Crispin Hull

Should we delay the Voice vote?

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese should not abandon the Voice referendum – at least not yet. But if the polls continue their present trend, he will have to seriously consider it.

The choice is stark. If the referendum is put and lost, a very sensible proposal and all of the exhaustive consultation with Indigenous people would be lost, never to be regained.

Reserve Banks loses leverage

Spare a thought for the new Governor of the Reserve Bank, Michelle Bullock. In the past few days many have reflected on the “mistakes” of out-going Governor Philip Lowe, sometimes comparing him to earlier Governors who seemed to use the interest-rate lever with more finesse.

But the more likely explanation is not that Lowe made “mistakes” by holding rates too high for too long to meet a non-existent wage spiral; holding rates too low for too long fearing an economic crash that did not happen; and then jacking them up too high too quickly.

Rather it is that Lowe’s governorship coincided with changes in the Australian economy that made the interest-rate lever a much less predictable tool. And it will not be any different for Bullock.

NATO must bring Putin down

NATO leaders will meet this week in Lithuania, a nation that suffered both the Nazi jackboot and the hammer of Soviet communism. Their main subject, of course, will be Ukraine, which suffered the same fate as Lithuania and now suffers at the hands of the Putin dictatorship.

As those leaders meet, they should reflect upon the words of Robert Jackson delivered during the opening the prosecution at the Nuremberg trial in 1945:

The obsession with surpluses

The Federal Government has posted the first actual surplus for 15 years – as distinct from a projected surplus with celebratory coffee mugs just before covid struck.

The essential lesson is not to get stuck on the mantra of “surplus good, deficit bad” and that that is the be-all and end-all of budgetary (or fiscal) policy. Governments are not like households. They do not have to keep spending within the bounds of income or go bankrupt.

Restoring trust in politics

Question Time should be abolished. Its corrosive effect on our democracy was exposed yet again last week – the last sitting week before the long winter break.

Question Time was supposed to increase trust in the institution of Parliament by keeping the executive government accountable. But it has now been reduced to a scripted pantomime.

Nats in blunder over Voice

Nats say No to Voice. Not a smile in sight.

Nationals Leader David Littleproud made an astounding error of fact in his arguments against the Voice yesterday.

But in doing so he inadvertently made one of the strongest arguments in favour of the Voice so far.

Cleaning politics: hopes and fears

The elected Whitlam Government was sacked by Governor-General John Kerr in 1975 for trying to govern and spend money without the approval of the Parliament after Malcolm Fraser’s Liberal Party blocked Supply in the Senate.

In short, spending money by a Government without parliamentary approval is a a constitutional No-No.

Yet, last week the Australian National Audit Office reported that the Department of Health in the Morrison Government did precisely that. But that was four years and two elections after the event.

Nightmare for ‘young people today’

“Young people today!” The Yorkshire-accented words emitted from the narrow-screen television in the Monty Python classic skit.

I was reminded of this last week when the “young people today” were hit with a 7.1 per cent increase in their student debt through indexation. On the average debt of $25,000 that is $1775. It is the highest indexation for three decades, but back in the 1990s wage increases matched inflation. In 2023, very few got a 7.1 per cent wage increase.

Which Australians are more equal?

The Constitution gives some Australians more rights than others. Or in the words of George Orwell borrowed by Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, “some Australians are more equal than others”. They are called Tasmanians.

Why is that so? Because the founders thought that the smaller colonies would not have a reasonable say in the affairs of the Commonwealth. They could be silenced or squeezed out.

Calvary and legal glitches

The key to the dispute over the takeover of the public hospital land of Calvary Hospital lies in what is, in effect, the ACT’s Constitution – the Self-Government Act.

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