A few days behind the times, but what a disappointment this decision was.
Cabinet has rejected both the Productivity Commission recommendations for cheaper book imports and Competition Minister Craig Emerson's "compromise" plan. Dr Emerson had proposed that Australian publishers be required to publish works for which they hold copyright within a week of their international release, rather than the current time limit of 30 days, or face competition from overseas imports.
In short, Australians will continue paying more for books because for some reason successive governments have decided that the printing and publishing industry should be protected from foreign competition.
How can Kevin Rudd claim to support an education revolution when he leads a government that rejected a decision to make books cheaper?
The arguments coming from the independent booksellers who were against the proposed changes are quite confusing.
And independent booksellers -- although they opposed the abolition of import restrictions -- also struck out at the government for failing to reform the industry to allow local bookshops to compete with large online sellers such as Amazon, which pays no GST.
Fiona Stager, who owns the Avid Reader bookstore in the inner Brisbane suburb of West End, said the government had squandered an opportunity to reform the book industry in the face of ongoing digitisation and online retailing.
"It breaks my heart when I say to people that we don't have a book in stock yet, and they say 'I'll just get it on Amazon'," Ms Stager said.
"Amazon pays no GST, they don't remember their customers' children's names, they don't support local schools and charities, which is something that all bookshops in Australia do every day.
"We are fighting this kind of shifting consciousness where people think, 'Oh, I'll just get it on Amazon', as if Amazon is this kind of benevolent charity," she said.
It's hard to feel sorry about independent book-sellers losing market share if they opposed the reform that would have made them more competitive. And there solution, instead of listening to customers complaints about delayed supply and excessive costs they propose a tariff on foreign competition. Sorry guys, but we live in a global marketplace, and if a new book is 15 bucks cheaper from bookdepository.co.uk that is where I am buying it.
The sad thing is, although this decision is relatively small compared to the big tariff decisions of the past, it does show the Rudd and the current Labor government are a far cry from the pro-market reformists of Hawke and Keating.
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