Australian politics

While many Australians are experiencing the hangover that comes with a resounding defeat at the ballot box, young Australians are feeling particularly terrible. They’re experiencing a kind of political hangxiety that will have…

Australia’s defence department gave tens of thousands of dollars of work to a US firm blacklisted for corruption and bribery. Defence last year contracted US firm Lock N Climb to provide it with $25,000 of specialist ladders used for…

Labor is urging the Coalition to boost the Newstart payment after the government bowed to public pressure to lift the income of almost 700,000 aged pensioners by changing the deeming rate. Following the government’s announcement on…

The Australian federal police commissioner Andrew Colvin will quit in September, after he revealed on Monday he will not seek an extension of his contract. Colvin announced the end of his 30 years as a police officer in a statement…

Let’s be honest: Australians have never had much time for our South Pacific neighbours. The island nations that lie to our north and north-east, stretching from Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands to Vanuatu, Fiji and beyond, may be…

Australia remains “deeply concerned” about China’s treatment of the Uighur people, including use of forced labour, the foreign affairs minister Marise Payne has said. On Monday Payne revealed that China had blocked Australia’s attempts…

Temporary skilled migration has not undercut job opportunities or conditions for Australian workers but the “revolving door” political response to foreign workers has frustrated businesses, an industry report has found. The report from…

About one million Australians will receive up to $804 more a year when the government moves to change its income test for pensioners. The government is set to cut deeming rates, used to estimate how much some pensioners earn on their…

This week came news via the treasurer’s Twitter account that so far “1.1 million tax returns have been lodged compared to around 600,000 at the same time last year”. He trumpeted this as evidence of the desire for tax cuts “despite…

Political commentary from progressives has been grim, and it has only gotten worse since May. We are told that Australians are not ready for a progressive agenda, and Labor lost the federal election because it talked too much about its…

Alastair Campbell could not be happier to be in Australia next week. “I’m really glad I am going to be there when the wretched charlatan Boris Johnson becomes prime minister,” he says. “I cannot believe it is happening. I cannot believe…

The Queensland Liberal National party will offer property developers free cocktails and other perks as part of a paid “diamond membership” package, following the state’s ban on them making political donations. At its annual convention,…

Peter Dutton approved a plan to bring a refugee child to Australia after lobbying from Nauru, despite warnings from his department that it would be seen as a contradiction of the policy not to resettle people in Australia who came by…

Let’s start this weekend with Ken Wyatt. When Wyatt addressed the National Press Club on Wednesday, he recounted the moment when Scott Morrison offered him the job of minister for Indigenous Australians. The first Indigenous person to…

A couple of years ago, I fought to save the life of a six-year-old child, to make sure she never attempted suicide again. This child is doing well but that was because I was able travel to her, in the heart of our continent, to one of…

Senator Malcolm Roberts has been forced to pay a $6,000 penalty and legal costs to a blogger who sued him for sitting while ineligible at the height of the constitutional eligibility crisis of the 45th parliament. On 24 June the high…

Peter Dutton says the Coalition’s policy is to achieve Indigenous recognition without enshrining a voice to parliament in the constitution, seemingly ruling out a key demand by the authors of the Uluru statement from the heart. The home…

The latest two-year survey of household incomes and wealth from the Australian Bureau of Statistics has revealed that over the past two years inequality has increased. The wealthiest 25% of Australians have increased their income by…

Early in Keith Pitt’s first term in Canberra, the Queensland National got some bracing feedback from Craig Laundy, a plain-speaking Liberal from New South Wales. “Craig told me very early in the first term – he said, ‘Mate, you are…

As thousands of Australians try to submit their tax returns, the main online portal for federal government services has gone down. The MyGov site appeared to be unavailable on Friday morning, returning an error. The Department of Human…