New Politics: Australian Politics, News, Analysis & Commentary

The Victoria election was held last weekend and, contrary to what everyone in the media wanted and predicted, it was another crushing defeat for the Liberal Party. It wasn't even close. For the past three months, many in the mainstream media predicted Daniel Andrews had to lose the election; it was going to be very close; there was a surge for the Liberal Party; Andrews was possibly going to even...

Industrial relations are once again in the spotlight, with the mining industry and Qantas joining the Coalition in their attacks on the Labor government’s proposed legislation. And the big sticking points for these large companies is that issue of workers from different companies to collectively negotiate pay rises – but it seems that business just wants everything on its own terms. It’s the weeke...

There’s been a major breakthrough in the diplomatic relationship between Australia and China, with the Australian Prime Minister and Chinese president holding a meeting at the G20 summit in Indonesia. And this is a process initiated by both Anthony Albanese and Xi Jinping – it follows years of hostility from the previous Coalition government directed towards China, and a great deal of commentary v...

There’s a lot of issues that are starting to build up in federal politics and with just a few more weeks of sitting days before the end of the year, the Labor government is trying to fit in as much as possible before they all go home for Christmas. And major issue that they’re trying to push through as quickly as possible is their industrial relations bill, and the main agenda here is increase wag...

The Budget is all over, and just like many of the previous Budgets, it’s almost disappeared from the news cycle, although there’s still some remnants that are being discussed, and the two big issue s are inflation and tax cuts – the Reserve Bank did raise interest rates during the week, and that’s the seventh consecutive interest rate rise – and the Reserve Bank Governor Phillip Lowe said that the...

The second Budget for 2022 has been released, and it’s Labor’s first budget in nine years – it’s a Budget that’s been prepared in very difficult circumstances – there’s a national government debt of almost a trillion dollars – inflation is now running at 7.3% – and there’s a whole lot of demands about what the government should be doing with taxpayer funds over the next few years. But economics is...

The floods in eastern Australia have been the focus of political attention over the past week, with major flooding events in Victoria, southern New South Wales and the northern parts of Tasmania – there are parts of Australia that going through their third once-in-a-hundred year flooding event over the past two years, and some areas are getting their second major flooding event, just after the pre...

There have been calls for a parliamentary inquiry into media diversity in Australia, and generally, the behaviour of the mainstream media – and these calls have been made for about 20 years or so. The independent member for Goldstein, Zoe Daniel – and she used to work as a journalist before entering parliament – she currently has a motion in parliament, and that was introduced in early September,...

The Conservative Political Action Conference rolled into Sydney last week, and it’s an extreme libertarian group who are maniacally angry, loud, abrasive, in-your-face, and filled with endless complaints about everything in their sights. A culture of complaint but without any solutions and without any responsibilities. They’re anti-socialist, anti-woke, anti-republic, anti-cancel culture. What are...

The anti-corruption commission is one step closer to reality – the Labor government tabled its Bill in Parliament this week, despite all the claims from conservative media that the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, was stonewalling the commission and using excuses, such as the death of the British monarch, to withhold the legislation and stymie the commission. It can never be underestimated how fa...

After a fortnight where most of Anglosphere was preoccupied with the death of a British monarch, life is getting back to normal and to the real things that matter: there’s a Budget coming up soon, and there’s been a hint from the Treasurer, Jim Chalmers, of “substantial temporary taxes” to repair the national figures and start managing the trillion dollar government left behind by the Coalition. A...

Australia lost a head of state last week, and gained a new one, even though nobody voted for King Charles, and nobody was asked about it. And this will keep happening until Australia becomes a republic. The Queen has died, and people can pay their respects if they wish to, but it’s time for Australia to move on with its own future and its own destiny – it can’t be hamstrung by some dysfunctional f...

The federal government is still feeling the warm inner glow after the Jobs and Skills Summit, which was the first public display of the consensus politics the Prime Minister talked about during the federal election campaign. And getting corporate, union and political leaders together is no mean feat: agreement is the harder part though, and it seemed to work out well. But now the difficult part –...

Robodebt was one of the most disastrous acts of public administration in Australia’s history and the condemnation has arrived from all sides of politics – former Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, Labor, the Australian Greens, the federal court – and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced a Royal Commission into this scheme. All up, it’s a scheme which cost taxpayers $1.8 billion, over 2000...

As the rumblings of Scott Morrison’s secret ministers become louder, the Liberal Party – and their friends in the media – are keen to dismiss Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s decision to hold an inquiry into how and why these appointments were ever made. No suitable explanation has been provided by Morrison – or the Governor–General David Hurley – and it’s essential to find out why. Democracies d...

Irrespective of how much effort conservatives and the mainstream media are putting into downplaying the significance of the secret ministries of former Prime Minister Scott Morrison, the fact that the two people at the apex of Australia’s political system – the Prime Minister and Governor–General – made secret executive decisions, will reverberate for some time to come. Secrecy and low levels of a...

A lull in politics gives us some time to assess how the political parties are travelling, and since the May election result, most of the focus how been placed on the Coalition – the messages that it can take from their election loss and how they can become a better political party and return to office at some point in the near future. But what are the lessons for the Labor Party? The did win the e...

The details for the Voice To Parliament have been released by the Prime Minister, and it’s three simple changes to the Constitution, but already, conservatives are circling the wagons and claiming that that it’s a document that has kept Australia safe since 1901 and is too precious to change. But it’s an exclusionary document; it was founded on a racist agenda from yesterday and Australia is now a...

The 47th Parliament has commenced and the new Labor government wants to implement its agenda as soon as possible. After nine years of a Coalition government seemingly unwilling to implement anything meaningful, it’s a shock to the body politic to see new leaders wanting to do things, rather than applying the dark arts of politics to spin, diffuse, negate, and ultimately ignore acting on behalf of...

After several months of absence from the national stage, former Prime Minister Scott Morrison made an appearance on a different kind of stage – the pulpit of the Victory Church in Perth, announcing that he still believed in miracles. And that he doesn’t trust in government or the United Nations. As the distance between Morrison’s tenure as prime minister and the current events of today become grea...

Foreign affairs is still a dominant issue for the Albanese government – and why not – so many relationships to repair after a neglectful nine years of Coalition government which left the Pacific islands behind. The Prime Minister is also putting out the strong message to the world that there is a new government in office and is taking climate change seriously. But words are one thing; action is an...

There’s a madness in the media and hard to see when it will stop. The Prime Minister has returned from the recent NATO meeting – which included a visit to Ukraine – and the media wanted to create a false equivalence and criticised Anthony Albanese for spending too much time overseas. Why? Because they criticised former Prime Minister Scott Morrison, when he made his secret family holiday trip to H...

How many political staffers does it take to change a piece of legislation? Independent MPs have been outraged about the Prime Minister’s decision to reduce the number of political advisers from four down to one – which means they will have a total staff of five – and decided to take their outrage directly to the media. But what is the correct number? Some MPs could have a staff of 100 and still be...

The Australian Greens have had their most successful election campaign ever – four seats in the House of Representatives, 12 Senators and 12.25% of the primary vote all across Australia. These are excellent figures and a promising result for progressive politics. But how well will they be able to work with the new Labor Government? To pass their legislation, Labor will need the support of these 12...

The biggest war is not the one in Ukraine – there are no generals in this war, there are no medals to hand out, and it’s possibly a war without end. And, of course, it’s a war that’s been concocted by the mainstream media and the Opposition, mainly to put pressure on the new Labor government. Yes, it’s the energy war, which is a war on public sensibilities and could end up being a war on the credi...