I have learned one thing about wielding power in the Senate: it’s important to pick your moment.
When you do it right, you can do a world of good. If you get it wrong, you can do enormous damage.
So, I was so disappointed to read of the Greens’ plan to hold up the government’s stimulus package this week. They want to add a pay increase for Newstart recipients, and coronavirus leave for workers. Both those ideas make sense.
So does immediate cash payments to everyone on a pension or payment. So does expanding tax breaks for business investment. So does making money available for businesses to keep their staff on the books, instead of sacking them. Basically, what the Morrison government has already proposed to do makes sense.
And it is unbelievable that the Greens would threaten to shoot down everything because they didn’t get more.
Businesses are going to the wall. I spoke to a hotel operator in Burnie, Tasmania, who told me he normally runs at 90 per cent occupancy. This week, he’s at 5 per cent. He’s got nothing for the week after that. How do you run a hotel without any guests? How do you pay staff?
That’s the world I’m living in. Meanwhile, the Greens are writing to the rest of the parliament boasting about how they’re willing to “play hardball” with the government. Play hardball? This isn’t a game.
Getting the stimulus through can’t wait for a week. What we are talking about is life or death for businesses. People who have lost their jobs or their shifts at work need financial support today.
As politicians, it’s our job to be doing everything we can to make it happen as soon as possible.
Most of us are trying. A skeleton-crew parliament will sit on Monday to pass the $17.6bn payments. The Coalition hopes to get parliamentary approval through both chambers by this evening. I sincerely hope it does, too.
But in the middle of a global health and economic emergency, the Greens want to play silly buggers in the Senate.
Stunts like this are pointless and dangerous. It’s absolutely cynical. This is all about getting eyeballs. They know damn well they can’t stop the stimulus package, nor can they amend it or add to it.
The ALP has already said it supports what the government is doing. The legislation will pass with bipartisan support. The Greens’ numbers don’t matter.
To be clear, putting up amendments you know will not pass isn’t a sin. If it is, I’m guilty as well.
I do it to get the rest of the parliament on record, or to push a point. The Greens do it for the same reason.
So I’ve done it, and I get it. But I would never do it over this.
What the Greens are doing isn’t helping a soul. It is reckless, cruel and vain.
Wheeling and dealing in the Senate is sometimes the only way to get good results. The art of politics — distasteful as it can be — is a necessary evil of the job and I get my hands dirty when I need to.
But there’s no prospect of a deal here. I know it, you know it, and the Greens know it.
Instead, here we are again, with the Greens taking up everyone’s time for nothing. They’re playing the same tired political games that speak to their inner-city base.
To my Green colleagues in parliament: the economy is not a bargaining chip. You don’t help people on Newstart by holding the threat of a recession over everyone. People are hurting, and it’s getting worse. They’re begging for help. Who do you think gets hurt the most by a global depression? Millionaires?
Jacqui Lambie is a senator for Tasmania.
