Tag: Australian Politics

A federal budget that delivers $250 a year to workers while handing $16.3 billion to fossil fuel companies.

The Budget That Will Not Save You

May 13, 2026May 14, 2026 · 1 Comment ·

The 2026-27 federal budget breaks two election promises, grows fossil fuel subsidies faster than the NDIS, hands $250 a year to workers, and approves gas drilling until 2080. Jim Chalmers was right that the can had been kicked far enough. He has been less forthcoming about who was doing the kicking.

Satirical Farrer election scene with oversized ballot box

The Front Fell Off The Coalition

May 11, 2026May 11, 2026 · 1 Comment ·

Written in tribute to the late great John Clarke and his long-suffering straight man Bryan Dawe, whose two chairs and a clipboard remain the gold standard of Australian political satire. The occasion: One Nation’s historic first win in the House of Representatives, the Coalition’s nine-point-eight per cent primary vote in a seat held since 1949, and an exit strategy that turns out to be no exit at all. Going forward.

A political campaign graphic for the Division of Farrer in 2026. The background shows an aerial view of the Murray River and agricultural plains. Centered is a parchment-style map overlay depicting a tug-of-war between "Coalition" and "One Nation" figures over a large money bag. The text reads: "Farrer 2026: From 77 years of Coalition rule to One Nation’s first lower-house seat. But who owns the party now?"

That Was the Week That Was, Part 3: “The Farrer fracture:

May 10, 2026 · 2 Comments ·

One Nation’s David Farley has taken the once‑impregnable Coalition seat of Farrer. But with Gina Rinehart’s funding and the party’s rural base, who really owns the populist rage?

Australian Parliament House exterior under overcast sky, Canberra.

That Was The Week That Was No. 1, Part One: The Repository of All Wisdom

May 9, 2026May 9, 2026 · 1 Comment ·

Tony Abbott, they whisper, is the answer. One pauses to consider the question. The man who stopped the boats is looking for votes — and the portfolio he has quietly assembled since Warringah showed him the door is not a gaffe reel. It is an ideology rendered as a CV. Fox Corp is the mothership. The GWPF handles the science. Quadrant handles the culture. The Ramsay Centre handles the universities. The Danube Institute handles the international networking. And the Australian Liberal Party, should Abbott have his way, handles the politics. It turns out he was the repository all along.

Satirical editorial illustration showing a politician speaking at an outback podium labelled "For the Battlers" while a giant billionaire figure in shadow pulls puppet strings from behind. A private jet sits in the red dirt.

One Nation’s battler lie unravels

May 2, 2026 · 3 Comments ·

One Nation calls itself the battler’s friend. Gina Rinehart’s plane, the NRA’s phone calls and Big Coal’s Senate votes tell a different story. Howard sowed the tares.

Diptych: archival vice-regal study with letters on left, silver telephone handset with crown reflection on right, divided by gold line

AUKUS: A Black Comedy in Several Ruinously Expensive Acts

April 29, 2026 · 3 Comments ·

The Palace knew about Kerr’s plan to dismiss Whitlam. Whitlam did not. Fifty-one years later, the same Crown is phoning the American president to sell AUKUS. Urban Wronski on the loyalty that never changed.

Caps Off: How Mark Hammond’s Appointment Completes Labor’s Capture by Uncle Sam and the AUKUS Boondoggle

April 18, 2026 · 5 Comments ·

Albanese grins in his USS Vermont cap. Hammond smiles in his Chief of Navy lid. The submariners have taken the wheel of Australian defence — $368 billion, phantom crews, obsolete technology, and a slow bicycle ride to yesterday’s wars. Urban Wronski on how Labor completed its capture by Uncle Sam. With a little help from Clarke and Dawe.

Defence Minister Richard Marles at National Press Club podium announcing record defence spending as Geelong oil refinery burns in background during Australian fuel crisis 2026

The Biggest Peacetime Increase in Our Nation’s History

April 17, 2026April 17, 2026 · 1 Comment ·

Defence Minister Richard Marles announces Australia’s largest peacetime defence spending hike while the Geelong refinery burns and fuel reserves hit five weeks. A deadpan account of spending better, NATO accounting, and submarines arriving in the 2040s.

Richard Marles, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence, at a press conference projecting institutional confidence while Australia’s defence procurement record, AUKUS submarine delays, the Washington happenstance encounter, and the Geelong refinery fire suggest a more complicated story

DeadWood Marles: Australia’s Liberal in Drag

April 16, 2026April 17, 2026 · 7 Comments ·

He is, in the most precise political sense available, a Liberal in drag. Same tough talk on alliances and deterrence. Same fondness for American hardware and AUKUS largesse. Wrapped in just enough factional red to keep the true believers satisfied. All suit, no spark. And a remarkable talent for making national security sound like a mildly confusing numbers meeting that ran somewhat overtime. Urban Wronski profiles Richard “DeadWood” Marles, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence.

Are we at War with Iran?

March 23, 2026 · 4 Comments ·

INTERVIEWER: Are we at war with Iran?
ALBANESE: No.
INTERVIEWER: Then why did they bomb our base?
ALBANESE: Because they’re Iran.
One interviewer. One Prime Minister. Forty-five satellite dishes, three submariners, one Wedgetail aircraft, a peace negotiation bombed flat, a hundred and seventy schoolgirls, and a pocket square without a mark on it. A political interview in the tradition of Clarke and Dawe.

Urban Wronski Writes

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