Perth Dialogues

"It's not just about proving who you are, it's about who gets to decide what you do." – Paul Conlon

The Australian Government says Digital ID remains voluntary for individuals, and from 1 December 2026 accredited private providers can join the Australian Government Digital ID System. Paul G. Conlon, author of Citizen One: The Case Against Digital Identity, argues for caution. In this conversation we put the scams, convenience and regional-access arguments to him.

Paul is a Perth-based engineer, product manager and author.

Paul's website: https://paulgconlon.com/

In this episode:

• Why an engineer wrote a book on identity, and the family history behind it

• What counts as a "digital ID" and why the definition matters

• Federated design, centralised data and the "honeypot" argument

• Whether "voluntary" stays voluntary in practice

• Social media age checks, scams, and what happens when systems go down

• Older Australians and migrants, plus lessons from Aadhaar in India

• The Australia Card debate of the 1980s, the UK reversal and what comes next

• Practical steps to protect your personal information

Chapters

00:00:00 Cold open: who gets to decide what you do

00:01:13 Why an engineer wrote Citizen One

00:05:07 The book and the Digital ID Act

00:06:32 Who was Nadine Schatz?

00:08:53 What goes through his mind opening a digital ID app

00:10:54 Scams, convenience and the case for digital ID

00:14:45 What counts as a digital ID?

00:18:29 The case against convenience

00:19:39 Federated design and the honeypot argument

00:22:14 Is "voluntary" really voluntary?

00:24:41 Social media age checks

00:27:04 Can digital ID reduce scams?

00:29:02 Optus, Medibank and reissued IDs

00:30:57 Regional access and when systems fail

00:33:29 Is 1930s Germany a fair comparison?

00:37:00 Where to find the original records

00:38:19 Older Australians and migrants

00:40:57 Aadhaar: lessons for Australia

00:44:00 What would a better system look like?

00:46:59 Private businesses join from 1 December

00:48:37 Will it raise the cost of living?

00:51:15 The Australia Card of the 1980s

00:53:45 The UK, China and where Australia goes

00:56:17 Can opposite sides of politics agree?

00:58:40 Was the book too alarmist?

01:00:34 Takeaways and protecting your information

01:03:50 What's next for Paul

01:06:36 Where to find Paul's work

For the official information

Australian Government Digital ID: https://www.digitalidsystem.gov.au/what-is-digital-id/digital-id-act-2024

ACCC Targeting Scams report 2025: https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/continued-action-critical-to-combat-fraud-as-annual-scam-losses-exceed-2-billion

Note: in the conversation, the ACCC's 2025 scam loss figure was mentioned as $2.8 billion. The ACCC reports $2.18 billion.

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Sayed Barkat Hussainizada is a Sydney-based community advocate, actor and founder of RexTech Marketing Agency, and a founding member of the Afghan Fajar Association.

At 12 years old, Sayed Hussainizada fled Afghanistan with his family in the dead of night. Today he's played a lead role in a feature film about asylum seekers, founded a community organisation, built his own marketing agency, and still isn't sure whether acting or business scares him more.

In this conversation:

• Arriving in Australia in 2005 at age 12, and what it took for the family to start over

• Being the first in his community to go to university

• Landing a lead role in the 2016 telemovie Journey — and what it meant to tell a story so close to his own

• Starring in Sheltered, a short film about bullying and belonging

• Founding the Afghan Fajar Association, and what newly arrived families need most

• Building RexTech Marketing Agency, and the hardest lessons two small businesses have taught him

• His take on Australia's humanitarian intake numbers — and what he'd tell the Prime Minister

• What he thinks people get wrong about refugees

This episode touches on refugee mental health and includes a reference to suicidal ideation among people in immigration limbo. If this brings up anything difficult for you, Lifeline is available 24/7 on 13 11 14, and Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636.

Chapters:

00:00 Introductions

02:28 Arriving in Australia at 12

06:27 First in His Community to Go to University

08:44 When Did He Start Feeling Australian?

11:22 How a Community Email Led to His Acting Career

14:19 Sheltered — Telling a Refugee Boy's Story on Screen

19:39 Founding the Afghan Fajar Association

21:42 Biggest Challenges Facing New Arrivals

23:53 On Assimilation, Identity and "Being Australian"

27:57 From Community Work to Building RexTech

30:15 Running a Small Business — Costs & Challenges

31:15 The 7NEWS Young Achiever Awards Finalist Story

32:05 The Hardest Part of Small Business

34:04 Advice for First-Time Entrepreneurs

35:53 Balancing Acting, Advocacy and Business

39:52 The Government's Humanitarian Intake Numbers

41:57 What People Get Wrong About Refugees

45:38 A Message for the Prime Minister

47:22 What's Next for Sayed

Views expressed by guests are their own, not Perth Dialogues'.

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A $4.2 billion WA Government bond matures October 21, 2026. WA collects $10 billion a year in mining royalties — but sends $30 billion a year to Canberra. Independent MLA Jonathan Huston joins Perth Dialogues to explain how Western Australia's tax system really works, and what one bold reform could change everything.

Jonathan Huston is the Independent Member for Nedlands in the WA Legislative Assembly.

▶ CHAPTERS

00:00 Welcome & Introduction

02:25 Payroll Tax Explained — $6 billion a year tax on jobs

04:00 WA's Royalty System — how mining is taxed

06:13 Iron Ore Margins vs Small Business

07:54 The Alcoa Bombshell

10:48 The Plan: Abolish Payroll Tax by 2035

12:25 Alaska Model & Sovereign Wealth Fund

13:25 The $4.2B Bond & WA's Hidden Debt

15:45 Investment Protections for New Miners

18:55 Federal Super-Profits Tax

23:46 Public Sector Reform (First Time on Air)

31:23 The GST Fight

37:10 The $30B Annual Drain to Canberra

39:07 Zero WA Representation on Federal Boards

44:22 One Takeaway for 2029

📬 CONTACT JONATHAN HUSTON MLA

Email: [email protected]

#WesternAustralia #PerthPodcast #MiningRoyalties #PayrollTax #WApolitics #PerthDialogues #JonathanHuston #WApolicy #GST #AlaskaModel #Nedlands #WAmining

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With one average salary in 2005, you could buy 2.5kg of gold. In 2025, half a kilogram. 90% of the UK's printed press is owned by three companies. 40% of American voters identify with neither major party.

Author Metin Pekin (Breaking Democracy's Chains: Freeing and Fortifying Democracy Against Hidden Capture) joins Perth Dialogues to make the case that it isn't any one party letting voters down — it's the party system itself. We push back hard on it: can independents actually govern without collapsing into gridlock? Don't they just get bought the same way parties do? What actually stops them re-forming into new factions?

In this conversation:

- Why the party "whip" system means your MP may answer to their party before their voters

- Money in politics — from union funding to billionaire donors

- Metin's proposed "No-Party" model: independent MPs, a directly elected leader and shadow leader, and issue-by-issue voting

- A real stress-test: Australia's Teal independents and Climate 200 funding

- The corruption risk when independents replace parties

- Two-party vs multi-party systems — the Netherlands and Israel compared

- Why Metin himself stopped voting for major parties after the Iraq War

About the guest:

Metin Pekin holds a degree in Political Economy from the University of Greenwich and spent 30 years as an entrepreneur before writing Breaking Democracy's Chains. Find the book and his socials at metinpekin.com, or on Amazon.

Book 🔗 https://www.amazon.com.au/Breaking-Democracys-Chains-Fortifying-Democracy-ebook/dp/B0G1TY9MCP

Disclaimer: This conversation covers contested historical and political claims. These are the guest's own arguments and interpretations, not positions endorsed by this show — we'd encourage viewers to weigh them against other sources.

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Cold open

01:31 Welcome & introducing Metin Pekin

02:20 Metin's background — business, and why he wrote the book

06:25 Defining democracy — and where it breaks down

09:00 The party whip system (Boris Johnson and the 21 MPs)

11:04 Money in politics — Reform UK's billionaire donor

13:49 Donor influence, Trump, and the Jerusalem embassy

15:23 Julian Assange and media capture

22:24 The green grocer: performing belief in a broken system

27:14 Why don't people see the chains? (Maslow, political apathy)

33:44 The werewolf game — how a small minority controls the majority

36:20 Metin's three-step solution

41:22 How to "break the chains" without banning parties

50:59 Devil's advocate: why do we need parties at all?

53:11 Who really funds parties — unions vs billionaires

56:38 Should power be decentralised to the states instead?

01:00:14 Won't independents just re-form into factions? The Teal MPs test

01:09:44 Can independents be bought too? The corruption question

01:16:00 Two-party vs multi-party — Netherlands and Israel

01:22:38 Could 150 independent MPs actually govern?

01:35:07 Voter turnout and apathy — Metin's own voting story

01:44:30 Long-term policy without party continuity — China vs India

01:52:51 The one thing every voter should take away

01:55:29 The pushback Metin actually gets

01:57:15 Where to find the book

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"The state has not given them those rights yet." That's what Deng Xiaoping reportedly told a reporter after Tiananmen Square — and it's the moment that shapes how today's guest thinks about where human rights actually come from.

WA Parliament has opened every sitting day with the Lord's Prayer since 1928. A WA Labor MP now wants to replace it with a moment of silent reflection. Returning guest Prof. Matthew Ogilvie (Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame Australia) makes the case for keeping it.

In this conversation:

- The strongest argument for scrapping the prayer, steel-manned in full Genesis, human dignity, and where Matthew traces the roots of Western human rights

- Tiananmen Square, Deng Xiaoping, and what happens when the state becomes the only reference point

- Would a Sikh, Muslim or Buddhist prayer do the same job as a Christian one?

- The Acknowledgement of Country as a parallel case — Matthew calls it "lighting a fuse"

- A live controversy in the 2026 Census: some faiths get several tick-boxes, others get none

- Christian affiliation is down to around 44% of Australia — does the heritage argument still hold?

Disclaimer: Perth Dialogues doesn't take a party-political position — the job here is to ask the hard questions on behalf of everyone listening, whatever their faith or none. Views expressed are of individual speakers and must be interpreted in the context of the bigger discussion in which they have been expressed.

Referenced in this episode

Matthew Ogilvie article in The Spectator Australia: https://www.spectator.com.au/2026/08/wa-parliament-should-keep-the-lords-prayer/

WA Parliament Inquiry: https://www.parliament.wa.gov.au/Parliament/commit.nsf/(EvidenceOnly)/2952D1C29D83B7E648258E67002FF956?opendocument#details

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 "The State Always Misuses That Power"

01:32 What Is the Lord's Prayer, and Why Does It Matter Now?

02:51 The Prayer as a Building Block of Civilisation

04:14 Genesis, Human Dignity, and the Roots of Western Rights

10:12 Is Australia a Christian Country? Multiculturalism vs "No-Culturalism"

14:47 Steelmanning the Case to Scrap the Prayer

17:37 "No Other Workplace Does This" — and the Premier's Response

22:52 Church, State, and Section 116

27:17 Can Human Rights Exist Without God?

29:03 Tiananmen Square and Deng Xiaoping's Chilling Answer

35:41 "Chopping Down the Tree While Demanding Its Fruit"

40:24 Acknowledgement of Country: The Parallel Debate

45:04 Would a Sikh, Muslim or Buddhist Prayer Do the Same Job?

46:50 Australian Values, Identity, and the COVID Test

50:36 Christians Are No Longer the Majority

55:59 The Census, Denominations, and a Flawed Question

58:43 The Kirpan, 9/11, and What Ignorance Breeds

01:01:15 A Hindu Neighbour, Halloween, and Learning to Laugh

01:03:45 Should Canberra Be the Model?

01:04:49 Designing Parliament From Scratch

01:07:58 Closing Message: Assume Good Faith

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The United Nations calendar has 15 days dedicated to women and girls. It has zero for men and boys. That, says David Maywald, is where this conversation starts — not with grievance, but with an audit.

In Australia he points to six times more public spending on women's medical research than men's, almost one million children growing up without an actively involved father, and male teachers now making up less than one in five primary school staff.

David Maywald is the author of "The Relentless War on Masculinity" and has made a submission to Australia's current parliamentary inquiry into educational attainment.

JOIN DAVID MAYWALD

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmaywald/

Substack: https://celebratingmasculinity.substack.com/

ICMB: https://www.menandboys.net/

Book: "The Relentless War on Masculinity" — https://books2read.com/trwom

TIMESTAMPS

00:01:33 Why "father" comes before every other title

00:05:51 Missionary parents, a feminist mother

00:06:38 Women overtook men at university in 1987

00:07:55 What made him start speaking up

00:10:55 The six waves of the men's movement

00:14:11 What he tells his own son and daughter

00:17:48 Is advocating for men anti-feminist?

00:19:43 "Six times more spent on women's medical research"

00:20:26 The $990m suicide prevention audit

00:21:17 Divorce, custody, and children's outcomes

00:23:14 What is the ICMB?

00:23:49 The 12 disparities: education and health

00:25:26 False allegations, violence and partner abuse

00:27:56 Homelessness, workplace deaths, media

00:29:58 Which disparity is most ignored?

00:30:59 India's Section 498A: "legal terrorism"

00:33:10 Why the male suicide ratio keeps climbing

00:34:24 Did no-fault divorce change the numbers?

00:37:22 "But men dominate the boardrooms"

00:38:02 "Sixty times more health funding to women"

00:39:11 What he means by male disposability

00:42:52 Gynocentrism defined

00:46:44 Inside Australia's boys' education inquiry

00:49:40 The ten groups of boys being left behind

00:51:07 Programs that actually work

00:54:32 What can parents actually do?

01:00:53 Why are male teachers disappearing?

01:01:23 A million kids with no involved father

01:05:37 Advice for the parent of a disengaged son

01:07:07 Rites of passage and the bridge of adolescence

01:10:11 Men's health envoys: real change or symbolism?

01:12:10 Saving a quarter of a million lives

01:14:12 Why men die by suicide

01:18:09 What Finland did differently

01:21:42 Reaching migrant men who won't talk

01:25:45 110 countries now mark International Men's Day

01:29:42 What women and mothers of sons can do

01:32:50 One thing to change today

01:35:13 Where to find David Maywald

⚠️ This episode discusses suicide and mental health. If you or someone you know needs support in Australia:

Lifeline 13 11 14

Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636

MensLine Australia 1300 78 99 78

In an emergency call 000.

#MenAndBoys #BoysEducation #MensHealth #AustralianPolitics #Perth #MaleSuicide #Fatherhood #PerthDialogues

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In 2018, the Australian Senate ran an inquiry into dowry abuse. Among the submissions was one from an organisation based 8,000km away in New Delhi — arguing Australia should not introduce a dowry law at all. Wasif Ali co-founded that organisation. In this conversation he explains why.

WHAT WE COVER

- How an engineer became a men's rights activist after his own marriage broke down

- What Men Welfare Trust actually does — the helpline, the counselling, the advocacy

- Section 498A: what the law is, and why he argues it is misused

- The Arnesh Kumar judgment and what changed after it

- Why India's 2023 criminal law overhaul (BNS) changed less than it appears

- The marital rape exception, the split Delhi High Court verdict, and the pending Supreme Court appeal

- Why a Delhi NGO made a submission to Australia's 2018 Senate dowry inquiry

- NRI cases — impounded passports and men caught between two legal systems

- Male suicide in India, and the case for a National Commission for Men

CHAPTERS

00:00 "In India, a bad marriage is a recipe for disaster"

02:12 Why an Australian podcast is asking about Indian dowry law

04:23 From engineer to activist: what happened to his own marriage

08:33 The first man he helped — and what these calls sound like

10:47 What is Men Welfare Trust, and what does it actually do?

14:55 Why they intervened in the marital rape case

16:38 Who calls the helpline? "12,000 calls in one month"

18:24 Did India's new criminal code (BNS) change anything?

20:42 "Legal terrorism" — the Supreme Court's 2005 remark

23:03 The Arnesh Kumar judgment and the drop in arrests

24:48 The conviction-rate argument — and the counter-argument

28:04 What reforms does he actually want?

29:49 Why an Indian NGO wrote to the Australian Senate

32:53 Australia said no to a dowry law. What does that signal?

34:23 "What about the woman in Perth who says it happened to her?"

35:26 NRI cases: impounded passports, two countries, no way out

39:05 What do most people get wrong about dowry law?

40:46 The marital rape case — what it was about

43:18 The split verdict and where it stands now

45:33 Consent, and why he says rape law can't apply inside marriage

49:18 Male suicide and the case for a National Commission for Men

54:08 Where to find his organisation

Men Welfare Trust: https://www.menwelfare.in/

Save Indian Family: https://www.saveindianfamily.org/

Australian Senate Report on 'Practice of dowry and the incidence of dowry abuse in Australia': https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Legal_and_Constitutional_Affairs/DowryAbuse/~/media/Committees/legcon_ctte/DowryAbuse/report.pdf

SUPPORT

This episode discusses domestic violence, legal distress and suicide.

- Lifeline Australia — 13 11 14

- 1800RESPECT (family and sexual violence) — 1800 737 732

- MensLine Australia — 1300 78 99 78

- In India: Tele-MANAS — 14416

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#PerthDialogues #DowryLaw #498A #IndianDiaspora #AustralianPolitics #MensRights #FamilyLaw #India #Australia

$50,000 invested in 2011 could be worth $9.4 million today. Almost no Australian would have made that bet.

Mihir Bhatt is the founder of Artha Academy, a Perth-based share-market education platform. In this conversation he makes the case — as one voice among many, not as personal financial advice — for why Australians, and migrant communities in particular, tend to put everything into one asset class, and what a more diversified approach could look like.

In this episode:

- Why Australia is one of the most property-concentrated economies in the developed world

- The "asset rich, cash poor" trap — and how families end up there

- Why migrant communities lean so heavily on property, in Mihir's experience

- Diversifying beyond the family home: shares, ETFs, gold, and self-managed super

- Investment vs speculation — and the psychology of market timing

- How to spot share-tip and "signal-selling" schemes

- What Mihir would tell his own son about the road to a first home

Guest links: Artha Academy: https://arthaacademy.ai

Timestamps:

00:00 Introduction

01:50 Who Is Mihir Bhatt? From Banker to Founder

03:08 Why Trust a Share Market Educator? (The Disclaimer)

04:07 The Father Who Built a Portfolio in Secret

06:34 Why a $100K Salary Still Can't Buy a Perth House

07:40 Don't Get Asset Rich, Cash Poor

08:38 Inside Artha Academy's Four Pillars

10:51 Why Doesn't Australia Build Its Own Apple or Nvidia?

13:10 The Leverage Argument: Property vs Shares

16:44 Already Got a Mortgage? Here's How You Still Invest

17:52 Why Do Migrant Families Only Ever Buy Property?

20:19 What Schools Get Wrong About Money

22:03 Investing vs Speculating: The 50% Rule

25:14 Can Anyone Actually Time the Market?

26:33 Bitcoin, FOMO, and the Psychology of Fear and Greed

27:55 How Do You Spot a Share-Tip Scam?

31:19 Why Is Artha Academy Free (Mostly)?

33:19 Mihir's Final Message: Learn Before You Invest

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A Victorian court recently ruled that a vaginal examination performed without consent during labour was assault and battery. Dr Marian Dover says it's the most important case in her specialty in years — and she has strong views on why it happened.

She was also told, as a child, that she was "less worthy as a human." Dr Marian Dover's family fled religious persecution in Egypt when she was young. She's now a rural generalist working in one of the most remote parts of Australia — 827km from Darwin — delivering babies, running emergency departments, and flying in specialist care by air because the roads are too far.

In this conversation, Dr Dover talks with host Nirmal Singh about:

- Growing up in Egypt's persecuted Coptic Christian minority, and arriving in Australia as a child

- The extra hurdles overseas-trained doctors face to practise in Australia — and the everyday racism that comes with it

- Choosing one of the remotest postings in the country as a "second migration"

- Inside Gawthrop v Bendigo Health — what the ruling means for consent in childbirth across Australia

- Why rural maternity units have halved since 1990 while births have doubled

- Her frank, personal perspective on Closing the Gap and First Nations health outcomes

- Doctor burnout, vicarious trauma, and why she thinks mental health leave should be built into medical contracts, not optional

Disclaimer: This conversation touches on legal and medical matters. Nothing in this episode is legal or medical advice — views expressed are Dr Dover's own professional perspective and experience. Read full Gawthrop v Bendigo Health [2026] VSC 157 judgement here: https://www.austlii.edu.au/cgi-bin/viewdoc/au/cases/vic/VSC/2026/157.html

Follow the conversation:

02:51 Who Is Dr Marian Dover?

03:00 Fleeing Religious Persecution In Egypt

04:47 A Migrant Interviewing A Migrant: What Do You Remember?

06:02 Arriving In Australia: "This Government Must Really Care"

07:43 Honouring Her Parents' Sacrifice

09:19 How Her Childhood Shapes The Care She Gives Today

11:34 Do Migrant Doctors Have To Perform At A Higher Standard?

13:19 Why Australia Makes It So Hard For Overseas-Trained Doctors

15:36 Migrating Again — Choosing One Of Australia's Remotest Towns

17:31 Convincing Everyone She Could Do This As A Woman

20:04 Her Advice To Young Female Professionals

22:22 Moving To The Kimberley: Childcare, Family And Community

24:49 A Day In The Life Of A Rural Generalist

27:00 Why Rural Hospitals Keep Going "On Bypass"

30:21 The Gawthrop Case: "That Was Assault"

34:00 What Needs To Change In Maternity Policy

35:54 Rural Maternity Units Have Halved Since 1990 — Why?

38:14 Her Unfiltered Take On Closing The Gap

43:39 Western Medicine vs Traditional Healing

45:36 Living With Life-And-Death Pressure

47:44 Why Doctors Are Their Own Worst Critics

50:03 How She Manages Her Own Mental Health

53:04 What Would Get More People Into Rural Medicine?

54:52 Her Legacy: "Every Postcode Deserves The Birth They're Owed"

56:28 A Message To Her Younger Self

57:54 How She Wants To Be Remembered

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A West Australian council spent an estimated $180,000 a year on disputes it never actually resolved.

One ratepayer was prosecuted for pulling weeds and planting native trees — then billed for his own prosecution.

Gavin Waugh is the founder of the Melville Shadow Council, a volunteer-run "council in waiting" set up to hold the City of Melville accountable between elections.

In this conversation, Gavin walks Nirmal through what pushed him to act after more than a decade of unresolved disputes, how local government oversight bodies actually work, and what he calls "crimes of participation" — the pattern he says councils use against residents who speak up.

A candid, occasionally uncomfortable look at how one of Perth's local councils operates, and what genuine community engagement could look like instead.

🔗 Melville Shadow Council: melville.shadowcouncil.org

Timestamps:

00:00 Cold Open: "I Pay for My Own Prosecution"

00:28 Welcome: Gavin Waugh, Melville Shadow Council

01:07 What Is Local Government Actually For?

03:00 Enter the Shadow Council: Bridging the Gap

04:26 One Volunteer, No Pay, No Access — How Does He Cope?

06:01 Are the Watchdogs Actually Independent?

07:12 12 Years in the Making: Why He Finally Acted

08:30 Answering the Mayor's "We're Already Transparent" Claim

11:04 The "Double Whammy": Paying to Be Prosecuted

12:09 Prosecuted for Planting Native Trees

14:02 What Is a Shadow Council, in Plain English?

14:59 Charged for Information the Law Says Is Free

15:43 What Does "Council in Waiting" Mean?

16:42 Why He Launched on April Fools' Day

17:19 Staying Motivated With Zero Funding

20:16 The "Revolving Door" of Local Government Oversight

22:38 Auditing the Auditors: Conflicts on the ARIC Committee

23:59 50+ "Council Failures" — and Counting

26:29 Volunteers: 1% on the Books, 30% in Reality

31:12 What New Migrants Should Know About Local Councils

33:06 What Real Community Engagement Should Look Like

36:49 Are Decisions Already Made Before You Speak?

37:46 What Are "Crimes of Participation"?

39:11 Is This Just Melville — or Every Council?

40:47 Why State Government Reforms Keep Failing

44:31 Two Changes He Wants to See in Two Years

45:57 The Personal Cost of Fighting City Hall

48:06 You're Convinced. Where Do You Start?

51:06 How to Contact the Melville Shadow Council

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Follow our host, Nirmal Singh, at

Website: https://nirmalsingh.au/

X (Twitter): https://x.com/nirmalsingh

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nirmalsingh.au

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nirmalsingh.au

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/psknirmal/