THERE’S A PATTERN

AUSTRALIA is going nuclear, and if anyone believes our Prime Minister when he says nuclear submarines aren’t going to be the thin edge of the wedge when it comes to supporting the civil use of nuclear power need only look to the pattern of behaviour shown by our prime ministers in the past. Remember John Howard and the GST that was never going to happen but always was? And our current Christian PM isn’t above stabbing supporters in the back either, when trying to get things under the radar when it suits him. As for the long and sorry history of defence spending and failed military projects in Australia, there’s been more waste involved than a Chernobyl meltdown.

It’s what happens here when military and political intelligence combine to produce oxymoron central. Imagine, committing billions to convert nuclear submarines to electric and diesel that — by the time they’re built would be obsolete — only to do an about-face that will effectively leave Australia inadequately defended for a further 10 years. And yet our proud pigeon PM struts to his dais to make another — among the many he has made — grandiloquent, if not delinquent, announcement: the birth of AUKUS.

Michael McCall Primrose Sands