Interviewed recently about the government’s plan to roll back key consumer protections in Labor’s financial advice legislation, Arthur Sinodinos said his advice to consumers was to “get more informed…
Listening to Liberal senators, you’d think Labor was accusing Arthur Sinodinos of being an axe murderer and killing the family dog to boot. In fact the opposition wasn’t demanding anything particularly…
Tony Abbott is publicly backing Arthur Sinodinos remaining in situ but it would be better for the Assistant Treasurer to stand aside while the ICAC inquiry is on. That would meet the requirements of both…
Parties keep saying they want to attract better candidates and then continue to throw up some shockers. On the evidence, one such has the top spot on the ALP’s ticket for the West Australian Senate election…
The Productivity Commission has slammed the assessment and development processes for Australia’s public infrastructure projects, finding “numerous examples of poor value-for-money” because of bad selection…
The government’s dilemma in pursuing the so-called “Bolt amendment” to the Racial Discrimination Act has been highlighted by the experience of one of its new marginal seat holders in an electorate with…
Malcolm Turnbull’s suggestion that the 75% “reach” rule for TV networks should be changed is not as radical as it sounds. It is certainly much less of an issue than liberalising the cross media provision…
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull is sending out strong signals that the government is sympathetic to liberalising the cross-media rules, which now say an owner can have only two of TV, radio and…
On the matter of his paid parental leave scheme, Tony Abbott has got religion. He’s been using every occasion in the run up to Saturday’s International Women’s Day to sing hymns to what he’s determined…
The stipulation that Qantas must remain majority Australian-owned is, above all, a legacy of 1990s Labor politics. There is little logic in keeping it today. When the ALP government of that time walked…
As Liberal MP Ewen Jones walked out of the Coalition parties meeting, Tony Abbott gave him a pat on the back and some praise. “Well said,” the PM told the Queensland backbencher. Jones had just delivered…
It’s passing strange to hear Tony Abbott advancing the gung ho “dry” argument that Qantas must not be treated as a special case. But after he crossed that line in the sand by rejecting aid for SPC Ardmona…
Hardly a week goes by, it seems, when there is not some fresh announcement of job shedding. Qantas’s loss of 5000 is the latest blow. But amid the gloom on Thursday, Tony Abbott optimistically reaffirmed…
Before the election Stephen Conroy inflicted severe damage on his own side with his ill-fated media reforms. Now his badly judged attack on Angus Campbell, the military man in charge of Operation Sovereign…
This week the government’s new “freedom commissioner”, Tim Wilson, fresh from the Institute of Public Affairs, started at the Human Rights Commission, with the central task of promoting free speech and…
There have been so many declarations of good intentions followed by minimal progress that it is hard to dare hope real advancement might be made in Aboriginal affairs in the next few years. Yet, we have…
Overreach seems to be endemic in this government. One would think that, after Tony Abbott laid it on far too thick about workers’ conditions at SPC Ardmona and received a tongue lashing from one of his…
A former colleague of Tony Abbott says John Howard would never have flatly denied SPC Ardmona the $25 million in assistance. “He’d have given $15 million with conditions,” said the man, who was praising…
The Abbott government has been firing rhetorical bullets at friends and enemies alike in the last few days. Some employers are weak-kneed. The ABC is unpatriotic. On the face of it, there’s little in common…
In his Australia Day message this weekend Tony Abbott will repeat his commitment to amend the constitution to recognise Aboriginal people as the “first Australians”. He’ll say this should be a “unifying…
Professor in U.S. Politics and U.S. Foreign Relations at the United States Studies Centre and in the Discipline of Government and International Relations, University of Sydney