The Commonwealth government's 2002-03 Intergenerational Report is one in a series of reports required by the Charter of Budget Honesty Act. While there are differing opinions as to the accuracy of the fiscal projections made in the report and the appropriateness of the policy responses it favours, there is also more fundamental point of contention...

The major companies in the HIH Insurance Group (HIH) were placed in provisional liquidation on 15 March 2001. The losses and hardship inflicted on the Australian community by this corporate failure have been significant and have been a major contributing factor to the current insurance crisis. The liquidation process could take up to ten years...

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) has highlighted the potentially severe threat posed by infectious diseases to modern economies. This Research Note surveys the evidence.

This brief provides an overview of the trafficking of women and children into the Australian sex industry in the context of the global trade in people trafficking. It examines why there have been no prosecutions of traffickers under existing Commonwealth laws. It explains how Australia's emphasis on border control is working against the prosecution of...

In many ways the election was a re-run of the election held in Victoria just 16 weeks before. A Labor government's popularity had remained solid since the previous election: a popular, but policy-cautious premier retained a high degree of community support; the Liberal Party had undermined, then replaced, its leader relatively late in the parliamentary...