Correction

Crikey writes: Re. “Animals splashed as chairman Murdoch tours Bad News outpost” (yesterday, item 2). In yesterday’s email edition we said Janet Calvert-Jones was still chair of The Herald and Weekly Times. It should have said she was still a director.

NT election

Greg Williams writes: Re. “Was the NT election the dirtiest on record” (yesterday, item 3).  Bob, you appear to be bemoaning the fact that the CLP has started to catch up with the ALP in the “dirty tricks” front for elections in Aboriginal communities.

I think, however, they probably still have a fair way to go on that front.

As a presiding officer on a NT Aboriginal community in the mid-late ’70s, I can assure you it was apparent the imported Aboriginal ALP booth worker had expectations, based on previous elections, of “assisting” elderly Aboriginal voters, whether they requested (or in fact needed) assistance or not. And was quite dismayed when a spoke was put in that wheel.

But let’s not limit ourselves to the NT Aboriginal communities.

How about Queensland’s Cape York Peninsula Aboriginal communities in the early ’80s?

The local Kadaitcha Man who was also an ALP booth worker being allowed to accompany virtually every voter into the polling booth.

Or how about 152 (ALP) ballot papers filled out in the one hand at one community polling place where only a relative handful of voters would have been so illiterate as to be incapable of completing their own ballot paper.

Or perhaps the presiding officer public servant opening the polling booth at 6am, well before the conservative booth worker/s and scrutineer/s were scheduled to fly in, etc.

Yes Bob, it must have been a disappointment for your mob to have been beaten at your own game. And notwithstanding your dreams “Absent of any dramatic events over the next few days, Paul Henderson’s NT Labor Party is a shoo-in to win the NT election next Saturday” (Bob Gosford, Crikey, six days before the election) and “Henderson’s (Labor) team won’t win government outright, but may well retain minority government on the back of independent candidate …” (Bob Gosford, Crikey, the day before the election) the cold reality was a 16-seat-to-eight trouncing, generally accepted as being the result of the Territory’s Labor government support of “Intervention Mark II” in the face of strident loathing by the bulk of residents on remote Aboriginal communities, and the even-more-on-the-nose forced amalgamation of some remote Aboriginal councils.

Maybe Bob, just maybe, the NT election was possibly “the dirtiest on record” because the other mob of spivs is starting to catch up with your mob of spivs.

Button up about James

Bob Smith writes: Re. “Speechwriter speaks: James Button and public service confidentiality” (yesterday, item 1). Bernard Keane makes some interesting points about James Button’s book and confidentiality.

But what does he think about articles and books written by former public servants such as Michael Keating, Andrew Podger and Glyn Davis?

Davis wrote a smart little book about cabinet processes in Queensland in which he quoted interviews (anonymously) with people he had once worked with as a public servant. As far as I know no one got upset.

The sacred cow of GST

Niall Clugston writes: Re. “Ask the economists: should the GST remain a sacred cow?” (yesterday, item 9). All the economists questioned about the GST seem to believe that it’s a state tax. No, it’s a federal tax. It’s used to fund the states, but federal funding of the states did not begin with the GST and would not end if the GST was abolished.

Alan Oster argues that the GST was “set up to be almost impossible to change it”. Actually the federal Parliament can just change the law overnight.

John Quiggin’s suggestion that states “shift some responsibilities back to the Commonwealth” is historically ignorant (“back”?) and economically irrelevant. Ultimately it’s not governments that pay for things: it’s taxpayers.

Worst of all is Warren Hogan’s assertion that “consumption as a proportion of economic activity is going to be lower”. This violates a basic tenet of economics: all activity must end in consumption.

Pedant’s corner

Michael Noonan writes: My thanks to Ian Smith (comments, yesterday) for his “begging the question” comment — it really grated on me too. A short lecture to contributors on what “eke out” actually means would be helpful too!