Australia’s Pacific neighbours deserve much better from our foreign minister. Australia is becoming a de facto nuclear armed state. Australia has allowed US nuclear propelled—and quite likely nuclear armed—submarines free access to Australian naval bases, US Air Force nuclear weapons capable B-52 bombers have access to at least two RAAF air bases, and more than Continue reading »
Government
Based on its review of “the changes in the Chinese barley market” that it started in April this year, the Commerce Ministry on Saturday lifted the anti-dumping and countervailing duties it levied on imported Australian barley from May 2020. The Australian side immediately expressed its welcome to the move, including that by Australian Prime Minister Continue reading »
It is dispiriting that the Public Service Act Amendment Bill now before the Parliament says so little about ‘merit’. Nothing about secretary appointments and terminations and only a minor grammatical change to clarify that ministers are not able to direct agency heads about individuals’ employment. Yet we have: the Robodebt Royal Commission highlighting ‘the lengths Continue reading »
White Australians like to think of themselves as an egalitarian and frank people, despising pretentiousness, while basking in a reputation for larrikinism and mateship. But this is all a front, papering over a culture that is deeply racist, excessively masculinist, and incorrigibly populist. Indeed, from its very beginnings, white Australia has been a morally backward Continue reading »
At the Australian Labor Party’s upcoming national conference in Brisbane, recognition of a Palestinian state — pursuant to Labor’s 2021 national platform that supports the recognition of Israel and Palestine as part of a two-state solution — is on the agenda. Senior Labor party figures, including former Foreign Ministers Bob Carr and Gareth Evans, have already come out in Continue reading »
In his recent comprehensive P&I article ( “Abandoned sovereignty: Australia’s intelligence function colonised by US”) Mike Scrafton has raised serious concerns about Defence Minister Marles’ announcement at the recent AUSMIN talks of the creation of “Combined Intelligence Centre – Australia” within our Defence Intelligence Organisation (DIO) by 2024. Details of how this extraordinary joint Australian-US Continue reading »
The Robodebt Royal Commission revelations have triggered revulsion in all fair-minded Australians. They’ve also stimulated a critically important national conversation about what could be going on in Australian government, including in the Australian Public Service (APS), that such a thing was even possible. For 40 years now, without most Australians realising it, the APS has Continue reading »
The Robodebt Royal Commission has shown that the Australian Public Service is at a crossroads. It can be a professional and ethical APS that serves the public interest through the government of the day. Or it can be an overtly politicised service, little different from the staff in ministerial offices. What must not persist is Continue reading »
It’s hard to credit, but the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) continues its incessant grumbling about forms of interference across a number of areas of Australian political and economic debate. What stands out in this method of noisy declaration is the tactic of sidelining legitimate public debate. Such interference supposedly impairs the credibility of the Continue reading »
The Australian Universities Accord Interim Report shows an echidna on its cover, in keeping, Education Minister Jason Clare acknowledges, with the spikey issues he is attempting to address in the education system. His goal is to reduce inequality in Australian society while improving the quality of education across the system. Clare gets the point that Continue reading »