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Canberra Today 15°/17° | Thursday, March 28, 2024 | Digital Edition | Crossword & Sudoku

Macklin / Hope runs high among the summiteers

THE fallout from the ascension of Malcolm Turnbull continued this past week as the new PM organised an economic mini-summit to get the movers and shakers on the same page with tax reform. When they left the meeting all seemed buoyed with hope.

Robert Macklin
Robert Macklin.
Trouble is, “reform” usually means we want the other bloke to pay more. So when it comes to the nitty gritty we can expect plenty of confected outrage from the usual suspects. However, it’s a start, and the presence of so many women at the meeting was a hopeful sign.

MEANWHILE, the former Oxford boxing blue did the rounds of friendly shock jocks echoing the cry of defeated pugilists everywhere: “We waz robbed!”

Someone should tell him, the train has left the station, Tony, and it ain’t coming back.

SO, too, the doctors who want to retain a Medical Benefits Schedule that hasn’t changed since 1984 while medical science has leapt ahead. Far be it from us to suggest the medicos are happily rorting the system to perform unsafe and unnecessary procedures, harming patients for financial gain. But that certainly is the way Minister Sussan Ley sees it, and she’s one of the better holdovers from the Abbott era.

And how nutty of the Labor Party to oppose the wholesale review of the Medical Benefits Schedule. Unfortunately, they haven’t learned there’s a new game in town; they’re still playing by the Abbott rules of fierce opposition to anything emanating from the other side.

THE rather nasty comment from Labor’s junior Foreign Affairs spokesman Matt Thistlethwaite questioning Julie Bishop’s decision to have partner David Panton seated with her to hear Pope Francis speak to the UN General Assembly was another case in point. That was bad enough but for Deputy Opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek to then call it “an odd look” was quite unworthy.

IT’S to be hoped they don’t fall for it on the issue of Norfolk Island, where this past week the Chief Minister Andre Nobbs sought to enlist the new PM in his quest to avoid incorporation into the Australia polity and paying tax.

His case is special pleading for the transplanted Pitcairners who since 1856 have run the island’s economy into the ground. It’s unlikely to touch a chord with Malcolm whose wife’s uncle Robert Hughes revealed the island as the crucible of early Australian history in his book, “The Fatal Shore”.

ANOTHER blow to the Abbott hangover was the dropping of all charges against former Raiders forward John Lomax who’d been arrested and charged with blackmail after giving evidence at Dyson Heydon’s Trade Union Royal Commission. That’s what you call “an odd look”.

SPEAKING of legal shenanigans, the new Minister of State Mal Brough remains under investigation by the AFP for allegedly illegally procuring and distributing copies of former Speaker Peter Slipper’s diaries in 2012. More can be expected on this.

AND speaking of Speakers, Bronwyn Bishop was given front row billing at China’s National Day concert this week. The G-G Sir Peter Cosgrove addressed a glittering diplomatic crowd before a recital by Tan Wei, the world’s best performer on the Erhu. Perhaps Bronny had been invited before the fall. Either way, it was a stunning performance…by Tan Wei.

robert@robertmacklin.com

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Robert Macklin

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