Well we have a government. There could be shaky times ahead but it seems the independents did the rational thing. Supporting the coalition would have given them only a one vote working majority. It was assumed all three independents would go one way. With the two independents Labor has two votes in hand under the new agreed system with Bob Katter voting against the government. Bob Katter is a real National Party person - no ifs no buts. He would have known what the others were going to do. For all his talking his electorate got nothing. He obviously knew which way he would fall all along. It was all show.
Ironically, the Coalition has given Labor an extra vote by having a member of the opposition as deputy speaker with no voting power. Tony Abbott was not thinking clearly when he made that decision. Not giving in to this could have swung the two independents the other way. The Western Australian National must have had an effect. He said he would not block supply for the Coalition. His decision to sit on the cross bench gave the impression that he was not fully supportive though.
After the treasury analysed the Coalition election promises, throwing more money at the independents had no effect. A brand new hospital was clearly far too much for the Tasmanian representative. It seems Tony Abbott had lost credibility. His behavior in the election came back to haunt him. Something fishy was about when his promises were not costed initially.
The real "swinger" was the National Broadband Network. If the Coalition had just said it would review the NBN it would have won office without this fiasco. You can sometimes be too stubborn for your own good. Many have said if labor had not brought the mining tax in the coalition would have done so. It was like the GST - a Labor idea adopted by the coalition. Pity Tony Abbott was not more like John Howard who saw some good in Labor concepts.
Ironically, the Coalition has given Labor an extra vote by having a member of the opposition as deputy speaker with no voting power. Tony Abbott was not thinking clearly when he made that decision. Not giving in to this could have swung the two independents the other way. The Western Australian National must have had an effect. He said he would not block supply for the Coalition. His decision to sit on the cross bench gave the impression that he was not fully supportive though.
After the treasury analysed the Coalition election promises, throwing more money at the independents had no effect. A brand new hospital was clearly far too much for the Tasmanian representative. It seems Tony Abbott had lost credibility. His behavior in the election came back to haunt him. Something fishy was about when his promises were not costed initially.
The real "swinger" was the National Broadband Network. If the Coalition had just said it would review the NBN it would have won office without this fiasco. You can sometimes be too stubborn for your own good. Many have said if labor had not brought the mining tax in the coalition would have done so. It was like the GST - a Labor idea adopted by the coalition. Pity Tony Abbott was not more like John Howard who saw some good in Labor concepts.
0 comments:
Post a Comment