Labels have power. They shape the way we know the world. They allow people to see actions with greater clarity or distort our understanding to make things unrecognisable. When war involves “collateral damage,” the label strips the incident of shredded flesh and wailing orphans. By labelling the near elimination of abortion access a Pro Life Continue reading »
Government
There is nothing that agitates some whitefellas more than an intelligent, articulate and charismatic blackfella. The emphasis the No Campaign is putting on Thomas Mayo is a classic example. Thomas Mayo attended the Uluru gathering and afterwards travelled the country visiting hundreds of communities to explain the Voice. At each he movingly recited from memory Continue reading »
The Royal Commission into Robo-debt has provided significant insights into how a cavalier government can ignore fundamental processes of good governance by ignoring accepted standards of decision making to pursue its ideological agenda. Commissioner Catherine Holmes is to be congratulated for her comprehensive consideration of the Robo-debt scheme which “lacked a legal framework and revealed Continue reading »
The Holmes report into the Robodebt scandal gives the Albanese government all the authority and mandate it needs for root and branch reform of the public service, including a spill of its senior leadership. Bet your life, however, that this administration simply lacks the courage, and that all we will see is some piecemeal changes, Continue reading »
A lot of opportunities have been missed to engage more closely with Indonesia over the last few decades, a period when Australian government enthusiasm and funding for engagement with Indonesia declined significantly. Correcting that is getting harder as time goes on and Indonesia grows in economic and political influence. The recent three-day visit to Australia Continue reading »
The Federal Government has been urged to ignore advice from Private Healthcare Australia (PHA) suggesting that private health insurance funds have an important role in increasing access to dental services. Rather, it is the underfunded and overworked public dental services that have expertise in delivering services to vulnerable people, says health policy analyst Charles Maskell-Knight. Continue reading »
At the heart of setting the age of the qualifying child for Parenting Payment (PP) is the question: when should a sole parent cease to be treated as a person whose primary responsibility is to care for children and more like a person seeking paid work? Sole parents are, due to the absence of a Continue reading »
As one of the pipers for the Australian War Memorial, I get a unique view of the crowds around the Pool of Reflection during the daily ritual that is the Last Post Ceremony. Invariably, the faces are solemn and reflective. Not infrequently there are tears. On the way out, I move with the crowd. The Continue reading »
The Australian War Memorial Council believes it’s a strength that Council members can campaign against Council decisions – a far sighted and enlightened view in many ways but also one that could allow a minority to undermine the AWM’s mission. Recently the Defending Country Memorial Project Inc wrote to AWM Chair, Kim Beazley and the Continue reading »