Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

One of the many things that distressed me about the Howard government was its politicising of the Commonwealth public service, and its subversion of the spoils of office to its own party-political ends. So when Mr Rudd said "I'm very much wedded to the restoration of Westminster and that means the restoration of a continuing independent public service" I was pleased - but how serious was he?

To the average punters in Asia, the perception of Australia has been coloured, if you excuse the pun, by the White Australian Policy (THE WAP) and its remnants. The contemporary Australia might have a hot economical engagement with the Asian region, but politically and socially, there are still nagging questions being asked about Australia. First, has Australia completely jettisoned the WAP? or it is still lurking just beneath the surface. Second, is Australia an Asian country? or a Western country? or an Eurasian country? or none of the above? Sometimes, I think we don’t know the answer to this question ourselves.