"A Deficit we must have"... or, one we should have had?...

[Bernard de Silva]

“A Deficit we must have”…
or, one we should have had?

Deficit…not a pleasant word a the best of times, particularly
for Australians. In the face of the current economic turmoil,
we are faced with the ‘deficit we must have’ to stimulate local
economy. This amounts to, a virtual printing of unsecured
currency, which will see the country encumbered, in a time
of world recession, for many years to come...The question
arises…Why now? Why did none possess the foresight, to use
debt to foster prosperity, at some earlier, more opportune and
buoyant time?

The Australian economy, presently relies heavily on mineral
commodity demand, raw material export from our northern
regions, being a prime source of an income, largely regulated
by the purchaser. All onshore usage of our major resource…
we do have, huge supplies of readily mined coal and iron ore,
as well as other minerals in high demand, [all in the premium
quality range], has largely been terminated and multi- national
ownership has further eroded export income. Why did we not
see the obvious before us?…Why did we not previously generate
a situation where we could have been the major supplier of
‘fresh water’ manufactured steel in the world?
We have all the base ingredients for such an enterprise…always
have had them at our disposal…The presented excuse, has ever
been finance…
The iron ore and coal, both the best on offer, though sited on
opposite sides of the continent, could easily be rail transported
to be processed at a viable region, toward the eastern seaboard
 in Northern Queensland, which affords excellent access to
Asian and Pacific shipping channels. Millions of megalitres of
fresh water resource, courtesy of regular monsoonal and tropical
rainfall, currently pour unrestrained, uncontained  and unused
into the ocean via our northern waterways…Why we export the
base ingredients at what amounts to a minimal profit…and then
buy back a lower grade salt water manufactured steel, along with
its by-products, at premium prices, is one question to be answered
and perhaps, stands as an indictment, to previous Government
strategy.
As so often, it would seem, we had the ball at our feet, but were
too reticent, or too foolish, to kick it…

 ©. Copyright: Bernard de Silva…09.

[zondrae]

morning Bernard,

Did you send a copy of this to Big Kev?  I know it wouldn't get through to him (in either sense of the word) but maybe it would land on the desk of some policy maker or other. Ya never know.

[r. magnay]

G'day Bernie,
At the risk of opening a can of worms, I will just chuck my thoughts on the matter out there. One of our biggest problems in this country has been caused by the unions and endorsed by the labour governments in their bid for the top job. Our labour is too dear by far! Before the screams about sweat shops and slave labour start pouring in, I had better clarify the statement a bit. We as Australians get too much money for the work we produce, I have no problem with the price of labour, but I certainly do with the productivity! What other country in the world pays the average worker six weeks a year to not be at work, then another 5-10 days if you get sick then contributes another 9% into a savings account for you to retire on, on top of that you get paid to have meals and coffee breaks not to mention time off to go outside for a smoke several times a day. Then because you have all this time off during the day you have to work back for an hour or two to catch up.........and get paid penalty rates for that! Then to to top the whole lot off your employer has to put aside money so he can pay you three months long service leave because he didn't sack you for ten bloody years. Oh yeah, but don't forget that you can still leave before that time with no penalty, and now there are some industries that have portable long service leave! can you believe that, if an employer has a project that lasts two years say, he has to contribute to a fund that goes into your long service leave and then you keep moving around until your ten or seven years is up and you can have two or three months off on full pay...........and people wonder why all our manufacturing is going off shore!!.......................derrrr.
John Howards industrial policy may not have been perfect, but at least it was on the right track, we need fair laws for BOTH sides of the employment equation.
Until we get this sorted out we can forget about ever being competitive on the world market in any industry, and in the meantime we will lose a lot of our manufacturing infrastructure which will make it even harder to get back into it if and when we sort out the problems.
Your questions and ideas are good ones, (in my ignorance I wasn't even aware of the difference between fresh and salt water steel) and I also have had thoughts for a few years on a similar thing we should be doing. As our nation was origionally founded largely "on the sheeps back", I believe we should be putting much more effort into agriculture, as you say we have all that water going out to sea in the northern part of the country, why couldn't a percentage of it be used to grow food, we have for too long tried to keep the agricultural areas that already exist producing, when clearly much of that country is no longer reliable enough to sustain our agricultural industries, shift the bloody people to the water!! When Australia was being settled, people went all over the place looking for opportunities for wealth and found and built them, now we won't move away from the relative comfort and 'security' of our coastal sprawl to make things work!.......................I'm confused!

[zondrae]

morning Ross,


I think I agree with you.  Ask a small farmer or his wife just what their hourly rate is. It would be about the same as a so called sweat shop. And Don't even get me going on this paid maternity leave caper.   I think it is just (can't find a suitable worn other then ) highway robbery. To expect your boss, not only to keep your job open for you, but also to pay you while you have a child.... For once (and it doesn't happen often) I'm dumfounded.

Now I'm no toff. My Dad was a wharfie and my Mum was a barmaid, so I come from and live in a working  class situation. I worked all my life for ordinary pay rates. I've done everything from making beds in motels to being a paymaster of a fairly large company. Noone paid me for hours I was absent from employment while I had my three children. Like you say Ross, how can things improve if we keep expecting hand outs.

[r. magnay]

Yeah Zondrae, I feel the same about the maternity leave, if people spent a bit less time trying to have the material things and spent a bit more time at home raising their kids I am sure we would have a lot less social problems than we do now, we all like to have plenty of money, but it seems plenty is not enough these days.
I too was raised in a middle class family, we always had plenty to eat and wear, nothing too fancy but always enough and good enough. Mum and dad worked bloody hard, on the land some of the time and a bit in their own business, my next brother and I started working at a young age, weekends, after school and on school holidays, the pay? food and lodgings and an education in work and work ethics! I am proud to say that my wife, also from a similar work culture (well from her mothers side anyway) and I have successfully handed much of the work ethic down the line to our kids, it was a bit of a battle at times and even looked as though it might be in vain sometimes, but it did get through! The problem we face now as a society is that we are now looking at families of kids whose parents lived the too much money culture and passed that on.
Like many of our era I too have tried my hand at whatever would earn me a quid, sparkies did not always enjoy the pay we can now expect, I have driven trucks, worked in bars, operated farm machinery, worked in shearing sheds and pretty much anything else that would make a quid, including the things that my trade took me to, like working underground in the mines.
The sentiments I expressed earlier, I believe are the reason something like Bernie suggests will never get off the ground, I am tired of the doers in this country always being penalised for the sake of the bludgers!

[Bernard de Silva]

 

G’day Ross,
                  I have an opinion about politics…if you go far enough right,
you get the feeling it might be left and vice versa…and the problem, as
is with unionism, is that the pendulum of power, always swings too far
in the direction of ruling bias…there is never enough common ground…
                   Whatever one’s political persuasion, or affiliation, it must
be conceded, that either political party, at their times of prominence
could have instigated industry to transform our own raw resources into
products more profitable than exporting the base commodity…Any excess
raw material could still have been sold, but we should have been in a far
better, less reliant position, to broker a premium price, for such exports.
                     As you have likely noticed, we, as a nation, have the unhappy
knack, of shooting ourselves in the foot with our established markets…If
we have the undisputed, best product and the whip hand, in world markets
and production, what do we do? Do we exploit our dominance and hard
earned experience, expertise and technology? Of course not, we are the
font of benevolence, we freely give away all this knowledge and advantage
and create our own industries’ nemesis and ultimate demise…The sugar
industry, is a prime example of this folly…did we learn from that, Hell no!
We export all our finest animal bloodlines and whilst we do surely make a
transient profit until this convenience to opposition is no longer required,
any previous processed product market may soon be effectively ended by
overseas breeding. Add to this the blatant fact we seem to be becoming a
nation, too ill educated, too lazy and too obese to get out of our own way,
and the future doesn’t look too bright for ‘The Lucky Country’ and it’s a long
haul back to riding ‘on the sheep’s back’…
 
                       The ‘world owes us a living’ and the ‘welfare’ mentality are
now firmly ensconced in Australian society and both major parties should accept
the blame…the fear of political expediency feeds this malady…
To put it bluntly, we have become a nation of bludgers…and sadly the ‘something
for nothing’ mentality overflows into the workforce. Pride of workmanship and any
semblance of a fair days work, for a fair days pay has largely vanished…Every lurk
and perk, as you have also noted, will be exploited and a minimal output will likely
be produced  and a premium wage demanded …Saddens me, and yourself, no doubt,
that the true tradesman…and I make no apology to women kind, nor correctness,
for not making that, “tradesperson”, has largely vanished from the earth…
The eventual replacement, may well come from a third generation of  the, “We’ve
never worked…Why should we, Dynasty”, forced to play literacy and numerical catch
up, then take TAFE classes at the threat of welfare withdrawal…
                         This next comment, will likely draw more flack, but, I feel blessed
I am not currently in business or employing people, in that I would be before the
workplace discrimination tribunal eight days a week…every bloody week. I’ve always
been of the conviction, diligence deserves reward and fair time spent requires a fair
recompense, but, the bloke picking up the tab, employs whom he likes, or justly
dismisses any he finds inadequate or dishonest, as he sees fit…The other thing,
which would really place me in the war zone, is that nubile young females, or women
of childbearing age and capability, would never be considered for employment, given
the trouble to maintain positions, loss of production and company expense…
                          Once thing, which has always confused me Ross…maybe you
can enlighten me…This bloody democracy thing…has it really ever existed, as it is
popularly defined, anywhere on this planet?…and who is it really runs the show anyway?…
and  for sanity’s sake, don’t say, “God”…
                            Cheers Mate…how should our unofficial anthem go?
“Another day older, and deeper in debt”?
                                                                      Bernie…

[r. magnay]

G'day again Bernie,

Just for the record I am not affiliated with any political party though I have never made any secret that I am not a great supporter of labour or their policies, however, I do agree with your pendulum analogy.
Unions, like politicians unfortunately are a neccessary evil, and like politicians, they are alright until they get out of control! Through history we have seen a fair bit of both happening! I think Tuesday night endorsed your suggestion for an anthem too, I feel sorry for my kids and grandkids having to try and get through this mess, we had to do it in Pauls time and that wasn't easy. I hope some of your ideas get to the right places and inspire some sensible thought from the pollies, a big ask I know, but we can only hope. Don't expect any credit for it though if it does happen, they will only do something if they think or can make us think it was their idea!
In closing mate, there is not too much we need to debate in our views, I reckon we are thinking along fairly similar lines.

[jim tonkin]

Good one comrades,looks like you've got it right.Remember the words of your great leader Bob Menzies"keep the worker on his knees'

[r. magnay]

G'day Jim,

I don't remember Ol' Bob saying that, must have been a bit young at the time, looks like Paul and Kev heard him though, they are both pretty good at keeping us all on our knees 'ey! 

[jim tonkin]

yeah you're right Ross,personally Malcolm Fraser in the seventies was the one that affected me most.Up here we've got a teachers strike.Lock them all up and put them in labour camps,we'll show them what a free democratic country we've got.Better still demolish Canberra and run the country from Bushverse

[r. magnay]

G'day Jim,

Yeah, forgot about Fraser, I never was a big fan of his, his government did get Australia out of the mess we were in but it was more good luck than good management, the cockies had a couple of good years and they had droughts overseas............we won't get onto teachers!