Michael Stutchbury interviews Brett Stevenson about his new CIS paper The Discipline of Profit, which tests the claim that Woolworths and Coles have been raking in megaprofits at the expense of shoppers, suppliers and staff. Stevenson goes to the only place the argument can actually be settled: the companies’ own audited accounts.

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👉 Further reading: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/the-discipline-of-profit-what-supermarket-accounts-reveal-about-profiteering-debate/

This is the audio version of Wrong Way – Go Back: How Australia’s Workplace Relations System is Holding Back Growth, Wages and Opportunity, a Centre for Independent Studies paper by former Fair Work Commission vice-president Graeme Watson. For the full paper, go to: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/wrong-way-go-back-how-australias-workplace-relations-system-is-holding-back-growth-wages-and-opportunity/ 

Watson argues that Australia’s workplace system is uniquely prescriptive and uniquely complex — National Employment Standards, 122 modern awards, and a bargaining regime stacked on top of one of the world’s highest minimum wages. The 1990s consensus of Hawke, Keating and Howard put a fair safety net under enterprise-level deals that lifted productivity and real wages. From 2022 to 2025 that rationale was reversed: more prescription, revived multi-employer and pattern bargaining, expanded arbitration, and individual claims that reward speculation over merit. Productivity dropped out of workplace policy even as growth slumped and real wages flattened.

The paper’s answer is to go back: regulation as a guardrail, not a handbrake. Watson sets out 16 first-step reforms, including a simplified small-business award, annual salaries instead of overtime complexity, employer consent for multi-enterprise bargaining, a productivity test for agreements, tighter unfair-dismissal and general-protections rules, and cost orders against unreasonable claims. Australia cannot regulate its way to prosperity. Read the paper at the link above.

Watch here: https://youtu.be/8PZDxDVb1_o

Michael Stutchbury interviews CIS Education Director Blaise Joseph about his new paper: Classrooms in Crisis: Australian teacher views on student behaviour. 

A national survey of more than 370 teachers finds classroom disruption is costing students an average of 12 weeks of learning a year — roughly one-third of instructional time

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👉 Further reading: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/classrooms-in-crisis-australian-teachers-perspectives-on-student-behaviour/

Michael Stutchbury interviews the Hon Graeme Watson, former Vice President of the Fair Work Commission, about how Australia’s workplace relations system is holding back productivity, real wages, investment and business growth.

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👉 Further reading: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/wrong-way-go-back-how-australias-workplace-relations-system-is-holding-back-growth-wages-and-opportunity/

Has Australia’s experiment with multiculturalism reached a breaking point?

In this episode of Liberalism in Question, economist and public intellectual Henry Ergas AO joins the conversation to examine one of the most sensitive and consequential questions facing classical liberalism in Australia today: how a free and open society can sustain social cohesion amid rapid demographic change, cultural fragmentation, and the rise of identity politics.

Ergas, a long-time columnist for The Australian, former OECD economist, and one of the country’s most rigorous public thinkers, argues that the post-Whitlam model of multiculturalism has shifted from a pragmatic policy of tolerance and integration to an ideology that celebrates difference while weakening the shared civic culture that once held Australia together. He explores the consequences for immigration policy, national identity, and the liberal order itself, including the alarming surge in antisemitism and the broader erosion of social trust.

A clear-eyed and unflinching conversation about culture, belonging, and the future of liberal democracy in Australia.

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In this episode of Liberalism in Question, Joseph Healy examines what Adam Smith would make of modern Australia.

Drawing on both The Wealth of Nations and The Theory of Moral Sentiments, he diagnoses today’s economic and social challenges and outlines a more balanced path forward.

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Michael Stutchbury interviews Dr Peter Tulip about new NSW data showing development applications and lodgements rising sharply, with building approvals expected to climb but still falling short of the federal housing target. The conversation explains recent NSW reforms like transport‑oriented development and low/mid‑rise housing, and why supply constraints from local councils matter for affordability.

The episode also reveals a ‘naughty list’ of lagging councils, outlines graduated remedies (naming, inspections, state intervention), and explores the debate between concentrating high‑rise near transport hubs versus spreading townhouses more widely across suburbs.

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👉 Further reading: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/will-nsw-meet-its-housing-target/

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📖 Read more from CIS here: https://www.cis.org.au/

Watch here: https://youtu.be/n_l-fl2w6Z0

From de Tocqueville to Lord Acton and beyond, the idea of Democracy has developed, not always ideally, and signs of its demise are evident in Australia, making its defence a priority.

Rachael Kohn AO FRSN is an author, commentator, and award-winning producer and broadcaster, best known for her long tenure at the ABC. She has written three books, edited a fourth, and holds a PhD in religious studies from a Canadian university.

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👉 Key points: 

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👉 Further reading: https://www.cis.org.au/publication/a-nation-of-strangers-how-a-civic-vacuum-enabled-antisemitism/

👉 Watch Part 1: https://youtu.be/zhxJXyavYzI

Is Islam compatible with liberalism? In this episode of Liberalism in Question, Dr Mark Durie joins the Centre for Independent Studies to examine the fundamental tensions between Islamic theology, sharia, and core liberal principles such as individual freedom, equality, and freedom of religion.

Mark Durie is a pastor and academic. He writes and speaks on a wide range of topics which include the connection between faith and culture, freedom of religion, the persecution of religious minorities, particularly non-Muslims living under the Islamic sharia, the origin and history of Islam, and discipling new Christians.

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