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(This is my first contribution to Al Jazeera, the Qatar-based independent news service)
CLIMATE change has reared again as a major factor in the Australian political landscape, even as the issue has dropped substantially down the list of important issues for the electorate. Most commentators are saying about this election, “It’s the economy, stupid.” But, over the past seven years, government and opposition positions on what should be done about climate change have had a greater impact on personal and party political fortunes than the economy. Continue reading “It’s climate change, stupid”

KEVIN Rudd is strutting the country this election campaign saying he saved Australia from the global financial crisis. Tony Abbott, on the other hand, says John Howard’s prudence saved Australia, and that Labor squandered more than was necessary to save us. Continue reading “Who really saved Australia from the GFC?”

IT IS now a decade since I left permanent full-time employment. As it happens at roughly the same time Australia’s workforce hit a cross-over point. Those in full-time employment are now out-numbered by the rest of the workforce. Continue reading “Work crumbling to bits and pieces”

THE Coalition’s willingness to rule in discussion of the GST reminded me of an encounter some years ago. I was in the checkout queue at Manuka Coles and who should be behind me but a leading economist in one of Australia’s leading think tanks. Continue reading “Smarter, higher taxes make us better off”

TELEVISION journalists often have to fill air, especially when a big story breaks but there is little new detail to be had. And thus it was on the day the election was called. Perhaps the two most ill-considered statements were about the prospects for the Greens in the Senate. Continue reading “Rudd change to help Green Senate hopes”

CANBERRA’S bitter winter and even more bitter electricity costs are making everyone painfully aware of the need for greater energy efficiency in the home. It will be reinforced come the extremes of summer when the air-conditioner beckons. Continue reading “EER ratings past their used-by date”

EVERY television and radio news broadcast in Australia – commercial and public – has the same misguided priority. They all put sport before the weather. Continue reading “Weathering the media sport storm”

THE unannounced, but perhaps the best, part of Prime Minister Kevin’s Rudd’s change to the carbon tax is that it will very likely put the Australian car industry out of its misery. That would also put Australian taxpayers out of a lot of misery – $19 billion worth of misery to be more precise. Continue reading “End of car industry a benefit of tax change”

THE Instruction Manual for the British Civil Service (which is used extensively by its Australian, Canadian, New Zealand and even US counterparts) has quite a few instructions in several chapters on what to do when an incoming government proposes to “cut through the red tape”. I was reminded of the chapters this week when Opposition Leader Tony Abbott announced he was going to set up a “Deregulation Unit” within the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. Continue reading “Another futile attack on red tape”

NO DOUBT that before white settlement, the indigenous people of Australia lived in, what Thomas Hobbes called, a state of nature in which life was “nasty, brutish and short”. And to some extent life is more nasty, brutish and short for indigenous Australians than it is for the rest, but perhaps better than what it was in the state of nature. Continue reading “Qld murder laid bare & credit card usury”