Labor should take Intergenerational Equity seriously

Politically, Labor is in real danger of acting to cement its place with ‘Generation Gough’, only to see a growing slippage of twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings to the Liberals, not out of any strong belief in their overall program, but out of a sense that they are serious about economic management, whereas Labor’s messages are muddled.

The First Home Owners Scheme (FHOS) has been the worm in the bud on this. In a strategy that goes back to Benjamin Disraeli, the Liberals have sought to create, and then to cultivate, a young suburban property-owning class. There is definitely scope for the Liberals’ to use such policies to build a strong 18-39 vote. Andrew Robb. Former Executive Director of the Liberal Party, has often quoted the figure that 46 per cent of university students voted Liberal or National Party in 1996, in spite of the fact that many of their university student councils had spent large amounts of their money convincing them to vote Labor.

While it's not quite like the 1980s sitcom Family Ties, where the hippy parents spawn a Young Republican, there seems to be a growing gap between what may of the 45-54’s in ‘Generation Gough’ think the 18-39’s stand for, and what they actually do. The failed Republic referendum was perhaps the clearest marker of this, but there have been signs of such a shift in many places. The mass exodus of young audiences from ABC TV at the time when they are increasingly likely to have completed, or be pursuing, a tertiary education, may well be another indicator.

I’ve provided a rough-and-ready table of the differences below:

Labor should also take intergenerational equity seriously for the simple political reason that the Government is offering to do its hard work for it. What was so unconvincing about Kim Beazley’s ‘Rollback’ plans for the GST was that no-one could see why he would do it. Why not let the other side do all the hard political spadework of introducing new taxes and then spend the revenue when it's your turn in office? The conservative parties have never hesitated to take the credit for the Hawke and Keating governments taking on vested interests in the manufacturing sector in the 1980s and 1990s, and the resulting opening up of the Australian economy to globalisation.

Labor does not want to become to politics what ABC TV has become to culture: the predictable beacon of a set of values and attitudes forged in the 1970s, but since allowed to ossify and atrophy. It should think twice about being knee-jerk about the current government’s policies for reform of the DSP and the PBS, as the challenge facing it is likely to be an even tougher one at some point in the near future.