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

John Menadue. What a dreadful week.

Last week an important public debate on key issues facing Australia was sabotaged by Tony Abbott, Joe Hockey and News Corp. The old scare campaigns were back again. Bill Shortens timidity did not help. Paul Keating commented We have a political culture that has the ambition of a gnat. He is right. Instead of a sensible discussion on climate change and carbon pollution, News Corp, via The Australian and the Daily Telegraph picked up a draft options paper on climate change which was being prepared for the ALP Federal Conference. This options paper suggested that the ALP is considering...

Robert Manne. Laudato Si' : A political reading.

Robert Manne describes the Papal Encyclical as the first work that has risen to the full challenge of climate change. Robert Manne ads: There can be little doubt that the Papal Encyclical is the most consequential intervention in the discussion of climate change since Al Gore's film, 'An Inconvenient Truth'. ... Like Al Gore, indeed, like all rational people, Pope Francis accepts the consensual conclusions of the climate scientists. ... For Pope Francis the climate crisis is the most extreme expression of a destructive tendency that has become increasingly dominant through the course of industrialisation. ... The Encyclical argues that...

Christopher Kennedy and Malcolm Fitzgerald. From sound bite to web bite.

We are so used to pointing our fingers at the Chinese for their pathetic attempts to control the web we do not see the fundamental change in Western society and the relationship between the governed and the governing. For example; in the Victorian election internet, as defined by the term 'social media', was given credit for the amount of damage it did to the Liberal campaign; with the out-going premier blaming his loss on the social media. Another example is the prime minister recently degrading the net as electronic graffiti after it was pointed out that the Liberals had no...

John Menadue. Refugees- from toxic politics to a humanitarian policy.

The ALP Federal conference which will be meeting in a week's time, will be considering refugee policy along with other major issues. I have re-posted below a post from 22 June on refugees . Media reports suggest that boat 'turnbacks' will be a contentious issue at the conference. There are several issues that I think should be kept in mind on this issue. The first is that the dramatic drop in boat arrivals has not been due to turnbacks, but the decision by the Rudd Government announced on 13 July 2013, that any people arriving by...

Stuart Whitman. Labor 2035

This article is posted from Grassroots, The Local Labor Journal - Party Reform: Past Present and Future. Its 2035, and Labor members from an inner suburb of Australias largest city are gathering in their local community centre to welcome the new Labor Prime Minister on her first official visit to the electorate. The recently elected Prime Minister is returning to her childhood community to congratulate its Labor branch on their Community Action Programs and to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the ALP National Conference that changed everything. Since the party reforms were passed at the...

Peter Blackrock. Germany in control.

What is happening in the European Union and Eurozone? Clearly, there is a seismic shift underway. Here is one interpretation of what is happening. The key driving force behind the shift is the German Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schaeuble. He is the number two in the right-wing Christian Democratic Union, behind Chancellor Angela Merkel, although many say he really calls the shots. He is 72. He's a nationalist. He is a fiscal conservative. He doesn't believe Germans should keep paying for the sins of their fathers by prostrating themselves before the European Ideal. He wants to leave behind a legacy....

James Button. A Moment of Unexpected Hope

From the local Labor journal, Grassroots - Party Reform, Past, Present and Future. This should be a moment of unexpected hope for the ALP. Remarkable election wins in Victoria and Queensland, theopinion polls tracking well, another Liberal Government exposed as mean, tricky and out of touch...it all suggests that after the debacle of the last federal election Labor might be back in power far sooner than anyone could ever have hoped for. The climate of ideas should be on Labors side, too. The great policy challenge of the day how to sustain economic and jobs growth while expanding...

John Menadue. Q&A Why bother with Ministers?

The ABC has tied itself into a knot in trying to appease the government and get ministers back on Q&A. But why bother? If ministers arent allowed or dont want to go on the program, so be it. They would not be missed and neither would most members of the shadow ministry. I must confess that I am only an occasional viewer of Q&A. It is not for me. It unfortunately follows the adversarial and confrontational approach that is so debasing so much of public discussion in Australia on important issues. ABC viewers would be much better served...

Kerry Breen. The Australian Medical Association vs. The Medical Journal of Australia.

Troubles at the Medical Journal of Australia and the birth of Friends of the MJA The Medical Journal of Australia (MJA) has been in existence for over 100 years and has become the most important national publication for every aspect of the health and health care of Australians. It is owned by the Australian Medical Association (AMA) and is published by the Australasian Medical Publishing Company (AMPCo), a wholly owned subsidiary of the AMA. AMPCo makes a profit on its Medical Directory* but, like other journals of medical associations around the world, makes a loss with the MJA. The...

John Howard on political Royal Commissions.

Last September John Howard said 'I am uneasy about the idea of having Royal Commissions or enquiries into essentially a political decision. ... I don't think you should ever begin to go down the American path of using the law for narrow targeted political purposes. I think the special prosecutions in the US are appalling.' See link below to John Howard's comments. John Menadue http://gu.com/p/4xhj7/sbl

Peter Day. Warning: role models may shrink

Role models: We love them. We look up to them. We say we need them. We want to know them. We want to live through them. But who are they, and what purpose do they serve? In Australia they tend to be sportsmen and celebrities of note: young people who can kick a footy, smash a tennis ball, and generally do things much faster and better than the rest of us - and look good while doing so. And while there is something noble and edifying in admiring anothers feats, the cultural propensity to place another human being...

Miriam Lyons. On inequality of opportunity

The myth of meritocracy is todays version of the divine right of kings, and it is playing much the same political function. Call it the divine right of Kings School alumni. Another week, another report on the growing gap between rich and poor. The latest, from ACOSS, reminds us that the top 10% of households has been racing ahead of the rest, with the result that almost half of Australias wealth is now in their hands.[1] Housing wealth is particularly skewed, a finding unlikely to surprise any first-time buyer who has tried to find a house in Sydney or...

John Menadue. London Postcard-some impressions.

We have just spent three weeks in the UK in Bath and London. But I kept the blog going with the help of friends. For years I have largely avoided the UK. When I first visited London in 1963, I was very conscious of social and economic class. It seemed quite unhealthy. Most people knew their place, particularly working people. In 1963 I found it quite a relief to go to Ireland that did not show the same obsession with class. That initial impression in 1963 was followed by the harshness, in my view of the Thatcher years. ...

Warwick Elsche. Heads must roll at ABC, but not at ASIO

Heads must roll; words from the Prime Minister Tony Abbott. And in case you missed them he said them twice on national TV. He was talking of the ABC and presumably some executives who failed to detect the threatening presence of a convicted Islamist sympathizer Zaky Mallah in the audience of popular current affairs program Q&A. Tony dislikes the ABC because it is not as imaginatively sycophantic as the Murdoch Press. He has branded it on this and other occasions as cruelly politically biased - despite the fact that the Head of his own media office was...

John Menadue. Is the European Project finished?

Perhaps the Greek crisis will force a fundamental rethink and Europe will find the way to rekindle again the idealism and hope that gave rise to the European Project in the aftermath of WWII. By any means Europe has been a remarkable success in social development, human rights, economic growth, the mobility of people and capital but most importantly of all, a seventy year period of peace. After centuries of war, mainly religious wars, followed by WW1, Hitler, the Holocaust and Stalin, Europe has been at peace. The founders of the European Project spoke with great idealism...

Greek Crisis

See below links to two interesting articles. The first is by Paul Krugman, 'Ending Greece's Bleeding' in the New York Times. The second is by Thomas Picketty 'Germany has never repaid' from the German newspaper Die Zeit. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/06/opinion/paul-krugman-ending-greeces-bleeding.html?rref=collection%2Fcolumn%2Fpaul-krugman https://medium.com/@gavinschalliol/thomas-piketty-germany-has-never-repaid-7b5e7add6fff

Failure in Afghanistan. We don't want to talk about it.

On the 24th June, I posted a link to a review from the London Review of Books. (See https://publish.pearlsandirritations.com/blog/?p=3957) In referring to the UK involvement in Afghanistan, it was headed 'Worse than a defeat: shamed in Afghanistan'. The review by James Meek said 'The extent of the military and political catastrophe [in Afghanistan] it represents is hard to overstate. It was doomed to fail before it began and fail it did, at a terrible cost in lives and money. How bad was it? In a way it was worse than a defeat because to be defeated an army and its...

Pearls and Irritations Policy Series

Link to Fairness, Opportunity and Security. Policy Series edited by Michael Keating and John Menadue. https://publish.pearlsandirritations.com/blog/?p=3719

John Menadue. The Greek crisis and regime change.

Current Affairs A lot of the blame for the present crisis should be borne by many countries and institutions, but the one group that is least responsible is the present left-wing government of Greece, Syriza. The major blame must rest first with the previous Greek governments that mired the Greek people in corruption and cronyism. The second group that must bear immediate responsibility is the incompetence of the Troika the EU, the European Central Bank and the IMF, led very much by the German Government. The austerity campaign inflicted on Greece has resulted in the GDP shrinking by...

Bob Kinnaird. China FTA labour mobility fight looms

Current Affairs The ALP National Conference at end-July will likely have before it an urgency motion demanding changes to the foreign worker provisions in the China FTA as a condition for supporting the agreement, according to The Australian (Change or block unjust trade deals, MPs told, 26 June 2015). Driving the move is a cross-factional group of eight unions concerned about the impact on Australian workers of FTA provisions mandating easier access to Chinese 457 visa workers, in some cases unrestricted access. On top of that, it has now emerged that an FTA side-letter removes mandatory skills assessments...

Europe's attack on Greek democracy.

See below link to article by Joseph Stiglitz in Project Syndicate. Joseph Stiglitz is a Nobel Laureate in Economics and University Professor at Columbia University. He was also Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank. John Menadue.   http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/greece-referendum-troika-eurozone-by-joseph-e--stiglitz-2015-06

Ross Kerridge. GP Remuneration.

Current Affairs I understand that at the recent National Conference of the AMA there was general support for a move to help funding systems other than just fee-for-service. Ross Kerridge examines this issue below. John Menadue Healthcare Heroes. How to reward GPs for what they do best: a hospital specialists proposal There is an old saying in healthcare: - If the GP is good, a specialist may be able to help. If the GP is bad, nothing will help. The Junior Doctor has asked my advice about a 78 year old woman who has been booked for...

Walter Hamilton. Why I am an Australian citizen

Current Affairs. Amid all the howling about terror, treason and the ABC, Australians seemingly have lost the ability to stop, listen and think. Everyone is in such a hurry to outdo the next person in vilifying and repudiating the other, whether it is a Muslim Australian, a political opponent or a commercial rival. I cant remember when the fabric of public debate has been so tattered by prejudice, ignorance and a determined refusal to listen to the other point of view. I am not a regular watcher of ABC-TVs Q&A; I dont like the format, and I feel sometimes...

Mark Scott. The ABC belongs to all of us.

Current Affairs. Address byMark Scott Centre for Corporate Public Affairs Annual Corporate Public Affairs Oration Thursday 25 June 2015 From time to time, Im asked to speak to journalism students about what its like working in a news room. I often reflect that for all the planning you can do around big news eventsan election, a budget, The Olympicsalmost by definition, the biggest stories are those you cant predict, you didnt know were about to erupt. These kinds of stories are sometimes fascinating, sometimes appalling. But they get the adrenaline running in the newsroom. Thinking about...

Rod Tiffen. Murdoch's declining influence.

Current Affairs Labor might not have noticed it yet, but Rupert Murdochs capacity to influence the outcome declines with each passing election. Over the past eight months, Victoria and Queensland have voted out first-term Liberal governments despite the best efforts of the Murdoch press in those states. Their slanted front pages, unfair coverage and combative editorials only highlighted their growing irrelevance to the electoral process. The central reason for this decline in influence is the radically shrinking reach of News Ltds newspapers. Last year, the total circulation of all Australian daily newspapers was a little over 2.1 million, fully...

Is the European Central Bank looking after the Greek people or the banks?

Current Affairs. In London I have been reading this interesting piece in The Telegraph, by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, (link below) on the 'Greek problem'. It was published on 19 June 2015. John Menadue. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/11687229/Greek-debt-crisis-is-the-Iraq-War-of-finance.html

John Menadue. Triple-dipping by Big Pharma.

Current Affairs The major pharmaceutical companies in Australia, almost all foreign owned, keep pushing their luck at the expense of Australian consumers and taxpayers. In my series on health reform, I pointed to a minimum of $2 b. p.a. that we could save in drug costs if we had a government purchasing system like the New Zealanders. In the last budget the Minister for Health made a few changes around the edges but the high prices charged by Big Pharma will continue. It is the same story around the world. Many American consumers find it worthwhile to cross...

David Charles. Innovation in Australia.

Policy Series. Australia is currently facing a challenging situation in which the economy needs to transform from one very largely driven by investments in the minerals and energy sector to one which has a wider spread of investment drivers. The overall economic growth rate, while still reasonably strong by OECD standards, is below the long term rate of about 3 to 3 and one half per cent per annum. The famous three Ps productivity, population and participation - all need to play their part if Australia is to get back to its long term growth path. Arguably...

John Menadue. Facts on the $11b per annum private health insurance industry subsidy.

The Minister for Health and Ageing, Sussan Ley has said she wants to canvas community and expert views on PHI (private health insurance). If she does consult the community on this issue that will be a welcome change, for consideration of the PHI is usually a private discussion with the vested interests the PHI industry, doctors and private hospitals. I am not holding my breath about real consultation with the community. So much consultation is purely token. Furthermore the community is genuinely confused about the range of look-alike policies that are very hard to understand until the...

Bob Kinnaird. China FTA labour mobility fails the national interest test

Current Affairs. Prime Minister Abbott said nothing about the labour mobility provisions in the China Australia FTA (ChAFTA) package when releasing the FTA text last week. There will be a strong community reaction once these provisions are understood. The Federal Labor Opposition set two benchmarks for the China FTA labour mobility provisions to pass the national interest test: retention of labour market testing or comparable safeguards on temporary migration; and they must enhance, not constrain, job opportunities for Australians. The Abbott government concessions on labour mobility in the China FTA comprehensively fail both benchmarks and undermine the Coalitions...

Worse than a defeat: shamed in Afghanistan.

Current Affairs In London, I have been reading again some of the history of the recent UK military venture in Afghanistan. It is disturbing reading. Neither people in the UK or in Australia seem to want to learn from the disaster in Afghanistan. Only recently our Prime Minister and senior military officials have been telling us how successful we have been in Afghanistan. Just as in the UK I suspect that it is mainly puff to cover a failed venture. Australia's war in Afghanistan was the longest national conflict in Australia's history. Overall 40 Australians were killed and...

Brad Chilcott. Refugees, possibility before protest.

Current Affairs. As founder and national director of Welcome to Australia my dream is that many thousands of refugees and other migrants arrive safely in Australia every year to be welcomed into a fair, diverse and inclusive society where they will live free from vilification, fear and prejudice. For asylum seekers and refugees themselves, the greatest risk of Labors upcoming National Conference is not the danger of an imperfect chapter in the Platform. It is the danger of Labor failing to deliver real and practical outcomes to help ease their plight, while causing them to endure the...

Walter Hamilton. Magna Carta and universality.

Current Affairs. Eight hundred years ago, this month, King John reluctantly signed Magna Carta, a form of peace treaty forced on him by rebellious barons. It is considered to have marked the beginning of the end of the age of despotism. Some also see Magna Carta as the extension into politics of Christianitys leveling theology: no longer was there one chosen people (monarch); all humanity had access to salvation (the law). Durham Cathedral (one of the architectural marvels of the Christian tradition) holds a 1216 edition of Magna Carta, which is currently on display to mark the anniversary. It...

Geoffrey Harcourt. Piketty, flawed, but not a light that failed.

Current Affairs A review of Thomas Piketty, Capital in the Twenty-First Century.* Translated by Arthur Goldhammer, Cambridge, Mass and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2014. viii + 685 pp. ISBN 978-0-674-43000-6* *This is a smaller version of a review article to be published in the next issue of Economic and Labour Relations Review. The article contains a bibliography on which this version draws. At each end of the spectrum of responses to Thomas Pikettys best seller are those of Paul Krugman and Deirdre McCloskey. Krugman pronounced it the most important book of the year ...

Max Bourke. Northern Australia the fantasy continues

Current Affairs The White Paper on Northern Australia. ( www.northernaustralia.dpmc.gov.au accessed June 19, 2015) The cover of this Report features, a slightly sick (ironically seems to have a fungal disease), young seedling growing in rich black soil. The seedling well reflects the issue, the black soil does not. When white settlers landed in Australia at the end of the 18th century they brought the techniques and understandings they knew from Europe to farming, the climate and the environment. What else could they do? It has taken over 200 years for many Australians, and some clearly still do not,...

Robert Manne. Papal Encyclical and Cardinal Pell

Current Affairs In The Monthly on 31 October 2011, Robert Manne recalled the efforts of Cardinal George Pell to discredit the case of those who were concerned about climate change. Cardinal Pell said that Robert Manne was following fashionable opinion on the subject. Extracts from Robert Mannes article follow below. John Menadue. In theSydney Morning Heraldof October 28, Eugene Robinson, a columnist with theWashington Post, reported the findings ofthe most comprehensive study of the Earths temperature ever undertaken. The study had been conducted by the Professor of Physics at University of California, Berkeley, Richard Muller. His team had...

Michael Wesley. The Dangerous Politics of National Security.

Policy Series In January 2013, as she launched her governments National Security Strategy, then Prime Minister Julia Gillard proclaimed that Australias decade of terrorism was over. Her argument was that al Qaeda had failed to regenerate after being degraded in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, and that there were other more conventional security issues, such as the rise of new Asian great powers, that would dominate the forward security agenda. It was a bold call; and in the close aftermath of attacks in Paris, Ottawa, Montreal, Copenhagen, Sydney and Belgium, clearly a mistaken one. But one can...

John Menadue. A night with the Vice Chancellors the export of education services.

Current Affairs Education services earn an export income for Australia of over $16 b. p.a. Those export services are expected to increase to $31 b. p.a. by 2020 from about 600,000overseas students. Education is now our fourth largest export behind iron ore, coal and natural gas. It is our major services export, ahead of tourism. The benefits from our export of educational services have been spread across Australia. It is estimated that each international student spends over $40,000 p.a. in fees and living expenses. Chinese and Indian students represent over 30% of overseas students. The top 10 source countries...

Nikki Marczak. History repeats for Christian Assyrians

Current Affairs As ISIL continues its brutal rampage across Iraq and Syria, a recent United Nations report found that ethnic and religious minorities are facing crimes against humanity, and even genocide. For Christian Assyrians, these atrocities evoke terrible memories of the genocide their ancestors endured under the Ottoman Government (the Young Turks), known by the community today as Seyfo, or the sword. Prevention of genocide can only be effective if patterns are identified early, and if the world is willing to intervene when the warning signs become clear. Strong parallels in both ideology and strategy between the Young Turks and...

John Menadue. How the Australian Bishops and Rome ignored the warnings.

Current Affairs. We were warned about events such as in the Ballarat Catholic Diocese. But they were even worse than what we expected. Bishops have been warned for a long time but they have ignored the warnings. See article below that I posted on 22 February 2013. Bishop Geoffrey Robinson, formerly Auxiliary Bishop of Sydney (1984-2004) has consistently and firmly drawn attention to the damage that sexual abuse was wreaking on individuals and the integrity of the Catholic Church. As early as 1997, when launching Towards Healing, Bishop Robinson called on Pope John Paul II to commission a...

John Menadue. Early tax avoidance: the window tax

Holidaying in Bath, I came across an early example of tax avoidance. A window tax was introduced in the UK in 1696. It was believed to be a progressive tax on the assumption that the wealthy property owners had larger houses and more windows. But the tax avoiders found a way around the problem...fill in the window spaces with masonry and avoid the tax even if it looked very ugly. Wealthy property owners don't often have good taste or care about neighbours. The tax was abolished in 1851. Tax avoidance is now largely conducted in secret and the scale of...

John Menadue. Catholic bishops keep saying sorry, but avoid structural and cultural reform.

Current Affairs. Catholic bishops keep telling us that they didn't know and how sorry they are about the horrific events in Ballarat and in many other parts of the Catholic Church before that. We all know how terrible these events are, but what have the bishops done to address the opaque governance structures and cultural problems that have contributed to this abuse. The Catholic Church is still run like an absolute monarchy. Sexual abuse of children is an appalling abuse of power but it is only one form of abuse of power in a hierarchical and clerical system.In the selection...

John Menadue. Risk-averse business.

Current Affairs The Reserve Bank has pushed interest rates to record lows but business continues to be reluctant to invest. Capital investment will fall by a record 25% to $104 b. in 2015/16 compared with what companies expected to spend a year earlier. In the March quarter of this year spending by companies on new equipment and buildings fell 4.4%, the sharpest fall since the global financial crisis. In this blog on 30 October last year, see below, I wrote about how Australian business was becoming risk-averse rather than investing in new ventures it was handing money...

John Menadue. Is war in the American DNA?

Current Affairs In his book Dangerous Allies Malcolm Fraser warned us how we can be drawn into US conflicts that are of no immediate concern to us. We have seen that in recent decades in following the US into wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. He spoke of dangerous strategic dependence The US has a long history of involvement in wars. In the Washingtonblog.com in May 2014, and which was carried by the SMH, it showed the number of wars that the US had been involved in since its independence in 1776. The data was well documented. According to...

Fred Chaney. The challenge of providing fairness, opportunity and security for Indigenous Australians.

Policy Series It is unlikely that at any time since 1788 a sample of Indigenous Australians would agree they have enjoyed fairness opportunity and security. It is similarly unlikely that any Minister responsible for Indigenous Affairs, past or present, would claim as much progress in achieving those objectives as hoped for. The now obligatory annual report card delivered in Parliament by the Prime Minister of the day confirms the slow and irregular progress in closing the gaps in economic and social circumstances. Any snapshot of the circumstances of indigenous Australians at any time post settlement will reveal our...

Robert Manne. Human Rights Commission and Gillian Triggs.

Current Affairs The Australian government and The Australian are at it again, attacking Gillian Triggs. I re-post below an article by Robert Manne from earlier this year. John Menadue Readers of John Menadues blog will be aware that a vile attack is at present being launched against both the Human Rights Commission and its President, Professor Gillian Triggs. The Australian has been the media orchestrator of the campaign, led by its editor-in-chief, Chris Mitchell, legal reporter, Chris Merritt, and its reactionary columnist, Chris Kenny. The Australian has clearly been orchestrating the campaign in close collaboration with the Abbott...

Peter Cosier. A Healthy Environment and a Productive Economy

Policy Series Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists[*] When faced with significant environmental challenges in the past, Australian governments, businesses, communities and individuals have shown their capacity for responding creatively and energetically to environmental challenges, with positive outcomes for the health of the environment and economic productivity. While there are thousands of examples across Australia every day where individuals, communities and businesses strive to live sustainably, too often, despite best intentions, we place short-term interests over long term benefits. The consequence is that as a nation, we are taking more from our environment than can be replenished, and that...

Garry Everett. Whos Messing with marriage?

Current Affairs A response to the Australian Catholic Bishops Conferences Pastoral Letter entitledDont Mess With Marriage, May 2015. The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference issued this Pastoral Letter with three purposes in mind: to engage in the current debate about marriage equality; to present the Catholic Churchs teaching on marriage; and to explain the position of the Church to the wider community. The letter does not succeed as it should on any of the three nominated purposes. The letter is a curiously constructed document basically in two parts. The first part attempts to set out the Churchs views about...

Glenn Withers. A Smarter Australia

Policy Series Knowledge capital is the real wealth of nations. If you stop to think about it, what matters more for opportunity, fairness and security than the skills, talents and ideas of the people? Yes, other things matter, but in the long haul they are way back in second place. And, yes, we do a lot already to foster our abilities, but we could be even smarter in this endeavour. Education Structures In Australia, growing our knowledge capital starts at the beginning. Child development is the foundation. It is well established that getting early childhood development right makes...

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