Wake Up Australia

Listen to Wake Up Australia with Luke Grant, the Full Show Podcast here.

11/02/2019

Listen to the full show podcast with Michael Mclaren

Daniel Wild, director of research at the Institute of Public Affair recently wrote that Australia has entered into a per capita economic recession for the third time in 28

years, according to figures released yesterday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The figures also show there have been 18 quarters in the past 28 years where per

capita incomes have gone backwards.

The 28-year yardstick is relevant because that is the time since Australia last

experienced a full-blown aggregate economic recession, defined as two consecutive

quarters of negative economic growth.

Michael is joined by Daniel, who explains that state and federal governments are addicted to mass migration because by fueling economic growth it also fuels government revenue. The federal government’s promised return to surplus in next month’s budget is almost solely reliant on ongoing mass migration.

The same is true for state governments, which rely heavily on the GST and property

taxes to underpin their revenue.

Listen to Wake Up Australia with Michael McLaren, the full show podcast.

- 07/03/19

Australia’s economy has slumped into a per capita recession which is bad for the Morrison government.  It’s only one month way from treasurer Josh Frydenberg delivering an early budget which is hoped to reset the election criteria for the Morrison government and propel them for victory with news of a return to surplus.

The market didn’t see that yesterday as the dollar dropped sharply which saw economist slashing the odds for official interest rates to reach record lows of 1% by September.

Michael is joined by Leith Van Onselen from Macrobusiness - the 'Unconventional Economist' to discuss how the only thing stopping Australia from tipping into an official recession has been rapid population growth.

Listen to Wake Up Australia with Michael McLaren, the Full Show Podcast here.

06/03/19

Listen to the full show podcast with Michael Mclaren

According to Premier Gladys Berejiklian, pioneering pilot Nancy-Bird Walton is “an absolutely inspiring choice” as the name for western Sydney’s new airport.

Michael is joined by Gabbie Kennard, who was the first Australian woman to circumnavigate the globe by airplane in 1989, to get some insight into Ms Walton… an inspirational Australian that she knew well.

Known as the “Angel of the Outback”, aviatrix Nancy Bird Walton took her first flying lesson from Charles Kingsford Smith, pioneered outback ambulance services and founded the Australian Women’s Pilots Association.

Born into the Bird family of Kew (NSW) on 16 October 1915, Nancy seemed

destined for the skies. At 13, she went for a flight in a de Havilland Gipsy Moth at a

local fair and was hooked. She took flying lessons from Kingsford Smith, gaining her

class A flying licence when 17 years old.

Walton held her pilots licence until three years before her death, aged 93, in Sydney

in 2009. The terminal at Bourke Airport is also named after her, and an annual

sponsorship for young female adventurers was set up in her name by the Australian

Geographic Society.

Nancy Bird Walton’s achievements are remarkable in an era when women were

discouraged from wearing pants, let alone flying planes. Her autobiography,

published in 1990, is not surprisingly called ‘My God, It’s A Woman!’.

Listen to the full show podcast with Michael Mclaren

News.com’s nation political editor Malcolm Farr wrote late last week that the Liberal Party’s programme of self-destruction, which began with the ousting of Malcolm Turnbull last August, is speeding up.

The government’s structure has been wrecked by the instability of three prime ministers in four years.

It is now difficult to keep count of the senior figures and backbenchers heading out the door, in what will be seen as an exodus to avoid the Coalition’s humiliation at the May election.

Farr joins Michael who asks out of the list of those leaving, who will cause the biggest blow to PM Scott Morrison?