Kevin Rudd was faced yesterday with 2000 protesters against the mining tax, led by billionaire miners Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest (dressed in jeans and a hi-vis t-shirt) and Australia’s richest woman Gina Rinehart.
Rudd offered up a $2 billion sweetener to the WA government for roads, rails and ports.
Protestors chanted the catchy slogan “Axe the Tax”, and Twiggy talked about how China is attempting to lower mining taxes — “I ask you which communist country is turning capitalist and which capitalist country is turning communist”, although according to John Garnaut, China is actually considering raising taxes on resources.
But is Kevin Rudd actually prepared to negotiate with miners? Will the high profile rally change anything? Is this mining tax as terrible as the miners claim?
Here’s what the pundits are saying:
The Australian
Jennifer Hewett: PM’s tax talk works only on the surface
But there is no sign that the Prime Minister is prepared to act on what he is hearing and alter the essential elements of the government’s resource super-profits tax. Instead, it’s all about appearances.
Samantha Maiden: What’s the PowerPoint of all these mining ads?
But it is surely a bridge too far for the government of the man who coined the term “great moral challenge of our time’’ on climate change, who suggested mining companies were either lying or ignorant, to start throwing stones in the rhetorical hysteria glasshouse.
Matthew Franklin: Kevin Rudd offers up a bonanza from mining levy
As the Prime Minister vowed to divert the lion’s share of a $6bn infrastructure fund into the resource-rich states, the opposition accused him of pork-barrelling to avoid defeat in the approaching election.
Michael Stutchbury: How mining helped Australia avoid recession
Yet Australia’s greater reliance on mining, rather than manufacturing, clearly separated us from the US, Britain, Europe and Japan, all of which went into recession.
WA Today
Michael Gordon Perth: It’s Commie Kev versus the Bolshie Billionaires
Outside the hotel, at the corner of the park, there was another, more modest protest. An Aboriginal woman, Jude Kelly, stood by a hand-painted banner reminding anyone who cared to look just who were the original owners and custodians of Australia’s mineral wealth.
Sydney Morning Herald
Ian Verrender: In miners’ war on tax, logic is first casualty
Enough is enough. If one more person looks me in the eye and talks about sovereign risk and the new resources tax, I swear I’ll strangle them.
The Daily Telegraph
Steve Lewis: Turmoil has PM Rudd in the pits of despair
What do we want? Another billion!
When do we want it? Now!
In scenes reminiscent of the late 1960s Vietnam War protests, hundreds – possibly thousands – of peace-loving Perth residents took to the streets in the Wild West yesterday, taking aim at that dreadful parade of socialists known as the Rudd Government.
Herald Sun
Editorial: Voters confused
Mr Rudd needs to fix his flawed policy before it turns into an election losing about- face along with all the others he has made.
You guys are in the media business- how much for all those professionally printed signs?
As for Twiggy in the Hi-Viz shirt – oh please.
I think the Government and media are kidding themselves a little. They seem to think the mining tax has alot to do with Rudds poor polling, but if you ask the general public no one seems to care about the mining tax arguement that is going on. And yesterday in Perth with 500 people attending the conference with Rudd and Cabinet only 2 questions were raised regarding the mining tax. Most people have little interest in this tax and couldn’t care less what happens or who wins this arguement. And the Government are wasting $38 million on advertising there arguement for it, and the funny thing is most Australians couldn’t give a shit about it.
@Holden Back: You can get those signs from Miners-Are-Us or Rent-A-Crowd at quire reasonable rates. Dou you think that Hi-Viz shirt had actually been out of its plastic wrapper before yesterday?
Personally, I would like to see a bunch of protesters outside a Mining Firm’s shareholders’ meeting with some “Pay Your Rent” signs….
Surfer
[I think the Government and media are kidding themselves a little. They seem to think the mining tax has alot to do with Rudds poor polling, but if you ask the general public no one seems to care about the mining tax arguement that is going on. And yesterday in Perth with 500 people attending the conference with Rudd and Cabinet only 2 questions were raised regarding the mining tax. Most people have little interest in this tax and couldn’t care less what happens or who wins this arguement. And the Government are wasting $38 million on advertising there arguement for it, and the funny thing is most Australians couldn’t give a shit about it.]
The problem is though if the net effect on polling is negative, i.e. even if most people don’t give a shit about it if the ones who do are more inclined to dislike it then this tax will impose a political cost. And given the gutless nature of the Rudd government if that political cost is even remotely significant they’ll back down on a tax that is, as far as I can tell, a good thing for this nation. Therefore advertising matters.
I think you’re right though Rudd’s poor poling doesn’t have much to do with the RSPT, though it will if he backs down. The reason he’s hurting in the polls is because the man stood up at the last election as someone who was above the normal “immorality” of gutter politics – or “anti-politics” as shirke would say – but ditching the ETS, on which he campaigned with such moral authority (and the blessing of most of the Australian people), simply because it was perceived as the path of least political resistance showed the Australian people that he is no less a politician than John Howard. We all had expectations that he would be something better, and by fighting a double dissolution election on the ETS, leading the nation against the forces of demagoguery and fear he would have. Instead he made a decision simply based on political tactics, not the good of the nation. Therefore if he now, after backing away from policy action in the national interest simply because it left him slightly vulnerable politically, backed down to big miners? That would have an effect on his polling.
@ Merlot64- So not from Total Tools?
The shirt looked as if it had been laundered. No doubt there is some droppin’ of gees, back slappin’, and beer drinkin’ at various points in the life of the busy billionaire. Coz’ he’s just one of the blokes.