The post-election political chaos has brought the disadvantage of regional Australia to the nation's attention. This geographical inequity was portrayed by Emeritus Professor Tony Vinson as 'hidden', in a 2007 report titled Dropping Off The Edge The Distribution Of Disadvantage In Australia. Vinson demonstrated that extreme social disadvantage is real, measurable, endemic to a small number of locations in regional areas, and fixable.
Fortuitous political circumstances have now forced the Federal Government to act. If that is what the 'new paradigm' is all about, it can only be a good thing. Except that allocating a fairer share of Commonwealth funding for the bush will probably lead to a fresh set of inequities, because it is being driven by the need to buy political support, and not the demonstrated needs of rural Australians.
Hospitals will be renewed in the electorates of Lyne and New England, while others in equal or greater need will miss out. Wagga Wagga Base Hospital is rundown, and it had been ranked at the top of the priority list for rebuilding. But last week, hospitals at Tamworth and Port Macquarie won preferential treatment under the deals struck between Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Independent MPs Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott.
There is also speculation that communities in Lyne and New England will be given priority for connection to the National Broadband Network. If the common good or the most pressing need were previously the determining factors, they have now been cast aside.
Pork-barrelling has always been part of the political process, but that does not make it any less of a scandal. Politicians steal from those whose votes do not count and give to others whose votes ensure their political security. If Labor is serious about governing for all Australians, it will find a way of convincing the Independents to support funding allocations and priorities for regional Australia that address the greatest need.
The Independents are not in an unassailable position, as was apparent last week when Windsor let slip his belief that the alliance with Labor rather than the Coalition is more likely to allow him to remain in his pivotal position of power. If she wants to, Gillard is surely able to use this to ensure a more appropriate distribution of funds among rural Australians.
It is not the case that experts lack a detailed breakdown of where regional Australia's greatest needs lie. Various studies have been completed,