Words or action? Dreyfus and human rights at home
Mark Dreyfus has been appointed Australia’s special envoy on human rights. Is the government prepared to match international advocacy with concrete action at home – by finally legislating a Human Rights Act?
Recent articles in Our Top Five Each Week
5 December 2025
How media coverage helps normalise the far right
Media coverage does more than report on the far right. Through language choices, sensationalism and false balance, journalism can help shift racist politics into the mainstream.
5 December 2025
Trump’s drug war on Venezuela reeks of hypocrisy
Donald Trump’s campaign against Venezuela is less about drugs than power, exposing deep hypocrisy in US policy and raising uncomfortable questions for Australia about its alliance.
4 December 2025
Australia’s immigration 'debate' is rhetoric, not policy
Australia is awash with immigration rhetoric, but little of it is grounded in evidence, clear definitions or serious policy alternatives. Rather than an informed public debate, Australians are being offered slogans, blame and ambiguity.
4 December 2025
How the Albanese government kept “jobs for mates” alive
The Albanese government promised to end political patronage in statutory appointments, but has instead chosen a non-binding framework that preserves ministerial discretion and limits accountability.
2 December 2025
Charting Trump's decline
New polling reveals a clear and sustained decline in public approval of Trump and his policies that is already reshaping US electoral prospects, with significant implications for Congress and beyond.
2 December 2025
Rising student visa refusals clash with plans to boost enrolments
After encouraging universities to expand overseas enrolments, the government has overseen a sharp fall in student visa approval rates – leaving institutions uncertain and applicants frustrated.
2 December 2025
We’re not about to go full Trump no matter what the culture warriors say
Strains on social cohesion cannot be dismissed as the embrace of multiculturalism has made the task of defining what holds the community together more challenging.
1 December 2025
Australia's strategic choices in a fragmenting global order
With Trump 2.0, the global order is changing and changing rapidly.
30 November 2025
Faith that costs something: the Pope's challenge to comfortable Christianity
A new Vatican document challenges wealthy Catholics to move beyond charity toward justice, solidarity and real encounters with the poor.
28 November 2025
Why Labor can’t be bold without confronting tax reform
If the Albanese government wants to deliver lasting reform – in education, healthcare, housing and climate – it will have to confront the hardest political question of all: how to raise the revenue to pay for it.
28 November 2025
Why Medicare needs joint federal–state hospitals
Medicare’s founding promise is failing millions as jurisdictional division leaves patients stuck on waiting lists and priced out of specialist care. A shared federal–state hospital system is the missing reform.
27 November 2025
The inflation myth propping up private school privilege
Private schools regularly blame inflation for rising fees, yet funding arrangements mean they are largely compensated for cost increases. Their fee-setting power widens the resource gap while feeding back into inflation itself.
Catch up on other sections
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21 November 2025
Assessing the Liberal Party's policy-making capacity
19 November 2025
Working with PM Fraser - the changeover - Part 1
13 November 2025
ASIO's Mike Burgess and a lust for the limelight
7 November 2025
Australia’s fragile multicultural consensus under threat
