How do we in Australia move forward into the new year? Is our understanding of Australia as an egalitarian society still valid, or is it merely a myth?
Do we have leaders who believe in "a fair go for all", wherein the dispossessed are treated with the same respect as those who own large amounts of money? Do our politicians see themselves as servants of the public — after all, their salaries are paid with our taxes — or do they think they know what's best because they are in power?
It appears that, at all levels of government, there is a constant shift away from serving the public to corporate governance. Rather than a democratic, bottom up approach to government, the top down approach dominates, wherein corporate profits are consistently put before the welfare of the people.
This was clearly demonstrated in the life of Kerry Packer, whose death last month generated much fanfare about his supposedly huge contributions to Australia.
"Kerry Packer is dead — long live the king!" Yes, the capitalist system, of which he was part of the fiefdom, saw him in this light. But what contribution did Australia's richest individual make to the well-being of ordinary Australians?
Did he champion tax reform to ensure that the rich paid their share and public services were well-funded? Did he oppose sending soldiers off to unjust wars, or support improvements to Medicare? Did he contribute to constructing an egalitarian society, a society that actually implements the beliefs, supposedly held by everyone, of "a fair go for all" and "a fair day's pay for a fair day's work"? He did not.
Certainly, Packer funded private foundations that support charities like the Salvation Army and Brotherhood of St Lawrence. And yes, he funded the placement of vital heart machinery in ambulances in NSW. Apparently he even gave millions of dollars to the public hospital system.
But where did that money come from? It is well known that Packer's wealth came more from tax avoidance than from a "fair day's pay for a fair day's work". On average, the companies he owned pay just 10% tax. In some years it has been substantially less.
Packer and his ilk have been the main beneficiaries of successive Australian governments' taxation policies. Most recently, under the guise of making the tax system more equitable, the Howard government introduced the GST. That's fair — the average Australian earns around $50,000 and pays the same GST on everything as Kerry Packer did!
Regressive taxes such as the GST, under which those who have the least pay the most, enable the wealthy to indulge in their favourite charities. That's fair!
In the meantime, who funds public health care, education, public transport, and clean water and air? It's certainly not the wealthy, so that leaves the rest of us, ordinary people. No wonder these public services are in a bad state.
Do the wealthy use these services? No, they can afford private health care and private schools for their children. And public transport is only for poor people, isn't it? Between 1984 and 1999, the poorest 20% of our community suffered a 10% loss in disposable income while the richest 20% increased theirs by 1%.
Kerry Packer may have donated heart machinery to NSW ambulances, but if had paid his fair share of taxes, the government could have installed the machines in all ambulances Australia-wide, not just where Packer chose.
A charity from the rich approach to public services takes control away from elected governments and puts it in the hands of a tiny minority whose main purpose in life is actually to acquire more personal wealth at the expense of working people. This is clearly not "a fair go for all".
In 2006, we need to be more focussed and united in our struggle for a genuinely democratic and egalitarian society. We need to be very clear that in our society — capitalist Australia — the "fair go for all" is a myth, and strive to turn that around so that, instead of rich individuals being deified for putting private profit before people's needs, our society is based on democracy, equality and social solidarity in which if you "touch one, you touch all".
Chris Johnston
[Chris Johnson is an activist in Geelong and a member of the 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly-Socialist Alliance Editorial Board.]
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, January 25, 2006.
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