Centre for Independent Studies

Britain after Brexit

Pundits all too often call political fiascos “circuses.” But rarely does a political class oblige by providing several rings of entertainment at once. Such has been the British Conservative government’s attempts to leave the European Union by April 12.
Meanwhile, the Tories under Prime Minister Theresa May plunge into one melodrama after another. The British Labour Party under socialist Jeremy Corbyn has vacillated and equivocated over Brexit. As for the British public, their trust in Westminster has dissipated dramatically since the 52%-48% referendum to leave nearly three years ago.
To get an up-to-date analysis of Brexit, Alexander Downer, former foreign minister (1996-07) and high commissioner in Britain (2013-18) and Tim Montgomerie, founder of ConservativeHome, a centre-right political blog in the UK, and former editorial page editor of The Times joined us at the CIS for a conversation with our director Tom Switzer.
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Bulletproof Problem Solving - Robert McLean

Managing Partner of McKinsey, Robert McLean AM and Belinda Hutchinson AM, Chancellor of the University of Sydney were at the CIS for the launch of Bulletproof Problem Solving: The One Skill That Changes Everything (Wiley). Co-authored by CIS director Robert McLean AM and Charles Conn.
"Navigating ambiguity and solving complex problems creatively is the truth test for humans to complement rather than substitute the artificial intelligence of computers. Without much better approaches to teach those skills, our schools risk preparing second class robots rather than first class humans. Rob McLean and Charles Conn show that this can be done and provide an intuitive roadmap for how to do this, with lots of real-world examples that make it fun" – Andreas Schleicher, Director for the Directorate of Education and Skills, OECD
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China and Free Societies

Join John Lee, former senior advisor to foreign minister Julie Bishop and senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington alongside James Laurenceson, acting director of the Australia China Relations Institute for a wide-ranging discussion. Moderated by Sue Windybank, convenor of a new CIS project on China and free societies.
For decades, it was widely held that China’s economic progress would create the internal conditions for a more democratic regime that would be more stable and less of a potential global threat. But Beijing has not followed the “end of history” script.
So have we been naive about China? Is Australia’s longstanding pragmatism—putting differences aside to focus on shared interests—still tenable? To what extent does Beijing threaten our national sovereignty? And how can we best preserve political autonomy in a regional order that increasingly revolves around China?
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Elections 2019: Do Third Parties Really Matter?

One of the major battlegrounds in the upcoming NSW state election will be for the Upper House. After March 23, centre-right minor parties are likely to hold the balance of power.
It raises the issue of why third parties matter. As the broader Liberal-National coalition shows increasing signs of splintering, what third party best represents the path to a sound governing and legislative agenda at both state and federal levels?
Mark Latham, former federal Labor leader and One Nation candidate, Senator David Leyonhjelm, outgoing Liberal Democratic Party senator and LDP candidate along with Dr Greg Walsh, Australian Conservatives candidate are all vying for seats in the NSW Upper House this election and formed our panel.
Miranda Devine Columnist for the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph moderated the panel and delved into that question of why third parties matter.
Who best represents the path to a sound governing and legislative agenda at both state and federal levels?
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Amanda Stoker: The future of Liberalism

Queensland LNP Senator Amanda Stoker visited the CIS for our first Leadership Lunch of 2019.
With a strong desire to see Australia return to a country of opportunity based on centre-right beliefs, Senator Stoker hopes to actively engage with Australian’s on social issues and not just on its traditional economic strengths, suggesting that Australia’s current cultural trends reflect the centre-right’s abdication of this responsibility over the last two decades. Senator Stoker represents the young, fresh face of free speech and traditional values in a party she says has ‘vacated the field’ out of shame.
Amanda Stoker has been a LNP senator for Queensland since March 2018.
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NSW State election preview: Nick Greiner & Bob Carr

As NSW prepares for the March 23 election, the “premier state” is in reasonably good condition. Retail spending and business investment are up, the budget is at $1.1 billion surplus and unemployment is at 4.3 per cent. Meanwhile, Sydney’s major public projects — from the new Sydney Metro to the WestConnex underground motorway scheme and Sydney Light Rail — are well underway.
And yet opinion polls show that the Coalition and Labor are neck and neck. Why? Are federal factors at play? What distinguishes Liberal premier Gladys Berejiklian from the Labor Opposition leader Michael Daley? Is either party committed to productivity-enhancing economic reform?
Nick Greiner, former NSW Liberal premier from 1988 to 1992, Bob Carr, former NSW Labor premier from 1995 to 2005 and host Brigid Glanville, ABC’s NSW political reporter, were at the CIS to discuss the state of the state.
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Leeward: A Memoir: Geoffrey Lehmann

Join former High Court justice Michael Kirby and Geoffrey Lehmann for the launch of Leeward: A Memoir (NewSouth) at the CIS.
Geoffrey Lehmann has been one of Australia’s leading poets and tax lawyers for several decades. A partner of PwC and chairman of the Australian Tax Research Foundation, he was involved in the design of Australia’s GST and other tax legislation. He was also short-listed for the T S Eliot Prize. His poetry has appeared in the New Yorker and in 2015 his Poems 1957-2013 won the Prime Minister’s Literary Award (Poetry). His Australian Poetry Since 1788, co-edited with Robert Gray, was one of The Economist’s best books of 2011.
In his frank memoir, Geoffrey describes how he was the late child of a bookish mother and a working-class father. Much to his mother’s surprise, his father, who was a launch driver, bought three houses on the waterfront at McMahons Point and became a slum landlord in the era of rent control. As a 10-year-old child, reading the begging letters from dozens of would-be tenants, Geoffrey became an economic rationalist and an atheist.
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Women In Politics

On Thursday, 31 January our panel of speakers thrashed out the issues surrounding women in politics.
Are setting affirmative-action quotas the answer to boosting female representation? Or is a merit-based system of choosing candidates a better option? Are claims of a bullying culture inside the Liberal Party true? Is Labor playing the gender card and identity politics? Who’s had better policies on improving the lives of women? Labor or the Coalition?
Ticky Fullerton (moderator), formerly with the ABC and Sky News, anchors Ticky, weeknights on Your Money.
Karina Okotel is a senior civil lawyer at Victoria Legal Aid and a federal vice president of the Liberal Party.
Eugenie Joseph is a senior policy analyst at The Centre for Independent Studies.
Kristina Keneally, a former NSW premier, is a Labor senator for NSW.
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Brendan O’Neill on political correctness and its discontents

Join Brendan O’Neill, one of Britain’s quirkiest, wittiest and liveliest commentators, in conversation with Jeremy Sammut, head of research at the CIS.
The PC brigade continues to entrench itself in the western body politic. Waging war on the past is all the rage. Along with its various campus manifestations such as “safe spaces,” political correctness has become a kind of pathology that damages the capacity to argue and reason. How should we challenge PC?
Brendan O’Neill is the editor of Spiked Online and a former CIS scholar in residence. He is author of A Duty to Offend: Selected Essays by Brendan O’Neill.
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The Crisis Of Democracy

For generations, we just assumed democracy is fixed and given. However, all across the world, democracies are sick and suffering from a crisis of confidence. Polls show just a third of Australians are satisfied with the way our democracy is working. Public trust in our politicians is at record lows.
So, how do we restore faith in democracy? Is there too much corporate and foreign money involved in the electoral process? Is the noisy and relentless media cycle the cause of the problem or the symptom? Is political polarization likely to get worse? How do we attract better elected representatives? How do we do democracy better?
Join us for a lively conversation with Luca Belgiorno-Nettis, of newDemocracy, and Glenn Barnes, Company director, as well as Janet Albrechtsen, columnist with The Australian and Matthew Lesh, a research fellow with the IPA and author of Democracy in a Divided Australia (Connor Court).
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