Business is generally pessimistic about the prospects for further economic reform. For this it blames Canberra. While the Australian Parliament must shoulder some of the responsibility, the problem runs much deeper: on the question as to what constitutes reform there is agreement neither inside nor outside the Parliament. Until such agreement is reached, any federal government will struggle and the parliament will bicker.

Without structural changes to the budget, Australia  will face unsustainably large deficits through the middle of the century and beyond.

Tony Abbott’s National Press Club speech was an unsurpassed opportunity to put the last 17 months behind him, chart a new course for his government and take the Australian people with him. Yet yesterday’s speech contained mixed and confusing messages: the budget needs repairing but new spending is appropriate, lessons have been learned but broken promises will be pursued.

If Australia is to make a successful transition from the end of the mining boom to a competitive, more diversified economy it needs a lower exchange rate without an accompanying lift in wage inflation and consumer prices.

It does not follow that what is good universities is also good for students as consumers of higher education.

"The array of promises broken in the May budget … has shocked consumers already worried about their jobs."

Mining industry attitudes towards taxation policy are about to confirm the adage that refusing to learn from the errors of history makes their repetition inevitable. As world iron ore and coal prices slump the inefficiencies of the state royalty regime are again being laid bare. A shift to a profits-based royalty system could lift both state government revenues and after-tax mining returns.

The Australia-China trade deal can be properly evaluated only when its details are fully known. It should be subjected to parliamentary scrutiny. 

Let’s have a proper discussion about tax reform, but let’s recognise that the GST cannot be all things to all people and the public will not accept company tax being a voluntary tax for profit-shifting multinationals.

The row over the ANU’s share portfolio quickly descended into tribalism rather than embracing any logic or consistency.

Ethical claims have become big business. Australians have every right to choose what they consider to be ethically better places for spending and investing their earnings. But because so much money can be made from being classed as ethically superior, there is a growing risk of alliances of convenience between environmental groups and corporations making misleading claims about their offerings and about their competitors.

Philosophically the Harper review's interim report on competition reforms heads in the right direction: competition policy should protect competition not competitors. But its recommended effects test is likely to do the opposite, deterring major businesses from engaging in vigorous competition to deliver lower prices and new offerings to consumers

With official confirmation that national income has been falling, as predicted in Ross Garnaut’s book, Dog Days, attention must now turn to arresting the decline. 

Australia has enjoyed a mining boom based on China’s voracious appetite for minerals. If we get it right, Australia can enjoy a dining boom based on China’s voracious appetite for premium quality food and wines.

The inability of industry and governments at all levels to effectively address the community’s environmental concerns about coal seam gas, combined with political opposition to its development, is creating substantial economic risks in south eastern Australia.

Australia's hosting of the G20 meeting in November gives us the opportunity to sustain the momentum in world trade talks achieved at a meeting in Bali last December. If we miss that opportunity, momentum gained could be irretrievably lost - with the world trade negotiations facing oblivion.