December 09 2021 Edition
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Again we have a week were concerns about the Omicron COVID19 variant have dominated the news. Hopefully clarity will emerge pretty soon.
In the US we are seeing the Biden Administration showing that US prestige in the world is slowly declining and this is making the world less safe I fear. For all its faults the US is surely preferable to the CCP!
In the UK we are seeing COVID again on the roll again – how it plays out we will again need to wait for a few weeks. Going into winter may be a considerable worry.
In OZ parliament has risen for the year in chaos and we have an election due by May. I will get pretty willing from here I reckon!
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Major Issues.
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https://www.afr.com/markets/equity-markets/investing-in-an-inflationary-multiverse-20211124-p59bv2
Investing in an inflationary multiverse
Waiting for the inflation scenario to become apparent is not without cost. It’s been so long since inflation ruled that some managers never formulated a strategy to deal with it, writes Katrina King.
Katrina King
Nov 28, 2021 – 5.00am
This year, Marvel fans celebrated the premiere of the animated series What If…? that explores alternate timelines in a multiverse and what happens if some of the films’ major moments occurred differently.
What If…? got me thinking about the inflation debate. Forecasting inflation is a wicked problem. The multitude of inputs – both global and domestic, policy and endogenous to the economy – make the current debate of “transitory or not?” highly problematic.
Unfortunately, portfolio construction in this environment is no easy task. Inflation hasn’t been an issue for decades, so many portfolio and asset managers have never had to consider this as part of their portfolio construction.
Now, they’re facing a new multiverse.
Waiting to adjust portfolios once the inflation situation becomes clearer can bring additional consequences. There are costs of trading and tax when shifting assets in a strategic asset allocation which can become meaningful.
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Confused by conservatives and their take on ‘cancel culture’? I am too
Head of social work and policy studies, University of Sydney
November 29, 2021 — 5.30am
After spending most of my life attending a local Anglican church, I recently left abruptly after the church minister gave a sermon on diversity. He suggested that topics around race and sexuality are “identity politics disguised as social justice issues”. He went on to preach that we should learn to live with diversity, but also gracefully and gently show them the way to the one truth.
As a bisexual man, who also identifies as a person of colour – my father is iTaukei (indigenous) Fijian – I have struggled to make sense of where I fit into a conservative Christian worldview. In church gatherings, I have been consistently told that the LGBTQ+ community should be feared and kept at an arm’s length, and that my own sexual orientation is sinful and wrong.
In my early 20s, I was involved in a conversion program to help “pray the gay away”; but on completion, I left feeling more confused and even concerned about not sharing my authentic self with my church family and wider community.
Upholding conservative views in Christian circles encourages people to uphold the binary status quo of right and wrong – and everything outside this way of life, or thinking should be condemned and challenged.
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Ways to build on ETF foundation
An open-minded approach and appreciation of what is really represented in an index should underpin the decisions behind a thoughtful share strategy.
Giselle Roux Contributor
Nov 29, 2021 – 5.00am
Deliberations on how to construct an equity portfolio are endless – claiming evidence on active versus passive, concentrated versus diversified, value versus growth etc. Healthy debate is welcomed, yet the rationale of why one is better than the other is one-sided as each proponent makes a case for their preconceived stance that suits a vested interest.
Active managers do underperform passive, on average. Why can’t a group of clever people beat a systematic index that does not have any idea of the future?
There are likely two key reasons. Stock-picking fund managers may have perfectly sensible views on stocks with a logical construct on their expectations and valuations. The weight of money does not necessarily always agree with their thesis. Others can have a diametrically opposite opinion but more often have cottoned on to another thematic that is gaining ground. Valuations are subjective and therefore hold sway on broad consensus rather than being beholden to facts.
It’s no surprise that investors have turned to following an index, rather than entrusting their faith to human foibles. But this is not always better as the indices are an oddity. The profit-based providers (MSCI, S&P, ASX and others) decide on which companies are to be represented and what weight they will have. The indices don’t conform to financial success but rather reflect opinion and size, flawed or otherwise.
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https://www.afr.com/chanticleer/two-big-picture-aims-in-apra-s-capital-rules-20211129-p59d7c
Two big-picture aims in APRA’s capital rules
Improving competition and tilting the economy away from property lending are the main goals of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s new rules.
Nov 30, 2021 – 5.00am
Australian banks will likely have two nagging issues with the release of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s final capital framework.
For the big banks, timing is likely to be an issue. APRA wants the new rules, which essentially tweak the way capital needs to be held against various assets without increasing the amount of capital required across the system, in place by the start of 2023.
But that’s going to require a fair amount of work inside the majors, which have also watched as their European counterparts have been given more time to make the transition.
For smaller banks, fairness will be the lingering issue. APRA says it has reduced the risk weightings for the low-risk mortgages of smaller banks as far as it could under the Basel 3 global banking standards, but it knows the smaller guys wanted it to go further to help level the playing field with the majors, which are required to hold relatively less capital against these loans.
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Calling out Dutton’s war talk, khaki election tactics
Australia’s security would be better served by a defence minister who spoke more softly and carried a bigger stick – and a foreign minister who spoke about our strategic challenges.
Nov 29, 2021 – 4.28pm
Peter Dutton’s National Press Club speech that further amped up the Morrison government’s drum beats of war rhetoric goes to show that sometimes it’s not what you say but how – and who – says it.
Mr Dutton’s politicised strategic observation in the run-up to next year’s federal election is that if war breaks out between the US and China over Taiwan, it’s “inconceivable” that Australia would not back its major security partner. That might be the tragic reality of maintaining the US-Australia alliance.
But military conflict with its major trading partner would be a strategic catastrophe for Australia. A superpower showdown over Taiwan involving Australian forces is the outcome that Australia’s foreign policy and diplomacy should be seeking to avoid. But with missing-in-action and generally invisible Foreign Minister Marise Payne unable or unwilling to articulate this, it’s the Defence Minister and hardened political warrior Mr Dutton who’s out there proclaiming a new domino theory.
Last week’s timing was particularly unfortunate, following on the heels of this month’s US-China summit between Joe Biden and Xi Jinping, where the American President sought to de-escalate talk of a new cold war and warn against tensions over Taiwan spinning out of control into conflict. That should be an opportunity to productively scale down China-Australia tensions too.
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This election is about who you trust not to change your lives
Labor wants the contest to be about shaping the future. But the PM’s call for an end to governments telling people what to do is backed by new polling.
Nick Dyrenfurth Contributor
Nov 30, 2021 – 12.12pm
The battle lines for the federal election almost certainly to be held in May next year are clear. Prime Minister Scott Morrison seeks to portray the contest as one over trust, John Howard-like, despite accusations that he plays fast and loose with the truth. Labor’s Anthony Albanese has taken to calling the PM a “liar”, whether it be his dealings with foreign leaders or previous claims on electric vehicles.
In Howard’s case the tactic didn’t work when he was likewise accused during his long prime ministership: think of his “never, ever” GST backflip or committing troops to the 2003 Iraq War.
For Morrison, it is a matter of “choice”, a rather abstract ideological invocation of “can-do capitalism” and who can be trusted to manage the post-pandemic economy. With interest rates tipped to rise next year, and despite projections of resurgent growth and low unemployment rates, it is a familiar refrain. But the strategy is not without risk.
Morrison is also betting that after two years of unprecedented government intervention, people want certainty and an end to governments telling them “what to do”. In this, the PM is not simply fighting Albanese but a triumvirate of Labor state premiers.
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Courts turn up heat on SMSF inheritance disputes
Duncan Hughes Reporter
Dec 1, 2021 – 5.00am
Courts are taking a tougher approach to the growing number of inheritance disputes over assets in self-managed super funds, creating new issues for will-makers, trustees and beneficiaries.
They are tightening the discretion given to trustees to distribute scheme assets after the death of another member.
Surviving trustees, typically family members, usually have an absolute and unfettered discretion (which means total control) unless they do something unlawful or the testator has a binding death benefit nomination (BDBN). The nomination is a written direction from a member to the super trustee setting out how they wish some, or all, of their super death benefits to be distributed.
The number of inheritance disputes is expected to continue rising as the $730 billion-plus in an estimated 593,000 self-managed super funds grows.
Family disputes about wills and estates have also soared because of the rise in “blended families” as couples dissolve (resulting from separation, divorce or death) and form new families.
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Far-right threat under spotlight as Andrews government backs probe
November 30, 2021 — 6.50pm
A parliamentary inquiry into the rising threat of far-right extremism is set to examine how the COVID-19 pandemic fuelled the proliferation of misinformation and neo-Nazi groups.
The Victorian Greens have secured the support of the Andrews government to establish the inquiry.
Greens leader Samantha Ratnam will introduce a motion to the Legislative Council on Wednesday to examine far-right extremism in the state, including methods of recruitment and communication, the risks it poses to the state’s multicultural communities, the links between these groups and anti-vaccine groups, and how to combat the threat posed by extremist groups.
The Greens anticipate securing the votes of at least two more MPs to pass the motion, which a researcher on extremism has urged parliamentarians to support, warning the far right is one of the greatest problems and challenges of our time.
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https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/cost-threat-to-solar-powerhouse-20211201-p59dpw
Cost threat to the ‘powerhouse’ of renewable energy
Angela Macdonald-Smith Senior resources writer
Dec 1, 2021 – 5.00pm
High commodity prices could wipe out three years of cost reductions in solar power, putting at risk the “powerhouse of growth” for the surging renewables sector, the International Energy Agency has warned.
The cost of wind power investments would also return up to levels last seen in 2015 should commodity prices remain high through the end of next year, the agency said in its annual review of renewables.
Australia is facing particular challenges with difficulties integrating new rooftop solar into the network, leading to compulsory curtailment of generation by households, and congestion on the transmission grid that is hindering some new grid-scale plants, it said.
As a result, the IEA is forecasting a slowdown in the project pipeline here “due to grid integration challenges”.
Globally, new renewable energy capacity is expected to increase to 290 gigawatts this year, beating the previous record set in 2020. By 2026, worldwide capacity for renewable power is forecast to surge by more than 60 per cent from 2020 levels to more than 4800GW, putting it on a par with the existing total capacity of fossil fuel power and nuclear combined.
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Morrison’s winning ways once more on show
Award-winning political commentator and author
December 2, 2021 — 5.30am
The last time Bridget Archer alerted the Prime Minister’s office in advance that she was considering voting against the government, she says she had two senior members of his staff literally standing over her in her office.
Archer told colleagues at the time, and has since confirmed it to this columnist, that for almost two weeks she felt bullied, threatened and intimidated by the staffers – one male, one female, both of whom have been around politics a long time who should know better – seeking to persuade her to vote with the government.
Archer spoke against the cashless welfare card legislation, then abstained from voting. Her decision triggered a campaign of online abuse from trolls, threatening her and her kids. Archer has five children, aged six, eight, 10, 12 and 18. She jokes there are times when her home looks as if it has been burgled, but there was nothing remotely funny about what happened last year. It was a terrible time for her and her family.
Lately, constituents in her notoriously fickle Tasmanian seat of Bass, which she holds with a margin of 0.4 per cent, have been stopping her on the street, saying: “we like you Bridget, but...” The “but” drips with portent for Scott Morrison and the government.
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We need real military grunt to deal with worsening security
11:00PM December 1, 2021
Two announcements illustrate, and exacerbate, the extreme contradiction at the heart of all Australian defence policy. The US will increase the troop numbers it rotates through northern Australia, as well as its air force, surface ship and submarine visits.
That’s very good. Washington is more committed to our security.
But, more quietly, we retired a huge chunk of our air force, the only bit that could carry long-range missiles. We got rid of the last squadron of Classic Hornet F-18 fast jets, the only planes in our air force capable of firing long-range strike missiles, the old version of the Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile.
So while our diplomacy with Washington is successful, as Joe Biden’s Indo-Pacific co-ordinator, Kurt Campbell, demonstrated with typically generous comments, we are reducing, yes actually reducing, our already minuscule defence capability.
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Why passive activism is the now the biggest game in town
One of the biggest ever days of equity trading reveals how the rise and proliferation of index tracking funds has reshaped the structure of global markets.
Jonathan Shapiro Senior reporter
Updated Dec 2, 2021 – 11.15am, first published at 10.12am
There was plenty going on in global sharemarkets on Tuesday as November closed out. A new virus was creating anxiety, while the US Federal Reserve was preparing a dramatic messaging pivot.
But one of the largest trading days in living memory had little to do with either of those unannounced events.
Instead, it was a mammoth day of index rebalancing that led to over a trillion dollars of notional trades in the US and more than a third of that volume in Asian markets.
Index tracking funds and exchange traded funds that also track indices tend to conduct their business near or at the close of the day and in the Australian session, a large drop in the S&P/ASX 200 at the match was evident of this enormous day of index related rebalancing (that preceded any Fed announcement.)
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Labor’s path to victory at the election is narrow
Even Labor optimists believe a minority government will be an achievement and are talking that up as a win.
Phillip Coorey Political editor
Dec 2, 2021 – 7.30pm
In the end, Christian Porter’s decision to retire from Parliament at the next election was influenced by the stark reality he was going to lose his seat.
The results of internal polling conducted by the Liberal Party to ascertain whether Porter could hold his West Australian electorate of Pearce are being tightly held.
Those close to Porter suspect he probably would have walked anyway. The results of the polling, conducted about a month ago, ended any indecision.
Porter’s life and career were destroyed by the publication of historic rape allegations which could never be proven and which he has vehemently denied. There is a degree of sympathy towards him from colleagues, mindful that the new standard is that allegation is enough to end a career.
“If he did it, then fair enough, if he didn’t, then he’s been treated like shit,” opined one senior Liberal. “We’ll never know.”
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Dementia a looming ‘disaster’ for ageing SMSF trustees
Duncan Hughes Reporter
Dec 3, 2021 – 4.00pm
Ageing SMSF trustees are a potential “recipe for disaster” because of the risk they will suffer dementia or another form of mental impairment while still controlling the bulk of the sector’s $822 billion worth of assets.
A recent spate of legal actions revealing wealthy elderly suffering dementia, or other forms of mental impairment, exposed large amounts being lost through either neglect, abuse or incompetence, and highlights the growing problems facing rich retirees.
Lawyer Darryl Browne says: “The victims are often aged people with significant assets who rely on others. It’s often an invisible crime. Those who want to get away with it can get away with it.”
Browne, who is principal of Browne Linkenbagh Legal Services, says porous legal protections and patchy regulatory oversight by the Australian Taxation Office mean abuse is often hard to detect and correct.
Andrew Simpson, national head of wills and estates for Maurice Blackburn, adds: “It’s a recipe for disaster. I do not think the regulator would even realise. For the most part, the cases go undetected because it happens within families and takes a while to detect.”
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Election storm brews for the Coalition
11:00PM December 3, 2021
Anthony Albanese has all the politics running in his direction at the end of the parliamentary year and going into the 2022 federal election campaign.
After two weeks of parliamentary confusion and disruption as the Coalition faced an ascendant Labor opposition, there was no appetite or incentive for extended sittings next year as the government opted for just two weeks of parliament in February before the scheduled March 29 budget.
There is anger and frustration with Scott Morrison, the Coalition is divided, there’s disunity in the ranks as MPs and senators rebel, retirements of serving MPs are rising, the left and right of the Liberal Party are both unhappy with the prime minister, and the ALP is ahead in all the polls.
There are now 11 Coalition MPs retiring at the election, including the highly successful Health Minister Greg Hunt, when local politics, identity and grassroots connections are going to count much more than in previous polls.
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COVID 19 Information
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Omicron: New Covid-19 variant is worrying, but scientists are preparing defences
By Ben Spencer
The Times
November 28, 2021
On Monday morning, four long days before anyone had heard of the Omicron variant, an announcement was made by the health department in Pretoria, one of South Africa’s capital cities.
A cluster of new Covid cases had emerged at Tshwane University of Technology, which health officials assumed had been caused by an increase in socialising in the run-up to Christmas. The nearby townships of Atteridgeville, Mamelodi and Soshanguve were also seeing rising numbers of infections. Cases in the city and surrounding area had risen fourfold in a week. By the end of the week it was clear this surge not only threatened to envelop South Africa, but also marked the most worrying development in the pandemic since the Delta variant emerged from India last spring.
A constellation of mutations
While officials in Pretoria were worrying about resurgent cases in student dorms, in nearby Botswana scientists were growing concerned about an unusual set of Covid samples taken from three patients. The test samples, the first of which dated back to November 11, revealed a brand new variant, displaying an unprecedented 50 mutations. Scientists were startled: this was not just a gradual shift, it was an evolutionary leap. Worryingly, a fourth sample with the same genetic sequence was recorded in Hong Kong from a patient who had travelled from South Africa.
The new variant - at that point unnamed - was particularly concerning because the spike protein, the protrusion on the outside of the virus, had 30 mutations. By comparison, the Delta variant, which ripped across the world in the spring, only had 13 spike mutations. Such a dramatic evolution has two significant ramifications. Firstly, the key vaccines in use - Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca - work by teaching the immune system to recognise the spike protein. If the spike protein has significantly changed, antibodies might no longer recognise it quite so well. Our hard-won immunity might be sidestepped.
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New COVID variant means getting used to ‘dial up, dial down’ controls
Epidemiologist
November 28, 2021 — 3.44pm
Omicron, the newly designated SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern, has set off alarm bells around the world for a few reasons; the number of mutations it carries, particularly in the binding domain of the protein spike which is where the virus attaches to human cells and also the target for most vaccines, it’s emergence coinciding with a 10-fold increase in cases in under a week in South Africa, a country not long out of a large Delta wave, and the reporting of higher rates of reinfection suggesting natural immunity following a Delta infection might not be very protective.
The reassuring news is that the South African Medical Association is reporting a different pattern of symptoms and, importantly, a milder disease than with other variants, especially in the vaccinated. Most people are reported to have muscle aches and fatigue as the main symptoms, feeling unwell for only a couple of days.
We know most people who develop severe disease often don’t develop those symptoms until the second week of infection, but so far hospitals are not being overwhelmed and, if symptoms are resolving quickly, it does raise hope that this variant may cause a more benign infection than Delta.
We also can’t yet tell if this is a transmission threat of the same proportion in settings outside southern Africa. Most cases to date have been reported in South Africa which has low vaccination coverage with only 25 per cent of the population fully vaccinated, and rates are even lower in neighbouring countries. There are also higher numbers of immunocompromised people living with HIV/AIDS.
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Omicron will cast a lasting pall over financial markets
The omicron variant poses an immediate and downside risk to consensus expectations for growth, inflation and earnings.
Grant Wilson Contributor
Updated Nov 28, 2021 – 2.49pm, first published at 1.48pm
The omicron variant is going to cast a pall over financial markets. It poses an immediate and downside risk to consensus expectations for growth, inflation and earnings.
The variant also represents a challenge to the market micro-structure as liquidity conditions are impaired in some sectors, and this will only worsen over the next few weeks.
Bear in mind the starting point. The S&P 500 made new highs early last week, and has more than doubled from the pandemic lows. Markets were gaining confidence in the Federal Reserve accelerating its taper schedule, and lifting rates by the second quarter next year.
The energy complex had been ramped into the COP26 session in Glasgow, underpinning the global inflation narrative, yet leaving oil susceptible to the six standard deviation wipeout that occurred on Friday.
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Omicron overreaction would sacrifice Australia’s vaccine advantage
The best response to the Omicron wake-up call at this stage would be for the developed world to ramp up efforts to roll out the jabs in the under-vaxxed parts of the globe.
Nov 28, 2021 – 4.54pm
Two years after the escape of COVID-19 from Wuhan triggered a global pandemic, the virus is fighting back against the trillions of dollars, months of shutdowns and the high-tech medical science weaponry mobilised to defeat it.
The battle has now been joined by an unprecedented and possibly more infectious genetic mutation of the coronavirus, which is doing what all viruses do – shift shape to try to evade the immunity provided by vaccines or prior infection.
The omicron variant that emerged in southern Africa has now been detected in travellers to countries including Belgium, Botswana, Hong Kong, Israel, Germany, Italy, the Czech Republic,and the UK.
Global alarm has been sparked by the 50 mutations identified in what is now the fifth COVID-19 variant to surface. With 30 or more of the mutations on the “spike protein” tool that a virus uses to infect human cells, the world may now have to grapple with a much more infectious virus that might challenge the effectiveness of the vaccines.
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Why markets are vulnerable to the omicron scare
The surge in real estate and equity prices leave markets highly vulnerable to rising interest rates and to the threat of another bout of lockdowns.
Karen Maley Columnist
Nov 28, 2021 – 5.26pm
Black Friday is famous for its bargains, but this year the price cuts went further than usual, with global share markets suffering their biggest daily drop in more than a year, as investors fretted about the emergence of a new COVID-19 variant.
Commodity markets also offered an array of discounts, with the American oil benchmark, West Texas Intermediate, down 13 per cent to $US68.15 a barrel, while the international benchmark Brent was down 12 per cent to $US72.72 a barrel. Meanwhile, the price of digital currency bitcoin fell from just under $US60,000 last Thursday to around $US54,200 at present.
Bargain hunters, however, found little joy in the US bond market. A flight to safety saw investors piling into government bonds, pushing yields lower. (Yields fall when bond prices rise.) The yield on benchmark US 10-year bonds has fallen to 1.48 per cent, down from 1.64 per cent last Wednesday.
Needless, to say, these abrupt shifts have caused a massive “pain trade” for global portfolio managers, who are heavily overweight on shares, and underweight on bonds, in the expectation that inflationary pressures will persist.
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Deal with omicron uncertainty by preparing for the worst
Steven Hamilton and Richard Holden
Nov 29, 2021 – 5.00am
There are many things we don’t yet know about the new omicron variant of COVID-19. Is it more contagious than delta? Will existing vaccines work against it? Is it more lethal? Precisely because we don’t know the answers to these questions, we certainly shouldn’t get hysterical. But neither should we be complacent.
As has been the case ever since the very first COVID-19 cases emerged in China almost two years ago, what we need to do is to make effective decisions amid a great deal of uncertainty. Indeed, if you – or more importantly our policymakers – have been taken by surprise by omicron, then that suggests a failure of what economists call “decision-making under uncertainty”.
Good decision-making under uncertainty involves thinking ahead about all the possibilities that might arise, and developing a contingency plan for whichever eventuality occurs.
Omicron is no bolt from the blue – we know viruses mutate as they circulate, and natural selection can – by design – generate new, more transmissible and vaccine-resistant strains. Omicron is simply another draw from the probability distribution of life.
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Moderna chief warns existing vaccines will struggle with omicron
Jamie Smyth
Nov 30, 2021 – 4.52pm
Cambridge, Massachusetts | The chief executive of Moderna has predicted that existing vaccines will be much less effective at tackling omicron than earlier strains of COVID-19 and warned it would take months before pharmaceutical companies can manufacture new variant-specific jabs at scale.
Stephane Bancel said the high number of omicron mutations on the spike protein, which the virus uses to infect human cells, and the rapid spread of the variant in South Africa, suggested the current crop of vaccines may need to be modified next year.
“There is no world, I think, where [the effectiveness] is the same level ... we had with delta,” Mr Bancel told the Financial Times in an interview at the company’s headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
He added: “I think it’s going to be a material drop. I just don’t know how much because we need to wait for the data. But all the scientists I’ve talked to ... are like ‘this is not going to be good’.”
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Infections in Europe pre-date Omicron’s identification in South Africa
By Andrew Meldrum and Raf Casert
December 1, 2021 — 4.09am
Brussels: New data relating to the Omicron coronavirus variant on Tuesday confirmed that the strain was circulating in Europe well before South Africa sounded the alarm on November 24.
The Netherlands’ RIVM health institute found Omicron in samples dating from November 19, while health authorities in Scotland tracked infections to an event there on November 20, indicating the variant was in community circulation well before the UK shut its borders to southern Africa on November 28.
Meanwhile, Japan and France reported their first cases of the variant, which has plunged the world back into uncertainty.
It is unclear where or when the variant first emerged and the Dutch and Scottish announcements further muddy the timeline. Previously, the Netherlands had said it found the variant among passengers who came from South Africa on Friday, but the new cases predate that.
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Brain problems for one in 100 Covid hospital patients
By Kat Lay
The Times
3:13PM November 30, 2021
One person in 100 treated for Covid-19 in hospital will develop brain complications, an international study has shown.
Patients developed conditions including strokes, bleeding on the brain and inflammation, according to research being presented on Tuesday at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America.
“Much has been written about the overall pulmonary problems related to Covid-19 but we do not often talk about the other organs that can be affected,” said Scott Faro, the study’s lead author and professor of radiology and neurology at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia.
“Our study shows that central nervous system complications represent a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in this devastating pandemic.”
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Scientists discover cause of rare AstraZeneca clotting
8:16PM December 3, 2021
Scientists have found the trigger for extremely rare blood clots associated with the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine, paving the way for the pharmaceutical giant to tweak the vaccine in the hope of removing the side effect.
A team of British and US scientists believe the clotting occurs when a protein in the blood attracts to a key component of the vaccine, subsequently kicking off an adverse chain reaction in the body’s immune system.
The research, published in scientific journal Science Advances, says that when the vaccine – made up of Covid-19 genetic material – is injected into the muscle, it can leak into the bloodstream and bind together with a protein in the blood named platelet factor four.
In extremely rare cases, scientists believe the immune system confuses platelet factor four for the virus and releases antibodies to attack it, which then clump with the blood protein platelet factor four and trigger the formation of dangerous blood clots.
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Climate Change.
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Climate protectionism wastes Australia’s energy comparative advantage
Protecting dirty fossil fuels by remaining outside the global climate consensus means Australia risks missing out on the massive clean industry opportunities in hydrogen and carbon capture.
Ross Garnaut Contributor
Nov 28, 2021 – 1.00pm
Australia’s emergence as an energy superpower depends on other economies remaining open to imports of zero emissions products.
Paul Samuelson, the most influential American economist through the long postwar expansion, once nominated “comparative advantage” as the idea in economics that was both non-trivial and correct. Australians developed an elaborate theory of why Australia operated under different rules. The Australian way was different, and wrong.
After the Hawke government removed nearly all protection, we rose to the top of the developed world’s league table on productivity growth after nine decades near the bottom. We began the longest period of growth unbroken by recession that any developed country had ever had – ending only in the second quarter of 2020.
We heard a lot about the Australian way to zero emissions at the Glasgow conference. It is different, and wrong.
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Labor sets 43 per cent emissions reduction target for 2030
By David Crowe
Updated December 3, 2021 — 9.54amfirst published at 9.39am
Labor leader Anthony Albanese has set a new target to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 if he wins power at the next election, clearing the policy with senior colleagues ahead of a meeting of MPs to confirm the plan.
The Labor shadow cabinet agreed on the target on Friday morning in a pivotal decision that exceeds the forecast of 35 per cent which Prime Minister Scott Morrison took to the United Nations climate summit in Glasgow last month.
Several Labor sources confirmed the 43 per cent figure.
The plan will rely on a little-known element of the federal government’s current policy, known as the Safeguard Mechanism, to do more of the work in achieving bigger cuts to emissions.
The mechanism caps the emissions at about 200 large companies in sectors like resources and industrial production, but the government has set generous caps that do not expect significant cuts.
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Labor’s climate plan goes hard on heavy polluters
Phillip Coorey Political editor
Dec 3, 2021 – 6.06pm
More than 200 of the nation’s heaviest polluters will be required to collectively lower their emissions over the next three decades under Labor’s climate policy to help achieve an economy-wide cut of 43 per cent by 2030, and net zero emissions by 2050.
The policy was in line with demands by peak employer and business groups, but nonetheless is set to become an election battleground after the government labelled it a carbon tax before it had even seen it.
Federal opposition leader Anthony Albanese is holding a press conference.
The policy, according to the associated modelling by Reputex, will lower power prices, increase jobs and drive the uptake of renewable energy.
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Labor offers a far more ambitious climate plan
The Opposition is offering a much more ambitious climate plan than the government with the sorts of tangible policies voters can easily grasp.
Laura Tingle Columnist
Dec 3, 2021 – 4.26pm
Political journalists are often accused, sometimes quite correctly, of being too obsessed with how the political game is played, rather than with what the political system is delivering.
And we are accused of spending too much time on “race calling”; reporting on policies purely in terms of how they might affect the political prospects of the major parties.
There is an argument to be made that those rules have been upended this year – as has so much in an era of global pandemic – but not because journalists have necessarily mended their ways.
They have been upended because pandemic politics has rewritten so many rules – the politics of the relationship between the federal and state governments for starters, but also of the language of fiscal rectitude.
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Royal Commissions And The Like.
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National Budget Issues.
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Australia’s GDP plunges by 1.9 per cent, the second biggest contraction in 47 years
Ellen Ransley and Rebecca Le May
NCA NewsWire
December 1, 2021
The Australian economy went backwards by 1.9 per cent in the September quarter, with Delta-induced lockdowns in the nation’s biggest cities having a massive impact.
That headline gross domestic product figure was described by economists as “ugly” but does not constitute a recession – two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth – given GDP was up 0.7 per cent in the June quarter and up 3.9 per cent through the year.
The worst slump during the pandemic was the June quarter of last year, when GDP plunged 6.8 per cent after shrinking 0.3 per cent the previous quarter, putting the nation in official recession.
Unsurprisingly, domestic demand drove the latest fall, with household spending plummeting in the states hit hard by prolonged lockdowns.
It crashed 8.4 per cent in NSW, Victoria and the ACT, compared to the rise of 0.7 per cent in all other states, detracting 2.4 percentage points from GDP.
The debt bomb that awaits in Australia economic recovery
Ronald Mizen Economics correspondent
Dec 2, 2021 – 4.38pm
Interest payments on $1.3 trillion in state and federal government debt will grow to $34 billion a year by 2024-25, as Australia’s strong economic bounce back reduces debt but pushes interest rates higher.
Interest payments will increase to 1.4 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) over the next three years, according to the latest national fiscal outlook from the independent Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO).
“This is $3.2 billion higher across the period 2020-21 to 2023-24 than forecast at the previous outlook, despite the improvement in the debt position,” the PBO said.
National net debt is forecast to grow to 55 per cent of GDP by 2024-25.
The shift upwards was partially attributed to assumed borrowing costs lifting 0.8 percentage points higher to 1.6 per cent across the forward estimates compared to the 2020-21 Commonwealth budget.
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Students ‘toxic’ at extended border closures
Julie Hare Education editor
Nov 30, 2021 – 3.59pm
International students have coined the phrase “lollipop” to describe the many promises made by the federal government over the past year concerning their return, only to have their hopes quickly dashed.
Kenneth De Claro, 21, knows the lollipop effect only too well. Just 30 hours before his December 1 flight from Manila to Sydney via Hong Kong was due to take off, Mr de Claro received news it was cancelled.
“I had already even said farewell to my family and friends, so I was kind of dejected upon hearing the news,” said Mr De Claro, who has been enrolled to study mechatronic engineering at Macquarie University since July and has been studying online.
“It is an understandable move from the government, but certainly makes things difficult for students who have already booked flights based on the government’s previous announcement.”
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Why you shouldn’t gloss over the September GDP fall
Turbocharged taxpayer stimulus and business adaptability cushioned the blow, but that must not be used as an excuse for imposing future lockdowns.
John Kehoe Economics editor
Dec 1, 2021 – 3.40pm
Turbocharged taxpayer stimulus and business adaptability during lockdowns meant the economic contraction was not as bad as feared in the September quarter, but that must not be used as an excuse for imposing future lockdowns.
The national economy suffered the third-biggest decline in activity on record, falling 1.9 per cent, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
Locked-down NSW shrank a whopping 6.5 per cent as the state raced to deploy vaccines to fight the faster-spreading delta variant of COVID-19.
While the economy is rebounding strongly out of lockdowns, we should not gloss over the enormity of the September quarter figures.
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Health Issues.
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CSL in talks to buy European business Vifor Pharma
12:49PM December 2, 2021
CSL is believed to be in exclusive talks to buy Switzerland-based business Vifor Pharma in a deal that could be worth $10bn.
The understanding is that an equity raising is looming for the Australia’s largest healthcare company through Bank of America that could be in the order of $3bn to $4bn.
DataRoom flagged in March that an acquistion of Vifor by CSL could be on the cards.
However, the understanding is that now negotiations have progressed, as revealed by DataRoom online on Thursday.
Sources say that earlier, issues related to intellectual property placed a pause on a looming transaction.
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Shake up for maternity care, joint replacements in hospital reforms
By Sean Parnell
December 3, 2021 — 8.52pm
Public hospitals will be offered bundled payments to provide common medical services in expectation it will lead to better - and cheaper - care.
The Independent Hospital Pricing Authority has notified governments that, from next financial year, it will allow trials of alternatives to the activity-based funding model introduced in 2012.
After several years of consultation, and previous proposals that were ultimately deemed unworkable, the IHPA will finally be in a position to test whether bundled payments can transform the health system.
Such payments would apply to relatively predictable health interventions across multiple settings, for example hip and knee replacements, that are normally funded separately.
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International Issues.
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Taiwan scrambles jets after 27 Chinese planes enter its buffer zone
November 29, 2021 — 8.04am
Taipei: Taiwan said 27 Chinese aircraft entered its air defence buffer zone on Sunday, the latest in a long series of incursions as part of Beijing’s pressure on the self-ruled island.
The Defence Ministry said Taiwan scrambled combat aircraft to “warn” the Chinese planes to leave. It also deployed missile systems to monitor them.
Sunday’s incursion included 18 fighter jets and five H-6 bombers, as well as a Y-20 aerial refuelling aircraft, according to Taiwan’s Defence Ministry.
The Chinese aircraft flew into Taiwan’s air defence identification zone near the southern part of the island and out into the Pacific Ocean before returning to China, according to a map by Taiwan authorities.
Over the past year, the frequency of Chinese incursions has increased, with about 150 aircraft over a period of four days.
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The Grand Avenue of the Sphinxes reopens
By Magdy Samaan
The Times
5:34PM November 26, 2021
For centuries it was the focus of ritual celebrations to mark the annual flooding of the Nile before it was covered in the sprawl of Luxor.
The Grand Avenue of the Sphinxes, a 3000-year-old parade that stretches for almost three kilometres, was reopened on Thursday night with a grand procession to rival those witnessed by the pharaohs.
Dancers, musicians and costumed actors enlivened the festivities to inaugurate one of the largest open-air archaeological sites, which connected the ancient temples of Karnak and Luxor.
The avenue created by Queen Hatshepsut, who reigned from 1479 to 1458BC, was developed over 1000 years, flanked by up to 1200 sphinxes, many with the heads of rams on sandstone bases.
It was rediscovered in the 1940s, buried under the streets of Luxor, formerly known as the ancient royal capital of Thebes. The site has been excavated and restored over the past decades.
The recreation of the ceremonial route, once named the Path of God, has involved the demolition of hundreds of homes, several mosques, a 19th-century palace and a church.
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Biden declares independence by keeping Powell at the Fed
The most important appointment of Biden’s presidency has protected the role of the Federal Reserve - and reaffirmed his independence from the Democrat left.
Kenneth Rogoff Columnist
Nov 29, 2021 – 11.58am
Give US President Joe Biden, a Democrat, credit for reappointing Jerome Powell, a Republican, to a second four-year term as chairman of the US Federal Reserve.
In doing so, Biden passed up a strong alternative in Lael Brainard, the candidate much preferred by progressives and who, in the abstract, would also have been an excellent choice.
Firmly resisting strong pressure from the left wing of the Democratic Party, Biden accomplished several things at once.
First, and most important, he reaffirmed the central bank’s independence from political pressures.
His predecessor, Donald Trump, inherited a very capable central bank head, Janet Yellen, and he acknowledged as much. But he decided that it was preferable to have his own person in charge, perhaps hoping that he could call on Powell not to tighten monetary policy in the run-up to the 2020 election.
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There’s gold in the Solomon Islands, but not for the people who live there
Political and international editor
November 30, 2021 — 5.30am
The Solomon Islands are so named because they were thought to contain the fabled treasures of King Solomon.
The Spanish expedition that chanced upon the South Pacific archipelago near the equator in 1568 was sure it had found the Biblical land of Ophir, the source of Solomon’s vast trove of gold.
The Spaniards were wrong. It wasn’t Ophir. But there was some gold, quite a bit. And the people of the Solomon Islands are still waiting, waiting for their share.
As the capital, Honiara, descended into rioting, arson and looting last week, the country’s dominant mine, Gold Ridge, sat, shuttered, 22 kilometres away. The mine, controlled by a Chinese state-owned company, which has big plans for it, is central to the Solomon Islands’ future.
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Powell says time to stop calling inflation ‘transitory’
Craig Torres and Matthew Boesler
Dec 1, 2021 – 3.41am
Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell said it’s appropriate to consider finishing the US central bank’s tapering of asset purchases a few months earlier than previously expected, with inflation proving more persistent than forecast.
Powell made the comment on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT) in response to questions during a Senate Banking Committee hearing in Washington.
The Fed is currently scheduled to complete its asset-purchase program in mid-2022 under a plan announced at the start of November; policymakers next meet December 14-15, where they could make a decision to accelerate the tapering.
It’s “appropriate in my view to consider wrapping up the taper of our asset purchases, which we actually announced at the November meeting, perhaps a few months sooner”, Powell said.
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‘Good time to retire that word’: Fed chief’s abrupt change of heart shakes markets
Senior business columnist
December 1, 2021 — 11.49am
US inflation, it seems, is no longer transitory and the prospect of markets-shaking interest rate rises in the US and elsewhere has suddenly drawn closer.
In testimony to the US Congress on Tuesday the Federal Reserve Board chair, Jerome Powell, said the US economy was very strong and inflationary pressures were high. The risk of higher inflation had increased.
Even as US inflation has remained at levels last seen 30 years ago throughout this year – the rate was 6.2 per cent in October and even on the Fed’s preferred core inflation measure was 5 per cent – Powell and other influential board members have insisted that it would be “transitory” and deflate as the economy and global supply chains normalised from the pandemic.
Now Powell says “it’s probably a good time to retire that word and explain more clearly what we mean.”
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China’s plan to end its Australian iron ore dependency
Michael Smith North Asia correspondent
Dec 2, 2021 – 5.00am
Tokyo | China will boost domestic iron ore production by 30 per cent, significantly ramp up investments in overseas mines and strengthen scrap steel recycling under a plan designed to break Beijing’s dependency on Australia’s most valuable commodity export.
China’s top steel industry executives and senior government officials outlined a strategy for achieving the five-year targets in an article published this week, which highlights the Chinese government’s frustration with volatile iron ore prices and its desire to follow Japan’s lead by investing heavily in offshore mines.
The article published in the state-backed Economic Daily singled out Australia and Brazil for dominating China’s imports of the steel-making ingredient.
“The control of overseas iron ore resources is obviously insufficient, and more than 80 per cent of the import volume comes from Australia and Brazil. The risks to resource security are prominent,” said Chen Ziqi, a senior executive at China International Engineering Consulting Corp, a major adviser to the Chinese government on investment and construction.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/powell-s-transitory-retreat-is-just-the-beginning-20211202-p59e1k
Powell’s ‘transitory’ retreat is just the beginning
The catch-up process – and a rapid one is required given the delays so far – could destabilise markets and the economy. It didn’t have to be this way.
Mohamed A. El-Erian
Dec 2, 2021 – 6.42am
By retiring the word “transitory,” Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell did more than finally correct a gross mischaracterisation of inflation that he was wedded to for way too long.
He also put the spotlight on inflation as a major risk to the economy and financial markets — not because the prospects for further price increases are inherently problematic (they aren’t) but because the Fed’s communication process and policy responses have been lagging realities.
The catch-up process – and a rapid one is required given the delays so far – could destabilise markets and the economy. It didn’t have to be this way.
For months, Powell asserted that inflation was transitory. Rather than revisit in a timely basis his assertion in the face of ample evidence to the contrary, he adopted an ever-more elastic concept of the word that favoured longer and arbitrary time periods at the expense of economic analytical rigor.
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How long can Beijing prop up Chinese property?
The colossal $7 trillion of debt amassed by developers in the Asian nation means there’s only so long that Beijing can continue to kick the can down the road.
Karen Maley Columnist
Dec 2, 2021 – 5.00am
Some time in the next 12 months, Beijing will be confronted with an invidious decision: will it bail out the households, banks and investors who lent some $US5 trillion ($7 trillion) to Chinese property developers, or will it force them to share the pain?
So far, Chinese authorities have managed to delay taking a stand on this difficult issue. They’ve been able to kick the can down the road, in part because they have been able to corral state-owned property developers and banks, along with local governments, to help prop up activity.
And this has prevented a catastrophic loss of confidence in the country’s property market, which would weigh heavily on economic activity.
But while this policy is clearly in everyone’s interest, there’s only so long that Beijing can persist with extend-and-pretend. And that’s because some of China’s property development giants have some massive debt repayments coming due, which can’t be papered over.
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What will the world be like in 20 years?
By Andrew Ross Sorkin
December 2, 2021 — 12.15am
“Demographics are destiny.”
It is a phrase — often attributed to French philosopher Auguste Comte — that suggests much of the future is preordained by the very simple trend lines of populations. Want to understand how the power dynamic between the United States and China will change over the next 20 years? An economist would tell you to look at the demographics of both countries. (China’s economy is likely to overtake the US economy by 2028, but remain smaller on a per capita basis.)
Want to know how much lithium we’re going to need to mine to make batteries over the next 20 years? Demographics will most likely provide the answer. (We are likely to need 13 to 42 times the amount we currently use, according to the International Energy Agency.) And on and on.
Predicting the future may be a fool’s errand. But using demographic data to assess the opportunities and challenges of the next two decades is something that business and political leaders don’t do enough. We’re all too swept up in the here and now, the next quarter and the next year.
Of course, demographics can’t spot pandemics or other crises. But as seismic as they feel in the moment, such events are rare.
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China lashes out at Abe over former leader’s Taiwan warning
December 2, 2021 — 3.02am
Beijing: China lashed out at Shinzo Abe on Wednesday after the former Japanese prime minister warned of the serious security and economic consequences of any Chinese military action against self-ruled Taiwan.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said Abe had “talked nonsense, pointed fingers at Taiwan issues and made irresponsible remarks on China internal affairs.
He said China “strongly opposes and deplores this” and had protested to Japan through diplomatic channels.
“No one should underestimate the resolve, determination, firm will and strong ability of the Chinese people to defend national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” Wen told reporters at a daily briefing. “Anyone who dares to repeat militarism and challenge the bottom line of the Chinese people will surely be shattered in the face.”
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US defence chief slams China’s drive for hypersonic weapons
Kim Tong-Hyung and Hyung-Jin Kim
Dec 2, 2021 – 6.30pm
Seoul | US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin said on Thursday that China’s pursuit of hypersonic weapons “increases tensions in the region” and vowed the US would maintain its capability to deter potential threats posed by China.
Mr Austin made the remarks in Seoul following annual security talks with his South Korean counterpart that focused on challenges from China and North Korea and other issues facing the allies.
“We have concerns about the military capabilities that the [People’s Republic of China] continues to pursue,” he said.
“Again, the pursuit of those capabilities increases tensions in the region,” he said, referring to China’s latest hypersonic weapons test in July.
“It just underscores why we consider the PRC to be our pacing challenge,” Mr Austin said. “We’ll continue to maintain the capabilities to defend and deter against a range of potential threats from the PRC to ourselves and to our allies.”
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Why central banks should worry that everyone is talking about inflation
The global economy is at a turning point: conditions may be shifting from deflationary to more inflationary overall.
Otmar Issing
Dec 3, 2021 – 5.00am
Many countries are reporting their highest rates of inflation in decades: 6.2 per cent in the United States, 4.2 per cent in the United Kingdom, 5.2 per cent in Germany, and above 4 per cent in the eurozone. Some insist it is a temporary phenomenon; others fear we must brace ourselves for an extended period of significant price increases driven by expansionary monetary policies and rising public debts.
Still, both camps agree that at least some factors behind the recent inflationary surge will soon subside or disappear. In 2020, prices rose only slightly, and even declined in some cases, setting a low baseline for the year-on-year increase in 2021. Surging prices for heating oil, gas, petrol and diesel are also generally considered to be temporary. A significant decline in headline inflation can thus be expected in most countries in 2022.
In the longer term, however, we must adapt to higher fossil fuel prices to fight climate change. Similarly, though the across-the-board price spikes in building materials, computer chips and raw materials are not expected to continue indefinitely, nor are we likely to find lasting relief.
After all, the problem is global. When China fully entered world markets in the 1990s, the resulting flood of cheap goods placed downward pressure not only on prices but also on wages. Trade unions, concerned about job losses, were reluctant to demand higher wages. But now these pressures are easing.
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Evidence Vladimir Putin is planning invasion of Ukraine, says Antony Blinken
By Max Delany and Francesco Fontemaggi
AFP
4:26PM December 2, 2021
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday that Washington had seen “evidence” Russia could be planning an invasion on Ukraine, threatening Moscow with painful economic sanctions if it attacks.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, for his part, said he wanted “concrete agreements” from NATO that it would not expand eastwards.
Mr Blinken accused Moscow of massing “tens of thousands of additional combat forces” near Ukraine’s border as he geared up for talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov in Stockholm over the crisis.
“We’re deeply concerned by evidence that Russia has made plans for significant aggressive moves against Ukraine, plans include efforts to destabilise Ukraine from within as well as large scale military operations,” he said after a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Latvia’s capital Riga. “Now, we don’t know whether President Putin has made the decision to invade. We do know that he’s putting in place the capacity to do so on short order, should he so decide.”
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Deterring Russia in Ukraine
The Wall Street Journal
December 3, 2021
Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday made the toughest statements to date about Russia’s military build-up on its border with Ukraine. And on Thursday he’ll meet his Russian counterpart in Stockholm as tensions rise between Moscow and the U.S. The question is whether President Biden’s envoy can convince Vladimir Putin that the U.S. means what it says.
“We’re deeply concerned by evidence that Russia has made plans for significant aggressive moves against Ukraine,” Mr. Blinken said Wednesday at a meeting of NATO ministers in Latvia. “The plans include efforts to destabilise Ukraine from within, as well as large scale military operations.” In other words, Russia may be planning a coup in Kiev.
“We are prepared to impose severe costs for further Russian aggression in Ukraine,” Mr. Blinken added, and “NATO is prepared to reinforce its defences on the eastern flank.” Mr. Blinken didn’t get specific, and Ukraine isn’t a NATO member, but this was as clear a statement of military deterrence as the alliance has been willing to make as Mr. Putin stirs trouble on his borders. Mr. Blinken had better mean it because Mr. Putin may call his bluff.
Mr. Biden met with the Russian strongman in June, hoping for better relations, but the returns have been negative. Russia has tested an antisatellite missile, without warning, that could be used against U.S. assets. Belarus, with support from Moscow, has weaponized migrants along the European Union border.
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US economy adds 210,000 jobs in November, jobless rate falls to 4.2pc
Olivia Rockeman
Dec 4, 2021 – 4.42am
Washington | US job growth registered its smallest gain this year while the unemployment rate fell by more than forecast to 4.2 per cent, offering a mixed picture that may nevertheless push the Federal Reserve to quicken the wind-down of pandemic stimulus.
Nonfarm payrolls climbed 210,000 in November after upward revisions to each of the prior two months, a Labor Department report showed Friday. The labour force participation rate edged up to 61.8 per cent.
The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for a 550,000 payrolls gain and for the jobless rate to fall to 4.5 per cent.
The jobs report is composed of two surveys -- one of employers and the other of households. The employer survey, which determines the payroll and wage figures, showed hiring slowed across industries, including declines at automakers and retail outlets. The household survey, which determines the jobless and participation rates, showed employment surged by 1.14 million people and many came off the sidelines.
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Ukraine braces for ‘large scale’ Russian invasion of ‘100,000 troops’ in January
By Justin Vallejo
News Corp Australia Network
1:15AM December 4, 2021
Ukraine is bracing for a “large scale” attack in January as an estimated 100,000 troops massed on its border with Russia.
The dire warning comes after Ukraine said it would not drop its ambitions of joining NATO, which Russia demanded after the United States said it had “evidence” Moscow was planning an invasion.
Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov told parliament that its intelligence was analysing all possible scenarios.
“The most likely time to reach readiness for escalation will be the end of January,” he said. “The possibility of a large-scale escalation from Russia exists.”
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Open way of life is being exploited by China: UK spy boss
11:00PM December 2, 2021
Public speeches by heads of intelligence agencies are infrequent, so the speech by Richard Moore, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (better known as MI6), at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London on Tuesday has attracted attention.
It was Moore’s first public speech since becoming the 17th “C” in October last year. (Disappointingly, he does not seem to be related to actor Roger Moore of James Bond fame.)
The MI6 chief sees public speaking as important, as in his view it holds MI6 to account, helps retain public support and hopefully will inspire the right people to join the organisation.
The speech is important for Australia because of our close participation in the Five Eyes intelligence arrangements (involving Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the US and Britain). More so, because it is now effectively a “Three Eyes” arrangement, as neither Canada nor New Zealand contribute much to the intelligence relationship.
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Brace for war in our time
Australians must face the fact that China is determined to invade Taiwan — and in a China-dominated region we won’t enjoy the freedoms we assume are our birthright.
By Alan Dupont
December 3, 2021
It is often said that there are only two certainties in life – death and taxes. But war and conflict must surely qualify as a third.
Despite our best efforts, we have yet to eliminate the scourge of war. The good news is that when they occur, most conflicts never escalate to the level of last century’s two ruinous conflagrations. We have all been accustomed to peace for so long that uber optimists believe major wars have been consigned to the dustbin of history.
But Taiwan’s emergence as a potential trigger for a hot war with global consequences is fundamentally changing perceptions. Earlier this year, The Economist described Taiwan as “the most dangerous place on Earth” – fearing that it could become the catalyst for war between the US and China.
Until now, defending Australia’s democratic values and sovereignty from the thickening ranks of autocrats has been largely bipartisan. This bipartisanship is starting to fracture over the crucial question of whether China’s unassailable but ageing leader, Xi Jinping, will chance his arm and take Taiwan by force to cement his legacy as the nation’s great unifier. Although not all would agree with Defence Minister Peter Dutton’s belief that it would be “inconceivable” for Australia not to join the US in military action to support Taiwan, the Coalition is broadly united around the need to buttress the island’s democracy.
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I look forward to comments on all this!
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David.
