The Party Line on Labor’s leadership crisis

Hi and welcome to episode 58 of the party line. This podcast was recorded on an Aboriginal land and we stand in solidarity with our indigenous brothers and sisters in their struggle against racism and capitalism. Oh my darling, oh my darling, oh my darling party line, oh I never will forsake thee, or I love this life of mine. Jordan? Hello. How's it going? Anika. I realise that for people who have never listened to the podcast, I say hi to you guys but my name is just left us. But you don't usually say hi aren't you? No, I say hi Jordan, hi. So anyways, yeah, if you haven't listened before I'm Anika, it's going on. I'm starting a petition. Uh oh, what's this about for? It's so fucking annoying. Two weeks in a row going on Thursday night. It's the worst. It's not appropriate. It's a school night. More importantly, it's our branch. God, it makes it impossible. You mentioned you're trying to focus on some irrelevant political questions. Doing this amazing. Irrelevant. It's like a last minute addition to the 2026 Victorian Socialist Policy platform is to ban Thursday night. Yeah, the three quarter time entry but also not more. I used to hate like Sunday 3pm ones for some reason but I think that's just because I was tired. Yeah, yeah, they're really fine. I think 745 is too late for a game for people to start. I agree. I don't know if that's controversial. It's always been at that time. For sure, we're playing this Saturday 745 or something disgusting. Yeah, the game ends and you're tired and you're going to head. But speaking of the policy platform, um, I recommend if people haven't already bought a ticket to our launch party. Yes, you do it. Or on Saturday you do it now because the rumblings in the organizing committees is that we need to turn off the ticket sales. Yeah, because we've sold so many. We're not going to do that to our. It's like 800 people coming. That's crazy. We had to get an overflow space to figure out, you know, setting up speakers outside because probably they're going to have too many people to get them upstairs. So it's not a small venue either which is kind of crazy. Yeah, so it's, if you're in Victoria, it's on Saturday at 4 o'clock to what street in foreign bry at the Aboriginal advancement league. And if you come, I think you'll get to hear from one of our one of our constituents. One of our like the park. No, you're not speaking. Are you not speaking? No way. Maybe we'll do some boxpops. I actually proposed Omar and like there was rebellion. I think I started the rebellion. So people should definitely do that. So the main content for this week is going to be all about like why the LPL is so shit. Labor. Federal and state level. We're recording on Tuesday. So it's not totally settled yet. You know, whether it's going to be Ben Carroll or Sonny Kilkenny. I think it's going to be Ben Carroll. But yes, so we're going to get into that. But we've got a bunch of headlines first. So we wanted to talk about some politics going on in the world before we come back to our back quarter of a country. Yeah. I think we should start off with the world being on fire. It's not good. No, it's fine. Yeah, I didn't see any of this until I put it in the document. Pay attention to it here. It's really bad though. You know, the European summer has already seen like multiple extreme heat waves. Thousands of people have died from just like a heat exposure basically. And now there's going to be like there's already huge bushfires, wildfires, all over Spain and parts of Europe. And then in America, they're suffering through their own heat wave as well. So, yeah, the Northern hemisphere is basically just on fire again. And it's like this is the reality of the climate crisis from now on. Yeah. And because of like the climate crisis and because of climate change, like what used to happen was when North America for example is experiencing their bushfire season, we used to send out like planes and fleets and stuff like that over. But now our bushfire seasons are crossing over. Overlapping. So like we're all fucked, but also like you know the kind of existing fire fighting fleets and stuff particularly in Victoria are just like a shambles. So even if you know we were to do that, it would still like and the climate won't overlapping. It would still be bad. But yeah, it's just like actually like horrific. It's getting close to half a million people have been evacuated across France and Spain. Like it's just absolutely mental. The fires are really close to Madrid and I think Bordeaux in the south of France. And this is going to be a third heat dome in like a month starting I think today. Heat dome is a crazy concept. That's right. It's just like this hot air that just sits above a territory and doesn't move. There's no moisture, no humidity, no wind, just like heat. And like Europe isn't built for it. Yeah, I was going to say like one of the reasons why in like Australia heaps people dying winters because the like houses aren't built for. Yeah, yeah. And it's the opposite in the UK across Europe. Heaps of public like buildings like hospitals schools. They don't have air conditioning units because they don't they haven't needed them in the past. But now with this accelerating climate crisis, it's like. You can't there's nowhere to go to seek for a prev. Yeah, anytime it hits 28 degrees in the UK, like it is inevitable that people die like elderly people. And just any people really. And now there's all these like tech companies building these high-piscale data centers, which is just going to. She's really going to help. Anyway, so that's that's like on a scary headline like people are describing like the end of the world is one headline. Yeah, just just terrifying scenes. The next thing. This is bad as well. So Israel is basically planning a full scale invasion of the West Bank again. The last two years have been like record amounts of new illegal settlements and new illegal outposts they call them, which are like the pre pre step to constructing a settlement. And last week there was a group of what were described in the bourgeois press as high case. Yeah, just like walking around and they just happened to find themselves in a Palestinian village with like rifles slung. Yeah, dozens of men walking around with rifles in a Palestinian village on occupied land. They're just hikers. Anyway, the Palestinians. One of them rebelled and grabbed a gun and shot and killed one of these settlers. And then there was another person, another Israeli soldier killed as well who turns out was actually killed by Israeli forces breaking news from last night. But anyway in response to that, there's been like massive wave of attacks across the West Bank. There's been mocks burnt down, farms, olive groves, etc. I think 80 or 90 Palestinians have been arrested last time I checked. And all the other Israeli media are reporting that it's going to be a really convenient stunt for the Netanyahu government to re-escalate tensions and basically start a mini war there with the hope that it rebuilds their credibility ahead of the November election. I saw that there was a march forming as well like to do more of this. Yeah, that's right. But there's no internal like barriers or opposition or limits to just the like mowing down of Palestinians, the continued seizure of their land. This is just something that is supported by hot, like basically the entire Israeli population. And that's a thing. It's like, yeah, it is a good political stunt. But it's a political stunt that costs the lives of untold numbers of Palestinians and the continued theft of their land. Like it's such a backwards, just horrific situation. And it always gets blamed as like there's just a few extremists or whatever, but it's not true. Like the whole idea facilitates this kind of thing. The Israeli political class all agree with it. I mean, they just approved the huge settlements. And talking about bulldozing, the whole village where this happened until they talk about it as like it's like a honeycoming process. Like they, you know, the settlers go out, they set it up and then around that, you know, more settlements get billed. This is this is the process that legitimizes just the fifth of land. So they just build up build up build up until it's just yeah, we're here. And then yeah, every now and again, the government helps facilitate it by military incursions or passing laws to approve the settlements. Yeah, there's like, there's this guy on TikTok. He's like a German Israeli guy and he goes and lives with families in the West Bank all over the West Bank. Like just to tell the story of like what it looks like and the idea that like it's not just a few bad apples that are doing this and he's like. You know, he'll be staying with a family in the middle of the night, like 20 people will come and start stealing sheep and everything. And, you know, like start putting up razor wire, like assaulting people and whatever, or armed with guns and everything. And then like the police will come and it's the IDF. And then they'll just arrest all of the Palestinian people. Yeah, like remember when Louis Thurough was doing that documentary about the settlers and they're getting just shot at by Israelis. He's with like a Palestinian family. He goes, "Isn't anyone we can call?" And the Palestinian guy just laughs at him like, "Who are we going to cook today?" Yeah, yeah, they'll help. Yeah, so it's pretty serious stuff and it's all very conscious and deliberate. And this is what Israeli elections are like. It's a competition for who can be the most aggressively colonial and racist. Like the worst insult in Israeli politics is you're working with the Arabs. Totally. Yeah. It's like the slur that gets cast from one party to another. All right, the next thing's also in the Middle East. People might have been hearing and you guys probably have heard like one of the reasons for the American war with Iran was because, you know, it's. America can't let Iran get nuclear weapons. No, that would be terrible if any of that. It's a bureaucracy. It's repressive. It's anti-democratic. They don't let like women do stuff there. Exactly. So they had to go to war to stop them getting nukes. Well, they've just signed a landmark deal with Saudi Arabia. Thriding democracy? Really strong on women's rights. Yeah, it's incredible. Really equal society, no theocracy whatsoever. And they're going to be giving them nuclear power and building to nuclear weapons. So that. And this has been reported by the Guardian. Bailey, anywhere else, it did register. Because of course, Saudi Arabia is a friend of the West. Yeah. And therefore their theocratic practices, their murdering of journalists and chopping them up. It's different. Yeah, it's reasonable. You know, they're beheading. They still behead people. Totally reasonable. You know, it's just what you got to do when you're running a good theocratic dictatorship. So America's doing this, you know, it exposes this the absolute cynicism of US foreign policy and Western foreign policy. But if the Saudis get nuclear weapons, the Iranians are going to need nuclear weapons and, you know, the Israelis obviously already have them and the UAE will want them. So this is like a really dangerous step. Definitely. In a in a time where regional conflicts are always just threatening to spiral out of control. Like just the more countries they get, the worse, where we are going to be in a situation we're going to be in. Yeah. And I mean, there's been over the last couple of months, like quite a bit of just acceleration on the nuclear. And uranium front, like Australia's massive deal with India. Yeah. To ship them out uranium. Like I think it's sort of a sign of the political times that we live in that like the nuclear question becomes more and more like a central question for foreign policy. Yeah, it's not about power. It's not about energy. It's about bombs. Yeah. That's what it's all about. But speaking of US foreign policy, which is a power I'm putting it. I believe this is an Australian financial review article. It was originally in the FT, but they republished it. That's nice that they share. So wave cutting down on journalists. That's right. Yeah. But the US has collected about $19 billion of Venezuela's oil money. Where is it? So yeah. Obviously, we've talked quite a bit on the port about America's illegal in like incursion into Venezuela. The kidnapping of the president. And obviously all of it has been in service of just like the power and wealth for America. So a lot of the discussion about Venezuela in the same way that they talk about Cuba is like, oh, the government stills money from people blah, blah, blah. It's like, obviously, it's a government. They do that. Name one that doesn't. But it's again, it's like the hypocrisy of all of this, which is just as if America gives a fuck about the population of Venezuela. They're doing it for themselves. So none of this money is being repatriated to the poor communities of Venezuela who had no democratic rights, etc. They just have a new power that's deciding and dictating what's going to happen to them. And yeah, $19 billion is not a small amount of money. Yeah, I mean, Venezuela is one of the poorest countries in the world right now. They've just had this massive earthquake. And like Australia announces, oh, he's $2 million is the same as what it was. And it's like the Americans have $19 billion of Venezuela money just sitting in their bank accounts. And there's been other reports recently about Marco Rubio is essentially running Venezuela. Because one of the other things that left really got wrong about the whole process is they, like it was an American kind of coup. But then they actually, the Venezuelan government collaborated with them. And Delcio Rodriguez, who's the current leader, is just absolutely working with Rubio. The report I read was like, they have a WhatsApp chat and they share like Joe Mason, like, oh my god, family pictures and stuff. Kind of like our WhatsApp chat. Yeah, it's a shame thing. My shop we have as much power as they do. But anyway, so yeah, this is all just like, it's an American imperial adventure. But then it's like all the imperial adventures is always like lackeys, you know, who are prepared to go along with it for their own enrichment. And the Venezuelan government, they got rid of one guy and they've just slipped the switch and just gone along with it to the detriment of their own people, which is disgusting. And that's why a class analysis is so required. There's no good countries and bad countries. There's only workers and bosses. And then speaking of conflict between people workers and bosses. This is good. Yeah. We talked the other week with Saegar, who got lots of positive reviews. Yeah, yeah. People like that guy agreed. Definitely. The cockroach movement, the student movement that was one of the things we talked about has had a big win. So this is an ABC headline. India's cockroach, Janata, isn't it? A junta party, claim significant and rare victory over the Modi government. And basically what's happened is a student protest that occupied the capital city in India, were brutalized by police, mobilized masses of people across the country. Their demand was to change the education system, make it more democratic, less corrupt, to sack the education minister and a bunch of other things. They've got a number of their demands met. The education minister has resigned. The government's promise to release all the arrested people from the movement. And this is like we said, a very far right government. This is correctly a rare victory and a very important victory and a lesson that if you fight, you can win even in the darkest circumstances. Totally. Yeah. But also it shows like, it wasn't a socialist movement. So the ruling class is obviously intervened and we're like, okay, we can let the education minister go, give into some of the demands and then just keep it all going kind of thing. It's a mass mobilization across the country. And like, yeah, I don't know. I'm just sad to see it die down because of this. I mean, I think it's the pattern of many social movements, which is that they rise around particular questions and they either get crushed or they meet their demands. And if there's not infrastructure to sort of deepen them, then they can sort of just, you know, move back and then. But it can mean that in the next moment where there's like political struggle or whatever, there can be lessons that have been learned. You remember sort of what it took to win last time. New political forces can grow out of it. So, yeah, I think like the point about, you know, being able to realize that there's been a win here, this can give confidence to layers of people that it's possible to push back. And in a lot of like the recent history of India, it's not been that possible to push back against the government. So, yeah, this can actually mean that people feel like, well, we can do something when we fight. And win. Yeah. So you're right. Like, it is, it is a strategy to co-opt or, no, I mean, I can't, but neutralize the movement. But also from our side, it's an argument that movement's going to win. So both those things can be true at the same time. And I guess, yeah, time will tell which kind of dynamic wins out. I don't think Modi is going to we know about all these people from this movement. So, I mean, they're going to replace a education minister with another education minister from the same fascist party. Yeah. Well, you know, bringing us back to Australia, which is going to be the rest of the episode. This headline is quite good, but also grim. Forget crypto. Single motherhood is the best get rich quick scheme, according to Pauline Hansen. Pauline Hansen has spent the last couple of weeks just doubling down on massive attacks on just women, like just extreme misogyny. And her latest claim is that women are like scamming the welfare system by claiming and men. Oh, yeah, and men by claiming that they're victims of domestic violence. Yeah. And you know, it's like the amount of money that you can get for being a victim of domestic violence is like a couple of thousand dollars. Yeah, it's like when you are a victim of domestic domestic violence, you are trying to leave. Yeah. You need a lot more than five thousand dollars to be able to restart your life, let alone like, you know, getting mental health support. The fact that you have to keep on working when you've been like traumatized by some violent man or whatever. And yet, Hansen's just like, fuck you. Just leave. Yeah, I will just leave. Oh, I got myself out of a bad situation. situation. So you should be able to as well. And this is in the context where actually, you know, there's been more discussions about the killing of women by abusive partners, where there has been an increase in the rate of poverty amongst single parent households and primarily its women who, you know, burdened with the responsibility of looking after children when marriages break down. And there's also been like a massive underpayment of child support payments. So women aren't even receiving the amount of money that they owed by these men. And the thing that Hanson wants to go on about is like women are like grifters destroying the lives of men and stealing money from the taxpayer. Not only that, but she's like women in domestic violence situations play a part in their domestic violence. Yeah. It's too waste street. Like fuck sake. I know. Like the data is very clear. It's men do all the abuse. Women are overwhelmingly the victims. But then when men are other victims, it's from other men, you know? And because obviously there's there's gay relationships. So it's like it's topsy-turvy land with the far right as usual. The thing about like there's been a bunch of research into like child support payments and how they're weaponized by the men as well into like allowing them to have a long term control and abuse over their ex partners. And so you know, some ex partners decide not to even bother with it because they don't want to have anything to do with these people. But single parents and single women are so poor. Like what's the research in this article? I think it said that the rates of poverty among single parents is like three times higher than parents in relationship. So it's like a really difficult situation. It's not a Ponzi scheme raising a child. It's actually a net loss financially. So the, you know, so women in this situation need support. And men mostly don't give it out very easily. There's $1.9 billion owed in outstanding payments. That's in this article, which is a very good article by Jacqueline Maley actually unusually good. So $1.9 billion is a single parents are owed from these men. Like it's disgusting. That's yeah, it should be like I know people who were just never paid. Yeah. And you have to go to like court and fight like it's a big hassle. And if you've got a kid and maybe you don't want to teach the kid that their dad is an absolute scumbag. Maybe you want to try and allow them to have some like the emotional cost of going to court and having this battle over money can be not worth it. And so a lot of women just give up and don't get the money they deserved. And then a lot of the time like the money that you get is like absolutely nothing like my mom used to say that the child support that she would get from my dad didn't even pay for the wheatbeaks that we are. It's just yeah. And yeah. So fuck Paulian. Yeah. It's also like it's also connected to all the housing stuff like the government is spending like billions and billions of dollars on you know things that aren't going to help. But also like has finally recognized that like oh you know women fleeing domestic violence situations need somewhere to stay. But obviously the housing system is fucked. So what we're going to do is again spend more billions and billions of dollars for like crisis accommodation which is paying like private motels. You know some people fleeing domestic violence who are able to navigate the system whatever can get two weeks in a motel. That is like cockroach infested like covered in mold like I've seen quite a few of these like crisis accommodation places for women in this situation. It's shocking. And like these like private motel owners are making shit loads of money. And instead of doing something about the housing system we're like yeah we'll do we'll just we'll just give these people keeps the money which is yeah shocking. But also like on that note this isn't in the article. An article came out this weekend in the Harold Sun. And it was talking about that vacant residential land tax thing that I've been banging on about for a while about like you know taxing the Victorian government introduced attacks on vacant residential land in 2018 and have done nothing about it for since 2018. This this year the data the data came out about how many like actual enforcement thingos that they've done for the last financial year because they did a big press release in 2024. They was like we're going to start you know go on after they implemented it. Exactly. And then so the data the data came out they pursued so there's 100,000 empty homes or underutilized homes in Melbourne. And the threshold for that is a lot higher than the threshold for being part of the vacant residential land tax because the vacant residential land tax is only six months of a year. This is like a lot higher but so take the 100,000. There were 940 something investigations of that of those 940 something there were about 750 that actually resulted in like fine so that's a massive percentage. And it raised 38 million dollars for like 750 like there's your fucking revenue issue that you're worrying about. Maybe they should hire you to do the investigations. I would love that people aren't dream jobs. You can put big yellow stickers on all the empty houses and make videos. I would do that for free. Anyways moving on. But that is genuinely criminal. Yeah. So like this could be revenue that goes into schools and hospitals, build public housing. Yeah. Instead it's just like untouched. It's just harassing. Sitting there like empty. Yeah. And there was there was a response from the property investor council chair. And with those they are wonder. The guy was like it's a misleading name like I didn't even know I had to pay this tax until my accountant told me. Oh awesome. Anyways this headline says PM praises Sally McManus and Michelle O'Neal as giants as they resigned from the ACT. It's a sad day for us all. It's well missed the inspiring leadership. Yeah. Yeah. It's been like their their reign over the ACTU has been really wonderful. They've overseen massive cuts to wages like real wages. Massive like drops in union density and union membership. They've like turned the I mean the ACTU kind of always was like a mates kind of thing like Labour party hacks just doing their thing but like even more so. And yeah I mean it's I think next year is the hundred anniversary of the ACTU. So like you know they're saying. Oh, it's just the casualty. Exactly. The next giant is going to take over. I reckon my favorite one was when they their submission to the increase to the minimum wage was like lower than what the fair work. It is militantly. It's actually insane. Like yeah. But I wanted to say some of my favorite Sally McManus moments which were like very early on. She was interviewed when she got the job and was asked about did you know the Labour party deregistered the the BLF and she just had no idea about that. It's cool. You need to know your history. Yeah. It's really good. And then also like I wore a shirt on the project that said like good people disabate bad laws. That was a shirt that Sally McManus wore when she was talking about the CFMU a couple years before you know she put the CFMU into administration with Labour. So yeah. Yeah. When Sally McManus came into the job there was like so much fanfare and excitement because her slogan was you need to like break the rules. You know because the rules are unfair and they limit the capacity for people to strike and which is true. Yeah. You know agree with all of that. But there was the promise of Sally McManus and then there was the reality of Sally McManus and very quickly break the rules became change the rules and then quite literally. And then there wasn't even any discussion about changing the rules after that. They were pretty happy with this sort of situation that they end up in. Yeah. The rules are good. Yeah. Just leave it as it is. It should be right. Yeah. I mean the thing is they came in in opposition and then but most of you know at the time has been now with Labour. And like I don't think it's quite they did actually change a bunch of rules. It's just the rules they changed were very technocratic, very like fair work commission level which have meant that union bureaucrats have more capacity in the fair work commission like the multi enterprise bargaining tools which haven't really seen that much industrial action. Yeah. Using those powers has been like one or two protests here or there but but it just strengthens their hand in the negotiation process. And there's been a bunch of small tweaks which mean the union officials just have more save of what goes on at fair work. But the fundamentals of the situation are like what you guys have said. Like workers industrial action now is at historic lows. Like I'm sure the teachers strikes will do an artificial bump for like one year and that was driven by the NOAA campaign. There would only have been one without that. And they'll write off that for a while. And, you know, like the Michelle and Neil this morning on ABC radio. was saying, "Oh, there's been a slight uptick in membership." It's like, yeah, maybe from like 12.8 to 13.1 or something. Yeah, yeah. But like, we're still bouncing along at the historic bottom of Union density. And I think the NGOization, like, like, the only thing the unions do now is email us after the Labor Party passes legislation. - Yeah. - And it says, "What a big win!" - Big win. - It's like, there was no campaign for this. - Exactly. - We can ask for this. This is just a Labor Party policy being unrolled. - Yeah. - Yeah. And, or rolled out, I should say. And then the unions just clap themselves on the back, like, job well done. - Totally. - So it's just a PR machine for Labor, like, entirely. And so, I mean, to be honest, just from the ASU, which, like, no shade to the members of the ASU, who are great people, but like, as a Union, it's classic Labor Left Union, very much about, like, liberal identity politics, like, all its conferences, it just, like, talk fest about privilege and stuff, and different groups of minority groups of workers, which is all kind of fine. But they're a very passive unit, and they never take any action, they don't fight for their own members. And so, when she was promoted, it was like, okay, the unions are shifting from, like, industrial organizations to political lobby groups for the Labor Party. That's what that's signaled. - Yeah. - And they're going, they're going to go further into that, I suspect. - Have they said who's going to be the replacement yet? I think so. - I think they have to do, like, a, you know, one of those fake election kind of things with the Union secretaries and whatever they get to. - It's pretty quick. Like, she's stepping down in August. - It's basically August. - Yeah, yeah. What if there's some drama or other stuff? - I really loved the way that they started the video. It was like, we wanted you to hear it from us first. And I was like, oh, what's happening? - Gee, we just, I was just, they were retiring. It's like, we're good. - I think it's a shit about that. - Yeah. - I know. Anyway, they've already forgotten. - Yeah. - Rating, gulp, the party line. - So today we've lost another giant. - It's certainly half. Just into Alan has, you know, stepped down. And she was a premier fish in her press release. I think it was 1332 days, something like that. - How many days off a statue is that? - And not a single day was wasted. So. - I agree. But yes, this has been like a couple of months coming now for just into Alan. There was before the winter break for Parliament. There was rumors of a leadership spill coming. They quietened that down. Ben Carroll was asked by a journalist to look in just into Alan's eyes and say that he wouldn't, you know, try and roll her and he hand on hard. - Karen, but I already see you. - And then over the last couple of days, yeah, he's, you know, put the knife in. Backed up by both sections of the right faction and the left faction. And now we're just waiting for Sonia Kilcani to do her, you know, maneuverings to try and become the deputy PM. But it's very highly likely that Ben Carroll, the member Fenidri and the teachers or the education minister is likely to come into play. - Which is great because like, on the way here, I was talking to my mum, she was like, did you know, you know, the Victorian Premier resigned. I was like, yeah, heard about that. And she was like, the article, they were saying the two reasons that resulted in the, the imbattled, I love the word imbattled. Premier's resignation were like crime and the inability to come to a deal over the teachers' stuff. And it's like, well, that's, that's very funny if that's the reason she's resigning and they're putting the guy. - Yeah, he's responsible for that. Well, he's sort of leaking to the media that, oh, actually, I never supported the cut of funding. I'm actually really passionate about education. - Oh, that's so nice to say. - So the teachers have a lot of leverage now. Now that we're fighting the Premier, not just the education minister and Brennan Laws, I can't even say for Nidri, rebel teacher, all over the near Sunday night, he hopefully has a lot of leverage as well. So that is something to watch. But we should probably start by just talking about what goes into the situation. - Yeah, so the context has been well over a year now of just ongoing attacks from the right, the bosses and the media, especially always independent, the age. - Campaining around. - Shippling ground. It employs in. Yeah, it's one of that kind. - Shippling ground. - Homer Eugene, the Grand The Fifth. - I thought it was at the fifth. - Yes, the fifth. - God, the lineage goes back. Anyways, but they've been campaigning about the supposed corruption in the construction industry and have been campaigning about just into Alan's role in helping to basically create the conditions for corruption in the construction industry. So it's been an ongoing, quite intense and very, very political campaign that has led us to this moment. - Yeah, over 100 articles. I asked them Google and Gemini answer over 100 articles about the building bad thing. And the relentless narrative is that, you know, there are real issues, right? - Yes, certainly. - The mafia's involvement. We don't support that. There's set cause of polling personal behavior. But like, the overwhelming thing is that construction workers are getting paid too much. - Yeah. - It's disgraceful that construction workers were earning union wages and had strong health and safety conditions on these sites. - Yeah. - You know, sorry, 14 construction workers die every year on average. The CFMU for all its faults has spent many years fighting to try and bring that number down. And basically, the bourgeois press, the capitalist media are annoyed that bosses can't keep cutting safety corners, can't pay their workers. That's what this is about. The $15 billion, we talked about it a few episodes ago. If you haven't listened to that app, listen to it again. - Definitely. - That $15 billion, one is it totally made up figure. But two is basically the difference between union wages and non-union wages. So they're basically arguing for, you know, the Labor Party to not have supported the CFMU's involvement in these massive projects, which is obviously just disgusting. - So the age is Nick McKenzie has been a real sort of like. - Attack dog. - Around this campaign sort of came up with the building bad sort of slogan to encompass all of this. And yeah, I think it's right to say that there's like a whole bunch of stuff that's not supportable about the leadership of Sekka, you know, some of the stuff that CFMU has done. But yeah, I think it's really right to point out that like most of the articles like look at all the super that these people were paid. How many tens of thousands dollars more construction workers earning than other industry? And it's like, no, actually we support people being paid high wages. But this has been the sort of the basis of the political attack. - And the recent thing about Labor was like, oh, just into Alan personally intervened to ensure that union conditions were like a necessary component of every government contract. - Yeah, that's like a basic. - Yeah, that's actually. - Exactly, there's a positive intervention. Like, yeah, if you look at all of the articles, it's like, how many did we see about like, oh, fucking traffic workers are overpaid? It's like these are the people that are most likely to die on the job because of some idiot driving into them. But also like, there is one element that is kind of Labor's own undoing, and that is the like the Labor hire stuff. Like Labor did their own investigation into criminality in the construction sector. And they found that it's because of Labor hire companies. Predominantly, that's where the big infiltration from organized crime and all that kind of stuff is. And the CFMU opposed the use of Labor hire on, you know, government builds. And, you know, because they run closed shops, the Labor government intervened and were like, "Nah, fuck you. We're doing Labor hire. Labor hire is bad because obviously it's like these companies that do nothing, get like 20% of people's paychecks and whatever." And then, yeah, there you go. Like, you did, you did kind of make this mess. So you got to go lie in it. So part of the big argument from the right, the bosses, the media, has been the need for a royal commission into the construction industry, into corruption, etc. And just into Alan has opposed those calls for whatever her own reasons. Like one that would just cause more political drama for an already sort of unpopular Labor government to, you know, whatever, who knows what they will. I think that's the main thing. What did Alba say? Just like lawyers make money from royal commissions. I've only had applied that. But yeah, I think with Ben Cowell coming in, it's quite likely that this is what we'll be coming out of it. But I think there's something to say here about the what are the priorities of the age, the heralds, the ruling class in Victoria. There's no discussion about what is it like for working class people, the hardship that they face. There's actually a huge amount of corruption and like robbing from ordinary people. Like we've talked a lot about the energy companies and the way that They price gouge, they charge huge amounts of money when they don't need to, etc. There's all of the stuff that Jordi's talked about, about these investors who like build these shoe box apartments, charge hundreds of thousands of dollars for it. And it leaves them empty. Yeah, whatever. Where are the big campaigns about that? Where's the Royal Commission into these companies and corporations? There's nothing. So yeah, it's just like we get fucked over. There's this huge political circus. And that's it. Well like Pauline Hanson, you know, like there is obviously some critical commentary about Pauline Hanson, but it's not from page news every day. There's not a hundred articles being written, relentlessly calling out all of her fascist lives. Yeah, no, it just ventilate her talking points. Yeah, that's all they do. And then like in the comments pieces, they'll be the occasional like Wally Daly piece or Jellyn Malley thing. But it's like, you know, it's not a campaign. Yeah. Like Chipler Grand is not out to get Hanson. He's been out to get labor. And the age has got like, it's like the biggest headline you've ever seen on their website is like just into Alan Roll, oh my god, labor. And the reason they're celebrating is because it's their doing. They're basically saying, look, we did this. And they're not trying to do that to Hanson. They're not doing that to the Liberals. They didn't do it to Morrison. This is just like we're going to the Labor Party. And it kind of reflects like just how right wing the capitalist press is because the Labor Party is a pile of shit in Victoria. It's not a left-hanging party. Yeah. It would be centrist at best. It's authoritarian. It's pro-Israel. It's pro-boss. It's privatized everything, including um, Vic roads and Melbourne water now. It looks like it's happening. So this is not a left-wing government. But they can't tolerate the fact that the Labor Party is like basically a one-party state in Victoria. They want to bring the right back into the game because they want to keep labor honest from the right. And in bringing down just into Alan, that's that's what they feel like they've achieved. Yeah. And I think the other sort of element of it is that any opportunity to undermine the capacity for union like representation, organizing high wages, good conditions. If you can say that those things are corruption, well, then you've gone a long way to boosting the bottom line on a whole range of in a whole range of different industries. So I think like the anti-union element of it is quite major. Even in the context where like union activity is a historical level as we've talked about on even this episode of the podcast. So the more that they can do to undermine union sentiment, I think is good for them. Totally. So should we talk about what Ben Carroll is going to do if he gets in? Well, before that though, I mean, I think there is some stuff to say about like because a lot of what we've just said is focused on like the right-wing attack on the Alan government. But we're no defenders. Just into Alan. She's gone now. You can't speak ill of the dead. That's one of my favorite things. But just into Alan's like replacement of Dan Andrews was in many ways like a right shift even on the Dan Andrews government. One of her early announcements was about the adult time for violent crime policy, which is basically just a carbon copy of a Queensland liberal government policy. But then also the announcements about the public housing towers and the continued destruction of public housing. And these were sort of two big parts of just into Alan's political project. Yeah. And then I already mentioned but the privatization of Vic Rhodes, Melbourne water. The like at the same time doing the like, oh, we're going to bring back the SEC, which is just a reprivatizing it in a different way as well. And then yeah, like cracking down like brutally on protest is every time we go do something, just absolutely horrific. Not a good track record. Yeah. I mean, Victoria still has the memorandum of understanding with Israel in terms of arms trading. There was a land forces conference that was under Alan's watch right 2024. Can't run in the yeah, it would be. She's got ages I think. So you know, they spent millions of dollars bringing internet. Yeah, cops. And as well as cops from New South Wales. That's right. That's crazy. I saw online somewhere like they spend $400 million upgrading the corporate boxes at the Grand Prix. Wait, we paid for that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And a billion dollars on any prison. So like, like just into Alan has run a very right wing labor government like every labor government kind of gets worse. And this is like the worst one. And yeah, the institutionalized underfunding of hospitals and schools. So, you know, like just a structured decline of working class life over many years is what just into Alan represents. And you know, Dan Andrews had that moment of like rebellion against the bosses in COVID. Just into Alan's had not a single moment of that. She's not done anything to Jenny reflect to the left. Yeah. Um, with the exception of the sort of tepid treaty stuff, which is just about co-opting the indigenous rebellion and fight for liberation into just like a state department. And so Ben Carroll's going to really really like nice breath of fresh air. He's going to undo all of the attacks on public housing. He's going to get a really good deal for the teachers. He's going to like, you know, ensure the right to strike index for us. That right. Cool. So shall we pack up? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, definitely. I was trying to do it on my sarcasm. Do it work. No. We were asked to do a disclaimer every time I was sarcasm by the way. No, yes. Ben Carroll is going to be a hop skip and jump to the right. He's from the right. He is indeed. Not being from either of them means anything. Yeah. I think like the factions in the Labour Party have kind of always aligned to different sections of the union movement. And historically, like just into Alan has been from the left faction, but Ben Carroll from the right faction. From a young age, he was a member of the SDA, the shop distributors association, whatever, hell. Right, union. Which, you know, is a union that opposed access to abortion rights, opposed marriage equality and also is famous for doing sweetheart deals with coals and more words to under like, you know, fuck over working conditions just so that the union can have representation in those workplaces. So that's Ben Carroll's like union history. He's a supporter of North Melbourne. And he's also a, an Essenden boy. He went to one of those like funny private schools in Essenden. And his political inspiration is Bill Clinton. Oh, incredible. Wow. So this was an article I think was from the age. I've just got the quote here. It says, if, if Keating loomed large in Carroll's formative years, the third way centrist of Bill Clinton did just as much to inspire his move into politics. Where's that from? In his first speech to parliament. He recalled being in his final year of high school when Clinton was sworn in as US president, promising to deliver more opportunity for all. Clinton. But I'm inspired by him. Oh my god. This was like the neoliberal democratic president who also abused a woman's office famously. Yeah, I guess we're far away from that now that you can be inspired by him again. Totally. Wow. Seriously. Of all the losers of American politics. Like the guy who pretty much set up the American decline. Yeah. Yeah. So Ben Carroll's like indications of what he wants to do as Premier is to be tough on crime and to be tough on corruption. And this is just a acquiescence to this right wing media and ruling class campaign that we've just been discussing. Yeah. It's a real I mean ditching Alan at this late stage. Like they didn't do it in wind like early winter now they're doing it like it's such a desperate attempt to just kind of neutralize the media and maybe like convince the age to go back on their side or whatever. It's just throwing working class people under the bus sacrificing a leader for the sake of like appeasing the media. It's not going to help them. I just think there's no way this is going to revive Labor's fortunes. But the fact that they're prepared to do it and prepared to move sharply to the right attack the union movement even further. I mean if they actually do declare royal commission into the union movement. It's like the only royal commission that's like the only injustices in Australia are the Palestine movement and the union movement. That's the only thing the government's investigating it. Labor federal and state like seriously. That's what happens. Like Labor will deserve everything that's coming for them totally November. And so their hopes is that this can mean that you know going into the on the ground section of the state election campaign they'll just sort of have a more clear run of it. But I think the point that you made earlier. are about the fact that the like the ruling class in Victoria, they want to make the Victorian politics more competitive. And if that means like, you know, giving more ground to one nation, to take sections of Melbourne's West and they're out of reach, like regions, they're happy with that. This could actually help the Liberals fortunes and the Liberals have been into climbing a massive way in Victoria. So, you know, this is unlikely to revive the popularity of the Labour Party, not the we care about that that much at all. But yeah, I think it just sort of as an indication into sort of how right wing formal politics has become in Victoria. >> Totally. Good news. >> Yeah. >> On Sunday, I was called into the office by Nick, who's a student teacher, media, Wrangler, extraordinaire. He had the idea of doing a press conference to announce the fact that Victorian socials is running, I think 13 teachers across Victoria in the upcoming state election. And I was at like an anti-Juss, anti-racism strategy event. And then I rushed over to the office. >> I saw you rushing by. >> I think I passed my stall. And actually, yeah, I hitched a hike with Chris Dye and I had a candidate about it. He was in an Uber, which is how an Richmond candidate gets around. But Thomas Towing candidate certainly doesn't get around in Uber. Yeah, just other people's Uber's. >> Anyway, so we had this press conference and the media loved it. Like they had it up. So, we got coverage on 9 and the ABC and maybe SBS about how we're running these rebel teacher campaigns. And it's got a lot of support online. And I think it's like an attempt to kind of put it out there that there's more than there's not just like Labour and the right in this election. There's a radical left alternative that represents the political aspirations of unionists and radicals who believe that a better education system is possible. And I just want to play the clip because I think it's a fucking cool. >> And teacher turmoil continues to cause a headache for the government. A group of rebel educators are putting up candidates in more than half a dozen Labour held seats, including pitting teacher Brendan Laws against Deputy Leader Ben Carroll in the electorate of Nidry. >> And we are running to win. We're here to win at the ballot box. >> The group are members of the Victorian Socialists Party and not happy with the government's latest. >> So you're not happy? >> So good. Yeah. >> One thing that I found out in my research this morning is that Ben Carroll's mum was born in Texas and Brendan Laws who were running against Ben Carroll was also born in Texas. So I think that's like a funny coincidence. >> So do we need to vote for someone else? [laughter] >> Of the protest against American and Birrily. >> But yeah, I think it's really fantastic. It's so good to be able to say like, yeah, there's these rebel teachers and educators who want to fight back against the Labour government and I think it's a real sort of idiot move for the Labour Party to put Ben Carroll in as the premier in the context where he's just spent the last couple of months swucking over teachers. >> And I think the no campaign can take some credit for that, right? >> Absolutely. He would have assumed this would all be done by him. >> Yeah. >> And we are the reason it's not done. The last vote was 51% to 49. Like, oh, if it's definitely swung that. And so, yeah, this issue is lingering and actually the longer it lingers, the more likely we are to win concessions because you can't run for premier on the basis of having fucked over all these teachers and failed to get an agreement. So I think, you know, if we had a leading leadership with any gusto, they would be announcing a strike like now. >> Yeah, totally. >> And saying that we're going on strike unless we get everything we're asking for and Ben Carroll. >> We have to be like, yeah. >> Yeah, exactly. That we'll see. >> So, yeah, we need to build up those kind of movements that can have that confidence to know when an opportunity is presenting itself and take it. But for that, you need to have a sense that it's right to be oppositional, it's right to fight, it's right to demand more. And that's just missing from politics in Australia in such a real way. Like, I think horizons are so low because we've been fed shit for so long. And I think it's the role of socialist movement, socialist politics. To be like, we're not going to fucking take shit anymore. Like, we're going to demand what we deserve. And more on top of that. And giving people a sense that our horizons should be higher is why we like, that's what a socialist movement can build. >> Totally. >> Right, in goat, the party line. >> I heard that there was a really good theatre production in Adelaide the other weekend. >> Yeah, really good script writing. >> Yeah. >> Very tight. >> Yeah. The stage manager had like all the cues ready to go. People knew their lines. It was really good. The ALP federal conference. >> Yeah. Yeah. I didn't actually hear some great things about how it was so well stage managed. >> Albinese was really happy about the conference for two reasons. One was that it went for three days instead of a week, which is. >> Get it over with. >> Yeah. >> And that it was the most united conference that he's ever been to since he first joined the Labour Party. >> Yeah, they're not for debates or anything like that. We've just got to get it done in three days and keep doing what we were doing. >> Three days. I mean, even that's generous. Why not just move all the motions on block and then just go to the pub, you know? >> Like, is it going to start? It kind of sounds like a good guy. >> Yeah. >> But the narrative about it is basically that unity, discipline, whatever. It basically reflects the Labour Party has no principles and no points. It's just a machine that exists to win government and stay in government and govern with no interest in any kind of transformation or even just mild improvements of society. Because the Labour government right now is failing on every measure. And yet the entire membership of the party, I just prepared to sit there willingly on stone. >> Yeah. >> And get Albinese, he's tick of approval. >> Yeah. >> And if you were anyone with any hope in the Labour Party, I feel like the last weekend, the last few days should have just like absolutely abolished that for you. And I think it did for some people. Like, on Sunday, I spoke to two people on the, like, just on the street in Carlton. One of them, her great grandfather was Labour Premier for a hundred days in coalition with the country party at the time I believe. And she was like, this is just like, you know, I'm a, obviously from a Labour family. If, you know, my great grandfather being in a coalition government with a country party didn't tell me I don't know why I didn't feel like I'm just done. Like, this is absolutely ridiculous. And then I spoke to another, like an older lady who had been a Labour member for 50 years. All of a shit is windy outside. And she was like, you know, I want to meet the socialist candidate. This is ridiculous. So yeah, like. >> And were you like, hi. >> Yeah. He's like, hey, that's me. Sick. Yeah. Good thing I'm here. >> Yeah. So the biggest kind of like question, what, it's like I don't even want to call it a debate because it never got to the stage. >> No, it wasn't even a debate. >> Was the proposed motion on the question of Palestine by Ed Hewsyk. Ed was kicked out of the front bench a number of months ago and has spent his sort of time in obscurity trying to present as though there's like opposition inside the Labour Party. His opposition has gone nowhere. And I think this motion that he attempted to move, which was a very weak motion that just sort of said like, all the UN thinks that there's been some bad stuff that's happened in Palestine. Yeah, this motion didn't even make it to conference four. >> Yeah, it was not even allowed to be discussed. And it says a lot about the modern Labour Party, I think, in a bunch of ways. First, like this guy is from the NSW right. Ed Hewsyk is a right wing figure. He's on the right of the party. >> One of the most right wing Labour parties as well. >> Yeah. So he's from the NSW right. And he's allied with like Bob Carr, who was one of the Labour Party in NSW right wing parameters. But the NSW right mostly operates in Western Sydney. And so they had this electoral thing of like, well, most of our voters are Muslim and my grants and whatever. So we want to kind of genie-flake to that. And so they've been pushing this thing about like recognizing Palestine in statehood and just generally trying to be like rhetorically a bit more even-handed when it comes to the Israel genocide in Gaza, whatever. So the motion is very limited. It doesn't call to expel the ambassador, to cut ties or anything like that. But it does recognize that genocide happened. And that Israel is in apartheid side. >> Not even that. It notes that the ICJ has said that it's plausible that it happened. Like it's a bit more qualified. But like, so it sort of does that thing about genocide. And then it calls Israel in apartheid state, which is just language that the Labour party just has never tolerated and still doesn't tolerate. But even this tepid motion, which doesn't actually require almost any radical or even like decisive intervention at all from the government, there's just this massive effort to squash it. And the motion I read this morning like the way he set it up was that he actually, they moved the motion twice because they didn't trust the people who were seconding the motion. He had a seconder. And so the MUA and the ETUs, the Maritime Union and the Electrically Trade Union, they both left unions nominally. They both seconded it. So there was two motions because he thought one of them would pull out. But it didn't think both of them would pull out, which is what happened. And it turns out, like the way he describes it is, like there was this enormous behind the scenes effort to crush this motion. and ensure that there was no discussion of the situation in Palestine whatsoever. Yeah, I saw an MUA post this morning about why they pulled out and whatever and their reason was that, like, well, if it went up, the, like, pro-Israel sections of the Labor Party would have made it, like, even, even worse, like the Labor Platform, even worse than already is. And it's like, that should tell you something about the party that you're a part of. Absolutely. Like, yeah, the, like, also the amount of effort that this man would have had to go through the amount of meetings and whatever, and hours and hours and, like, to get this passetically worded motion up only for it to not even be discussed is, like, give up, like, stop it. This is absolutely useless in the Labor Party. And then the way that the Labor Party sort of, what, the way that they wanted to have the discussion about Palestine and Israel was again to sort of try and make it about unity somehow. So they got Josh Burns, who's a pro-Israel politician from Victoria and bus him up to who is a Palestinian man. They got them up to shake hands and talk about how, you know, they could have had a motion that was divisive. But instead they wanted to have a motion that represented the unity of the Labor Party. And Josh Burns waxed lyrical about the beauty of a two-state solution, two peoples living side by side with democratic rights and freedoms. And this is what Labor stands for. And they're embraced, you know, really set the scene for how Labor wants to govern and oh, just makes you sick. I know. And this is important because, uh, Basim Abdul was the replacement in the last election for the woman who came before. I forgot her name now. Great woman. Anyway, Labor left kind of, uh, branch of the party in Colwell. In Colwell, broad matters. So like the most sort of multicultural part of Melbourne, um, with a specifically Arab and Muslim kind of a Turkish kind of community there. And they put in Basim Abdul because, um, they knew Labor was losing support in the, as a result of the genocide. And so they picked this Palestinian guy purely as a front for the Labor Party. And there were actually debates in the Palestine movement in Melbourne because I was the candidate against him. And this isn't about me at all. But like, the argument was about social, like, like, do you want a Palestinian in the Labor Party to advocate for change from within or should the movement break with Labor and support alternative politics that's principled and staunch and whatever? And actually there was quite a sharp division in the movement and a number of people said no, it's better there's a Palestinian. Yeah. And this also happened in Cooper where there was, uh, the Greens were going to, we're talking about running a Palestinian woman who's also very involved in the movement. And there were people in the movement and said, no, we shouldn't run against Jed Kani because Jed Kani is a good voice in the Labor Party for Palestine. But this is the reality. Like Basim Abdul's, the entire purpose of his existence was to shake Josh Burns's hand and squash the Gaza motion. That's why he exists. He's existence is as a normalizing pro genocide frontman for the Arab and Muslim community. And I hope some people learn a lesson from this, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I got politics matters. Yeah. And like, there's no, you don't get anywhere by sucking up to people inside institutions. You get, you get places by building a movement outside them. And then if they change to a accommodate, well, good. Yeah. That's great. But the, the, the movement's power independently from the parties where gets it done. And this is still relevant because the, you know, the Labor Party is continuing to try and co-opt figures from the Palestine movement and from the Muslim community. Just last week, the Muslim envoy put out a report about Islamophobia and so on. And it was the most milk toast crap, you know, compared to the anti-Semitism thing. Yeah. Like just absolutely not getting a role commission. No, it didn't mention anything about governments or bosses. It was just about like attitudes, community attitudes, stuff like that. But nothing about structural Islamophobia, which is obviously very deliberate. And so the result of this is that basically we have a Labor Party committed to genocide and a Palestinian Labor MP who's like the face of that. Yeah. And so, you know, that's the lesson of Labor. But you can't, you're not going to get changed from a misinstitution. Yeah. And I think we've seen over the last number of years of the Labor Government federally and in Victoria, the way that they can ensure that politics is dampened, as I said before, horizons are lowered, that the interests of the bosses are prioritized. This is Labor. Labor is not a working class alternative. Labor is not a progressive voice. There's no room for criticism. There's no room for even the smallest amount of disagreement. And I think, you know, we have sort of noted over the last little while that Victorian Socialist and the Socialist Party has been picking up people who have been members of the Labor Party and a dissolution with that. And it's like, if you are a member of the Labor Party and you're listening to this podcast, you are already too left-wing to be in that party. Yeah, totally. It's just why listening to this podcast. So, you know, I encourage you to leave that party and help us actually build an actual working class alternative to the shit of Australian politics. Yeah. And before we wrap up, I just want to read from this article because this is what, you know, I mean, this is what was happening at the Labor Conference, like debate shut down, you know, made it a smaller period of time to again avoid more debate, more discussion. You know, this was happening in Labor and Victoria, like absolutely nothing, just like, you know, popularity contest between, like, I don't know, Labor members. This is the, this is in the financial review and it's called Labor's political speed dating is working ministers to the bone. Poor, poor darling. Yeah. So, and it starts by saying forget a contest of ideas. Labor's 50th National Conference in Adelaide this week is a festival of fundraising. At least that's what one attendee called it. So like, I don't know, there's a really important, like political things that we need to address in this country, in my opinion, but instead, chief executives and lobbyists are paying $12,000 per ticket to attend the federal Labor Business Exchange on the sidelines of the conference drawn from subscribers of Labor's pay for access scheme known as. Pay for access scheme. Yeah, that's what they're calling it. So it's like, it's actually called the federal Labor Business Forum, for which membership starts at 33,000. So these executives pay $33,000 to be like in the program and then another $12,000 to attend this event so that they can be like, here's what policy they use for us. Seriously, do you think maybe that would be corruption? Or is it only trade unions that do. Yeah, I wish it only. Exactly, but also only if the liberals do it. This is good business practice. Yeah, yeah, it's about hearing all voices. So that's the kind of voices that they do want to hear from, not ours, not even like their most. Not even poor Ed's. Yeah, not even Labor members themselves, like Labor fucking parliamentarians. So yeah, like obviously this institution is not worth our time to change from within because it just like, look, every time someone tries, look what they show us. So yeah, I think the answer to all of this rubbish is to build a socialist movement. Isn't that what Albo's doing? Yeah, definitely. So it was left, actually, and in control. Certainly. And the same with Justin Dallan, actually that's what I thought in Daniel Andrews, the socialist left. Left. Or what are they like soft and hard left, what are they like, what the fuck? Dust drill left. Yeah, like, okay, they're just making up. What are they sometimes like? Yeah, Labor party. But yeah. All of them lacking a backbone, exactly. Yeah, during the socialist party, build a socialist movement that can fight back against, like literally no matter who wins this election, yeah, them. Yeah. Rating goat, the party line. Well, thanks so much for listening to the party line. If you liked the podcast, you can subscribe. That certainly can. You can. $33,000 a year. For the pay for access, getting an adoption to the Patreon. We'll give you a 12 minute segment. One person did that. Like, it'd be pretty good. Yeah. I don't think we have that kind of clientele. Okay. But if you don't have $33,000 that you have like $10 a month, you could become a member of our Patreon and help support the podcast that way and share that with your friends and come along on Saturday. Thanks for listening. So bye.