Nanny State

30 June 2018

The lives of ordinary people have been made worse by the elimination of plastic bags in supermarkets – achieved by legislation in most states and by the corporate virtue-signalling led by the ever-diminishing duopoly of Coles and Woolworth. This impact, you must understand, is not a side-effect or something taken into consideration during the pursuit of a broader policy objective;

8 March 2018

Food, nutrition and human behaviour are far too complex to be regulated with a star rating system Mandatory food labelling is a bureaucrat’s dream and a consumer’s nightmare. Just take the commonwealth government’s health star rating system for example. It’s so bad that Coles beer batter steakhouse chips receive a four-star rating (out of five). Coles execs must have a

23 February 2018

Before Malcolm Turnbull prohibited his ministers from having sexual relations with their staff, there’s a few dozen things he should have banned first. For example, he could have banned ministers wasting taxpayers’ money. That way we wouldn’t be spending $50 billion on submarines that won’t be operational for 30 years. Or he could have banned ministers breaking their election promises by introducing

8 January 2018

Australians are expected to lose a record $404 billion in taxes in 2017-18. Yet this is not enough for some. Under plans submitted to the Turnbull government by anti-alcohol lobbyists, Australian drinkers would be hit with a $29 billion tax slug over a 10-year period. The Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education (FARE) has proposed a raft of tax hikes

1 November 2017

When Woolworths and Coles announced in July that they were phasing out the use of plastic shopping bags, it was only a matter of time before our politicians got in on the act. So it was no surprise when the Andrews Government announced a statewide ban on so-called “single use” plastic bags. Sadly, the State Opposition is supporting the ban. In fact, their

10 November 2016

New Galaxy Research polling commissioned by the Institute of Public Affairs has found that 64 per cent of Australians oppose a newspaper cartoonist being investigated by the Australian Human Rights Commission, and 45 per cent of Australians support change to the Racial Discrimination Act so that it is no longer unlawful to “offend” or “insult” Executive Director of the Institute

1 October 2016

The UK government’s nanny statist food ingredients and portion size policies are now being expanded to restaurants, cafés and pubs of all sizes. The government plans to set sugar reduction targets, calorie caps for particular products such as chocolate bars and muffins, and push for smaller portion sizes. If foot outlets, of any size, don’t follow the punitive guidelines they will be named and

7 September 2016

This week Target became the latest target of the politically correct warriors. Target’s crime of political correctness was to sell a T-shirt. A pink T-shirt for girls. The t-shirt read, “Batgirl to-do list: Dryclean cape, wash batmobile, fight crime, save the world”. And with that, the warriors launched their attack on social media. The accusations the warriors levelled at Target

13 July 2016

A new app is doing what years of nanny state programs and millions of wasted taxpayer dollars failed to do – get people outside, on their feet and living healthier lifestyles. Pokemon GO was released only last Wednesday and is already the most popular mobile application on iPhone and Android. The game puts players in aug-mented reality, based on real

11 December 2015

The story of what happened to Chelsea-lee Downes reveals everything that’s wrong with Australia’s attitude to innovation and risk-taking. Malcolm Turnbull and Chris Pyne’s Innovation Statement released on Monday is a good start. Less important than the statement’s billion dollars of handouts is its recognition that our attitude to innovation must change. And of course, the biggest source of opposition