When Labor objects to the misinformation put out about its policies at the last election, the federal government is quick to respond with Labor’s “Mediscare” message of 2016. The Coalition knew it would be suicidal to abolish Medicare but they were already heading in the wrong direction on health issues. They had no qualms about gouging $50 billion of the funding trajectory out of health and had delayed, not abandoned, cutting bulk-billing incentives that affected pathology and imaging.

Compare that to the “death duties” scare that was never, ever contemplated in Labor’s campaign platform. In his publication Venom, David Crowe relates how this lie went viral on social media.

Then there was the portrayal of Bill Shorten holding the No Adani sign he had taken off a protester after he made it clear that he would not stop Adani if it affected our sovereign risk rating.

The ‘Bill Australia can’t afford’ message obscured the fact that Labor’s tax cuts, unlike those of the Coalition, were more generous to low income earners and matched those given by the government to middle income earners.

When Scott Morrison’s “quiet Australians” realise that even if they earn as little as $45 000 a year, they will soon be paying the same tax rate as those earning as much as $200 000 per annum, they might awake from their slumber.

Frank Carroll