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MAD doctrine doesn't translate in modern domestic politics

By Rick Brown - posted Wednesday, 5 June 2013


For those of us who have seen it before, the events of last week were a big yawn. Once again, the major parties negotiated a deal to line their pockets at our expense - all for our benefit of course.

The fact that it came unstuck should not have come as a surprise. The key to these deals is that:

  • they are negotiated without our knowledge
  • voted on by the parliament at five minutes to midnight so that we cannot do anything about it, and
  • supported by both the government and the opposition.
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The process reminds me of the period from the 1960s to the 1980s, otherwise known as the Cold War.

Back then the prevailing mantra was called MAD - mutually assured destruction.

The assumption was that both the USA and the Soviet Union had so many nuclear missiles that neither side could afford to fire one for fear that they would destroy themselves in the process.

With the pulling down of the Berlin Wall, MAD appeared to die as well.

However it has not.

For politicians it is alive and well. When they want to do something which they know the voters will resent, like putting more of our money into the coffers of their parties or their own bank accounts, they resort to the defence of marching to the same tune.

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That way it does not matter what we think. We have to like it or lump it because we cannot do anything about it.

Voters understand exactly what is going on which makes them even more resentful of the process and more contemptuous of politicians and politics.

What last week's events demonstrate is how corrosive the Canberra culture is and how great is the risk that even the most well-grounded politicians and operatives will succumb to it.

Nobody involved in negotiating this deal would have been under any illusion. They would have known that voters would be furious.

However they would not have cared, first because they could not see past the arguments they advance to argue that by ensuring that they continue to run things they way that they want to, they are the saviours of democracy and secondly because they have got to the point that they do not care if the voters are forewarned.

Under the MAD theory all that matters is that everybody holds their nerve.

One problem was that, whatever politicians respect or lack thereof for voters may be, four months out from an election, Coalition MPs were not prepared to insult them.

I suspect that another problem was that the money would go to federal offices of parties, making state branches supplicants - not exactly a great motive for state offices to support the proposal.

Last week we saw also hypocracy as usual.

The Greens cloaked themselves in the mantle of virtue, but said they would take the money.

It also seems that had at least an inkling of what was going on and did not tell anybody, even though it clearly breached their agreement with the Government.

A cynic might think that there was a wink and a nod and that the Greens would protest, but not too much.

Labor and the Coalition both took the high moral ground. Democracy is under threat. Both sides of politics are at risk of being captive to a declining donor base-read a few large unions on the Labor side and the likes of mining moguls on the Coalition side.

The solution: buy off the political parties so that they do have to succumb to these evils.

However, from the splendid isolation of the Hill in Canberra, politicians and commentators alike do not get that we do not buy the argument.

Many of us think that while unions are affiliated to the Labor Party a group of careerists will manipulate the system to achieve their goals, regardless of how much money the unions give to Labor.

As for the Liberals, we think that, regardless of how much money Coles and Woolworths or BHP and Rio Tinto give, they will have more sway over them than we do. After all the big three mining companies did not change Labor's mining tax by donating money to them.

What they also do not get is the apparent hypocricy of this argument.

On the one hand we have governments all around the country, both Labor and Liberal, telling public servants that they have to tighten their belts. It is called a 'productivity dividend' and it has been foisted on public services for years.

On the other hand, with odd exceptions such as the car industry (i.e. the equivalent of Coles and Woolworths), businesses are told that, if costs are too high, do not come looking to governments looking for a handout.

Likewise if the local football club cannot recruit enough members or enough players it fields fewer teams or folds up.

Yet, when it comes to the inability of political parties to recruit members or attract donors, there is not any suggestion of folding up or cutting back election campaigns. Rather the solution is to sting the taxpayer.

If democracy is as threatened as political parties say and they want us to come to the rescue, they need to convince us that things are as bad as they claim and that their solution will work.

After all, what evidence is there that our throwing more money into the honey pot will not merely mean more television advertisements and more work for pollsters and political consultants?

Why would the problem not be solved by restricting expenditure on election campaigns?

Why should taxpayers fund the administration of political parties? If they cannot sell themselves to recruit members why should that become the taxpayers' problem?

Why should political parties not be like any other business? If they cannot raise the money do not spend it.

If unions did not exert substantial influence over the Labor Party and big business over the Liberals who would?

Then there is the matter of politicians' pay and entitlements.

Why do they need a special tribunal comprised of one person who does not seek the views of taxpayers and appears not to attempt to impose on them productivity measures or performance criteria (the argument presumably being that the ballot box is the criterion even though the real electors of upper house members are internal party committees and the majority of lower house politicians hold what generally are regarded as safe seats)?

Why is Fair Work Australia not capable of doing the job even though it is capable of doing it for virtually every other occupation?

Finally they do not get, or at least they think that we do not get, their conflict of interest.

That is unlikely to change anytime soon. In the same week as the political party funding fiasco, the House of Representatives passed a law exempting themselves from the freedom from information legislation.

Their reason? They always have been exempt. Now why are we not surprised at that.

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About the Author

Rick Brown is a director of CPI Strategic, which focuses on strategic advice and market analysis. He was an adviser to Howard government ministers Nick Minchin and Kevin Andrews, from 2004 to 2007.

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