New Catallaxy

Lockdowns are having “long-lasting effects on the economy” according to Australian business

Australia’s Corporations Rebel Against Government’s Draconian COVID Lockdowns is from Zero Hedge in the US reporting on a story published by the Financial Times in London. It may be in the local press, but I haven’t come across it here. Still, an important story, you would think.

In the letter – which was reported on by the FT – the signatories allege that Australia is making “big mistakes” in failing to reopen to the world. By making the lockdowns so severe (and so unceasingly long), the Australian government is putting politics before the well-being of the Australian people ahead of the federal elections that must be held by the end of May – when the Senate’s present term is slated to expire.

The companies that signed the letter “…employ almost one million Australians” and warned that lockdowns were having “long-lasting” effects on the economy. However, this shouldn’t be news to Australia’s political elite: Economists at Australia’s central bank, the RBA, already lowered their growth projections after a stronger-than-expected Q2 GDP print.

But all the incremental data seen so far suggests that Q3 could be a disaster – well that, coupled with the intensifying economic pressure from Beijing, which is trying to win a geopolitical stare-down contest with the Australian government by blocking a growing number of imports.

As for Australia’s infamous “drawbridge” border policy, the letter’s signatories insisted that the decision to close Australia’s borders was a colossal mistake. 

“The borders should have never been closed,” Graham Turner, chief executive of travel company Flight Centre, told the Financial Times. “We’re making some very big mistakes here.”

“It’s time for corporate Australia to turn its disquiet and rumblings into a roar,” said Greg O’Neill, the chief executive of Melbourne fund manager La Trobe Financial, one of the signatories to the open letter sent by the Business Council of Australia. “It is time for courage and honesty. Not politics.”

Politics is politics. But courage and honesty would be nice for a change.

Steve Kates

13 responses to “Lockdowns are having “long-lasting effects on the economy” according to Australian business”

  1. Boambee John Avatar
    Boambee John

    As for Australia’s infamous “drawbridge” border policy, the letter’s signatories insisted that the decision to close Australia’s borders was a colossal mistake.

    So they are all “concerned” about the hold up in the grand Ponzi scheme. Not about the actual citizens of Australia.

    7
  2. Miss Anthropist Avatar
    Miss Anthropist

    Which of these companies cry out for people to be double jabbed and for vaccine passports?
    Only asking because I intend to boycott them and I can’t do the investigation myself with my chronic condition.

    14
  3. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    If the companies signing the letter had helped the smaller parties along, the Uniparty wouldn’t have such a stranglehold on the Australian economy.
    This is where sitting on the fence and feeding the two biggest birds gets you.
    But that would foster competition, wouldn’t it?
    Competition isn’t what these blokes want – it’s regulation.

    9
  4. Bruce of Newcastle Avatar
    Bruce of Newcastle

    Australia’s Corporations Rebel Against Government’s Draconian COVID Lockdowns

    If they think this is bad just wait until the climate rubbish kicks in. All for nothing.
    I wish they’d get spines, and brains.

    23
  5. Rockdoctor Avatar
    Rockdoctor

    No. The draw bridge should have gone up a month earlier than it did. That said once we knew what we were dealing with, we should have started to open up 12 months ago. The fact they keep reinforcing failure says the whole lot are intellectually bankrupt. I wouldn’t trust most of the CHO’s with diagnosing the common cold at the moment and don’t start me on the Doherty Institute. Wrong more than right and horribly compromised would be the politest discription.

    I agree with the above this is all about vested interest losing bucket loads. Welcome to hell…

    21
  6. Roger Avatar
    Roger

    “The borders should have never been closed,” Graham Turner, chief executive of travel company Flight Centre, told the Financial Times.

    It seems that for the right people they never were.

    22
  7. Pat Avatar
    Pat

    If the luvvies had to wait till now to accept that lockdowns etc have killed small businesses as we knew them, they NEED brain and conscience transplants.

    luvvies equals all those who you all know. ?

    6
  8. johanna Avatar
    johanna

    Well, they would say that. I mean, Flight Centre?

    I don’t and didn’t hear of them agitating against the assaults on the civil liberties of their fellow citizens, not to mention the physical assaults against their persons.

    As Americans say, they can go pound sand.

    8
  9. duncanm Avatar
    duncanm

    Here’s the original letter from the Business Council of Australia. With list of signatories..
    https://www.bca.com.au/an_open_letter_from_the_business_community

    1
  10. Zipster Avatar
    Zipster

    No. The draw bridge should have gone up a month earlier than it did. That said once we knew what we were dealing with, we should have started to open up 12 months ago. The fact they keep reinforcing failure says the whole lot are intellectually bankrupt.

    +1.

    various agendas attempted to take over the narrative and make political gain

    the average mug punter still thinks the rona is a killer. it is not

    5
  11. Winston Smith Avatar
    Winston Smith

    The Political/Ideological/Intellectual Elite strikes again.
    It was always going to end like this – the one class of people who shouldn’t have been allowed out of the house unsupervised, have, for the last thirty years arrogated power to themselves and their idiot ideologies and this is what we get.
    All over the Western world, it’s the same;
    Bridges to nowhere.
    Infrastructure that will never pay back its investment costs.
    Policy made by people who have never made their own beds or tidied their own rooms, who have never doubted they were the smartest people in any room ever, who have never entered a competition where they didn’t get a consolation prize, and when this preening over confidence has hit the real world, it has failed.
    Mao was certainly right when he closed the universities and sent them back to the fields to work with their hands so they could enter the real world.
    Until this nexus of intellect, pride, and arrogance is brought to heel and banished from the Parliaments and Boardrooms of our society, it will just get worse.
    And they will blame us, because without us demanding the Rights they allow us, it would all be smooth sailing. It’s ALL our fault.

    5
  12. egg_ Avatar
    egg_

    Methinks the Govt knew the Wuhan chunks flew in in Jan 2020 and the damage was already done – hence, the Ruby Princess was just theatre.

    Now hoping to re-open the Ponzi floodgates.

    2
  13. Dot Avatar
    Dot

    egg_says:
    October 1, 2021 at 7:46 pm
    Methinks the Govt knew the Wuhan chunks flew in in Jan 2020 and the damage was already done – hence, the Ruby Princess was just theatre.

    Now hoping to re-open the Ponzi floodgates.

    Dunno about this one egg.

    Didn’t we have a month last calendar year where all of Australia had zero COVID cases?

    1

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *