Andrew Leigh

Mobile Offices

I'll be holding a mobile office on Hibberson Street in Gungahlin next Saturday (6 August) from 9-10am. Do come along if there are local or national issues you'd like to raise in person with me.

Community Forums

Also, I'll be hosting a Youth Climate Change Forum next Tuesday. I will give a short outline of the key features of the Gillard Government’s clean energy future plan, answer questions that you might have about the clean energy future plan, and discuss how we can work together to achieve this historic reform.

The details are:

Tuesday 9 August
Manning Clark Centre Theatre 2
Australian National University
6.00-7.30pm
RSVP: Andrew.Leigh.MP <@> aph.gov.au

All welcome - young, and young at heart.

Finally, I'll be holding another community forum on climate change in Dickson.

Sat 27 August
Majura Community Hall
Rosevear Pl
Dickson
10.00-11.30am
RSVP: Andrew.Leigh.MP <@> aph.gov.au

Having entered the world 39 years ago, I now begin my 40th year. Which made me feel rather old until I realised that if Alfred Deakin were alive, he'd be celebrating his 155th birthday today.

There are also some rather likeable features about 39, such as the fact that it's the sum of the first three powers of 3 (3¹+3²+3³). Does this mean I should be doing things in triplicate this year?

The ACT Labor Party conference today debated a motion (moved by Natasha Shahidullah and Andrew Barr) that advocated a change to include same-sex couples in the definition of marriage. I spoke in favour of the change.

Same-Sex Marriage
ALP ACT Conference, 30 July 2011

Few moments in life are so powerful, so emotionally charged, that they transcend the individual and connect us all.

• The birth of a child;


• Saying and being told I love you;


• And for those of us who are married – our wedding day.

A day so special that we name anniversaries silver, gold and diamond.

Marriage should be recognised and registered by law, regardless of the sexual orientation, or gender of the couple wanting to be married.

Same sex marriage is not about gay versus straight, conservative versus progressive, left versus right.

It is about social justice, equality for individuals, the recognition and protection of fundamental political and civil rights.

It is a Labor issue.

Our values make our party great. These have guided us for 120 years and should guide us on this issue.

We are a party of leadership. It is we who place a premium on treating people with dignity, decency, without discrimination.

In our heartland, our members, our voters watch Ellen DeGeneres and Erik van der Woodsen, Matt Lucas and John Barrowman, Jodie Foster and Stephen Fry; we listen to Elton John and KD Lang. Equality for same-sex couples is not unfamiliar to everyday Australians.

I understand and respect those who argue that marriage should remain a union between a man and a women. I have met with them in my electorate office and at my mobile offices. I have heard their views and their stories. They say that marriage is about the protection of the reproductive relationship and, as much as possible, giving children the opportunity to be reared by their biological parents within their natural family.

As a father of two, I absolutely understand the devotion to providing a caring, nurturing, loving and safe environment for children. But what I cannot understand is how my sexuality in some way gives me the right to marry because I am a better father than same sex parents.

The ACT has already led the way in recognising same-sex relationships.

Motions for marriage equality have already been passed at the Tasmanian, Victoria, Northern Territory, South Australian, Queensland and Western Australian conferences.

I am hoping we can add the ACT to that list.

A young woman named Natasha recently wrote to me:

‘I have wonderful dreams for my friends. I hope they will experience a loving life. But most of all I want them to have the freedom to pursue their own happiness. Marriage equality is a part of this’.

I have been told countless stories of the impact that discrimination has had on same-sex couples. These stories shock and appal me.

Same-sex couples ask for our support in having their love treated equally. I joined the Labor Party because I believe in equality. I am proud to support this motion.

I'm particularly grateful to Damien Hickman for his work on the speech.

The debt ceiling crisis in the US really is quite extraordinary to behold. For decades, the US Congress has raised the debt ceiling as required. After all, the debt ceiling is just the natural consequence of a set of political tax and spend decisions, so in some sense it's odd that it even requires separate legislation. As recently as late last year, most reasonable observers thought there was no chance that Congress would vote against raising the debt ceiling.

But the US Republican Party no longer does reasonable. Following the Tea Party takeover, House Republicans have now now decided that they would prefer to trash America's credit rating (and thereby push up interest rates for millions of Americans) rather than accept any increase in taxes for high-income Americans.

The question is: how do mainstream commentators react when one party moves sharply to the extreme? As Paul Krugman's column and blog have recently noted, the overwhelming tendency among most political observers has been to maintain a standard he-said, she-said approach. So it's easy for the casual watcher to miss the big story: the US Republicans are fast abandoning any semblance of a market-driven party, and are now willing to do or say just about anything for political gain.

The contrast with parties like the UK Conservatives and New Zealand National Party is palpable. I don't agree with some of what those parties are doing, but at least it's possible to discern a clear ideological compass in their decisions, many of which continue to be pro-market (eg. both countries' adoption of emissions trading schemes).

As for Australia, it's now pretty clear where Tony Abbott takes his lead. Having abandoned his party's belief in using markets to deal with climate change, walked away from a set of fuel tax reforms first put in place by Peter Costello in 2003, and used any chance he gets to attack the scientific consensus over climate change, Abbott is firmly placing himself in the US Republican mould. The question is: will the Coalition's rejection of mainstream economics in favour of populist politics get written up for what it is? Or will commentators miss the critical shift (that one political party has taken a huge leap to the intransigent right) and focus instead on what Krugman describes as 'the centrist cop-out'?

I spoke in parliament recently about the passing of bookseller and social activist Bob Gould. I wouldn't normally use this website to promote a business, but his daughter Natalie Gould wrote to say that she is trying to ensure that Gould's Books survives, and is running a 50% off sale until 14 Aug. So if you're strolling along King St Newtown, do drop in.

A few articles that have caught my fancy lately.

• Nicholas Gruen has a thoughtful paper for the COAG Reform Council on economic reform (read slowly - it's like a freeze-dried meal)


• Hal Varian on the economic value of Google


• Hal Varian on hangover-vodka searches & the four stages of unemployment (highly recommended)


• The Grattan Institute on regional investment


• How teacher turnover harms student achievement


• As from Zzzzs: the benefits to students of starting classes a little later in the morning


• Do politicians discriminate against racial-minority voters?


• Do countries grow faster if their politicians are better-educated?


• Elizabeth Farrelly on Canberra


• How to make people use less water (hint: it's all in the social comparisons)


• Gadi Barlevy & Derek Neal propose teacher 'pay for percentile'


• How hospital competition reduces mortality


• 'Last place aversion' - why the poor sometimes oppose redistribution


• How do badly-rated plumbers find new clients? (Answer: they change their names)


• Shaun Vahey and his team at the ANU Centre for Applied Macroeconomic Analysis have established a Shadow RBA Board. You can see their interest rate preferences here (hey guys, why not add a Taylor Rule interest rate too?)

Tim Soutphommasane's recent philosopher column in The Australian dealt with the underrated issue of social mobility - how far does the apple fall from the tree?

I penned a short letter in response, which the Oz kindly ran on Tuesday.

Dear Editor,

I enjoyed Tim Soutphommasane's article on social mobility. As he correctly points out, it's fundamental to how we think about inequality, since most of us are willing to put up with a bigger gap between rich and poor if the lottery is redrawn each generation than if social position is immutable from birth.

Tim quotes my research as finding that Australia is "among the most socially mobile societies in the world". Not quite. My study found that we are more socially mobile than the US, but less socially mobile than the Scandinavians.

For those who like numbers, a 10 percent rise in a father's income is associated with a 1-2 percent rise in his son's income in Denmark and Sweden, 2-3 percent in the UK and Australia, and 4-6 percent in the US and China.

So it's not as hard to jump from rags to riches in Australia as in some other societies. But we could still do more to ensure that every child - no matter their circumstances - has the opportunities that should be their birthright.

Andrew Leigh
Member for Fraser.

The Australian Government's Tax Forum will be held in Canberra on 4-5 October. Expressions of interest opened today for people in several categories: community, business, academics, superannuation, general public, and students.

More details here, with an expression of interest form here.

A friend emails to draw my attention to the new AIHW statistics on drug use.

Thought you might like to know that the updated population stats on drug use are out today. The media is mostly excited about the illicit side of things but... the following may interest you: smoking is down (to 15% of people aged 14+), preference for 'alcopops' among young people is down, and more than two-thirds of people support increased tax on tobacco products or bans on point of sale advertising.

Lots of positive changes there.

By coincidence, two of my favourite economics commentators today have written up papers that I wrote while an economics professor at the Australian National University.

• Ross Gittins discusses my paper with Francesca Cornaglia, which finds that crime lowers the mental wellbeing of non-victims (and suggests that the fear effect of crime may even be larger than the direct impact).


• Peter Martin discusses my study with Joshua Gans, which looked at Australian media slant in the period 1996-2004, and found that the press was mostly pretty centrist until 2004.

The academic publication process being what it is, both are still wending their way through refereeing and revisions.