Episode 76: Morrison attacks workers and children, real wages cut, billionaires are not the answer to climate change

"The Week on Wednesday" with Van Badham & Ben Davison

Van Badham and Ben Davison look at how the diverging political fortunes of Morrison and Albo are driving Morrison into ever more desperate acts of political theatre at the expense of working people and children.

On Monday the NSW Liberal's effectively conspired to shut down the train system by locking out the workers and then spent the entire day using a decision, made by their management team (some who had played the same role locking out workers at Qantas), to attack workers, union leaders and the Labor Party.

From Prime Minister Morrison and his industrial relations Minister Michaelia Cash to the boy prince Premier Perrottet and his Transport Minister David "I don't answer my phone after dark" Elliot the full weight of the Liberal Party was focused on blaming the workers for stopping the trains when the truth is that it was the NSW Liberal government and their hand picked underlings who threw the state into chaos.

Tuesday saw no apology but did see Morrison move onto his other favourite target group; trans children. On the same day that we received a copy of "This is me", a heart warming picture book written by a teacher and AEU member about sporty young people coming out to their family the Prime Minister of Australia was supporting banning trans children from playing sport.

Van and Ben discuss how this behaviour by Morrison is about his desperate attempts to revive his political fortunes in the face of news today that real wages are going backwards, living costs are going up, insecure employment rampant and his ideologically driven leadership has made things worse.

The news that billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes and Canadian private equity fund Brookfield want to buy AGL has been greeted by some as the arrival of climate change Batman but Van and Ben breakdown why the low ball offer was never likely to succeed and what it tells us about the battles between billionaires for power and money. Never simp for a billionaire.

Plus there is good news about carbon capturing soft drinks in The Netherlands!

And as always we pay tribute to our contributors. You can become a Cadre, Extending the Reach or Buck a Week contributor at www.buymeacoffee.com/weekonwednesday or you can just make a once off contribution.