By Martha Knox-Haly

From April 2023 to October 2023, Australian voters were subjected to an unprecedented social media disinformation campaign around the Voice to Parliament Referendum. The Voice to Government was supported by Scott Morrison in 2017, and it had enjoyed the steady support of the majority of Australian voters several years. The proposal was modest. It did not extend to a treaty, and there was no reason to suspect the Voice referendum would be controversial. Then in April 2023, the new coalition leader Peter Dutton signalled he was going to side with West Australian Liberals, and that he would campaign against the Coalition’s previous policy.

This was the cue for the launch of the ‘No campaign’ in April 2023. The associated digital disinformation campaign was unparalleled in intensity, spread and sophistication. The ultimate victims of the no campaign were amongst the most impoverished and marginalised Australians. The trashing of Indigenous dreams by wealthy donors was reprehensible. To date, these wealthy donors have not apologised for the spike in Indigenous suicide rates that occurred from April 2023. The No campaign claimed to champion free speech, but how can speech be free when discourse is the product of online manipulation and deceit? It was not the first time political actors had pursued digital disinformation campaigns, but it was the first time these strategies had succeeded.

How can Australian voters be protected against digital disinformation and attacks on democracy? A robust regulatory framework requires coercive powers. It needs to be able to combat disinformation from the point of initiation and within echo chambers. The framework needs to empower social media users and the associated regulatory institutions. Above all, the regulatory frameworks needs to be agile enough to make a difference in the tight time frames that exist around electoral activity.

The Albanese Government proposed amendments to the Broadcasting Act of 1992, strengthening the powers of the Australian Communications and Media Authority. Despite the proposed amendment containing many of the elements the Coalition Government had taken to the 2022 election, the Coalition’s response was predictably histrionic. There were assertions that the bill would establish ‘a ministry of truth’ and ‘was a threat to democracy’. In reality, the amendment bill provided ACMA with a modest increase in the power to gather information and maintain records about a social media platform’s responses to disinformation. ACMA was not given powers to force content to be taken down expeditiously, and it did not cover media organisations.

Coercive powers around the removal of content were reserved for the ‘e-safety commissioner.’ The ‘e-safety commissioner’ is concerned with protecting the rights of adults or children who are subject to abuse, and its scope does not extend to ensuring the safety of democratic electoral systems. Under the Online Safety Act 2021, online providers are required to develop codes of conduct, and the E-Safety Commissioner can pursue fines. Online providers are required to respond to the E-Safety Commissioner’s questions, and take down content. There is nothing about compliance audits of social media platforms, or promoting algorithmic transparency and sovreignty in either the Online Safety Act or the proposed ACMA amendments. These frameworks are complaints focused, and not designed to bring about systemic reform of social media providers.

There is a proposal to introduce new laws based on recommendations from the Commission into Robodebt. These recommendations are that all federal government agencies be transparent in explaining how algorithms and AI affect decision making processes. Unfortunately, these recommendations do not extend to online service providers.

The regulatory gap is a problem. The onus is on social media giants to be responsive to requests to remove offensive content. The platform owner’s personality can influence responsiveness. For example, former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was a programmer by background, and proactively managed the risks to elections. Regretfully Elon Musk, the current owner of X, dismantled the capacity for users to flag political disinformation during the referendum campaign.

The ACMA amendments permit the regulator to raise concerns with a platform, and investigate the platform’s self-regulatory process. If the self-regulatory processes of a platform are deemed inadequate, there are potential penalties and enforcement of a mandatory code of conduct. The emphasis is on providing the platform with as many opportunities as possible to take mitigating action before levying sanctions. The process is not in any sense fast moving or agile. There is nothing in the legislation around algorithmic sovereignty or opt outs from personalised recommendations. These are the very tools that a platform user needs to have to start creating an information ecosystem where disinformation is weeded out.

The European Union’s Digital Services Act provides an example of how social media users can be provided with these tools. On the 20^th October 2023, the European Union adopted a delegated regulation under the Digital Services Act around compliance audits for what is referred to as very large online search platforms (VLOSP) and very large online search engines (VLOSE). The delegated regulation specified the role of independent auditors, who were required to use templates for implementation reports. In August 2023, Articles 34-48 of the Digital Services Act came into effect, with a range of compliance provisions, such as risk assessments, opt outs from personalised recommendations, algorithm transparency, data and access for researchers. The mandatory annual independent audit assesses compliance with these provisions, which are the basis for mandatory reports to the European Commission and Digital Services Coordinator. One notable weakness in the European Union delegated regulation is that auditors will be paid for by the companies they are auditing. The EU’s Digital Services Act is not an agile framework either. Importantly none of the regulatory frameworks in Australia or the EU is particularly effective at combating the formation of echo chambers, which are the repositories for disinformation.

Only technological solutions have the capacity to combat the lightning spread of disinformation. Examples of agile technology that could be incorporated into policy frameworks include BotSlayer, a software program designed by researchers at the University of Indiana. Botslayer detects the presence of coordinated disinformation campaigns through the use of bots. It is free software that can be used to monitor sudden suspicious spikes in activity. Another technological solution includes random dynamical nudges.

Researchers Curin, Vera and Khaledi-Nasab have explained that social media is built around the advertising culture of the ‘hyper-nudge’. This is a marketing technique of communicating identity-based messages that appeal to generating user consumer behaviours. This social media design feature is responsible for generating echo chambers. Curin and colleagues developed the concept of the random dynamical nudge, where social media users are presented with a random selection of other users’ opinions. Their research found that using random dynamical nudges led to consensus formation, rather than fragmentation of political discourse and formation of echo chambers.

Policy frameworks could mandate joint systematic monitoring by the Social Media Platform, ACMA and the AEC with the use of BotSlayer style software, with compulsory auditing for the dismantling of disinformation campaigns and deployment of random dynamical nudges around electoral promises. Regulating online platforms and providers is complex, but protecting democracy is worth the effort.

By John Haly

The burden of supplying job vacancies falls on the government and business sectors. Instead, the government and media typically blame the unemployed, portraying them as unmotivated, parasitic welfare recipients. This is despite, by any unemployment measurement, there are more unemployed than open job positions.

This suggests that the real issue is a lack of jobs in the public and private sectors, and the market – not the unemployed – is to blame. If the RBA utilised more accurate unemployment estimates to evaluate unemployment instead of the ABS subset, it would never have a reason for hiking interest rates.

The ABS subset of unemployment data shows that the neoclassical assertion that unemployment is too low (and must be used to offset inflation) is pure propaganda. The ABS data fails to account for the larger share of domestic unemployment.

Exchange Settlement & OPA A/cs

This has not stopped the RBA from inflating your interest bills to benefit bankers’ profits which appears to be their only “success,” although they would not boast of it. None of the RBA’s publicly-recognised strategic goals appear to be progressing well. They have not regained management control of interest rates since March 2020. Interbank loans are a fifth of what they once were, with much of it sitting on deposit with the Reserve Bank and a consequential interest being paid less than interest received. Inflation has responded to supply changes, not the strategy of interest rate rises. All of this is despite attempts to boost lending by increasing banks’ Exchange Settlement Reserves during the pandemic (see Figure 1), which didn’t work either. Consequently, substantial overnight loans at these inflated interest rates are rarer (see Figure 2).

InterBank Market transactions

Governments, businesses, and central banks all make political decisions regarding unemployment. The corporate capital class employs it as a tool for pressuring working-class compliance with exploitation. The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) believes that the Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU) must be offset against inflation. The desired unemployment rate has been a highly flexible and shifting target percentage rate for decades. Even though post-World War II Western nations, including Australia, have had 2% to 3% unemployment for decades without significant inflation. Still, this zombie economic notion refuses to die. Remember that 2% unemployment occurred when gig jobs were virtually nonexistent?

Our current RBA governor believes that “full employment” is at 4.5% unemployment, and that our current rate of 3.7% is dangerously low. According to the ABS, the rate is 3.7% (Oct 23). Even though the Jobseeker and Youth Allowance count each month has been somewhere between 1.6 and 1.9 times that, over the last three years. That doesn’t even consider the harsh consequences of excluding Jobseekers from aid. For example, 502,698 jobseeker payments were suspended between July and September of this year. This averages more than 160,000 per month. Keep in mind that, according to ABS, the number of unemployed has been stable at roughly half a million for the last two years (see Figure 3). So, keep reading if that makes you suspicious that something isn’t quite kosher.

Multiple measures of unemployment

The ABS’s reported unemployment rate of 3.7% does not accurately reflect the domestic reality of unemployment as it affects the real numbers of people who are jobless. The media, capitalists, and political elite rarely, if ever, discuss what purpose the ABS statistics genuinely serve. It serves two fundamental functions:

1. comparative analysis on an international scale and
2. the interests of capitalist class exploitation.

The ABS approach to assessing employment by ILO methodology has been criticised as “imperfectly realised” (Pg 78-85). It does not consider internal or domestic unemployment in a country, a lack of employment opportunities, or decent welfare compensation. I have addressed the international comparative function before, so I will shift to the second aspect. The ABS’s primary domestic purpose is to gauge the unhindered accessibility of labour to employers, and as such, it is not a complete set.

Despite Treasurer Dr Jim Chalmers’ declared goal of attaining full employment, the September 2022 Job Summit failed to progress this. Instead, Chalmers advocated increasing the Permanent Migration Programme planning level to 195,000 for the fiscal year 2022-23. This is expected to relieve some skill shortages. Free higher education is still in place in many less economically advantaged European countries. Opponents believe that free tertiary education is financially unfeasible. However, free education has to become a higher political priority for spending.

Jim Chalmers recommended providing funds for the free provision of TAFE courses in 180,000 spaces in 2023. This barely registers as an impact on the ABS unemployment estimate of 473,000. Keep in mind that the ABS estimate is far lower than the counted number of people granted “JobSeeker” benefits. The Labor Party’s attitude lacks sincerity. The boost in immigration coincides with the interests of their corporate capitalist funders, who gain from cheap immigrant labour. The ABS approach benefits employers rather than the general public or government policy. Individuals who may not be immediately available, even if they have had NO work and NO pay in a month, but have a “job attachment” in the gig economy, are in family businesses, or are busking on the streets. Foreign workers who have been here less than four years, those registered in government-sponsored jobless work programmes, and those who are unable to provide active evidence of seeking employment are excluded. This alone disqualifies thousands of people from being considered unemployed. The ABS description does not give the public an accurate picture of Australian domestic unemployment. Including unpaid persons with gig job affiliations would significantly increase unemployment, approaching the Reserve Bank’s NAIRU threshold of 4.5%, effectively demolishing the rationale for interest rate hikes. (see Figure 3)

The Australian Reserve Bank’s (RBA) monetary policy framework does not use a precise unemployment count (rather than an estimate) like Jobseeker’s account. Doing so would imply an unemployment rate higher than 5.6%, negating any justification for raising interest rates. The opportunity to have the country with one of the world’s highest household private debt to GDP ratios (112% in 2023) shift money from the debtors to wealthy financiers and banks would be wasted. It is strange that, in a neoliberal society that worships markets and the private sector, the government and media are refusing to accept Roy Morgan’s estimate of unemployment, which was at 1.5 million in October and has stayed continuously high over the past two years. The conservative establishment’s stance remains mostly anti-private-sector research in areas that do not agree with the Reserve Bank’s objective. The government and media frequently cite underemployment. However, Roy Morgan’s “disreputable” private enterprise model for unemployment has maintained these ABS subset numbers at levels that are roughly half to one-third lower.

I chose October 2023 statistics because they were all available when I started writing this paper. Over the last year, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has consistently recorded unemployment at around half a million (currently 2/3rds of the JobSeeker count and 1/3rd of the Roy Morgan estimate). Even the seasonally adjusted labour force increase claim varies greatly, which any statistician will recognise affects the percentage estimate for unemployment.

The difference between the September and October workforce measurements is 780K, more than the number of unemployed ABS claims. If that difference worries you, consider that Roy Morgan’s aggregate estimates of under and unemployment were at least twice as high as ABS’s (1.44 million), totaling 3.12 million. That corresponds to 20.1% according to Roy Morgan’s workforce numbers (15.5 million), but 21.19% if ABS’s estimate of 14.7 million is accurate. Although this is a fascinating statistical game, the fact that neither the private sector nor the government will step forward to provide relief, has an impact on people’s livelihoods.

RM Under and Unemployment & Job Vacancies (ABS & Dept Emp’)

The gap between the needs of the under and unemployed and the available job vacancies in the market is so large as to be insurmountable (see Figure 4). Both measurements of job vacancies posted and claimed via surveys conducted, respectively, by the Department of Employment and the ABS, plainly reveal the dismal provision of work by both the commercial and public sectors. I have already explored this and will do so again in a subsequent article. It demonstrates that governments have done little to improve the plight of the unemployed in the last half-century compared to the prior quarter century.

Finally, the graph in Figure 3 reveals that Roy Morgan’s estimates are the most probabilistically feasible. The ABS unemployment estimates and zero-hours figures outperformed the JobSeeker numbers from August to October 2021. Recognising JobSeeker or Roy Morgan’s prominent unemployment figures would indicate that the Reserve Bank’s interest rates should always have remained at the 0.1% level. Every step made by the RBA to raise interest rates is subsequently boosting inflation and living costs despite their intended goals, and is based on the presumption of low unemployment. Every claimed goal for their strategies is based on a total economic fabrication.

This article was originally published on AUSTRALIA AWAKEN – IGNITE YOUR TORCHES and Independent Australia.

You can be pretty sure that Michael Sukkar will never be homeless. That is because, as of May 2022, he owned three properties.

You might be interested to learn that he was, for several years, our man tasked with addressing homelessness in Australia.

He was appointed to the ministry in 2017, by Malcolm Turnbull. He was the Assistant Minister to the Treasurer, with special responsibility for “addressing housing affordability”.

In February 2017 he was asked about his area of special responsibility, that being ‘housing affordability’. He responded this way:

“We’re also enabling young people to get highly paid jobs, which is the first step to buying a house,” he said.

There can be many ways to tackle housing affordability, but it would be difficult to find one which is more obfuscatory, or vague, or even misleading.

Here is a former assistant to the treasurer, a man with a commerce degree, and he thinks that increasing the income of potential buyers will address the problem of housing affordability.

A quick google search provides some alternatives, although he might not like the source. The Grattan Institute suggests some solutions:

“The Federal Government can improve housing affordability by reducing demand. It should reduce the capital gains tax discount from 50 per cent to 25 per cent; abolish negative gearing; and include owner-occupied housing in the Age Pension assets test. Housing will also become more affordable if more homes are built.”

Economics is often called the “dismal science”, but there are some maxims which have stood the test of time. “Supply and demand” in simple terms, means if you want to lower the price of an asset, increase the supply of the asset.

Far be it from me to tell a former assistant treasurer how to address housing affordability, but perhaps a small return to his old textbooks might serve to refresh his memory.

It would be useful to remember who he was assisting. Scott Morrison was the Treasurer at the time, and so it can be imagined that the pair of them often sat up, late into the night, discussing the best way to make homes more affordable to the common people.

It is difficult to know whether Scott Morrison’s belief in the prosperity gospel won out over economic orthodoxy, or was Michael Sukkar channeling Joe Hockey, who was famous for his own solution to the housing crisis.

You must remember that, when he advised first-home buyers to find a “good job that pays good money”. They must employ the same speech-writer.

So many mentors, so little actual sense.

Michael Sukkar eventually became a minister

In December 2020, Sukkar, who had earlier supported Peter Dutton against Malcolm Turnbull in their leadership tussle, was forgiven by Morrison, and promoted. His new roles included the roles of Assistant Treasurer, Minister for Housing and Minister for Homelessness, Social and Community Housing.

This was a shock to many, because he had consistently voted against making life easier for those who were doing it tough.

This included voting against capping gas prices, federal action on public housing, increasing access to JobKeeper payments, increasing housing affordability, increasing the age pension, and he even voted against treating the Covid vaccine rollout as a matter of urgency.

As a matter of fact, he also voted for drug testing of welfare recipients.

What does he do now?

Should you, dear reader, take comfort from the fact that these people are no longer in power, remember this. Michael Sukkar is currently the shadow minister for these three portfolios.

Shadow Minister for Social Services
Shadow Minister for the National Disability Insurance Scheme
Shadow Minister for Housing and Homelessness.

So, notwithstanding Mr Sukkar’s voting record, and his extreme social conservatism, it is likely that he would retain these portfolios if the Coalition was to regain power. That should be enough to keep you up at night.

They are unlikely to be revelatory, will shatter no myths, nor disprove any assumptions. Cabinet documents exist to merely show that a political clique – the heart of the Westminster model of government, so to speak – often contain the musings of invertebrates, spineless on most issues such as foreign policy, while operating at the behest of select interests. Hostility to originality is essential since it is threatening to the tribe; dissent is discouraged to uphold the order of collective cabinet responsibility.

The recent non-story arising from the cabinet documents made available as to why Australia participated in a murderous, destructive and most probably illegal war against Iraq in 2003 proves that point. The documents available showed, for instance, that a country, without mandatory parliamentary consultation, can go to war under the stewardship of a cabal influenced by the strategic interests of a foreign government. The Howard government, famously buried in the fatty posterior of the US imperium, was always going to commit Australian military personnel to whatever military venture Washington demanded of it. (In some cases, even without asking.)

It was modish to suggest during the “Global War on Terror” that governments with fictional weapons of mass destruction might pass them on to surrogate non-state actors. It was fashionable to misread intelligence material alleging such links, and, when that intelligence did not stack up, concoct it, as Tony Blair’s government happily did, sexed-up dossiers and all, in justifying Britain’s participation in the mauling of Iraq.

The larger story in the recent documents affair over Iraq was what documents were withheld from the provision to the Australian National Archives in 2020. In his January 3 press conference, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese outlined the process. Normally, cabinet documents would be released two decades after their creation. Such documents are provided to the Archives three years in advance by the government of the day. But on this occasion, 78 were omitted from the transfer, enabling Albanese to point the finger firmly at his predecessor, Scott Morrison. (Those documents have since been transferred to the Archives.)

In Albanese’s view, “Australians have the right to know the basis upon which Australia went to war in Iraq. Australians lost their lives during the conflict and we know that some of the stated reasons for going to war was not correct in terms of the weapons of mass destruction that was alleged Iraq had at the time.” Australians, he went on to say, had “a right to know what the decision-making process was.”

The mistake in question had to be corrected, and the Archives had to release the documentation provided to them. A constricting caveat, however, was appended to the declaration: the release of the documents had to “account for any national security issues […] upon the advice of the national security agencies.”

The caveat is a good starting point to suggest that this documents saga, and the restrictions upon the disclosure of the missing 78 Cabinet records, are set to continue. For one thing, Albanese has added to the farce of secrecy by commencing an independent review that is barely worth that title. The review is to be chaired by the very sort of person you would expect to bury rather than find things: Dennis Richardson, former director of the Australian Secret Intelligence Organisation and former head of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT).

Richardson’s appointment continues a practice of partisan control over a process that should be beyond the national-security fraternity. There are fewer strings of accountability, as would apply, say, to the Commonwealth Ombudsman. There are no terms of reference outlined. Short of simply being a political manoeuvre that might cast a poor light on the previous government’s practices, it is unclear what Richardson’s purpose really is apart from justifying the retention of any of the said documents from public view.

Either way, he will be on a tidy sum for the task, something which he is becoming rather used to. As The Klaxon reports, Richardson has been well remunerated by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) for previous work. A $50,000-a-month contract was awarded to him last year for “strategic advice and review” between August 2 and October 31. The department refuses to state what it was for, preferring the insufferably vague justification of some “need for independent research or assessment”. Be on guard whenever the term “independent” is coupled with “inquiry” or “assessment” in an Australian government context.

A media release from the PM&C further notes that no department official or Minister has a direct role in the release or otherwise of the documents in question; the Archives will have the final say on whether those documents will be released or otherwise, whatever Albanese says. Researchers, transparency activists and those keen on open government, are almost guaranteed disappointment, given the habitual secrecy and dysfunction that characterises the operation of that body.

If there is a true lesson in this untidy business for the Albanese government, it must surely lie in the need to debate, discuss and dissent from matters that concern the entanglement of Australia, not merely in foreign wars but in alliances that cause them. That, sadly, is a lesson that is nowhere being observed. Howard’s crawling disposition has found its successor in Albanese’s obsequiousness, in so far as foreign conflicts are concerned. Wherever the US war machine is deployed, Australia will hop to its aid with gleeful obedience.

And as for anything to do with revealing the Australian decision-making process about the decision to invade, despoil and ruin yet another Middle Eastern state in 2003, one is better off consulting records from the White House and the US State Department.

The Search for the Palace Letters: Jenny Hocking v Fuckingham Palace

By guest columnist Tess Lawrence

Warrior Australian historian and colonial upstart Jenny Hocking notoriously took on Queen Elizabeth 11, Fuckingham Palace, Australia’s anal-retentive fortress of ‘forbidden history’, the National Archives, the Attorney-General and the Office of the Governor General – and won!

For years the diminutive, pixie faced Hocking and her formidable team of lawyers stormed the continuum of legal barricades put up by this obsequious group of forelock-tugging monarchical subjugates, dismantling spurious legal argument that basically strove to deny fellow Australians the truth about the role of the/our British monarch and her man in Oz, Governor General Sir John Kerr in the 1975 dismissal of the Whitlam Government.

The ruptures caused by ‘The Dismissal‘ still loom large upon the nation’s political and societal psyche.

The legal stoush was one thing. The years leading up to the Courts quite another. All up a decade or more, and even to this day, Hocking is fighting facile restrictions on her access to our national archives.

What is going on?

The NAA is behaving more like Lubyanka than the guardian of our past and thus a guide to our future. It is our library. It doesn’t belong to our Monarch, and it certainly doesn’t belong to censorial bureaucrats.

The archives belong to us. Our history belongs to us. Shameful or otherwise.

You would think that our Attorneys General and the National Archives of Australia would both be in Hocking’s and thus our corner, leading the charge to champion the release of correspondence between the late Queen and her hapless self aggrandising and needy lapdog, Sir John. It’s embarrassing to even reflect upon the entire scenario.

The Search for the Palace Letters and The Search for Jenny Hocking

At 8pm tomorrow night in a world premiere, ABC television will broadcast the much-awaited film ‘The Search for the Palace Letters‘ based on Hocking’s own non-fictional historical thriller, The Palace Letters.

The documentary might well have been sub-titled ‘The Search for Jenny Hocking’.

Despite Hocking’s prolific writings and public appearances, like her opponents in the courtroom and public fora, we do not have her measure. She is a natural and generous teacher and communicator and her passion for history is matched by her determination to share it. In her writings she has that precious ability to combine academic prowess with literary flourish. In a gumnut shell, she is a compelling storyteller, who breathes life into history. Question and answer sessions are an audience favourite because she has a well-earned reputation for calling it as she sees it, invariably drenching her answers with her wry wit and sense of humour. I know, because I’ve seen her in action.

Last year, whilst appearing on the wonderful podcast series, The Scandal Mongers, Hocking caused spluttering and outrage in the British and international media when she called for our King to apologise for his personal interference (when he was Prince) and support for Sir John Kerr’s role in the Whitlam government’s dismissal.

The Scandal Mongers is presented by the dynamic duo of Andrew Lownie and Phil Craig. You can read about it in full in this article The AIM Network published in March.

Lownie himself has been fighting his own battles in the UK that in many aspects mirror Hocking’s experiences here. He wrote an exclusive article for The AIMN last year on his own struggles with the Palace and the British Government.

Below: Hocking’s appearance on The Scandal Mongers remains a popular episode. Lifelong cobbers Andrew Lownie and Phil Craig are wonderfully jovial, irreverent intellects and co-hosts. They are two sharp dudes.

The Search for the Palace Letters will give us greater access to Hocking’s personality and what drives her. It’s fascinating that her life and professional partner, Daryl Dellora is the director and again, has teamed up with producer Sue Maslin. Both are festooned with awards and accolades under the Film Art Doco banner.

Of course, this brings an inevitable professional voyeurism and curiosity as to how Dellora treats his subject, with whom he is intimately involved. Then again, as a family, the Hockings underwent so much to take on The Firm and The Establishment. And the third eye of the camera will reveal secrets and provide insight.

Such battles are not always won in the courtroom, but rather around the kitchen table, in the dead of night, in bed. Endless hours of research, fact checking, cross checking, briefings, emails, phone conversations. It’s daunting. At times, frightening. You have to nurture morale. Try not to be dissuaded by the negativity and indifference of others. It’s sometimes scary. One inevitably bites off more than one can chew.

Hocking also whistleblower – exposing corruption within collusive system

Let us not forget Jenny Hocking is also a whistleblower.

Make no mistake, the dismal affair in my book, that led up to The Dismissal constituted corruption and arguably, corruption of constitutional propriety, insofar as royal and direct interference in our political affairs and government leadership are concerned.

These arduous campaigns for justice are all pervasive, as well I know. Subtext and back stories form arterial alleyways to the brain. One has to stay alert. Legal opponents throw everything at you. Vigilance and strategy become endemic bedfellows. You sleep almost with your eyes open. It is not an obsession. It is not even a compulsion. It is a requirement, part of the job, in order to try to stay one step ahead.

Hocking on the set of The Search for the Palace Letters. Photo by Hilary Wardaugh.

Whistleblower often one person against many

Onlookers sometimes forget that invariably the whistleblower is simply one person fighting a phalanx of opponents to expose injustice for the greater good.

And so often when all is finally revealed and the calumny exposed, we learn that many others knew of the wrong doings. That in itself can be dispiriting, disheartening.

Why did Jenny Hocking’s opponents spend millions of taxpayers’ monies to try and block access to the Queen/Kerr letters? Because they knew what was in the files. They knew that the Queen and Kerr would be exposed as the main key and culpable players in an end game that ultimately was to bring down the Whitlam Government.

It’s all there in the Palace Letters. And to read the bilge written by those who wrote that the palace letters didn’t reveal any such thing, is simply another attempt at fake news and revisionism of history, indeed journalism itself and is an indictment of a lack of knowledge and understanding of the machinations of the Queen, Fuckingham Palace and ‘The Firm’.

Impediment to accessing our own history comes from enemies within

Besides, since the High Court decided in Hocking’s favour and blowout after the publishing of The Palace Letters, container loads of evidence of Palace interference in political affairs have been published, as recently as this week and this day, as the Epstein files attest.

The impediments to accessing our own history comes not so much from ‘foreign’ entities but rather from the enemies within. And they are legion.

The next time someone tells you, one person can’t make a difference, you might consider citing Jenny Hocking as someone who did. As someone who does.

The Search for the Palace Letters. ABC TV, Monday, January 8.24. 8pm AEDT

It seems that whenever Labor comes to power, it is under the worst possible economic conditions. If you have a long memory, you will recall the period known as the world oil crisis. It began in 1973 and inflicted on the Whitlam Government a period of economic mayhem.

By 1975, inflation was 15%, and Australia was teetering on the edge of a recession that eventually transpired and continued throughout the seventies. The oil crisis of the 1970s was:

“… brought about by two specific events in the Middle East: the Yom-Kippur War of 1973 and the Iranian Revolution of 1979.”

In 1983, the Hawke Labor government:

“… came to office with inflation still at 11.5%, unemployment at 10.3% and Australia in the middle of a long-lasting recession.

Hawke’s treasurer, Paul Keating, would later say about his early period as treasurer that there needed to be a prominent place to look for an answer to the economy’s problems.”

During this period, I had an overdraft with 19% interest. Remarkable, I hear you say, but running a business without one was nigh on impossible.

Kevin Rudd was in power briefly when extreme stress in global financial markets and banking systems happened between mid-2007 and early 2009. It was known as the “Global Financial Crisis.”

Through no fault of his own, Anthony Albanese has grappled with the worst worldwide cost of living surge in decades. However, none of these events, a pandemic and a war, have elicited a word of sympathy from a media intent on saying that Labor couldn’t manage money. It has been the LNP’s catchcry for as long as I can remember.

After leaving the country a trillion dollars in debt 18 months ago, the LNP has sarcastically repeated, “Labor cannot manage money.” But even the Murdoch muck tabloids and others from the far right agree that it would be inflationary to just hand out money.

After almost a decade of perpetual political controversy and inept governance, the Opposition parties and their media friends have dared to emerge from a period of disgraceful, immoral and corrupt Government and say: “Elect us again, and we will fix the problem.” And just 18 months without even apologising for the damage they caused to our institutions and democratic principles. It is laughable that they are being touted as a real possibility to return to power. What were they doing when they were in power?

The only evidence for a LNP re-election is a victory was in The Voice referendum and in the bad economic news worldwide. Sure, Labor has struggled with the cost of living, rents and interest rates, but they seem minuscule against the backdrop of the 70s and 80s.

Indeed, inflation is higher than people under 40 have experienced. Their parents lived through sharper price hikes in the 1970s and ’80s, but the media paints the worst possible canvas of today. Those experiences should help shape the way today’s economy is viewed in comparison. But it doesn’t because the world of conservative commentators and media sluts doesn’t do such fairness.

We haven’t even entered a recession, which means today’s economic conditions bear no comparison with the bloody awful circumstances of previous times.

Favouring a Labor victory is that the hatred of Peter Dutton is still there, and it exposes his vile political nakedness every time the words ‘immigration’ or ‘First Nations people’ are used. His history is still very much alive with the policeman’s authority.

The Roy Morgan 2023 politicians distrust list has:

“… former Prime Minister Scott Morrison on top, Peter Dutton at two. Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong took the most trusted title for a second straight year, and Jim Chalmers was a strong second.

“The very high levels of distrust in Peter Dutton, and others in the opposition make it unlikely they would be able to win government in the current climate,” Roy Morgan chief executive Michele Levine said.

As we leave 2023 and meander our way through the summer sojourn into 2024, both parties will leave a residue of little transparency. Albanese promised better politics, but somehow, it got left behind in the slipstream of too many overseas trips.

Labor has lost the flare for embellishment without exaggeration. In other words, it couldn’t sell ice to Eskimos. In policy terms, they have had an excellent first term so far, but you wouldn’t think so. Many of their promises have been fulfilled, but they face a year of re-engagement with change for the better.

In Peter Dutton, the right has a clone of Tony Abbott, excellent at negativity, but after that, he falls away to nothing. Outside of policing, does the electorate know his thoughts on anything? He reminds me of that night on ABC 7.30 many years ago when Abbott asked Kerry O’Brien not to ask him any questions about the internet because he didn’t understand it. “Wow,” I wonder how he does his banking these days.

How does he see the future of Australia in a rapidly changing world? Does he have the intellectual capacity to explain himself? For example, he has no knowledge of economics, and on top of that, his current shadow ministers would form his cabinet; yes, the same corrupt lot of them.

Albanese isn’t a natural-born salesman whose words fly off the tip of their tongues with consummate ease, able to convince anyone to buy their blabber.

He must learn quickly that life isn’t about perception, not what it is, but what we perceive it to be. He must learn how to convince people of his sincerity.

The first twelve months of Labor’s tenure were dynamic, but then muckraker Murdoch’s relentless cost of living campaign slowly began to hit a government preoccupied with The Voice referendum. Of course, a sage mind would have determined that the referendum was lost the moment Dutton said he would oppose it.

His belief that the result would be a triumph of hope over experience proved incorrect. Subsequent polling by the Australian National University has shown majority support for a legislated Voice. Why didn’t Albanese just delay it when the result became apparent.

Labor passed some excellent legislation in the months leading up to Christmas, but again, Albanese should have sold it to the public using the authority of his office. He should have shouted their virtue to the heavens and every electorate. Yes, even advertisements to publicise their necessity.

• These policies included an agreement at the National Cabinet to create a National Firearms Register.
• They made a deal with the states to ensure the NDIS is solid and sustainable.
• They reached a landmark healthcare agreement to take pressure off hospitals and boost our health workforce and Medicare Urgent Care Clinics.
• They passed critical laws in Parliament to protect workers’ conditions and to improve the environment.
• Wage theft will become a crime, and industrial manslaughter will be legislated.
• Companies underpaying workers through labour-hire loopholes will be outlawed.
• They also passed a bill to establish a nature repair market. This will make it easier for farmers and landholders to carry out projects that repair nature – like replanting koala habitats.
• On top of all this was an announcement to dramatically reduce immigration.
• Add to that further funding to healthcare, childcare, and better policies on the environment and the Murry Darling, and you find Labor has done more in 18 months than the conservatives did in almost 10 years.
• “But that’s not all,” as the man selling the steak knives said. The sale of EVs is really picking up. There has been a slow relaxation of export embargoes. Unemployment benefits have risen. $10 billion has been designated for housing.

Labor enjoyed a dream run in their first 12 months, stabilising the government and getting things done competently, in contrast to sloppy Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison governments.

In all this excitement about the Conservatives possibly winning the next election, one thing seems to have escaped the minds of those supporting this idea: When in the hurly burly of an election campaign, the electorate is reminded of the sins of the National and Liberal parties over nine and a bit years, the hairs on the ends of voter’s heads will stand on end. Will they then feel inclined toward a repeat dose of the same medicine?

AUKUS, the trilateral pact between the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia, was a steal for all except one of the partners. Australia, given the illusion of protection even as its aggressive stance (acquiring nuclear-powered submarines, becoming a forward base for the US military) aggravated other countries; the feeling of superiority, even as it was surrendering itself to a foreign power as never before, was the loser in the bargain.

Last month, Australians woke up to the sad reminder that their government’s capitulation to Washington has been so total as to render any further talk about independence an embarrassment. Their Defence Minister, Richard Marles, along with his deputy, the Minister for Defence Industry Pat Conroy, preferred a different story. Canberra had gotten what it wanted: approval by the US Congress through its 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) authorising the transfer of three Virginia class nuclear-powered submarines to the Royal Australian Navy, with one off the production line, and two in-service boats. Australia may also seek congressional approval for two further Virginia class boats.

The measures also authorised Australian contractors to train in US shipyards to aid the development of Australia’s own non-existent nuclear-submarine base, and exemptions from US export control licensing requirements permitting the “transfer of controlled goods and technology between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States without the need for an export license.”

For the simpleminded Marles, Congress had “provided unprecedented support to Australia in passing the National Defense Authorization Act which will see the transfer of submarines and streamlined export control provisions, symbolising the strength of our Alliance, and our shared commitment to the AUKUS partnership.”

Either through ignorance or wilful blindness, the Australian defence minister chose to avoid elaborating on the less impressive aspects of the authorising statute. The exemption under the US export licensing requirements, for instance, vests Washington with control and authority over Australian goods and technology while controlling the sharing of any US equivalent with Australia. The exemption is nothing less than appropriation, even as it preserves the role of Washington as the drip feeder of nuclear technology.

An individual with more than a passing acquaintance with this is Bill Greenwalt, one of the drafters of the US export control regime. As he told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation last November, “After years of US State Department prodding, it appears that Australia signed up to the principles and specifics of the failed US export control system.” In cooperating with the US on this point, Australia would “surrender any sovereign capability it develops to the United States control and bureaucracy.”

The gem in this whole venture, at least from the perspective of the US military industrial complex, is the roping in of the Australian taxpayer as funder of its own nuclear weapons program. Whatever its non-proliferation credentials, Canberra finds itself a funder of the US naval arm in an exercise of modernised nuclear proliferation. Even the Marles-Conroy media release admits that the NDAA helped “establish a mechanism for the US to accept funds from Australia to lift the capacity of the submarine industrial base.” Airily, the release goes on to mention that this “investment” (would “gift” not be a better word?) to the US Navy would also “complement Australia’s significant investment in our domestic submarine industrial base.”

A few days after the farcical spectacle of surrender by Australian officials, the Congressional Research Service provided another one of its invaluable reports that shed further light on Australia’s contribution to the US nuclear submarine program. Australian media outlets, as is their form on covering AUKUS, remained silent about it. One forum, Michael West Media, showed that its contributors – Rex Patrick and Philip Dorling – were wide awake.

The report is specific to the Navy Columbia (SSBN-826) Class Ballistic Missile Submarine Program, one that involves designing and building 12 new SSBNs to replace the current, aging fleet of 14 Ohio-class SSBNs. The cost of the program, in terms of 2024 budget submission estimates for the 2024 financial year, is US$112.7 billion. As is customary in these reports, the risks are neatly summarised. They include the usual delays in designing and building the lead boat, thereby threatening readiness for timely deployment; burgeoning costs; the risks posed by funding the Columbia-class program to other Navy programs; and “potential industrial-base challenges of building both Columbia-class boats and Virginia-class attack submarines (SSNs) at the same time.”

Australian funding becomes important in the last concern. Because of AUKUS, the US Navy “has testified” that it would require, not only an increase in the production rate of the Virginia-class to 2.33 boats per year, but “a combined Columbia-plus-Virginia procurement rate” of 1+2.33. Australian mandarins and lawmakers, accomplished in their ignorance, have mentioned little about this addition. But US lawmakers and military planners are more than aware that this increased procurement rate “will require investing several billion dollars for capital plant expansion and improvements and workforce development at both the two submarine-construction shipyards (GD/EB [General Dynamics’ Electric boat in Groton, Connecticut] and HII/NSS [Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding]) and submarine supplier firms.”

The report acknowledges that funding towards the 1+2.33 goal is being drawn from a number of allocations over a few financial years, but expressly mentions Australian funding “under the AUKUS proposed Pillar 1 pathway,” which entails the transfer component of nuclear-powered submarines to Canberra.

The report helpfully reproduces the October 25, 2023 testimony from the Navy before the Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommittee of the House of Armed Services Committee. Officials are positively salivating at the prospect of nourishing the domestic industrial base through, for instance “joining with an Australian company to mature and scale metallic additive manufacturing across the SIB [Submarine Industrial Base].” The testimony goes on to note that, “Australia’s investment into the US SIB builds upon on-going efforts to improve industrial base capability and capacity, create jobs, and utilize new technologies,” and was a “necessary” contribution to “augment VACL [Virginia Class] production from 2.0 to 2.33 submarines per year to support both US Navy and AUKUS requirements.”

The implications from the perspective of the Australian taxpayer are significant. Patrick and Dorling state one of them: that “Australian AUKUS funding will support construction of a key delivery component of the US nuclear strike force, keeping that program on track while overall submarine production accelerates.”

The funding also aids the advancement of another country’s nuclear weapons capabilities, a breach, one would have thought, of Australia’s obligations under the Treaty of Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Defence spokesman for the Australian Greens, Senator David Shoebridge, makes that very point to Patrick and Dorling. “Australia has clear international legal obligations to not support the nuclear weapons industry, yet this is precisely what these billions of dollars of AUKUS funding will do.”

The senator also asks “When will the Albanese government start telling the whole truth about AUKUS and how Australians will be paying to help build the next class of US ballistic missile submarines?”

For an appropriate answer, Shoebridge would do well to consult the masterful, deathless British series Yes Minister, authored by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn. In one episode, the relevant minister, Jim Hacker, offers this response to a query by the ever-suspicious civil service overlord Sir Humphrey Appleby on when he might receive a draft proposal: “At the appropriate juncture,” Hacker parries. “In the fullness of time. When the moment is ripe. When the necessary procedures have been completed. Nothing precipitate, of course.” In one word: never.

By Denis Bright

Nothing excites the electorate more than the voice of our leaders’ messages of hope over adversarial politics. Prime Minister Albanese has been busy consolidating with art in media releases over the holiday break.

The press conference in Sydney on 3 January 2024 was a sign-on for more duties that are usually beyond the scope of a Prime Minister:

Happy New Year everyone. In 2024 I’m very positive as we enter the new year. And later this morning I will be briefly attending the beginning of David Warner’s last test match at the SCG. And I do hope, if it hasn’t happened already, whoever knows anything about the missing caps – David Warner has represented Australia on more than one hundred occasions. The baggy green caps belong to him. He has earnt them and they should be returned.

The press conference continued to cover vital issues about living standards and skilling the nation. There was a promise of 300,000 fee-free TAFE places during 2024. The MYEFO spirit continued with a promise of more commitment to cost-of-living-relief in the 2024-25 budget scheduled for 9 May.

What a contrast to the political statements from Prime Minister Morrison exactly two years ago. In a live interview from Kirribilli House to Sarah Abo on the Today Show, discussion moved to the leadership skills of then Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese:

Well, he’s always full of complaints after the fact. I’ve found with the Leader of the Opposition. He’s like that person on the Monday morning who always says what the coach should have done and what all the players have done. But you know, I don’t think you want that bloke running the team at any time.

The current press conference marginalized adversarial politics. Responding to a journalist’s questions Prime Minister Albanese offered New Year on several fronts:

What we want is to take pressure off people who are feeling pressure as a result of global inflation. This has had an impact. Australians, of course, were hit by the pandemic and then they were hit by global inflation, which was a result of two global impacts. One was the ongoing supply issues related to the pandemic, and the second of course, was the illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine that had an impact on prices here as they did right around the world. So, we’re very conscious about those cost-of-living pressures. That’s why we have introduced a range of measures, including fee-free TAFE, but in addition to that, our energy price relief plan, our plan that has made an enormous difference in reducing the price of medicines. That’s why we’ve also undertaken increases in rent relief, for example, the largest increase in rent assistance for 30 years, along with other measures that we took assisting single mums, assisting others.

Peter Dutton as Opposition Leader received just one mention from the Prime Minister at the press conference and in response to a journalist’s question:

JOURNALIST: Did you reflect over the break over any changes you would like to see in the way the Government operates in the New Year?

PRIME MINISTER: We continue to engage in a positive way. We’ll continue to put forward our positive plans for the nation. Continue to point out that Peter Dutton has no solutions and nothing positive to offer the nation.

More mention of the Opposition or the Opposition leader merely fosters a return to unproductive pollical polemics. This outcome would be detested in households, comfortably-off and disadvantaged alike. The recovery of Labor’s primary vote would be inhibited.

Having outperformed on budget estimates from May 2023 as recorded in MYEFO 2023, the Labor Government can perhaps consider more generous cost-of-living relief measures. Some review of the rate of delivery of Stage 3 tax concession might even be possible. Fully implemented on the Morrison Government’s formula would cost around $69 billion over the forward estimates period (to 2026-27), and around $313 billion over the medium-term projection period (to 2033-34) according to ATO estimates. Adjustments for bracket creep can still be accommodated at the lower end of the taxable income stage where households deserve a 30 per cent income tax rate.

Most voters would surely welcome a review of the background to Australia’s commitment to the Iraq War in 2003 which brought thousands of Australia’s out onto the streets in protest in 2003. Prime Minister Albanese cautiously did not pre-empt the results of the inquiry chaired by Dennis Richardson:

I do want to make some comments about the release of documents that takes place every twenty years. The process there is that documents are provided to the National Archives of Australia three years in advance. So, the documents for what occurred in 2003 were provided in 2020 by the then Morrison Government to the National Archives of Australia. It’s clear that there were some Cabinet records missing from that transfer from the Government. Some 78 Cabinet records were not transferred to the National Archives. The public service has now, within days of being notified of that, provided the remaining documents to the Archives, and the head of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has commenced an independent review that will be conducted by Dennis Richardson, as to how this failure in 2020 to provide all the appropriate documentation occurred. Let me make it very clear of what my government’s position is. Australians have a right to know the basis upon which Australia went to war in Iraq. Australians lost their lives during that conflict and we know that some of the stated reason for going to war was not correct in terms of the weapons of mass destruction that was alleged Iraq had at that time. Australians do have a right to know what the decision-making process was, and my Government believes that this mistake must be corrected, that the National Archives of Australia should release all the documentation that has been provided to them, having account for any national security issues, of course, upon the advice of the national security agencies.

Unless more investigative journalism is hastened on the background to the LNP’s AUKUS defence deal in 2021, readers will need to wait until the early 2040s before details just maybe available of the background to the nuclear-powered submarine acquisitions.

The AUKUS deal was announced in an imperious style on 16 September 2021 with the imprimatur of Scott Morrison, Boris Johnson and Joe Biden. The statement offered strategic aspirations without details of forthcoming contracts an advanced warning about future costs. Later Australian government officially estimates the cost of the program to be between $268 billion and $368 billion over the next 30 years. These far-ranging estimates include:

• Acquisition of submarines: Purchasing at least eight nuclear-powered submarines, either directly from the US or built in Australia with US and UK assistance.
• Infrastructure and facilities: Upgrading existing facilities and building new ones to support the operation and maintenance of the submarines.
• Operational costs: Fuel, crew training, and ongoing maintenance throughout the lifespan of the submarines.

The press conference on 3 January 2024 provides just a peek into the need for more openness in government processes. The media team handled this press conference with outstanding professionalism. The complex issues were communicated in stages after that less than nerdy reference to David Warner’s stolen cricket cap. Perhaps the chase is a negative metaphor against unnecessary secrecy in government.

Can this openness ease the current fragmentation shown by recent national opinion polling? Currently, support for the Greens is completely offset by preferences from far-right parties back to the LNP?

Perhaps the solutions require much more than offering a higher standard of new clips to promote a more thorough understanding of the processes of government so that populist whims and soft media discussions do not determine outcomes relating to living standards and Australia’s stamp in geopolitics.

The killing of an Australian-Lebanese national Ibrahim Bazzi, his Lebanese wife Shorouq Hammoud, and his brother Ali Bazzi by the Israeli Defence Forces in a missile strike in southern Lebanon, has been an object exercise in selective outrage, selective ethical concern, and, generally speaking, selective morality.

The strike took place on a home in the neighbourhood of Al-Dawra in the town of Bint Jbeil, said to belong to the Bazzi family. On paper, the case demands investigation, explanation, even reparation. But the Australian government has pounced on an opportunity to ignore the killing of Ibrahim and his wife – both civilians and intending to head back to Sydney – and focus on the background of Ali Bazzi instead.

In his December 28, 2023 press conference, the Australian Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus noted “the announcement made by Hizballah claiming links to one of the Australians killed. We are seeking to establish facts.” The context to essentially excuse the killings is then sketched: “Hizballah is a listed terrorist organisation under Australian law”; there was “daily military activity in southern Lebanon, including rocket and missile fire, as well as airstrikes”; Australians in Lebanon should leave “while commercial options remain available.”

On Ali’s connections, Dreyfus could make much of a terrorist link that, were it to be confirmed, would make the killings, more generally, less egregious. “It’s an offence [for] any Australian to cooperate with, to support, let alone to fight with, a listed terrorist organisation like Hizballah.” But – and here Dreyfus was not drawn – it is not an offence for Australians to serve in the armed forces of a foreign country under Part 5.5 of the Criminal Code Act 1995 (Cth).

Naturally, this would depend on the country in question, and the amoral calculus used when deciding that nonsense called the “national interest”. Australians serving with the IDF is entirely permissible, despite that army’s obliteration of Palestinian civilians in a most cavalier interpretation of international law; Australians serving with their opposite numbers are criminals, buccaneering agents who deserve what they get.

Reserves Captain Lior Sivan, an Australian who served as an IDF tank commander, was killed on December 19 in a Hamas ambush. When news was made public of this fact, his love of Israel and personal attributes splashed the media outlets. Here was a noble human beaming with noble courage, to be garlanded and celebrated. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) sent its “condolences to his family during this difficult time and stand ready to provide consular assistance.”

When news came of the slain trio in Bint Jbeil, two civilians were forgotten in favour of the supposedly blighting attributes of the alleged Hezbollah fighter. “Of course,” stated Dreyfus, “there are examples in the past of Australians having had links with Hizballah. One of the reasons why the Australian Government has listed Hizballah, in both its arms, as a terrorist organisation, is because of the potential links to Australia and Australians.”

And what of the destruction of civilian life in this conflict, with thousands of instances of it in Gaza, and a rising toll in Lebanon? The Australian government, Dreyfus insisted, had “consistently called for civilian lives to be protected and we have consistently raised our concerns about the risk of this conflict spreading.”

Peter Cronau, a veteran ABC producer and investigative journalist, makes the point about the relevant processes that need to take place: an investigation followed by the laying of charges; the collection of forensic evidence by the Australian Federal Police and Australian Defence personnel from the Australian embassy in Lebanon; the gathering of evidence “regarding who issued the orders, selected the targeting, and who fired the weapon, using all the intelligence and resources available to Australian officers working at Pine Gap base.”

The role of Pine Gap, a primarily US-run satellite surveillance base located to the southwest of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, is potentially critical, given its role in furnishing geolocation data to Washington and, in some cases, its allies regarding distant military operations. Targeting data for drone strikes, for instance, has been something of a favourite.

Cronau’s suggestions are credible, and invoking links with Hezbollah by Dreyfus are expedient forms of dismissal. Similar steps of investigation and inquiry were, after all, taken in attempting to identify who and what was used in the shooting down of the Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 over Ukraine in July 2014. The downing of the flight resulted in the loss of 298 lives, including 38 Australians. Much ink and time was expended on identifying the allegedly relevant military personnel involved, the supply chain of the Buk-TELAR missile system, not to mention the repeated insistence on the part of the Australian government that action be taken against the Russian separatists and the Kremlin for their misdeeds.

Canberra proceeded to impose targeted financial sanctions and travel bans on four of the personnel. “These sanctions,” Foreign Minister Penny Wong stated in a media release, “demonstrate the Australian Government’s ongoing commitment to hold to account those responsible for the downing of Flight MH17.”

For all this, Australian nationality is a soupy, thin concept. Its protections are limited, unreliable and arbitrary. When brandished with a certain political preference and bias, it is cherished, a convertible currency in the international stock exchange of diplomacy. We think of the Iranian-detained Australian-British national Kylie Moore-Gilbert who was, for reasons never fully explained, exchanged for a number of Iranian operatives jailed in Thailand over a miscellany of bungled assassination attempts against Israeli officials and targets. Rarely has an Australian Prime Minister, a Foreign Affairs minister, or DFAT, been so busy over the fate of one of their citizens.

We contrast such extravagant efforts with the treatment offered individuals as David Hicks or Mamdouh Habib, seen by the Australian political class as Islamic refuse (converted or born), and therefore deserving of torture and punishment by other powers. To that can be added death by missile strike, as well.

By Denis Bright

The projections in The Mid-Year Economic and Financial Outlook (MYEFO 2023) offered a peek into our national financial future for the New Year and beyond.

MYEFO 2023 was released by our financial leaders with strident and confident expectations on 13 December 2023.

These future concerns were offset by the improvements in most indicators since delivery of the Australian budget on 9 May 2023.

The good news enabled our financial leaders to clasp their MYEFO 2023 papers more tightly.

The MYEFO papers were a collective badge of honour for the Albanese Government with the prospect of two consecutive budget surpluses and some evidence that the slow-down in the global economy might result in a softer landing than expected some months ago.

Percentage Australian Domestic Economic Projections

Walter Frick of the Harvard Business Review (27 December 2023) offered a more positive interpretation of short-term prospects for the global economy. Financial journalists at Reuters (22 December 2023) were also upbeat as the New Year approached. Investors had transferred funds from hedge-funds to other S&P financial options. Nearer to home, China’s economy is likely to grow at close to 5.5 per cent in 2024 according to Forbes Asia (23 November 2023). All these developments make the OECD projections for 2024-25 a trifle dated.

The growth and diversification of the Chinese economy helped to carry Australia and even the US through the GFC more than a decade ago.

These vibes are returning in 2024-25. The Biden Administration seems to be moving towards Win-Win trading and investment links with China again after cooling potential disputes over the Taiwan Strait and those uninhabitable rock outcrops known as the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands in the Sea of Japan (East Sea).

Australian investment ties under the federal LNP were increasingly with the financial capitals of the older developed world in the US and Britain. Interested readers may wish to check out the innovative presentation of this data by ABS as released on 3 May 2023.

Despite short-term budgetary improvements, Australian public sector finances still present real challenges.

MYEFO 2023 was cautious about unsustainable trends in our public finances. Our financial leaders have spotted these emergent problems.

Loose fiscal policies would worsen the situation in the event of an economic slowdown in the mid-2020s.

Commentators are now expecting a lighter correction in the global economy than our financial leaders anticipated several months ago.

MYEFO 2023 still justified that optimum balance between government spending, public capital works and essential private sector investment that the budget set in place on 9 May 2023. The caution paves the way for new options in the budget ahead in 2024.

LNP overstates Labor’s commitment to public sector spending. Government spending as a share of the national economy peaked at 31.3 per cent of GDP in 2020-21. It is now 25.7 per cent of GDP in MYEFO estimates for 2023-24.

Trendlines in Major Australian Government Spending Priorities

For a Labor government that is striving for an extended term in office, the investment multiplier offered by private sector investment is the crucial variable in our economic and community development. Chart 2.8 from MYEFO 2023 showed just why this is a transitional time for the Australian economy in the post-mineral boom era. New patterns of investment are required for changing times.

Strategic considerations on the expansion of our investment ties with China is an inherited liability from the Morrison Government. Such assessments were quite alarmist. Our US strategic allies are quite adept at playing games of economic diplomacy with compliant countries like Australia. Economic diplomacy usually trumps strategic policies as national elections approach in Taiwan on 13 January 2024 and the Primaries commencing at home in the US. Very few voters perceive that peaceful days should be marred by strategic scares and preparations for new conflicts.

Each US administration welcomes purchases of US Treasury Bonds by the Chinese Government. The American Enterprise Institute and Heritage Foundation has highlighted the global distribution of Chinese investment to mid-2023 without any negative comments.

US commercial symbols are a regular feature of Chinese streetscapes as noted by Business Insider:

There has been at least one bright spot for Beijing when it comes to foreign investment: American fast-food chains have decided a market of 1.4 billion people is simply too delicious to pass up.

KFC China’s parent company opened its 10,000th restaurant in China this month and aims to have stores within reach of half of China’s population by 2026. McDonald’s is planning to open 3,500 new stores in China over the next four years. And Starbucks invested $220 million in a manufacturing and distribution facility in eastern China, its biggest project outside the U.S.

Media monitoring by Google Bard claims that Chinese financial institutions have invested between $A$1.3-$1.5 trillion in US Treasury Bonds to October 2023. This is the world’s second largest foreign equity in US treasury Bonds after Japan.

Public education campaigns by key federal financial departments and the varied Labor-oriented think-tanks might deliver a broader range of investment options for future discussion in Australia.

US economic diplomacy is less timid. The resources of the US Trade Representative in Washington routinely monitor all free trade agreements with countries like Australia for lapses in commitment to neoliberal values which have been embedded into these global trade and investment agreements.

Australia can do better in advancing our own economic diplomacy. This is one area in which Australian Governments could tune into US policies. Australia is a major global economy with a GDP that is half the size of its British counterpart. Our per capita income here is 40 percent higher than in Britain.

Let the lyrics from the Inner Circle foster real change agendas to confront old colonial cringes as proposed by the Inner Circle Band from Jamaica.