As federal Education Minister Brendan Nelson attempts to gain even greater control over Western Australia's tertiary education sector, thereby satisfying his Canberra-based bureaucrats' thirst for greater control, our state politicians sit about looking b
Last week, State Scene highlighted several little-discussed trends within the once powerful and highly successful state Liberal Party, which today is steadily sliding towards electoral irrelevance.
It's a tough life at the top of business at the best of times. It's even tougher when things aren't going well and pesky journalists keep asking well-informed questions.
Since State Scene recently highlighted the state Labor Party's dismal electoral performances – measured by the number of primary votes Labor gained in the 1989, 1993, 1996, 2001 and 2005 state elections – in the interest of balance perhaps it's time the L
Well, it has happened again. Western Australia is to have another governor, a retired public servant, 67-year-old Dr Ken Michael, and the people were again denied a say in who would hold their state's most powerful constitutional post.
Brance office syndrome, the inferiority complex that rears its head every few years in Western Australia, is overdue for a return if stock exchange pecking order is a guide.
A delegate attending a recent Liberal Party rural divisional conference unexpectedly announced he was fed up with living under three tiers of government – national, state and local – and said one should be scrapped.
It has taken two years for the Bank of Scotland, trading under the alphabet soup name of HBOS, to bed down its sometimes troublesome Australian subsidiary, BankWest, but recent events in the market flag the launch of what some observers see as a classic ‘
We are very, very uncomfortable that Foodland Associated Ltd has agreed to sell 16 of its best Action supermarkets in Western Australia to one of the two dominant grocery conglome
State Scene has three excellent informants with a good view into what's happening within Canberra's conservative elite headed by John Howard and John Anderson.
What do the chaps at Crosby Partners know that eludes Australian investors? Simple really. Every morning they look at a map of the world and ask a simple question: “has China disappeared?”
There has been much reference to the promised tax cuts in this year's Federal Budget, with the Labor opposition damning its “unfairness” while supporters have emailed around the famous restaurant analogy we published on this page last year.
John Howard and his senior ministers, all of whom hold interstate seats, show all the signs of embarking upon megalomaniacal bureaucratic practices rather than remaining the levelheaded administrators that Australians rightly expect.
Just in case anyone missed me, I have had the great pleasure of visiting the State's vast North West with the Chamber of Commerce and Industry's annual tour.
Now that Labor's One-Vote-One-Value legislation is finalised, let's consider how parties and voters, the latter allegedly its beneficiaries, have emerged from this drawn-out tussle.
One step forward, one step back. If that sounds like marking time it's because it is. And if you think it's how the stock market is performing right now, you're right.
The competitive landscape facing Western Australian businesses will become a lot clearer over the next few weeks after the state and federal governments release plans for tax and industrial relations reforms.
I attended an Institute of Management Consultants function this week, where the organisation welcomed several fellowships and introduced a new certificate program to try to provide some form of solid footing to the profession here.
Examining the thinking of Perth's council candidates has provided some interesting fodder for thought, especially with regard to issues confronting our central city and its role as our capital.
