Chris Johnson
Chris Johnson is the National Political Correspondent for The Sunday Age and The Sun-Herald
Chris Johnson
Swan's $16b target to ensure surplus
Chris Johnson Baby bonus payments, private health insurance rebates and the budget surplus target have all been cut, but there is no slashing of public service jobs in the government's latest economic update.
It's time to move past sexism talk, MPs say
Chris Johnson Government ministers have urged all MPs to get back to discussing policy instead of the name-calling that has dominated parliamentary debate in recent months.
Milne targets miners, rich in tax campaign
Chris Johnson Greens leader Christine Milne wants mining companies and rich people to pay more tax.
Green light for dirtiest power
Chris Johnson Australia's dirtiest power stations will no longer be phased out as was planned under the government's Clean Energy Future, after talks with station owners collapsed over compensation amounts.
Chris Johnson
PM back to Pacific Solution
Chris Johnson Prime Minister Julia Gillard has all but adopted John Howard's ''Pacific Solution'' to asylum seekers, agreeing to urgently reopen offshore processing centres at Nauru and Papua New Guinea's Manus...
Besieged Gillard asserts her leadership
Chris Johnson Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has declared the government to be ''at war with itself'' amid talk of a renewed push to return Kevin Rudd to the Labor leadership.
Parties enter campaign mode as tax approaches
Chris Johnson Labor and the Coalition have each kicked into a pseudo campaign mode as the carbon tax approaches as asylum seeker boats keep heading to Australia.
Abbott to reject advice of panel
Chris Johnson Opposition Leader Tony Abbott insists he doesn't need a panel of experts to tell him what asylum seeker policy he should adopt.
PM brushes aside fresh talk of leadership spill
By Chris Johnson Prime Minister Julia Gillard is refusing to buy into a renewed surge in leadership speculation, sparked by chief government whip Joel Fitzgibbon, who suggested continued bad polling might see a...
Back to basics for new Greens
Chris Johnson The Australian Greens will refocus their attention on the environment and ramp up pressure on the government under the new leadership regime installed to address worrying polling results for the...
Abbott accuses PM of cover-up over embattled backbencher
Chris Johnson Opposition Leader Tony Abbott insists it is unconscionable for embattled Labor MP Craig Thomson to refuse to co-operate with police over investigations into alleged union corruption, adding that...
Troops to withdraw slowly, PM promises
Chris Johnson Australia's troops in Afghanistan will return home slowly, and most will stay deployed for another 18 months.
