I hear that Australian politics is just as trivial as UK politics. At a time of financial crisis, with western forces still dug in in Afghanistan and Iraq, and worries about terrorism and migration, the media are going to town because the Leader of the Opposition once visited a strip club and the Treasurer once said he wanted the top job.

I understand that the Leader of the Opposition is a family values Christian, so it is a newsworthy lapse or inconsistency. The real issue for him is will it make any difference to what he does in power were he to win? I doubt if one night drunk in New York means he feels he has to give tax breaks to strippers to grow more night clubs in Sydney, or ditch his Christian beliefs. Christianity is based on the doctrine of the fall of man, and on the inevitability that men and women will sin.

The Treasurer has been well known to want the Prime Minister’s job for many years. Again it is newsworthy that he once said so, and threatened to damage the Howard premiership because he wanted it so badly. The truth is he has not destroyed the Howard premiership, and has been prepared to work with the PM to produce a successful run so far.

The most important issue for both men that the press should concentrate on is how will they respond to the world financial crisis? Governments have had good times owing to the very long period of very low interest rates, the credit mountain that generated, and the hard work of the Chinese and Indians who kept prices down so people could borrow and spend all that money without pushing prices up. In a period of some correction of too much debt and higher interest rates governments and rich countries generally are going to have work harder and smarter to maintain and advance their living standards. It is a time for people who know how to get value for every dollar and pound spent by the public sector, and for parties that can free business to compete.

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