The looming confrontation between Qantas and its pilots, engineers and baggage handlers could easily become Australia’s most dramatic industrial conflict since the waterfront dispute of 1998. But it seems…
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Another attack on Fraser Island - the flashpoint for dingo management issues - has highlighted our complex relationship with these animals once again. But when we shoot and trap dingos, do we really know…
Can Prime Minister Julia Gillard lecture China on its human rights record given the many failings observers see in Australia’s own treatment of vulnerable groups? Australia generally has a good human rights…
Spending on health is the most rapidly expanding part of federal and state budgets, driven by chronic diseases, an ageing population and unrealistic expectations. The $100 billion spent this year on health…
Carbon tax or not, Australia’s emissions will keep rising, driven by rapid rates of population growth and increasing affluence. Most of the carbon is domestic but we also own the carbon that China and…
Steve Jobs, Apple CEO, hit back at reports yesterday that the company’s iPhones track the movements of its 100 million users. The charge was that Apple was storing a database of this information, to which…
This morning Fairfax newspapers delivered a savage hit to the reputation of Paul Howes, National Secretary of the Australian Workers Union (AWU) and the country’s best-known union leader. The story carried…
Cities are shaped by flows of people, money and goods.Tourists flock to their most famous sights, but guiding them through the city to their less obvious attractions can be lucrative for the locals. The…
The Anzac Day clash between Essendon and Collingwood has come and gone yet again, as well as the inevitable publicity surrounding the most hyped home-and-away match of the season. You could be forgiven…
Fraser Island dingoes, a population facing extinction, are back in the news again, but for all the wrong reasons. The latest? Australian rangers have killed two dingoes believed to have mauled a three-year-old…
Both Ross Garnaut and Ken Henry have spoken out against the Fringe Benefits Tax concession for company cars, pointing to it as an incentive for us to drive more. Indeed some would say that it is just one…
A recent application to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) requested alcohol be rescheduled as a prohibited substance “unfit for human consumption”. The application quickly got the thumbs down…
You may have heard that a male black swan was widowed by rock-throwing children in Melbourne recently. The event caused ripples of public concern, but also revealed how little we know about these iconic…
It seems a simple question: “Why don’t women just leave violent relationships?” But many victims can’t simply walk away. There are many barriers to ending an abusive relationship, and financial worries…
Recent polls have shown a rise in public support for former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd returning to The Lodge. After an appearance on the ABC’s Q&A television show widely seen as possibly preparing…
Every year we are bombarded by messages about the importance of road safety as holidays approach and regaled every night with state-specific road toll statistics. But we know roads are not the only places…
We may not know it, but psychometrics has shaped the way we understand intelligence. We’re all familiar with the idea of an IQ test, and we might know where we stand on the IQ scale - but what about the…
So far there have been three Intergenerational Reports by Treasury examining the challenges of an ageing population which have consistently been used to justify new policies to address a potential ageing…
Conflict of interests occur often in corporate life, where multiple interests intersect and where objectivity and professional detachment have been replaced by self-interest and concealment. Often they…
Every year since the early 1990s, thousands of visitors have invaded the Gallipoli battlefield. The rise of this sad, starkly beautiful and melancholy place as a tourist destination is of course related…
When Barack Obama received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009 he offered some reflections on just war theory and sought to justify, partly in its light, the war he inherited in Afghanistan. He did not apply…
The man in charge of the My School website says schools may discriminate against students with special needs because they drag down results. The head of the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting…
One thing most of us know about time is that there isn’t enough of the stuff, and that the problem is getting worse. “Too swiftly now the Hours take flight,” as the English poet Austin Dobson (1840-1921…
The two pieces of Commonwealth legislation strictly regulate research use of human embryos in Australia are currently being reviewed. The Australian public is overwhelmingly in favour of stem cell research…
Expected cuts in health and medical research in the May Federal budget have led to a predicable backlash from vested interests. We are informed that any cuts will detrimentally affect standards of healthcare…