Anthony Mason reshaped Australian law as Chief Justice – but his concealed role in the Whitlam dismissal casts a lasting shadow over that legacy. (more…)
Jenny Hocking
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‘Rude, arrogant and entitled’: ex-Prince Andrew’s arrest is the inevitable conclusion to a sordid royal tale of privilege and protection
The arrest of ex-Prince Andrew over alleged misconduct is not an isolated scandal but the product of a system that shields the royal family from scrutiny. Without transparency and accountability, privilege can become a pathway to abuse of power. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Whitlam dismissal secrets unearthed from the archives of the Canadian governor-general
This newly uncovered material, exclusively published by Crikey, is the first indication from Sir John Kerr himself that Queen Elizabeth II approved of the position he had taken during his dismissal of Gough Whitlam. (more…)
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A calculated plot, an ambush, a coup
Five decades on from the dismissal of the Whitlam government, Australia is seeing a notable shift in the narrative that now recognises it as a calculated coup, and an assault on the conventions of government.
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The Second Dismissal
In an extract from The Double Dismissal, Emeritus Professor Jenny Hocking, distinguished fellow of the Whitlam Institute within Western Sydney University, and Dr Matt Harvey, senior lecturer at Victoria University of Technology, describe the chaos that led to two dismissals on 11 November. (more…)
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Whitlam dismissal secrets unearthed from the archives of the Canadian governor-general
This newly uncovered material, exclusively published by Crikey, is the first indication from Sir John Kerr himself that Queen Elizabeth II approved of the position he had taken during his dismissal of Gough Whitlam. (more…)
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The Coalition splits, maybe not
If there was ever any question about the dire state of conservative politics in Australia after the Coalition’s comprehensive election rout, the self-indulgent posturing of the past week leaves no doubt. (more…)
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A campaign with only one contender
Not since the conservative nostalgia of diminutive liberal Prime Minister Billy McMahon, whose timidity, wooden delivery and stolid conservatism was no match for the hope, energy, and optimism of Labor leader Gough Whitlam, has a Liberal election campaign been so poorly developed, so ineptly presented, and so badly run. (more…)
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‘It’s back to the (fossil fuel) future for Peter Dutton’
It’s only the first week – and if you thought Peter Dutton’s election campaign looks chaotic, dishevelled, and thin on policy substance, you’re right.
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The good, the bad and the downright ugly: Our media is broken
We have become accustomed, not too happily, to a form of political journalism in which opinion and news have increasingly merged, blunting the essential distinction between political commentary and detached objectivity. With journalists now routinely writing both news and opinion, this distinction has become impossibly blurred, undermining the impartiality and accuracy on which political journalism depends. (more…)
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Mainstream media fails to mention positive Labor policies
The new year in Australian politics, an all-important election year, began on a high with a host of initiatives taking effect from January 1, 2025. (more…)
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The continual cover up – Jenny Hocking on the strange disappearance of Gough Whitlam’s ASIO file
And it is not just Gough Whitlam’s ASIO file that has been “culled” by the National Archives of Australia. The relevant Government House Guest Books at the time of the Dismissal have disappeared and the entire archive of Kerr’s prominent supporters, including Lord Mountbatten, was accidentally burnt in the Yarralumla incinerator. (more…)
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‘”We promise him faith and obedience”: King Charles and the Premiers in a royal display of indifference’
‘Rude’, ‘deeply unprofessional’, ‘bad mannered’, a ‘slap in the face’, ‘insulting’, and ‘inhumane’. You could be forgiven for thinking the Australian state Premiers were engaged in a collective criminal enterprise to warrant such strident rebuke from the British press pack. In fact, they had simply declined an invitation to the welcome reception for our visiting (shared) monarch and head of state, King Charles III and his consort Queen Camilla, on their fleeting ‘tour’ of Sydney and Canberra. (more…)
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Senator Payman, Palestine, and caucus solidarity
In the wake of Labor Senator Fatima Payman’s shock decision to cross the floor and vote with the Greens against her party I was bemused, to say the least, to see social media light up with valiant attempts to press Gough Whitlam into service as the arbiter of what the ‘correct’ labor response should be. ‘Whitlam would never have suspended her’ was a popular view, and a completely incorrect one. As our most reforming Prime Minister and an avowed moderniser of the Labor party and its policies, Whitlam’s attitude to Labor’s policy platform was nonetheless an ‘uncomplicated’ one: ‘Where I disagreed with it, I sought to change it; where I agreed with it, I sought to implement it’. (more…)
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‘A loss is a loss is a loss’
‘A loss is a loss is a loss’. The ever-astute Niki Savva bluntly summed up the significance of the Liberal Party’s loss in the Dunkley by-election despite the ‘denial and delusion’ of the party’s reaction to it. Back in the real world, the Labor Party will be relieved and quietly pleased with an outcome that saw its candidate and the new member for Dunkley, Jodie Belyea, increase its primary vote – something no pundits predicted – securing 52.7 per cent of the two party preferred (2pp) vote with a 3.6 per cent 2pp swing against. (more…)
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The Search for the Palace Letters
Controversial documentary, THE SEARCH FOR THE PALACE LETTERS to premiere on ABC TV + iview on Monday 8 January at 8:00pm AEDT (more…)
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Burnt files, lost files and denial of public access: censoring archives and the falsification of history
From the destruction of Gough Whitlam’s ASIO file, Sir John Kerr’s burnt Royal letters of support reduced to ash in the Yarralumla incinerator, to the missing 1975 Government House guest books, these lost archives raise serious concerns about the care with which our vice-regal records are maintained, and our capacity to write a full and transparent history of the dismissal of the Whitlam government. (more…)
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Archives, access, and history: can the National Archives’ ‘democratic function’ survive?
How did the National Archives of Australia, whose core function is to ‘collect, preserve, manage and make public Australia’s most significant historical records, become instead an obstacle to public access and a barrier to knowledge of our own history? Minister for the Arts Tony Burke must act to reverse the Morrison government’s attack on the spirit of the Archives Act. (more…)
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Why I support Pearls and Irritations
Pearls and Irritations is a beacon of thoughtful, thought provoking, thoroughly researched and expertly presented, articles about issues so often ignored by the mainstream media. (more…)
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Careful what you wish for: Why a double dissolution over housing could spell trouble for the Greens
They can’t say they weren’t warned. Shortly before coming to office Anthony Albanese said, ‘I’ve been underestimated my whole life’. (more…)
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The search for The Palace Letters
The story behind Jenny Hocking’s epic battle against the Australian Government and HM Queen Elizabeth to access the Palace Letters is being told through a new documentary film. (more…)
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King Charles III of Australia: not my king
After the nauseating display of royal excess and dynastic exceptionalism last week, an Australian republic cannot come soon enough. (more…)
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An Indigenous Voice to Parliament: A moment whose time has come
‘I believe the time for the Voice has come’. With those words from the Liberal MP Julian Leeser announcing his resignation as shadow minister for Indigenous Affairs, the path to a successful referendum on an Indigenous Voice to parliament just got a lot clearer, as did Peter Dutton’s dire miscalculation in opposing it. (more…)
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‘Dispirited, disingenuous, and divided – can the liberal party survive?’
The Liberal party is broken. Riven by ideological differences, petty personal feuds and bitter factional disputes, the party which once dominated the Australian political landscape so completely, is today uncertain of what it stands for and incapable of working it out. (more…)
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When family and firm collide: escaping a royal horror story
At the heart of Prince Harry’s latest salvo in the trans-Atlantic royal family breakdown, now clearly beyond repair, is his ultimate target – the media-Palace relationship which has torn his family apart and which in its public disintegration now threatens the monarchy itself. (more…)
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The Queen’s coup and the role of King Charles
‘I wanted you to know that I appreciate what you do and admire enormously the way you have performed in your many and varied duties. Please don’t lose heart. What you did last year was right and the courageous thing to do.’ (Prince Charles) (more…)
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The incautious, entitled, ‘meddling’ King Charles III of Australia: Can he stay out of politics?
When, according to the self-appointed guardians of public decency and royal decorum, is it ever ‘appropriate’ to speak about the future of the monarchy let alone, dare I say it, a republic? Not while the Queen was alive – because, disrespect. And not now that the Queen is dead – because, also disrespect. And of course, don’t even mention the troubling political interventions of our new Head of State, King Charles III of Australia, because that might draw the Monarch and the Monarchy into political controversy. (more…)
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Prince Philip and Gough Whitlam: the story The Crown forgot. A socialist arsehole- A Repost
As Gough Whitlam put it- ‘I am the first prime minister since Sir Robert Menzies who … has been able to survive a second visit from Prince Phillip’. The long-standing consort described Whitlam as ‘a socialist arsehole’ (more…)
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‘Scott Morrison’s ministerial fetish: ”An unprecedented trashing of our democracy”’
Scott Morrison must resign immediately as the member for Cook, leave the Parliament, and try to salvage what remains of his shredded reputation as Australia’s 30th Prime Minister. (more…)
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Brutality, cynicism and unequivocal incompetence
On 21 May Anthony Albanese led the Australian Labor Party to a historic victory, winning government from opposition at an election for just the fourth time since the second world war. Labor appears set to form majority government with at least 76 seats and several seats still in doubt, taking 10 seats from the Liberal party with a 2 party preferred swing of 3.8% nation-wide. After 9 years in opposition this was a decisive victory for Labor and a transformative moment in our history. (more…)