Keywords: Public Services
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INTERNATIONAL
- Andrew Hamilton
- 18 July 2024
In the wake of recent elections in Britain and France, global democracies are seeing voters reject established parties amidst a deepening cycle of disillusionment. But can a return to honesty and integrity in politics break this downward spiral?
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AUSTRALIA
- David Halliday
- 28 June 2024
It's been eight months since the Voice referendum, and people are starting to grapple with what its defeat means for Australia. There are few voices in Australia as qualified to conduct a postmortem of the outcome of the Voice referendum campaign as Frank Brennan. We examine what lessons can be learned and crucually, whether there’s reason for hope for Indigenous constitutional recognition.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 27 June 2024
In addressing family violence, the immediate emphasis must be to protect women and children. But if the only response is harsher penalties in addressing any social problem, it is bound to be ineffective. Regulation depends also on understanding why people are drawn to behave badly and how the culture that supports it can be changed.
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AUSTRALIA
- Tim Costello
- 26 June 2024
Gambling is now so entrenched in the AFL and NFL it is changing the way people, especially young people, follow sport. With former AFL chief Gillon McLachlan set to become CEO at Tabcorp, we should consider the profound impact of gambling on Australian society.
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AUSTRALIA
The response to the Cass Review by gender medicine specialists and medical authorities in Australia has been deafening silence. Regardless of your position on gender-affirming care, it is unconscionable to stand in the way of a review that would allow for systemic problems to be addressed.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 13 June 2024
The wonder of Khin Myint's Fragile Creature: A Memoir lies in his calm and magnanimous reflection on his experiences and in his attempt to understand those who treated him poorly. It also provides a lens for reflecting on the dynamic at work in public debates that touch identity.
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ARTS AND CULTURE
- Andrew Hamilton
- 07 June 2024
Raimond Gaita insists that there is something precious in each human being. He does not rest this conviction on a particular religious or philosophical grounding. It flows, rather, from a rich reading of human possibilities and questioning of the meaning of life.
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AUSTRALIA
In a signature essay published last year in The Monthly, Treasurer Chalmers staked out an ideological terrain he described as ‘values-based capitalism.’ The Budget 2024 is quite the big reveal on what those values include and who they exclude. In it, the people who have borne the brunt of inequality and precarity are neither seen nor heard.
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AUSTRALIA
- Andrew Hamilton
- 30 May 2024
This Reconciliation Week and Sorry Day, we consider the defeat of the Referendum and the substantial failure to close the gap between the living conditions of Indigenous Australians and other Australians. It means that for many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, this week will be less about days of celebration than of grief and of grim resolve to continue to seek justice.
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AUSTRALIA
- John Falzon
- 14 December 2023
4 Comments
No doubt there were some who genuinely believed that privatising employment services would result in better services at a lower cost to the public purse. But the engineers of the socially destructive projects of the neoliberal era knew very well that they were more likely to result in the enrichment of some to the detriment of many.
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AUSTRALIA
- John Warhurst
- 01 June 2023
25 Comments
Amidst escalating tensions, the ACT government's move to acquire Calvary Public Hospital is facing strong backlash from the church. With claims of hasty decision-making and allegations of anti-religion bias dominating the discourse, this crisis highlights the societal shift towards secularism and questions the role of religious entities in managing public services.
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AUSTRALIA
- Julie Edwards
- 18 January 2022
2 Comments
The images are simultaneously striking and terrifying. A raging grassfire that is shooting flames into the sky and destroying nature around it and lapping perilously close to the fences around Central NSW’s Lithgow Correctional Centre. As local residents were evacuated and highways were closed to protect public safety when the fire raged out of control just before Christmas in 2019, 400 prisoners remained detained.
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