Michael Foot spy allegations and why MI6 should come clean about the past

Sep 25, 2018 17:48 pm UTC| Insights & Views Politics

According to The Times the late Michael Foot, the former leader of the Labour Party, was a Soviet confidential contact on the payroll of the KGB to the tune of 37,000 (in todays money). This might come as something of a...

What two books have to say about the political lifespan of South Africa's ANC

Sep 25, 2018 17:34 pm UTC| Insights & Views Politics

No political party can govern forever. In democracies with free and fair elections, no political party has been in power longer than half a century. So is the African National Congress (ANC), the party that governs South...

What Labour's Brexit motion means in practice

Sep 25, 2018 10:17 am UTC| Insights & Views Politics

As Labour delegates gathered in Liverpool, it was impossible to avoid mentions of Brexit. There are 25 separate fringe meetings listed on the conference agenda and there are certain to be more meetings arranged on the...

Despite her good intentions, Michelle Guthrie was never the right fit for the ABC

Sep 25, 2018 10:09 am UTC| Insights & Views Politics

Michelle Guthrie has been badly treated not by being sacked, but by being hired in the first place. As a former Head of ABC TV News and Current Affairs, I met Guthrie several times at functions in the ABC, and once at a...

With a seat on the UN Security Council, what can key ASEAN member Indonesia do to solve the Rohingya crisis?

Sep 25, 2018 09:33 am UTC| Insights & Views Politics

The United Nations (UN) recently released a report accusing Myanmars military of committing genocide. Since August 2017, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya, a religious and ethnic minority in Myanmar, have fled persecution...

Why the increased penalties for strawberry sabotage will do little to prevent the crime

Sep 25, 2018 09:33 am UTC| Insights & Views Politics

The fruit contamination crisis has delivered a devastating blow to the growers of Australia. The crisis is now so big it seems to have reached New Zealand as well. Producers and consumers have been justifiably outraged...

Michelle Guthrie's stint at ABC helm had a key weakness: she failed to back the journalists

Sep 25, 2018 09:32 am UTC| Insights & Views Politics

Michelle Guthries departure as managing director of the ABC, while a shock, is not surprising. In the face of sustained pressure from the government and Rupert Murdochs News Corp, she has seemed incapable of mounting a...