Public Policy
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JOHN BLAXLAND AND ELAINE PEARSON. Myanmar Rohingya crisis: Australia needs to stand up and help as the situation worsens.
The world seems to be sitting on its hands as the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar descends into what the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has described as “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing”. Continue reading »
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TRAVERS McLEOD. Opportunity for regional leadership on Rohingya refugees.
Australia and Indonesia, the Co‐Chairs of the Bali Process on People Smuggling, Trafficking in Persons and Related Transnational Crime, have been asked by regional experts to fulfil a promise made after the 2015 Andaman Sea crisis by responding quickly to the refugee crisis in Myanmar and Bangladesh. This is an historic opportunity for the Continue reading »
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RANALD MACDONALD. Testing times for the ABC with a ‘competitive, neutrality enquiry’.
One of our most trusted institutions is under real threat- and, like Humpty Dumpty, once broken may never be able to be put together again. Continue reading »
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WE ARE ALSO READING …
Pearls and Irritations provides the following links for weekend reading. Continue reading »
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BRIAN TOOHEY. PM walks with energy dinosaurs
The person known as Malcolm Turnbull who took over as Prime Minister is gone. That’s the one who declared immediately after getting the job that Australians have a wonderfully exciting future provided they recognise “change is our friend, if we are agile and smart enough to take advantage of it”. Continue reading »
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JEAN-PIERRE LEHMANN. University challenge: Asia in the scales of global knowledge.
The Times Higher Educational Supplement (THES) has published its 2018 World University Rankings. Rankings are rankings are rankings. They are not Holy Writ! Still they can be interesting fodder for drawing some interpretations and implications. I admit I may be partly biased as Oxford has come out number 1! (I was at Oxford from 1967 Continue reading »
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MUNGO MacCALLUM. An energy emergency after ten years!
Malcolm Turnbull assures us that he is concentrating on energy and its three pillars – cost, security and environment. Well, at least the first two; it must be said that the environment has not had much of a look in during the last frenzied week. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Are we stopping the boats to save lives at sea?
To justify its harsh refugee policies, the government has been telling us that its policies are designed to save lives at sea. The ALP also joins in this shabby chorus Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Failure of regional leadership on refugees
An estimated 270,000 Rohingya refugees have fled Myanmar in the last two weeks. More will follow. Their position is precarious. We should not be surprised as the persecution of Rohingya goes back centuries. Yet ASEAN and Australian leaders have failed again to anticipate and respond to this human disaster. Ethnic cleansing is under way. Continue reading »
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JOHN TULLOH. The female revolution at ABC News.
‘But the women (foreign correspondents) were (likelier than men) to be more thoughtful in looking at the wider context or human side of stories. In short, they were inclined to be nosier and would go the extra mile to pin down or dig deeper into an aspect of a story’. Continue reading »
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IAN DUNLOP. Hostage to myopic self-interest: climate science is watered down under political scrutiny
Scientific reticence allows politicians to neglect the real dangers we face. But waiting for perfect information means it will be too late to act. Continue reading »
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MICHAEL LAMBERT. Australia’s electricity markets policy: The shambles continues.
Over the last week we have been treated to the depressing spectacle of the Prime Minister and his government reacting in a knee jerk, wrong-headed manner to two sensible and useful reports that have been released by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO). This highlights the folly of not having a national plan for transitioning Continue reading »
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BRUCE THOM. Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, and their implications for Australia
Massive losses in Texas, Florida and across the Caribbean in recent days reminds us again of the capacity of tropical cyclones to wreak havoc. Continue reading »
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ALAN KOHLER. Coalition’s retreat back to coal-fired power stations and the loony fog
In 2015 Australia’s businesses made the mistake of thinking the Coalition government was serious about tackling climate change, and solemnly lined up to support it….There won’t be any new coal power stations and the lives of existing ones won’d be extended unless the government bizarrely and unnecessarily pays for it. If that happened,it would bring Continue reading »
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PAUL GREGOIRE AND UGUR NEDIM. Asylum seekers left destitute at hands of Dutton
Stooping to a new low, the Turnbull government has begun cutting off the welfare payment to vulnerable asylum seekers and given these people three weeks to vacate their government-supported accommodation. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Abbott and Turnbull are the real culprits on the energy policy mess. (repost)
This is a repost of an article that was originally posted on 14 June 2017. I have reposted this in light of current controversy on extending the life of coal fired generators. In his journal, The Constant Investor, Alan Kohler sheeted blame very directly to the Coalition and Malcolm Turnbull. He said Those crises have Continue reading »
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PETER MCCULLAGH. Good Suicide versus Bad Suicide
Will legalised suicide, even when presented as ‘assisted dying’, adversely impact on efforts to reduce do-it-yourself suicide? If it looks like a duck and it quacks, then . . . Continue reading »
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FRANK BRENNAN. Compulsory drug testing is no silver bullet.
Christian Porter, the Minister for Social Services, has been trying to make his mark as an upcoming minister in the Turnbull Government. Porter thinks he might have found the perfect silver bullet: mandatory drug tests for unemployed welfare recipients. Continue reading »
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TIM WOODRUFF. Basic income guarantee: this is a health issue!
In 1970, conservative republican US President Richard Nixon introduced a health bill into the American Congress. It passed but was defeated in the Senate. He didn’t realise it was a health bill, nor did many of his fellow politicians. It was called the Family Assistance Plan, a guaranteed income for families with children, not adequate Continue reading »
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IAN WEBSTER. Lessons from the British National Health Scheme for Australia.
Jeremy Hunt, Health Secretary in the UK, accused Stephen Hawking of a ‘pernicious lie’: “(he) is a brilliant physicist but wrong on lack of evidence.” Stephen Hawking had said his survival for 75 years with motor neurone disease was due to the care he received from the British National Health Service (NHS) and he now Continue reading »
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ACT Government provides much needed leadership on refugees
Last Thursday, the ACT Government passed a strongly worded motion calling on the Federal Government to end its “damaging, cruel and inhumane policy” on refugees. It requested that the Federal Government immediately remove all refugees and asylum seekers from Manus Island and Nauru and resettle them in Australia. Continue reading »
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KIM OATES. Infections in healthcare: common but eminently preventable
Infections acquired in hospitals are a major contributor not only to avoidable deaths but also to the cost of health care. Among preventative measures the simple but often neglected practice of hand-washing stands out. Continue reading »
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MUNGO MacCALLUM. Captain Cook.
For months we have had to endure war on all fronts – the class war, the gender war, the religion war, the equality war, the war on poverty, the war on drugs, the war against political correctness, the war on the ABC and of course the perennially convenient war on terror. Continue reading »
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ROB MOODIE. Seven tactics that unhealthy industries use to undermine public health policies.
Across Africa there are examples of governments trying to introduce policies that improve health and protect the environment only to find their efforts undermined by unhealthy corporations and their industry associations. A case in point is South Africa’s efforts to introduce a tax on sugary drinks to reduce the growing burden of obesity. In the Continue reading »
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EMMA CARMODY. Murray, Darling, what’s all this 4 Corners fuss about?
This article examines the contents of a recently aired 4 Corners episode, Pumped, which included allegations of water theft, corruption and regulatory capture in the Murray-Darling Basin. Continue reading »
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FREYA HIGGINS DESBIOLLES. The politics of public monuments: It’s time Australians looked at what, and whom, we commemorate
Recent events in the US have seen Confederate Civil War monuments pulled down and painful histories revisited. Comparing these acts to those of the Islamic State terror group, Spiked editor Brendan O’Neill evocatively called this an “Orwellian war on history” and a “Year Zero mentality” on the march. O’Neill also took aim at Australia’s Yarra Continue reading »
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PAUL BUDDE. The end of the Foxtel wars
The announcement of the proposed merger of Foxtel with Fox Sport Australia, combined with Telstra’s agreement to dilute its shareholding in the pay TV operator, paves the way for the end of the Foxtel war between News Corp Australia (formerly News Limited) and Telstra. The decline in revenue and subscriber numbers will most certainly have Continue reading »
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RAMESH THAKUR. Debating the Burqa
Brandis was wrong to harangue Hanson. A debate on banning the burqa in Australia is required and should address three questions: its origins in religious edicts and cultural practices; the current practice in Western liberal democracies; and the practice in Islamic countries. Continue reading »
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John Menadue. The burqa and hijab – public space must be neutral and secular.-a repost
The burqa and the hijab are stale news in France. There has been an important debate and discussion on Muslim head and body covering in France for many years. The simple head dress or hijab, turbans and kippas have been banned in French schools since 2004. The burqa has been banned in public spaces since Continue reading »
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HENRY REYNOLDS. That day again
Controversy about Australia Day intensifies. The ABC’s Triple J is consulting its listeners about moving the popular Hottest 100 Countdown from January 26th. Debate is taking place in council chambers across the country. Melbourne’s Yarra Council was savaged by Prime Minister Turnbull in parliament last week because the councillors had decided to cancel official ceremonies Continue reading »