Corruption watch

The National Anti-Corruption Commission will provide guidance on “corruption vulnerabilities” ahead of next year’s federal election, given increasing public concern on the issue.

Turning off the tap

Politicians have boosted Australia’s economic performance through increases in immigration rather than productivity over the last 20 years, but the current housing and infrastructure crisis has prompted a rethink, not least in the much abused foreign student visa system.

Marking the class of 2023

It’s not just Australian children who get report cards as school breaks up. So do government ministers, when parliament rises at the end of the year, so how is Anthony Albanese’s administration faring as the inevitable political problems pile up now the honeymoon is over.

Happy Christmas, Albo?

Halfway into its first term, the big question is whether the Albanese government is in a temporary bad patch, or at the beginning of a downhill slide.

Why don’t Jews feel safe?

Jewish organisations have criticised Foreign Minister Penny Wong over her latest comments on the Israel-Gaza conflict, while Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles has said Jewish Australians “have never felt less safe”.

Does politics let down the people?

While Australians remain strong supporters of democracy, criticisms of the political system which delivers and administers it continue to mount, so what are the problems and what can be done to solve them?

Voices off

The failure of the Voice campaign has set back the cause of indigenous representation, rather than advanced it, and by blaming anyone but themselves for their failure, Voice advocates risk repeating the same mistakes in the future.

No, thanks

In a major setback for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Australian voters have overwhelmingly rejected the proposal to inject racial preference into the constitution, with every state and the Northern Territory voting no by a decisive margin.

Albo’s folly?

In the glow of his triumphant election victory, Anthony Albanese gambled on enshrining an indigenous Voice to Parliament within the constitution, rather than legislating such a body or listening to existing groups. As with other referendums before him, that decision now looks like a mistake.

The Yes campaign goes down in flames

A barnstorming speech by Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, the leading Indigenous woman of the “no” campaign, at the National Press Club capped another disastrous week for the Yes campaign, which now seems unlikely to carry a single state in October’s referendum.

Will the vote for the Voice unite or divide us?

The stakes in October’s referendum are high for politicians on both sides of the fence, not least Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton, and the country as a whole.

A very different nation

The Australia of the 2060s will be very different from the one we know today, according to the latest Intergenerational Report issued by the Federal Government.