[LINK] Murchoch's NBN - means-testing Medicare?

Craig Sanders cas at taz.net.au
Mon Apr 15 19:01:30 AEST 2013


On Mon, Apr 15, 2013 at 03:13:23PM +1000, Robin Whittle wrote:

> Your mention of a future coalition government "means testing Medicare"
> plan is new to me.  A quick Google search turned up nothing fresh.  Can
> you cite any sources for this?  

It's not a declared policy (which aren't in fashion with the Libs
anyway - why have official policies that might backfire on you when
you can have sound bites?).  It's part of a list of 75 proposals
(incl. means-testing medicare, breaking up and selling off the the
ABC, privating SBS, repeal the carbon tax and mining tax, stop further
construction of NBN and privatise what's been built, and more) from the
IPA that Abottt declared a blanket "big yes" to "many" (whatever that
means) of at a recent $500+ per head fund-raising dinner.

he hasn't specifically mentioned medicare or PBS that I know of (at
least, not this election campaign) but he's made repeated attacks on
both whenever he's had the chance in the past, so it's not difficult to
guess that gutting medicare and the PBS will be part of his agenda.

None of the mainstream papers have mentioned the speech or the dinner or
asked him questions about which, exactly, of the proposals he's actually
saying "yes" to.

the only sites that have mentioned it at all are getup and some of the
independent politics blogs.

http://blog.getup.org.au/2013/04/09/campaign-update-a-sign-of-things-to-come/

http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/getup-to-date-on-the-ipas-radical-plans-for-australia/

http://australiansforhonestpolitics.wordpress.com/2013/04/08/abbott-says-yes-to-to-10-of-the-ipas-75-radical-ideas-so-far/#more-3085

and a petition to get Abbott to declare which other of the remaining IPA
proposals he plans:

https://www.change.org/en-AU/petitions/tony-abbott-leader-of-the-opposition-clarify-which-of-the-ipa-s-75-policies-the-coalition-plans-to-implement



crikey appears to mention it here (but i can't read the full article
because i'm not a subscriber):

http://www.crikey.com.au/2013/04/05/abbott-bolt-rinehart-fawn-in-the-ipa-court-of-king-murdoch/

they do have open access the list of 75 proposals here:

http://blogs.crikey.com.au/theurbanist/2013/04/11/is-tony-abbott-the-new-gough-whitlam/




> Surely means testing Medicare would be to the disadvantage of
> wealthier people who the coalition is relying on for support.

they've caught the american disease of rabid ideological
anarcho-capitalism. medicare has to go because it's socialist.

the middle classes, even the upper middle-class, simply don't count
any more...they're not the corporations or right-wing think tanks who
dictate policy, and they're not even swinging voters, they're mostly a
loyal voter base that doesn't realise they've been betrayed yet.

the australian middle classes will be as screwed over by these policies
as they have been in the US.

(which is why Turnbull has been neutered, he's one of the few remaining
old-school Liberals who still represent that demographic - the rest have
been either marginalised and ignored within the party, or replaced with
ultra-right wing ideologues)

craig

-- 
craig sanders <cas at taz.net.au>



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