Victorians have every right to be angry
The orange waters of Secret Harbour
‘There are no safe Labor seats in this state, or in this country any more…’ declared Luke Herdegen, the freshly…
Can Victoria send Albo a melon-surrender bin?
While the fabric of Australia is tearing itself to bits, the national conversation remains preoccupied with the Prime Minister’s melon…
Do politicians have the right to block citizens on social media?
Politicians, or perhaps their shallow-minded media managers, have been going crazy with the ‘block’ button. If you call the Treasurer…
I can’t believe they haven’t banned Community Notes
The fragile feelings and unconvincing campaign promises of politicians are under threat from … X’s Community Notes. We know because…
Woke hasn’t killed Australia’s adventurer spirit
I was brought up on Boy’s Own adventures. I remember pacing up and down with Sir Douglas Bader’s Reach for…
Tanya Plibersek’s history lesson for young Australians
In early August, the Minister for Social Services, Tanya Plibersek, provided a history lesson for ungrateful young Australians. ‘There’s never…
Checking in on the health of our government
Once again, this week, I heard reports about inflation, interest rates, immigration, employment, and also sex-related humour. How do we…
The standard you walk past
Recently TikTok-ing her way into Victoria’s psychologically bruised subconscious is Labor’s Legislative Council member Sonja Terpstra – clearly unhappy about…
The Curley problem of cynical vote harvesting
Most of you will recognise the Curley Effect, even if you haven’t heard of it. James Curley, also known as…
Victorians have every right to be angry
Ben Carroll can abolish the 1 per cent transport levy, but he cannot abolish the questions surrounding how it came…
Immigration confusion
A clear majority of Australians want less immigration, but it’s not clear exactly what that means. In the lead-up to…
Shahriyaragan: The ancient Iranian tradition of ideal kingship
This essay concerns a desire that Iranians have preserved deep within their collective soul for centuries, a longing for the…
Stories from the edge of the world
Part 1 – The Refusal In the second war, an enemy raider lying in Port Davey hears the banshee blast…
Our universities are captured and don’t even know it!
The problem with Australian universities is not that they are ‘Woke’ in the typical sense. Politics is never that simple.…
If super is really our money, prove it
Australians are constantly told that superannuation is ‘their money’. They can choose a fund, switch providers, consolidate accounts, or run…
Data centre derangement syndrome
Data centres are more unpopular than potholes, and the industry seems unable to shift public perceptions with facts and figures.…
The trouble with Utopia … is us
The Left has been fighting human nature for more than 200 years. Human nature keeps winning. You would think by…
Two dead families’ worth of grief, and one theory
Two courtrooms, an ocean apart in relevance but identical in structure. In Massachusetts, Lindsay Clancy’s lawyers have rested their case,…
Before the shouting starts
Every sitting day in the Western Australian Legislative Council begins with the same small act. Before the debates, the interjections,…
Albanese thinks his government is anger-proof
There is something strange going on in Australian politics. Usually, the last thing a sitting government wants is an angry…
Australia’s eSafety Commissioner loses again – A victory for free speech | Celine Baumgarten S3 Ep 18
Celine Baumgarten (Celine Against the Machine) has celebrated her SECOND victory against the eSafety Commissioner. This wasn’t only a personal…
Did Donald Trump conquer the world with witty insults? | Joel Gilbert S3 Ep 17
Did Donald Trump conquer the world with witty insults? I’m joined by Joel Gilbert to discuss the genius of humour…
Digital tyranny or ‘child safety’? 😵 & the bitcoin revolution | Efrat Fenigson S3 Ep 16
When Australia’s Under 16 social media ban started locking adult political writers out of #Substack – it was just the…
Dolly, Kylie & Albo
Just when you thought it was safe to view melons simply as grocery items, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese himself has,…
Brown study
In the last week, Melongate has proceeded along its sordid way. But it has now taken on a new significance.…
One trillion and counting
Last week, the federal government’s debt dial clicked over one trillion dollars. It’s a figure we should have avoided. But…
The High Court’s Pauline problem
How exciting. Three weeks ago in these pages, I predicted that if Pauline Hanson sought special leave to appeal to…
The heretics strike back
Raising the profile of a not-for-profit organisation is no easy task. Add to that trying to bring in new members.…
Murdoch, the Australian and me
We all know the Australian, the national newspaper Rupert Murdoch created in 1964, as a publication that generally occupies the…
Britain’s feuding conservatives
Most Spectator Australia readers won’t have heard of Sir Simon Woolley, the Right Honourable the Lord Woolley of Woodford, a…
Safety catch
Antisemitism is an abomination, unacceptable in any civilised society. Yet, as we look at the current state of our streets…
TikToxic antisemitism
One of the most illuminating pieces of evidence given to the Royal Commission into Antisemitism and Social Cohesion came in…
The Productivity Commission has declared war on productivity
I served on the staff of Alf Rattigan’s Tariff Board, the Productivity Commission’s ancestor, in the years it began pulling…
Super spivs
Australia’s compulsory superannuation scheme, says Liberal Senator Andrew Bragg, is ‘a massive failure, probably the biggest failure of public policy…
Brown study
The Spectator Australia has just received a leak of the latest entry in the private diary of Anthony Albanese, Prime…
We don’t need to be afraid of the Greens any more
There’s an ungallant phrase from the old days, generally used by men, the rotters; ‘Coyote Ugly’ which refers to the…
Why are French kids’ school bags so heavy?
It’s that time of year again in Paris, when the cool breeze and light rain announce the arrival of the…
Is this the way to fix a university education?
Although it has been many – many – years since I was a student, I’ve never forgotten looking at my…
Poland’s homeland defence strategy puts Britain to shame
Russia has demanded that Britain either reverse its ‘hostile line’ on Ukraine or face a direct attack on military targets.…
Nepal must learn from the Rasuwa floods
When I first heard the news that the Rasuwa region in Nepal had been seriously flooded, I barely paid attention.…
Wilderness and war are changing Chernobyl forever
Dappled light falls across the lobby of Pripyat’s abandoned Hospital No. 126, now so smothered by vegetation that it is…
British citizenship has become meaningless
I went back to my hometown recently, a small suburb in north-west London. I strolled the streets, stopped by the…
Choosing a coffin for my younger brother
Ronnie’s family has been in the same line of work since the 1880s. His office is next door to a…
Why stop at Lake America?
The Irish Rovers sang about the biggest mixup that you have ever seen: he was christened David Anthony, but still…
Of course we need a crackdown on H-1B visas
The Trump administration has proposed a fee of more than $100,000 for most H-1B visas. The usual suspects have come out with…
Britain must stand up to the US before it’s too late
Weaponising trade; interfering in the domestic affairs of open societies; using technological dependencies to undermine national security; threatening to invade…
Ratko Mladic was the ultimate Serb hillbilly hero
It’s rather appropriate that General Ratko Mladic, the 84-year-old former commander in chief of the Bosnian Serb army, “Butcher of…
Why you shouldn’t shrug at New Zealand’s greyhound racing ban
Greyhound racing ended in New Zealand on August 1. Those who neither own a greyhound nor care for the sport…
A New Zealand republic in Jacinda Ardern’s lifetime?
New Zealand’s former Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern, believes the nation will become a republic within her lifetime. We have heard…
The row over English becoming an official language of New Zealand
Parliamentarians in New Zealand have been limbering up for an oddly unedifying debate over what ought to be the most…
What they don’t tell you about Christmas in New Zealand
‘I still think New Zealand the most beautiful country I have ever seen,’ Agatha Christie marvelled in 1922. Evidently she’s…
Jason Arday’s tragic death is no reason to silence the press
This silly and drivelling piece of tosh
Every so often something comes along that is so bad it fills the soul with wonder and dismay. It seems…
This devastating portrait of Americana
It’s more than 75 years since Lee J. Cobb opened in Elia Kazan’s production of Death of a Salesman and…
An aggravated splendour
Rod Liddle, who died on 2 August, was a journalist of genius and you could only feel a bit wonder-struck…
An exercise in murder
A friend said recently that the only two people he knew who had read Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers…
An excellent spy: Cold Sunset, by William Boyd, reviewed
Gabriel Dax, the hero of William Boyd’s latest spy thriller, is one of literature’s reluctant spies: good, solitary men who…
We must stop treating soil like dirt
There is a delightful moment at the end of this book when Frank Ashwood is out looking for soil-dwelling invertebrates…
The wonder of ancient English parish churches
John Betjeman, the patron saint of the English parish church, invented the term ‘church-crawler’ in 1948. Rachel Morley acknowledges his…
A world full of artifice: Life of M, by Rachel Cusk, reviewed
The twin themes of Rachel Cusk’s latest novel are truth and fame. In fact it’s not quite accurate to call…
How black music changed the world
In the boiling August of 1919, a 27-piece African-American jazz outfit called the Southern Syncopated Orchestra was summoned to play…
Could we bring back the Great Auk?
In 2023, the State of Nature Report announced that Britain was one of the world’s most nature-depleted countries. This can…
Would Eve Babitz really have wanted her unsent letters published?
‘I regard Too L.A. as Eve’s second masterpiece – her first being, of course, Slow Days, Fast Company – and…
Why Mussolini still fascinates Italians
You do not have to travel far in Italy to encounter the remains of Mussolini’s dreams of architectural splendour. From…