This is a record — not an accusation.
Over the last forty years, successive Australian governments — Labor and Liberal — have made a long series of decisions about the country’s assets, defence, money, housing, health, and sovereignty. Most were made in good faith. Some were made under fiscal pressure. Some were made under international pressure. Some were made with the best information available at the time.
It is entirely possible that the cumulative outcome below is the product of incompetence, of ignorance, of the small forgiving compromises that every government makes. We are not asking you to assume otherwise. Assume the best. Assume every decision was made by people doing what they thought was right.
What we are asking is: look at the cumulative result. Look at the direction. Look at where forty years of these decisions, taken together, have left the country. Then ask whether the next forty years should continue in the same direction, or whether it is time for a plan and a method out.
What follows is the record. Read it. Form your own judgement. We will offer ours at the end — along with a path forward, for all Australians.
“Whatever caused these decisions — design, drift, or distraction — the outcome is the same. At some point the question stops being why it happened, and starts being what we do next.”
Part One
THE RECORD — WHAT WAS DONE
Over four decades, successive governments sold national assets built up by Australians over the preceding century. Most were profitable; all gave Australia institutional capability that has not been replaced.
1
Commonwealth Bank of Australia
Sold across three tranches between 1991 and 1996. A profitable national bank owned by every Australian. Now among the most profitable banks in the world — with profits flowing to private shareholders rather than to the Commonwealth balance sheet.
2
Qantas
Sold 1993–1996. The national carrier, built with public capital, transferred to private ownership.
3
Telstra
Sold across three tranches: T1 (1997), T2 (1999), T3 (2006). The national telecommunications infrastructure. The copper network was subsequently replaced through the NBN at public expense — meaning Australians paid to build the network, paid to sell it, and paid a third time to replace it.
4
Australian National Line — the merchant fleet
Wound up by 1998. Australia is an island continent. Every tonne of exports leaves by ship; every tonne of imports arrives by ship. Australia no longer owns a single significant merchant vessel under its own flag.
5
The gold reserve
In 1997, the Reserve Bank sold 167 tonnes — approximately two-thirds of Australia’s entire gold reserve — for around AU$2.4 billion (about AU$450 per ounce, near a 20-year low). Gold today trades above US$3,000 per ounce. Even after accounting for what the sale proceeds earned in foreign currency assets in the years since, the foregone value runs into the tens of billions. The remaining 80 tonnes are stored not in Australia but in the Bank of England’s vaults in London. Germany retained 3,350 tonnes through the same period; France 2,437; Italy 2,452. Australia chose differently.
6
No Sovereign Wealth Fund from resource extraction
Norway discovered oil in 1969 and built a sovereign wealth fund now valued at approximately US$1.7 trillion from the proceeds. Australia has extracted resources of comparable cumulative value over the same period. The Future Fund exists, but at roughly $200 billion it is not equivalent in scale or purpose. The resource revenue was collected; no sovereign wealth fund of comparable scale was built from it.
Australia’s domestic manufacturing base has narrowed substantially over the same period. The Commonwealth has the largest single procurement budget in the country; the way it has been used did not prevent the contraction.
7
Car industry — closed 2016–2017
Holden, Ford, and Toyota all closed their Australian assembly operations between 2016 and 2017. Approximately 50,000 direct and indirect jobs were lost. The sovereign capacity to mass-manufacture vehicles — including military vehicles on existing assembly lines — was eliminated.
8
Government procurement — a lever not used
The Commonwealth alone awarded approximately $105 billion in procurement contracts in 2024–25 (Department of Finance AusTender data). Total public-sector procurement across Commonwealth, states, and local government runs to $200–300 billion annually. Mandatory Australian-content requirements remain limited — meaning the largest single customer in the country is not deliberately used to anchor a sovereign manufacturing base, as comparable economies do.
Australia’s ability to function in a sustained supply disruption depends on liquid fuel, refining capacity, and trained personnel. Each has narrowed.
9
Liquid fuel reserve — below the IEA 90-day standard for over two decades
The IEA requires member nations to maintain 90 days of net oil imports as a strategic reserve. By the strictest measure (stocks held physically in Australia), the country sits at around 28 days. By the more generous measure (including tickets, contracts, and stocks in transit), the figure is around 50–60 days. By either measure, Australia has been in continuous breach of the 90-day IEA obligation for over twenty years — the only IEA member to persistently fail this standard.
10
Refinery closures — eight to two
Australia operated seven to eight refineries through the 1990s. Today there are two: Geelong and Lytton. Major closures included Clyde (2012), Kurnell (2014), Bulwer Island (2015), and Altona (2021). The two remaining refineries depend on imported crude and operate at margins that have repeatedly required Commonwealth support to keep open.
11
ADF personnel — fewer than in the 1980s
The Australian Defence Force’s full-time strength peaked around 70,000 personnel in the late 1980s. Today it sits around 58,000–60,000 — despite Australia having a substantially larger population and a strategic environment widely assessed as more challenging.
12
LAND 400 programme — sustained delay
The LAND 400 programme to replace ageing armoured vehicles has been delayed and rescoped repeatedly across more than a decade. No domestic capacity exists to manufacture replacements at scale without foreign partnership.
Australia’s defence posture has been substantially restructured around AUKUS and a growing allied military presence on Australian soil. The decisions were made by executive agreement.
13
AUKUS — $268–368 billion over 30 years
The government’s own central estimate commits Australia to between $268 and $368 billion over the next three decades on a nuclear-propelled submarine capability not deliverable for 15–20 years. Most of that spend goes to US and UK suppliers.
14
AUKUS — signed without referendum
The largest defence commitment in Australian history. No referendum. No plebiscite. Limited parliamentary debate. Signed by executive decision in September 2021 and ratified through Australia, US and UK governments without direct public mandate.
15
US Marines rotating through Darwin — since 2012
Approximately 2,500 US Marines have rotated permanently through Darwin since 2012 under the Force Posture Initiative agreed by the Gillard government. The presence has expanded over the subsequent decade.
16
B-52 strategic bombers at RAAF Tindal
Nuclear-capable US B-52 strategic bombers rotate through RAAF Base Tindal under an Enhanced Air Cooperation agreement confirmed by Defence in 2022–2023.
17
US nuclear submarines at HMAS Stirling
Under the Submarine Rotational Force-West arrangement, US Virginia-class nuclear submarines are based and operate from HMAS Stirling in Western Australia — before Australia takes delivery of any submarine of its own.
Decisions about monetary policy, taxation, and foreign ownership have shaped how Australian households experience the economy. Each is on the public record.
18
RBA bond purchases — $281 billion under the Bond Purchase Program
Between November 2020 and February 2022, the RBA purchased approximately $281 billion in Australian Government and state government bonds under the Bond Purchase Program — its first sustained bond-buying programme. Combined with earlier yield-curve-control purchases and the Term Funding Facility, the RBA’s balance sheet expanded to around $356 billion in bond holdings. (Source: RBA Annual Reports 2022 and 2023.)
19
RBA accounting loss — $36.7 billion
Following 13 consecutive cash-rate rises between May 2022 and November 2023, the RBA recorded a $36.7 billion accounting loss in 2021/22 as the market value of the bonds it had purchased fell. The Bank is in a position of negative equity, which it will restore over time by retaining future profits rather than paying dividends to the Commonwealth — meaning the cost is borne through foregone Commonwealth dividends rather than realised cash transfers.
20
Section 11 of the RBA Act — effectively removed in 1996
Section 11 gave the elected government a democratic override over RBA decisions. The 1996 Statement on the Conduct of Monetary Policy between the Treasurer and the RBA Governor established the convention that this override would not be used. The democratic backstop over monetary policy, formally available for over forty years, has been dormant for nearly thirty.
21
Foreign-owned agricultural land — approximately 15% of total
Approximately 53 million hectares of Australian agricultural land — around 14–17% of total agricultural land — is foreign-owned according to the ATO Register of Foreign Ownership of Agricultural Land. The largest holders by nationality include Chinese, UK, US, Dutch, and Canadian entities.
22
Port Darwin — 99-year lease to a foreign owner
Port Darwin — the most strategically significant port in northern Australia — was leased to Landbridge Group, a Chinese-owned company, on a 99-year lease by the Northern Territory government in 2015. Defence and intelligence agencies raised concerns at the time. The sale proceeded. The lease runs until 2114 — beyond the lifetime of every Australian alive today.
Two tax measures and one structural trend have together produced the housing market Australian households experience today.
23
Capital Gains Tax discount — 50% on investment property
Since 1999, capital gains on investment property held for more than 12 months are taxed at half the normal rate. This makes property among the most tax-advantaged investments available to Australians, and is the single largest tax concession affecting housing.
24
Property tax concessions — $25–30 billion per year
Treasury Tax Expenditures Statements estimate the combined annual cost of negative gearing (approximately $3–5 billion) and the CGT discount on investment property (approximately $20–25 billion) at around $25–30 billion per year in foregone revenue. The combined effect directs private capital into existing housing stock rather than into productive enterprise.
25
Sydney house prices — among the highest income multiples in the world
Demographia’s annual International Housing Affordability survey has placed Sydney’s median house price at 13–15 times median household income in recent years — among the highest ratios in the developed world. Melbourne, Brisbane, and Adelaide are not far behind.
26
Rental stress at record levels
Rental stress — defined as paying more than 30% of household income on rent — now affects a majority of low and middle-income Australian renters according to ABS and CoreLogic data. National vacancy rates are at or near historic lows.
Federal welfare and health spending has grown substantially. The outcomes that spending was meant to produce have not kept pace.
27
Bulk billing decline
The Medicare rebate for a standard GP consultation has not kept pace with the cost of running a practice for over a decade. National bulk billing rates have fallen from approximately 88% in 2022 to 77% in 2023 (Medicare published data), with sharper declines in regional and outer-metropolitan areas where bulk billing has dropped below 50%.
28
$89 billion JobKeeper — without comprehensive claw-back
The $89 billion JobKeeper program distributed substantial sums to businesses whose revenue did not in fact decline, or even increased — ANAO and academic analysis has estimated this at between $13 and $27 billion. The scheme’s eligibility rules required only a projected revenue decline, not actual decline. No general claw-back was legislated. The program was a necessary policy response in a fast-moving crisis; the question is what should have been recovered afterward, and what was learned.
29
Robodebt — found unlawful by Royal Commission
The Robodebt scheme used an income-averaging method later found to be unlawful by the Federal Court. The resulting class action was settled for $1.8 billion (refunds, debt waiver, compensation, costs). The 2023 Royal Commission found the scheme was “crude and cruel”, devised without regard to the social security law it was meant to operate under. People died — the Commission heard evidence of suicides connected to debt notices. Multiple senior public servants and ministers were found to have been aware of concerns about the scheme’s legality. The Commission made sealed referrals to integrity and oversight bodies (NACC, APS Code of Conduct). To date, no individuals have been criminally prosecuted.
30
NDIS — $48 billion and growing faster than the economy
The NDIS now costs approximately $48 billion per year and has been growing at around 14% annually — a rate Treasury, the Productivity Commission, and the 2023 NDIS Review have all described as unsustainable. NDIA estimates and Fraud Fusion Taskforce data point to billions per year in provider fraud and over-servicing. Substantial reform is on every recent government’s agenda; none has yet been delivered at scale.
31
Aged Care — systemic failure found by Royal Commission
The Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety (2018–2021) found the system to be systemically under-resourced, poorly regulated, and in many instances unsafe. The recommendations have been partially implemented. Mandatory minimum staffing ratios were resisted for years before being introduced in 2023–2024. The fundamental care workforce shortage remains.
Australia has entered binding international arrangements that constrain the policy choices of future governments. Two are documented here; others exist.
32
ISDS clauses — foreign corporations can sue Australia
Investor-State Dispute Settlement clauses in several Australian free trade agreements allow foreign corporations to sue the Australian government for policy decisions that affect their profits. Philip Morris used such a clause to challenge Australia’s plain packaging tobacco laws (the case was eventually dismissed on jurisdictional grounds). The mechanism remains in place in multiple agreements signed since.
33
Banking Royal Commission — misconduct documented, criminal prosecution rare
The 2017–2019 Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry documented systemic misconduct including charging fees for no service, predatory lending, and breaches of consumer protection law. ASIC subsequently pursued civil penalty actions and secured material settlements; criminal prosecutions, however, have been rare. The institutions found to have engaged in widespread misconduct continued operating with their licences intact.
The information environment in which Australian political decisions are debated has narrowed significantly. Two facts are sufficient.
34
News Corp — approximately 70% of Australian print media
News Corp Australia controls approximately 70% of Australian print newspaper circulation. Together with Nine Entertainment Co (owner of the Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, and the Australian Financial Review), two corporations dominate Australian print, broadcast and digital news. Australia’s media ownership concentration is among the highest in the developed world.
35
ABC — sustained real-terms funding decline
The ABC’s indexed Commonwealth funding has fallen in real terms across multiple budget cycles since 2014. The one major Australian broadcaster without commercial ownership interest has had its funding reduced and its editorial independence challenged by successive governments.
Australia’s decisions were not made in isolation. The same kinds of decisions were made simultaneously by other Western governments. The pattern is regional.
36
QE — simultaneous across Western central banks
The US Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the Bank of Canada, the RBNZ, and the RBA all ran large-scale bond-purchase programmes through 2020–2021. Same direction. Same timing. The Western financial bloc moved as one.
37
Refinery closures — Western world, same decade
The UK, Australia, France, and other Western economies all reduced domestic refining capacity over the same period, under broadly the same policy preference for market efficiency over strategic industry retention. The capacity is not coming back.
Part Two
THE PATTERN — WHAT THE RECORD SHOWS
THE PATTERN
You have read thirty-seven facts. We are not asking you to assume bad intent. As we said at the start: assume the best. Assume each decision was made by people doing what they thought was right at the time.
Set intent aside. Look only at the cumulative result. The direction across four decades, across both major parties, across different Treasurers and Prime Ministers and economic conditions and global circumstances, is consistent.
Every sovereign asset reduced. Every strategic capability narrowed. Every democratic accountability mechanism weakened. Every form of national independence — financial, industrial, military, institutional, health — partially or wholly handed to foreign governments, foreign capital, or international bodies. The mechanism varies. The direction does not.
“Capture does not require conspiracy. It only requires that decisions favourable to one set of interests get made repeatedly, and decisions favourable to another set of interests do not. Whether the cause is corruption, ideology, fashion, fatigue, or genuine error, the outcome is the same.”
WHO HAS BENEFITED FROM THE PATTERN:
►
Financial institutions and asset holders — banks, investment funds, and capital that profit from privatised essential services, inflated asset markets, and monetary policy that has favoured creditors over debtors.
►
Foreign owners — of Australian farmland, water entitlements, ports, energy assets, and critical infrastructure. The dividends now flow offshore.
►
Allied military structures — which now have marines, bombers, submarines, and intelligence operations on Australian soil under arrangements no Australian was asked to ratify.
►
International institutions — the BIS, IMF, WHO, and WTO frameworks that have progressively shaped Australian decision-making through processes with limited democratic input.
Who has not benefited: the Australian worker. The Australian family. The Australian farmer. The young Australian who cannot afford a home. The mortgage holder who absorbed thirteen rate rises. The defence force member operating ageing equipment. The Australian who lost work during the COVID years and never quite recovered.
Whatever the cause — design, drift, neglect, or genuine error — the result is the country we live in today. The question is not how we got here. The question is what we do next.
Part Three
THE PATH FORWARD — A PLAN FOR ALL AUSTRALIANS
The Moral Majority Party does not offer managed decline at a slower pace. We offer a different direction. The decisions of the last forty years were made by governments. A different set of decisions can be made by a different government. Here is what we will do in the first term.
None of this is aimed at any individual or any party. It is aimed at the pattern itself. Every commitment below survives whoever was responsible for the original decision — because what matters now is the next forty years, not the last.
RESTORE SOVEREIGNTY — IMMEDIATELY
✔
Liquid Fuel Emergency declared Day 1 — Under the Liquid Fuel Emergency Act 1984. Strategic hold on canola exports. 90-day sovereign reserve legislated within first term. Domestic biodiesel crush mandated at market price.
✔
Section 11 RBA override restored — The democratic backstop that existed for 65 years is restored in the first sitting week of Parliament. The RBA operates within democratic boundaries again.
✓
AUKUS repositioned, not cancelled — the workforce, the funding, the shipyards, and the partnerships are preserved. The output is redirected: from eight crewed nuclear submarines arriving in the 2040s, to hundreds of mass-produced unmanned coastal-defence platforms, dual-use cable-laying and pipeline vessels, and a Sovereign Defence Manufacturing base under the SBC umbrella. Same 3% of GDP. Stronger alliance contribution. Australian-built, Australian-operated, Australian-maintained.
✔
Foreign military presence reviewed — Full parliamentary review of all foreign military basing arrangements. Any arrangement that makes Australia a participant in foreign conflicts without public consent is subject to renegotiation or termination.
✔
FIRB strategic cap — Foreign ownership of agricultural land, water rights, critical infrastructure, and strategic assets capped and partially reversed. Australia's land, water, and infrastructure are Australian.
✔
No further public asset sales — Not one. Ever. The MMP government will not sell a single public asset. It will build new sovereign institutions.
BUILD WHAT WAS SOLD
✔
Sovereign Build Corporation — Six infrastructure corridors carrying power, water, gas, fibre, freight rail, and maglev. The largest sovereign infrastructure program in Australian history. Built in Australia, by Australians, owned by Australia permanently.
✔
Resource Extraction Levy — 73%×50%×49% = $17.88 per $100 of gross commodity value at point of sale — not profit, which can be engineered to zero. $87.6B/yr funds defence, budget support, debt reduction, and a permanently lower income tax rate. The ground pays its owners.
✔
Citizen Dividend — Every enrolled Australian receives a direct annual payment from corridor and resource revenue. ~$408/yr from Year 5, growing as SBC revenue scales. Not welfare. Not a handout. Your share of what Australia owns.
✔
Sovereign manufacturing mandate — Government procurement requires minimum Australian content. The $600B annual procurement budget anchors sovereign manufacturing — steel, vehicles, ammunition, pharmaceuticals, electronics — in Australia.
RETURN YOUR MONEY
✔
$50,000 tax-free threshold — From Day 1 of the first term. Every worker saves $4,500–$7,500 per year immediately. Funded by the Resource Extraction Levy.
✔
Power under 10 cents per kilowatt-hour — Legislated by end of first term. Trending to 6 cents on the SBC corridor. Bills cut by more than half.
✔
Wholesale gas under $10/GJ nationally — Domestic reservation policy with mandatory supply to the local market before export approvals. Fast-tracked Beetaloo, Cooper, and Canning approvals. Industry cost base restored, household gas bills cut.
✔
Essential Food Basket — margins capped — 120 items tracked weekly. ACCC given real divestiture powers. The supermarket duopoly ends.
✔
$150,000 corridor homes — Rent-to-buy on Crown land. Granny flats as of right nationally. 200 new towns with power at cost, water, fibre, and maglev.
UNDERSTAND HOW WE GOT HERE
✓
Royal Commission into the COVID-19 response — full scope: emergency powers, vaccine policy, information policy, JobKeeper administration, international coordination, the WHO IHR amendments. The most significant exercise of government power in peacetime should have a public record.
✔
Full accounting of asset sale proceeds — What was received for every public asset sold since 1983. Where it went. What it produced. Published in full.
✓
Parliamentary inquiry into the QE program — What advice the RBA received before launching it. What international coordination occurred. How the $36.7 billion loss came to be borne by Australian taxpayers. What lessons the country should take from it.
✔
Seven further Royal Commissions — Family Law. Local Government. Drug Epidemic. Banking and Corporate Fraud. Media Ownership and Political Influence. Foreign Military Basing. Water Rights and Foreign Ownership.
A CHOICE OF DIRECTION
You have read the record. You know the direction of forty years of decisions. You know who has benefited from the cumulative result. You know the same kinds of decisions are still being made — in this electoral cycle, with new trade agreements, new basing arrangements, new international frameworks.
We assume the best of those who made the original decisions. We extend the same courtesy to those making decisions today. But assuming the best of intent does not require accepting the result. A different direction is available. It requires a different government to choose it.
“A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. The next forty years are the trees. We can plant them, or we can keep selling the orchard.”
Robertson is one electorate. The 2027 federal election is one election. But it is where Australian voters can begin to make a different choice — on the record, in the federal parliament, for the country their children will inherit.
▶ READ THE RECORD. FORM YOUR OWN JUDGEMENT.
▶ SHARE THIS DOCUMENT WITH AUSTRALIANS YOU KNOW.
▶ VOTE 1 BRETT MURRELL — ROBERTSON — 2027