Michelle Grattan talks to Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull about the government's new anti-online piracy measures, Zaky Mallah on ABC's Q&A, gay marriage and much more.
Michelle Grattan talks to Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young about personal attacks on her, paying people smugglers to turn their boat around, gay marriage, and much more.
Michelle Grattan talks to Minister for Small Business Bruce Billson about the budget, the small business tax cuts, cabinet leaks, gay marriage and much more.
A budget speech that fails to discuss basic measures of how the economy going is revealing in itself. Joe Hockey is the first treasurer since at least 1981 not to mention GDP.
The UK is poised for another minority government, this time possibly with a hung parliament. Australia’s long experience of such arrangements offers lessons in how to manage minority government.
Lack of youth involvement in politics is often attributed to lack of interest. But my research indicates the bigger barrier is government capacity to listen to and work with young people’s views.
More than 280,000 votes were cast online at the NSW election, which has been claimed as a new world record. The state’s early vote also looks set to hit a new high, mirroring a trend across Australia.
The same forces of disruption that are changing industries and economies around the world are now having a discernible effect on Australian politics – and that’s bad news for the major parties.
How might Liberal MPs vote in the upcoming leadership spill? The answer to that question is vastly more complicated than it might seem. Ostensibly, they will be voting for the best political leader amongst…
Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s government was sworn in just over one year ago, making this an opportune moment to review its performance from an international perspective. Abbott and his Canadian…
Labor frontbencher Anthony Albanese recently bemoaned the decline in the quality of political reporting in Australia. Albanese is not the first current or ex-politician to question the standard of reporting…
On the occasion of US Secretary of State John Kerry trip to Australia for AUSMIN talks, I reflect upon the role of Australia in America’s democracy. Meetings such as AUSMIN focus on military contributions…
The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) is enjoying another moment in the sun. Australian politics is starting to move to the beat of its drum as Treasurer Joe Hockey talks about an “end to the age of…
It looks like there’s a new Clive Palmer in town. At Monday’s Queensland Media Club lunch in Brisbane, where the Palmer United Party (PUP) leader talked down the federal budget and spruiked his own ideas…
Announcing his review into the national curriculum late last week, education minister Christopher Pyne said that the government fears it has a partisan leaning towards leftist politics and doesn’t recognise…
Socrates once observed that no-one could be a statesman if they were entirely ignorant of the problem of wheat. Once again wheat – or, more precisely, grain handling and the sale of GrainCorp – is drawing…
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison loves to cast the battle against the boats in military terms. So we might apply that language to assess the continuing struggle between government and media over the…
Should we care about Kevin Rudd’s legacy? Will anyone care? Australian political historians gaze with envy at the United States, where past presidents are revered and books about the “founding fathers…
Almost all the politicians sworn in today for the new Parliament are much constrained, glued to the parties that put them there. That imposes disciplines at multiple levels. Clive Palmer, as he showed…
Tony Abbott says he hopes Australia will have an Indigenous prime minister “one day, not too far off”. Addressing the Welcome to Country ceremony at Parliament House, Abbott said that Noel Pearson, “a…