The Money Men:Chris Bowen’s book on Australian treasurers

The Money Men:Chris Bowen’s book on Australian treasurers

• THE AUSTRALIAN
• AUGUST 03, 2015 12:

Troy Bramston

Senior Writer and Columnist
Sydney
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Chris Bowen has done Joe Hockey a favour. In a new book about Australian treasurers, he has unwittingly exposed the weaknesses in the government’s economic management and provided Hockey with valuable advice about how to become a more effective policy reformer and public advocate.
Hockey has not been a successful treasurer. In opposition, he promised that the Coalition would “end the age of entitlement” and fix the budget’s balance sheet. But in government he has done little to rein in spending, his reform scorecard is negligible and he is not an effective communicator of the government’s agenda.
Last year’s budget damaged the government’s credibility and it has never fully recovered. Broken promises and initiatives widely seen as “unfair” shattered public confidence and plunged the Coalition into a leadership crisis earlier this year. This year’s budget retreated on economic reform and budget repair.
Bowen’s book, The Money Men: Australia’s 12 Most Notable Treasurers (MUP), is essential reading for anyone interested in economics and politics, including Hockey. It offers a detailed examination of the role of treasurer, draws lessons on how to succeed and is filled with insights from Australian economic history.
When Kevin Rudd returned to the prime ministership in 2013, Bowen was appointed treasurer. Apart from being a policy wonk with a keen interest in history, Bowen says his ambition to reclaim that role in a future Labor government is a key reason why he wrote the book.
“I was the treasurer briefly and aspire to be again, which has allowed me to write about the office with an insider’s perspective,” Bowen writes. “I’ve learnt things writing this book that will make me a better treasurer should I receive the honour of serving in the post again.”
Bowen interviewed all living treasurers profiled in the book: Bill Hayden (1975), John Howard (1977-83), Paul Keating (1983-91), Peter Costello (1996-2007) and Wayne Swan (2007-13). He also profiles George Turner (1901-04; 1904-05), William Watt (1918-20), Earle Page (1923-29), Ted Theodore (1929-30; 1931-32), Ben Chifley (1941-49), Arthur Fadden (1940-41; 1949-58) and Jim Cairns (1974-75).
An effective treasurer, Bowen argues, must have a successful partnership with their prime minister and together develop and agree on policy; neither be a captive of Treasury nor ignore it; and he argues that knowledge and judgment are more important than qualifications and intelligence. This point is best illustrated by Cairns’s disastrous tenure.
“The job of the treasurer is to be a competent manager of the economic cycle, ensuring growth that is as smooth as possible and avoiding recession,” Bowen says. “It is also to be an advocate for reform, within the government and in public … if a treasurer can effectively explain why difficult decisions are in the long-term interests of the country, a government will much more likely be successful.”
This is where Bowen exposes Hockey’s failures. The government lacks a clear economic reform agenda. There is little leadership on policy. It has no political capital to outmanoeuvre a recalcitrant Senate. It has no capacity to explain problems and articulate solutions.
Howard gives Bowen advice on how to succeed. “A treasurer must be in the media every day,” he says. “Making the case for change, being one of the government’s most effective communicators.” Yet Hockey, unlike Costello and Keating, often goes for days without appearing in the media.
At the end of each chapter, Bowen offers an evaluation of each treasurer. This is fraught with difficulty because success and failure in politics is often, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder.
Few would disagree with Bowen’s assessment that Keating was Australia’s best treasurer, given the economic challenges he faced and the landmark reforms he delivered in partnership with Bob Hawke. They produced a more productive and competitive economy that boosted growth, jobs and living standards.
“Keating asked Australians to embrace more economic change than any of his predecessors or successors, and an unprecedented period of uninterrupted economic growth was the result,” Bowen writes.
Bowen gives Costello and Swan “honourable mentions” in the ranking of treasurers. But he is too critical of Costello and too soft on Swan. This is tricky, given Costello and Swan still loom large in Australian politics.
He is generous about Swan’s handling of the global financial crisis but notes his mixed record on reform, including flaws in the mining tax and poor handling of carbon pricing. He is defensive about Swan’s broken promise to return the budget to surplus and is too forgiving on spending.
Bowen offers faint praise for Costello, the longest-serving treasurer, describing him as “competent and solid”. He implemented the GST, improved prudential regulation and delivered nine budget surpluses. Bowen discounts Costello’s achievements because of the mining boom. He adds that if Costello had led the Coalition to the 2010 election then the Gillard-Swan government would have been defeated.
He offers interesting profiles of early treasurers such as Turner, Watt and Theodore. Bowen rates Hayden’s brief tenure highly during Gough Whitlam’s faltering government. He describes Howard’s stewardship as “a case study in frustration” during Malcolm Fraser’s government.
There was not a good reason to include Cairns in the book — a man who believed in “the economics of love” — while excluding notable treasurers such as the long-serving Harold Holt or more recent treasurers Phillip Lynch, John Dawkins and Ralph Willis.
Bill Shorten will launch Bowen’s book on August 19. Labor’s electoral viability will, to a large extent, depend on the ability of both of them to craft a convincing economic message and develop policies that embrace economic reform and address budget repair.
They have a lot of work to do. But Bowen’s impressive book can only help their cause.


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