John Menadue

John Menadue is the Founder and Editor in Chief of Pearls and Irritations. He was formerly Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, Ambassador to Japan, Secretary of the Department of Immigration and CEO of Qantas.

John's recent articles

JONAH BEN AVRAHAM. Palestinians Could Have Historic Influence in Israels Next Government (Truthout 5-10-19)

The political climate in Israel following Septembers snap elections is by no means favorable to Palestinians. However, there is reason to be hopeful for gains in Palestinian political power as the prospect of a unity government between the center-right Kahol Lavan party and the further-right Likud party looms large. Palestinian parties are contesting for a historic amount of influence in shaping the next Israeli government, and the challenge for Palestinian political leaders will be to turn this growing relevance in Israeli politics into real power in the fight for Palestinian liberation, rather than a force for the normalization of Israels...

THE SOUTHERN CROSS (Adelaide). New Vietnamese church a blessing. Our Lady of the Boat People.

In what was a momentous occasion in its 40-year history in South Australia, the Church of Our Lady of The Boat People was dedicated by Apostolic Administrator Bishop Greg OKelly SJ, with an evening of Vietnamese celebrations to follow.

GREG BARTON. Australia isnt taking the national security threat from far-right extremism seriouslyenough (the Conversation, 3 October 2019)

Until the terror attack in Christchurch in March, the threat of far-right terrorism in Australia was one we knew was coming, but believed was well over the horizon. The sordid story of the Christchurch attacker ordinary Australian turned hateful bigot turned mass-murdering terrorist contains some uncomfortable truths for our country, not least of which is the fact that the threat of far-right extremism has arrived in the here and now.

GERARD O'CONNELL. As Amazon Synod begins, Pope Francis looks to proceed with a pastoral heart

Pope Francis opened the first plenary session of the synod for the Amazon region this morning by praying with the synod participants at the tomb of St. Peter in the basilica dedicated to his name and then gave an incisive speech to offer some direction to guide them over the next three weeks.

DAVID ROWE. It's a miracle! (AFR 7.10.2019)

David Rowe

LUIZA CH. SAVAGE. How Russia and China are preparing to exploit a warming planet

Hurricanes, floods, and wildfires aside, climate change is delivering another threat: a remaking of geopolitics that stands to empower some of Americas adversaries and rivals.

FIONA STURGES. Snobs,Brexit and Lady Hale (The Guardian, 27 September 2019)

For all the talk of an industry in crisis, you have to hand it to the British media for their ability to get to the nub of a story. It was, one imagines, with a gasp of triumph that the Daily Mail was able to deliver a stinging blow to the president of the supreme court, Lady Hale, she of the spider brooch and the damning verdict on our prime ministers prorogation wheeze. Via a stunned headline, the paper was this week able to reveal that Hale, who graduated top of her class at Cambridge in law, who was the...

DANIEL BRAMMALL. The financial advice changes nobody is talking about

The long-suffering consumer of financial services has plenty to be pleased about thanks to sweeping industry reforms. The initiatives mark the end of a gravy train culture and a renaissance in genuinely independent financial advice. They are reforms, however, of which the majority of financial planners and their clients are largely unaware. Commissioner Kenneth Hayne examined some 10,000 submissions and conducted seven (very) public hearings to arrive at 76 recommendations addressing this problem of trust in financial services. Some of those recommendations have already been implemented by the government, and almost all of the rest will be underway before...

LAUREN RICHARDSON. Japans deepening diplomatic crisis with South Korea (East Asia Forum 15-9-19)

Japans relationship with South Korea is not amicable at the best of times. Yet in recent months it has entered a rapidly descending diplomatic spiral of unprecedented depth and scope. Mounting bilateral friction over the intractable history problems is steadily bleeding into the economic and security realms of the relationship. The result is a bilateral trade war with potential repercussions for the global supply chain of high-tech devices.

JOHN MENADUE. From a Long Term Permanent Resident of Hong Kong.

The following report is from a long term permanent resident of Hong Kong who along with the rest of Hong Kong has watched the long Summer of Discontent, with disbelief at how rapidly the city has fractured and deteriorated. It analyses what is happening and why and is pessimistic about a solution to the current problem in the near future.The writer is a university lecturer who wishes to remain anonymous for reasons of personal and professional security.

Thanks to guest editor, Ramesh Thakur.

During our three weeks holiday in the UK, Ramesh Thakur has been guest editor for Pearls & Irritations. Susie and I greatly appreciate his contribution. In considering the future of Pearls & Irritations, we may find that guest editorship provides a possible way forward. Guest editorship provides a means of continuing the broad direction of Pearls & Irritations as well as providing an opportunity for guest editors to draw on their own unique background and experience. Ramesh Thakur is currently Professor Emeritus at the ANU in the Crawford School of Public Policy. He was formerly the Director of...

KISHORE MAHBUBANI. What China Threat? How the United States and China can avoid war (Harper Magazine 22-01-19) A Repost.

Quite remarkably ,of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council ,China is the only one among them that has not fired a single shot across its border in thirty years,since a brief naval battle between China and Vietnam in 1988. By contrast,even during the relatively peaceful Obama Administration, the American military dropped twenty six thousand bombs on seven countries in a single year. Evidently, the Chinese understand well the art of strategic restraint.

JEFFREY BRAITHWAITE: How to improve the health system, part 2: learn from things going right as well as things going wrong

At the Australian Institute of Health Innovation at Macquarie University we have around 80 projects going on at any point in time. There are more than 180 people doctoral and masters students, professional staff, researchers, visiting academics and associates and dozens of partners, nationally and internationally. We are working on providing the evidence that supports practical and implementable change in the health system, delivering real benefits to people.

JEFFREY BRAITHWAITE: How to improve the health system, part 1: support the staff

I hear many stories and over the years have conducted many studies about peoples experiences with doctors and hospitals. I access these in the course of my work as a health systems researcher and some simply come to me as a parent, husband, son, or friend. All can at least potentially be used to change the health system.

PETER MILLER. Politicians who become lobbyists can be bad for Australians health

The revolving door of people between government and the alcohol, tobacco and gambling industries is now recognised as an increasing threat to public policy making. In a new study by Deakin University researchers this revolving door has revealed for the first time the influence of lobbyists on public health policy.

JOHN MENADUE. A updated post: A Commonwealth Hospital Benefit similar to the existing Medical Benefit to replace the $11b private health insurance subsidy.

The wasteful and unfair $ 11b per annum cost to taxpayers of the subsidy to Private Health Insurance should be abolished and the savings used in three possible ways part funding a Medicare dental scheme, additional funding for public hospitals and/or part funding private hospital care through a Hospital Benefit Scheme. This third option may be more politically possible given the power of private providers who have an effective veto on reform. In that Hospital Benefit Scheme, individuals could choose to access either a public or a private hospital in the same way that veterans do today.

JOHN MENADUE. A Repost and update: The scourge of lobbyists and crony capitalism.

Abuse by lobbyists is back in the news .The most recent appalling example has been Crown Resorts. With Ex Labor and Liberal ministers and officials on the payroll of Crown neither the Liberal or Labor Parties raised the Crown scandal involving 'Chinese junkets' and 'high rollers' receiving favourable treatment . They ran away from the scandal. It was left to Andrew Wilkie, other Independents and the Greens.

BRET STEPHENS. Blessed Are the Refugees (The New York Times 13-9-19)

Under Donald Trump, America is ceasing to be the last best hope.

HAJO DUKEN. Australian values

What a great and timely question Allan Patience asked on P+I on 7 August. Whilst I agree with him that most of the Australian value talk is simply humbug, I feel that, in times of Trump and Brexit, the Uluru Statement from the Heart and raids on the ABC, we more than ever need to have a serious discussion about what the values of a nation in general, and Australian values in particular, are and who determines them.

JOHN MENADUE. We have surrendered our sovereignty to a very dangerous and violent ally. An update

As China reasserts its historical world role, its influence will grow in Australia and elsewhere. But that influence is minimal compared with the US which has 'agents of influence thick on the ground in Australia. Our media ,including the ABC, is saturated with US content and a large part of it is controlled by an American citizen with close ties to Donald Trump. We have a reasonable degree of domestic political autonomy despite foreign ownership of our major companies but we have ceded effective foreign and defence power to the US military,industrial and intelligence complex. All our major political parties...

GILL HOFFMAN, KHALED ABU TOAMEH, OMRI NAHMIAS. Netanyahu Vows to Annex All Settlements, Starting with Jordan Valley (Jerusalem Post 11-9-19)

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Tuesday that if reelected, he will apply sovereignty over all settlements in Judea and Samaria, starting with the Jordan Valley.

JOHN MENADUE. 'Things you learn along the way'.

Occasionally friends suggest to me that I should write my autobiography. Ruefully I explain that I wrote 'Things you learn along the way' twenty years ago.The book sold about 8,000 copies but as far as I know is no longer available. The book covers many aspects of my life: The early days as a footloose son of the Methodist manse; seven years in the 'wilderness' working for Gough Whitlam in Opposition; working for Rupert Murdoch in his better days; Secretary of Prime Minister and Cabinet to both Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, including the Dismissal; enjoyable family days...

VICTOR GAETEN. Pope Francis Holy Diplomacy in Ukraine (UCA News 5-9-19)

Why Washington and the Vatican Dont See Eye to Eye

JAMES CHAPPEL. Weigels Irony of Modern Catholic History in review.

The pope is far less in control of his flock than most people realize. This has always been the case: no leader in history, let alone one in charge of a billion people across the globe, has been able to claim absolute obedience. It is especially true, though, of Pope Francis, and especially true in the United States. Here, the standard-issue neglect of papal missives coincides with a well-financed effort to conquer the Catholic public sphere in the name of clerical conservatism and libertarian economics. Over the centuries, popes have had to deal with all manner of challenges to their...

RYAN MANUEL. The Hong Kong Government is as Leaderless as the Protesters (Foreign Policy, 5 September 2019)

A distant Beijing and a shifting protest movement make it hard to sit down at the bargaining table. Bruce Lee didnt like conventional fighting styles, finding them too rigid. Instead, like jazz musicians with their scales, he took his many years of repetitive training in various martial arts and riffed on them to try and take people by surprise, hitting them hard from odd angles. He was a street fighter, not a prizefighter.

CSAR RODRIGUZ GARAVITO. Bolsonaro is a Regional Threat

President Bolsonaro of Brazil is behind a policy of clearing the Amazon rainforest for more cattle farming and agriculture. He claims that this is a matter for Brazil and no one else. The Amazon basin does not just belong to Brazil. Parts of it are in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Peru, Suriname and Venezuela. The Amazon rainforest influences the weather patterns throughout the whole of South America. More importantly it is a significant source of carbon capture for the whole world.

BEN EHRENREICH. The End of the Frontier Myth. America can no longer run from its past (The Guardian 31-7-19)

The idea of the frontier in US history has been one of endless promise, but the reality has involved violence, even genocide. As this powerful study argues, its latest incarnation is Trumps wall.

KEVIN RUDD. Democracy overboard: Rupert Murdoch's long war on Australian politics (The Guardian 7-9-19)

Australia has become a dangerously complacent country, dancing to the reactionary tune of the Murdoch press

REBECCA TAN. How a conservative town in Australia set aside politics to rally for a family facing deportation (The Washington Post, 5 Sep. 2019)

Biloela, population 6,000, is a rural town in northeast Australia. When the towns first and only set of traffic lights was built 10 years ago, residents were sent into a tizzy. Many families still work in coal mines or cotton farms. On weekends, people fish.

AMJAD AYMAN YAGHI. The case of Mohammad El Halabi and the rabbit hole of Israeli justice

Its been three years and there have been 119 court appearances. He has been separated from his family and lost his freedom. Yet even though an Australian government inquiry has found allegations against him baseless, and his charges appear ever more outlandish as more is learned about the case, Mohammad El Halabi languishes in an Israeli prison, charged but not convicted, a Kafkaesque nightmare of the kind in which Israel with its administrative detentions and separate laws for separate peoples has become expert.

LINDY EDWARDS. NSW Political Donations Scandal would not have been exposed at the Federal Level

To the seasoned observer of political donations in Australia, the most remarkable thing about the recent NSW Labor scandal is that is has been exposed and people are being pursued. At the federal level this behaviour would have gone under the radar.

BRENDON KELSON. Letter to Minister for Veterans and Defence Personnel

The Hon Darren Chester MP, Minister for Veterans and Defence Personnel, Dear Minister $498M AUSTRALIAN WAR MEMORIAL EXPANSION Thank you for Robert Curtins reply of 25 July 2019 to my letter to the Prime Minister of 19 June 2019. That reply rather missed the main points of my letter so I restate them here in hope of a more fruitful exchange. This is clearly a matter for the responsible Minister and the Government as a whole, not just for the Memorial.

JOHN MENADUE. The continuing litany of lies on boat arrivals and border protection.

I am sorry if I keep repeating what I have been saying for four years but when will we finally accept that we have been consistently conned and lied to about boat arrivals and border protection for a long time. Our national policies on asylum seekers have been built on the shifting sands of government deception which the main stream media has failed to expose. Our borders are now less secure than ever before despite all the spin.

MICHAEL LEAHY. The Catholic Weekly: seeking justice for Pell or waging a culture war?

As a former colleague in the seminary and priesthood, and friend, of Cardinal Pell, it gives me no pleasure to see him fall so dramatically from grace. Along with all Australians of good will, I want to see him get justice from our legal system.

MICHAEL FURTADO. Playing Devil's Advocate for the Catholic Plenary Counci.

On November 4, 1956, the Soviet regime violently suppressed the Hungarian Uprising. Earlier in that year, at the Twentieth Congress of the USSR Communist Party,Khrushchev had bitterly denounced Stalin, deceased three years prior, for his crimes.

STEPHEN S. ROACH. Flailing at China (Project Syndicate 27.9.2019)

Despite years of denial, there can no longer be any doubt that the US is pursuing a bipartisan containment strategy vis--vis China. Whether justified or not, the real problem with this strategy is less the merits of the allegations leveled by US politicians than the incoherence of the Trump administrations policies to address them.

ROBERT FISK. The Crazed, Rogue Leader is in Washington Not Tehran (Counterpunch 2.9.2019)

History in the Middle East is unkind to us westerners. Just when we thought we were the good guys and the Iranians were the bad guys, here comes the ghostly, hopeless possibility of a Trump-Rouhani summit to remind us that the apparent lunatic is the US president and the rational, sane leader who is supposed to talk to him is the president of the Islamic Republic ofIran. All these shenanigans are fantasy, of course like the imminent war between America and Iran of which more later.

IVAN LEVINGSTON, DAVID WAINER. The Most Undiplomatic of Diplomats Is Trumps Man in Middle East (Bloomberg 30-8-19)

David Friedman has upended Americanpolicy in theunstableregion.

ANDREW SHENG, XIAO GENG. Hong Kongs Real Problem Is Inequality (Project Syndicate 29-8-19)

A powerful, but oft-ignored factor underlying the frustrations of Hong Kongs people is inequality. And, contrary to the prevailing pro-democracy narrative, the failure of Hong Kongs autonomous government to address the problem stems from the electoral politics to which the protesters are so committed.

TESS NEWTON CAIN. Australia shows up in Tuvalu and trips over (East Asia Forum 30-8-19)

On 13-16 August 2019 the leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum held their 50th meeting. The theme, as chosen by their host and current chair Tuvaluan Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga, was Securing our Future in the Pacific. The leaders meeting of 2018 provides context for what transpired in 2019 and why it is significant.

FRANCISCO TORO. Japan is a Trumpian paradise of low immigration rates. Its also a dying country. (Washington Post, 29 August 2019)

KITAKYUSHU, Japan For a sense of what the United States might look like in a reality where the hard rights dreams of drastically reduced immigration come true, you could come to Japan and ask my father-in-law about the house across the street. The owner of the house died some time ago in this low-key, working-class suburb of Kitakyushu, in Japans southern island. The house has fallen badly into disrepair. None of the heirs seems interested in it: The taxes are too high, and there isnt really a market for this kind of house anyway.

NICHOLAS KRISTOF. What religion would Jesus belong to?

ONE puzzle of the world is that religions often dont resemble their founders. Jesus never mentioned gays or abortion but focused on the sick and the poor, yet some Christian leaders have prospered by demonizing gays. Muhammad raised the status of women in his time, yet today some Islamic clerics bar women from driving, or cite religion as a reason to hack off the genitals of young girls. Buddha presumably would be aghast at the apartheid imposed on the Rohingya minority by Buddhists in Myanmar.

SCOTT BURCHILL. Resuscitating Sinophobia in Australia.

Sinophobia has a long history in the West, especially in Washington. It has always contained xenophobia, racism and Cold War animus in roughly equal parts. In Washingtons China, James Peck documents how since the 1950s, the national security establishment in the United States has used the fear of China to thwart any challenge to Washingtons vainglorious and limitless ambition to rule the world.

MINXIN PEI - An interview on China and Hong Kong (Project Syndicate 26-8-2019)

Many Chinese are deeply conflicted:they may not like the CPC, but they are proud of their country and resent outside criticisms.

NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER. Editorial: Those who dismiss Pell verdict ignore integrity of legal process

The response in certain circles to the Aug. 21 court decision upholding Cardinal George Pell's conviction for sexually assaulting two choirboys in the 1990s was as swift as it was irrational.

TONY COADY. What price intimidation?

The recent serious injury to Australias outstanding batsman Steve Smith caused by a ferocious bumper from speedster Jofra Archer in the Second Ashes Test at Lords should have raised concerns about the status of crickets law against intimidation. I discuss why they and similar incidents didnt and why they should.

ARTYOM LUKIN. China and Russias sky-high strategy (East Asia Forum 29-8-19)

On 23 July 2019, Russian and Chinese warplanes long-range nuclear-capable bombers accompanied by fighter jets and surveillance aircraft conducted a joint patrol over the East China Sea and the Sea of Japan. This marked the first ever joint air force operation by Russia and China beyond their borders.

CATHY WILCOX. Standing by our trusted ally. (SMH 23.8.2019)

In the face of destabilising provocation.

KELLIE TRANTER. Defence exports - what are we subsidising?

Last month Australian defence company, Electro Optic Systems (EOS), again denied its weapons system was being used in the Yemen war when photographs surfaced of four consignments of its Remote Weapons System for export in June and July to the UAE and Saudi Arabia. But what slipped through in relation to EOS is its February 2019 media release confirming its collaboration with Israeli company, Elbit Systems to develop a turret that adds a next generation, medium calibre turret to the EOS family of weapon systems and has been designed to meet a rapidly emerging global market worth...

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