Democracy & Accountability

Bill Browne

On the 10th of September 1996, two very different politicians rose at the same time to give their first speeches to Parliament, Bob Brown and Pauline Hanson. The Greens and One Nation have become fixtures of Australian politics. The Greens have almost always had more electoral success and many more parliamentarians than One Nation.

Bill Browne

Earlier this year, an Australia Institute freedom of information (FOI) request revealed that the Attorney-General’s Department had been holding back information from the public. Their apparent motive was to escape tricky questions at Senate Estimates, the rare opportunity that democratically elected representatives get to ask questions of government officials.

Amy Remeikis

What Albanese keeps missing is that the chaos is now the point. We have covered this in this column since before the last election. Keep offering people the same stuff that’s not working (and arguably never has) and people will eventually turn to a disruptor.

Richard Denniss

One Nation’s historic victory in the once safe Labor seat of Secret Harbour was of no more surprise than their recent defeat of the Liberals in the Farrer by-election, but the failure of the Greens to pick up any of the votes Labor is shedding has attracted far less attention.