Writer
Jack Waterford
John Waterford AM, better known as Jack Waterford, is an Australian journalist and commentator.
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Time to get fair dinkum, or the Voice proposal will lose momentum and support
Many of the proponents of the Voice referendum already agree that the referendum should go forward only if a Yes vote is a virtual certainty. Some expect that the effect of a rejection of the proposal would be catastrophic for First Nations people. Continue reading »
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No guts, no glory in deposing the King
Right thinking Australians ought to want their nation to be a republic led by a president rather than by a protestant King or Queen of England. Even the local self-effacing should want it if only for international and national self-respect. Continue reading »
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Republican Albanese imprisoned by royal protocol
I was arrested at a visit by then Prince Charles to Alice Springs in 1977 for handing out press statements on Aboriginal living standards. I avoided jail, but the less fortunate Albanese government has been imprisoned by royal protocol and constitutional custom. Continue reading »
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Labor must pro-actively manage potential conflicts of interest
The Liberal Party’s attack on the Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus, over an alleged conflict of interest in his share ownership was an unimpressive flop. It did not establish a case that Dreyfus had failed to meet the technical standard of disclosure of interests set by the prime minister – a standard far higher than that set Continue reading »
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Albanese won’t rescue the Governor General from his impossible position
The Governor-General (GG), David Hurley, is in an increasingly invidious position, and sooner rather than later will feel impelled to resign. He may not yet see it this way and will in any event be preoccupied with the Queen’s funeral and the transition of the King. But the prime minister’s intervention on Wednesday night to Continue reading »
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Marketing an economic plan must appeal to the heart as much as the head
Waiting until almost the last minute to decide what to do about the tax cuts serves another political purpose. Albanese and Chalmers have done a good job of making each of the present priorities seem part of an integrated economic plan. Continue reading »
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Albanese can afford to seem firm about tax cuts
Newly elected as prime minister Anthony Albanese promised voters he would not lose a second in getting down to the tasks for which he had been elected. In the period leading up to the election, he had been criticised by followers for having a narrow agenda. But that included some big-ticket items in child-care, NDIS Continue reading »
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Super Scott and the coup vaccine
The powers vested in prime minister Scott Morrison by the Governor-General David Hurley during the five-ministries affair represented both a sword and a shield against any coup against Morrison himself. They also gave Morrison unparalleled capacity to seize power for himself, casting aside some of his most powerful ministerial colleagues without being held to account Continue reading »
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The stench of Morrison’s dormant constitutional coup
The great unravelling of Scott Morrison’s pseudo-constitutional coup deserves a comprehensive inquiry. Perhaps a royal commission. It’s a commission that could also embrace other improper, illegal or general style of secretive unaccountable government, and also take in the connivance, or learned ignorance of other ministers and senior bureaucrats. Continue reading »
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The voice implies a change of heart
The Government’s proposal for a referendum on a Voice is a bold idea whose time has come. But it is being asked to carry a lot of weight – weight that might easily sink it. Continue reading »
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Does the US know what it is doing, and mean what it says, over Taiwan?
The Chairman of the US Chiefs of Staff, General Mark Milley, seemed quietly confident this week that Australia would be standing side-by-side with the US and Taiwan if China attempted to retrieve its errant and rebellious province by force of arms. Perhaps he knows something I don’t. Continue reading »
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Wardens of secrecy discredit their own system
Retired ACT Supreme Court Justice John Burns has copped a severe caning from the independent National Security legislation monitor this week. It’s over his handling of a case in which a man we cannot name was secretly charged with serious criminal offences, which cannot really be itemised other than in the most general way, who Continue reading »
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It’s the teals who are the most representative on integrity issues
Although the activities of politicians from minor parties and independents should fall under integrity legislation, we should mostly be grateful that they contain more enthusiasts for a tough and expansive system than within the government. Continue reading »
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Abbott chickens come home to roost
Tony Abbott, as prime minister nearly a decade ago, had more than a few bees under his bonnet. He thought his election had redeemed the nation from an intolerable scourge of a government of criminals. Other opposition leaders have engaged in this sort of hyperbole, but scarcely ever with the zeal and lack of restraint, Continue reading »
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The unlimited, and unaccountable powers we’ve given police
The US Supreme Court’s decision to overrule the Roe v Wade principle that the right to an abortion is a privacy right guaranteed by the American constitution has magnified the fears of pro-choice citizens. They are worried that in the red states that have already criminalised abortion, right-to-life zealots, including those in law enforcement, will Continue reading »
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Governments losing their way
Professor Peter Coaldrake’s review of a Queensland public administration which has been losing its way since the Fitzgerald reforms of thirty years ago should be compulsory reading for politicians, for public servants, particularly senior executives, and for citizens sick of the way that modern government has let accountability and integrity slip by the wayside. Continue reading »
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Liberals have ICAC on their conscience
NSW Liberals have a bit of a thing about ICAC. It was, more or less, a Liberal Party brainchild – seen as a counter to seemingly obvious corruption in the Labor government of the day, three decades ago. Perversely, some thought, incoming Liberal Premier, Nick Greiner, popularly regarded as a cleanskin was its first victim. Continue reading »
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Public servants judge and jury over next-up political bosses
Spare a thought for Michael Coutts-Trotter, the Secretary of the NSW Premiers Department. He has been asked, in effect, to decide which of several versions of how John Barilaro was appointed “on merit” to a cushy $500,000 trade commissioner job in New York most closely approximates the truth. Continue reading »
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Attorney-General’s has not been a recent friend of real law reform
Those in favour of a strong and effective integrity commission, including the retired judges who have done so much to outline the need, should be very suspicious of the central role being accorded the Attorney-General’s department. Continue reading »
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Can Albanese maintain the honeymoon mood?
Anthony Albanese is not the first prime minister whose taking of office has been greeted with widespread relief and a sense – or at least a hope – those years of acrimony, squabbling and ineffectual government and unpopular policies might be over, at least for a reasonable period. That is in fact the norm – Continue reading »
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Sooner or later, the integrity commission will take out a Labor minister
One of the reasons why some of Labor’s old hands, particularly on the right, regard the prospect of integrity legislation with less than complete enthusiasm is that sooner or later – probably sooner than expected and maybe even before the next election – it will be the instrument of the downfall of a Labor minister. Continue reading »
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The whole idea of Home Affairs and its constituent parts needs revisiting
A government wanting to get rid of Pezzullo or determined to undo his expensive and not very efficient empire, would not necessarily have to be involved in a public argument about human rights for refugees. Home Affairs has been repeatedly criticised by bodies such as the Australian National Audit Office for waste and mismanagement of Continue reading »
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Public service chiefs need trials before executions
Anthony Albanese needs some new departmental and agency leaders. The limitations of some of the existing ones are obvious. But the prime minister need not order some summary executions, as Tony Abbott, John Howard, Malcolm Fraser and Gough Whitlam did. Nights of the long knives often seem personal, sometimes vindictive, or in breach of the Continue reading »
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Albanese should share the map and the driving with the teals
One has almost to go back to World War II to find the Australian Labor Party in a more theoretically advantageous position in seeking to pursue its legislative and executive government agenda. But if Anthony Albanese and Labor are to capitalise on their luck in times almost as difficult, they must take great care in Continue reading »
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Has Labor timidity hobbled its right to exercise power?
One of the more amazing elections of the past 50 years was in 1974, less than 18 months after the Whitlam government took power – at least in the House of Representatives. It did not have a majority in the senate and was often frustrated there, in part because of the crossbench numbers of Democratic Continue reading »
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Can Morrison cash any pandemic, or economic recovery cheques?
Once Morrison was in an advantageous position to exploit Australia’s apparently successful management of the coronavirus pandemic and the economic shutdown it involved. He lost much of his advantage by his conflicts with the states over pandemic management, local responses and his determination to restart the economy before the pandemic was under control, as well Continue reading »
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Teals assault the thin blue line
If there is one thing worse than losing office to the other major party in politics, it is losing strength in the factional balances within one’s own party. On both sides of politics, even in mid-election there are some working for the defeat of politicians on their own team, even at the risk – indeed Continue reading »
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Campaign needs a touch of the spiritual
Australia is calling out for leadership, for ideas, for enduring values and for decisive choices. Continue reading »
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Labor will never appease Murdoch, and should stop trying
News.com is never shy about claiming all of the power and influence that its mortal enemies fear it has. Continue reading »
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Labor scared of the shadow of a Murdoch paper tiger
I think the power of the ranting media – News.com in particular – is on the decline. Continue reading »
