Shorten’s sop to the Left: a bung for the bureaucrats of the UN, by Satyajeet Marar.

You may have missed it in the Christmas rush, but opposition leader Bill Shorten proposes to quadruple taxpayer handouts to the United Nations Refugees Agency, in a move that will curry favour with Labor Left.

At the Labor national conference in Adelaide near the end of last year Bill Shorten announced that a Labor government would massively increase funding to the United Nations Refugee Agency to the tune of $500 million. The money will come from a slew of tax hikes set to hurt middle Australians and retirees, including Labor’s retiree tax, negative gearing changes and capital gains tax hike.

Priorities, priorities. Like importing new Labor voters.