It is essential that public policy-making is informed by high quality research, in order to support the effectiveness of government decision-making. But the full value of humanities and social science (HSS) research has yet to be realised by policy makers, and as a result we are concerned that the government’s efforts to make its policy...

The Minister intends to introduce a Bill to amend the Migration Act 1958 to reform the sponsorship regime for Subclass 457 and a range of other temporary visas that include work rights. This bill and associated regulation presents the opportunity to clarify sponsor obligations and provide further fair and transparent mechanisms to help deal with...

The commission was asked by the government to undertake modelling of the economy-wide effects of assistance options and scenarios identified by the current Bracks Review of Australia's automotive industry. The options cover a number of combinations of tariffs and levels of assistance provided under the Automotive Competitiveness and Investment Scheme. Assessing economy-wide effects of any...

The term ‘primary health care’ is commonly used interchangeably with ‘primary care’. However, strictly speaking, primary health care is a strategy of public health, derived from the social model of health and sustained by the Declaration of Alma Alta, which was jointly sponsored by the World Health Organisation and UNICEF in 1979. Primary health care...

The government is committed to the establishment of a Register of Lobbyists that will enable ministers and other government representatives who are approached by third party lobbyists to establish whose interests the lobbyist represents. The Register will be a public document and third party lobbyists will be required to ensure that they supply and regularly...