Letter

In response to The China shift: Australia's universities in an age of suspicion

Working with China

https://johnmenadue.com/post/2025/11/australian-universities-and-china/

Richard Cullen’s article points out negative effects of parts of the Australian establishment’s attitude to China.

I can remember when over 30 years ago many here were keen to assist in China’s development. eg. Zhengzhou province adopted the Australian model of OHS law. Working from a Chinese government plan for OHS 1990-2020, we were successful in a proposal to the Chinese Ministry of Labour for VET training in OHS.(Unfortunately WA authorities canned it because we had used personal contact, not official channels). However we did later succeed in publishing our textbook on OHS in Chinese through a Chinese press house. I was then able to provide the translator with a three month sabbatical studying OHS in Australia.

And subsequent to that was involved in assisting in the publishing in the international press of possibly the first open inquiry into an industrial accident, the Wenzhou high speed rail accident. A later one was on a bridge collapse. For our part we learnt of some Chinese ideas for OHS, such as the safety room at the entrance to a coal mine.

Were we wrong to collaborate? No, of course not. And it also led me to study Chinese, which re-orients your thinking.

— Geoff Taylor from Borlu (Perth)