Cunliffe's speech is an attack on the failed neoliberal policies of the last 30 years, and a call for greater co-operation between government and business groups in setting and achieving economic goals. Cunliffe favours a Scandinavian model, rather than the hands-off do-nothing approach of our current government.
Cunliffe used the analogy of the farm or garden throughout his speech.
If you want a garden to grow, then you have to dig the soil and plant the seeds. You have to feed and nurture the plants and you have deal to the weeds when they grow up amongst the crop.This translates to government taking a more active role in managing the economy, as governments do in Scandinavian countries.
In contrast, National's hands-off approach towards the economy involves sitting on the fence and letting the weeds grow up. This means disaster for the nation long term.
There's a lot in the speech (and there was even more in Cunliffe's spoken version), and I don't have time to summarise much further, so read it for yourself.
Excellent address.
ReplyDeleteOvercoming the ABC problem is going to be a major problem.
Mr Cunliffe is head and shoulders above anyone else on the left, but who will follow his lead?
Hopefully no-one will notice that his final sentence "But we need a government that acts, like a good farmer, not one that just sits on the fence, watching the weeds grow, and letting the farm go to ruin." exactly describes the Clark Government from 1999 to 2008.
But farmers can't control the weather - what Cunliffe seems to be suggesting is trying to control a world wide economic storm by fiddling with more things locally. Farmers know to avoid pissing into the wind.
ReplyDeleteSo, to continue the analogy, because farmers can't control the weather they shouldn't bother to do anything at all?
DeleteNo, they obviously have to work with whatever weather they get. The question is how much government should try and fiddle with something they may not be able to do much about.
DeleteCunliffe didn't explain what effect higher inflation would have on working people and beneficiaries. Shearer avoided addressing that when asked on The Nation.
And they haven't said how much it would cost trying to influence the exchange rate when other countries have much bigger printing presses.
Most other countries have CGT, they also have inflation, exchange rate and and economic problems and they also have property price booms and busts.
We should always be prepared to consider any alternatives, but Labour is hinting at doing something different without being specific, and without being upfront about the difficulties and the potential costs.
Actually there's plenty in the speech, including some specifics. It was a speech about ideas and about the political direction Labour wants to take. Two years out from an election there's no need for detailed costings or exact policy details.
DeleteAs for the rest of your speech, you as ever make lots of sensible points. Yes, other countries have problems too, and no economic system is perfect. So you're right. Let's not take any action in any matter until we know with absolute certainty all the costs and all the consequences...
I wonder if the Greens will get a little worried about this being against organic gardening principles, which involve little digging, and very, very little feeding of the soil except with the organic refuse from the garden itself, and encourages weeds for their biodiversity and contribution to soil structure :-)
ReplyDeleteBen - nope. We greens recognize an analogy for what it is - a blunt tool, a hoe perhaps.
ReplyDeletePete George - re your last sentence - not a farmer, huh?
I have a small farm. Farms are in the family, my mother and step-father were farmers. I grew up on an orchard in Central Otago where the weather was a major influence.
DeleteThe farming bit is a metaphor, it is not meant to be applied too literally ,,,
DeleteTranslation; Reef more income tax out of the last seven people paying it and start spraying borrowed money around like a mad ladies piss again.
ReplyDeleteYeah but no.
More vague metaphors but we all know that we are chooked.
>Ben - nope. We greens recognize an analogy for what it is - a blunt tool, a hoe perhaps.
ReplyDeleteDon't hoe yourselves out too hard. It's your principles that make you strong.
I like the general message, but I worry a bit when the opening analogy is wrong. As a third former could tell you, yes we need plants for the oxygen they produce during photosynthesis But they don't really need us for the CO2 we produce during respiration in which we burn up the fruits of their photosynthesis. They also respire and produce CO2. That is why they do photosynthesis in the first place. So they can make and store food and then use it later to produce energy and release CO2.
ReplyDelete