Money and power

Yet the public clearly wants government to do something about the degree of power that corporations enjoy in Australia. Seventy per cent of survey respondents said that there should be more regulation of big business, while only 4 per cent said there should be less regulation. When asked what kind of regulation this might be, they typically nominated more protections for consumers, workers and the environment.

At present, the political will to enact such reforms appears to be largely absent. In fact, mainstream politicians seem inclined to grant further concessions rather than revoke existing ones. But underlying community resentment about corporate power feeds into a wide range of disputes across the policy spectrum.

For decades, the public has been subjected to corporate waffle about “innovation”, “competition” and “choice”, often from the mouths of politicians. Inasmuch as these terms mean anything at all, they have been code for the need to deregulate markets and privatise public assets. Strangely enough, such developments have usually favoured big business over ordinary people.

It is time to wrest back some of the power that corporations have acquired at our expense and put it back where it belongs: in the hands of the people.