Brotherhood Comment April 2006

ISSN 320 8632A regul Ar upd Ate from Soci Al Action And r e Se ArchApril 2006COAG, the PM and a new social policy frontierimmense economic strength that The 10 February 2006 communiqué The COAG initiative signals has resulted have in some ways of the Council of Australian that social policy neglect is opened up these deeper social Governments (COAG) signals not an option. As the National policy questions to become the that social policy is back at the Reform Initiative Working Group new frontier of policy development centre of national political life. For (COAG 2005) put it: ‘It is … and innovation. (Howard 2006)some time at the Brotherhood of more important than ever that St Laurence we have argued that governments create the space for Indeed we face a new frontier. federal government performance the new investments’ (p.3), not The need for development and in economic policy has not been least to avert greater future costs innovation is particularly acute in matched in social policy and resulting from inaction. More Australia. In part this is because that we need a new integration importantly, they say, it is not we are in the midst of removing of the two. We welcome the just about avoiding costs. It is a key policy lever by which we announcement that the key social about all Australians reaping the have managed matters of social policy areas of health, mental economic benefits of investing protection and cohesion—the health, training and ...