The leaked review of the Liberal Party’s 2025 election defeat details campaign failures and organisational problems. What it avoids is the harder question: what policies or direction might rebuild support.
Category: Policy
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Why I risked prison to add a ‘Losing Sound’ to poker machines
Poker machines are designed to celebrate wins but stay silent on losses. A new project aims to disrupt that psychological design by introducing a simple losing sound – and to push for legislative reform. (more…)
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War on Iran signals urgent need for Australia to end risky imported oil dependency
The widening conflict in the Gulf has exposed Australia’s extreme reliance on imported oil. With minimal fuel reserves and a $12 billion annual diesel subsidy to mining, energy security has become a national security emergency. (more…)
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Migration scare campaign ignores Coalition’s own targets
The Coalition is trying to turn migration into a political flashpoint. But the long-term net overseas migration target under Labor is identical to the one projected under the Morrison government.
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Thirty years on, the Howard legacy still defines our limits
John Howard marks 30 years since the Coalition’s 1996 victory with a familiar story of stability and economic management. But the deeper legacy is the set of political and economic defaults both major parties now treat as common sense.
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Punishment politics and the suppression of restorative justice
Decades of ‘tough on crime’ policy have expanded prisons while narrowing reform. Restorative justice has been repeatedly constrained not for lack of evidence, but because it redistributes authority away from the state. (more…)
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Values, ethics, fear – Australian women and children in the Al Roj Camp
Politicians frequently appeal to Judaeo–Christian values, yet retreat from them when fear dominates debate. The test is whether those values guide policy when it is hardest to apply them.
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Australia is finally building more social housing – but it’s still not enough
Public investment will add tens of thousands of new social housing dwellings by 2030, reversing decades of decline. But new research shows the increase will only prevent further erosion of the sector, not reduce unmet need. (more…)
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Capital gains tax reform could reshape Australia’s housing market
As debate over capital gains tax returns to parliament, longstanding concessions are again under scrutiny for their role in driving housing speculation, inequality and intergenerational imbalance.
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Human rights: could Menzies help Albanese see the light?
Australia’s push for a federal Human Rights Act is stalled by political caution and media hostility. The path forward may depend on Coalition support – and reframing the reform as consistent with Liberal tradition.
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Punishment politics is breaking Western Australia’s justice system
A capability review of WA’s Justice Department shows a system overwhelmed by rising demand, delays and overcrowding. The underlying problem is political – punitive law-and-order settings that expand pressure without building capacity or preventing harm.
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Best of 2025 – Words or action? Dreyfus and human rights at home
Mark Dreyfus has been appointed Australia’s special envoy on human rights. Is the government prepared to match international advocacy with concrete action at home – by finally legislating a Human Rights Act? (more…)
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Best of 2025 – The new political economy of innovation: Why Australian policymakers need better tools
When the Commonwealth Government reorganised its innovation responsibilities for the fourth time in a decade, public servants made jokes about updating their email signatures again. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Gaza under siege: The continuation of Zionist demographic cleansing policies since the 19th century
Israeli propaganda tries to present the war on Gaza as a “defensive reaction.” Yet the historical record tells a very different story: systematic genocide, the destruction of civilian life and deliberate attempts to uproot entire populations. All of this is a direct continuation of Zionist colonial policies that began in the late 19th century. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Superannuation and the Canberra Press Gallery’s fantasies
The Canberra Press Gallery was completely absorbed with the supposed politics of last week’s superannuation changes and completely failed to consider their merits and why the changes were therefore made. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Disarming extremism in the algorithmic age
Amelie Szczecinski is one of six talented young Australians who will travel to the UN General Assembly in New York next week as part of the Global Voices project. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Ignorance is complicity: Australia must end its arms trade with those committing crimes
Rayana Ajam is one of six talented young Australians who will travel to the UN General Assembly in New York next week as part of the Global Voices project. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Brave new world
As Australia’s newly elected government seeks to navigate the shoals of President Donald Trump’s new world after the election on 3 May, it will behove us to think beyond our tariff concerns and AUKUS and focus on Southeast Asia. (more…)
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Best of 2025 – Australia is one trade deal away from backing authoritarians, says Taiwan
In the grand tradition of diplomatic overreach, Taiwan’s deputy foreign minister recently offered some sweet and spicy talking points to our media: semiconductors are tanks, China is akin to WWII Germany, and if Australia doesn’t fast-track Taiwan into the CPTPP, we might all wake up speaking Mandarin under a fascist AI regime, as reported by News Corp and 7 News. (more…)
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What Australia’s teen social media ban could mean for reading
As under-16s are locked out of major social media platforms, online book communities that helped many teens discover reading are disappearing too. What’s being lost, and what might replace it?
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Australia’s roads are full of giant cars, and everyone pays the price
Australia’s growing love affair with SUVs and utes is reshaping road safety. Larger vehicles don’t just cause more harm in crashes – they may also change how drivers behave. (more…)
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How much does it cost to end rough sleeping? An Australian-first study may have just found out
Homelessness in Australia is worsening, with services stuck in crisis mode. Evidence from Finland – and new research in SA and WA – shows a different path is possible.
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Australia’s social media ban puts free speech on the chopping block
Australia’s social media ban for under-16s is being sold as a protection for children, but it raises serious questions about free speech, democratic participation and the perverse effects of prohibition. (more…)
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Jobs for mates, by design: the government rejects its own integrity review
The government’s response to the Briggs review abandons legislated reform and leaves ministers wide discretion over appointments across the commonwealth. (more…)
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Too many states, too little nation: time to fix the federation
Australia’s federal system was designed for the nineteenth century. Today it produces duplication, dysfunction and state parochialism that frustrate national governance and reform. (more…)
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Refugees aren’t politically progressive by default – and policy needs to catch up
Australian settlement policy often assumes refugees will embrace progressive politics. Research and community experience show refugee political identities are far more diverse – with important implications for law and policy.
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Words or action? Dreyfus and human rights at home
Mark Dreyfus has been appointed Australia’s special envoy on human rights. Is the government prepared to match international advocacy with concrete action at home – by finally legislating a Human Rights Act? (more…)
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The great failure of the property industry
In every era, certain industries become so large, so politically embedded, and so culturally unexamined that their performance ceases to matter. (more…)
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New architecture, old assumptions: Australia and the China question
Foreign Minister Penny Wong speaks of balance, equality and a new regional order – yet Australia’s China policy still carries Cold War assumptions that risk strategy, prosperity and peace.
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Tackling vehicle emissions – the next big climate task
Reducing transport emissions is fast approaching as the next big issue in Australia’s climate debate. (more…)