The chief executive of the left-leaning Australia Institute think tank, Richard Denniss, has urged Labor to do a deal to implement elements of the government’s controversial direct action climate program…
- Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra
The Abbott government has slumped back to its post-budget low, trailing Labor 45-55% on a two-party basis, in today’s Newspoll. In results that will strengthen the determination of the new Senate – which…
Welfare reform is always a fraught policy area. But releasing the McClure blueprint for sweeping change after a budget that targeted a swathe of government payments guaranteed a lot of negativity. The…
Now that Clive Palmer has declared the government’s “direct action” plan a “waste of money”, is it dead? That would leave Australia without even a fig leaf of a carbon policy to reach its emissions-cut…
Liberal organisers expected their federal council meeting in Melbourne to be a “no surprises” affair. But, as with the Coalition government, it didn’t quite work out that way. Long-planned changes to the…
The Abbott government’s strong preference for limiting the role of Canberra and boosting that of the states is a central thrust in the terms of reference for the white paper on reforming the federation…
Former senior Howard government minister Richard Alston has become the new Liberal federal president, after a vote at the party’s federal council tonight. Alston, who was anointed by Prime Minister Tony…
University of Canberra Vice Chancellor Stephen Parker and Professorial Fellow Michelle Grattan discuss the week in politics including the elaborate showcasing of the Palmer United Party’s stance on the…
Tony Abbott will be in Melbourne this weekend to address the Liberal federal council. The timing is unfortunate. A Newspoll has just shown the Victorian Coalition would lose badly in an election held now…
What on earth was Al Gore, a zealot on climate change, doing celebrating a Palmer carbon policy that’s worse than what Australia has in place, although not as bad as it could have been? That remains a…
In a spectacular joint appearance with former Vice President Al Gore, Clive Palmer has announced PUP will vote to repeal the carbon tax but seek to set up a shell emissions trading scheme that could be…
American ambassador John Berry has said the decision against journalist Peter Greste cannot be allowed to stand and pledged the United States will “remain engaged” in trying to resolve the issue. The US…
Motoring Enthusiast Party senator-elect Ricky Muir has reaffirmed his unity with the Palmer United Party, as Clive Palmer prepares tomorrow to spell out his stands and demands on the government’s carbon…
In deciding to vote against the restoration of fuel excise indexation, the Greens have let the perfect be the enemy of the good. They’ve gone against their own policy, and appeared to be all over the place…
The Australian government will press the Egyptians “at the highest level” to try to free Australian journalist Peter Greste, sentenced to seven years jail after being convicted of supporting the Muslim…
The government is still decisively losing the argument over its budget’s “fairness” although it has reduced Labor’s lead, according to the latest Nielsen poll. As the government faces battles on key budget…
Australians are deeply cynical about both sides’ approach to climate change but especially mistrust Tony Abbott’s attitude, according to polling released by the Climate Institute on the eve of the reintroduction…
If it weren’t for the bad vibes between Greens senator Lee Rhiannon and Attorney-General George Brandis, Australia might not have a diplomatic crisis over how it describes East Jerusalem. The two scrapped…
University of Canberra Professorial Fellow Michelle Grattan and student Jelisa Apps, standing in for Vice Chancellor Stephen Parker, discuss the week in politics including controversy around the school…
As if it doesn’t have enough trouble with its budget, the government is now bracing for another attempt at selling its plans to water down Labor’s Future of Financial Advice (FoFA) law. Finance Minister…
The High Court has again ruled unconstitutional the federal funding for school chaplains, casting doubt over the future of a program to which the Abbott government is deeply committed. Queensland father…
It was like watching the little kids taunting the big kid in the playground, after the Senate handed the government a trigger for a double dissolution by rejecting for a second time the bill to scrap Labor’s…
It was quite a spectacle, when Liberal backbencher Ian Macdonald gave Mathias Cormann a viva voce in the Senate over the budget’s debt levy legislation – and then bluntly told the Finance Minister he’d…
The government today is set to bow to public and industry pressure to ensure that commissions remain outlawed under its controversial financial advice legislation. Finance Minister Mathias Cormann is expected…
In Canberra the Ides of March has recently come in June, soon after the Press Gallery’s Midwinter Ball and at the end of the parliamentary session. Kevin Rudd was deposed in late June 2010; Julia Gillard…
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