Terry Barnes is a Melbourne-based contributor for The Spectator and The Spectator Australia.
Almost sixteen years after he lost office and his own parliamentary seat, former Australian Liberal prime minister John Howard is still an influential political figure. Idolised by the right and demonised by the left, when Howard speaks, Australians still take notice. When Howard spoke to the Australian newspaper to mark his 84th birthday this week,
Sajid Javid’s deleted weekend tweet about Britain ‘learning to live with, rather than cower from Covid’ upset just about everyone – from frontline NHS workers to Covid-19 victims’ groups. But Javid could actually have been talking about Australians. While the UK’s Freedom Day went ahead despite 40,000 people testing positive for Covid daily, over half
In world sport, the Commonwealth games are a bit of a sideshow. In swimming and athletics, at least, they are seen as something of a mid-cycle training event for the Olympics. Australians, however, love the Commonwealth games. Not just because they are about friendly sporting rivalries and promote goodwill between the nearly 60 nations of
Today in Sydney, Australia’s most decorated soldier, former Special Air Services corporal Ben Roberts-Smith VC, was found by a civil court, on a balance of probabilities, to be a likely war criminal, a murderer, a liar and a bully. Roberts-Smith is a huge man, towering over all around him. When he was presented alongside other
Cynically dressed up as a coronation-related gift to the Canadian nation, just days after the coronation, the country’s leader Justin Trudeau has unveiled a Royal Crown of Canada. Trudeau is paying lip service to the monarchy Canada shares with Britain and the King’s other realms Not a physical gold and jewelled crown, mind you, but a virtual
It was not just Barry Humphries who died on Saturday. It was that towering skewerer of pomposity and humbug, and gate-crasher of Royal boxes, Dame Edna Everage. It was Australia’s roving cultural attaché and Australian Minister for the Yartz, Sir Les Patterson. It was pathetic Melbourne suburban pensioner, Sandy Stone. It was colonial hellraiser Barry McKenzie. It was a host
There are few surprises in the Aukus nuclear-powered submarine programmed announced by Rishi Sunak, his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese, and US president Joe Biden overnight. Australia will get its fleet of nuclear submarines. The United States will supply Virginia-class boats to Australia for the 2030s; US Virginias and Royal Navy Astute-class boats will be stationed
One hundred miles or so south of Sydney, lies tranquil Jervis Bay. On its shores, largely reclaimed by the bush, are the abandoned foundations of a large nuclear power station. When it was built in the late 1960s, it was intended to be the first of a network supplying nuclear-generated electricity to the eastern Australian
In July and August, Australia and New Zealand are hosts of the 2023 Fifa Women’s world cup. It could not be a better opportunity for the sport. Football in Australia at the professional level lags well behind Australian Rules and rugby league when it comes to profile and broadcast attention. And in New Zealand
Traditionally, the reigning monarch has appeared on the lowest denomination of Australia’s banknotes. It is a practice that harks back to the pound notes of pre-decimal days. It was even maintained by the Reserve Bank when the one-dollar note was replaced by a gold coin in the 1980s, and the Queen took the colonial philanthropist
So, Novak Djokovic has won the Australian Open tennis tournament – again. Djokovic was never seriously challenged at any stage, beating Stefanos Tsitsipas in straight sets in the final. In winning his 22nd Grand Slam title, drawing level with Spanish maestro Rafael Nadal, Djokovic also had his revenge on Australia – and Australians. Australia is,
Australia Day was once a big deal Down Under, but in recent years the annual celebration has been somewhat muted. Take the Australian Open, currently running in Melbourne. The organisers have dedicated days throughout the tournament for a range of causes: there has been a Pride day and a day celebrating indigenous art and culture.
In May 1940, Winston Churchill was not only appointed Prime Minister but Minister for Defence. In doing so, Churchill ensured that he, and not the three traditional cabinet secretaries traditionally responsible for the armed services, had ultimate responsibility for Britain’s war effort. This was an open, and very public, move which was welcomed and praised
Timing is everything in politics. This week in Canberra a new junior minister, an obscure Australian Labor Party MP named Matt Thistlethwaite, was sworn in by the Queen’s representative, Governor-General David Hurley. His portfolio: Assistant Minister for the Republic. A minister of the Crown sworn to bring about the demise of the Crown in Australia.
‘Scott Morrison is empathetic – without the “em”.’ Those words, spoken on Friday by the Labor party frontbencher Jason Clare, on a national breakfast programme, perfectly encapsulated how Scott Morrison was defeated in the Australian election on Saturday. Morrison wasn’t saved by his economic management (this Friday Australia’s unemployment rate was confirmed as 3.9 per
While the main electoral attraction of the moment is the French presidential showdown between Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, it is not the only significant election underway in the western world. On 21 May, Australia goes to the polls. The contest is between the nominally centre-right coalition of the Liberal and National parties led
With Russia playing a deadly cat-and-mouse game with Ukraine, this week the world number one tennis player, Novak Djokovic, must have thought we needed a distraction. Following his charm offensive with the BBC’s Amol Rajan earlier this week, Djokovic has announced that he would like to play the Australian Open again, despite the minor complication
The Australian government’s decision to cancel the world number one tennis player Novak Djokovic’s visa was inevitable in the end. Things started well for Djokovic. On Monday he won his initial match in the law courts when his QC-led legal team successfully challenged his visa cancellation as a breakdown of procedural fairness. After this utter
Just minutes from the heart of Victoria’s capital, Melbourne Park is one of the great tennis complexes. For a fortnight in January, it will be the centre of the tennis world as the home of the year’s first Grand Slam tournament, the Australian Open. For Melburnians the Open is more than just a tennis tournament.
As former Australian foreign minister and High Commissioner to the UK Alexander Downer wrote in last week’s magazine, almost all Australian states, like neighbouring New Zealand, are determined to eliminate Covid-19 at all costs. At the beginning of this year, Australia seemingly had defeated Covid. Total numbers of people infected, out of 25 million, were
