Tony Abbott

Current Issue Taxes, death and superannuation

It’s only super till you die

By Judith Brett

Taxing has never been easy. It has, however, become harder in Western countries. The “victory” of neo-liberalism, as declared by Rupert Murdoch in his speech to the Institute of Public Affairs last month, has left us with the expectation, if not the reality, of smaller government. Although many of us still share the view of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jnr that taxation is the price we

Current Issue The Saboteur

Kevin Rudd’s unrelenting campaign to regain power

By Erik Jensen

Kevin Rudd began his second campaign for the leadership of the Labor Party by not standing. Just after 10 pm on 23 June 2010, on the so-called night of the long knives, he emerged from crisis meetings to announce that his deputy, Julia Gillard, had challenged him to a ballot. In his last hours as prime minister, Rudd learnt her numbers would crush him. Key unions had withdrawn their support.

May 2013

May 2013 Editor’s Note

By John van Tiggelen

On 14 January, Julia Gillard leapfrogged Kevin Rudd to become Australia’s 16th longest–serving prime minister. On 16 March, she slipped past Australia’s first prime minister, Sir Edmund Barton, into 15th place. At the start of next month, on 1 June, she’ll overtake Gough Whitlam. It’s likely that no one but an uber-competitive uber-nerd will take any notice – no one, that is, but Kevin Rudd. To catch

April 2013

No Bid Election

By Mungo MacCallum

There is not much to look forward to in the next election, still a full 20 weeks away – how will we survive? But there will be one unique feature about it which may provide some relief. Instead of bidding for our votes with improbable and unrealisable promises of largesse, both major parties will be vying for the position of most responsible ec

Adventures in Katterland

The Heart and Mind of Bob Katter

By Louis Nowra

One steamy Saturday morning in mid March, Bob Katter, dressed in jeans, a pale shirt and his trademark cream-coloured Akubra Arena, was pacing up and down outside a home in Emerald Creek, 15 minutes’ drive from the town of Mareeba, in Far North Queenslan

Lest we forget

Abbott steps up on reconciliation

By Robert Manne

On 13 February a short speech of perhaps genuine historical significance was delivered in federal parliament. Apart from Eureka Street’s Father Frank Brennan, no one seemed to notice. The occasion was the second reading of the Aboriginal and Torres Strai

March 2013

Resilient Gillard

By Mungo MacCallum

Let me start this piece on a personal note. The day after the tragic farce of the leadership spill, Julia Gillard paid a long-scheduled visit to my home electorate of Richmond in northern New South Wales, so I tagged along. Richmond is held by Justine Elliott, a Rudd

The Making of Tony Abbott

Political Animal

By David Marr

The 1977 race for the presidency of the SRC was the first political contest that really mattered to Abbott. He was the great hope of the right. The campaign that winter term was bitter and he lost, heavily, to Barbara Ramjan. Though she was of the left, her wo

The Rise of the New Right

By Mark Latham

Two thousand and twelve was a bumper year for the breaking of political conventions in Australia. For the first time, a national political leader was investigated and pursued for her professional conduct before winning elected office. Led by the Australian newspaper, a

March 2013

Mining The Dead Heart

By Rhys Muldoon

What will this election be fought on? One common answer, naturally, is: "the economy, stupid". With a slight reshuffle of that answer comes the question: "is the economy stupid"? No. It's smart, ruthless and pumping. Have we missed all that it had to offer? Un

March 2013

The Western Front

By Mungo MacCallum

When you’re hot you’re hot, and when you’re not, well, you’re Julia Gillard. The premature announcement of the Prime Minister’s expedition into Sydney’s western suburbs was obviously a mistake; it gave the media far too much time to pontificate on

Australia’s policy drought

A taxing year

By Judith Brett

There are many things to dread about the forthcoming election year: set-piece speeches from both sides, full of motherhood aspirations and gangland rhetoric; the ABC’s Tony Jones hectoring ministers and shadow ministers alike; the slow playing out of sleaze in the aff

February 2013

King of the North

By Mungo MacCallum

There’s one thing about Tony Abbott’s Liberals: you can always rely on them to provide a healthy dose of nostalgia.When I joined the Australian back in the early days of 1965, one of the first stories I did was about a committee of Sydney businessmen formed to develop the north. This was before Australia sent troops to the Vietnam war, but even then ther

Joe Hockey for PM?

Too darn hot

By Mungo MacCallum

If it does nothing else, the election year of 2013 will vindicate some political careers and end quite a few others. Among them, of course, will be those of the party leaders: we will learn whether Julia Gillard can recover from an apparently terminal decline in the opinion polls and whether Tony Abbott can translate his initial blitzkrieg into a win where it counts. But first, both have to surviv

February 2013

A Break in the Storm

By Michaela McGuire

Early this week, as Queensland residents were faced with the city’s second major flood in as many years in the wake of ex-tropical cyclone Oswald, Federal Liberal MP Andrew Laming embarrassed himself on Twitter again. On Monday afternoon he tweeted

January 2013

Tony in the Telegraph

By Michaela McGuire

Last week, while a catastrophic fire warning was in place for southern NSW, Tony Abbott announced on Twitter that he was going on standby with a volunteer fire brigade. Federal Labor MP Brendan O’Connor was quick to retweet the opposition leader’s stat

November 2012

Political Animal: The Making of Tony Abbott

By Judith Brett

Correspondence to David Marr’s Quarterly Essay Political AnimalIn Political Animal, David Marr gives us two Abbotts: Politics Abbott and Values Abbott. The first is the man of driving ambition who competes hard for the prizes of political office; the second the man wh

November 2012

Let them pull their weight

By Nick Feik

I’ve always found Tony Abbott’s stance on asylum seekers loathsome. He refers to refugees as ‘illegal’ despite knowing it’s entirely legal to seek asylum. He recently announced the Coalition would reduce Australia’s refugee intake, seemingly just to show he is tough. And TPVs are now back on the Coalition agenda. So it was confronting to hear Abbott proposing a ‘work-for-the-dole’