Australia

The tenures of Prime Ministers Malcolm Fraser, Bob Hawke, Paul Keating and John Howard have had both positive and negative outcomes. Some of them have been more successful than others in establishing policies that have improved Australia’s economy and social welfare, while others have had more difficulties in providing a better situation for Australia. This essay will discuss the policies andactions that I support and do not support of the four prime ministers. As well, it will display the ranking of the four of them from best to worst.
Malcolm Fraser headed a Liberal-National Party coalition from 1975 to 1983. His main pronouncement was “Life isn’t meant to be easy”. He believed that Australia depended too much on public provisions, so therefore, he tried to reduce government andtried to only intervene habitually. The Fraser government found a solution to tackle inflation. They thought that if prices could be reduced and profits restored, then there would be more activity than before. They also thought that reducing government expenditure would help the public deficit as well as savings in the public sector, and therefore, interest rates would decrease leading to moreprivate investment. Inflation declined during the Fraser government but in the same way, the number of unemployed people was greater than 400,000. The main disadvantage that I see with the Fraser government is that its policy was only focused on one of the problems that Australia was having at that time. The government focused entirely on inflation leaving unemployment and other problems forgotten.For a policy to be successful it must tackle various problems at the same time, a policy cannot tackle inflation without causing unemployment. Therefore, I think that the Fraser government would have been more efficient if the policies were not only aimed at inflation but at other problems as well.
Moreover, the Fraser government imposed restrictions on foreign investment so that they couldfinance the expansion on export industries. I support this action because I think that a country should strengthen its domestic market first before it can compete globally. By imposing restrictions on foreign investment, export industries have a greater chance of becoming stronger and more prepared to compete internationally later on. I also support Fraser’s vision of including human rights in hisforeign policy, as well as his close relationships with America and China. However, unemployment and the breakout of wages ensured Prime Minister Fraser’s defeat in the 1983 elections.
In 1983, Bob Hawke was the new Labor Leader. He worked for the Australian Council of Trade Unions and during his leadership he insisted that it was necessary to have national reconciliation. Hawke’s government had aspecial relationship with unions. They negotiated with the Australian Council of Trade Unions so that workers would give up wage increases for job creation. I strongly support this action of Hawke’s government because it led to the creation of one and a half million new jobs and unemployment fell from 10% to 6%. As well, this government was successful in working a lot with union and businessleaders, they restored public medical insurance and made improvements in social wage. Furthermore, another positive thing is that they created government programmes to guarantee that industries like steel and car production continued being reliable.
On the other hand, an action of the Hawke’s government that I do not support was that they did not give importance to the defense of the currency,allowing it to be set by the market instead. By 1986, the dollar lost 40% of its value. Net foreign debt was 30% of the national product and every fall in the exchange rate increased its cost, and as well exports were no longer having a reliable demand. This government had plans to reduce tariffs that protected local industries, and to reduce the control of wage fixation. I do not support this plan...