I think we’re supposed to be grateful to the Morrison government for initiating the Royal Commission into the aged care system. The trouble is, if they were actually governing competently, we wouldn’t need a long, expensive inquiry into the horror stories that are now surfacing. They’ve occupied the Treasury benches – with carte blanche to investigate and reform the system – for more than five years. In fact, I well recall Aged Care Minister Bronwyn Bishop being taken to task

The suggestion for a women’s caucus among our female Members and Senators is a good one; but it’s only the beginning. The time has come to face the simple fact that men are uniquely unsuited to the business of politics. It should an occupation reserved for women. I’m not joking. Politics is far too important to be left to the fragile egos and testosterone fuelled pomposities of men. They cannot be trusted to govern nations. They can’t even govern their own flailing vanities.

One day last week America produced the perfect illustration of the forces that are tearing that country apart. US science achieved the stunning feat of gently landing a spacecraft on Mars; and simultaneously the Trump White House released an uncompromising rebuttal of a report on the devastating effects of climate change. Said Trump, ‘I don’t believe it.’ The uncivil war between the two contending forces – of science and wilful ignorance – could hardly be more scarily demonst

The ABC let itself down very badly with its final Four Corners of the year where it attempted to throw some light on the imbroglio surrounding the sacking of Managing Director Michelle Guthrie. The result was pathetic – and quite unworthy of a program that has been the investigative flagship of the ABC for half a century. In the first place it was a silly decision to investigate itself. That was just the sort of foolishness it would have decried if other organisations - the N

Australian cricket is in a mess. And last week’s no-show by spectators at the Prime Minister’s XI match against the South Africans really drove the message home. It came in the wake of an independent review commissioned by Cricket Australia (CA) into the root causes of the ball-tampering scandal that saw Captain Steve Smith, Vice-Captain David Warner and opener Cameron Bancroft banned from the game for up to twelve months. Surprisingly, but correctly, it sheeted home a good d

I’m sure I’m not alone when I say I’m sick to death of people saying sorry. When Kevin Rudd started it with his apology to the Stolen Generations it seemed like a fitting response. Certainly, most of the Aboriginal folk in Parliament House on the day appreciated it. Many of the women cried and even some of us whitefellas had to wipe away a tear. But since then it has gradually to descended into an empty gesture. Who really believes the apology of those characters in the bank

As the electors of Wentworth consider their options to replace Malcolm Turnbull as their MP, we might take a moment to note his legacy as PM. At first glance it barely rates with his predecessors in the passing parade since Kevin Rudd’s departure in 2010. Rudd at least has the apology to the Stolen Generations; Julia Gillard will be credited with the NDIS and the Royal Commission into child abuse; and who could forget Tony Abbott’s knighthood to the Duke of Edinburgh. But Mal

From the moment Scott Morrison entered Federal Parliament, he nailed his religious colours to the political mast. Indeed, he devoted more than 750 words – about a quarter of the entire speech - to his deep devotion to his special brand of evangelical Christianity, known as Pentecostalism. ‘I made a commitment to my faith at an early age,’ he said. Indeed, it was within the faith that he met his wife Jenny, ‘and after fourteen years of bitter disappointments,’ he said, ‘God re

If you think that the election of Scott Morrison and Josh Frydenberg as a ‘new generation’ of Liberal Party leaders ends the cataclysm that enveloped the government last week, think again. Just consider – last Friday in the face of an uprising from voters around the country, no fewer than 40 of the 85 Liberal MPs and Senators voted for the Dodo from Dixon. It only needed three of the others to change their vote and Dutton would have been off to Government House to be sworn in

No one wants to know about the war in Afghanistan. It was not always so. From the beginning in 2001 politicians on both sides of the aisle set forth with flags flying. From Howard to Rudd to Gillard, Abbott and Turnbull, all cozied up to our lads on the front line with ‘secret’ visits that just happened to include photo spreads in all the media. Canberra’s own Member for Fenner, Andrew Leigh in 2013 recorded his ‘pleasure’ at lunching with the then Afghan Finance Minister, Dr

Last week the eminent Australian historian Prof Henry Reynolds questioned the value of our ANZUS Treaty with Donald Trump’s America. In a country whose government – from both sides of the political aisle - treats the US alliance as the cornerstone of its security, it was a courageous move, even for an academic of his standing. Reynolds best known for his pioneering work in the 1970s and 80s exposing the then hidden history of the Frontier Wars. Today, despite the resistance o

In a world where climate change is spinning out of control, where plastic waste is destroying our oceans and political chaos is breaking out in America, the UK, the EU and elsewhere, it would be understandable if we all went into an emotional decline. Add to that an American president accused of ‘treason’ by a former chief of his country’s Central Intelligence Agency; India disgracing itself with religious extremism; and the Chinese government destroying the remaining vestige

I was waiting for a taxi outside an Adelaide hotel when a tall, relatively well dressed, young man approached and said, ‘Excuse me, could you spare me some small change?’ Well, of course I could but I was so taken aback that I said, ‘No’ and he turned away. It’s been on my conscience ever since. When I told Zeru, my Ethiopian taxi driver about the encounter he said Adelaide had many people begging and sleeping rough. And when I mentioned it on Facebook, friends from around th

The cracks appearing in Bill Shorten’s leadership are bring greeted with delight by the Coalition. Defence Minister Christopher Pyne could barely contain himself as Shorten’s ‘captain’s call’ on the decision to oppose business tax cuts caused consternation in the Caucus. ‘Albo will be licking his chops,’ he said, at any wavering of support for the Labor leader. The ‘Albo’ in question was of course Anthony Albanese who contested the leadership against Shorten in the wake of La

The recent revelations of alleged war crimes by a small group of our elite SAS operatives in Afghanistan were deeply disturbing. The allegations – that in 2012 a Patrol leader kicked an Afghan prisoner over a cliff and that he was later ‘finished off’ by gunfire – are of course inexcusable. So indeed is the idiotic carriage of a Nazi flag on a Special Forces vehicle. And I have to report that there are more sensational revelations to come when the investigation by NSW Supreme

Way over here in our little corner of the world, it’s easy to underestimate the enormous struggle taking place among the global movers and shakers. And at the heart of it is the American president Donald J Trump. It is a battle not just for the relatively peaceful and productive world we’ve enjoyed since World War II, but for the notion of objective truth itself. And if the Trumpian forces prevail, we know exactly what kind of world we will leave to our kids. George Orwell ha

Some of my best friends are English. But honestly, what’s with our fawning over that marriage of a royal redhead to an American actor? And why, for goodness sake, did the Turnbull Government set aside $48 million for another memorial to James Cook? We already have a perfectly adequate one squirting water in Lake Burley Griffin. Unless it be thought that I’m racially (or rather nationally) prejudiced against all English, both my grandmothers were English and I have enjoyed my

Have you noticed how prosperous Tuross is looking lately - nearly every house nicely painted, spick and span, many with a new deck to catch the sun and the view? To those of us who have been coming here since the 70s, the change is quite amazing. And it’s only going to get better. Marlise at the local Real Estate tells me there’s a mere 34 properties for sale in the entire town, so prices are again on the way up. You only have to stay alive to add to your fortune. And here’s

A letter from a nine-year-old Canberra girl (‘turning ten’) to the ACT Education Minister, Yvette Berry has really struck a chord with readers of the ‘local rag’, the Canberra Times. The spelling isn’t great and the grammar not much better, but the sentiments – with the simplicity of innocence – provide an entirely new perception of what’s important in the Australian school curriculum. ‘What I want to talk about,’ she says, ‘is how we should learn more Aboriginal language an

I guess it’s not the end of the world – not quite, anyway. It just seemed that way when the news broke that the Captain of Australia, Steve Smith conspired to cheat in a Test match against the South Africans. At first, I, like most Australians, couldn’t quite believe it. Then the other shoe dropped and he and Cameron Bancroft, the actual perpetrator, confessed their sins at a press conference. And Steve had the temerity to say that he still felt he was the right person to lea

No one wants to be holier-than-thou when ‘private’ behaviour suddenly gets thrust upon us, like Barnaby Joyce’s dalliance with his attractive staffer, Vikki Campion that turned into something much more serious when she became pregnant. This is especially true of the Canberra Press Gallery, of which I was once a member. Their reasons, I have to tell you, are mixed. They say they keep such stories ‘private’ because, if they don’t impinge on the miscreant’s professional conduc

Well of course it is ridiculous to celebrate Australia Day on January 26, the day the First Fleet of British convicts and soldiers arrived to invade the land of our Aboriginal compatriots for the previous 60,000 years. Surely that goes without saying. Tony Abbott would have a point in asserting that the British arrival has led to the creation of a great country, if only it were done differently. But the British chose extermination over negotiation, then justified it with the

If 2017 revealed liberal democracy to be a delicate flower – as it surely did - then 2018 will decide whether its roots have reached deep enough to survive the fiery winds of ‘strongman’ autocracy sweeping the globe. Right now, the prognosis is not looking good. A quick glance at the big players is thoroughly discomfiting. The two most populous nations, India and China, are increasingly under the iron rule of autocrats Narendra Modi and Xi Jinping. Russia has become Vladimir

I love the idea of Steve Smith as Captain of Australia. Sure, he’s just the captain of the national (men’s) cricket team, but he’s really a throwback to the days when blokes like Don Bradman, Lindsay Hassett and Ritchie Benaud seemed to embody all the virtues of leadership. And we were proud to have them right at the top of the Australian tree. They were so different from the politicians who were in their game for what they could get out of it. The Captain of Australia led hi