The great thing about a New Year is you feel like you can make a new start.
The slate is clean, you believe. Last year is just so “last year”. That was then, this is now. It’s why many of us make New Year’s resolutions – even if we say we’re not, they’re still there in our minds: yeah, this year I will do more (some) exercise, this year I will write that novel I’ve been thinking about for years, this year I will get less stressed by work.
Inevitably, not a great deal changes. Not because New Year’s resolutions are doomed to fail, but because the New Year is actually not that big of a deal. Nothing magically happens over a summer break that changes you in any meaningful way.
Thus a government may believe it can start afresh and have voters believe things are different now, and that 2014 (and 2013) will be forgotten. But no. It doesn’t work like that.
For much the same reasons our New Year’s resolutions inevitably fail, so too do attempts for a government to wipe the slate clean. Voters in January might give even less of a toss about politics than they do in the other 11 months, but they don’t develop amnesia.
This is also the main problem with all articles and commentary about how the government can improve its standing with voters – like New Year’s resolutions they have at their core a belief that the government can change what it is. Tony Abbott is not going to become “Not Tony Abbott”.
The only way to really change the voters’ perception is to radically change who is in government and also most importantly change the policies.
This step is usually attempted by way of a reshuffle. And thus was the case last month when Tony Abbott shifted around a few Ministers.
Scott Morrison is now the Minister for Social Services, though most likely a majority of voters are unaware of this fact. Those who are aware would know that the change in Minister will not mean a change in the government’s attitude towards people on welfare.
Even fewer people are probably aware that Kevin Andrews who was Social Services Minister is now Minister for Defence, and those who are aware of it are probably trying their best to pretend it is just a dream.
Andrews is not what one would call a successful minister. He never has been. He was the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations who introduced WorkChoices; he was the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship who stuffed up the case of Mohammed Haneef.
In most other occupations he would have been either sacked or put into a role which unsubtly let him know that the organisation hoped he would resign.
Under Tony Abbott however he was given the role of Minister for Social Services and thus was at the heart of the measures which saw changes to welfare and which in turn formed the foundation of criticism that the budget was unfair.
So after that track record of course you would promote him to be put in charge of our defence.
The other big change was to shift Peter Dutton from the health ministry to immigration. Dutton was so woeful as health minister that he not only helped drive the government’s popularity down with his GP co-payment plan, but he also left new health minister Sussan Ley with the problem through his policy to institute via regulation a cut in Medicare rebates for GP visits under 10 minutes.
Given no one ever sits in a GP waiting room hoping the person ahead of them has an appointment over 10 minutes, it was a weird price signal to attempt to impose.
The move to do it via regulation meant the cut would have come into effect on Monday. And it meant that an issue that greatly damaged the government last year was already inflicting pain just 2 weeks into the New Year.
And worse for the Liberal Party it was also hurting the LNP’s chances in the Queensland election.
Think of it as a particularly odious and lingering smell left by a person as he exits the room.
And so yesterday Sussan Ley got out several cans of Glenn 20 and tried to clear the air. She announced she was dumping the rebate cut, but remained committed to establishing some sort of price signal.
Clearly the announcement hadn’t been well discussed because just 2 hours earlier the Minister for Small Business, Bruce Billson had told reporters the government would “persevere” with it.
Even worse, on Wednesday Tony Abbott told 3AW that the decision to cut the rebate was a “difficult” decision but that “we have to make them if Medicare is going to be sustainable for the long term future”.
Now I guess we don’t have to make them.
Ley in her press conference appeared greatly more skilful than Dutton ever was in the role, but to be honest that is like praising someone for being able to drink from a cup without dribbling.
And while the air freshener job yesterday at least got rid of the smell for now, it will likely be only temporary as Ley confirmed the government remains committed to its policy of a $5 GP co-payment to come into effect in July. Thus the stench of the government’s policy remains as does the sense the government’s budget is unfair and that Tony Abbott lied at the last election when he said there would be no cuts to health.
And thus the New Year for the government has begun with things so bad that a Minister had to break into her holidays to deal with an issue that was a carry-over from last year, and which in doing so saw her directly contradict statements said the previous day by the Prime Minister when he too broke into his holidays to give an interview on the issue.
It’s a bit like gorging on a big bag of potato chips and a few bars of chocolate two weeks after resolving to lose weight.
Ah well, maybe next year.
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