Cabinet

• This achievement is one fruit of the company’s More Electric Architecture for Aircraft and Propulsion (MEAAP) project.
• IHI’s new engine-embedded electric motor could provide power for aircraft and also serve as a key technology in hybrid electric propulsion systems for which R&D is underway around the world.
• In March 2020, IHI developed a 250-kilowatt-class engine-embedded electric motor offering the largest generator capacity for currently operating passenger aircraft.
• IHI will keep developing hybrid electric propulsion systems to electrify aircraft, and looks to demonstrate an engine-embedded electric motor during the middle of this decade.

• The capital city, Hobart, had a bit of a “living at the edge of the world” feeling in those days.
• It seemed about as far away from anywhere as you could get.
• A British spy had “secretly” been living only a few miles away in the sleepy town of Cygnet.
• The prime minister followed the exchanges closely, as revealed by her handwritten comments across documents.

• It begins, of course, with the elusive Wright – in my mind’s eye in the 1980s, I had expected him to be a dapper figure in a pinstriped suit.
• In court, Armstrong would face none other than the up-and-coming Australian barrister Malcolm Turnbull, appearing for Wright’s publishers.
• What the papers released by the National Archives provide is something rather more than just a good story, however.

That was then …

• Even the names of the leaders of MI5 were a closely guarded secret, never mind the workings of their organisation.
• It was simply not the done thing to discuss issues of national security in public.
• Advice was offered and arguments made behind closed doors and away from the public gaze.
• In the 1980s, it was still possible for government to believe it might be able to control the spread of information.

This is now …

• Modern expectations of transparency mean that governments are now governing in public, whether they like it or not.
• Where once the heads of MI5 had their identities protected, we now find them striding the public stage.
• Stella Rimington, the director general of MI5 in the mid 1990s, published her own autobiography in 2001.
• Their attempt to quash what turned out to be a rather innocuous book turned it into an international cause celebre.

The Spycatcher saga is a reminder that the nature of British government has changed. It shines a light on the extent to which something seen as an extraordinary public scandal in the 1980s would be seen as far less remarkable today. Modern governments are far more used to the norms of governing in public – for good or ill – in our more transparent age.
Dennis C Grube received funding from the Australian Research Council in 2013 (grant number DE130101131) for a previous project on the public face of government.

• By far the most significant decision the Howard government made in 2003 was to support the invasion of Iraq.
• While the Howard government had many other important issues to manage in that year, the Iraq War consumed most attention and sparked most debate in the wider community.

Entering the war

• But in March 2003, Prime Minister John Howard asked the full cabinet to confirm the decision to commit Australia to war.
• Howard advised Hollingworth there was no need to refer to the governor-general any decision to commit Australia to war.
• The governor-general had been consulted but did not need to give his approval, and cabinet had agreed to send Australian troops to war.
• Howard was determined to take advantage of the Iraq war to strengthen the alliance.
• In 2003, public opinion was opposed to Australian participation in the war.
• However, the government was aided by the effusive support of News Corporation papers for its position on the war.

Beyond the war

• Ten years after the agreement came into force, however, analysis showed it had diverted trade away from the lowest-cost sources.
• Read more:
  How the US trade deal undermined Australia's PBS

  Other papers relate to health policy.

• Howard sought to blunt an effective Labor campaign against the erosion of the rate of bulk-billing under Medicare.
• It described the package as a “decisive step away from the principle of universality that has underpinned Medicare since its inception”.

Resources boom – and missed opportunities

• This offered hope Australia could maintain a constructive relationship with its closest ally as well as its major trading partner.
• Three opportunities were missed in 2003.
• One was to establish a sovereign wealth fund to invest the temporary windfall gains from the mining boom.

David Lee is a member of Australians for War Powers Reform.

• TOKYO, Nov 29, 2023 - (JCN Newswire) - Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI) has been selected as a core company for the design, production and installation of an atomic reactor for research purposes (new research reactor) in a project led by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA).
• A basic contract has been signed between MHI and JAEA.
• MHI is contracted by JAEA to handle all work related to the development of the new research reactor, and will commence construction.
• MHI will utilize the technical capabilities it has accumulated thus far as it works on the development of the new research reactor as a core company.