Politics with Michelle Grattan The Conversation

Australia’s higher education sector is under heavy scrutiny. Still recovering from the impact of COVID and criticised for its treatment of staff, it faces strong pressures to step up its performance.
The government launched a broad review of the sector in late 2022 to inform a Universities Accord. The interim report was released in July, with the full report coming in December. Professor Brian Schmidt, is one of Australia’s most eminent academics, an astrophysicist who shared a Nobel Prize in 2011. Schmidt has been Vice-Chancellor at the Australian National University since 2016, a role he leaves at the end of the year.

Anthony Albanese has now confirmed he’ll be heading to China before the end of the year. He is the first Australian prime minister to visit since 2016, and it is the culmination of an improvement in China-Australia relations since the change of government.
In this podcast, we’re joined by Richard McGregor, an expert on China and senior fellow at the Lowy Institute.

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation’s politics team.
In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn discuss the latest national accounts and Jim Chalmers’ announcement that Grattan Institute CEO Danielle Wood will take over as head of the Productivity Commission. The appointment came as a surprise, after Chris Barrett, chosen for the position only recently, decided he had a better offer – he will become head of the Victorian Treasury.
They also canvass the QANTAS saga, which has seen its now former CEO Alan Joyce step down earlier than scheduled. The news came amid public anger over its poor customer service, and after the national carrier was taken to court by the consumer watchdog for selling more than 8000 tickets on flights already cancelled.
And finally, they discuss Anthony Albanese’s trip to Indonesia for the ASEAN summit, followed by a visit to the Philippines, before he attends the G20 meeting in India.




 

October 14, is the day Australians will head to their polling booths to vote for or against an Indigenous Voice being enshrined in the Constitution.
Anthony Albanese announced the date in a speech in Adelaide on Wednesday, as politicians across the spectrum and Indigenous “yes” campaign leaders rallied around the country.
In this podcast, we are joined by the campaign director for Yes23, Dean Parkin, and former deputy prime minister John Anderson, who sits on the no campaign’s advisory board. We spoke with each of them on the eve of Albanese’s announcement.

As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation’s politics team.
In this podcast Michelle and politics + society editor Amanda Dunn discuss the news that the Prime Minister next Wednesday will reveal the date for the Voice referendum. They also canvass the Intergenerational Report, which gazes into the 2060s, as well as Labor's national conference, that endorsed AUKUS. During the conference Anthony Albanese emphasised the importance of the party staying in office to bed down a long term agenda, with the message to the rank and file not to rock the boat.

Next week the Labor Party will hold its national conference in Brisbane. It’s the first face-to-face conference in five years. These conferences don’t have anything like the bite they once did, but there’s still a chance for the party’s rank and file to have a shout about issues. More than 400 delegates will be there. Most of the delegates are aligned to a faction, and for the first time in decades the left will have the largest slice of the numbers.
AUKUS and the Stage 3 tax cuts are expected to be among the hot topics, but the conference will be carefully managed – there will be no defeats for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese. Ahead of the conference, we have already seen the government change its stance on Palestine, a sensitive subject among the left and right factions of the party.
In this podcast we talk with Wayne Swan, the Labor Party National President. Swan was treasurer and deputy prime minister in the Rudd and Gillard governments.