‘Something is fundamentally wrong’: Why Ross Greenwood is mad as hell and not going to take it anymore
The usually-jovial 9NEWS finance editor has grimly warned unless our spending behaviours change, our living standards are at a real risk of declining.
Speaking on TODAY over the past two mornings, Greenwood called on Australians to be realistic and for politicians to be bold in their economic thinking.
Economic figures released yesterday revealed growth for the September quarter was just 0.3 percent, with yearly figures a similarly flat 2.8 percent.
Greenwood said an Australian recession for the first time in 24 years was a very real possibility unless the community altered its thinking.
“Many of us have become too comfortable and as a matter of right we expect wage rises, better health and better education,” he said.
“But somehow we’ve got it into our heads that we shouldn’t pay for it, that someone else can somehow magically pay for it.
“We’re frightened to make changes. We expect the government to do everything for us.”
He said Australians needed to reduce their individual debt if we expected our country to do the same.
Treasury department secretary Martin Parkinson told a tax forum in Melbourne yesterday Australians could expect a decline in income growth and living standards unless Australia undertook structural reform.
Greenwood took aim at our politicians, saying Australians didn’t trust them to make decisions for the nation’s best interests.
“This ability to earn more is dependent on politicians making it easier for companies to employ people and for less red tape in people’s lives,” Greenwood said.
“In the meantime, our senators act like schoolchildren and somehow we’re expected to get amusement out of their behaviour.
“It really drives me bonkers.”
He said the electoral system itself was broken, with senators from micro-parties holding the crucial balance of power despite not winning a majority of the popular vote.
Our recent “flip-flopping” on governments and the short-term focus this generates had compromised financial policy, he said.
“How is it that Ricky Muir can get 16,000 votes and get himself into the senate when the Sex Party got 60,000 votes and didn’t get the seat?” Greenwood asked.
“I know it’s all about preferential voting. Something is fundamentally wrong when the people’s votes don’t count for the representation in the parliament.
“That means the decision making in the parliament becomes corrupted by effectively those minority interests that are representing a very small sliver of our community.”
He pleaded with our political leaders to shelve inconsequential interests in favour of protecting our long term political growth.
“Unless someone is bold enough to lead the nation, take all of us on a journey, then the whole point is our living standards will decline,” he said.
“This is a real issue Australians should think about … whether we are frightened of change in this country.”
Read more at http://www.9news.com.au/national/20...-going-to-take-it-anymore#crwcIUJB0cllzWKO.99
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