Australian Polity, Volume 9 Number 3 - Digital Version

AUSTRALIA’S HOT TOPICS IN NEWS, CURRENT AFFAIRS AND CULTURE.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

HUMAN DIGNITY: THE

FOUNDATION OF FREEDOM

READ MORE ON

I AM WOMAN: IDENTITY POLITICS

AND RADICAL GENDER THEORY

A WORLD THAT FAVOURS

FREEDOM

THE RETURN OF STRATEGIC

COMPETITION

Volume 9 Number 3

“In every state, not wholly barbarous, a philosophy, good

or bad, there must be. However slightingly it may be the

fashion to talk of speculation and theory, as opposed

(sillily and nonsensically opposed) to practice, it would not

be difficult to prove, that such as is the existing spirit of

speculation, during any given period, such will be the spirit

and tone of the religion, legislation, and morals, nay, even

of the fine arts, the manners, and the fashions.”

- Coleridge, Essays on His Own Times.

As Coleridge observed, every age is the subject of a

prevailing philosophy. There are many elements to this

public culture: the content of everyday conversation,

the discourse of the daily media, the sermons from

pulpits and other places, the subject matter of political

debate, and the lessons of teachers and scholars, to

name just a few.

The prevailing philosophy is not static. Like a stream,

it flows in a series of eddies, washing this way and

that. It runs up against objects that can divert it in

differing directions. It can be shaped, over time, in one

direction or another. And it is subject to competing

claims and interpretations.

At its heart is the wellbeing of society. It defines how we

live together: What is permitted and what is forbidden;

what is right and what is wrong; what is lawful and what

is unlawful; what is supported and what is rejected.

Ideas are important. They shape the public culture.

They inform political discussions. They shape the role

of government. They define the relationships between

individuals, families, and the institutions of civil society.

They underpin policies and programs. In short, they

inform us about how we should live together.

There are certain ideas that we believe are important:

• That the dignity of the individual is the foundation

of all other relationships;

• That the political and economic freedom of the

individual is central to societal wellbeing, and that

personal responsibility underpins such freedom;

• That the convental relationships of love, loyalty,

friendship and trust exist outside the political

sphere but are essential to the health of society;

• That social order and shared values underpin a

healthy society;

• That government should be limited, without

forgetting that the protection of the poor and

the weak are pivotal political challenges;

• That functional families are crucial for the raising

of children and the stability of society;

• That society is a partnership across generations;

• That we belong to a nation, not a series of

segregated groups; and

• That our western, liberal democracy best enhances

individual freedom and human dignity and is worth

defending.

Our purpose therefore is to examine the principles

that underpin policy and to discuss proposals and

programme directions.

2 Australian Polity

CONTENTS

Australian Polity - Volume 9, Number 3

4

6

10

12

14

18

27

41

45

EDITORIAL

The Geopolitical Challenges / Men and Women

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The Long Twilight Struggle

Strengthening Sanctions

COVID

The People v the Privileged

CULTURE

More Cancel Culture

MEDIA

Calling the Trolls to Account

Making the ABC Accountable

FEATURES - VALUES AND CULTURE

Human Dignity – The Foundation of Freedom – Scott Morrison

I am Woman – Claire Chandler

FEATURES – AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE & SECURITY

A World Order that Favours Freedom – Scott Morrison

The Return of Strategic Competition – Josh Frydenberg

The Australian-American Alliance – Peter Dutton

CHINA

Gold Medal Totalitarians

The Uyghur Tribunal and Human Rights

POLITICS

The Great Challenge – Kevin Andrews

ISSN 1835-8608

Published by the Hon Kevin Andrews MP, Level 1, 651 Doncaster Road, Doncaster 3108

Printed by MMP, 10 Charnfield Ct, Thomastown 3074

Address for correspondence: Australian Polity, PO Box 124, Doncaster 3019

www.kevinandrews.com.au/australianpolity

The views and opinions expressed herein by contributors do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher.

Australian Polity 3

EDITORIAL

THE GEOPOLITICAL

CHALLENGES

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

When the history of the 21st century is written,

the past few years are likely to be noted as a

turning point in geopolitics. While it is always

difficult to accurately nominate how past events will

influence future developments, three occurrences are

significant. In chronological order, they are the election

of Xi Jinping as leader of the Chinese Communist Party,

the escape of the Wuhan virus, and the US withdrawal

from Afghanistan. The chronological order may well

reflect the ultimate significance of the events.

Much appropriate attention has been given to the

US withdrawal. The widespread dismay about the

botched manner of the withdrawal is a separate issue

to the desirability or otherwise of the maintenance of

an ongoing allied presence in Afghanistan. While the

restoration of the Taliban is likely to increase tensions

in the region, and will have wider implications, Xi’s

ascendency remains the most critical issue of our time.

This is not to underestimate the continuing impact of

Covid-19, but perhaps its greatest consequence has

been the revelation of the true nature of the Chinese

Communist regime. In a relatively short period of time,

Xi has managed to unite most of the free world, and

others, against his regime. While China faces significant

internal problems, including to its economy, Xi’s internal

repression, external aggression and bellicose nationalism

are unlikely to abate, especially in the lead up to the next

CCP Congress in 2022 when he is expected to be elected

for another five-year term.

Our response to China is critical for our future. This

edition includes a series of articles that touch on the

issue, including contributions by Australia’s leaders to

the strategic and economic challenges the nation faces.

Men and women

I was a reasonable schoolboy sprinter and hurdler. I won

regional and state championships and trained with the

legendary coach, Franz Stampfl. In the language of track

and field, I could run ‘even time’ at my best, meaning 11

4 Australian Polity

seconds for 100 metres on the grass and cinders tracks

of the era. There was nothing particularly special about

this. As a 17-year-old, the Australian Jack Hale ran 10.42

seconds for the 100 metres. Around the world, there

would have been hundreds, if not more, junior athletes

who could run the 100 metres in 11 seconds.

At the time I was competing, Denise Boyd claimed the

Australian women’s 100 metres record of 11.00 seconds.

Her handheld (stopwatch) timed run remains the fastest

by an Australian woman almost 50 years later. Melissa

Breen has the fastest electronically timed 100 metres

of 11.11 seconds. By contrast, the Australian men’s 100

metres record is Paul Narracott’s 9.9 seconds (handheld)

and Patrick Johnson’s 9.93 seconds (electronically timed).

“Xi’s ascendency remains

the most critical issue

of our time . . . Our

response to China is

critical to our future.”

I was reminded of this when reading Claire Chandler’s

article about transgenderism is this edition of Polity. How

fair is it to women who have trained for years that any

one of thousands of male athletes could claim female

status and win Olympic medals? As Claire indicates, this

is just one of many serious concerns with the current

developments. I commend her article to you.

Kevin Andrews.

Australian Polity 5

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

THE LONG TWILIGHT

STRUGGLE

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

6 Australian Polity

Sixty years ago, a new Democratic President of the

United States stood on the steps of the Congress

and proclaimed boldly: “Let every nation know,

whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any

price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any

friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the

success of liberty.”

South Vietnamese government in 1975, ensuring victory

by the north and the mass exodus of refugees. In his

memoir, Robert Gates who was Secretary of Defense

under both George W Bush and Barack Obama, wrote

that Biden “has been wrong on nearly every major foreign

policy and national security issue over the past four

decades.”

John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who was to be tested with the

Cuban crisis three years later, returned to the theme

elsewhere in his Inaugural Address: “Now the trumpet

summons us again - not as a call to bear arms, though

arms we need - not as a call to battle, though embattled

we are - but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight

struggle, year in and year out, ‘rejoicing in hope, patient

in tribulation’ - a struggle against the common enemies

of man: tyranny, poverty, disease and war itself.”

The idea that the United States would engage in a “long

twilight struggle” and “pay any price, bear any burden,

meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe

to assure the survival and the success of liberty,” has

been rightly questioned in the light of the Afghanistan

withdrawal.

Just as Obama and Biden withdrew from Iraq in 2011,

leading to civil war and ISIS, Biden’s decision about

Afghanistan will have significant consequences for the

region.

A narrative - common to both critics of Biden and

Chinese propaganda - that the US Administration would

not stand up to aggressors such as China towards its

neighbours was displaced by news of the revitalisation

of the Quad and the new AUKUS agreement. Although

the latter announcement focussed on submarines, the

accompanying news that Australia would acquire a range

of new potent missiles for the navy and airforce is of

more immediate benefit to our defences. Interestingly,

Chinese propaganda pivoted from the US being weak

and untrustworthy to it being an aggressor intent on war!

Much of the commentary focussed on the botched

withdrawal which resulted in the death of 13 US defence

personnel. Interestingly, a news report claims that in

their forthcoming book, Peril, Bob Woodward and Robert

Costa, write that both Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin,

and Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, objected to

Biden’s rapid withdrawal, but were overruled by the

President.

Several charges have been made against Mr Biden. One

is that he lacks the ‘strategic patience’ required of the

United States. It would have been best to maintain a

garrison of a few thousand soldiers indefinitely, just as

the US has done elsewhere. His military commanders

have since testified that this was their recommendation

to the President. The US has more than 700 military

establishments around the world, the largest presence

being in Japan, Germany and South Korea.

Others point to a more worrying concern, namely, that

Biden has a track record of foreign policy blunders going

all the way back to his opposition to giving aid to the

The significance of the AUKUS decision is that Australia

has stepped up to our responsibility for regional security.

The submarine decision is welcome. We can only hope

it is neither too late nor subverted by vested interests.

If Australia’s sovereignty and security is seriously

threatened in the future, a great deal of the blame can

be directed at parochial provincial politics that distorted

Australia’s national interest for more than a decade.

The government should seriously consider leasing Los

Angeles or Virginia class submarines from the US, the

secondment of Australian submariners and technicians

to the US fleet for immediate training and a hybrid build

to reduce the time frame and costs to deliver the new

vessels as soon as possible.

President Biden will never have the eloquence of JFK but

it is what his Administration does that ultimately counts.

In his speech to the UN General Assembly, the President

said the US would focus on ‘relentless diplomacy. “All

the major powers of the world have a duty, in my view,

to carefully manage their relationships so they do not

Australian Polity 7

tip from responsible competition to conflict.” He went

on to say “The authoritarians of the world, they seek

to proclaim the end of the age of democracy, but they

are wrong.” These are nice sentiments, but do they

engender confidence in a resolute preparedness to

defend democracy? Significantly, the Secretary of

State, Antony Blinken, made a short intervention at the

meeting on ASEAN Foreign Ministers on September 23 to

announce that the US will release a “new, comprehensive

Indo-Pacific Strategy” in fall which “builds on our shared

vision for a free, open, interconnected, resilient, and

secure region.” He stressed that “ASEAN is central to the

architecture of the Indo-Pacific region and its critical to

our own stability, economic opportunity, and vision for

a rules-based international order.”

Australia must play a significant role in partnership with

other nations in ensuring the US will continue to “bear

the burden of the long twilight struggle.”

Strengthening Sanctions

The Australian Government agreed in August to introduce

a new thematic sanctions regime targeting serious human

rights violations and abuses, and serious corruption. This

regime will be part of broader reforms to the existing

autonomous sanctions framework.

The decision arose from a unanimous report of the

Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs,

Defence and Trade, Criminality, corruption and impunity:

Should Australia join the Global Magnitsky movement?

It is a significant strengthening of the nation’s human

rights framework in line with legislation introduced in

several other jurisdictions, including the US, Canada,

the UK and Europe.

There has been a growing awareness that country- or

sector-wide sanctions, such as Australia currently has

enacted, often impact innocent parties disproportionately,

and a new way to instigate consequences for

unacceptable behaviour is required. Kleptocrats and

other perpetrators of serious human rights abuse and

corruption have transferred assets to enjoy in Western

countries with safe, stable democracies and secure

financial systems, such as Australia.

While it would be preferable for the perpetrators of

human rights abuse and corruption to face penalties in

their home countries, and reparations made to victims,

this is often not what happens.

Australians, and their families, have been threatened,

and human rights abusers have invested the proceeds

of their crimes in Australia, gaining access to Australian

education and healthcare systems. Elsewhere, targeted

sanctions legislation has allowed governments to tackle

this issue. Travel bans and seizing assets has prevented

perpetrators from enjoying, with impunity, the proceeds

of their crimes, and most likely deterred other would-be

perpetrators from attempting to do the same.

Although the Australian Government has chosen to

expand the existing sanctions framework rather than

introduce a separate Magnitsky-type law, the substance

of the Committee’s report has been accepted.

The legislation will give Australia the option to impose

travel bans and freeze assets. Working in concert with

other countries, we will close the gap of opportunity for

perpetrators, and ensure there are consequences in

cases where they were otherwise lacking.

Notably, the Government response included “malicious

cyber activity” in the range of situations which could give

rise to sanctions. This was a not a matter canvassed with

the Committee but is a welcome addition to the scope

of the new regime.

The Government response differed from the Committee’s

proposals about an independent body to consider

possible sanctions and advise the Government. It also

rejected the proposal for a ‘watch list’ of people being

considered for sanctioning, noting that this might allow

people to avoid the regime.

The Government has indicated that the new thematic

criteria for the consideration of sanctions will be focussed

on three particular rights relating to physical integrity:

the right to life; the right to be free from slavery, not to

be held in servitude or be required to perform forced

or compulsory labor; and the right not to be subjected

to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or

punishment. In addition, the regime will also focus on

serious corruption.

8 Australian Polity

“Let every nation know, whether it

wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay

any price, bear any burden, meet any

hardship, support any friend, oppose any

foe to assure the survival and the success

of liberty.” – John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

“Although Australia does not recognise a hierarchy of

human rights, violations and abuses of these particular

rights can have a devastating and often irreversible

impact on the physical and mental integrity of a person,

as well as on wider society,” stated the Government

response. “Focussing on these three rights enables

clear criteria to be set for the application of the regime”

The implementation of the report’s recommendations will

send a strong, clear signal to perpetrators of human rights

abuse and corruption about the values of Australians

and play a significant role in reducing the incentives for

engaging in human rights abuse and corruption.

“The implementation of the report’s

recommendations will send a strong,

clear signal to perpetrators of human

rights abuse and corruption about

the values of Australians and play

a significant role in reducing the

incentives for engaging in human

rights abuse and corruption.”

The bipartisan report of the Committee and the strong

response of the Government is indicative of the mood

amongst legislators to crack down on the activities of

individuals in totalitarian regimes who violate international

human rights norms. It also recognises that the same

individuals often seek to profit from their activities by

serious corruption that utilises the financial and other

systems of democratic nations.

The Government has indicated that it expects to introduce

the legislation this year. Given the bipartisan support

for the proposals, it can be expected to be passed

expeditiously by the Parliament.

This article was originally published in NewsWeekly, September

18, 2021.

Australian Polity 9

COVID

THE PEOPLE

V

THE PRIVILEGED

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

The long line of red lights stretching into the

darkness ahead of me is a familiar sight. I am

on the Hume Highway driving to Canberra once

again to avoid the prospect of 14 days in quarantine

should the Victorian Premier continue to lock down the

State. The drive is hardly lonely; there is a road-train,

lit up in bright red and white lights, every few hundred

metres, maintaining the essential supplies to our cities

and exports overseas despite the Covid restrictions.

After a negative Covid test, I am able to work from my

Parliament House office, dealing with constituents’ issues

and continuing my committee business. I am one of the

fortunate ones who can work from home or remotely.

Many people cannot, but their plight seems lost in the

continuing total lockdown fetish of state premiers.

After months of refusing to say so, the Victorian Premier

finally admitted that he has been pursuing a zero-risk

approach. We must ‘stamp out this Delta variant,’ he

said in announcing yet another extension of the state’s

lockdown.

Globally, governments have pursued one of two

strategies: a zero-risk approach or a managed-risk

approach. Along with New Zealand and South Korea –

at least until recently – and China – we have attempted

eradication rather than management. Other countries,

such as Britain, have sought to manage the risk, opening,

even with significant cases. As England’s Deputy Chief

Health Officer, Jonathan Van Tam, said recently, ‘Nothing

reduces the [Covid] risks to zero other than standing in

a meadow completely on your own ad infinitum.’

At some stage, all of Australia must move to a riskmanagement

approach. Covid is not going to be

eliminated and we cannot keep state and national borders

closed for ever. Only one human virus, smallpox, has been

eradicated and that took two centuries to achieve! Even

nations that have achieved high vaccination rates, such

as Israel and the UK, are about to offer booster doses.

Australians have been very patient, but that patience

is dissipating. Governments should be upfront with the

10 Australian Polity

public about, for example, the number of Covid patients

in hospital, the number in ICUs and the number of deaths,

including their age, co-morbidities and whether they had

been vaccinated. This data should be provided on a daily

rate, to date and per 100,000 eligible people, for global

comparisons. State governments should also provide

daily and up-to-to date statistics of the eligible people

vaccinated per dose, as well as per 100,000 eligible

people for global comparisons.

In 2019, 464 people died each day in Australia, a

comparison that fear-inducing premiers fail to mention.

Many more people continue to die from car accidents,

suicide, influenza and other causes than from Covid.

How many will die prematurely because of the inability

to obtain timely treatment for other conditions due to

the restrictions?

There has also been a reluctance to consider other,

complementary approaches to dealing with the virus,

including possible treatments and rapid testing.

The Prime Minister has said that ‘when we hit 80 per

cent, lockdowns should become a thing of the past’. But

already the WA Premier has thrown doubt about abiding

with this ambitious target and the Victorian Premier

has shifted the goalposts with his own separate plan.

Each premier should be asked to commit to the target

in the National Plan. While they continue to hide behind

unelected health officials who offer such idiotic advice as

not touching a football that flies over the boundary fence

at an AFL game, or, if you are frustrated with lockdowns,

to rearrange your sock drawer; there is no certainty about

opening-up. People who have been fully vaccinated want

to be at liberty to go about their lives free of restrictions.

Most of the European Union and the US, together with

more than a dozen other nations now welcome travel

by fully vaccinated people.

Preliminary analysis from the UK indicates that during

the northern hemisphere winter wave, when daily cases

were averaging what they are now, there were almost 27

times more Covid deaths each day and nine times more

people in hospital.

10,000 cases at the same point in the 2020 wave.

People aged 54 and under account for 60 per cent of virus

patients admitted to hospital in England during this wave,

compared with just 22 per cent during the 2020 wave.

Some 87.6 per cent of people in the UK have now

received at least one dose of the vaccine, up from 28.9

per cent at the same time in the winter wave. Instead

of demonising the AZ vaccine, Britain has embraced it.

Because of the strategy adopted by the premiers, the

Australian polity faces two significant challenges beyond

the health and economic consequences of Covid.

The first is to repair the growing gap between two

groups of Australians. Benjamin Disraeli once said that

‘the Privileged and the People formed two nations’. His

famous reference was less about poverty as such and

more about the lack of connection he observed between

the rich and the poor. In Australia today, the lack of

connection between the information-generating ‘elites’

who dominate much of the media, especially on social

media; and ordinary people who operate and work in

traditional trades and businesses, has been exacerbated

by the Covid restrictions. Australia is more factionalised

and divided than it has been for decades.

The second is to repair the Commonwealth. It was

Henry Parkes’ great rallying call for federation that we

are ‘one people with one destiny’. That notion has been

abandoned by the premiers. If it wasn’t for section 92

of the Constitution, I suspect that they would even stop

interstate trade. But why isn’t interstate tourism a form

of trade protected by s. 92 of the Constitution? It is

fanciful to imagine that the founders of the nation ever

envisaged that Australians would not be able to travel

freely between states. Even if some restrictions for health

reasons can be justified, there has been no precision in

their application. Whole states are locked down, including

areas that have never had a Covid infection.

In addition to securing our economic and national security,

reclaiming the notion that we are ‘one nation with one

destiny’ is the great challenge facing us.

There are currently 125 patients on a ventilator for every

10,000 daily new infections, compared with 2,312 per

This article was originally published in the Spectator Australia, August

7, 2021

Australian Polity 11

CULTURE

MORE CANCEL

CULTURE

/ KEVIN ANDREWS


By any fair assessment, Robert Gordon Menzies

has been one of the most illustrious alumni of

the University of Melbourne. President of the

Student Representatives’ Council, editor of the University

magazine, he graduated with first class honours in law

before completing a Masters’ degree. Menzies read with

the future Chief Justice of Australia, Sir Owen Dixon,

and was admitted to the Victorian Bar, specialising in

constitutional law. He was appointed a King’s Counsel

in 1929, the year after being elected to the Victorian

Legislative Council. He subsequently served in the

Legislative Assembly, becoming Attorney-General and

Deputy Premier.

Robert Menzies was elected to the Australian Parliament

in 1934 and was appointed Attorney-General in the

Government of Joseph Lyons. Upon the death of Lyons

in 1939, Menzies became Prime Minister of Australia,

serving in the role until 1941. He was one of the founders

of the Liberal Party in 1944, subsequently serving as

Prime Minister from 1949 – 1966, Australia’s longest

serving leader.

Given Menzies place in the life of Australia, it is not

unexpected that the University of Melbourne would

assist the establishment of a Robert Menzies Institute at

the campus. Although not as prolific as US presidential

libraries, there are similar bodies focussing on the life

and contributions of other Australian Prime Ministers,

both Liberal and Labor.

Apparently, this is an afront to a group of leftwing students

at the university who organised a campaign to block the

establishment of the Institute.

of a biography on Paul Keating, writes in Robert Menzies

– the art of politics, Menzies was hardly alone in his views

at the time, noting that in a letter to Neville Chamberlain,

“Menzies was not uncritical of Nazi Germany. Yet he

concluded this letter with a degree of praise for Hitler

who had lifted ‘the German spirit’ among his people.

Menzies reflected the views of the British and

Australian governments, which thought that the

complaints of the Sudeten Germans were legitimate,

and that Hitler’s ambitions were limited. This was a

significant misjudgement. But Menzies, like Lyons and

Chamberlain, was far from alone in making it. John

Curtin, leading a Labor Party with strongly pacifist

elements, also supported appeasement.

Bramston is not uncritical of Menzies, but his more

nuanced view of history and the challenges facing Britain

and Australia at the time are lost on Mr Joyce.

Perhaps the most astonishing claim to condemn Menzies

is because of the Liberal Party’s funding of universities.

Joyce seems to forget that it was the Menzies government

which significantly expanded the tertiary education

sector in Australia.

What is most disappointing is that a student of the

University of Melbourne prefers to cancel debate and

discussion rather than promote it. Better not have an

Institute that provides the opportunity to research and

discuss Menzies’ contributions, even to criticise them,

according to the likes of Joyce.

Writing in the Jacobin magazine, the self-described

“leading voice of the American left”, one of the protesters,

a Charlie Joyce, accused Menzies of not being a

true liberal, but a “ruling-class crusader and a racist

authoritarian who was implacably opposed to workers.”

Adopting the usual leftwing trope, Joyce writes that

“Menzies subsequently became a committed advocate

of appeasing the Nazi regime,” as well as Japan. For this

and other ‘crimes’, such as being a monarchist, Menzies

must be cancelled.

But as Troy Bramston, a former Labor adviser and author


MEDIA

CALLING THE TROLLS

TO ACCOUNT

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

Unlike the traditional media, people have been

able to anonymously defame and trash the

reputations of others on social media with

impunity. It is a realm in which the law has failed to keep

pace with technological change. The consequence is the

trolling that causes serious harm to many people. The

ABC presenter, Leigh Sales, complained recently about

the often-anonymous bullying on social media that is

“non-stop, personal, often vile, frequently unhinged and

regularly based on fabrications.”

Commonwealth powers to regulate

social media

There are three clearly applicable heads of power for

Commonwealth efforts to regulate social media:

• the post and telegraph power, the Commonwealth

Parliament’s power to make laws with respect to ‘postal,

telegraphic, telephonic, and like services’ (Section 51(v),

herein the ‘telecommunications power’);

In the previous edition of this journal, the suggestion was

made that the provision in the Broadcasting Services

Act (s. 91 of Schedule 5) which precludes a social media

provider being sued for defamation be repealed. The

decision of the High Court in the recent Voller case

enables a social media user, such as a media organisation,

to be sued for comments by third parties on its website,

but it fails to stop the mischief of anonymous trolling.

The impact of s. 91 of Schedule 5 of the Broadcasting

Services Act was alluded to by some of the High Court

justices, but the effect of the provision was not before the

High Court. Justice Steward appears to have observed

that if the view of the majority of the Justices is the law in

Australia, “it might also render Facebook itself, at common

law, the publisher of all posts made on Facebook.”

Further research suggests that the Commonwealth

can go further than simply repealing the provision and

introduce provisions requiring social media users to

provide identification to hold an account. This would

have a very significant impact on the misuse, trolling and

similar undesirable behaviour of many social media users.

• the corporations Power, the Commonwealth Parliament’s

power to make laws with respect to ‘foreign corporations,

and trading or financial corporations formed within the

limits of the Commonwealth’ (Section 51(xx)); and

• the incidental power in relation to both these heads of

power (section 51(xxxix)).

A requirement for identification

There appears to be no barrier to the Commonwealth

basing laws requiring social media accounts to be verified

by personal information based on the telecommunications

powers in section 51(v) of the Constitution. Indeed, there

are existing examples where Commonwealth by section

51(v) requires individuals to verify their personal identity

before accessing a telecommunication service, such as:

• The Telecommunications (Industry Standard for Mobile

Number Pre-Porting Additional Identity Verification)

Direction 2019 made under the Telecommunications Act

1997 which requires mobile carriage service providers

to implement customer identity verification processes


before accepting a port of a mobile service number

• The Telecommunications (Service Provider —

Identity Checks for Prepaid Mobile Carriage Services)

Determination 2017 which similarly requires carriage

service providers to obtain certain identifying information

about, and to verify the identity of, the customer.

Further, the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-

Terrorism Financing Act 2006 is an example of the use of

the incidental power to impose identification requirements

on entities captured by the Commonwealth’s banking

and/or corporations powers under the Constitution. In

addition the soon-to-be-replaced (by the recently passed

Online Safety Bill 2021) Enhancing Online Safety Act

2015 – which already regulates social media companies

to an extent – is another example of the Commonwealth

using a range of constitutional powers as a basis for

regulating social media companies.

A recent House of Representatives Standing Committee

Inquiry into family, domestic and sexual violence report

recommended that:

In order to open or maintain an existing social media

account, customers should be required by law to

identify themselves to a platform using 100 points

of identification, in the same way as a person must

provide identification for a mobile phone account, or

to buy a mobile SIM card.

Using existing legislation

The Online Safety Bill was recently passed by

the Parliament. Once it commences, the eSafety

Commissioner would have various powers, including

the power to make Service Provider Determinations,

under Clause 151 of the Bill.

This specifically allows for the creation, by legislative

instrument, of rules that would ‘apply to providers of

social media services in relation to the provision of social

media services.’ Whilst any such rules must relate to

matters specified in the Legislative rules made by the

Minister, the rules could impose a requirement on social

media service providers to require identification to open

or continue to operate an account.

There are potentially other avenues by which the

Commissioner could require or incentivise social media

platforms to require identification to open an account,

including through the Basic Online Safety Expectations

(BOSE) scheme, or by the setting of Industry Standards

and development of Industry Codes.

Corporations Power

Section 51(xx) provides that the Parliament shall have

power to make laws with respect to:

…foreign corporations, and trading or financial

corporations formed within the limits of the

Commonwealth;

A constitutional corporation is defined in such a way

as to capture the types of entities that most frequently

own and operate social media services. This is because

the Constitution allows the Commonwealth to make

laws with respect to foreign corporations that carry on

business within Australia, as well as trading and financial

corporations formed within Australia. This power has

been interpreted broadly.

Recent High Court cases have interpreted the

corporations power very broadly and expansively and

as a result it appears that the Commonwealth can

use this power to regulate all activities and aspects

of constitutional corporations, including their internal

operations. Consequently, it would almost certainly be

possible for the Commonwealth to place obligations on

social media providers (in their right as corporations) to

require identification of users, as a regulation of their

business as a corporation.

Another alternative

Another alternative would be to provide that if a social

media provider had failed to identify the account holder

(ie the user), in an action for defamation, the social media

provider would be liable for any damages arising from

the claim. In any event, the Commonwealth clearly has

the power to legislate.

I acknowledge the research of the Australian Parliamentary Library.


MEDIA

MAKING THE ABC

ACCOUNTABLE

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

The lack of transparency, the inadequacy of

its complaints system and the absence of

accountability by the ABC has been highlighted

in a series of cases over past years.

The main legislation applying to broadcasting is the

Broadcasting Services Act 1992 (BSA). Section 4 of

the BSA, on ‘regulatory policy’, includes the following:

The Parliament also intends that broadcasting services

and datacasting services in Australia be regulated in a

manner that, in the opinion of the ACMA:

for an independent Commissioner of Complaints.

There was a change of government (in March 1983)

between the introduction of that Bill and the final passage

of the ABC Act in 1983, and the clauses establishing the

Commissioner for Complaints did not appear in the Act

as passed by Parliament.

Rather, section 79 appeared in its current form (with

reference to the then in force broadcasting legislation).

The Explanatory Memorandum for the 1983 Bill does not

explain why this approach was taken.

(a) enables public interest considerations to be addressed

in a way that does not impose unnecessary financial and

administrative burdens on providers of broadcasting

services and datacasting services […]

Section 5 of the BSA states that:

(1) In order to achieve the objects of this Act in a way

that is consistent with the regulatory policy referred to

in section 4, the Parliament:

(a) charges the ACMA with responsibility for

monitoring the broadcasting industry […]

However, specific sections in both the ABC Act (section

79) and the SBS Act (section 70) generally preclude those

organisations from coverage of the BSA, and thus from

being monitored by ACMA.

Commissioner of Complaints

In 1982 the Fraser Government introduced a Bill, which

was a forerunner of the ABC Act. It contained a provision

Similarly, the Explanatory Memorandum to the Bill which

became the SBS Act does not explain why the exclusion

from the BSA occurred.

Other jurisdictions

Overseas jurisdictions that are similar in nature to

Australia have several different approaches to complaints

policies for their national broadcasters.

In the UK, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)—

as well as commercial broadcasters—is ultimately

regulated by Ofcom, which is an approximate equivalent

to Australia’s ACMA.

Ofcom’s broadcasting codes cover all radio and television

broadcasts (other than the BBC World Service, which

is, by its nature, not an internal broadcaster in the UK).

Section 56(3) of the BBC Charter requires the BBC to

have ‘a framework for handling and resolving complaints

to provide transparent, accessible, effective, timely

and proportionate methods of securing that the BBC


complies with its obligations and that remedies are

provided which are proportionate and related to any

alleged non-compliance’.

In New Zealand, TVNZ, a publicly owned television

company, requires complainants to complain in the

first instance to TVNZ itself. However, complainants

have appeal rights to the independent Broadcasting

Standards Authority, and ultimately can take matters to

the High Court, which is of equivalent status to Australia’s

Federal Court.

A proposal

Australian public broadcasters could be subject to ACMA

by repealing or amending section 79 and section 70 in

the respective Acts.

Furthermore, a Complaints Commissioner, as originally

envisaged, could be established for public broadcasters.

This action would achieve greater accountability than

currently exists.

I acknowledge the assistance of the Parliamentary Library in the

preparation of this article.


FEATURES – VALUES AND CULTURE

HUMAN DIGNITY – THE

FOUNDATION OF FREEDOM

/ SCOTT MORRISON

My father was a big believer in community.

He was Mayor of Waverley, he was on the

Waverley Council for some 16, 17 years and

he taught me a lot about the importance of community.

My father would tell me, if you want to understand

community, understand the Jewish community, which

he loved passionately and dearly. They cared for him

at Wolper Jewish Hospital in some of his last months

as my mother was recently cared for there. She is fine,

by the way, she just had a back operation. But the care,

the community of the Jewish community, has deeply

impacted my family and my father taught me that. So

I want to talk about a topic tonight that is dear to your

hearts – community: a community of individuals, a nation

of individuals.

I have been deeply influenced in recent years by the

writings of the late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks. His books

Lessons in Leadership, Covenant and Conversation, and

Morality, his last work, have given me a more textured

understanding of Judaism, my own Christian faith and

what unites us all as human beings. In his works, Rabbi

Sacks wrestles, a bit like Jacob, wrestles with the practical

complexities of our modern pluralistic world and finds,

through the tenets of his faith, as he did, a pathway to

the common good.

Human Dignity

At the heart of our Judeo-Christian heritage are two

words: Human dignity. Everything else flows from this.

Seeing the inherent dignity of all human beings is the

foundation of morality. It makes us more capable of

love and compassion, of selflessness and forgiveness.

Because if you see the dignity and worth of another

person, another human being, the beating heart in front

of you, you’re less likely to disrespect them, insult or

show contempt or hatred for them, or seek to cancel

them, as is becoming the fashion these days. You’re less

likely to be indifferent to their lives and callous towards

their feelings.


Those of Jewish faith understand this. As Rabbi Sacks

said, “The purpose of Judaism is to honour the image

of God in other people.” Reflecting the Psalmist: people

who are fearfully and wonderfully made. This is such

a beautiful idea and one shared by many other faiths,

including my own. Appreciating human dignity also

fosters our sense of shared humanity.

Hand, to argue this point:

I often wonder whether we do not rest our hopes too

much upon constitutions, upon laws, upon courts ...

believe me these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the

hearts of men and women, when it dies there, no

constitution, no law can save it.

This means that because we are conscious of our own

failings and vulnerabilities, we can be more accepting

and understanding of the failings and vulnerabilities of

others. True faith and religion is about confronting your

own frailties. It’s about understanding your own and our

humanity. The result of that is a humble heart, not a pious

or judgemental one.

Freedom therefore rests on us taking personal

responsibility for how we treat each other, based on

our respect for, and appreciation of, human dignity. This

is not about state power. This is not about market power.

This is about morality and personal responsibility.

The Foundation of Community

This has certainly been my experience. It has also been

my privilege to appreciate the commonality of this view in

deepening my ever connections with so many other faith

and religious communities across Australia. Christians

from all denominations. The Eastern Orthodox faiths,

Maronites, Catholics, Anglicans, and then of course

Judaism, Hinduism, Muslims. Seeing the dignity in others

means we can see others as imperfect people striving

to do their best.

In a liberal democracy - there is no greater liberal

democracy than the ones that are shared here and in

Israel - human dignity is foundational to our freedom. It

restrains government, it restrains our own actions and

our own behaviour because we act for others and not

ourselves, as you indeed do here this evening. That is

the essence of morality.

Morality is also then the foundation of true community.

The place where we are valued; where we are unique;

where we respect one another and contribute to and

share one another’s lives. Where we pledge faithfulness

to do together what we cannot achieve alone. Sacks

describes this as the covenant of community.

It is the determination to step up and play a role and to

contribute, not leaving it to someone else, to another. That

is the moral responsibility and covenant, I would argue, of

citizenship. Not to think we can leave it to someone else.

But there are warnings. Where we once understood our

rights in terms of our protections from the state, now it

seems these rights are increasingly defined by what we

expect from the state. As citizens, we cannot allow what

we think we are entitled to, to become more important

than what we are responsible for as citizens.

Alexis de Tocqueville agreed. He said, “Liberty cannot be

established without morality, nor morality without faith’.

Hayek the economist said the same thing, “Freedom has

never worked without deeply ingrained moral beliefs.”

Acting to morally enhance the freedom of others

ultimately serves to enhance our own freedom. So it

is no surprise then that Rabbi Sacks concluded in his

final work, Morality, “If you lose your own morality, you

are in danger of losing your freedom.” The implication

here is very important. Liberty is not borne of the state

but rests with the individual, for whom morality must be

a personal responsibility. In Lessons in Leadership, he

quotes distinguished American jurist Judge Learned

Teddy Roosevelt argued this more than a century ago in

his famous ‘Man in the Arena’ speech. But I’m not going

to quote the section that is most known. Arguing that

going down this path of entitlements of citizenship, as

opposed to the responsibilities, is a very dangerous one,

and it indeed jeopardises national success in a liberal

democracy. He said, “The stream will not permanently

rise higher than the main source; and the main source

of national power and national greatness is found in the

average citizenship of the nation.” He also said, “In the

long run, success or failure will be conditioned upon the

way in which the average man, the average woman, does


his or her duty, first in the ordinary, every-day affairs of

life, and next in those great occasional crises [and we

know a bit about that] which call for the heroic virtues.”

Together and individually we are each responsible for

building and sustaining community, and we each have

something unique to bring. Because community begins

with the individual, not the state, not the marketplace.

It begins with an appreciation of the unique dignity of

each human being. It recognises that each individual

has something to offer and that failure to appreciate and

realise this, as a community, means our community is

poorer and it is weaker. In short, to realise true community

we must first appreciate each individual human being

matters. You matter. You, individually.

happens when people are defined solely by the group

they belong to, or an attribute they have, or an identity

they possess. The Jewish community understands that

better than any in the world.

My message is simple: you matter, you make the difference,

you make community. And together with family and

marriage and the associations of clubs and community

groups, faith networks, indeed the organisations we’re

here celebrating tonight, and so much more, they are the

further building blocks of community on that individual,

providing the stability and the sinews of society that

bind us one to another. And upon that moral foundation

of community we build our institutions of state. Within

that moral context we operate our marketplace.

In this context I would also argue we must protect against

those forces that would undermine that in community,

and I don’t just mean, as I’ve recently remarked, the social

and moral corrosion caused by the misuse of social

media, and the abuse that occurs there. But I would say

it also includes the growing tendency to commodify

human beings through identity politics.

To your great credit, this event is an affirmation that

morality always starts with individuals seeing the dignity

and need in each other and deciding to act. You are

demonstrating by your own actions that morality can

never be outsourced, because when it is we rob ourselves

of that precious agency and we deny the strength and

goodwill that comes from building community.

We must never surrender the truth that the experience

and value of every human being is unique and personal.

You are more, we are more, individually, more than the

things others try to identify us by, you by, in this age of

identity politics. You are more than your gender, you are

more than your race, you are more than your sexuality,

you are more than your ethnicity, you are more than your

religion, your language group, your age.

You matter. Community matters. In a democracy, it matters

especially. It’s a tremendous source of strength and its

why foreign actors seek to sow discord online, in many

other ways, inflaming angers and hatreds and spreading

lies and disinformation. Of course, the right to disagree

peacefully is at the heart of democracy. But democracy

is a shared endeavour, and civility, trust and generosity

are the currency that mediates our differences.

All of these of course contribute to who we may be and

the incredible diversity of our society, particularly in this

country, and our place in the world. But of themselves

they are not the essence of our humanity. When we

reduce ourselves to a collection of attributes, or divide

ourselves, even worse, on this basis, we can lose sight

of who we actually are as individual human beings - in all

our complexity, in all our wholeness and in all our wonder.

We then define each other if we go down that other

path by the boxes we tick or don’t tick, rather than our

qualities, skills and character. And we fail to see the value

that other people hold as individuals, with real agency

and responsibility. Throughout history, we’ve seen what

The Hon Scott Morrison MP is the Prime Minister of Australia. This is

an edited extract of his address to the United Israel Appeal Dinner,

Randwick NSW, 29 April 2021.

“At the heart of our

Judeo-Christian heritage

are two words: Human

dignity. Everything else

flows from this.”


FEATURES – VALUES AND CULTURE

I AM WOMAN

/ CLAIRE CHANDLER


As legislators, we know that using language

precisely is critical. Using one word rather than

another in an act of parliament can dramatically

alter the interpretation of law. When a Bill is being drafted,

there is no more important task than properly defining

key terms. That’s why when our predecessors passed

the Commonwealth Sex Discrimination Act 1984, they

included in the Interpretation section a clarification (in

case there was any doubt) that “woman means a member

of the female sex”.

Fast forward to the 21st century, and the definition of

woman (and man) in the Sex Discrimination Act is no more.

‘Woman’ is now a word that means, as Humpty Dumpty

said in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass, just

what you choose it to mean – neither more nor less. When

I asked the Office for Women how they define a ‘woman’

for the purposes of undertaking their role, a long pause

and request for clarification was eventually followed up

with a scramble for a briefing note which revealed that

the Office for Women’s definition of woman is…”anyone

who identifies as a woman”, a circular and functionally

useless classification which nevertheless has become

the expected answer for anyone wishing to move in

respectable left-wing circles.

Perhaps even more confounding was Australia’s Chief

Statistician insisting on the veracity of the Bureau of

Statistics’ newly-published claim that biological sex can

change over the course of a human being lifetime. This

staggering (and fundamentally false) pronouncement

was made after consultation not with biologists, but

with a range of activist groups and other bureaucrats.

(To the ABS’ credit, following my questioning on this

point they did belatedly consult with experts and have

partially corrected this claim in their sex and gender

data standard).

If these were the types of outcomes that the former

Labor Government intended when they deleted the

definition of woman from the Sex Discrimination Act in

2013, then they have been wildly successful in achieving

their goals. These are just two of dozens of examples

of our public service adopting radical gender theory, a

left-wing cultural movement imported from the US and

UK which has captured bureaucracies, academia and


the corporate world so quickly that it’s hard for anyone

to keep up with the latest outrages which are occurring

all over the world – usually at the expense of women.

Radical Gender Theory

Consider this: the definition of woman (a member of the

female sex) which was in Australia’s Sex Discrimination

Act less than a decade ago is now regarded by influential

parts of western society as nothing less than hate speech.

This is no exaggeration: the point has been proven by

feminists who paid to have billboards erected simply

read “Woman = adult, human female”, only to have them

torn down after complaints of hate speech. Women

around the world have been sacked and subjected

to disciplinary action by their employers for holding

gender critical views. I myself was the subject of a

complaint late last year, accepted by Tasmania’s Anti-

Discrimination Commissioner, of incitement, offensive

conduct and discrimination for writing that women’s

sports, changerooms and facilities were designed for

people of the female sex and should remain that way.

One of the world’s most famous feminists, Harry Potter

author J.K. Rowling, has been subjected to torrents of

vile abuse, violent threats and defamatory falsehoods

because she took issue with an article titled “Creating

a more equal post-COVID-19 world for people who

menstruate”. “People who menstruate. I’m sure there

used to be a word for those people,” mused Rowling.

“Someone help me out. Wumben? Wimpund? Wommud?”

The violence and vitriol with which trans rights activists

and their supporters responded to Rowling clearly

indicates how much their goals depend on the redefinition

of the word ‘woman’ – and how they can’t afford to have

prominent women insisting that the word is not up for

grabs. There’s also an obvious element of enjoyment

and excitement which these vicious trolls get from being

given the license to abuse and threaten women while

much of the political left turn a blind eye (and in many

cases actively egg them on).

As the case of Rowling (a long-time supporter of the

UK Labour Party prior to the Corbyn era) demonstrates,

concern about the appropriation of the word ‘woman’ is

hardly a right versus left issue. The proponents of gender

theory and the idea that self-proclaimed gender identity

trumps biological sex are a relatively small subset of the

political left – which begs the question, which I will turn to

later, about why they have so much influence. Many of the

most passionate and eloquent critics of gender ideology

are feminists who traditionally have associated with leftof-centre

political parties. Others are politically neutral,

but are outraged about the attack on women’s sex-based

rights. Given what we know about the unacceptably high

rates of violence and sexual harassment of women in our

society, it’s hardly surprising that women of all political

persuasions see the protection of single-sex spaces

as critical – or indeed, that their husbands, fathers and

brothers agree with them.

Protecting Single-Sex Spaces

Trans rights activists continually assert that gender

diverse people using the facilities of their choosing has

no impact on women, but this is demonstrably untrue.

When rules are changed to allow biological males into

women’s single-sex spaces, they cease to be single-sex.

The question that therefore must be answered, rather

than being brushed aside, is: do females no longer need

or deserve to have single-sex facilities?

Single-sex women’s facilities, spaces, services and sports

have existed for decades. In certain areas of life, the need

to separate males and females is obvious and, until the

last few years, uncontroversial. Women’s changerooms,

for example, ensure privacy and dignity while also

reducing the risk of assault. While the vast majority

of men aren’t dangerous, the overwhelming majority

of sexual offenders who assault women are male. A

blanket rule keeping males out of women’s changerooms

is therefore widely accepted and supported, not as a

personal attack on men, but as a sensible safeguarding

rule.

Earlier this year, a Los Angeles spa became the centre of

international attention when a biological male exposed

his genitals to a group of women, including one young girl,

who were in the women’s spa. In normal circumstances

the police would have been immediately called and the

offender arrested. Shockingly though, staff ignored and

even criticised the women who complained, because the

person with male genitalia identified as a trans woman.

The left-wing media wrote stories complaining about

transphobia and alleging a far-right hoax, while far left

anarchists Antifa showed up to violently protest against

the allegedly bigoted women who raised the alarm.

A few weeks ago, it emerged that the trans woman at the

centre of the furore is a registered sex offender, with prior

convictions for indecent exposure, and has now been

charged over the Wi Spa incident. This was uncovered,

not by any of the major media outlets who uncritically

reported the incident as a case of transphobia, but by

an independent journalist. To be clear - this incident

doesn’t demonstrate that trans women are a danger to

women. What it does demonstrate, unquestionably, is

that allowing males to self-identify into female spaces

is a loophole that male sex offenders can exploit. It

also shows that women are not being listened to about

genuine concerns, or even actual sex crimes when they

occur.

Similarly, simple common sense would tell you that crisis

accommodation for women fleeing domestic violence, or

a rape crisis centre for women, need to be a single-sex

facility. Yet these too are now being labelled transphobic

and accused of discrimination if they don’t accept anyone

who identifies as a woman. One rape crisis centre in

Scotland has employed a trans women CEO who has

publicly said that “sexual violence happens to bigoted

people too” and said rape victims who object to the

presence of males in the centre will be “challenged on

their prejudices”.

Possibly the most offensively dangerous example of

gender identity taking priority over sex-based spaces

is the housing of male offenders in women’s prisons.

There are numerous examples of female prisoners being

sexually assaulted by male sex offenders who have

identified into women’s prisons. This is hardly a surprising

outcome, yet prison authorities, including in Australia,

continue to put female inmates at risk.

Naturally, these policies are rarely announced upfront

or admitted to the general public. With proper public

consultation they would be quickly identified as dangerous

and insulting proposals and knocked on the head. It

happens by sleight of hand – when you define ‘woman’


as anyone identifying as woman, a women’s prison or

women’s changeroom can therefore be accessed by

anyone identifying as a woman. If you don’t like that, you’ll

be directed to a piece of anti-discrimination legislation

stating that it’s illegal to discriminate against anyone

on the basis of gender identity, or to a bureaucratic

guideline which says the government values inclusivity

and respects everyone’s identity.

Gender and Sport

Of all the areas where gender theory has impacted

women’s rights, sport has been one of the most

visible. The broad appeal of sport means that there is

widespread understanding in the general public about

why male and female athletes are separated in the vast

majority of sports. Yet against all common sense and

scientific understanding of male and female sporting

performance, sporting bodies around Australia and

the world are eagerly re-writing their rules and policies

to allow biologically male trans women to compete in

women’s sport.

sport. To put the scale of this advantage in perspective, in

running, males enjoy a mere 10-13 per cent advantage –

which is enough for the women’s 100 metre world record

to have been bettered by male athletes more than 10,000

times, including by boys in high school.

When Hubbard qualified for the women’s category

in Tokyo with the second-biggest qualifying lift and

subsequently lifted a weight of 125kg which few other

competitors even attempted (the lift was ruled out by

judges due to a faulty technique), what we saw was a

mediocre male athlete, more than a decade past physical

peak, using that 34 per cent male advantage to qualify

for the very highest level of women’s sport. Hubbard

demonstrated this point by immediately retiring following

the Olympics, saying “Age has caught up with me. In

fact if we’re being honest it probably caught up with me

some time ago. My involvement in sport is probably due,

if nothing else, to heroic amounts of anti-inflammatories.”

Is this what we want for women’s sports, for the women’s

Olympics to be a last hurrah for ageing male athletes while

dedicated young females miss out and watch on TV?

Most prominently, in the recent Tokyo Olympic Games

New Zealand 42-year-old trans weightlifter Laurel

Hubbard was gifted an Olympic berth in the women’s

87kg+ category, at the expense of a young Nauruan

weightlifter, Roviel Detenamu, who now may never have

the opportunity to become an Olympian. Had her spot

at the Olympics not been taken by a biological male,

Roviel would have become the first woman from her

country to compete at the Olympics for more than 20

years. Around the last time a Nauruan women qualified

for the Olympics, Gavin Hubbard was a junior male record

holder at national level in New Zealand. This early career

success never translated into success at a higher level,

until Hubbard transitioned and began winning medals

and topping the rankings at Oceania level in women’s

weightlifting.

Hubbard’s story was widely publicised because there is

no scientific question that going through male puberty

provides a huge advantage over female athletes in

weightlifting. Peer-reviewed research puts this advantage

males have over females in weightlifting at 29-34 per

cent, which is at the higher end of male advantage in any

The Tokyo Olympics also put an end to the false and

misleading rhetoric that trans people are “banned” or

“prevented” from playing sport when Canadian soccer

player Quinn, a biological female who identifies as

transgender, won a gold medal with the Canadian

women’s team. Hubbard too would have been eligible to

qualify for the Olympics in the appropriate sex category

– the only obstacle being that the lift which achieved a

ranking of 5th in the world in the women’s category was

more than 100 kilograms off the standard required to

qualify for the male category.

Even the International Olympic Committee was

begrudgingly forced to admit that their current rules

around transgender participation are not fit for purpose.

This has been blatantly obvious to experts in the field for

some time, with IOC rules focused exclusively on trans

women being required to lower current testosterone

levels to 5 nmol/L. This limit, which is still many times

the normal testosterone level for females, is not fit

for purpose as a guideline for participation because

it is not current testosterone levels which confers the

vast majority of male athletic advantage. It’s the way in

which testosterone permanently alters the body during


male puberty to give more height, muscle mass, bone

density and other attributes advantageous in sport.

Peer-reviewed research demonstrates that lowering

testosterone after puberty is nowhere near enough to

offset the major performance advantages males have

over females.

In many sports, it’s not just fairness but safety which is

at risk for female athletes when males are included in

their competitions. The international governing body for

Rugby Union undertook a significant research project

to determine whether trans women could safely be

included in women’s rugby but found that there was

a 25-30 per cent increase in the risk of serious head

and neck injuries to female players when tackled by

a biological male. On the back of this research, World

Rugby understandably found that trans women should

not be eligible to play women’s rugby. However, in an

extraordinary display of recklessness, national governing

bodies including Rugby Australia dismissed World

Rugby’s findings and ruled that transwomen can play

women’s rugby. Other sporting codes in which safety

of women’s players is at risk have followed suit, backed

by Sport Australia and the Australian Human Rights

Commission’s inclusion guidelines which recommend,

on behalf of the government, that “participation in sport

should be based on a person’s affirmed gender identity

and not the sex they were assigned at birth”. Such a

statement displays an embarrassing and dangerous

lack of regard for the very purpose of women’s sport

and the safety of female players.

The AFL’s gender inclusion policy even goes so far as

to explicitly say that at community levels (the level in

which the vast majority of its participants play) ‘inclusion’

outweighs any fairness concerns for female players, and

that trans women seeking to play women’s community

football are encouraged to do so. This foolish policy

is exposed by the AFL’s separate inclusion policy for

‘elite’ football, which allows administrators to prevent

trans women from playing in women’s state leagues and

AFLW competition. It was on this basis that prominent

trans athlete Hannah Mouncey was prevented from

entering the AFLW draft or playing in the top-level

women’s competition but is allowed to play women’s

football at lower levels against smaller, less skilled and

less experienced women and girls. It’s hard to escape the

conclusion that the AFL knows this is unsafe and unfair

but figures they can get away with increasing the risk of

injury to women as long as it’s not televised.

For a sport just beginning to grapple with the lifelong

health repercussions of head injuries, exposing female

players in local communities to a known increase in

serious head injury risk is unbelievably callous and

reckless. We cannot overlook that they’ve been led to

this policy by taxpayer funded agencies and lobby groups

which are financially backed by dozens of Australian

Government Departments.

Trans-Lobby Tactics

Why is it, then, that bureaucracies have led the charge to

promote biological males in women’s sport, to replace

references to women and mothers with ‘pregnant people’,

‘chestfeeders’ and ‘vulva owners’? It’s one thing for woke

left figures such as the US Democrat Congresswoman

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to refer to women as “people

who menstruate”, but why are public servants reporting

to centre-right governments singing from the same

hymnbook?

In the UK, the reason for this trend is beginning to be

understood, as the tactics of the trans lobby group

Stonewall are exposed by media, LGB groups and feminist

organisations. Like most of the major ‘Pride’ groups

around the world, Stonewall has in recent years become

narrowly focused on promoting the gender ideology

of trans rights. Through the creation of its ‘Diversity

Champions Scheme’, Stonewall signed up hundreds

of government agencies, universities, businesses

and media organisations and each year ranks those

participants – for a handsome fee – on how well they

perform in meeting Stonewall’s demands for things like

pressuring employees to promote their pronouns in

email signatures, making staff toilets gender neutral, and

creating media opportunities which promote Stonewall

and their ideology. If participating departments and

businesses adhere closely to Stonewall’s demands, they

can win awards and market themselves as ‘Diversity

Champions’.

Do something that Stonewall isn’t so happy with, and


they can expect to receive a phone call or email from a

Stonewall representative making clear that they are at

risk of having their diversity rating downgraded. In one

particularly egregious example, Stonewall contacted the

chambers of lawyer, Allison Bailey, a prominent supporter

of sex-based rights and co-founder of the LGB Alliance,

and urged them to remove her from chambers or risk

losing their Diversity Champion accreditation.

More recently, UK government departments and

universities have repeatedly been caught out providing

incorrect legal advice and interpretation at the behest of

Stonewall. The volunteer-run group Fair Play for Women

was forced to take the UK Office for National Statistics

to court to stop incorrect advice being given to the

public about how to complete the sex question in the

national census. Fair Play for Women won and the ONS – a

Stonewall Diversity Champion – was forced to admit and

correct their error. It’s worth noting how one error quickly

leads to another in the field of identity politics: when

developing their own aforementioned sex and gender

standard which claimed a person’s sex can change over

the course of their lifetime, Australia’s ABS took advice

from none other than the ONS, right when the ONS was

in the middle of providing false and misleading guidance

on the same topic.

“It’s one thing for

woke left figures such

as the US Democrat

Congresswoman

Alexandria Ocasio-

Cortez to refer to

women as “people

who menstruate”,

but why are public

servants reporting

to centre-right

governments singing

from the same

hymnbook?”

As Stonewall’s agenda and inappropriate influence over

Government Departments and policy belatedly came to

light, agencies which never should have been signed

up as members of lobby groups are beginning to pull

out of the Diversity Champions scheme. A question

for policy makers in Australia is whether public service

agencies and departments here are falling for the same

tactics, and whether this is the reason for the recent rush

of embarrassing and out-of-touch forays into identity

politics by the bureaucracy. Because one thing is for

certain – everyday Australians never voted for this.

Claire Chandler is a Senator for Tasmania in the Australian Parliament.


FEATURE – AUSTRALIA’S DEFENCE AND SECURITY

A WORLD ORDER THAT

FAVOURS FREEDOM

/ SCOTT MORRISON

We are living in a time of great uncertainty not

seen since the 1930s, outside of wartime.

The challenges we face are many: the global

pandemic, the recession it has caused and the businessled

global recovery the world now needs to restore lives

and livelihoods; and a global trading system and rulesbased

order that is under serious strain and threat.

A new global energy economy is rising with profound

implications for Australia, as the world deals with and

addresses climate change. How we succeed and prosper

in this new ‘net zero emissions’ economy, without putting

at risk our resources, manufacturing and heavy industries,

the jobs of Australians, especially in regional Australia,

without imposing higher costs on Australian families

and how we keep the lights on, and not surrender the

economic advantages that Australia has had, is where

Australia’s national interest lies.

It’s not an argument about climate change. It’s about how

Australia best advances our interests as part of a world

that is dealing with climate change. It’s not about if or

when but protecting and advancing Australia’s interests

in a new net zero global energy economy. In that context

it is about the how.

Great power competition

However, above all, the defining issue I believe, for

global and regional stability, upon which our security, our

prosperity and our way of life depends, is escalating great


power strategic competition. This includes rapid military

modernisation, tension over territorial claims, heightened

economic coercion, undermining of international law,

including the law of the sea, through to enhanced

disinformation, foreign interference and cyber threats,

enabled by new and emerging technologies.

As the G7 plus leaders meet in Cornwall, our patterns of

cooperation within a liberal, rules-based order, that have

benefitted us for so long, are under renewed strain. As

American scholar Robert Kagan has warned, ‘the jungle is

growing back’. As leaders of some of the world’s largest

liberal democracies and advanced economies, we must

tend to the gardening with renewed clarity, unity and

purpose. Our challenge is nothing less than to reinforce,

renovate and buttress a world order that favours freedom.

Meeting this challenge will require an active cooperation

among like-minded countries and liberal democracies

not seen for 30 years. The COVID-19 crisis merely

underlines the urgent need to deepen and accelerate

our shared endeavours.

For inspiration we should look to the years immediately

following the Second World War to a world in flux

with competing models for economies and societies.

It was a time when President Truman called for ‘the

creation of conditions in which we [the United States]

and other nations will be able to work out a way of life

free of coercion’. In many parts of the world (old and

new), anxious peoples were craving peace, stability,

prosperity and a sense of sovereign control over national

destinies. Then, a remarkable generation of far-sighted

policymakers, under American leadership, set out to

bring order to this uncertain world; and importantly

order informed by liberal values and grounded in rulesbased

institutions. I believe the challenges we face today

demand the same common purpose for this new era.

Australia brings its own distinctive perspective to global

challenges, informed by where we are and who we are

- our principles, our values and of course our national

character. Our interests are inextricably linked to an

open, inclusive and resilient Indo-Pacific region. That

is our interest. And to a strategic balance in the region

that favours freedom and allows us to be who we are –

a vibrant liberal democracy, an outward-looking open

destiny in accordance with our own national sovereignty.

Let me explore five areas of Australian advocacy and

agency. The broad themes are:

• Supporting open societies, open economies and our

rules-based order;

• Building sovereign capacity, capability and resilience;

• Cooperating on global challenges;

• Enabling renewed business-led growth and development;

and

• Demonstrating that liberal democracies work.

I want to be clear about what we are seeking to do, of

course. I also want to be clear about what we are not

seeking to do. This is not about drawing a closed circle

around a particular club. To the contrary, It’s about

ensuring we maintain an open, rules-based global

system that supports peace, prosperity and aspirations

for all sovereign nations. A world order safe for liberal

democracy, yes, to flourish, free from coercion, reinforced

through positive, collaborative and coordinated action.

We are facing heightened competition in the Indo-Pacific

region. We know that because we live here. The task is to

manage that competition. Competition does not have to

lead to conflict. Nor does competition justify coercion.

We need all nations to participate in the global system in

ways that foster development and cooperation. Australia

stands ready to engage in dialogue with all countries on

shared challenges, including China when they are ready

to do so with us.

Let me turn to the areas where I believe liberal

democracies should be stepping up with coordinated

action.

Open societies, open economies and

rules-based order

The first is supporting open societies, open economies

and our rules-based order. The foundation for deeper

cooperation amongst liberal democracies lies precisely

in the shared beliefs and binding values we strive to live

by. Our belief that open, pluralistic societies provide

the fundamental freedoms and rich opportunities our


citizens need to reach their full potential: that democratic

economy, a free people determined to shape our own

elections, the rule of law, freedom of thought and

expression, independent judiciaries and accountable

governments deserve our allegiance based on their

intrinsic merit and on their capacity to deliver better lives

for our people; that open business-led, market economies

provide the best means for generating shared prosperity

in a world of rapid change; and that, working together, our

countries can support, defend and (where necessary)

renovate a liberal, rules-based international order that

supports universal human rights and opportunities for

all - a world order that favours freedom over autocracy

and authoritarianism. We can’t be casual about these

values and beliefs. They are inextricably linked to our way

of life in this country. We can’t be passive about them.

We can’t expect others to advocate for us for them. We

live them, we must speak up for them.

As we battle the COVID-19 pandemic and look towards

recovery, I’ll be making the case for business-led growth

globally, just as we have done so here at home. Our relative

success is a broader proof point. Australia’s strong

economic recovery in the past year has demonstrated

the critical role governments play in a crisis, but also

the enduring importance of policy settings that put the

private sector at the centre of the economy: doing what

it does best – driving growth in our economy, innovating,

creating jobs, seeking out new opportunities.

Australia will be one of only two countries [in Cornwall],

together with the Republic of Korea, that can point to

an economy larger today than it was at the start of the

pandemic. This hasn’t occurred in Australia through more

regulation, more tax and more government directives to

the private sector. That has not been the Australian way

through this crisis. It has come about through greater tax

incentives. What we’re doing in our modern manufacturing

strategy is all about providing incentives, not greater

taxes. Regulatory reform, continued support for open

trade and a recognition that government overreach can

misdirect resources and impede the creation of good,

durable, high-wage jobs.

As always, we will be an advocate for a free and fair

rules-based system for international trade founded on

open markets. Australia’s prosperity rests squarely on

maintaining our position as an outward-looking, open

trading economy.

Reforming the WTO

At the G7, we will be working with others to buttress

the role of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and

to modernise its rulebook where necessary: a wellfunctioning

WTO that sets clear rules, arbitrates disputes

objectively and efficiently and penalises bad behaviour

when it occurs. This can be one of the most powerful

tools the international community has to counter

economic coercion.

In my discussions with many leaders, I have taken great

encouragement from the support shown for Australia’s

preparedness to withstand economic coercion in recent

times. The most practical way to address economic

coercion is the restoration of the global trading body’s

binding dispute settlement system. Where there are

no consequences for coercive behaviour, there is little

incentive for restraint.

The G7 meeting provides an opportunity to point a way

forward on Appellate Body reform by the WTO’s 12th

Ministerial Conference in November this year. This will

not be easy – Australia shares many of the concerns that

have been raised around the operation of the Appellate

Body. But restarting practical and serious-minded

negotiations is the essential first step in identifying

feasible and effective solutions that address the needs

of all economies.

Another area where enhanced multilateral cooperation

is essential is around data and the digital economy.

Coordinated action by liberal democracies is necessary to

ensure future global standards reflect the specific needs

and values of open societies. Australia has been a global

leader in advocating strengthened accountability and

transparency of online platforms (especially in support of

women’s safety and in combatting violent extremism and

terrorism and protecting our children from child abuse)

and we look forward to working collaboratively with other

liberal democracies on international standard setting.


Building sovereign capacity

Building our own sovereign capability and resilience is

central to our efforts to enhance cooperation for global

security and stability. Australia’s strategic environment

has changed significantly over recent years. Accelerating

trends are working against our interests. The view the

world hasn’t changed in the last five years, is disconnected

from reality. Things have changed, accelerating trends

are working against our interests.

The Indo-Pacific region – our region – is the epicentre

of renewed strategic competition. The risks of

miscalculation and conflict are very present growing.

And the technological edge enjoyed historically by

Australia and our allies is under challenge. In last year’s

Defence Strategic Update, our Government committed

an additional $270 billion over the next decade to our

defence capability growth. Australia has never sought

a free ride when it comes to our security. We may look

to our allies and partners, but we never leave it to them.

We bring agency as Australians and critical sovereign

capabilities to our partnerships. We add value to the

combined effort, with our partners. This is why we are

respected. This is why we are at the table. We must

intensify our own efforts and cooperation with others

to meet the complex security challenges we face. There

is much more to do. Because Australia does, and must,

play an active role in securing our own future, using all

the tools of statecraft we have available to us.

Australia has been working hard in our region, building on

the strong cooperation with the United States, Japan and

India, stepping up in the Pacific, supporting Southeast

Asia and engaging ASEAN as a steadfast partner. I look

forward to discussing the strategic challenges of the

Indo-Pacific with our longstanding and unshakable allies

and friends.

The Biden Administration has made its focus on the

Indo-Pacific region very clear and the region is already

the focus of our alliance. My first face-to-face meeting

with President Biden will provide the chance to further

cement our alliance partnership, built on the bonds and

the values that are shared between our two peoples.


An ever-closer security and defence relationship has

become a signature part also of our Special Strategic

Partnership with Japan. I look forward again to affirming

our strengthened bilateral security cooperation when I

meet with Prime Minister Suga in Cornwall, as we work

towards signing our Reciprocal Access Agreement,

agreed in-principle last November.

I welcome the United Kingdom’s commitment to engage

more deeply in the Indo-Pacific following the Integrated

Review announced by Prime Minister Johnson in March.

When we meet in the UK, it will be an opportunity to

discuss how we can deepen cooperation also on security

and defence issues. And of course, I look forward to

sharing perspectives on the Indo-Pacific region’s

strategic challenges with other leaders at Cornwall, and

with President Macron when I visit France on my return

to Australia. A key focus of discussions will be ensuring

that markets for new and critical technologies develop

in ways that reflect our shared values.

Growing security challenges surround the development

of secure and resilient supply chains for critical

technologies. Artificial intelligence, machine learning,

quantum computing and other technologies have

enormous potential to support the prosperity, security

and well-being of our people. But they do carry risks.

We need these technologies to be reliable, affordable,

resilient and importantly secure, as well as governed by

rules and norms that reflect our liberal democratic values.

Secure and diverse supply chains

A further priority is the development of secure and

diverse supply chains in those critical minerals, essential

for clean energy technologies and military applications.

At present, the supply chain for rare earths is not diverse

- a single nation currently accounts for about 85 per

cent of the world’s refined rare earths products. And

given its endowment in critical minerals, Australia has a

responsibility to contribute to greater diversity of critical

minerals supply, as far along the value chain as possible.

The same can be said for lithium. That effort will yield

both a strategic and economic dividend for Australia.

I also look forward to discussions on broader supply

chain issues as they relate to our economic, health and

social resilience. Australia is a keen advocate of efforts

to keep supply chains open, transparent, competitive,

trusted and diverse. We’ve joined India and Japan to

establish a new Supply Chain Resilience Initiative and at

home we’ve set up an Office of Supply Chain Resilience.

We’ve launched a $107 million program to remove key

supply chain vulnerabilities. At Cornwall, I will point to

supply chains for critical medical equipment, PPE and

vaccines as key examples where we need enhanced

cooperation and I think that view is broadly shared.

Importantly, sovereign capability does not mean we must

produce everything we consume here. No economy can

or should be self-sufficient in all products and services.

That is why reliable supply chains with trusted partners

are so important.

stronger, more independent World Health Organization

with enhanced surveillance and pandemic response

powers, as I have articulated before. And I strongly

support President Biden’s recent statement that we

need to bolster and accelerate efforts to identify the

origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. Having led calls

for such an inquiry, an independent inquiry, it remains

Australia’s firm view that understanding the cause of this

pandemic has nothing to do with politics, it is essential

for preventing the next one, for the benefit of all people

everywhere. It is a very practical, sensible perspective.

The Hon Scott Morrison MP is the Prime Minister of Australia. This

is an edited extract of his speech to the Perth USASIA Centre, Perth

WA, 9 June 2021.

Cooperating on global challenges will be the third focal

point of Australia’s participation in the G7 Plus. Our

discussions at Cornwall will also focus on the need to

do more to prevent a pandemic like COVID-19 happening

again. I will lend Australia’s weight to growing calls for a

“Competition does not have to lead to conflict.

Nor does competition justify coercion. We need all

nations to participate in the global system in ways

that foster development and cooperation.”



THE RETURN OF STRATEGIC

COMPETITION

/ JOSH FRYDENBERG


We live in very challenging times. COVID 19

has fundamentally reshaped the global

landscape. It has triggered the largest

economic shock since the Great Depression. It has

seen the delivery of unprecedented levels of fiscal and

monetary support. It has led to a dramatic change in the

way we live and work, reshaping global supply chains

and accelerating the adoption of new technology. But it

is not just COVID 19 that we must grapple with. Climate

change remains a critical global challenge. One we must

all respond to. And new emerging technologies, such as

AI, robotics and nanotechnology are opening up exciting

new possibilities, but also creating new tensions.

I would like to focus on another key global challenge;

one that is reshaping our external environment and our

domestic policies. I am referring to the return of strategic

competition. Strategic competition is increasingly playing

out in the economic arena, further blurring the lines

between economics, politics and national security. In

many ways, Australia is on the frontline of this new

strategic competition. We have faced increasing pressure

to compromise on our core values. And when we have

stood firm, as we always will, we have been subjected

to economic coercion. As the Prime Minister said at the

USASIA Centre in June “competition does not have to

lead to conflict. . . Nor does competition justify coercion”.

Australia will always choose partnerships ahead of

conflict, wherever we can. However, heightened strategic

competition is the new reality we face. Now and likely

into the future. Our task is to prepare for and manage

this competition. And in this new world, economic

resilience is key: key to our strategic interests and key

to our economic interests. That is why the Morrison

Government is taking strong and active steps to further

strengthen the resilience of our economy. We are doing

this by:

• Building a stronger, more dynamic and competitive

economy.

• By supporting our businesses to diversify and adapt to

this new environment; and, where necessary,

• by securing our critical economic systems and industries.

The return of strategic competition

There can be no doubt that strategic competition is back.

It is a defining feature of the economic and security

landscape we face. Those that advocated ‘The End of

History’ in the early 1990s have been proven wrong. In

March this year, US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken,

said that America’s relationship with China represents

the “biggest geopolitical test of the 21st century” He

further noted that the US relationship with China will be

“competitive when it should be, collaborative when it can

be, and adversarial when it must be”.

This is a very different global environment to that

faced by recent Australian Governments. It is a far cry

from October 2003, when President George Bush and

President Hu Jintao both addressed the Australian

Parliament in successive days.

We have all witnessed the major shifts in global

economic weight over recent decades, defined by the

re-emergence of China and its rapidly growing economic

weight. This has helped to lift more than 800 million

people out of poverty and been a major contributor

to global economic growth and prosperity. But more

recently, it has also been defined by another feature: A

more confident and assertive China; and a China that is

willing to use its economic weight as a source of political

pressure. It offers economic ‘carrots’ through initiatives

such as the Belt and Road; and it threatens economic

consequences for perceived misdeeds. The Australian

Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) noted recently that China

had used coercive tactics 152 times between 2010 and

2020, against 27 individual countries as well as the EU.

China is also tightening its control over its business

sector, at home and abroad.

We have faced strategic competition before, including

during the Cold War, but there are important differences

this time around - most notably our highly integrated

global economy and trading system. During the Cold

War, the Soviet Union was largely cut off from the rest

of the world. It did not trade or invest much outside of

its sphere of influence. Its investment and trade with the

US were negligible.


Contrast this to the present day. The IMF estimates that

China’s share of global GDP will increase to 18.8 per

cent in 2021, up from just 7.7 per cent in 2001. China

became the world’s largest exporter of goods in 2009.

And by 2019, it accounted for over 13 per cent of global

exports. In 2001, the year that China joined the World

Trade Organisation, more than 80 per cent of countries

had a larger volume of trade with the US than with China.

By 2018, this figure was down to only 30 per cent. Almost

130 countries now have China as their largest trading

partner.

This combination of economic weight, global integration

and assertiveness poses new and significant challenges

for many countries around the world, and Australia is no

exception. Indeed, Australia is facing this pressure more

sharply than most other countries.

Australia is on the frontline of strategic

competition

China is our largest two-way trading partner, accounting

for over 30 per cent of our trade and the scope of our

trading relationship has broadened over time, evolving

from mining, to agriculture, to services such as tourism

and education.

Despite the COVID 19 disruption, China remained our

largest education export market in 2020, at $7.6 billion. In

many ways our economies are complementary, ensuring

the economic relationship is mutually beneficial. However,

it is no secret that China has recently sought to target

Australia’s economy, citing fourteen so called ‘grievances’,

covering everything from our foreign investment laws

to our willingness to call out cyber attacks. They have

targeted our agricultural and resources sector, with

measures affecting a range of products, including wine,

seafood, barley and coal.

We have remained steadfast in defending our sovereignty

and our core values. And we always will. As Foreign

Minister Marise Payne has said “that does not mean

we are anti China or anti any other country. It means we

want all countries to operate by the rules that protect

our shared interests”. But in the face of this new reality,

our economy has also proven to be remarkably resilient.

Despite China’s wide ranging actions, our economy has

continued to perform very strongly. At the headline level,

this is best reflected in our unemployment rate, which

has fallen to 4.6 per cent. The lowest level in around

thirteen years. Our headline trade performance has

also been strong, boosted by record commodity prices.

Indeed, our trade surplus hit a record high in the June

quarter of $28.9 billion.

I am not downplaying the impact of China’s actions. They

have hurt specific industries and regions, significantly

in some cases. Nevertheless, the overall impact on our

economy has, to date, been relatively modest. This is

perhaps surprising to many. But it is worth noting that

our exports to China of targeted goods accounted for

just 5.9 per cent of our total exports in 2019 and 1.2 per

cent of nominal GDP. And while China is easily our largest

trading partner, we also have deep trading relationships

with many other countries. Our two-way trade with the

US was worth around $73 billion in 2020; our trade with

Japan was worth around $66 billion; and our trade with

South Korea was worth around $35 billion - to name

just a few.

Our largest contributor to foreign direct investment is

the United States. China is only our sixth largest source

of foreign direct investment. This investment has fallen

by around 5 per cent since 2019, in line with a broader

decline in overseas investment from China overall.

We are also continuing to pursue new free trade

agreements to deepen our existing relationships and

open up new and growing markets. We have agreed on

the broad outlines of an Australia UK FTA. This will see

99 per cent of Australian goods, including wine, enter

the UK duty free.

Our Comprehensive Economic Partnership with Indonesia

entered into force in July last year, creating new export

opportunities in a large and fast-growing market. The

Comprehensive and Progressive Trans Pacific Partnership

(CPTPP) includes specific measures to help make it easier

for small businesses to establish new export markets.

This includes common and transparent trade rules to

cut administration costs.


Many of the firms and industries targeted by China’s trade

restrictions have also been successful in re directing

goods to other export destinations. This is particularly

the case for larger bulk commodities that trade on global

markets. Of those goods targeted by trade actions, our

total exports to China are estimated to have fallen by

around $5.4 billion over the year to the June quarter, but

over the same period, exports of those goods to the rest

of the world have increased by $4.4 billion. Australian

coal, that otherwise would have gone to China, has

found buyers in other markets including India, South

Korea and Taiwan. Over the past year, our coal exports

to China have fallen by around 30 million tonnes, but

our coal exports to the rest of the world have risen by

around 28 million tonnes. Australian barley has also

been redirected, including to new markets such as Saudi

Arabia. Overall Australian barley export tonnage was up

almost 70 per cent to the June quarter. Saudi Arabia

accounted for over 22 per cent of our total barley export

volumes, up from nothing in the June quarter last year.

Australian wine producers are also looking to redirect

more of their products to alternative markets such as the

UK, Singapore, Germany and South Korea. Importantly,

this demonstrates the power of open global markets.

In many cases, trade actions simply see a reordering of

global trade flows.

I want to be very clear. China’s trade actions carry a cost

to both Australia and China. They rob Chinese consumers

of premium Australian wine, seafood and other goods

and they rob Chinese industry of high quality and high

value inputs, such as Australian coal. We would both

be better off if markets were allowed to operate freely.

This is why we want a constructive relationship with

China. Nevertheless, in the face of these challenges

the Australian economy has shown itself to be highly

resilient. Our economy has continued to grow strongly.

Australian firms have pivoted, by finding new buyers

for their goods and global markets have responded,

redirecting Australian commodities.

That is the benefit of a strong, dynamic, open, market

based economy: a precondition for our prosperity and

something we should always seek to protect, preserve

and promote.

Building greater economic resilience

Despite Australia’s proven economic resilience, we

cannot stand still. Our external environment has become

more challenging. And it is likely to remain that way for

some time to come. We need to continue to find new

ways to reinforce that resilience. Not just for now, but

for the long term. This is a key priority for the Morrison

Government.

We are seeking to do this in three important ways. First,

by continuing to build a stronger, more dynamic and

competitive economy. This is always our first, and most

important line of defence, against economic disruption.

A strong economy is the foundation of a country’s

resilience and strategic weight. And our strong and

flexibly economy has served us well. It helped Australia to

achieve almost three decades of uninterrupted economic

growth, despite many external shocks, including the

Asian Financial Crisis and the GFC. And it has helped us

to navigate the COVID 19 crisis.

That is why our entire Economic Plan is designed to

deliver an even stronger economy: by lowering taxes

for individuals; by providing business tax incentives to

encourage support investment; by supporting Australia’s

digital transformation; by reducing regulation and making

it easier for businesses to invest and grow; and by

investing more in skills, training and education.

The benefits of a flexible and dynamic economy were

apparent early in the COVID crisis: as manufacturers

of sleep apnoea equipment pivoted to produce much

needed ventilators; as gin distilleries shifted to producing

hand sanitiser; as businesses partnered with the CSIRO

to test and manufacture surgical face masks; and as our

sovereign vaccine manufacturing capability was put to

good use by CSL, quickly enhancing the resilience of our

economy and benefiting Australian business.

In the vast majority of cases, Australian businesses will

have the capacity to pivot and respond to economic

shocks, without direct Government support. However,

where necessary, we will continue to support our

businesses to adapt to the new environment that they

face. In particular, we will continue to support our


businesses to access new export opportunities, reducing

their reliance on any single market.

As part of our Agri Business Expansion Initiative, the

Government is providing $72.7 million dollars to help

our farmers diversify and open new markets. We have

reformed the Export Market Development Grants

program, which provides support to around 4,000

small and medium sized businesses every year. The

Government will now reimburse up to half of all eligible

international marketing and promotional expenditure, up

to a total of 150,000 dollars per business each financial

year. We are also defending the interests of our barley

and wine exporters in the World Trade Organisation.

We will also continue to support our manufacturing sector

to access global markets and to build more sovereign

capability in areas of critical need. Our $1.3 billion Modern

Manufacturing Initiative will support business to scale

up, translate ideas into commercial opportunities, and

integrate into international supply chains. Our Supply

Chain Resilience Initiative provides grants of up to $2

million to firms to help remove supply chain vulnerabilities

for critical goods such as medicines and chemicals.

This assistance empowers individual businesses and

strengthens our economy overall. We will also help to

forge new partnerships with like minded countries around

the world, to further strengthen the resilience of our

critical supply chains.

Finally, the Government is also strongly committed to

securing our critical infrastructure. This includes in areas

such as energy, telecommunications and transport - the

essential backbones of our economy. There are a large

number of initiatives underway in this area, but given the

time, let me mention just a few.

We are investing heavily to strengthen our cyber

capabilities. Cybercrime is estimated to have cost

Australia $3.5 billion dollars in 2019. The Australian

Cyber Security Centre estimates that at least 10,000

Australian based servers were potentially vulnerable to

the Microsoft Exchange cyber attack earlier this year.

That is why the Government has committed over $1.67

billion to strengthen our cyber capabilities, in line with

our 2020 Cyber Security Strategy.

We have also undertaken the most significant reforms to


our foreign investment regime since their introduction,

to ensure we effectively respond to our new strategic

environment. This includes applying a new national

security test for foreign investors. This will require

investors to seek approval to acquire a direct interest

in a ‘sensitive national security business’ regardless of

the value of the investment. New stronger and more

flexible enforcement options have also been introduced.

Some of these measures involve economic costs of

their own. Through increased regulation or necessary

investments in new capabilities. We will always seek to

minimise these costs for business. But given the changes

in our external environment, there will be times when

we must pay a ‘premium’ to protect our economy and

ensure our long term economic resilience.

It is also the case that Australian businesses will need

to enhance their own resilience. Many have worked

hard to access the lucrative Chinese market. This has

brought great benefits to them and to Australia overall.

And they should continue to pursue these opportunities

where they can. But going forward, businesses also

need to be aware that the world has changed. And that

this creates greater uncertainty and risk. In this respect,

they should always be looking to diversify their markets,

and not overly rely on any one country. Essentially

adopting a ‘China plus’ strategy. And in the same way

that Governments are investing in economic resilience.

So too, should Australian businesses — from cyber risks

to supply chains and everything in between.

Conclusion

The world we operate in has fundamentally changed. We

face increased strategic competition. This will see our

economic and security interests increasingly overlap.

Australia is on the front line of this new battleground. But

we have shown great resilience to date. I am confident

in our ability to withstand any shocks we may face. The

Morrison Government is taking active steps to bolster

our economic resilience. And so too should business;

not just for the short term, but the long term as well.

This is a responsibility we all need to take very seriously.

The Hon Josh Frydenberg MP is the Treasurer of Australia.

This is an edited extract of a speech to the ‘Global Realities, Domestic

Choices’ forum at the Australian National University, September 6,

2021.


THE AUSTRALIAN-

AMERICAN ALLIANCE

/ PETER DUTTON


In mid-July I had the privilege of watching a firepower

demonstration in the north east of our country, just

north of Brisbane, in Exercise Talisman Sabre. It’s in

its ninth iteration and it is our largest military exercise

with the United States, having been conducted across

the north of our country biennially since 2005. It was

over 18 days; our forces improved their ability to operate

as a joint and combined force. To say it was impressive

was a complete understatement. The coordination,

the interoperability and the integration across the land,

sea, air, cyber, and space domains really was quite

unbelievable. Our troops moved together as one team,

and the comradery between them was clear for all to see

and this to me, is the spirit and the value that embodies

our Alliance.

The Australian people have in recent weeks seen the

strength and closeness of the alliance on dramatic

display as ADF personnel worked tirelessly with their

US and British counterparts to carry out the evacuation

of Kabul. We got 4,100 people out. We could not have

evacuated one person without the support of the 4,000

United States troops on the ground. We are incredibly

grateful for that. Our partnership continues to grow. It

has gone through two world wars, a cold war, and recent

conflicts in the Middle East and everywhere in between.

A Deep Friendship

Our friendship has deepened in times of crises, and

importantly in times of peace. This month has marked

the 70th anniversary of the signing of the ANZUS treaty

– formalising that incredible Alliance. It also sees the 20th

anniversary of 9/11, where, within days of those appalling

terrorist attacks, ANZUS was invoked for the first time.

In the months ahead, we will reflect on what Australia

and the United States have achieved together, in those

times of war and in those times of peace.

We can see this in the rhetoric of CCP spokespersons

– which has become increasingly bellicose over recent

years. We can see it in the activities of the CCP which

have become increasingly coercive, driven by a zero-sum

mentality. Their activities undermine the sovereignty

of other nations and grate against the rules-based

international order; an order from which they have happily

benefited for decades.

I want to reflect on the Alliance today, the opportunities

for the future collaboration, and the crucial importance of

industry and business in supporting defence objectives.

Our region is the global epicentre of increased strategic

competition. Whatever transpires in the Indo-Pacific will

not purely affect the nations of our region. The ripples

as we know will be felt by others globally. That is why

all nations have an interest in ensuring the Indo-Pacific

remains stable and prosperous, open and inclusive and

that of course includes China. Australia wants a positive

and constructive relationship with China, but the onus

is now on the CCP to demonstrate – through words and

deeds – that China will contribute to the Indo-Pacific’s

stability, not to continue to undermine it.

The Alliance Today

The presence of the United States and its military forces

in our region has underpinned regional peace and

prosperity for decades. The United States recognises

its enduring role in this regard, having identified the Indo-

Pacific as its ‘priority theatre’ and through the Alliance,

we are building a network of partnerships. Countries

who have shared interests; countries who want to ensure

our region is safe and secure and countries who are

committed to preserving an absolutely necessary

peace - a peace which has driven, and continues to

drive, humanity forward for the benefit of all.

As we look toward the future, it becomes clear that

our Alliance is absolutely more important than ever.

We are grappling with a regional environment far-more

complex and far-less predictable than at any time since

the Second World War. The times in which we live have

echoes of the 1930s, but they also present their own

unique contemporary challenges.

In this endeavour, like-minded countries are increasingly

working together at the bilateral and multilateral levels. For

example, the Quad partnership – Australia, India, Japan

and the United States – has committed to expanding

safe, affordable, and effective vaccine production,

and its equitable access across the Indo-Pacific. The

Five Eyes remains a fundamental intelligence-sharing


relationship. One which has immense value in the broader

national security and policy realm. The Pacific Step-up is

Australia’s enduring commitment to supporting our near

neighbours in a range of areas – like capacity building,

humanitarian assistance, and disaster response.

We also want to work with Indonesia, with Singapore,

and other partners in Southeast Asia – building on our

already strong relationships and in so doing, supporting

ASEAN’s centrality in our regional security architecture.

I am focused on ensuring Australia’s military activities

contribute to stability and to peace: to protecting the

maritime trade corridors upon which we all rely and

prosper; to maintaining freedom of navigation and

overflight in accordance with the United Nations

Convention on the Law of the Sea and to deterring the

most egregious forms of coercion and aggression. That

is why we are working with the United States and our

like-minded friends. It is why I am eager to level-up our

defence engagement and our joint training initiatives.

The Australian Defence Force regularly undertakes bilateral

and multilateral defence training activities and

deployments. Like joint and trilateral passage exercise

in the region. Like Exercise Talisman Sabre. Like the

biennial Exercise Rim of the Pacific – hosted by the US

and which last year involved 10 nations, including seven

from the Indo-Pacific. Or like Exercise Malabar – hosted

by India but also involving Japan and United States. The

appetite for – indeed the necessity of – these defence

activities is increasing.

A core component of our collaboration is the US Force

Posture Initiatives. Since 2012, we have hosted US

marines in Darwin as part of a rotational force. The

number of marines has grown from 200 to over 2,000 –

I want to see that number increase further.

Another initiative is enhanced air cooperation between

our air forces, now in its fourth year. Given Australia’s

geographic location – our strategic position in the

Indo-Pacific – and our defence infrastructure in the

Northern Territory and Queensland, I think there is a

clear opportunity to strengthen the US Force Posture

Initiatives.

Future Collaboration

At the same time, there are clear opportunities to deepen

our two nations’ industrial base collaboration. We can

work even closer together on defence capabilities,

on infrastructure, on science and on technology. The

emergence of new and disruptive technologies is

altering the nature of warfare. The boundaries between

conflict and competition are becoming increasingly

blurred. The cyber realm, economics, trade, resources,

and digital media are but some areas being used as

coercive battering rams – or indeed, being weaponised

in new ways. Consequently, the arenas of tension have

expanded, making the prospect of military conflict sadly

less remote than in the past – especially as a result of

miscalculation or indeed misunderstanding.

We need to pool our know-how and resources in ways

that sustain our capability edge. That means maintaining

investment in our core military capabilities – like

submarines, frigates and fighter jets. While continuing

to develop capabilities to hold a potential adversary’s

forces and infrastructure at risk from a greater distance.

Capabilities which send a clear deterrent message to any

adversary: that the cost they would incur in threatening

our interests outweighs the benefits of so doing. These

include new long-range strike weapons, offensive and

defensive cyber, and area denial systems. And capabilities

which can be produced in bulk, more quickly and cheaply,

and where their loss would be more tolerable, without

significantly impacting our force posture.

I am referring to assets like autonomous craft and

remotely piloted drones. Assets which can undertake

multifaceted missions, be used in a swarm capacity, or

teamed with traditional manned capabilities for force

multiplier effects. The unmanned Loyal Wingman is I think

the most impressive military combat aircraft that we have

seen recently and to be designed in Australia for more

than half a century. It’s a partnership between the Royal

Australian Air Force and Boeing Australia. This aircraft

– and the underlying ecosystem of Australian industry –

is an insight into the potential of future capabilities and

what can be achieved in partnership.

Our Government’s investment in Australia’s defence


capabilities is not only an investment in our national

defence. It is an investment in the security of the region,

and that of our friends and neighbours. Investing in

deterrence is an important way to ensure countries in

our region choose diplomacy and negotiation to advance

their strategic goals, rather than coercion or conflict.

Australia is fortunate to be included in the US National

Technology and Industrial Base. My message to industry

and business is simple: for Australia and the United States

to achieve our force posture and defence capability

objectives, we need to work even more closely together.

That must include giving greater practical effect to

Australia’s inclusion in the US National Technology and

Industrial Base. It means both our governments and

defence industry sectors working to reduce barriers to

collaboration and integration.

The Role of Industry

Our respective national industries and small businesses

have unique skills. They are at the forefront of innovation in

certain fields, and they lead technological developments

in distinct areas. Through cooperation, we can surge

ahead, creating a whole that is far greater than the sum

of our parts. We can share ideas and resources, reduce

risks, and accelerate outcomes.

Australian industry has a lot to offer in support of US

supply chain diversification and resilience. As part of

the Australian Government’s Modern Manufacturing

Strategy, around $1.5 billion dollars is being invested to

scale up our manufacturing – to make it more competitive

and resilient.

Greater bilateral industrial cooperation will have mutual

economic and security benefits. It will see new jobs

created for both our nations across an array of sectors

and importantly it will encourage more small businesses

to enter the defence marketplace, affording opportunities

to work with prime companies on high-value and hightech

defence projects.

There is a real opportunity to build on existing success

in several areas. For example, more than 50 Australian

companies are contributing to the global F-35 Joint Strike


Fighter program, supporting US assets. These companies

have shared in more than $2.7 billion dollars’ worth

in contracts associated with the fighter’s production

and sustainment. Through joint capability projects, the

economic benefits can swing both ways.

We are also strengthening defence infrastructure

collaboration. We are advancing plans from last year’s

Australia-US Ministerial Consultations to establish a US

funded and commercially operated strategic military fuel

reserve in Darwin. We are buttressing mutual supply chain

security, for example in critical minerals and rare earths,

which have become a staple of sophisticated military

platforms. We know that supply chains for a number

of critical minerals are limited. Indeed, downstream

processing is concentrated almost entirely in China.

We are making good progress with an outcome from

AUSMIN – a plan of action to improve the security of

critical minerals.

Australia and the United States are undertaking

research and development of new capabilities in mutual

priority areas – like space, cyber, artificial intelligence,

hypersonics and directed energy weapons. Australia has

more than 100 science and technology arrangements

in place with the United States, and 50 currently being

negotiated. There are many opportunities to bolster our

collaboration. But let me conclude by highlighting one in

particular: Australia’s $1 billion investment into Sovereign

Guided Weapons and Explosive Ordnance Enterprise.

This initiative will do several things: it improves our

self-reliance, it develops our sovereign capacity to

manufacture, to test, and maintain sovereign guided

weapons; it will assure our stocks of critical precision

guided munitions and components; it will bolster

global supply chain resilience; it will further establish

interoperability with our Alliance partner; and it will

allow the Australian Defence Force to act with greater

independence.

Importantly, bilateral industry support for the enterprise

will be a practical demonstration of the strength of our

inclusion in the US National Technology and Industrial

Base.

The Hon Peter Dutton MP is the Australian Minister for Defence.

This is an edited extract of a speech to the American Chamber of

Commerce in Australia, September 8, 2021

CHINA

GOLD MEDAL

TOTALITARIANS

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

It may seem rather petty, but the Olympic medal count

is indicative of the obsessive preoccupations of the

Chinese Communist Regime. Throughout the recent

Olympics, Chinese media published the medal count

regularly. But when the United States edged China off

the top rung, the tables disappeared, only to be replaced

a few days later on State-controlled social media by a

new table that included Hong Kong and Taiwan in China’s

column, even though these two states are separately

represented at the Games. Not content with stealing

intellectual property from other nations, China now seeks

to claim the medals won by other countries.

No aspect of life is free of the totalitarian command in

China, as the financial and business world has learnt

recently. A combination of events has highlighted the

significant hazards of both investing in China and doing

business there.

The Chair of the US Securities and Exchange Commission,

Gary Gensler, recently warned about the risks of investing

in Chinese companies, observing that many American

investors don’t know enough about some Chinese

companies that are listed on US stock exchanges.

The Commission has already prevented public offerings

by Chinese companies until they boost disclosures.

Tellingly, many investors have failed to understand that

they have been buying shares in shell companies instead

of the actual Chinese businesses.

“That means disclosing the political and regulatory risk

that the government of China could, as they’ve done a

number of times recently, significantly change the rules in

the middle of the game,” Gensler said. “If the auditors of

Chinese operating companies don’t open up their books

and records in the next three years, the companies . . .

won’t be able to be listed here in the US.”

The related risk arises from China’s new five-year plan

for regulating the economy. The new rules, which tighten

the control of the communist regime over the domestic


economy, range from national security to technology.

Already some sectors have taken a significant hit, such

as the crackdown on the private providers of education

and school tuition. The sector is unlikely to ever recover.

Other businesses have also been in the firing line,

including giants such as Alilbaba and Didi. The value

of shares in a series of companies has fallen with an

estimated $1 trillion wiped off Chinese investments since

February. In the past week, a further $500 billion in market

value has been wiped off the Hong Kong and China

exchanges. The Nasdaq Golden Dragon China index,

which tracks 98 firms listed in America that predominantly

operate in China, has fallen by 50 % in the past six months.

Many western investors are re-examining exposure to

a regime that is ready to arbitrarily change the legal

rules. China’s new anti-foreign sanctions laws have also

sent a shiver through the world financial and business

community as they expose individuals and companies

operating in China to new sanctions as it expands its

legal warfare.

The consequences include a migration of companies

elsewhere, especially from Hong Kong, and a reordering

of supply chains to avoid China.

Investors and businesses are quickly discovering to their

chagrin that capitalism “with Chinese characteristics”

means totalitarian control by Xi Jinping’s CCP.

When added to China’s out-of-control property bubble,

which leaves economic growth dependent on real estate,

and significant State-owned enterprise and regional city

debts, China is no longer a magic pudding.

Worse, it has taken to arbitrarily jailing business

people and others, including Australian journalist

Cheng Lei, on trumped up charges - or none - for

supposed crimes against vague national security laws.

The revelation by the leader of the World Health

Organisation probe, Dr Peter Embarek, that the first

Covid-19 patient may have been infected by a bat while

working at the Wuhan lab and that the WHO had delayed

declaring an international emergency to appease China

has further strengthened international resolve.

Despite this, Xi continues his stealth war on the west,

using the situation in Afghanistan to further threaten

Taiwan, liking it to the fall of Saigon. But China has much

to fear in Afghanistan, especially if the regime returns

to a terrorist haven and supports groups like the East

Turkistan Islamic Movement in Xinjiang province. No

wonder the CCP is reaching out to the Taliban. Despite

the lure of rare earth minerals, China knows the history

of the Pakistani-backed Taliban. In past weeks, Pakistani

radicals have bombed Chinese facilities and killed

Chinese workers in the country.

Along with the continuing Wuhan cover-up, Xi’s ‘wolfwarrior’

diplomacy is turning sentiment against the CCP,

causing the President to urge his diplomats to project

a more “loveable” China. But like every aspect of China,

‘Xi thought on diplomacy’ begins with the command

to slavishly adhere to the CCP. The regime is clearly

worried about the heightened - and united - opposition

to its aggressive behaviour. The US is developing new

long range ‘Dark Eagle’ hypersonic missiles that travel

2,700 kilometres and are deployable to submarines and

destroyers. The Administration quickly reassured Taiwan

- and its allies - that it will protect the island republic.

Australia and other democracies must ensure this occurs.

Having woken India to its threats, and increasingly

annoyed Japan which is deploying missiles to nearby

Ishigaki island, the CCP faces a reinvigorated Quad. Even

the Philippines, a country which has a Mutual Defence

Treaty with the US, has increased its maritime activities

in the South China Sea. Anti-Chinese public sentiment

in South Korea has grown so quickly that a majority now

regard the CCP more unfavourably than their former

colonial ruler, Japan, with 58% rating China as ‘close

to evil’.

In what smacks of desperation, Xi’s regime has also

increased its disinformation campaigns. Weirdly, it

‘discovered’ a Swiss scientist to justify China’s stance

on the WHO investigation, only for it to be revealed the

person does not exist. Equally bizarrely, Chinese statecontrolled

media circulated a forged US government

document falsely claiming that former Secretary of State,


Mike Pompeo, had persuaded President Trump to avoid

military confrontation, even if China attacked Taiwan.

Despite the sabre-rattling in Beijing, Xi risks major defeat

if he decides to turn his stealth war into a real military

conflict. Having been blamed for the botched Afghanistan

withdrawal, the mood in much of Washington is not about

further defeat and humiliation.

This article was first published in the Spectator Australia, September

4, 2021

The Uyghur Tribunal and Human Rights

An independent inquiry into the persecution of the

Uyghurs in the Chinese province of Xinjiang concluded

in London last week. The Uyghur Tribunal concluded eight

days of sittings, hearing from more than 70 witnesses

and reading from 500 witness statements. Chaired

by Sir Geoffrey Nice QC, who prosecuted Slobodan

Milosevic before the International Criminal Tribunal for

the former Yugoslavia, the Tribunal has compiled the

most extensive data base on the issue. It is due to hand

down its judgement in December.

The reaction from the Chinese Communist Party was

predictable. Sir Geoffrey, a prominent human rights

defender, was described absurdly by CCP officials as

a “notorious human rights abuser and a British spy.”

Nice is one of several leading critics of the Chinese

regime to have been sanctioned by the CCP, including

Parliamentarians, Sir Iain Duncan Smith and Lord David

Alton. IDS, as Smith is known, described the sanction as

a badge of honour.

Despite the bellicose rhetoric of the CCP, and its

assertions that the million people in concentration

camps are being educated voluntarily, it ignored multiple

invitations to present its case. Most damaging for the CCP

is the documentary evidence that links Xi Jinping directly

to the repression. Even if the camps were closed, China

has created a massive electronic surveillance network

across Xinjiang utilising facial and voice recognition,

monitoring every movement of people’s lives outside

their homes. Phone calls and text messages are recorded

by the State, as are downloads to mobile phones. The

contents are analysed using sophisticated algorithms.

Artificial intelligence and biometric data are used to track

the movements of 15 million people. People who switch

off their phones or leave them at home are tracked and

interrogated. Family members of diaspora groups who

criticise the regime from overseas are threatened, jailed

or paraded on State television to denounce their relatives.

Just as it is doing in Tibet and Inner Mongolia, the CCP

is enforcing a policy to eliminate the local language and

culture.

The conclusion of the Tribunal’s hearings comes at the

same time as Xi Jinping reiterated his assertion that

human rights are not universal. Foreign Minister Wang

Yi had previously told the UN Human Rights Council

that concepts of ‘peace, development, equity, justice,

democracy and freedom’ could not be universally

interpreted.

In an article in the People’s Daily on the “Study of

Xi Jinping’s Thoughts on Socialism with Chinese

Characteristics”, the President responded to the

question: “Why should we take a clear stand against the

so-called ‘universal values’ of the West?” The doctrinaire

Xi repudiated the values of freedom, democracy and

human rights, asserting they created an ideological

fog. Applying his strict Marxist-Leninist ideology, he

argued these values were instrumental in demolishing

feudal autocracy but are now just tools for maintaining

the rule of capital.

Tellingly, he worries about how these values were used

to dismantle the Soviet Union and employed in the Arab

Spring and how they could be used to overthrow the

CCP! No wonder other totalitarian regimes, including

most Islamic autocracies, have sided with China over

the treatment of its Muslim population. In 2019, the

Organisation for Islamic Cooperation, representing 57

member states, commended “the efforts of the People’s

Republic of China in providing care for its Muslim citizens.”

Statements by such well-known citadels of freedom

and democracy - Cuba and Belarus – to the UN General

Assembly in 2020 and the UN Human Rights Council in

2021, commending China’s actions were supported by

Islamic autocracies. The latter statement was breathlessly

reported in the CCP mouthpiece the Global Times as

evidence of “the truth about Xinjiang” as opposed to


“rumours and lies made by the anti-China campaign.”

Xi’s increasingly insistence on ideological purity - in

schools and universities, even in kindergartens, as well as

public and now private enterprises - should be a warning

to the West, including those who believe investment in

China is the same as buying shares at home. In addition

to rejecting universal values, the CCP has also proclaimed

that Xi Jinping’s ‘Thought on the Rule of Law’ is the

central tenet of the law itself. In a new five-year directive,

the Central Committee of the CCP and the State Council

stated that “Party committees and governments at all

levels should study and understand XI Jinping thought

on the rule of law to implement the whole process and

all aspects of the construction of the rule of law.” Xi

Jinping ‘Thought’ is now infused into almost every aspect

of Chinese life. Even the religious institutions that are

permitted to operate under State license are instructed

to display photos of XI, sing patriotic songs and pray for

the “martyrs of the Red Army” in temples and churches.

“Xi’s increasingly insistence on

ideological purity . . . should

be a warning to the West,

including those who believe

investment in China is the same

as buying shares at home.”

Some observers are now suggesting that Xi’s crackdown

on all aspects of society, including global private

enterprises, is the imposition of a new cultural revolution,

a so-called ‘Cultural Revolution 2.1.’ The circumstances

of Mao Zedong’s Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution

which he launched in 1966, leading to the deaths of at

least a million people, and Xi’s “profound revolution” differ

greatly, but there is one common feature. The programs of

both Mao and Xi are centred on the accretion of personal

power. There is a ‘Xi Jinping Thought’ on almost every

aspect of Chinese life, including the construction of

public toilets! If the CCP is becoming nervous about

the growing rejection of its policies, it can blame Xi for

his aggression.

This article was originally published in the Spectator Australia,

September24, 2021


POLITICS

THE GREAT

CHALLENGE

/ KEVIN ANDREWS

The purpose of a political party is to win government,

but that is not an end in itself; it is merely an

instrument to a greater objective - a free people,

a safe and prosperous nation and (in the Aristotelian

sense) a happy people.

Politics is not a public relations exercise. It is

fundamentally a contest of ideas about what best

serves the national interest. It is the ability to evaluate

competing visions of the common good that marks

a truly great people.

Australia has had many good Liberal Prime Ministers, but

it has also had at least two great ones: Robert Menzies

and John Howard. I had the privilege of serving in

the Parliament during one of the great eras of reform

under John Howard. If you visit the Howard Library at

Old Parliament House, you will read on the wall at the

entrance a statement that Mr Howard made:

John Howard’s statement reflects Menzies’ observation,

that if you get the policies correct, the politics will follow.

Unlike Kevin Rudd, who began his Maiden Speech

saying that “Politics is about power. It is about

the power of the State,” I believe politics is about

empowering people. As I said in my Maiden Speech,

“the essential end of government is not power or glory,


but the good life for ordinary men and women. The

ordinary man, as I know him, asks for a happy life,

not a complaining one; for a full life, not an idle one.”

Which brings me to the great challenges we face if we

are to be successful in seeking to represent our fellow

Australians.

to be an active part of our great political movement.

But we must also recognise that this involves more than

criticising the Labor Party, especially when in Opposition.

It is often said that Oppositions do not win elections,

governments lose. This is partly true, but the Opposition

must be credible and believable to succeed.

First, we must engage more of them in the political

process. I am told that when Menzies and others formed

the Liberal Party in 1944, there were 200,000 members.

The population of Australia was just seven million people.

Today the membership of the party would be lucky to be

more than 50,000 people, while the national population

is 25 million. In other words, there were some 15 times

more members in the early years of the Party than there

are today. We are not alone, the same trend has afflicted

our major opponent, but we need to engage more of our

fellow Australians.

That means we must understand their challenges and

aspirations. In his ‘Forgotten People’ broadcast - perhaps

the most famous of Menzies’s speeches, he observed:

As Menzies said: “Opposition must be regarded as a great

constructive period in the life of a party, not a period in

the wilderness, but a period of preparation for the high

responsibilities in which you hope will come.”

Let me recount a sobering statistic. Since 1990 in the

States and Territories, Liberal/National parties have

only been in government for an average of 12 years.

While this varies from place to place, State and Territory

Liberal/National coalitions have only sat on the Treasury

benches for a little over one-third on average of the past

30 years. Only in one State, Western Australia, has the

Liberal Party been in government for more than 50%

of the time since 1990. Currently, it is likely to be some

time before the party is returned to government in WA.

I do not believe that the real life of this nation is to

be found either in great luxury hotels and the petty

gossip of so-called fashionable suburbs, or in the

officialdom of the organised masses. It is to be

found in the homes of people who are nameless

and unadvertised, and who, whatever their individual

religious conviction or dogma, see in their children

their greatest contribution to the immortality of

their race. The home is the foundation of sanity

and sobriety; it is the indispensable condition of

continuity; its health determines the health of society

as a whole.

These ‘forgotten people’ were the “salary-earners,

shopkeepers, skilled artisans, professional men and

women, farmers and so on,” said Menzies. They are

the people I represent in my multi-cultural electorate:

the Italian butcher, the Greek greengrocer, the Chinese

pharmacist, the Indian restauranteur, the Aussie

tradesman, the immigrants who struggle to ensure their

children can get a tertiary education, and so on. They

were John Howard’s ‘battlers’. Our challenge is to reach

out to these people, to engage with them, to demonstrate

our vision for them, and where possible, to invite them

Why is this important? Apart from learning how to live

with and manage the Covid pandemic, there are a series

of major challenges facing us. These include paying for

the significant debt we have incurred in response to

Covid; ensuring the rule of law is maintained and peace

and stability preserved in the face of an increasingly

aggressive Chinese Communist Party; and addressing

domestic challenges including the substantial blow-out

in the costs of the NDIS. In addition, inflation is rising

globally, which if it continues, will impact us as well.

As John Howard said, how we in Australia respond

to these challenges will be determined by the ruling

philosophy and values of the parties in government. It is

why we must, in Howard’s words, portray and argue for

our vision of the common good. This is more than how

we respond to each program or proposal that is mooted.

It is about our vision for the way of life for Australians.

If the people understand and trust our values, they are

more likely to trust specific proposals. It is our task to

argue for the type of Australia, we envisage for the future.

This is an edited extract from an address to the ACT Young Liberals,

August 7, 2021.


Proportion of Time in Government 1990-2021


AUSTRALIA’S HOT TOPICS IN NEWS,

CURRENT AFFAIRS AND CULTURE.

VOLUME 9 NUMBER 3

Authorised by Kevin Andrews MP, Liberal Party of Australia, Level 1, 651 Doncaster Road, Doncaster, VIC 3108

Printed by MMP, 10 Charnfield Ct, Thomastown VIC 3074


Australian Polity, Volume 9 Number 3 - Digital Version

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