#downunder

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We hear a lot about the independence of our central bank, but not so much of their political bias. The RBA funded right wing think tanks for decades. These are the intellectual influencers dedicated to promulgating neoliberalism and anti-unionism downunder. If you want to know why the gap between rich and poor has widened so immensely in Australia look no further than  these institutions and their influence upon the Aussie economy over the last 30 years.

“And in 2020, the RBA said it had been paying the Centre for Independent Studies, and the Sydney Institute, $20,000 a year each since 2006 to support their work, but it hadn't provided similar support to left-leaning think tanks.”

- (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-02/sally-mcmanus-actu-thirty-year-war-against-unions/101458318)

Right Wing Think Tanks Funded By Big Mining Companies

The H.R. Nicholls Society was formed over 1985 and early 1986 by a group of men who strongly opposed Australia's arbitration and centralised wage fixing system at the time. They wanted to see major change. The group were Peter Costello (now the Nine chairman), former treasury secretary John Stone, the director of the Australian Wool Selling Brokers Employers' Federation, Barrie Purvis, and Western Mining Corporation's Ray Evans.

Ms McManus said there had been a "30-year war" against Australia's unions and that war hadn't ended.

That startling phrase was a reference to a 2014 speech by Eric Abetz, the then-employment minister in the Abbott Coalition Government.”

- (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-02/sally-mcmanus-actu-thirty-year-war-against-unions/101458318) Aussie Right Wing Media Slammed Union Corruption

I witnessed the decades of anti-union campaigning, which targeted the predominantly right wing media in Australia. Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp controls most of the print and other forms of legacy media downunder. There is no real progressive voice in the Australian media landscape. The ABC used to partially fill this role but has been silenced via conservative lobbying and LNP federal governments over recent years. A heavily disproportionate media focus on unproven union corruption went on for years. Bill Shorten copped masses of undue slurs and criticism for accusations which were never proven. The effect was that many ordinary Australians believed that unions were a bad lot. I come across these beliefs and attitudes in the workplace today. Many of the younger workers cannot remember the times when unions played a major role in defending Australian culture from avaristic businesses and development. This is a great pity in my view.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fH2EmC8TO-o Right Wing Neoliberalism Has Defined The Last Few Decades Downunder

We now find ourselves in an Australian economy defined by decades of neoliberalism, where a few made vast profits at the expense of the many. Public assets have ben sold off to create oligarchic billionaires at home and abroad. Our energy utilities are an illustrative example of this with SE Asian billionaires controlling many of the companies in this space now. The transition to renewables has to negotiate with these corporate players and much of Australia is ignorant to this fact. Ordinary workers have been shafted by the economic times if they have not become shareholders in the right companies along the way. Residential property prices in Australia have been inflated to a huge degree. Rents have followed suit making having a roof over your head an expensive business downunder. The RBA funded right wing think tanks for decades. This makes it easy to see what side the power elite were on throughout the last 30 years. The ‘so-called’ trickle down effect has proven to be not enough to live on in 2026.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/430048935923399/posts/525359389725686

The Wealthy Look After The Wealthy

The wealthy look after the wealthy. The RBA was actively supporting a right wing economic and political view of the country. They and governments were not providing unbiased governance. It has been the right way or the highway, folks. Soaring costs of living have chased super high house prices and we are in the midst of a prolonged housing crisis and endemically sluggish GDP growth. Obviously, the RBA’s neoliberal vision has not proved to be the universal panacea the right wing think tanks promised it would be.

The Coming Revenge Of The Young

Young people in Australia are about to take their revenge at the ballot box. Get ready for progressives to take the greed of the baby boomer generation to task over things like negative gearing, the capital gains tax discount, superannuation tax minimisation by the wealthy, and a host of other failures to tax wealth in Australia. PM Anthony Albanese is the last of the moderates too afraid to make the changes required to even the playing field in Australia. A new generation of political leaders are coming. Why should young Australians have to work 3 jobs just to get by, whilst the propertied class wine and dine to their heart’s content? Real change is coming folks.

Rise Of The Asset Rich Class

“The rise of the billionaire class presents our societies with new challenging questions. Is it OK for private individuals to accumulate billions? Everyday people may think to themselves, I want to be able to accrue as much wealth as I can through my life, unhindered by governments. Unfortunately, the unfettered accumulation of vast wealth goes beyond simplistic equations like this. For instance, once a certain level of wealth is reached the growth of that wealth becomes exponential. Rich people make lots of money on the back of their ability to purchase assets that appreciate. Property, especially, residential property in places like Australia has been on a boom cycle of appreciation over the last 30 years. It has become the single greatest divider between rich and poor in this country.”

- (https://www.midasword.com.au/is-it-ok-for-private-individuals-to-accumulate-billions/)

Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of What Price Life?; America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump; and other titles. NOW AVAILABLE AT APPLE BOOKS & GOOGLE PLAY BOOKS. Google Play Books AUDIOBOOK

©MidasWord

australia travel guide: plan your dream down under trip 🦘🌊

hey wanderlust souls, if australia's calling your name, let's break down how to make it happen without the overwhelm. this is your no-fluff guide to the land of oz.

timing it right

sep-nov: spring blooms + fewer crowds in the outback

dec-feb: peak summer for bondi beach days & great barrier reef dives

jun-aug: winter whale watching on the coast, milder in the north

iconic itinerary stops

sydney: opera house selfies, bridge climb, ferry to manly

melbourne: laneway art, great ocean road roadtrip (twelve apostles!!)

uluru-kata tjuta: sacred site sunrises, cultural tours with anangu guides

queensland: cairns for reef snorkel, daintree rainforest hikes

tasmania: wineglass bay, cradle mountain wilderness

eat + experience

brekkie: avo toast or vegemite (love it or hate it)

indigenous culture: dreamtime stories, bush tucker tours

wildlife: kangaroo island for roos/koalas, ningaloo for manta rays

practical hacks

visa: electronic travel authority (eta) app – quick & easy

transport: campervan for freedom, qantas/virgin for flights, greyhound buses

safety: slip slop slap (sunscreen!), watch for rip currents, respect wildlife distances

budget breakdown: hostels $30-60/night, mid-range $150+, activities $50-200 each

The neocons in Australia keep spruiking stuff about their culture wars but in reality the nation has rejected them. The truth about the Liberal Party is that the electorate has given a succession of their leaders the old heave ho. Former PM John Howard in Bennelong was ousted in 2007. “Howard had held the Bennelong seat for 33 years and has been the prime minister for 11 years. He becomes the first Australian prime minister in 78 years to be dropped by his constituency, and only the second in history.” - (https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2007/12/1/howard-loses-parliament-seat) Tony Abbott, another briefly former PM and Liberal leader was rejected by voters in Warringah in 2019. “One of the Liberals’ leading conservatives and Australia’s 28th prime minister, Tony Abbott, has lost his blue-ribbon Sydney seat of Warringah after moderate Liberal voters abandoned him in protest at the role he played in opposing climate change action.” - (https://www.theguardian.com/global/2019/may/18/australian-election-tony-abbott-loses-his-warringah-seat-to-zali-steggall) Now, Peter Dutton the latest leader of the Liberal Party has likewise been sent packing by the voters in Dickson in 2025. “For the past three years, when peers of Australia's former Liberal Party leader Peter Dutton were grilled over his divisive persona, they'd often profess his celebrity status in the north. "Peter is one of us… He's very popular in Queensland," said the leader of the Nationals, the Liberal's coalition partner, earlier this year. But on election night, it was Dutton's home state that delivered Labor its election win, with the red landslide ousting the veteran MP from his own seat of Dickson.” - (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgxg6x2vv4o)

Hard Truths About The Liberal Party Of Australia

What is that saying about cutting off the head of the snake? The Australian people have been busy rejecting the version of the Liberal Party embodied by these hard Right idealogues. They have done this in response to what they and their party have done to the nation whilst in government. John Howard has been responsible for the taxation changes which have made residential property in Australia so inflated and unaffordable for many, especially younger Aussies. Slashing the capital gains tax with a 50% discount. “Also, how negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount delivered massive tax breaks to the rich at the expense of affordable housing for the rest of Australia.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbvDNXqsDBE Negative Gearing: A Little History “Negative gearing has a long history in Australia. It was introduced in 1936 to encourage housing investment and increase supply, but it has been the subject of political debate ever since. Past attempts to reform the policy have produced mixed results. In 1985, the Hawke government limited negative gearing by stopping investors from using rental losses to offset income. However, this decision was reversed just two years later after housing shortages and rising rents. More recently, Labor attempted to curtail the policy during the 2016 and 2019 federal elections, proposing that the tax benefits should only apply to new housing.” - (https://www.moneymag.com.au/controversial-history-of-negative-gearing)

Shale Gas Exploration by K A is licensed under CC-BY-SA 2.0 Politicians Giving Away The Farm Downunder Australia has a long tradition of being pro-investment, as historically we were a newly colonised nation with lots of land but little else. Governments have been at pains to emphasise pro-investment strategies over the centuries. We still see this in the notoriously bad deals cut with mining multinationals, which favour them with huge tax subsidies to encourage their investment in Australia. National GDP figures include the dollar amounts of gas and minerals sold by these corporations whether the country actually gets a share via royalties and taxes or not. Someone needs to tell these politicians and bureaucrats that the game has changed and public expectation is that Australians actually get something for our resources and not just the very modest volume of jobs generated by their extraction.

The Decimation Of The Far Right Liberals The truth about the Liberal Party is that their shift to the far right has proven to be more and more unpopular. The Temu Trump phenomenon has been brewing for some time. Peter Dutton as the strongman leader of Oz via his unrelenting divisive attacks on anyone who was not essentially a white bloke living in the outer suburbs has seen the Liberal Party fall to its lowest level of elected representatives ever. Robert Menzies would be spinning in his grave. Women and young people in Australia do not identify with Liberal party policies or their general flavour. The average Liberal Party voter is a bloke in his 70’s and  the average Australian voter is a 37 YO woman. This equation spells big problems for them unless they change tack. The move of Jacinta Nampijinpa Price from the Nationals to the Libs is not a sign that this remedial shift is going to occur any time soon. This hardline Trumpian politician represents the extremist side of the conservative front downunder. As long as Donald Trump is wreaking havoc in the US and globally these radical right wing populist politicians will be on the nose in Australia. “The LNP Coalition in Australia is a right wing political party, no longer in the mould of its founder Robert Menzies. Its current leader Peter Dutton continues to take the LNP further right via divisive commentary and policies. Why they call Dutton ‘Temu Trump’? Peter, like many on the right, see Donald Trump as an inspirational model for extremist anti-government behaviour. Blame the government for everything is a popular sentiment in America.” - (https://www.midasword.com.au/why-they-call-dutton-temu-trump/)

New Leader Of Libs A Woman Sussan Ley has been elected the new leader of the Liberal Party of Australia. The question is whether she will be window dressing or an indicator that the Libs are moving back to the centre? “Sussan Ley been elected as the new leader of the Liberal Party. “ - (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-05-13/federal-politics-live-blog-albanese-ministry-liberal-leadership/105285002) Robert Sudha Hamilton is the author of America Matters: Pre-apocalyptic Posts & Essays in the Shadow of Trump. ©MidasWord