China's remarkable accomplishments

August 3, 2026

I have just returned from a trip to China and for reasons set out here would like to strongly endorse Les Macdonald’s call for Australia and other countries to set aside ideological prejudices and learn from China’s truly remarkable accomplishments, which include: universal health care and education, the complete elimination of extreme poverty, home ownership of about 90 per cent, a crime rate that is about one-hundredth that of cities like New Orleans, 90 per cent of new vehicle registrations in Beijing are electric, no beggars or homeless people on the streets of cities, a bullet train network that comprises 70 per cent of the global total, and, since my last visit 35 years ago, a life expectancy that has increased from 67 to 79 years, and so on. I felt as if I was in some kind of parallel universe.