AS the cat said to the canary, just because I’m fluffy doesn’t mean I’m not serious.

One of the correspondents to this site congratulated me for having more substance in my second column than my first (probably because I quoted someone else rather than myself).

But I don’t think there’s anything insubstantial about my earlier claim that John Howard has wilfully set out to bore people off scrutinising politics as his unique contribution to the Machiavellian tradition of holding on to
political power.

You want substance to back this claim? Just look at a transcript of any of his utterances. In the Dictionary of Australian Political Quotations, what might his entries be? As I’m feeling sub-substantial this week, I’ll improvise, rather than look it up:

“Buh duh buh duh, Anzac spirit, buh duh buh, cricket legend, buh duh buh duh buh duh, no return to the 40-hour week, buh duh, non-core promise, buh duh buh, un-Australian, buh duh, true Australian …”

This from a man who trained in the concise discipline of the law, who has been in politics for more than three decades and at the forefront of parliamentary debate. He is wilfully, deliberately, manipulatively yawn-provoking.

He is hardly ineffectual, though. He is extraordinarily radical.

Someone suggested to me recently that our nice little Prime Minister, with his party controlling both houses of parliament, was positioning himself nicely to become a little dictator.

For example, look what’s happening with federal-state relations.

When the Howard Government introduced GST, it made clear that the revenue would flow in a generous untied stream to the states. A few years on and federal pressure is being brought to bear on states to do away with their own means of revenue-raising, such as payroll tax and stamp duty. The argument is that the GST is there to replace these commerce and employment stifling imposts.

But the GST isn’t exactly a joint bank account. It’s not a simple divvy-up of the proceeds. An arcane formula controls how much each state gets under the grants system, using some 350 factors set out over 4000 pages to assess allocations, according to a report in this week’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.

If the states surrender their own means of revenue-raising, what’s to stop more and more conditions being applied to grants?

Remember Education Minister Brendan Nelson’s efforts a year or so ago? “So you won’t de-unionise your university staff. Well, whistle for it, baby.”

Dr Nelson’s plan to use grant blackmail that year was foiled by the Democrats in the Senate. Now the stage is set for a full-blown war over Commonwealth versus state powers.

And,

AS the plot congeals in the TT-Line saga, this week’s release of the Auditor-General’s report into the TT-Line board prompted me to trawl back through the files to see how the story had developed.

To my surprise, I found a Mercury editorial on March 7 that matched the sentiments of my last column on the issue precisely:

“Last week’s unedifying display of Government contempt for parliamentary scrutiny is an insult to Tasmanians. Attorney-General Judy Jackson didn’t turn up to the hearings and Tourism Minister Ken Bacon was seriously unprepared,” the editorial said.

“That Premier Paul Lennon decided to treat Mr Bacon like a mushroom and not give him the Treasury report on the Spirit of Tasmania service — so he could be fully briefed as he faced questions on the TT-Line’s performance at the parliamentary hearing — is damning.”

Ah so, but this editorial fire didn’t quite translate into prominence, space and persistence for the story in the news pages.

Fast-forward to now, and the editorial view has softened somewhat, anyhow.

Did anyone say ministerial responsibility? No way! The June 24 editorial in The Mercury seems happy to fall in with the Premier’s line that the Spirit of Tasmania III miscalculation was all down to the shortcomings of the TT-Line board …

Nothing to do with the late Premier Jim Bacon, who went ahead with buying the new Bass Strait ferry against Treasury advice or the minister responsible for the TT-Line at that time — none other than Mr P. Lennon.

Gabfest is a Tasmanian media professional.