Peter Costello had plenty of fun with opposition communications spokesman Stephen Conroy’s
Telstra confession yesterday that “it makes no difference to the
majority of Australians one way or the other about the ownership
structure. What they care about is what’s the best way to get cheaper
prices and better services.”

Dollar Sweetie is smirking, but
Labor might finally be remembering that economics matters and they
might even have got it in context. “Economic reform is central to the
primary mission of the Labor Party and the people who benefit are the
people we represent,” new shadow finance minister Lindsay Tanner told Paul Kelly last month. Steve Bracks’ manifesto for reform is also a positive sign.

Maybe. A lonely Labor dry writes to Crikey:

“So,
the ALP is supposed to be regaining its economic credibility hey? Well,
the current crop couldn’t hold a candle against the Hawke/Keating era.
Firstly, we have the so called Shadow Minister for Finance, Lindsay
Tanner, opposing the privatisation of Medicare Private. Yes, Medicare
Private. There is absolutely no case whatsoever for retaining this
thing in public ownership. At its most simplest, why should non
Medicare Private using taxpayers subsidise the services of Medicare
Private users? And as for using government ownership to drive down
private health insurance premiums. If you believe this drivel, then we
ought to have State owned car insurers to drive down the price of
vehicle insurance. Or State owned petrol stations to drive down the
price of petrol. Complete nonsense.

“And then there is Qantas.
The Qantas CEO is the Chicken Little of Executives – the sky is always
falling in. It’s not that Qantas make huge profits, it’s that they
always have their hand out to government. No competition on the
Sydney/LA route (the Singapore decision is an outrage) and who could
forget the leg up Qantas got from accelerated depreciation of aircraft.
Qantas are just shameless. But the club is the club, and because they
look after the MP’s (both Labor and Tory), you never hear a boo in
critique. We don’t have Transport spokespeople, we have Qantas
Spokespeople. If Labor was serious about economic reform, then it would
have an open skies policy and let it rip. Sod Qantas and the so called
national carrier rubbish. By all means remove the foreign ownership
restriction on them, but do it only after you open up the Sydney/LA
route and anything else. Kick the club.

“But this is just
wishful thinking. Labor is not going to regain its economic credentials
so long as you have Shadows that simply dislike the market. Scratch
these characters and you’ll just find old Bolshies who want to own and
control enterprise. That’s the truth of the matter.”

Oh dear, perhaps the bruvvers should have a quick look here at the words of one of their own – Peter Walsh’s foreword to that ignored classic Dry: In Defence of Economic Freedom by John Hyde.