O’CONNOR DUMPS HIMSELF IN IT
28-November-2011
The Christmas holiday break can’t come soon enough for a clearly uninspired Home Affairs Minister Brendan O’Connor, who has again tied himself in a series of knots today on anti-dumping.
In a bid to revive a faltering scare campaign, Mr O’Connor used a National Press Club address to spread yet more hysteria about Coalition policy that a Minister of any competence would know was false.
Sadly for Mr O’Connor, politicians who promote overblown slurs usually need good memories – and it’s clear this is a problem for him. While he is now alleging that our proposal to use preliminary affirmative determinations (PADs) more quickly and actively is a reckless act, his own public statements from June make clear that “the Government (itself) believes that earlier provisional measures will better prevent injury to Australian manufacturers”.
He is also admonishing the Coalition for not accepting a Productivity Commission inquiry recommendation, despite having ignored five such recommendations himself. And he is ludicrously claiming all the credit for policy changes that he is too embarrassed to admit were only forced on him (after three years of inaction) because of sustained pressure from the Coalition, Senator Xenophon, Australian industry and trade unions.
Regrettably, Mr O’Connor has also forgotten the context of Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade advice in his battle to discredit our policy. That advice related to compelling foreign producers to bear the onus of proof from day 1 of investigations – not from 59 days later, through the use of PADs, as is at the heart of both the Coalition’s policy and the relevant WTO rules.
The reality is that, behind closed doors, an exasperated Labor Party has been secretly working out how to match the Coalition’s policy – including by trying to sneak through the Parliament a piece of legislation pointing to a spectacular backflip to suddenly match Coalition funding.
This is because Mr O’Connor and his scare campaign co-conspirator, Trade Minister Craig Emerson, know the Coalition’s position is fully WTO-compliant and a sensible response to escalating problems with Australia’s anti-dumping system.
In the circumstances, it should come as little surprise that Mr O’Connor’s Press Club address was so sparsely attended – because people are sick and tired of politicians who cry wolf, and a Government that simply has no respect for telling the truth.