First published by The Australian

This Intergenerational Report paints a disturbing picture of an economy smaller than expected, growing slower than before and saddled with at least four more decades of debt and deficits.

First published by The Australian Financial Review.

The strong and welcome jobs numbers released last week were a tribute to Australians who have overwhelmingly done the right thing by each other to limit the spread of COVID-19.

First published by The Australian

The credit for last week’s jobs figures and Australia’s performance during the pandemic and its aftermath belongs to our people, who have done an outstanding job limiting the spread of the virus. But by bungling the vaccine rollout their federal government risks squandering the momentum and opportunities that flow from that achievement.

First published by The Australian

On the first day of May 2003, barely six weeks after the Americans entered Iraq, George W Bush stood on the decks of an aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln, dwarfed by an enormous banner that read “Mission Accomplished”.

First published by the Australian Financial Review.

On paper, the economy is expected to return to growth in the September and December quarters, but off an incredibly low base. While a return to growth is obviously necessary and welcome, this won’t be enough to undo the lasting damage that’s been done to the economy and the labour market so far this year.

Originally published by InQueensland.

This week, many thousands of Queenslanders eschewed the time-honoured Australian tradition of queueing in the hot election-day sun – a flurry of political paraphernalia in one hand, democracy sausage in the other – to cast their vote for the next Queensland government in pre-poll stations across the state.

Originally published by InQueensland.

A week before the Federal Budget I was in a Cairns coffee shop listening to Troy, a local business owner and employer, despair about Scott Morrison and the Federal LNP’s decision to start unwinding their support in the local economy.

Originally published by InQueensland.

There is rarely a single thing that turns an election; infrequently one defining insight into our leaders.  Campaigns are won on the accumulation of effort and perceptions building towards the decision voters make in a cramped cardboard booth holding a little stubby pencil.

Originally published by InQueensland.

When the Allman family laid the cornerstone for Warwick’s Criterion Hotel in 1917, Australia was on the cusp of what could be described as our first nationwide domestic disaster. Not long after, the Spanish flu pandemic would strike a nation still processing the trauma and loss of the First World War.

Originally published in the Australian Financial Review

In boardrooms right around Australia, well before most people had heard of the novel coronavirus, and now in Zoom rooms throughout the crisis itself, one issue has come up almost every time: our country’s longstanding energy policy paralysis and its consequences for business costs and investor certainty.