All Articles
-
JESSIE BATKIN-WALKERDEN. Homelessness: Why Early Intervention Matters
Early intervention is a vital piece of the complex puzzle, that is Australia’s homelessness. Long-term, appropriate and stable housing is becoming increasingly unattainable for many people. The current state of housing unaffordability leads to many people being at risk of becoming homelessness, or indeed being homeless. Continue reading »
-
CHARLES LIVINGSTONE. The Crown allegations show the repeated failures of our gambling regulators (the Conversation 30 July 2019)
Regulatory failure has been a hot topic in Australia recently. Royal commissions into the financial and aged care sectors have revealed major regulatory failures. The harm done by these oversights has been significant. Regulation is not just red tape. It protects the interests of those who put their faith, money, and in some cases, loved Continue reading »
-
ANDREW FARRAN. Boris will get his Brexit but at what cost?
Will PM Boris Johnson crash through and with what consequences if he does? He has set himself a wild challenge, on the level of do or die. Determined to achieve Brexit even without a deal, the likelihood at this stage is that he will get his Brexit but with consequences that will leave Britain anything Continue reading »
-
FRANCES RUSH. No Protection – No Hope
A 39 year old man from Iran arrived by boat in 2013. He was not permitted to apply for a Temporary Protection Visa until 2017. For six years he has lived in fear and struggled with mental trauma. He has no protection, no income, no social support and no family. He believes he has no Continue reading »
-
ANDREW GLIKSON. $trillion space games and false prophecies by billionaires while Rome burns
History testifies to powerful rulers’ aspirations for the position of gods, including the Pharaohs and Roman Emperors such as Caligula or Nero, nowadays mimicked by false messianic prophecies of “intergalactic civilization” made by billionaires and their followers in public and the media, including some scientists. This includes predictions of making life interplanetary by giant proprietors of space Continue reading »
-
NOEL TURNBULL. Putting lipstick on a pig
The phrase putting lipstick on a pig is probably unfair to pigs. For a generation brought up on Miss Piggy it might even be incomprehensible. But it does sum up a public relations innovation which resulted in a man who had been convicted of sexual assault getting positive coverage in the US magazines Forbes, HuffPost Continue reading »
-
WILLIAM D. HARTUNG. The US Military-Industrial Complex on Steroids (TomDispatch 16.7.2017)
When, in his farewell address in 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned of the dangers of the “unwarranted influence” wielded by the “military-industrial complex,” he could never have dreamed of an arms-making corporation of the size and political clout of Lockheed Martin. In a good year, it now receives up to $50 billion in government contracts, a sum larger Continue reading »
-
JOSEPH MARTOS. Can laypeople lead a parish? Look to Louisville for a thriving example.
In his recent book Worship as Community Drama, sociologist Pierre Hegy described an unusual Catholic parish whose identity he hid under the name Church of the Resurrection. When the book was published earlier this year and we read the chapter titled “A Lay-Run Parish: Consensus Without a Central Authority,” we could tell that it was Continue reading »
-
JACK WATERFORD. When loyalty and duty are in conflict
How the new AFP chief juggled his role during an investigation that compromised his own superior Reece Kershaw, the new Australian Federal Police Commissioner deserved to get the appointment via an open and independent appeal process. He might well have won it, and, assuming that he did, would be walking into the job in a Continue reading »
-
How good is Scott Morrison?
By any standard, Scott Morrison’s Government has a very threadbare policy agenda. Furthermore, the Government seems resistant to new ideas, whether they are from its backbench or the public service. According to Scott Morrison the role of the public service is limited to implementing government policy, which may help explain the thinness of his Government’s Continue reading »
-
MUNGO MACCALLUM. Labor accepts ritual humiliation.
One, two, three, four Keeping faith’s a dreadful bore. Five, six, seven, eight Tap the mat, capitulate. This, it appears, is Labor’s new tribal chant. And needless to say, it is less of a battle cry than a muted whimper. Continue reading »
-
Speaking out loud for the silenced
Scott M. has a new group of faves. It used to be that “hard working Australians” were top of his pops, along with those who benefit from the hard work of others through tax, negative gearing,“canny investments” and superannuation perks. They are still cherished and protected but even closer to Mr Morrison’s heart are “Quiet Continue reading »
-
PETER DAVIDSON. Multiplication’s the name of the game: infrastructure and Newstart trump tax cuts as an economic stimulus
When growth is slowing and interest rates are falling, the evidence indicates that a timely investment in social housing and an increase in Newstart are more likely to boost growth in jobs and incomes and provide better value than tax cuts, especially those going to high income-earners. Every dollar invested in social housing and Newstart Continue reading »
-
MASSIMO FAGGIOLI. The rise of ‘devout schismatics’ in the Catholic Church. {La Croix International”, 16.7.2019)
“If Matteo Salvini becomes prime minister, Italy will have a government led by a Catholic who is devout but schismatic.” So said Sergio Romano, a former Italian ambassador to NATO and the ex-Soviet Union, in a recent opinion piece in the Italian daily Il Corriere della Sera. Continue reading »
-
ALLAN PATIENCE. How to advance Australia.
In his important new book How to Defend Australia, Hugh White has placed before us a very clear picture of the contemporary security challenges now confronting Australia. First and foremost is China’s re-emergence as a (or maybe the) major power in the Western Pacific. This challenge for Australia is heightened by the Trump administration’s confusing Continue reading »
-
JOHN MCCARTHY. Enter, Boris.
Engaging in meetings and over dinner in London recently with British figures observing or involved in the Brexit process brought home that, while Australians follow the Brexit drama, we know little of its detail. We enjoy the sport, but try explaining the Irish Backstop in your local pub. Continue reading »
-
MUNGO MACCALLUM. Cultural warriors caught in conflict of loathing.
Once again, the cultural warriors of the right are caught in a conflict of loathing. They would love to see Julie Bishop and Christopher Pyne embarrassed and humiliated – they were supporters of the arch fiend Turnbull, renegades from the Miraculous Morrison and his band of angels. They deserve to be cast into the nethermost Continue reading »
-
JOHN DWYER -Failed regulation in health.
When I was much younger I often dipped into Ripley’s “Believe it or not” for a laugh, amazement and even enlightenment. I had a look at their website recently as I prepared to tell you a story that would fit well into their library and found that “Ripley’s” is alive and well, daily producing their Continue reading »
-
JAMES LAURENCESON. The efficacy of being very vocal: Australia and human rights in China (ACRI)
Last week’s news that the Australian Dr Yang Hengjun was being moved to a criminal facility in China was, to use Foreign Minister Marise Payne’s words, “deeply disappointing” to say the least. Continue reading »
-
PAUL MOSES. Putting Church above Children. The Vatican Fails to Comply with a UN Treaty
One way Pope Francis could move ahead with his aim of curbing clergy sex abuse in the worldwide Catholic Church would be to insist that the Holy See comply with the international human-rights treaty it signed to protect the rights of the child. Since nearly every country in the world (other than the United States) Continue reading »
-
PETER SAINSBURY. Sunday environmental round up, 28 July 2019
Hunger is on the increase again and the world will need yet more food over the next three decades. How can we properly feed 10 billion people and save the planet? Do the solutions lie in technology, behaviour change or socio-economic change? While the Australian government continues to ignore climate change, state, territory and local Continue reading »
-
Saturday’s Good Reading and Listening for the weekend
A regular collection of links to writings and broadcasts in other media Continue reading »
-
THE HON BOB CARR. Tribute to Graham Freudenberg.
The speech arrived on the Premier’s desk already clipped into the black leather folder. Did my staff realise that coming from the pen of the master and being a speech of welcome to a US President I would be disinclined to change a word? If so, their instincts were right. Two weeks after Bill Clinton Continue reading »
-
JOHN MENADUE. Vale Graham Freudenberg
A dear friend and colleague, Graham Freudenberg, died this morning at the Redcliffe Hospital. He was admired and will be mourned by many people who knew him personally and a great number of people who knew him in public recognition of his work. Throughout his long illness, he remained courageous and concerned for people around Continue reading »
-
CAROL SUMMERHAYES. Vale Graham Freudenberg.
Graham revealed in his memoir that he wrote his first speech in Brisbane in May 1945, aged 10, at the time of VE Day, and delivered it to his mother. In 1946 he scored a job with ABC Radio reading scripts of school broadcasts – “I learned a lot about the use of English written Continue reading »
-
SUSAN RYAN. Vale Graham Freudenberg.
Anyone who has heard of Graham Freudenberg, and most aware Australians have, think of him not so much as an individual , but in association with the great men, the massive political personalities whom he served. Continue reading »
-
ERIC WALSH. Vale Graham Freudenberg .
The family of Graham Freudenberg, his influential political contacts, his many friends and admirers, the Australian Labor Party and Australia itself are diminished by his passing after a long illness. Continue reading »
-
ABUL RIZVI: Government Responds to Dutton’s Visa Chaos on Asylum Seekers
The Government has at last responded to the chaos in our visa system. In response to a question from Senator Keneally, Senator Linda Reynolds has suggested the bridging visa backlog is apparently due to an unexpected surge in visa applications that caught Home Affairs off-guard. Also, in 2018-19 there has been a 12 percent fall Continue reading »
-
DUNCAN GRAHAM. Joko Widodo is no Lee Kuan Yew
Even read in English it’s a stirring speech with hints of John F Kennedy’s inaugural address: ‘Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country’. By the standards of Indonesian President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo, a normally awkward public performer, it was well delivered, calling on voters Continue reading »