNESS.
Terry Wright (Saturday 8 March 2008, 11:19 am) #

and certain people were concerned at the long-term effect of that on OUR PRECIOUS AUSTRALIANNESS

This is the part of Howard’s Australia I really hate. We are part of Asian, not the UK or The US. I had to live through being the arse end of a British Commonwealth system and now it seems it’s the US that influences us most. I don’t want this … it doesn’t fit geographically. I want to be part of Asia.

Plus I only eat Asian food. So Blahhhh.
Jeremy (Tuesday 11 March 2008, 1:55 pm) #

Sweet, sweet Mitcham Thai. How I will miss you if you ever disappear. How I will go to you as soon as you open tonight and order a chicken pad prig. Oh, yes.