Popular conceptions of government tend to derive from media representations of politicians in action, political speeches, yesterday in parliament, elections, scandal, controversy and so on. And the politics…
Walter Holland, London School of Economics and Political Science
The introduction of scientific principles into government decision-making began with the publication of the Haldane Report in 1918. Haldane believed that research should play a key role in government and…
Partisanship aside, extreme weather events linked to climate change pose an enormous threat to the Western, legal-political system of government.
EPA/Steve Pope
The recently released fifth report of the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change stresses the connection between climate change and severe weather events around the world, including devastating…
Buying power doesn’t always stack up as the best measurement for who we are and how far we’ve come.
Shutterstock/ MaleWitch
In the verbal volley between Gillard and Abbott, Swan and Hockey, there is a conversation that we are not hearing. It bubbles below the consciousness of mainstream Australia, a conversation that is old…
Everyone, it seems, has a “fix” for education. The government has staked improvement on extra funding while others say a higher bar for teaching graduates is needed, and some view the prestige of the profession…
We won’t realise the impact of state cuts to vocational education for many years.
AAP/Joe Castro
This year, the majority of TAFEs across the country have been threatened by state government changes to the sector. In New South Wales and Victoria, vocational education has seen institutional closures…
Are cuts the best way to achieve efficient Government?
Joe Castro / AAP
I was sitting in a session at the Institute of Public Administration Congress recently where Greg Hywood, the CEO of Fairfax, boldly announced that the public sector simply did not understand cuts. Not…
It takes more than a code of conduct to foster good departmental relationships.
AAP/Alan Porritt
The role of ministerial advisers and their relationship to public servants has been the subject of aserious public debate in recent weeks. Business Council of Australia chief Jennifer Westacott caused…
State governments are looking at changing the way they deliver education.
AAP Image/Mick Tsikas
At a time when the Commonwealth sponsored Gonski Review of School Funding is recommending an increase of $5 billion a year plus for schools around Australia, it may seem odd that some state governments…
The final pieces of the historical puzzle around the 1975 Whitlam dismissal are not as sensational as they first seem.
Image courtesy of National Archives of Australia. NAA: A6180, 13/11/75/33
Much hyperbole has been generated by the recent revelations concerning Sir Anthony Mason’s involvement in the 1975 dismissal, but for the most part it shows ignorance of the past. Earlier this week, The…
The PM should look to her successes in education and build on them by adopting the Gonski recommendations.
AAP Image/Julian Smith
Howʼs this for a radical thought to start the week - a robust contest of ideas around how we educate Australian students to an internationally competitive standard. Too quixotic? Perhaps, but it would…
Should the government subsidise university places when graduates gain so much from a tertiary education?
Flickr/pamhule
After releasing my report, Graduate Winners: Assessing the public and private benefits of higher education, the question I have most been asked is: if university fees go up, will students still come? It’s…
Spy agencies in Australia have a big job, but does the job match the budget?
Flickr/ocularinvasion
In an era of evolving threats, judgment calls will continue to rely on the provision of accurate, timely intelligence. But this intelligence does not come cheap. In order to be well-prepared and well-organised…
Current Prime Minister John Key is set to have an easy victory at today’s election.
AAP/NZN Image/SNPA, David Rowland
New Zealand goes to the polls today to elect both a government and conduct a referendum on the nation’s electoral system. It will cap off fifteen tumultuous months in the country. Christchurch has endured…
Shooty Vikadan died in Villawood Detention Centre before the Commonwealth Ombudsman could review his case.
AAP/Torsten Blackwood
The asylum seeker who committed suicide in Villawood detention centre this week should have been interviewed by the Commonwealth Ombudsman to establish whether he should have been released into the community…
Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey wants the Opposition’s policies privately costed.
AAP
Federal parliament has begun debating the merits of a new independent unit which would cost election promises and policies for all parliamentarians. But one of the more controversial aspects of the Gillard…
The carbon tax is the latest attempt by an Australian government to legislate in order to avert disaster, this time to the climate. Whether the tax will become law sits on a knife edge, and the stakes…
Brown talking up the Green’s role in the new Senate AAP/Alan Porritt.
One hundred and ten years after Federation, the Senate today helps to ensure that the Australian Parliament more closely reflects the will of the people. But despite assurances by Bob Brown in his speech…