I’m sorry – is this real?
asserted
this → ’m → ?
Australia, according to the latest international results, ranks poorly for classroom discipline.
uncertain
Australia → accord → discipline
On Saturday, the Coalition announced a solution: it would hire military veterans.
asserted
it → announce → veterans
The shadow education minister said: “When I think about the need for better classroom behaviour and more discipline in our classrooms, and the need for more support for Australian values, it seems to make sense.”
asserted
it → say → sense
“Let every school have a flag,“ the Coalition spokesman also said, in keeping with Angus Taylor’s call two weeks ago to protect the Australian flag more stringently from being burned.
asserted
spokesman → let → flag
These are unserious ideas, but will they work politically?
asserted
they → work → ?
I have no idea because the truth is they match the carnival-esque atmosphere of the past few weeks.
asserted
they → have → weeks
An ex-soldier crying blasphemy because of a cartoon.
asserted
- → cry → cartoon
Revelations that Pauline Hanson had criticised Anthony Albanese’s mother.
asserted
Hanson → criticise → mother
Suggestions – denied – that One Nation was stealing policies from the Coalition.
asserted
Nation → deny → Coalition
Golf club renovations, drug use and “sexual deviance”, melons, “feminisation” of our curriculum, the prime minister touring the home of the iPhone.
asserted
minister → tour → iPhone
These are not minor stories, but events that have dominated recent weeks.
asserted
that → dominate → weeks
There are various substantive things that can and should be said about the treasurer’s release of the Intergenerational Report today and the immigration minister’s speech at the National Press Club last week.
asserted
that → be → Club
But they are most accurately viewed as attempts to ground the overarching political narrative in a sense of seriousness again: to wrest back control of the dominant political story.
asserted
they → view → story
Whether this government is capable of reasserting control at this particular moment remains an open question.
asserted
is → reassert → moment
In his speech releasing the last Intergenerational Report (IGR) in 2023, Jim Chalmers said “the 2020s must mark the end of complacency”.
asserted
2020s → release → complacency
Australia had a chance to “turn these turbulent ’20s into the right kind of defining decade”.
asserted
Australia → have → decade
The government has begun acting on some significant challenges, including the energy transition, housing and broader inequality around assets.
asserted
government → begin → assets
These also mean it has begun to address questions raised in that last report on the taxation mix, with predictions then that, if nothing was changed, income tax would play an increasing role in the nation’s finances.
asserted
tax → mean → finances
How important the IGR was in paving the way for those recent changes is doubtful.
asserted
was → pave → changes
Recall that most observers were surprised by Labor’s decision in the recent budget to change the capital gains tax beyond housing – not a lot of paving had been done.
asserted
lot → recall → paving
Still, the last IGR was released only a year or so after Labor won government – the government was still determining its priorities.
asserted
government → release → priorities
Halfway through Labor’s second term, it’s reasonable to expect it has a clearer sense of where it wants to go.
asserted
it → ’ → sense
So the really significant question out of today will be how much Jim Chalmers succeeds in sharpening a story about problems he wants to solve.
asserted
he → succeed → problems
He will speak of the danger of people feeling “unmoored economically” at a time of great change, when the “intergenerational promise, of better times” is “fraying” – and say that the “division in politics now is … between those who prey on [the pressure caused by change] and pick on it and politicise it and catastrophise it – and those who seek to alleviate it.”
asserted
who → speak → it
Obviously, one of the ways some political figures, like Pauline Hanson, are trying to “prey on it” is by targeting immigration.
asserted
figures → try → immigration
Last week, Hanson announced her plan to slash migration in a policy that would have more people leaving the country than coming in.
asserted
people → announce → country
On the weekend, Angus Taylor promised he would “deliver one of the biggest cuts to immigration in Australian history”.
asserted
he → promise → history
It is into this overwrought context that Chalmers will launch the IGR, with its statistics about lengthening life expectancy, falling fertility and an older population.
asserted
Chalmers → launch → expectancy
Whether Chalmers says it or not, there is one inescapable conclusion: we will need migration to continue at reasonable levels.
asserted
migration → say → levels
So it is significant that Tony Burke announced last week that immigration numbers would stay within existing forecasts – in fact, at the level at which they have been for most of the past two decades.
asserted
they → announce → decades
Still, three of the most striking elements were more about shifts in the way migration is talked about.
asserted
migration → talk → way
The first was Burke’s attempt to shift focus away from the question of bringing immigration down to the issue of whether the system “unfolds in the way that we say it will”.
asserted
it → shift → that
Meeting migration targets, Burke said, was one of two elements in maintaining public confidence.
asserted
Burke → meet → confidence
(This is not only rhetorical: being able to do so depends on actual changes.)
The second was economic.
asserted
second → do → changes
Interestingly, he took this out of the abstract and towards the concrete, speaking about “the economy of our regions” and “the economy of our cities”, making it local.
asserted
it → take → cities
Then he talked about the economy in terms of hospitals, doctors, aged care and construction: whether those specific areas had enough workers.
asserted
areas → talk → workers
On Sunday, Anthony Albanese echoed this, saying One Nation’s approach would be “diabolical for our economy and have real consequences for issues such as aged care, healthcare, the hospitality sector, the agricultural sector”.
asserted
approach → echo → care
This is a significant pivot for Labor: towards a willingness to make a strong economic case for migration.
asserted
This → make → migration
Third, Burke said the recent decrease in numbers would make “space for housing supply to catch up”.
asserted
supply → say → space
…and 5 more, not listed.
The Aporia
