A Christmas gift of less regulation

~ Andrew Norton ~ 2 Comments

The most comically titled minister in the Rudd government is my local member, the Minister for Finance and Deregulation. Every government comes to office promising to reduce onerous regulations; every government leaves office having increased them.

But in a Christmas gesture, regulation is actually being reduced. From today grannies can take their knitting needles on flights, and nail files and metal cutlery are also back. Now if only they could get rid of those ridiculous explosive residue tests as well…

Merry Christmas.

Melbourne’s disappearing milk bars

~ Andrew Norton ~ 38 Comments

Last Saturday, as I have almost every Saturday over the last decade, I went into the milk bar at the corner of Barkly St and Canning St in Carlton to buy the papers. On the verge of tears, the owner told me that this would be the last time I’d do so. Not by choice, they were closing down.

milkbar resave
The cnr Barkly St and Canning St milk bar on its last trading day, 20 December 2009
Continue reading “Melbourne’s disappearing milk bars” →

Australia’s statist right-wingers

~ Andrew Norton ~ 24 Comments

This morning The Australian published my contribution to their What’s Right series, based on the political identity survey many of you contributed to earlier in the year.

Perhaps my main achievement is getting a newspaper to print the terms ‘classical liberal’ and ‘libertarian’ rather than blurring them with ‘the conservatives’. Unfortunately, however, when it comes to electoral politics ‘conservative’ is not such a bad catch-all term.

Various surveys over the years have asked voters to rate themselves on a 0 (left) to 10 (right) political scale. In the Australian Survey of Social Attitudes 2007 I classed the right as people putting themselves 7-10 on the scale and looked at their opinions on various issues. They were about 20% of the sample.

Social issues Continue reading “Australia’s statist right-wingers” →

Religion’s political influence (or lack thereof)

~ Andrew Norton ~ 13 Comments

Most Australians believe in God, but is that a politically significant fact?

Earlier in the year, I argued that while churchgoers have a consistent bias towards Coalition voting, a dwindling number of Australians were attending church. I was sceptical of the electoral impact of churches like Hillsong.

The Age this morning draws attention to an Australian Journal of Political Science article by University of Sydney academic Rodney Smith which argues more generally against the electoral influence of the churches, at least for the 2007 election.

Smith examined electoral statements from religious groups and found considerable variety in issues covered and perspectives taken. They tend to not specifically recommend a vote, though sometimes a preferred choice is implied. He notes that many church leaders would want to avoid alienating their supporters who do not share their political views. This is an important point I think. Religions are in a spiritual buyer’s market for both believers and attenders, which will tend to put a constraint on their politicking. Continue reading “Religion’s political influence (or lack thereof)” →

Australian belief in higher and other powers

~ Andrew Norton ~ 6 Comments

The Fairfax broadsheets yesterday ran the results of an ACNielsen survey on Australian religious beliefs, along with views on astrology, ESP, UFOs and witches (a somewhat provocative collection of topics).

Just over two-thirds of us believe in God or a ‘universal spirit’, while 24% do not and 6% aren’t sure. The number of non-believers exceeds the census finding of 19% of us with ‘no religion’. While the ‘not stated’ census category (it’s an optional question) presumably hides atheists and agnostics, the Nielsen survey reports that 11% are non-believers who consider themselves ‘culturally Christian’. The ‘no religion’ response in the census is only a rough proxy for the number of non-believers.

A quarter of Christians believe that the Bible is literally true, while half the believers of other religions see their major text as literally true. Belief in miracles (63%) is stronger than belief in Heaven (56%) or – conveniently, for the nation’s sinners – Hell (38%). Continue reading “Australian belief in higher and other powers” →

Quadrant’s funding problem

~ Andrew Norton ~ 30 Comments

Yesterday I received a ‘we wuz robbed’ letter from Quadrant complaining that its Australia Council literature grant had been cut from $50,000 to $35,000.

Quadrant editor Keith Windschuttle is calling the decision ‘patently political’. Given that left-leaning periodicals have had their funding maintained – particularly Overland which keeps its $60,000 despite coming out only four times a year instead of Quadrant’s ten, and having a far less distinguished poetry editor (Keri Glastonbury to Quadrant‘s Les Murray) – that looks like a fair call in the absence of any contrary explanation from the Australia Council. [Update 21/12: Crikey reports the Australia Council saying Quadrant was cut for having too small a group of literary writers.]

On the other hand, I’m not a big fan of these kinds of subsidies. It’s not just my usual philosophical objections to big government (and in the scheme of big government, a few hundred thousand dollars for magazines doesn’t make much difference). The Australia Council props up nine little magazines serving a small audience for literary material. Arguably this makes it harder for any of them to get the critical mass of contributors and readers needed for a high-quality, self-sustaining literary magazine. A few of them going out of business could help the rest. Continue reading “Quadrant’s funding problem” →

Should the whole censorship regime be relaxed?

~ Andrew Norton ~ 7 Comments

There is plenty of negative reaction across the ideological spectrum to Stephen Conroy’s internet censorship plans. You can go to the Fairfax website to cast your vote on it.

I agree that Conroy’s plan should be rejected entirely. But though there are special concerns that the Conroy firewall will catch innocent material and slow the internet, what it is essentially trying to do is enforce the existing censorship regimes (state and federal). If these regimes are worth having, then trying to enforce them is not ridiculous in principle, and the debate is just about the technical issues.

I’m not going to mention in any detail the contents that lead films to get the RC (Refused Classification) rating that Conroy is targeting, as it will cause my blog to get caught by the voluntary filters some firms, homes and public computers use. But you can read them at this link. Some of the sexual material that is banned is gross, but I am not convinced it should be censored. Another more extreme classification could guide consumers of standard X-rated films away from practices they don’t want to see.

This is an opportunity for a broader debate about the role of government in deciding what Australians can and cannot see.

Government confident unis will accept a bad deal

~ Andrew Norton ~ 6 Comments

DEEWR’s latest higher education newsletter, published today, mostly summarises prior announcements. But there was one statement worth noting:

The Government will announce the details of the review of base funding levels in 2010. While it is for the review to consider the appropriate level of base funding, … early estimates of over enrolments for Commonwealth supported places in 2010 suggests that universities will increase their number of Government funded places while being funded at current rates.

What this effectively says is that the government does not need to increase per student funding rates because universities will be stupid enough to keep enrolling more students even while the government keeps slashing their real funding.

I despair at the lack of political strategy and skill in the higher education sector.