Australia just wrote off $16b in student debt – NZ needs a Jubilee Government

Australia wipes AU$16 billion off student loans, targeting cost of living relief

Australia’s parliament on Thursday passed a law to cut student loans by 20 percent, wiping more than AU$16 billion (NZ$17.4 billion) in debt for 3 million people, and fulfilling a key election promise to help mitigate the rising cost of living.

The law is the first passed by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s centre-left Labor Party since being re-elected in May with one of the country’s largest-ever majorities.

“We promised cutting student debt would be the first thing we did back in parliament and that’s exactly what we’ve done,” Albanese said in a statement.

“Getting an education shouldn’t mean a lifetime of debt.”

Education Minister Jason Clare said the measure would help take a weight off the backs of young people.

Our own Kiwis fear returning because of student loan debt…

Overseas Kiwis struggle with massive interest, penalties on student loans

…it’s time for the NZ Left to be radical – we need a Jubilee Government!

Wipe student loan debt for those who agree to return to NZ and stay 5 years!

We must look at a radical reset for student loan debt and beneficiary debt, we must take the tax yoke off the shoulders of workers and place it on the mega wealthy.

Wipe student loan debt for those who agree to return to NZ and stay 5 years!

We must look at a radical reset for student loan debt and beneficiary debt, we must take the tax yoke off the shoulders of workers and place it on the mega wealthy.

I have been arguing since Bernie Sanders stood against Hilary that the only way to combat Trump’s (and the wider rights) negative populism is popular populism.

Not one poor family is sitting around the kitchen table cancelling each other for misusing pronouns, they are trying to work out how to pay the bills, and when the working poor turn to us on the Left for solutions and see only alienating identity politics dogma being served up as a solution, they turn away in anger at us.

I’ve only been pointing this other since 2016.

Meanwhile the planet burns.

If we’ve all finished alienating possible voters with pure temple politics, how’s about some good old fashioned Broadchurch class solidarity instead?

• Free public transport
• An Iwi back 3rd Supermarket chain.
• First $20 000 tax free
• GST off essentials
• Free Dental
• Free Health
• Free Education

Left Universalism is our goal, subsidising the biggest costs for the poorest people.

The NZ Left needs to move beyond the low hanging fruit of identity politics and the illusion of awareness…

He once rebuked billionaires for not paying enough taxes. Now this historian says we need ‘moral ambition’ to fight tyranny

Bregman says one antidote to that fear is “moral ambition.” It’s his term for people who blend the idealism of an activist with the ruthless pragmatism of an entrepreneur to make the world a better place. In his new book, “Moral Ambition: Stop Wasting Your Talent and Start Making a Difference,”Bregman uses the example of that German shipyard worker and other ordinary people to critique what he sees as a common failing of people on the left: They fall for the “illusion of awareness,” a belief that simply exposing people to injustice will inspire them to act.

“Awareness doesn’t put food on the table. Awareness won’t keep a roof over your head,” writes Bregman, a vegan who has spoken out against animal factory farming. “With awareness, you don’t cool down the planet, you’re not finding shelter for those 100 million refugees, and you won’t make a bit of difference for the 100 billion animals at factory farms worldwide. Awareness is at best a starting point, while for many activists, it seems to have become the end goal.”

…the manner in which social media school chambers have radicalised voters into Qanon militia speaks to a deeper wound and is reminiscent of the way global Muslim youth were radicalised in the 1990s and 2000s thanks to online Jihadist recruitment videos.

Citizens should feel angry and cynical at a system that is rigged in favour of the rich!

The Left should lean into that populism!

We need to focus on how to combat this terrible racist, anti-worker, anti-Treaty, anti-renter, anti-beneficiary, anti-environment Government who are selling out the common good for the interests of their donor friends.

We have to re-establish the egalitarian mission by promoting policy that directly challenges the capitalist status quo in meaningful ways.

Without vision, the Left is lost.

There are 4 magical pillars of the NZ economic ‘success’

1 – Stealing Indigenous land and never paying back the full value.

2 – Selling basic milk powder to China

3 – Selling each other houses and pretending that makes us rich.

4 – Addiction to a low wage economy.

The migration exploitation rules are garbage because NZ loves exploiting migrant labour!

We are addicted to it.

We say locals are too lazy for these jobs when really what we say is locals won’t allow themselves to be exploited as easily as migrant workers.

There is of course a solution here.

Universal Union membership for every migrant worker crossing the border.

That way domestic workers know they are not competing against exploited labour.

That way migrant labour can’t be exploited without the Union stepping.

 

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