Welcome to the latest edition of Clark Matters, Andrew’s monthly email newsletter to help keep you abreast of federal politics and what he’s been up to.
Australia-United States relationship
For as long as I’ve been in public life, I’ve called for Australia to adopt a more independent foreign and security policy. Although this view was formed in the aftermath of the disastrous decision to follow the United States into its illegal and unnecessary war in Iraq in 2003, it’s been turbocharged by Washington’s current foolishness over Iran. I’d be surprised if the community’s concern with current US behaviour isn’t reflected in the 2026 Lowy Institute Poll on foreign affairs, which is due in coming months.
None of which is to say that Australia shouldn’t partner with other countries when our interests overlap, nor enter into security arrangements for bilateral and multilateral consultations, intelligence sharing and defensive military operations. But such arrangements must be limited to bolstering our security, and never make us beholden to any other country.
To that end I don’t object in principle to Australia, the United Kingdom and the US penning a security treaty. What I do object to is that AUKUS will inevitably require us to play an active submarine warfare role in future conflicts involving the US, regardless of the merits and risks in doing so. Moreover, the mooted Australian nuclear submarines will cost too much and gut the rest of the defence budget, take too long to bring into service, and are not the best technology for the relatively shallow waters of the South-East Asia region. Assuming they ever actually arrive.
Taxing natural gas exports
I’ve joined other federal cross-bench parliamentarians in calling for a 25 per cent tax on exported liquefied natural gas. This would collect up to an estimated $17 billion per year from LNG exports, instead of the paltry export gas figure buried within the $2 billion Petroleum Resource Rent Tax collected nowadays.
Such a tax would provide a welcome boost to the federal budget and create the opportunity for some kind of sovereign wealth fund for the benefit of future generations. It would likely drive prices down for domestic gas because that supply would not pay the export tax. And it would be popular, as evidenced by a series of opinion polls which put support for an export gas tax at between 60 and 75 per cent.
Of course the gas companies are outraged by the suggestion of such a tax, and the compliant Federal Government has quickly fallen into line and ruled it out. But the merit of the proposal is clearly illustrated by the case of Santos Limited, which has not paid any company tax on $45 billion in sales over a decade. No wonder my clarion call at a recent media event, that “it’s not their gas it’s our gas”, received such widespread coverage.
Gambling advertising
The Federal Government has finally announced a response to the so-called Murphy Report into gambling harm. This consensus report was the work of a cross-party parliamentary committee and is widely regarded as the blueprint for online gambling reform in Australia.
Sadly the Government’s response, shamefully held back by more a thousand days, is underwhelming to say the least. For starters it only partly addresses just one of the 31 recommendations in the Murphy report, and it ignores completely the flagship recommendation that there be a phased-in complete ban on all gambling advertising.
Clearly the Government has much work still to do because, if it now calls the job done, then it will prove once again that the Government remains scared stiff of the gambling and media companies, as well as the major sporting codes. I can assure the community that I, my cross-bench parliamentary colleagues, and a growing number of Government and Opposition backbenchers, will continue to push for genuine reform and be a thorn in the Government’s side until such reform is realised.
