Another cut to interest rates appears more likely after the mining sector led a much bigger-than-expected decline in business investment.

Bureau of Statistics figures show capital expenditure (capex) fell by 2.2 per cent in the December quarter, to $37.5 billion.

Economists had been pessimistic before the data dropped, but the number was still far worse than their median estimate of a 1.6 per cent decline in capex.

Investment in buildings and structures fell 2.6 per cent to $24.9 billion, while spending on equipment, plant and machinery fell 1.3 per cent to $12.6 billion.

read more: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-26/capex/6263736

And of course Joe Hockey never heard of the Global Financial Crisis through which Labor made Australia sail with flying colours. The Global Financial Crisis (GFC) was far more severe than the present international soft trading conditions. The GFC involved the value of the main sauce ingredient: MONEY. Money was MASSIVELY going down the drain because some (many) naughty US banks had done some dirty tricks that were unravelling...

Treasurer Joe Hockey is under fire for launching a taxpayer-funded public relations push to sell the need for tax reform.

Treasury bureaucrats have revealed Mr Hockey personally directed that a public relations strategy be devised to accompany the imminent launch of the Coalition's tax white paper process.

So far, $650,000 has been spent on focus groups and devising a slick communications strategy to "convince people of the need for reform", a Treasury official told a Senate estimates committee on Thursday.

The Australian Financial Review revealed on Friday that a public information campaign, including TV commercials, will accompany  the intergenerational report and the government recently came under fire for spending $8 million on an advertising blitz to promote its proposed higher education reforms.

Public affairs firm GRACosway, co-chaired by former Liberal minister Helen Coonan and Keating-era Labor treasurer John Dawkins, has been paid $360,000 to prepare the communications effort on tax reform.

The project is being led by GRACosway executives Richard King and Peter Greenwood – both former Coalition ministerial staffers. Mr King was a senior political adviser within Mr Hockey's Tax Reform Unit.

Treasury deputy secretary Rob Heffron said past governments have relied on the release of discussion papers but said Mr Hockey was keen to "get people engaged in the process".

"The Treasurer this time around was very concerned that the old way of doing things was simply not going to cut the mustard," he said.

Mr Hockey has been widely criticised from inside and outside the government for failing to convince the electorate of the need for budget repair. The Treasurer said in December the government had "made a mistake" in communicating about tough budget measures with voters and "neglected the conversation".   

http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/joe-hockey-under-fire-for-taxpayerfunded-pr-campaign-on-tax-reform-20150226-13pwxr.html

The argument behind Joe Hockey's intergenerational report is that those who create wealth should be allowed to keep it for themselves and those who can't must suffer because of their lack of financial ability. Former associate chairman of the British Conservative Party, Josh Stevenson, debunks the Coalition's latest propaganda exercise.

In the nineties, I was the founder and Director of the New Zealand Centre for Psycho-sociological Development. The purpose of this organisation was to bring to light the effect on the world view of the people of New Zealand – by the application of depth psychology – the distortions of democracy that were being wrought by those in positions of power in that country, be they political, business or media. (At that time Serge Halimi ofLe Monde wrote of the New Zealand media that it was as 'self satisfied as it was mediocre'.) I am however, now resident of Victoria.

During that time a submission was made to a Select Committee of the New Zealand Parliament analysing the attempt to tell people that changes to the state pension (called superannuation in that country) were necessary because of the very same kinds of reasons the Abbott Government is now using to attempt to alter pensions for the Australian people.

In short, the argument being used in New Zealand and now in Australia, is one of the proportion of generators of wealth to consumers of wealth. 

This is a totally fallacious argument, because in a free democratic society it is the wealth available to the citizenry that matters — not who generates it. This basic fact of a democratic society is of course extremely unpalatable to today's political right who have corrupted the traditional conservative right (to which I used to belong as an association chairman for the British Conservative Party ) into the New Right of a world determined by those whom Shakespeare once referred to as 'mere arithmeticians'.

The unsaid argument behind the Abbott Government's thinking appears to be that those who create wealth should be allowed to keep it for themselves by not taxing them too highly and by extrapolation, those who can't generate wealth for themselves must suffer because of their lack of financial ability.

read more: https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/joe-hockeys-intergenerational-report--written-for-the-rich,7459

See toon at top...

The last time the Reserve Bank cut interest rates ahead of a budget the man who is now Treasurer said this: "Wayne Swan says the economy is doing just fine. If that is the case the Reserve Bank would not be cutting interest rates today."

Joe Hockey was right in 2013 and what he said is right today. The Reserve Bank has cut its cash rate to an all-time low because the economy is weak.

Not only is mining investment sliding, but non-mining investment is set to slide in the financial year ahead according to the latest official survey.

read more: http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/why-the-reserve-bank-cut-its-cash-rate-to-an-alltime-low-20150505-gguldv.html