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

Corporate bullies

Public debate and the development of good policy are being steadily corrupted by the success of powerful lobby groups to quickly close down debate and force retreat by the government. This tactic is assisted by a timid government and a media that has little understanding of policy issues, and is only too prepared to recycle the handouts from powerful groups. Last week we saw this bullying in full view. The government floated the suggestion that the concessions handed out to wealthy retirees in tax concessions by Peter Costello in 2007 should be reconsidered. The superannuation lobby went into immediate...

The Bad Samaritan. Guest blogger Greg at Cottesloe

You dont have to be Christian to get it about helping sick or injured strangers but the parable of the kindly Samaritan does have its limits. What happens when the Samaritan notices the packet of smokes and the crumpled betting tickets? Irritation then becomes outrage - could that be a bottle of liquor in his pocket? And how can anyone be reading rubbish like that? Thank God I stopped to help him. Well fix him up in no time. Lets start with....... Most people have started to feel uneasy before this point, sensing that simple kindness is changing into a...

Teaching 'medical English' in Vietnam. Guest blogger Kerry Goulston

Vietnamese medical students realise that English is the international language of Medicine. They can read it wellall have Laptops or i-pads and have easy access to radio and TV- but they know that they have problems in understanding spoken English and in speaking it. It is a language very different from their own but in schools and at university English is taught by other Vietnamese. Few can afford private tuition in spoken English as they are poorly paid. Young healthcare workers aspiring to gain scholarships overseas to further their studies realise that there is a need to improve their skills...

Sport and Markets. Guest blogger: Ian McAuley

We are all suitably shocked by Justice Minister Jason Clares announcement of the findings of the Australian Crime Commissions investigation into the use of prohibited substances and links to organized crime in sports. I heard his solemn announcement as I was driving home, past our local croquet club, and wondered if any code was exempt. Sport in Australia has never been entirely clean. Most people of my age have enough stories from the racetracks to bore our dinner guests for hours. But we also recall an era when league football was an outlet for suburban tribalism, when a player...

Japanese Amnesia. Guest blogger: Susan Menadue Chun

In the Washington Post articleshttp://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/japan-must-face-the-past/2013/01/25/7a9b9244-6713-11e2-85f5-a8a9228e55e7_story.html Jennifer Lind describes how Japanese conservative politicians have been playing a potentially dangerous game in disputes with neighbouring countries. The dispute arises mainly because of Japans inability to acknowledge its past aggression. The current Japanese hostility to neighbours is in part designed to distract national attention away from the countrys economic woes. Fortunately, Prime Minister Abe did not antagonise the ROK on territory issues as feared on Takeshima Day on 3 February 2013.(Takeshima/Dokdo are the disputed islands between Japan and ROK). Hopefully, it is a sign that Prime Minister Abe is becoming more moderate....

New leadership on Asylum seekers

Yesterday, Crikey published an article by Arja Keski-Nummi and me on the opportunities for the new Minister for Immigration to break the impasse on asylum seekers. You can find it at my website publish.pearlsandirritations.com.

Can the media spell 'policy'?

A friend of mine, Ian McAuley, has drawn attention to an election study by the ANU's Institute for Public Policy Trends. It covers elections 1987-2010. The study shows conclusively that our media is badly out of touch with what the public wants. For the 2010 federal election campaign, the study asked voters what were the most important considerations in their voting decision. 52% said 'policy issues'. 25% said 'parties as a whole'. 15% said 'party leaders'. 8% said 'candidates in my electorate'. The media and particularly the Canberra Press Gallery keep pushing personalities, leaders and politics when clearly...

Cricket - Junk food and BUPA

I used to be a grafted-on cricket watcher. But I am being weaned off. One reason is that there is so much cricket on TV that the quality suffers. I mostly turn off the audio and although the camera work is superb, I can't turn off the unhealthy diet of fast-food and beer advertisements that Channel 9 and Foxtel overwhelm me with from first ball to stumps. I thought sport had something to do with encouraging healthy lifestyles. But the endless Kentucky Fried Chicken, Macdonalds, Pizza Hut and Victorian Bitter advertisements do just the reverse. But my real...

Handle with Care. Guest blogger: Greg from Cottesloe

When I was a kid, the pictures on Saturday afternoons were a highlight of the week. Before the main feature, the cartoons and even the Pathe newsreel would come one of the top favourites, a government warning on the danger of keeping unexploded ammunition in homes. Mortar bombs often featured; unlike bullets and other aimed projectiles, they dont miss and they wound anyone thats exposed. These films had names like Not Worth Dying for and started with a picture of a mortar bomb on the mantelpiece, went to pipe smoking Dad accidentally knocking it over, the house going up with...

Federal Election bits and pieces

There was nothing new in the timing of the next election announced by Julia Gillard. There wasn't much doubt that it would be some time in August or September. There may be a marginal benefit for the government in the early announcement. It has some major policy issues to outline - Gonski reforms, national disability and how they are to be funded. Having the resources of the bureaucracy in outlining these issues will be a considerable advantage. Furthermore, oppositions have been inclined to make themselves small targets and hide policy until late in the day. That will now be much...

Nova Peris and the Captain's pick

Julia Gillard's action in parachuting Nova Peris into the Northern Territory senate seat is understandable. The ALP machinery is so decrepit and undemocratic that occasional use of power by the parliamentary leader is necessary. Party members have left the ALP in droves over the years. It is a ramshackle organisation that is so easy to manipulate by faction heavies. With so few party members it is remarkable that there isn't more branch stacking and manipulation in preselections. Apparently only about 230 party members voted in the preselection for Senator Crossin for the Northern Territory Senate. But there are over...

Rio Tinto - Corporate Governance and Asia

Since 2007 RioTintohas written off $US 35 billion in failed investments. It must be a world record. There are probably more write-downs to come with its investments in Mozambique coal and in aluminium in North America. TomAlbanesehas been sacrificed but the remainder of the RioTintoboard are apparently unscathed. They have been too lax with shareholders money that they have washed so comprehensively down the drain. The boards of some of our mining companies in the mining boom must think that they are playing with monopoly money. Booming commodity prices and demand lulled them into being careless on major investment...

Australian media and President Park Geun-Hye of ROK

If we want to be serious about our future in the 'Asian Century' we will need to start with our media. The election of President Park Geun-Hye in ROK in December last year was a very significant event, but it passed in the Australian media with only the briefest of mentions. (The same could be said of the election of Prime Minister Abe in Japan in the same month.) Contrast that with the overwhelming coverage we had last year of the US Republican primary, the US Presidential election and now the inauguration of President Obama. The media coverage of...

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