Columnists Australia
Brown study
You liked Pink Batts? You’ll love Funny Money! Why? Well, I am now convinced that the Liberal party has gone…
Brown study
Last week, candidates from all parties were starting to drop like flies as they were disendorsed by their parties for…
Brown study
I see that some members of the media have started referring to the election as ‘boring’. I disagree with them.…
Simon Collins
A wealthy, white, male, middle-aged American Christian takes his wife on holiday to Australia. Hiking through the Tasmanian wilderness one…
Australian notes
Labor’s water hypocrisy What water scandal? ‘I acted on the recommendations of my department which had conducted an independent, competitive…
Brown Study
Our serried ranks of interstate and overseas readers may not be aware that in the last two weeks Melbourne has…
Australian Notes
Golden transparency of surrogacy secrecy? How many times have you met a person and wondered if they could talk under…
Brown study
The federal parliament used to be a place of vigorous but respectful debate. Not now. I was reflecting on this…
Simon Collins
When Christopher Hitchens decided to qualify the title of his 2007 magnum opus God is not Great with the caption…
Brown study
There is something symbiotic about the fact that the federal Budget has been dropped on us just when the final…
Brown study
What do the ABC and the New Zealand terrorist horror have in common? Apart, I mean, from the fact that…
Simon Collins
There are two kinds of political figure who cannot be effectively satirised. One is the kind of leader who makes…
Running on empty
If anything happened to disrupt our imports of oil and fuel, such as a blockade of shipping through the South…
Simon Collins
In the early 1980s I went out briefly with the daughter of a Thatcher cabinet minister, and spent several evenings…
Australian notes
On academic freedom The dismissal of Tim Anderson from his academic post at the University of Sydney has triggered a…
Brown study
A few weeks ago we drew attention to some significant reforms to the electoral law in the Democratic Republic of…
Simon Collins
If there is anything which can be relied upon to bring a nation together better than the achievements of its…
Brown study
The appointment of Ita Buttrose as the new Chair of the ABC is another step back from making it truly…
Australian notes
Let’s emulate Jordan Jordan Peterson’s much-hyped performance on Q&A was a model of reasonable discussion. As long as the ABC…
Simon Collins
Queensland may have thrown in the towel in its wars with the cane toad, the rabbit and the crown-of-thorns starfish,…
Brown study
The iconic Australian company, Bradbury’s Chocolates, has just concluded its search for the sensible centre. But the dismal results obtained…
Brown study
The Spectator Australia Electoral Reform Unit, working in secrecy behind its heavily fortified premises at Belconnen in the ACT, has…
Simon Collins
Two weeks ago on this page I complained about how rarely mainstream Australian media uses the word ‘masculinity’ without the…
Brown study
The absurd contribution by Thomas Vargas, the head of the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Indonesia, to the refugee issue…
Australian notes
For me, at least, this year’s Australia Day was preceded somewhat significantly two days earlier by a vast four page…
