On Monday, Greens leader Adam Bandt announced that a deal had been reached with the government to pass Safeguard Mechanism with some key amendments. Richard Denniss is just back from Parliament House to help explain the deal and what it means for Australia’s emissions. This was recorded on Monday 27th March 2023 and things may

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, just released a report with a a very clear message; there is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all. One of the key messages in the report is that new fossil fuel projects are incompatible with a net zero

The Federal Government’s recent announcement that the AUKUS deal will cost an eye-watering $368 billion sent the media into a spin, with former PM Paul Keating calling it ‘the worst deal in all history.” The deal to acquire nuclear submarines from the United States has been a bumpy process, to say the least. But what

Superannuation is supposed to help us save for our retirement, and tax concessions on super are meant to reduce the burden on the government to fund our retirement through the age pension. But what are these concessions, and are they really working in the way they are intended to? To help explain, we’re talking to

Australians are doing it tough at the moment, with cost of living soaring, real wages falling at a record pace, and the RBA’s nine back-to-back interest rate rises only making things harder, all in the name of reducing inflation. Some commentators are warning of a ‘wage price spiral’. But what is really driving inflation? This

The Climate Integrity Summit 2023 brought together leading experts to discuss and address integrity risks that could jeopardise Australia’s emissions reduction policies. The Australia Institute’s Polly Hemming unpacked what climate integrity really is, and why it is the antidote to the Australian government’s state-sponsored greenwash. This was recorded on Wednesday 15th February 2023 and things

The RBA recently raised interest rates again for the ninth time in a row, in an effort to reduce inflation. But is the pain the interest rate rises causing worth it? And could they do anything else instead? This was recorded on Wednesday 8th February 2023 and things may have changed since recording. The Australia

The new ‘Build Your Own Budget’ tool released by the Parliamentary Budget Office reveals that despite how all-or-nothing the debate about the Stage 3 tax cuts has become, the $300bn cost of the tax cuts over 9 years provides an opportunity for the Albanese government to amend the tax cuts and also increase support for

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. Australian governments have committed to tackling the twin climate and biodiversity crises but continue to subsidise and approve fossil fuels and habitat destruction. While simple policy solutions exist, governments are instead relying on over-complicated market-based solutions to conceal the

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. Last year, the Greens introduced a bill to establish a ‘climate trigger’ in Australia’s environment laws which would force the government to take into account the climate impacts of fossil fuel projects. This was recorded on Wednesday 21st September

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. Andrew Quilty was one of a handful of Western journalists who stayed in Kabul as the city fell. His new book August in Kabul his first-hand account of those dramatic final days. This was recorded on Wednesday 3rd August 2022

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. Pacific Island nations are on the front line of climate change, and as Australia celebrates the passage of the 43% climate bill, Pacific leaders want to know that the new Australian Government’s improved rhetoric on climate is matched by

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. The Federal Election earlier this year was considered by many to be the Integrity Election, with many including the Teal independents campaigning on integrity issues, including a federal anti-corruption commission. In retrospect, these issues won many new seats, and

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. The Uluru Statement from the Heart is an invitation to the Australian people to walk with First Nations people to create a better future. It is a gift: a strategic roadmap to peace, where all Australians can come together

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. Earlier in the year the Australia Institute hosted Nobel Laureate Professor Joseph Stiglitz for a speaking tour of Australia. In this episode he, Richard, and Ebony discussed the need to expand the role of governments, unions, and civil society.

Our summer podcast series brings you some of the best conversations from our webinars in 2022. A prime minister in the making, and a nation on the move. In Lone Wolf, Katharine Murphy offers a new portrait of Anthony Albanese. She reveals a leaderwho has always had to think three steps ahead, who was an insurgent for

It goes without saying, but 2022 was a hell of a year, from war in Europe, to a federal election, two state elections, two budgets, and the death of Queen Elizbeth. To refresh your memories, Ebony is taking a look back at the year, and all the chaos and progress it brought. This was recorded

This week*, Duncan and Mark review 2002’s Minority Report, directed by Steven Spielberg and starring Tom Cruise along with Colin Farrell, Samantha Morton, Max von Sydow (a regular on this podcast) and Neal McDonough. This is a film loosely based on Isaac Asimov’s short story The Minority Report. Seriously, by loosely we mean that the

A report from the Australia Institute’s Democracy & Accountability Program represents the largest and most comprehensive domestic study of the practice of cronyism in relation to appointments to a government agency ever conducted in Australia. This was recorded on Wednesday 12th October 2022 and things may have changed since recording. The Australia Institute // @theausinstitute

What happens when your pet dog has a disagreement with your laptop? You can’t publish this week’s episode last week like you were supposed to! Despite the delay (we’re very sorry, comrades), it’s Wall-E time! And what perfect timing given recent events – Wall-E depicts an idiotic future that only someone like Elon Musk could

New research shows Australian workers are on average working 6 weeks unpaid overtime per year, costing over $92 billion dollars in unpaid wages across the economy. 2022 marks the fourteenth annual Go Home on Time Day (GHOTD), an initiative of the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute that shines a spotlight on overwork

To combat persistently low wages growth, the Government has put forward its Secure Jobs Better Pay Bill, currently before the Senate. The most contentious reform within the Bill is ‘multi-employer bargaining’. We’ve heard employer groups call it a ‘seismic shift that will increase strikes’. On the other hand, unions are calling the reforms moderate. What

Climate is dominating headlines worldwide as COP27, the United Nations annual climate conference, begins in Egypt.

The October Budget delivers on a range of welcome bread & butter commitments, but has deferred solving Australia’s meat and potatoes revenue problems. So who are the winners and losers, and what are the missed opportunities? This was recorded on Thursday 27th October 2022 and things may have changed since recording. The Australia Institute //

US military imperialism, meet your biggest threat: a full-scale Soviet invasion force on your Latin-American doorstep. This film also features a highly advanced extraterrestrial lifeform hunting humans for sport. Only one man, and his crack special forces team of muslce-bound misogynists, can put an end to both. Yesterday’s Tomorrow Today is sponsored by the Carmichael

Gas companies in Australia made up to $40 billion in windfall profits in the last year due to the war in Ukraine, and global price spikes. There are growing calls for a windfall profits tax to claw back some of these war profits, to fund essential services in Australia. This was recorded on Tuesday 18th

In our third episode, Duncan and Mark dive into the 1997 sci-fi noir, Gattaca. Duncan skips out on the squirmy bits, but both our podcasters ultimately complete the viewing of this underrated film with a sense that the eugenicist strive to perfection that so often infiltrates the thinking of tech companies is perhaps not a

As pressure builds for the Albanese government to scrap the promised Stage Three tax cuts, discussion has shifted around who would lose out. The Australian said it would mean “2.5 million middle income Australians will pay thousands of dollars in additional tax,” but describes middle income Australians as individuals earning between $120,000 and $160,000 a

In Episode 2, Duncan and Mark review Starship Troopers, the 1997 Paul Verhoeven and Ed Nieumeyer film that is part tragedy, part comedy, all comment on the farce that is a future in which Nazis have been normalised and the cast of Melrose Place do humanity’s shooting, spaceship driving and brain-bug hunting. Yesterday’s Tomorrow Today

Pacific Island nations are on the front line of climate change, and as Australia celebrates the passage of the 43% climate bill, Pacific leaders want to know that the new Australian Government’s improved rhetoric on climate is matched by policy integrity when it comes to new gas and coal projects and exports. Join Their Excellencies