"I certainly believe in her right to say what she said. I thought some of the things she said were an accurate reflection of what people feel."
These words are from former Prime Minister John Howard in 1996, failing to repudiate the independent (former Liberal) MP Pauline Hanson's maiden speech, in which she put forward the view that Australia was being "swamped by Asians".
This changed the political narrative in Australia. While under the previous Keating Government racism was called out, under the Howard Government it was carefully incorporated into policy that played to an undercurrent of racism that exists in Australia.
As Keating himself said: "you change the government, you change the country" and this is precisely what Howard's deliberate failure to repudiate Hanson's racism did. He had given permission for racism and elevated it to an acceptable view, a view which "reflected what people felt" and because it was what people "felt", it no longer needed to be justified. It gave permission for a type of cognitive dissonance that allows someone to spout racist views, but be good mates with their ethnic neighbours. Every challenge to this contradiction can be met with an accusation of "political correctness".
Fast forward to the Abbott Government. Abbott, through his words and actions, has carefully crafted a similar story for sexism and a similar dissonance for those on the Right to hold those views while still believing themselves not to be sexist. To challenge them is to play the "gender card" or to be "politically correct". This sits nicely with the general conservatism of the populace, which does not see gender politics as any more nuanced than a simple matter of "equality". It is this simplistic view of feminism that enabled the effectiveness of the parade of "Abbott's Women", who by their mere presence proved that he could not be sexist. The more nuanced symbolic arguments of the Left failed to have the resonance of simplistic symbols paraded by the Right.
In his article for the Guardian, Jeff Sparrow argues that "The challenge for the left is not to abandon symbolism, but rather to fill symbolic reforms with real content" and argues that by doing this the Left will achieve the resonance with the populace that it needs to repudiate Abbott's sexism. Sparrow argues: "If [...] progressives can use debates over sexism in political life to discuss the oppression faced by women who don’t hold positions of prominence and power, Abbott’s persona suddenly pits him irrevocably against him the bulk of the population."
Although it is true that the Left must "fill symbolic reforms with real content", the achievement of this is not, as Sparrow suggests, a matter of finding this resonance by using relateable examples. It ignores the relativism and cognitive dissonance of views that the Right has given permission for people to hold. If the Left wants to break this type of relativism, its leaders must challenge the contradictions inherent in the Right's ideological narrative.
The job of the Left is to call out these contradictions. For those calls to resonate, it requires leadership that is not timid. The Left must articulate its own ideological vision.
This is the tragedy of the treatment of former Prime Minister Julia Gillard's "misogyny speech"[video]. Here was an example of a leader repudiating sexism, denying permission, outlining an ideological view. However, by this time it was too late. The ALP was too timid to engage directly with the electorate on gender for fear of Gillard's gender being a defining feature of her Prime Ministership (which it was already). This re-enforced the Right's position and it was hardly surprising that a cynical media amplified the Opposition's "gender card" excuse to fit the narrative of the PM that the ALP had allowed to take hold.
The Left has been too timid to engage in this direct battle of ideas, preferring to console itself with symbolism - arrogantly assuming its symbols are too nuanced for the electorate to engage with directly - or expressing an incoherent middle-class dissatisfaction through movements such as 'Occupy' or disengaging entirely through clicktivism.
The Left must stop ceding ground to the Right and directly engage with the Right's contradictory ideological position. This can not be done by adopting the type of soft-liberal symbolism that divorces their position from the majority of the electorate but with a coherent ideological narrative that articulates the Left's position.
This goes further than Sparrow's "filling symbolic reforms with real content", it is a coherent ideological response to the Right. Sparrow's view encourages the sort of soft-liberal approaches that have been the very reason for the Left's failure to counter the Right's ideological position.
The Right is incoherent and contradictory and its culture wars are a distraction from its incoherence. An ideological narrative from the Left will expose the cognitive dissonance inherent in the ideology of the Right.
The occupation of the narrative is the goal of the culture wars and the Left must meet it head on, not through soft-liberalism but through hard-edged ideological vision. It is only then that the narrative can be wrested from the incoherence of the Right.
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Monday, September 23, 2013
Moroccan Lamb Stew
Ingredients
500 grams lamb2 Cns tomato
1 Carrot
1 bunch baby spinach
1/2 cup frozen peas
1 onion
1 tsp fresh ginger
1 cl garlic
1 pinch saffron steeped in hot water
2 bay leaves
1 dried chili
1 Tbsp olive oil
Spice mix
1 Tbsp Coriander powder1 tsp Fennel powder
1 tsp Cinnamon powder
1 tsp dried Rosemary
1 tsp Cumin
Pearl couscous to serve
Method
Brown the lamb in oil and remove.Brown onion, garlic, ginger, chili
Add chopped carrot
Add spice mix and cook until fragrant
Add saffron water and tomatoes (add extra water if needed)
Add salt and pepper to taste
Pressure cook for 40 mins
Once lamb is tender, add peas and cook uncovered until done then add spinach.
Serve over pearl couscous.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
The calibre of Abbott's paid parental leave: It's not the inequity, it's the economics
Many people have criticised the Coalition's paid parental leave (PPL) [PDF] scheme as entrenching inequity, however, since Coalition backbencher (and IPA fan) Alex Hawke, began questioning the opposition's paid parental leave (PPL) scheme from a neo-liberal economic prospective, several prominent feminists have come out in support of the scheme.
Eva Cox has asserted that:
In this post I want to firstly, address the fallacy behind Cox's defence of the policy and secondly, address how a PPL scheme could meet Cox's criteria.
The table below outlines the basic structure of both policies:
Cox makes three main points in praise of the Coalition Policy:
Cox accuses the Government's scheme of emulating a welfare payment not only on the basis of the rate, but also because it is administered by Centrelink. This assertion is extremely misleading and belies a misunderstanding of the way the government scheme is administered. The Government's PPL scheme is administered by Centrelink, however, payments are made to the employer to be paid to the employee - keeping the nexus between PPL and employment.
However the Coalition's plan is to:
The amount is not the issue as Cox asserts, the mechanism of payment is, which brings me to Cox's next point.
Cox argues that the Coalition's policy normalises PPL as a workplace right similar to personal or annual leave. In fact, the economics of the policy actually bring it much further from a workplace right than the Government's scheme.
Workplace rights stem from the relationship between the employer and employee - not to rates of pay - annual leave is a right regardless of how much is paid. Annual leave is a mandated part of the payment package that every employee receives. The government does not pay the employee for their annual leave, the employer continues paying a wage while the employee is on leave.
The Coalition's PPL breaks any nexus between the right and the payment. The payment for the right becomes the Government's responsibility, not one borne by the employer as other rights are. It is the very definition of government funded welfare.
Which brings me to the third point - the burden on business.
The Government's PPL scheme is paid out by the employer, firstly to try and keep the nexus between the payment and the right, and secondly, to try to encourage business to "top up" the basic payment to become an "employer of choice".
Although this does create an administrative burden on business, the benefits of keeping this nexus of payment far outweigh the burden. Once the scheme becomes embedded, the burden will lessen as it becomes part of normal business processes, but the benefits will increase as the PPL right becomes normalised. Furthermore, the costs of this administrative burden are likely to have far less price impact than a 1.5% levy.
Many large businesses already have generous PPL schemes designed to attract talented employees to their business. Levying a tax on business to pay for PPL is an active disincentive for business to offer PPL rights (as part of their enterprise agreement or contract) to their employees as businesses will see that they've already paid for PPL thought the levy.
The PPL levy moves the responsibility for PPL from business as a workplace right to government as a welfare payment. Targeted government spending in this manner deliberately crowds out the private sector.
The Coalition's PPL scheme cannot meet each of the elements on which Cox praises the policy. The Coalition's scheme is the very epitome of welfare which Cox argues against.
The Coalition's policy:
For all its flaws, the Government's scheme at least keeps the nexus between the right and the payment and does not mimic the welfare model as the Coalition's policy does.
In the same way that leave conditions are used by business to attract the best employees, PPL conditions should be no different. In fact, many businesses already offer PPL conditions as an incentive to employment.
While government should provide a basic PPL scheme as a base level (to at least provide a base level of pay to enable women to have the choice to have children), business should be encouraged to provide PPL over and above this rate. This could be done as a "return to work" subsidy or an employment subsidy for non-ongoing PPL leave positions to fill in for the employee on leave,while keeping the current right of return.
Keeping the nexus between PPL and employment is the only way to change workplace culture in Australia and this nexus includes business' close involvement with the scheme.
The Coalition's scheme divorces business from the scheme by shifting the expenditure from employment to tax. The Government's scheme at least keeps the connection as the employer remains the paymaster.
The Coalition's policy is just middle-class welfare dressed up as a female-friendly policy and although the Government's policy lacks the incentivisation for business - it is further away from welfare than Cox asserts.
Cox has been fooled by the Coalition's simplistic scheme - but the problem is not with the inequity (as Cox points out) but with the economics (which Cox's arguments do not address).
The Coalition's scheme is welfare, and like other welfare payments can be reduced - particularly since the Coalition's scheme is likely to be extremely expensive. The Government's scheme begins the process of embedding PPL as a workplace right and as business begins to "top up" the scheme (particularly if the Government offers incentives to do so) it becomes less likely to be removed.
Even though on pure payment amounts the Coalition's scheme looks more attractive, it does none of the things that Cox praises it for - all it does is entrench PPL as welfare, and extremely expensive middle-class welfare at that.
Eva Cox has asserted that:
"Interestingly, Tony Abbott’s pitch for his version of paid parental leave is closer to the feminist angle than the health or welfare justifications. He has designed a payment that meets so many traditional feminist demands."This is untrue and is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the economics of the Coalition's policy.
In this post I want to firstly, address the fallacy behind Cox's defence of the policy and secondly, address how a PPL scheme could meet Cox's criteria.
The two policies
The table below outlines the basic structure of both policies:
| Government Scheme | Opposition Scheme | |
|---|---|---|
| Paid leave | 18 weeks (primary caregiver) at minimum wage | 26 weeks (Mothers only) at equivalent wage capped at $75,000 |
| Include superannuation: | No | Yes |
| Administered by: | Centrelink (DHS) | Family Assistance Office (DHS) |
| Paymaster: | Employer | Family Assistance Office |
| Paternity leave: | 2 weeks at minimum wage | 2 weeks at full wage |
| Same-sex Partner leave: | same as paternity leave | unclear, but policy only mentions fathers |
| Funding: | general revenue | 1.5% levy on large businesses |
Cox's Argument
Cox makes three main points in praise of the Coalition Policy:
- It represents 26 weeks of leave at equivalent pay which differentiates PPL from a welfare payment because of the attachment to the rate of pay;
- it normalises PPL as a workplace right the same as personal leave or annual leave; and
- it's paid for by a levy on big business so "business benefits from not having to make the payments out of individual profits." (Coalition PPL policy)
Why Cox's assertion is flawed
Pay equivalence certainly seems to differentiate the Coalition's policy from welfare if it is compared against the Government's scheme on pure payment rates. However if the policy is analysed more deeply its flaws become apparent.Cox accuses the Government's scheme of emulating a welfare payment not only on the basis of the rate, but also because it is administered by Centrelink. This assertion is extremely misleading and belies a misunderstanding of the way the government scheme is administered. The Government's PPL scheme is administered by Centrelink, however, payments are made to the employer to be paid to the employee - keeping the nexus between PPL and employment.
However the Coalition's plan is to:
"be paid and administered by the Family Assistance Office and will not impose an unnecessary administrative burden on employers, unlike Labor’s scheme"Which is a welfare payment, administered by a welfare agency paid directly to the recipient...as welfare.
The amount is not the issue as Cox asserts, the mechanism of payment is, which brings me to Cox's next point.
Cox argues that the Coalition's policy normalises PPL as a workplace right similar to personal or annual leave. In fact, the economics of the policy actually bring it much further from a workplace right than the Government's scheme.
Workplace rights stem from the relationship between the employer and employee - not to rates of pay - annual leave is a right regardless of how much is paid. Annual leave is a mandated part of the payment package that every employee receives. The government does not pay the employee for their annual leave, the employer continues paying a wage while the employee is on leave.
The Coalition's PPL breaks any nexus between the right and the payment. The payment for the right becomes the Government's responsibility, not one borne by the employer as other rights are. It is the very definition of government funded welfare.
Which brings me to the third point - the burden on business.
The Government's PPL scheme is paid out by the employer, firstly to try and keep the nexus between the payment and the right, and secondly, to try to encourage business to "top up" the basic payment to become an "employer of choice".
Although this does create an administrative burden on business, the benefits of keeping this nexus of payment far outweigh the burden. Once the scheme becomes embedded, the burden will lessen as it becomes part of normal business processes, but the benefits will increase as the PPL right becomes normalised. Furthermore, the costs of this administrative burden are likely to have far less price impact than a 1.5% levy.
Many large businesses already have generous PPL schemes designed to attract talented employees to their business. Levying a tax on business to pay for PPL is an active disincentive for business to offer PPL rights (as part of their enterprise agreement or contract) to their employees as businesses will see that they've already paid for PPL thought the levy.
The PPL levy moves the responsibility for PPL from business as a workplace right to government as a welfare payment. Targeted government spending in this manner deliberately crowds out the private sector.
The Coalition's PPL scheme cannot meet each of the elements on which Cox praises the policy. The Coalition's scheme is the very epitome of welfare which Cox argues against.
The Coalition's policy:
- Is paid by the government like welfare
- Has no connection to the employer like welfare
- Is paid as a tax that acts as a disincentive for the private sector to fund the right (like personal or annual leave).
For all its flaws, the Government's scheme at least keeps the nexus between the right and the payment and does not mimic the welfare model as the Coalition's policy does.
How to fix the Government's scheme
The economic conditions for the payment of PPL at the employee's wage level need to be provided by business to truly divorce the PPL payment from welfare. Cox is wrong to assert that the mere connection between the right and the payment rate is enough. The connection needs to be between the paymaster and the payee to truly entrench PPL as a employment right in the minds of business as this is how other rights (such as annual leave) operate.In the same way that leave conditions are used by business to attract the best employees, PPL conditions should be no different. In fact, many businesses already offer PPL conditions as an incentive to employment.
While government should provide a basic PPL scheme as a base level (to at least provide a base level of pay to enable women to have the choice to have children), business should be encouraged to provide PPL over and above this rate. This could be done as a "return to work" subsidy or an employment subsidy for non-ongoing PPL leave positions to fill in for the employee on leave,while keeping the current right of return.
Keeping the nexus between PPL and employment is the only way to change workplace culture in Australia and this nexus includes business' close involvement with the scheme.
The Coalition's scheme divorces business from the scheme by shifting the expenditure from employment to tax. The Government's scheme at least keeps the connection as the employer remains the paymaster.
The Coalition's policy is just middle-class welfare dressed up as a female-friendly policy and although the Government's policy lacks the incentivisation for business - it is further away from welfare than Cox asserts.
Cox has been fooled by the Coalition's simplistic scheme - but the problem is not with the inequity (as Cox points out) but with the economics (which Cox's arguments do not address).
The Coalition's scheme is welfare, and like other welfare payments can be reduced - particularly since the Coalition's scheme is likely to be extremely expensive. The Government's scheme begins the process of embedding PPL as a workplace right and as business begins to "top up" the scheme (particularly if the Government offers incentives to do so) it becomes less likely to be removed.
Even though on pure payment amounts the Coalition's scheme looks more attractive, it does none of the things that Cox praises it for - all it does is entrench PPL as welfare, and extremely expensive middle-class welfare at that.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Fraudband, entrenching the past to monopolise the future.
The Coalition has now released its broadband policy and it is heartening that the Opposition has finally realised that high-speed broadband is an important infrastructure issue.
However, beyond the technological differences (which others have comprehensively dealt with elsewhere), the policy fails on one of the fundamental advantages of the NBN - ubiquitous bandwidth over a single wholesale network.
A ubiquitous fibre network provides business certainty for the private sector to build and deploy high-bandwidth applications across Australia, the Coalition's hodgepodge of technologies and last-mile monopolies does not provide this certainty.
Only vertically integrated businesses will have the ability to cost-effectively deliver applications across the network proposed by the Coalition - which is good news for FOX and Telstra but bad news for any other business looking to provide high-bandwidth applications.
It seems that the Coalition is keen to replicate the previous mistakes of digital TV and datacasting regulation that has entrenched the status quo in the broadcast sector - little wonder that the "fraudband" policy was launched in FOX studios.
However, beyond the technological differences (which others have comprehensively dealt with elsewhere), the policy fails on one of the fundamental advantages of the NBN - ubiquitous bandwidth over a single wholesale network.
A ubiquitous fibre network provides business certainty for the private sector to build and deploy high-bandwidth applications across Australia, the Coalition's hodgepodge of technologies and last-mile monopolies does not provide this certainty.
Only vertically integrated businesses will have the ability to cost-effectively deliver applications across the network proposed by the Coalition - which is good news for FOX and Telstra but bad news for any other business looking to provide high-bandwidth applications.
It seems that the Coalition is keen to replicate the previous mistakes of digital TV and datacasting regulation that has entrenched the status quo in the broadcast sector - little wonder that the "fraudband" policy was launched in FOX studios.
Wednesday, February 20, 2013
Linux.conf.au 2013 - Copyright's Dark Clouds
 |
| LCA2013 |
There are a couple of other presentations on activism and politics, that I'd also recommend watching:
Sky Croeser's Free and Open Source Software and Activism
and
Pia Waugh's Geeks Rule Over Kings - Distributed Democracy
There are also plenty of interesting technical talks which can be found at http://mirror.linux.org.au/linux.conf.au/2013/mp4/
Enjoy!
Monday, December 31, 2012
Obligatory Top-10 Tech Predictions for 2013
I did this last year, so rather than shatter any expectations of readers, I will be sharing my technical prescience once again. Of course, all of them came true last year 1, so here goes:
So there you have it 2013.
-----------------
1 Disclaimer: This post and any prior "predictions" posts may contain harmful levels of hyperbole and exaggeration.
- Despite Google's best efforts, users still won't realise that Google Hangouts has a social network attached.
- Apple will lose its way, so will its users - thanks Apple maps.
- Windows 8 will fail to revive the glory days of Windows ME.
- More and more services will move into the cloud, mainly thanks to cloud based companies continuing to expand the definition of what cloud based services actually are.
- Malware writers will increasingly target web exploits to avoid the hassle of writing for multiple platforms. Software companies will just complain about having to write for multiple platforms. HTML5 will continue to be largely ignored.
- Facebook will continue to suck, users will continue to complain about it. Facebook will still have eleventy billion members.
- Tweets will become the number one source for mainstream news organisations. Mainstream news organisations will publish at least one "twitter is stupid" article per month for "balance".
- Android will continue to grow despite the sucky API and the need to develop for multiple platforms. Apple will continue to grow despite its command economy for apps.
- There will be enormous buzz in the tech community over a true Linux-based smartphone OS. Lots of buzz. It'll be so slashdottingly buzzworthy that no-one will notice that it hasn't been released nor does it have any support from any major hardware vendor.
- 2013 will be the year of the Linux desktop.
So there you have it 2013.
-----------------
1 Disclaimer: This post and any prior "predictions" posts may contain harmful levels of hyperbole and exaggeration.
Monday, August 27, 2012
A simple sleight of hand - The morphing of Fair Work to WorkChoices
The spectre of WorkChoices was back from the dead today as the Liberal Party's own Lazarus, John Howard, urged the party to resurrect the dead, buried and cremated policy. The current leader of the opposition, Tony Abbott, was quick to shut down any discussion (lest it lead to an actual policy position that may enable voters to see any Liberal policy longer than three word slogans). However, in his rush to shut down the discussion, he inadvertently gave a glimpse of the mechanism by which he intends to introduce a more radical workplace policy.
Abbot stated that:
Abbot stated that:
"The Labor Government under the Fair Work Act has put in place individual flexibility agreements. I think these agreements need to be made more workable, but there's no going back to the past. We want the Fair Work Act to work better."Individual flexibility arrangements (IFAs) are arrangements that can vary an employee's conditions under enterprise agreements (EAs)- s202 of the Fair Work Act 2009 - or modern awards - s144(1). They are designed to allow employees to vary their workplace conditions to suit their circumstances (such as working hours) or for employers to offer a set of conditions to an employee to alter their working conditions to better match business requirements. However, unlike the old WorkChoices Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs ), IFAs are limited to a specific set of workplace conditons, cannot be made a condition of employment and must leave an employee "better off overall".
IFAs vs AWAs
| characteristic | IFA | AWA |
|---|---|---|
| Subject Matter | Limited | Unlimited (within a basic safety net) |
| Can be offered as a condition of employment | No | Yes |
| Can be offered en masse | No (that's what EAs are for) | Yes |
| Termination | Unilateral | By agreement |
| Test | Better off overall | No Disadvantage (initially no test) |
As can be seen from the table there are only a few differences between IFAs and AWAs - most notably the subject matter and whether they can be offered as a condition of employment. The removal of these two conditions on IFAs would effectively re-introduce AWAs. A removal or erosion of the test for the agreements would effectively bring back the worst elements of the supposedly dead policy.
Abbott's admission that IFAs are the mechanism by which a future Liberal government would re-introduce "flexibility" should give us pause for thought. The re-introduction of AWAs would not require substantial changes to the Act and so when Abbott states that all changes will be within the Fair Work framework it is cold comfort that the Liberals' pet policy, WorkChoices, isn't ripe for resurrection.
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