What the papers say today, Tuesday, December 14, 1999

AAP General News (Australia)
12-14-1999
What the papers say today, Tuesday, December 14, 1999

SYDNEY, Dec 14 AAP - One could only sympathise with Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson
yesterday as he tried to deny the Government wants a two-tiered wage system for the city
and bush, the Canberra Times says in its editorial.

In denying the Government wants such a system he appeared to contradict Treasurer Peter
Costello, who had mused that lowering minimum wages in rural and regional areas might
be one way of tackling unemployment, it says.

The paper notes an Australian Local Government Association report that city-bush income
inequality was growing.

"Now it is true that part of the reason for this disparity is the reluctance of enterprises
to locate their operations outside the metropolitan areas, and the consequent higher unemployment
rates in the bush," it adds.

"Some way must be found of attracting business back to the bush, it continues. "The
question is whether it is fair of proper for this to be done by formalising and legitimising
wage inequality?"

A little more than a week ago the fiasco of the Seattle World Trade Organisation meeting
caused much international hand-wringing about stymied free trade, the Adelaide Advertiser
says in its editorial.

"Last weekend the heads of the European Union gathered in Helsinki and added to the
number of countries eligible for membership.

"It is now likely that by the middle of the next decade a united Europe will stretch
from (mainly Muslim) Turkey through the Aegean to the Baltic, perhaps 28 nation states,
constituent members of the new, second superstate," it says.

"This is an enormous challenge for Australia as it seeks to redefine its 21st century
trade and economic relationships."





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