Gabriella Power:
Joining us now is Adam Creighton, Chief Economist at the IPA. Adam, thank you so much for your time. Look, we’ve got to start with a serious and sad topic. It’s been more than five weeks since the horrific Bondi terror attack. And there’s of course still so much anger at the Prime Minister over his lack of action on antisemitism in the lead up to that terror attack and also his response to it. I mean, not going to funerals. He was dragged, kicking and screaming until finally calling for a Royal Commission and then trying to rush through hate speech laws in response to it.
Look, I also mentioned at the start of the show, I was overseas during the break and so many people that I spoke with overseas were saying how devastated they were for us, seeing the horror that unfolded at Bondi Beach. And then many were very quick to criticise our prime minister for his weak and slow response. And a recent Resolve Monitor poll found that the majority, 58% of people in Australia say that this response to the attacker, his response, I should say, has been poor. And of course, during his first address to parliament, he refrained from explicitly naming radical Islamist extremism in his condolence motion. What are your thoughts, Adam? Can I get your assessment of his leadership and his response?
Adam Creighton:
Yeah, sure. Look, it’s obviously a shocking tragedy and it’s definitely tarnished Australia’s image internationally for sure. And the hurt and pain and suffering will be with the families and the communities of that area for many, many months, many, many years. As for the Prime Minister’s response, look, it was slow and sluggish. And obviously, there’s so much awkwardness because as you know, the Labour Party and government, they have a lot of seats with majority Muslims in them. And so they have to kind of dance on PIMS, if you like, to avoid saying what the real problem was, which is radical Islam, as you said before.
And I think that in turn has created more anger in the Jewish community. The fact that the government won’t actually say what the real problem is. It blames everything else but that. And of course, there was the delay with the Royal Commission, which we’re now having, which was a right thing and good thing. I mean, Australia tends to have Royal Commissions for everything left, right, and centre, pink batts and shipping licences. So it certainly should have had a Royal Commission for something as serious as this.
Gabriella Power:
Absolutely.
Adam Creighton:
I think it’s disappointing now we’re in the response situation and we have this extraordinarily rushed bill, which I think is going to be voted on this week. There’s the hate speech bill, there’s the gun aspect to it. Thankfully, I think the coalition has got those two bills split as they should be. I mean, the gun bill, I don’t personally care about very much, but the other one I care about a great deal and it is a disastrous bill and we all have to hope that it fails.
So far it looks like it will fail, but if the Greens manage to make it even worse, because of course they have the balance of power in the Senate, then it’s quite possible that we’ll have a hate speech law that is the toughest in the world of any place. And as I wrote in my column in the Australian last week, actually tougher than China’s hate speech laws.
Gabriella Power:
Wow.
Adam Creighton:
We like to criticise China for being totalitarian. Well, ours is even worse in that regard. In China, for instance, there has to actually be someone feeling intimidated or hated. Whereas in the Australian bill, there doesn’t actually need to be any actual real hate or intimidation, only the possibility of it from a hypothetical third person.
So obviously, the threshold of criminality, and these are not civil actions, these are criminal actions. If you’re convicted of saying something which someone finds hateful, then the minimum prison sentence is five years, so that is pretty extreme. It’s going to have a profoundly bad impact on civil society in Australia, political speech, comedy, artistic expression. So we really have to hope that fails. I personally think, why not wait for the Royal Commission to conclude and to reach its verdict?
Now, that’s going to find what were the real causes of Bondi. And my personal view is it wasn’t hate speech. I mean, violence is already illegal, incitement to violence is already very illegal at state and federal level. This is a whole other question of law, which I don’t think we need.
Gabriella Power:
Oh, Adam, it is such a huge concern. I also want to talk to you about more of the polling that we’ve seen recently. It’s pretty extraordinary that this exclusive news poll conducted for the Australian shows that support for One Nation has surged ahead of the coalition for the first time. One Nation’s primary vote has risen seven points to 22% with the coalition dropping three points to a record low of 21% and Labour falling four points to 32%. It is absolutely extraordinary, but it doesn’t surprise me. What do you make of it?
Adam Creighton:
No, not at all. Not at all. I think at the moment, One Nation is becoming the opposition, the real opposition. They oppose the government on the question of immigration. They oppose the government on the issue of net zero. They actually have policies out there. And let’s face it, immigration and net zero, they were, at least until now, perhaps, the two biggest political issues in Australia. And the coalition doesn’t really have a policy on either of them. And yet they’re meant to be in this reflection period since the election last year. Well, that was May, that’s a long time ago. Where’s the report? It’s still not out. And I think that suggests that they don’t internally know what the position is going to be.
Now, they have come out, as you know, the Liberal Party has come out and said that they oppose net zero, but they don’t really talk about it at all. I mean, One Nation’s out there on the front foot. And I think Pauline Hanson, for all her supposed and alleged flaws as a leader, she’s probably the most famous politician in Australia, I would say. Far more famous than the Prime Minister. She’s been around for a very long time. She’s very dogged. She’s ruthless and she has an incredible life story.
And I think more and more people, including young people actually, I’ve got friends who are young and they say that they’re going to vote for the first time for One Nation. And that never used to be the constituency of One Nation, it tended to be older people. So I think when you’re seeing in these polls now younger people turning to One Nation, that should be a real concern for the two majors. And I think if this primary vote is held at about 22%, 23%, that is going to be a huge earthquake at the next election. I mean, you’re looking at two to three senators in every state for One Nation and the massive loss for Labour and the Libs.
I mean, that first poll you mentioned just earlier, it was Labour supporters going to One Nation just as much, I believe, as coalition supporters, so she’s drawing from both sides. And what you may also see is all those other minor little right wing parties, the Libertarians, the Clive Palmers, all those, they may just merge with One Nation and then it will be even bigger.
Gabriella Power:
Wow. It’s incredible. I’ve been hearing it too. I’ve been hearing it in different circles here in Australia and also Pauline Hanson saying, “Oh, it was being dropped while I was overseas too. Just getting global recognition.”
Now, Kevin Rudd is stepping down as Australia’s ambassador to the US. The White House statement around this was, “We wish him well.” Now, Adam, you wrote back in 2022 that Kevin Rudd’s appointment as ambassador to Washington is likely to go one of two ways, brilliantly or disastrously. I’d like your thoughts on that. And of course, you wrote back actually in 2024, Trump 2.0 could end Kevin Rudd’s Washington stint. You weren’t wrong about that either. Don’t hold back. Give us your thoughts around the departure.
Adam Creighton:
I’ve got those forecasts right. No, I think I wrote two columns and you mentioned one and certainly it was the disaster in the end, but I think I also wrote one that says he has to go. And I remember at the time being mocked by various leftist commentators saying, “Oh, you’re being hysterical, blah-blah-blah.” But no, that was right. He did have to go and people saying, “Oh, he’s going at the end of his term.” Not really. He’s got more than a year left. And believe me, that’s a job you don’t leave, because it’s a great job.
Have you seen the house? Unbelievable mansion you get there with staff and a lot of prestige, a lot of influence, very high salary, much higher salary than an ordinary cabinet minister. So he definitely did not want to leave that job. And also, he’s gone back to his old job, which is being the boring senior fellow of some think tank. Actually, I shouldn’t say that because I’m a senior fellow in a think tank. No, it’s very, very exciting.
But compared to being the ambassador to Washington, it’s definitely a step back. So I imagine that’s a stepping stone for him to try to get some sort of UN job, but he will find that difficult because the US obviously is very influential in that body. And if Trump is true to his words saying that I’ll never like you, then he probably won’t and it’ll be hard for him to get one of those. So he might be just waiting for the next presidential election to roll on by, or who knows, he may even come home. He may even come back to Australia and try to be governor general. Wouldn’t that be something?
Gabriella Power:
Wouldn’t Aussies love that? Adam Creighton, well done with your predictions. Brilliant to speak with you. Thank you so much for making the time. We really appreciate it.
Adam Creighton:
That’s so great. Thanks for having me.
Gabriella Power:
And that is Power Hour. Thank you so much for joining us for our first show back for 2026. We’ll see you again tomorrow and don’t forget to subscribe to Sky News Australia on YouTube.
This transcript with Adam Creighton talking on The Power Hour – Sky News Australia from 20 January 2025 has been edited for clarity.
