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    Politics

    Canberra Observed

    This Month

    Anthony Albanese’s announcement of a 15 per cent wage rise for childcare workers came before the current wage hearing before the Fair Work Commission was finalised.

    Short-term politics won’t leave sustainable childcare legacy

    Five years ago, Labor promised to subsidise childcare wages and was howled down. Now, it hardly moves the dial.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations and Minister for the Arts and Leader of the House Tony Burke.

    Like Howard, Albanese knows two heirs apparent are better than one

    Labor’s leadership succession plan seems less obvious than it did six months ago.

    • Phillip Coorey

    July

    Senators Jacqui Lambie and Pauline Hanson voted against the Ensuring Integrity Bill.

    It’s not just Labor that let the CFMEU off the leash

    Jacqui Lambie, Pauline Hanson and some independents have played a role in enabling the militant union.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Prime Minister Anthony Albanese sought to benefit from a dominant Labor base at the state level when he came to power - the premiers had ideas of their own.

    Wall-to-wall Labor not necessarily a bonus for the PM

    As the federal election nears, the question is whether Labor in power across the entire mainland has become a problem for the Albanese government in terms of brand damage.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Middle Australia has every opportunity to rise up the income ranks, according to new Productivity Commission analysis.

    Middle Australia is indeed the lucky country

    A suite of new data sources has enabled the Productivity Commission to revise its measure of economic mobility. The result surprised everyone.

    • Tom Burton
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    Fatima Payman will set on the Senate crossbench.

    Muslims and farmers, everyone wants a piece of Labor

    An unanticipated backlash in WA is the last thing the government needs, given the prospect of the creation of a pro-Muslim political movement targeting heartland ALP seats.

    • Phillip Coorey

    June

    Fatima Payman indicated her allegiance to her “Muslim brothers and sisters” was the greater imperative.

    Payman has crossed Labor’s tribal caucus comrades

    Unlike the West Australian senator who gifted the Greens a propaganda victory, Penny Wong stayed in the tent and effected change from within on same-sex marriages.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Peter Dutton is proposing seven nuclear plants in Coalition electorates.

    Dutton is prepared to take risks, but he is no onion eater

    The signature difference between what the Coalition unleashed on Wednesday and the debilitating climate fights of the past is that both parties are operating from the assumption that emissions need to be reduced.

    • Phillip Coorey
    On just 15 occasions has the preamble to the teals’ questions in the House made any reference to either the MP’s seat or their constituents.

    Teals are ‘paying the piper’ while Dutton plays Russian roulette

    Peter Dutton reckons the cost of living doesn’t discriminate between the teal seats and the rest.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Adam Bandt’s assertion is the Albanese government is “complicit in genocide”.

    Greens metamorphosis goes well beyond normal politicking

    The party these days bears only a passing resemblance to the political conservation movement started by Bob Brown that fought nobly against habitat destruction.

    • Phillip Coorey

    May

    There won’t be a reshuffle until there is one

    To move Immigration Minister Andrew Giles, a close factional ally of the Prime Minister and member of his praetorian guard, could cause more problems than it would solve.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Immigration is again poised to play a lead role, not because the boats are coming, but after Peter Dutton used his budget address-in-reply to conflate it with the housing crisis.

    Both sides are pushing buttons on migration, one is being more subtle

    Migration long ago became a lazy method, adopted by both sides of politics, to generate growth in the absence of any reform or productivity agenda,

    • Phillip Coorey
    Treasurer Jim Chalmers: politicians spent a long time telling voters that they were hard done by, and government was there to help.

    This budget sees the return of government as saviour

    Two decades ago, Australia was poised to shed the hard-done-by battler mindset. Now it is more entrenched than ever.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Peter Dutton will at least send strong signals on housing, immigration and energy in his budget reply.

    Budget week is time for Dutton to roll a few Jaffas down the aisle

    In the same week Peter Dutton went in to bat for the koalas, Labor flew the flag for gas.

    • Phillip Coorey
    May 2, 2024

    Labor election plans start blowing smoke

    Labor is banking on at least one rate cut before calling an election. That scenario is no longer guaranteed.

    • Phillip Coorey
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    April

    Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Nationals Leader David Littleproud

    Dutton’s atomic bet threatens Coalition chain reaction over climate

    Rather than keep the heat on Labor’s handling of the cost-of-living pain as inflation stays high, the opposition leader’s nuclear venture risks becoming the story.

    • Jacob Greber
    Three weeks ago, Cook, whose state is critical to Albanese’s re-election prospects, urged Albanese and Plibersek to delay the EPBC reform

    Delay to environment reforms shows what WA wants, WA gets

    The decision to delay reform of federal environmental laws underscores the stranglehold the resources states have on the next election.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Labor chooses to sit in the middle denouncing both Islamophobia and anti-semitism and purporting to be concerned about social cohesion.

    Political point-scoring blinkers everyone’s approach to Gaza

    Anthony Albanese is right to say the impact Australia can have on the behaviour of either side of the conflict is “limited”. But that has long ceased being the point.

    • Phillip Coorey
    Governor-General David Hurley should have led the way on transparency over Scott Morrison’s secret ministries.

    At Yarralumla it’s not about the person. It’s about the institution

    For 99.9 per cent of the time the governor-general is irrelevant to the lives of most Australians. But when they do matter, they matter very much.

    • Jacob Greber

    March

    Minister for Climate Change and Energy Chris Bowen announced mandatory pollution caps for cars.

    Green policy car crash complicates Labor’s election outlook

    A series of competing and interlinked priorities are colliding in Labor’s Senate, where all eyes are turning to the next election.

    • Jacob Greber

    The Australian Financial Review Magazine

    About Time Watch Weekend

    BOSS Financial Review

    Sharon Lewin, a night owl, does a lot of her emails at night and sends them the following morning.

    Life & Leisure

    The Fold6 is compatible with the S-Pen, it just doesn’t have a place to store it.

    Rich List

    Gumbuya executive Ron Weinzierl in front of the park’s famous golden pheasant sculpture in 2017.