Australia’s global performance: falling behind

As the pandemic continues to dominate people's lives and our national conversation, Australians are starting to get angry at Australia's failing response.

Your head really could explode if you thought too much about how Australia has wasted our natural 'island continent' advantages. We had time to prepare and manage COVID. But, for over a year the Federal Government has failed to build adequate quarantine facilities, and Australia is now coming last in the developed world in the vaccination race.

This is a shocking indictment on Scott Morrison and the Federal Government. Right as the rest of the world has begun opening up, millions of Australians have been locked down again. Citizens and the loved ones of Australians are locked out. And 25 million Australians are locked up indefinitely.

But for years the warning signs for these failures have been there. Well before COVID-19, Australia was going backwards, and Australians were being left behind since this government was elected. On numerous critical economic, social and environmental measures, Australia has been falling behind the rest of the world.

The fact is Australia is less productive, more unequal, more corrupt, less happy, more indebted, less affluent, and less trusting of public institutions than when the Liberal National Party government was elected in 2013.

Claiming to 'manage the economy well' is part of the Liberals' brand propaganda. But their actual record is abysmal. Since being elected Australia's key economic indicators – wages, household debt, inequality, housing affordability – all show Australia and Australians going backwards.

Even before COVID, Australia had sunk to third last place out of 35 OECD countries for wage growth. Real wages in Australia were 0.7% lower in 2019 compared to 2013, meaning Australians had less in their pocket on pay day than they did when Labor was last in office. Unbelievably their latest Budget bakes in a further cut to real wages over the next four years despite $100 billion of new spending.

Wage cuts are no accident – as the former Finance Minister Matthias Cormann admitted they are "a deliberate design feature" of Liberal economic management. Cuts to penalty rates, public sector wage freezes, refusal to support minimum wage increases and a badly run migration program.

Productivity – the 'secret sauce' of economic growth – is a fundamental factor in a nation's property and ability to compete internationally. It's a measure of how efficiently a country uses the resources available to it.

OECD data shows that Australia has become less productive and less competitive in a global economic context since the Liberals were elected in 2013.

Shockingly, Australia's productivity has been steadily declining. In 2013, Australian productivity was growing at 1.7% per year - 10th highest among 34 OECD nations. Yet by 2018, Australia's productivity was negative at -0.3% - ranking 5th last in the OECD. Scott Morrison can't hide this failure by blaming COVID. It's their record.

Household debt as a share of GDP has soared to 119.4% - the 2nd highest rate of 43 countries studied by the Bank of International Settlements. Over 1 in 3 Australians (37%) admit to struggling to pay off personal debt.

Very high rates of household debt can act as a brake on the rate of economic growth and pose serious risks to the economy, but the non-economic effects on family and community are also significant as more people are worried about staying afloat.

Because wage growth has not kept up with the cost of living, the goal of many Australians to own their own home is increasingly unattainable. Australia is now the third most unaffordable housing market within the OECD. That has a serious social effect on the ability for Australians to build a family or plan their lives.

Astoundingly, the Liberals' only response is to invent more programs to pour petrol on an already raging house fire, by pushing up demand and increasing house prices. So far they've resisted the stupidest idea – to let people use their superannuation retirement savings to buy houses – but even that economic idiocy has vocal supporters in Morrison's government.

COVID has been great for Australian billionaires, whose combined worth was assessed to be 52.4% higher in December 2020, than at the same time in 2019.

Yet even before COVID, Australia had become the 11^th most unequal nation in the OECD under the Liberals. Just 20% of Australians holding 64% of the nation's wealth.

Scott Morrison's policies just make inequality worse. In responding to COVID he privatised much of the recovery, with nearly 2 million Australians forced to rip $35.9 billion from their superannuation just to survive. Yet he handed billions of dollars in JobKeeper to profitable companies to pay dividends and executive bonuses.

Our trade performance has also fallen. The latest data ranked Australia's export diversity at 84^th globally – a level last seen in the 1960s. In 2018, Australia ranked only 87th out of 133 countries globally in economic complexity, our performance effectively stagnating.

Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita have been the highest in the world under the Liberals and things are getting worse.

Under Scott Morrison, Australia ranks second worst globally for Government climate policy, and on climate action is now ranked dead last out of 193 countries in the latest UN-backed Sustainable Development Report. Once a world leader, to receive the lowest scoreisa withering repudiation of the Coalition government.

The Liberals' failures on climate change are mirrored by their failures to protect and enhance Australia's natural environment. Australia has the second highest level of biodiversity deterioration in the world. That's not a prize we should be winning.

Australia's wild koala population is now at real risk of extinction. Studies suggest that possibly as few at 48,000 koalas still exist in the wild.

Over the last eight years, the land area of native forest in Australia has shrunk. Australia now has the highest rate of loss in the world at 34.44% - more than three times the second ranked country, the US and sixty times worse than 10th ranked Finland.

Degradation of the Great Barrier Reef increased from 2014-2017, due in part to climate change driven coral bleaching. This is a major threat to Australia's tourism industry.

Unfortunately it's also bad news on social measures, including health, education, gender equality and indigenous Australians' wellbeing.

Australia has one of the world's best universal healthcare systems, thanks to the Whitlam, Hawke-Keating and Rudd- Gillard Labor Governments. This system is complemented by the availability of private health insurance coverage.

But under the Liberals, private coverage has become 36% more expensive and coverage is at its lowest rate in 15 years, putting pressure on the system.

The 2020 Commonwealth Fund International Health Policy Survey shows Australia now ranks only 8th out of 11 high-income countries for healthcare affordability, and we have been ranked just 7^th out of 11 countries for equity. Or to put it another way, under Scott Morrison, healthcare is less affordable in Australia than in the UK, Germany, France, Norway, the Netherlands, Sweden and Canada. On July 1 Scott Morrison made cuts to Medicare which will force people to pay thousands more in out-of-pocket expenses for vital surgeries.

The Government's own data shows what Australians already know; the cost of seeing a doctor has never been higher. In Victoria the cost of seeing your doctor is now 37% higher than when the Liberals were elected.

First Nations Australians have the lowest life expectancy amongst First Nations people globally. This is shameful.

Outcomes for Australia's First Nations people are well behind those of non-Indigenous Australians, as demonstrated by the 2020 Closing the Gap Report. Yet The Liberal Government has failed to meet its own targets. In 2020, 5 of the 7 targets were either not met or not on track.

Rising incarceration rates of First Australians are a national and international disgrace. First Nations adults are just 2% of the population, yet comprise 27% of the prison population. We have to do better than this.

An explosion of seething anger about the treatment of women has been one of the defining national moments of 2021. Ignited by brave revelations of an alleged rape 50 metres from the Prime Minister's office, Scott Morrison's response has been tone-deaf, highlighting deep seated cultural problems in the Liberal and National parties.

Following the 2019 election only 23% of the entire Coalition party-room are women. The Labor Party has almost 50%.

Australia's global ranking for the proportion of women in the Lower house of the national parliament fell from a high of 32nd place in January 2010 under Labor, to 48th place in 2019. OECD data shows Australia fell in the global rankings for the proportion of women serving as Ministers, from 22nd in 2012 to 33rd in 2019.

Education, skills and infrastructure are key to our future economic prosperity. Yet we are falling behind on every measure.

National fixed broadband speeds are amongst the lowest in the developed world with Australia ranked 61^st globally.

Australian children's educational outcomes have slipped in both national and international terms. Science and maths skills of 15 year old Australians have suffered the most since 2013. Australia slipped from 8th to 13th position in science and from 17th to 24th in mathematics outcomes.

Investment in education is critical to both the life fulfilment of individuals and Australia's future international competitiveness. Yet Australia's falling education outcomes have been accompanied by a fall in education spending as a proportion of GDP.

Just two things are rising in education under the Liberals: fees and student debt. University fees have gone up rapidly and are amongst the highest now globally. According to a comparison of OECD data, the average annual borrowing by Australian students in tertiary programs rose by a whopping 36.7% between 2013 and 2018.

Less visible is the corrosive impact of Scott Morrison's governing style on our democracy. But it's clear Australia is more corrupt under the Coalition Government.

Transparency International Australia's annual independent assessments confirm that Australia is becoming more corrupt. Australians' trust in public administration has slipped when compared to a decade ago.

In 2012, Australia ranked 7th on the Corruption Perception Index. Yet by 2020, under Scott Morrison, Australia had become more corrupt, slipping to 11th position.

Australia can and must do better. We have never pretended we were perfect but when we faced major challenges – from bushfires to wars, from social change to building great institutions – our governments and communities have worked together to strive to build a better future for all Australians.

But after seven years of Liberal National Party Government we are going backwards and slipping behind countries which once envied us and looked on us as an example of a healthy, innovative democracy.

As Australia hurtles toward $1 trillion of Liberal debt, and a possible Federal election this year, Australians have a right – indeed a responsibility as citizens – to question how well our country is actually doing.

The coming election is a choice about our future. On any objective measure Australia has gone backwards after 8 long years of Liberal National Government.

Australians deserves a Government that acts in their interests, a government that's on their side.