The Liberals finally get tough on the eSafety Commissioner
Did you know the Australian Financial Review named Julie Inman Grant, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, as the third most culturally powerful…
Mark Speakman is a bad omen
The great mystery of conservative politics is whether or not the Liberal Party will survive Net Zero. Mark Speakman’s latest…
Donald Trump and Anthony Albanese sign critical minerals deal
Upon arriving at the White House, the press asked the President if he had a message for the people of…
China is afraid of Donald Trump striking a deal with Albanese
As Anthony Albanese touches down in America in preparation for his meeting with US President Donald Trump at the White…
Net Zero: more haste, less speed
There’s an old proverb that progressives seem to have forgotten: more haste, less speed. In our race toward Net Zero,…
Language is shaping Australia
When my wife and I visited East Germany in 1984 it was still under communist rule. We were planning a…
The tragedy of multiculturalism
‘Diversity is strength; tolerance is natural,’ says the Prime Minister of Australia on his official website. This may be a…
Jerusalem: always was, always will be Israel’s capital
The capital of Israel is Jerusalem, and no amount of diplomatic re-framing can change that fundamental fact. Yet in 2022,…
Is it time for the Australian political right to convene another Albury conference?
Over the years, Pauline Hanson has proven to be one of the most effective politicians in Australia. Like her or…
Merit in the eSafety Commissioner?
There have been many valid criticisms surrounding the Online Safety Act 2021 (‘The OSA’) since its inception. This is especially…
Debunking conspiracy theories and the American shutdown
Last week, protestors in the United States staged numerous ‘King/Dictator Trump’ demonstrations. The protestors claim that President Trump is a…
The potential MAGA-Teal alliance
I mentioned in a previous column how I live in probably the greenest part of Australia – surrounded by political…
A tale of two countries
It was the best of times and the worst of times. Indeed, as wrote Dickens about the French Revolution, it…
The LNP needs a clear policy direction
The concept of a ‘fair go’ is almost the purpose of our democracy. This matters, because half the world now…
Australia bars Candace Owens
When it comes to curbing foreign voices regarded as disruptive, Australia has raised the bar. Farmer v Minister for Home…
Trump saves Albo from diplomatic disaster, but Rudd must go
In international diplomacy, it is common for egos to clash and alliances to teeter on the edge of rhetoric. Australian…
Jacinda, Jacinta
I’m not a big fan of self-serving autobiographies, particularly of recently departed political leaders. I had briefly considered dipping into…
Sorry seems to be the Libs’ hardest word
Do you know that vague sense of unease that comes over you when you feel you must have missed something…
Trump ain’t no king, and he ain’t no Hitler
The No Kings marches across the US were a variation on the ‘Trump is Hitler’ line that has been circulating…
Net zero is il-Liberal
If the Liberal party is truly going to unite around the values it was built upon, there is only one…
Equality, but only for some
Equality is a central theme of the Australian ethos. Freedom and democracy might round out a handsome triumvirate of the…
Australia is not Argentina. Yet.
Every few years, Australian politicians rediscover ‘tax reform’. It is a comforting phrase, soothing to voters and headline writers alike.…
Europe’s net zero retreat
Who would have thought 2019 could now seem a distant, former era? For it was then that the UK under…
A Rudd awakening
Anthony Albanese came to Washington seeking to strengthen his relationship with the US President based on mutual interests in trade…
Plaid Cymru storms to victory in Caerphilly
The Welsh nationalists have won almost half the vote in the Caerphilly by-election, storming to a victory in a seat…
Why Prince Andrew gets more attention than grooming gangs
This week, a group of Pakistani-heritage men appeared in court. The 54-year-old alleged ringleader stands accused of preying on two…
TfL chief accused of ‘lying’ over tube graffiti claims
Well, well, well. TfL Commissioner Andy Lord has been accused of lying about graffiti on the underground, after he made…
Why I resigned from the national grooming gang inquiry
This week I resigned from the Victims/Survivor Liaison Panel of the National Inquiry into Grooming Gangs. Victims have been fighting…
Jacinda, Jacinta
I’m not a big fan of self-serving autobiographies, particularly of recently departed political leaders. I had briefly considered dipping into…
Why the Maori party keep doing the haka in parliament
Parliamentary proceedings in New Zealand once again screeched to a halt this week after an unsanctioned performance of the haka…
Rex Landy: women’s rights activist arrested
Four years ago, in this very publication, I made a prediction that a Māori women’s rights activist in New Zealand…
Winston Peters tells UN New Zealand will not recognise Palestine
New Zealand’s Foreign Minister, Winston Peters, has delivered the nation’s official comments on the Palestine issue to the United Nations.…
Who were the real bigots in Epping?
Transcending the cloaks and jewellery
Mrs Warren’s Profession (in selected cinemas from October 23) is one of Shaw’s ‘Plays Unpleasant’ and it’s an extraordinary play…
Is Jeremy Strong our John Cazale?
If you’re a big Bruce Springsteen fan, then this weekend’s new release, Deliver Me from Nowhere, will be one of…
La de da
Everyone who has read the work of the late great Thomas Bernhard, the Austrian novelist forever spitting his fellow Austrians…
The Chair Company is the workplace comedy we need right now
If you watched The Paper and, like most of its viewers, remained unimpressed by its comparatively limp updating of The…
Are Vermeer’s paintings really coded religious messages?
The Delft painter Johannes Vermeer, now probably the most beloved artist of the Dutch Golden Age, had an unusual career.…
The Wall Street Crash never ceases to fascinate
When Winston Churchill dined with the crème de la crème of American finance in New York on 28 October 1929,…
A celebration of friendship – by Andrew O’Hagan
When I interviewed Andrew O’Hagan ten years ago about his Booker longlisted novel The Illuminations, the most striking thing that…
Thrilling tales of British pluck
December 1917. For years the Ottoman Turks have been trying to spark a jihad of the world’s Sunni Muslims, hoping…
Farewell to Lyra: The Rose Field, by Philip Pullman, reviewed
In the middle of The Rose Field, the third volume of Philip Pullman’s The Book of Dust trilogy, Lyra has…
The dangerous charm of Peter Matthiessen
In 1951, the American author Peter Matthiessen moved to Paris. The scion of a wealthy Wasp family, he had studied…
Trouble in Tbilisi: The Lack of Light, by Nino Haratischwili, reviewed
For a newly independent Georgia, the 1990s were a dark time literally and figuratively, as civil war raged, criminality flourished…
The disturbing allure of sex robots
By the late 1980s, the war against pornography was lost. Feminists, as well as Christian moralists, mainly in the UK…