Joshua Smith explains how much youth “consultation” is really occurring in Parliament, thanks to his experiences at last week’s body image launch. Were students being used as a nice crowd backdrop for the media, rather than listening to any of their ideas?
Parliament House 
Canberra: sure it’s boring, but it’s also beautiful
Sure Canberra’s boring if you’re under 30, and it has no beaches and the coffee’s poor, but it has the mountains and it’s beautiful and the epitome of the great place to bring up kids.
Inside the inner Rudd sanctum
The design of the parliamentary office of PM Kevin Rudd’s inner circle says much about the power factions of the Rudd government. Mark Davis examines who sits where.
Parliament House or animal house?
The conduct of Federal Parliament recently has descended from chaos into outright farce, says Christian Kerr. Both sides know they’re behaving badly, but will either fall back into line?
Baby in the chamber: the ugly anti-family face of parliament
Our Parliamentary standards are still stuck in a Victorian era of old white male legislators, writes Bernard Keane.
Anti-family attitudes are embedded in our parliament
Do we want mothers of young children (and hopefully fathers with child care responsibilities) to be MPs or not? asks Senator Sue Boyce.
Stay at home, Senator, and raise your children
I don’t think that the primary care-givers of children should be parliamentarians, writes Helen Razer.
How to kill five hours at Parliament House
There’s nothing quite like watching senators discuss Serious Government Business while licking the ice-cream drips off a white chocolate Magnum. Crikey’s intrepid writer writes from the House.
Guy Rundle: On first looking into Parliament’s home
Straight up from Sydney on the red-eye you would want something a bit more eye-catching to arrive at, for a nation’s capital .
Budget takes Australian journalists hostage
Question, why do we have to go all the way to Canberra to be locked up in a room with the budget when most of it is already leaked by the time we get there?? Hey Wayne? Hey?
Crossing the Floor with Bernard Keane: One sleep til Budget!
Bernard Keane has a look around the Press Gallery on the eve of the Budget. WARNING: may induce motion sickness
Remaking Australia, part four: Miriam Lyons
In a special post-election series, Crikey asked leading Australian thinkers to sketch a blueprint for a future Australia. Today, Miriam Lyons, Director of the Centre for Policy Development, takes a look at remaking Australian culture, for want of a smaller topic.
Tips and rumours
Was Channel 10 the first to break the election media blackout with a Family First advertisement at 12:03am Thursday morning?
Hi Crikey, it’s 12:05am and I just saw two Liberal party advertisements (from 12:04am - checked using telephone time service) on Channel 10. One about unions, the other I hadn’t seen before about Labor’s effect on […]
Prime Ministerial trivia with RD Chalmers
“Kirribilli House was first set aside for use as an official residence of prime ministers in which decade?”
An election timing hint?
You can read what you like into this email distributed to the NSW Liberal Party faithful yesterday:
Tips and rumours
The Howard Government out of touch? Sure are … so much so that it seems prominent Minister Joe Hockey doesn’t even know where his own electorate boundaries are. I received a glossy 4-page brochure from Joe last night in my mailbox. Only problem is I don’t live in the North Sydney electorate I live in […]
The PM leaves the backdoor open
John Howard’s electorate website has been hacked today. It’s nothing nasty – more a “Look what we can do” job.
