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.

👉 Support CIS Research: 🔹 Become a member: https://www.cis.org.au/membership-2-s... 🔹 Make a donation: https://www.cis.org.au/support/donate... 🔹 Learn more: https://www.cis.org.au/

👉 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.

👉 Support CIS Research: 🔹 Become a member: https://www.cis.org.au/membership-2-step-1/ 🔹 Make a donation: https://www.cis.org.au/support/donate/today/ 🔹 Learn more: https://www.cis.org.au/

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.

👉 Support CIS Research: 🔹 Become a member: https://www.cis.org.au/membership-2-step-1/ 🔹 Make a donation: https://www.cis.org.au/support/donate/today/ 🔹 Learn more: https://www.cis.org.au/