Upon coming to power, new Treasurer Wayne Swan announced he will work more closely with Treasury than his predecessor, and the RBA annonced significant changes to the way it communicates its work with the financial community and the public. ANZ Chief Economist muses on the apparent changes to the rules of engagement.
First commonwealth
Brough’s laws: a downside of the 1967 referendum
When, in 1967, Harold Holt’s government put to the Australian people a proposal to amend section 51 (xxvi) of the Constitution so that the Commonwealth could make special laws with respect to Aboriginal people, the maverick Liberal MP Billy Wentworth warned that this could mean that in the future, a government could not only make laws to benefit Indigenous Australia, but also to disadvantage it. He was ignored.
