If Arthur Sinodinos couldn’t be across key facts about a company of which he became chairman, how can he and the government credibly argue that someone with no expertise should be their own watchdog?
AAP/Daniel Munoz
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…
Federal Opposition Leader Bill Shorten, WA Labor leader Mark McGowan, Federal Deputy Leader Tanya Plibersek and Federal Labor MP Alannah MacTiernan in Perth this week. Joe Bullock is conspicuously absent.
AAP/Tim Clarke
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…
Desalination plants are an example of bad processes at a state level.
Thiess
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…
The debate about media ownership will inevitably revolve around Rupert Murdoch.
EPA/DREW ANGERER
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…
Cory Bernadi has received a slap in the Coalition party room.
AAP/Alan Porritt
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…
Tony Abbott is trying to switch the focus from a Qantas debt guarantee to the repeal of the carbon tax.
AAP/Alan Porritt
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…
Attorney General George Brandis will soon take to cabinet proposals to remove the “Bolt” provisions.
AAP/Daniel Munoz
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…
Tony Abbott is committed to the Closing the Gap targets.
AAP/Alan Porritt
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…
The outcome of Saturday’s byelection will set the tone for the first sitting week of 2014.
AAP/Dan Peled
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 Government has sent messages to business and the ABC, this week.
AAP/Alan Porritt
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…
Tony Abbott faces difficulty within his own party about indigenous recognition.
AAP/Lukas Coch
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