Australian Notes

5 May 2012
Peter Coleman

Even the Canberra Press Gallery can read the signs. Christopher Pearson reminded us in the Australian last weekend how they had queued up to tell us what a government masterstroke it had been to appoint Peter Slipper as Speaker of the House of Representatives. Prime Minister Gillard had sensationally outwitted Tony Abbott, they said. They had been similarly effusive about the appointment of the hapless Bob Carr as Foreign Minister and the error-prone Tim Flannery as Chief Climate Commissioner, among many other brilliant coups over the years going back to Gough Whitlam’s appointment of Vince Gair as Ambassador to Ireland...

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Life without Labor?

5 May 2012
Derek Parker

The dust from the Queensland election might have settled, but there is a lingering sense that something profound is happening to the national political landscape. Hanging on to only a handful of seats in the Queensland parliament, stripped to the staunchest seats in its bastion of New South Wales, facing the prospect of another demolition in Western Australia and confronted with opinion polls indicating not just defeat but disaster at the next national election, there is a real possibility that the Australian Labor Party could cease to exist as a viable political force.

Of course, predictions of the demise of...

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Book tour diary

5 May 2012
James Delingpole

Who the hell is Jon Faine and what is his problem? Ever since our sticky encounter on his ABC Melbourne talk radio show I’ve had conservative Aussies coming up to pat me on the back for having stuck it to him good and proper. Really? Had I realised beforehand just how brusque and negative his line of questioning was going to be, I promise you I would have been much, much ruder. My policy in interviews is much the same as Israel’s in international diplomacy: be courteous to me and I’ll be lovely to you; step out of line and...

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The dimming of democracy

5 May 2012
Maurice Newman

‘Make the Clean Energy Finance Corporation difficult to abolish,’ says its Chairwoman, Jillian Broadbent, according to newspaper reports. Ms Broadbent said she had recommended that the appropriation of the fund should be tied with its legislation, which would make it harder to abolish. The fund would seek only a nominal return on investment in renewable energy projects and would put in place stringent risk management practices to prevent a repeat of failed government-backed solar projects overseas.

Really? What’s so important that we must quarantine this initiative from the normal democratic process?

Apart from providing tenure for the board and the...

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Latham's law

5 May 2012
Mark Latham

Parliamentary service confers on its participants a wide range of life skills. One of these is an unerring ability to spot a particular personality type: the wacky fanatic. My introduction to this process came during my first days as the Member for Werriwa in 1994, taking over from John Kerin.

I met a constituent, Mrs Baskerville (known as ‘Hounds Of’), who visited the electorate office every day to tell us about the latest correspondence she had received from various government agencies. It might have been an electricity bill, a council rates notice or a pension update. Whatever the letter,...

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Diary

5 May 2012
Kristina Keneally

I’m waiting to discuss the domestic issues of the day with Ashleigh Gillon and Robert Doyle on Sky News’ Lunchtime Agenda. One minute before going to air the producer interrupts in my earpiece: ‘Sorry to do this to you, Kristina, but the Foreign Minister has just told David Speers that the Taleban doesn’t need to be part of the Afghan peace process. We want to get the story up straight away, so we are going to ask you about it.’ Great, I’m tempted to quip, just what the country needs: the former Premier of NSW running commentary on Afghanistan. Fortunately,...

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