This week, we have seen leaders in western Europe forced to move from fumbling cautious politeness to action as a result of the US president's various pronouncements.

There's no reason to think Australia's national interests will not be directly challenged in a similar way, whether that is over economic or geo-strategic interests, or even over political fashion.

A worldwide shift to the hard right, as exemplified by Trump, might have given the Coalition some political encouragement. But as this shift has been turned into wilder and wilder pronouncements, with real world implications, that becomes a riskier proposition if the costs and uncertainty of such a shift resonate with voters.

The Australian political debate seems particularly slow and parochial by comparison with what is happening overseas.

The prime minister and his ministers move methodically through a list of one political problem to another ahead of the final calling of the poll, with policy solutions of very variable quality.

It moved to neutralise the issue of the so-called NZYQ cohort of convicted criminals who the High Court ruled could not be held in indefinite detention after their services were served by announcing an (unspecified) deal to move three of them to Nauru.

Albanese wrote to Tasmanian salmon industry leaders last weekend, vowing to "introduce" special legislation (unspecified or detailed) "to ensure appropriate environmental laws are in place to continue sustainable salmon farming in Macquarie Harbour".

This as he noted that "it is clear to me the Environment Protection and Diversity Conservation Act… does not allow for a common sense solution on an acceptable timeline".

That would be the federal government's primary piece of environmental legislation he is talking about, and the one under which his environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, had ordered a review of aquaculture in the harbour.

So the PM wants legislation to override the government's own legislation.

Whatever the merits or otherwise of either case, it smacks of the worst sort of pre-election expediency.

The government is desperate to win the seat of Braddon — which runs down Tasmania's west coast and includes Macquarie Harbour and the neighbouring town of Strahan — from the Liberal Party.

But doing so also risks losing the seat of Franklin, held by one of his own ministers — Julie Collins — to an anti-salmon farming campaign being run by community independent Peter George.

There's been lots of other strapping down the furniture going on in the past week or two, including matching the Coalition's proposed ban on foreign investors in existing residential housing for two years, even though most analysts say it will have little effect on the market.

The government is bailing out both Rex Airlines and the Whyalla steelworks. There are legitimate arguments to be made for doing both in an era when we have become more aware of supply chain vulnerabilities and imperfect markets, and less brutal about the needs of private sector competition at all costs.

But equally, there have been lots of questions raised about the management of both these operations, and it's not clear who might emerge to buy them. The structure of the Whyalla deal does not go as far as anticipating on-going government ownership but is structured to go much further than just keeping the doors open.

But it doesn't hurt that the deal reinforces the prime minister's broader political message about the importance of making things in Australia. 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2025-02-22/global-politics-us-ukraine-election-australia/104967262

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