There’s a certain hypocrisy about nearly all political leaders: We’ll see the happy family all up there for various events like campaign launches or victory parties, but then when someone asks a difficult question about something they’ve done or alleged to have done, we’ll hear the “You shouldn’t bring my family into this!”
Of course, I do have some sympathy for the poor family…
“Can you organise the kids for Saturday night, I think it’s important that we’re all there?”
“Can’t your girlfriend do that?”
“Just do it, ok?”
“A please would be nice.”
“Please then. Or and don’t wear the green dress this time, it looks like you’re supporting a minor party.”
Now, I should point out that this is just a fictional dialogue and if any politician, living or dead, or who lost their seat at a previous election, has had a conversation with their partner that resembles that, it’s just coincidence and just because I bumped into your wife at the shopping centre…
Anyway, I was thinking about the whole “don’t bring my family into it” when Peter Dutton brought his son, Harry, into the housing debate thing…
Before anyone brings up the photo of Dutton’s son holding up a bag of an unidentified white powder, I should point out that this was his other son, so don’t make any suggestions about having less sugar in your latte if you want to buy a house…
No, this was the tragic story of a 20 year old apprentice finding it hard to save for a house thanks to Labor. Why there was a time when a young buck could have bought the entire Queensland police force for less than it costs to buy a house up there now…
Whatever your views on housing policy and which party has the better one and whether the economists are right and both major parties risk pushing the price of houses up, one has to ask which Labor strategist has infiltrated the Dutton camp? Who on earth could be stupid enough to think that dragging out your son to complain about his inability to save a deposit wouldn’t lead to a lot of questions?
The first one was asked – and ignored – but here are a few that occurred to me:
- “You’re pretty well off, Mr Dutton, will you be helping him out?”
- “If your son hasn’t managed to put much away, is this because you haven’t taught him how to manage money? Is this why you haven’t released costings on your policies yet?”
- “Why did you choose your son to be part of this? Didn’t anyone else want to be associated with you?”
- “Do you really think that this going to play well with people in their thirties with a young family, who’ve been working for years and are struggling to get together a house deposit? Won’t they think that it smacks of privilege when you have some whiney 20yo complaining that an apprentice wage isn’t enough to save?”
- “If your son hasn’t been able to save a deposit, how will your tax deduction policy help him?”
- “Does this mean that wages are too low?”
Ok, I’m sure that there are plenty of others, but question five is probably the one that’s likely to cause most of the difficulties for the Liberal leader. Not about his son, but it’s the question that first home buyers who don’t have a deposit will be asking. If you don’t have the money already, then all this is doing is potentially pushing up prices.
On the other hand, the ones who do have a deposit will be trying to work out exactly what it means for them:
“So it’s a tax deduction on $650,000… Is the deduction on the whole mortgage repayment or just the interest or just the part of the interest that adds up $650,000 or just the whole repayment on the $650,000 and do I get it or does my partner or do we both get it and if only one of us gets it, can we pick the one with the highest tax rate or… oh, we can’t get on the place we were looking at, because it has to be a newly constructed place…”
Yes, it’s probably very simple to understand once you’ve looked at it and once you’ve realised that it doesn’t apply to you because you’ve already struggled with your mortgage over the past few years and it’s only for first home buyers, or it doesn’t apply to you because you earn too much, or too little to buy a place, then the 83 people it actually helps will be very grateful.
Naturally it’s not going to help poor Peter’s son because he’s one of those who don’t have a deposit… Or enough of an income to get approval for a loan… Perhaps he should start a Go Fund Me campaign. We could ask Christian Porter if he knows any generous people who’d like to kick it off… Oh, that’s right; he didn’t know who helped him out, so he’ll be no help!
Just like Mr Dutton…
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A piece of satire did the Facebook rounds yesterday “quoting” Dutton as saying his son would have to borrow from his trust fund.
It sucked in a lot of us.
Not all that funny when it is so close to reality.
Rossleigh it is unfortunate that your take is so close to reality. Boofhead Duddo is well out of his depth (and we are told well out of his electorate with his principal residence on the Surfers Coast).
We have been given no cost estimates for any COALition election promises (that are usually cancelled once re-elected, on the John Anderson principle of promise them everything ONLY if they vote for the NOtional$). Is that because the mathematics is too difficult for Boofhead given that he failed his university and TAFE courses??
It is still 18 days to the election with pre-poll voting to begin just before ANZAC Day Will Boofhead invoke the ANZAC tradition to propose returning Australia to the WWI scenario of wasting talent pursuing unachievable pipedreams?? NO, there will be few if any cost estimates because Boofhead believes that the world is lost.
Some very good points there in Rossleigh’s article, and points that the media should be asking Dutton, but wont.
Dutton never fails to remind us what a complete fucking twat he is.Three more weeks of ‘clever’ stunts, and he’ll be out on his regrettable arse and out of our lives forever….unless he takes up an offer from Porky Palmer….or the red headed broom jockey.
What a great dad Peter Dutton is, he has at last reluctantly agreed that he will probably help his kids out in getting a deposit for a house.
Another backflip?