By JAMILA RIZVI
Tough. Difficult. Necessary.
As a press secretary, these are the kind of words you use in a politician’s press release when you know that what they’re announcing is going to get slammed by the public. In the special language of Canberra, these words have entirely different meanings to what they do in our common vernacular. In the world where promises are core and non core, and iron clad agreements generally turn out to be pretty flexible – these words are all euphemisms for: unpopular.
And what about the word ‘brave’, I hear you ask?
In politics-speak ‘brave’ isn’t used to describe knights in shining armour who rescue damsels in distress. It’s not even applied to celebrities who wear clashing prints to an awards season red carpet. No, no, no.
Brave is code for REALLY f*cking unpopular…. usually with a healthy dose of internal party dissent thrown in as well.
History will remember former Prime Minister John Howard for many things. As the man who back flipped on the GST, who cut income taxes for the wealthy, who failed to apologise to the stolen generation, who refused to sign the Kyoto Protocol, who lost his own seat in the Kevin 07 election and for introducing Work Choices.
I’m not going to try and hide the fact, I wasn’t a fan of John Howard.
But for the Government buy back (and destruction) of more than 700,000 Australian owned guns, following the horrific massacre at Port Arthur?
For that, Howard will be remembered as brave.
And rightly so. In the 17 years that have followed – in which Australia has not seen another massacre of this kind – it can be easy to become complacent. To say ‘of course’ Howard made that decision, that is was a no-brainer, the obvious choice, and that compared to the US our country never had a strong gun lobby anyway.
Wrong.
Howard’s decision came early in his term as Prime Minister. He faced significant community dissent, including from within his own Coalition Government. Politically? This wasn’t an easy decision. Howard was accused of politicising a tragedy, for trampling on farmer’s rights, and of making radical change without a political mandate (because he hadn’t taken a gun buy back promise to the election).
Howard explained in an opinion piece for the New York Times that:
“There was strong resistance by some in rural Australia. Many farmers resented being told to surrender weapons they had used safely all of their lives. Penalizing decent, law-abiding citizens because of the criminal behavior of others seemed unfair. Many of them had been lifelong supporters of my coalition and felt bewildered and betrayed by these new laws…. Passing gun-control laws was a major challenge for my coalition partner: the rural, conservative National Party.”
The peaceful legacy of the Howard Government’s gun buyback speaks for itself: Australia is a safer place to live because of that (brave) decision. And while of course our situation is vastly different to that in the US, where the right to bear arms is far more deeply entrenched, that doesn’t mean Australia’s experience cannot be an example to the world.
This video played on the American television show The Daily Show this week, following the rejection of new gun control laws by the US House of Representatives. Howard agreed to be interviewed for the parody. It’s rare that I reflect positively on his term in Government but this video didn’t just make me laugh – it made me proud.
John Howard on Gun Control. from John Beohm on Vimeo.
Political disclaimer: Jamila previously worked for the Gillard and Rudd Governments and is a member of the Australian Labor Party.
Top Comments
I went to school for a long time and even though I do not consider myself rich I do make good money, but there is no way I would want to live in a country where only rich can afford to get sick or get a decent education, where emergency services officers are overworked and underpayed, where there are no comunity services or are those privatised and charging an eye from the head, where kids may not be certain that they will be fed or where they'll sleep and if they'll be safe through another day... We should all do what we can, and try to keep our place safe for our kids. And a person who went to university for 6 years should not need to be told
Can I ask what the problem is reducing the taxes for the rich are? Because we have a large income that should mean we should be giving more? What utter BS my husband studied for 6 years at University and works at least 18 hours per day. If you want more money get another job and earn your own money. Stop expecting "the rich" to hand there hard earned money over we already pay 47c in every dollar we earn. That not enough ??
I think you mean 45c in the dollar for anything over $180,000, before this, the same as everyone else in their individual tax bands.
But given only 1-2% of Australians earn this kind of money, regardless of their long hours, I would conclude you are among the most fortunate members of society. I have to say I find your attitude really depressing.
The progressive tax scale is a system that applies in many other civilised societies, where citizens have decided they are morally obligated to create a decent society for everyone.
If you resent your taxes being paid to your society in order to make it healthy and safe and educated then perhaps you'd like to try living in a less civilised part of the world where you can keep all your money to yourself and languish inside the insipid walls of your gated community.
I can see why you are a lnp supporter. I am a business owner and believe we should all pay more tax to provide excellent govt services. Also it is spelt their not there.