Jack Waterford

The powers vested in prime minister Scott Morrison by the Governor-General David Hurley during the five-ministries affair represented both a sword and a shield against any coup against Morrison himself. They also gave Morrison unparalleled capacity to seize power for himself, casting aside some of his most powerful ministerial colleagues without being held to account by important constitutional protections against tyranny implicit in the concept of responsible government. (more…)

The great unravelling of Scott Morrison’s pseudo-constitutional coup deserves a comprehensive inquiry. Perhaps a royal commission. It’s a commission that could also embrace other improper, illegal or general style of secretive unaccountable government, and also take in the connivance, or learned ignorance of other ministers and senior bureaucrats. (more…)

Retired ACT Supreme Court Justice John Burns has copped a severe caning from the independent National Security legislation monitor this week. It’s over his handling of a case in which a man we cannot name was secretly charged with serious criminal offences, which cannot really be itemised other than in the most general way, who was tried in secret in a closed court with evidence we are not allowed to know about. He was found guilty and given a 31-month jail term in the ACT prison without the public – or even the ACT Attorney-General – being allowed to know anything about it. (more…)

Although the activities of politicians from minor parties and independents should fall under integrity legislation, we should mostly be grateful that they contain more enthusiasts for a tough and expansive system than within the government. (more…)

Tony Abbott, as prime minister nearly a decade ago, had more than a few bees under his bonnet. He thought his election had redeemed the nation from an intolerable scourge of a government of criminals. Other opposition leaders have engaged in this sort of hyperbole, but scarcely ever with the zeal and lack of restraint, of Abbott. (more…)

The US Supreme Court’s decision to overrule the Roe v Wade principle that the right to an abortion is a privacy right guaranteed by the American constitution has magnified the fears of pro-choice citizens. They are worried that in the red states that have already criminalised abortion, right-to-life zealots, including those in law enforcement, will be anxious to search out and punish those breaching these state-based laws. The text of some of these laws, and the rhetoric of some of their proponents, suggest that the concern is by no means simply paranoid. (more…)

Professor Peter Coaldrake’s review of a Queensland public administration which has been losing its way since the Fitzgerald reforms of thirty years ago should be compulsory reading for politicians, for public servants, particularly senior executives, and for citizens sick of the way that modern government has let accountability and integrity slip by the wayside. (more…)

NSW Liberals have a bit of a thing about ICAC. It was, more or less, a Liberal Party brainchild – seen as a counter to seemingly obvious corruption in the Labor government of the day, three decades ago. Perversely, some thought, incoming Liberal Premier, Nick Greiner, popularly regarded as a cleanskin was its first victim. Later he could claim that he was “exonerated” from a corruption finding by the NSW court system, but, whether that is true or not, it was too late. He was right out of politics.
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Spare a thought for Michael Coutts-Trotter, the Secretary of the NSW Premiers Department. He has been asked, in effect, to decide which of several versions of how John Barilaro was appointed “on merit” to a cushy $500,000 trade commissioner job in New York most closely approximates the truth. (more…)

Those in favour of a strong and effective integrity commission, including the retired judges who have done so much to outline the need, should be very suspicious of the central role being accorded the Attorney-General’s department. (more…)

One of the reasons why some of Labor’s old hands, particularly on the right, regard the prospect of integrity legislation with less than complete enthusiasm is that sooner or later – probably sooner than expected and maybe even before the next election – it will be the instrument of the downfall of a Labor minister. (more…)

One has almost to go back to World War II to find the Australian Labor Party in a more theoretically advantageous position in seeking to pursue its legislative and executive government agenda. But if Anthony Albanese and Labor are to capitalise on their luck in times almost as difficult, they must take great care in managing their relationships with those with whom they have interests in common. Too close, too intimate, will be nearly as bad as being too careless of each other’s sensibilities. (more…)

One of the more amazing elections of the past 50 years was in 1974, less than 18 months after the Whitlam government took power – at least in the House of Representatives. It did not have a majority in the senate and was often frustrated there, in part because of the crossbench numbers of Democratic Labor Party – foes of Labor since the 1956 Split. The DLP was led by Vince Gair, a former Labor Queensland premier, a fairly good one really who had been expelled from Labor with some of his ministers, including Bob Katter’s dad, for daring to defy an AWU official. (more…)

Once Morrison was in an advantageous position to exploit Australia’s apparently successful management of the coronavirus pandemic and the economic shutdown it involved. He lost much of his advantage by his conflicts with the states over pandemic management, local responses and his determination to restart the economy before the pandemic was under control, as well as by a host of failures over vaccine ordering and distribution. (more…)

If there is one thing worse than losing office to the other major party in politics, it is losing strength in the factional balances within one’s own party. On both sides of politics, even in mid-election there are some working for the defeat of politicians on their own team, even at the risk – indeed likelihood – that the loss of a seat may be the difference between government and opposition. (more…)

Australia is calling out for leadership, for ideas, for enduring values and for decisive choices. (more…)

New governments should hit the ground running, even as they are exhausted by the election campaign, and nearly three dreary years of disaster and pandemic. (more…)

The history of unreliable opinion polls in Australia is such that it would be a brave punter who would call the election result on the evidence of polls alone. Right now, however, it would be an even more courageous one, who would be betting against the definite trend –of polls indicating a decisive change of government. (more…)

One of the habits I have always urged on young political journalists is of jotting down, and remembering statements made by politicians on general principles of accountability, responsibility and personal and public morality. (more…)