BLOODY QUEENSLANDERS....... 310

Wrong - we need to focus on areas where we have the compebreastive advantage - that is high skill, high education industries, not low skill manufacturing and agriculture.

The invention of the power loom and other textile manufacturing breakthroughs made large amounts of workers in Britain redundant - but life and the economy moved on despite the luddites protests.

The invention of the motor car made farriers mostly redundant - but life and the economy moved on.

And so it always has been, and so it always will be.

Its called progress.And the industries that fall by the wayside are a consequence of that.From weavers to farriers, from production line floor workers to farmers.The economy evolves and some people are left not being able to work in an industry for their entire life.Yet living standards continue to increase and income levels continue to increase over every given timeframe.

And everytime someone fails to get this point, they complain about how THEIR industry's pbutting will lead to the end of the world, how this time it really will lead to economic collapse and the whole country will be rooned.

Except it wont be, because this time it isnt different, because it never is.

But its not just sugar is it.If its good for sugar, then its good for something else.Sugar isnt special - what about low end Australian manufacturing, and pork producers, and orange growers, and farriers and weavers for that matter?

Every job saved by protecting an industry that cannot compete in the marketplace leads to other jobs in other areas of the economy getting destroyed and downstream industries being forced to pay for the protection becomming uncompebreastive themselves.

Saving sugar kills other industries, bit by special-interest-pleading bit. And everytime an industry gets propped up by the Australian taxpayer, somewhere else in the economy, somewhere more productive than sugar - well it gets f***ed over.And that's just a really dumb thing to do - sacrifice the efficient workers in efficient industries to save the lazy, industry welfare addicts

No.

Its not a reason.What makes sugar farmers more special than pork producers or low end manufacturing workers or orange growers? What makes them such an integral part of the national interest that they get to f*** up the productive areas of the economy?

But its not a bit more - its hundeds of millions of dollars more.And why is sugar so special that they deserve special treatment and not all those other industries that progress, transport and technology has made uncompebreastve?

Prop them up too?

It makes a significant difference.Save an unproductive sugar farmer and take a job away from a brewer, or a confectionary producer who rely on export markets and who CAN compete, or a retail worker that suffers through no fault of their own but simply because some special interest pleader in QLD reckons its his god given right to f*** the taxpayer and the economy over because he can grow sugar - as if its some f***ing miracle that only he can do.

Its bullpoo.It doesnt work and makes everyone poorer.

Petrol is priced internationally.Its called pricing parity.We dont go and subsidise petrol everytime some idiot reckons its a good idea to invade the Mid East and send the price of a barrel of oil rocketing - the country adapts to the price and moves on.

Yet you reckon whats good for petrol isnt good for sugar.

Pigs arse it has.Some of the stuff we used to produce was just complete and utter crap.Alot of it STILL is.Overpriced complete and utter crap at that.Whitegoods for instance - f***ing useless.The first time Aussie consumers got a choice they dumped Australian made whitegoods because they were rubbish.

If Australia "always produced goods of the highest quality by world standards" we wouldnt have had any industry pee off overseas because we would have competed on quality.Some of the Euroweenies manage quite fine on that front.

We couldnt though.And we couldnt compete on price either.Its not me that's saying this, its the judgement of 20 million Australians whom decided to cast judgement with their wallets.

We made goods that werent good enough and were too expensive for what they were.Thats what the market said - and after all, the market is who these goods were actually made for.

No one owes us a living comrade - we've got to pull our finger out and adapt like everyone else.That means high skills development and large education outlays.Not tariffs and other welfare for lazy industries that refuse to adapt to an ever changing world and expect the taxpayer to provide them a living.

Please provide some data that even remotely suggests that Australia is losing its ability to feed itself.In case you havent realised, Australian farming is more efficient than it ever has been and continually produces a MbuttIVE food SURPLUS.

Just what do you think primary production exports are comrade?