Introduction Following the 1914 election, the Federal Parliament comprised members of the governing Australian Labor Party (ALP), the Commonwealth Liberal Party (CLP) in Opposition, and one Independent Member of Parliament (MP). Although both major parties generally supported Australia’s participation in the First World War, only the CLP came to demonstrate unanimous advocacy for the conscription...

This quick guide provides a brief overview of aged care in Australia. It describes the types of care provided, arrangements for accessing subsidised care, statistics on aged care, the organisations that provide care, and the regulatory arrangements for ensuring quality care.

Executive summary Housing affordability is a significant issue for low income households in receipt of social security payments. The social security system recognises the additional financial challenges that non-homeowners face in two ways: – providing Commonwealth Rent Assistance (CRA) to assist with the cost of rent for those social security recipients in the private rental...

This Quick Guide provides links to: a listing of Australian Government Indigenous affairs policies and programs the Council of Australian Government (COAG) key agreements under ‘Closing the Gap’ key documents on the proposed Constitutional Recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples other recent high-profile reports and publications on Indigenous issues statistics and funding a...

Introduction Statistics are widely used in the development and evaluation of social policy. Closing the Gap indicators, studies on the effectiveness of drugs being considered for inclusion in the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS), analyses of National Assessment Program—Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) results and the evaluation of welfare interventions such as income management all include statistics...