The mixed result in the analysis of Australia’s tax and handout system shows how much further the Rudd Government has to go in order to achieve its stated goal of a simpler, fairer and more jobs-friendly regime. The analysis shows that 97,000 families in the top half of the income ladder lost family payments because of the budget. However, the clawback was offset by 53,000 new family payment recipients coming from the bottom half of the ladder, due to other tax changes.

The Labor-commissioned review of the Howard government’s work-for-welfare reforms also calls for single parents looking after a disabled child to be elevated to a $38-a-week higher pension payment. Under the current welfare-to-work rules, single parents are forced off the pension and on to the dole to look for work when their youngest child turns eight. The report recommends this should be changed so parents can do some training to get better jobs.

This week was a time for new beginnings. In the US, Barack Obama accepted the Democratic Party nomination, while Republican John McCain the little-known Sarah Palin as his running mate. In Australia, the Liberal leadership speculation entered an even more confusing stage, while the Labor Party outlined a number of new policies.

While the messages are various, the stands taken by Kevin Rudd this week will send a few shudders through state government and the unions. They’ll also suggest to the “battlers” that on some things, not all that much has changed from the former Howard government.

As Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his deputy Julia Gillard began the hard sell of tough new measures to improve school standards, the trade unions continued to flex their muscles behind the scenes over a number of policy measures.

Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith has labelled the Prime Minister’s plans as copycat measures and says Mr Rudd has not yet delivered his promise of a computer for every senior secondary student. The Australian Education Union also says Mr Rudd’s proposals are not new and are merely a diversion.

For too long, welfare has been seen as an unfettered right, without any attendant responsibilities. Now, the children of the generation lost in the rights-based culture of the 1960s and ’70s risk being lost too unless policies encourage parents to accept responsibility for their children. Accordingly, Labor’s belated acknowledgment of past policy failures is to be applauded.

Rebel Labor MPs have raised concerns about the Australian Building Construction Commission, as well as the welfare payment plan. But the Government defended both measures, arguing that it had flagged the welfare reforms in the May budget and that it had promised to retain the ABCC until 2010 at last year’s election.