Michelle Grattan
Michelle Grattan is the political editor of The Age. In 2008, she shared the Melbourne Press Club Lifetime Achievement Award with Laurie Oakes. She edited the books 'Reconciliation' and 'Australian Prime Ministers' (2000), and wrote 'Back on the Wool Track' (2004).
Michelle Grattan
Opposition gets itself in a tangle again over budget surpluses
Michelle Grattan Last year the opposition got itself into a complete tangle over its position on the surplus.
Michelle Grattan
Abbott's blueprint is still a work in progress
Michelle Grattan It was OK as a performance, delivered informally, US-style, with a hand-held mic, but the opening salvo of Tony Abbott's mini-campaign told us little new.
Michelle Grattan
Coalition in another tangle thanks to Hockey
Michelle Grattan LAST year the opposition got into a complete tangle over its position on the surplus, finally committing itself to delivering one in each of its first three budgets.
Michelle Grattan
Surplus swansong leaves Labor in stormy waters
Michelle Grattan Wayne Swan's ditching of the promise the government made in 2010 - is a difficult and humiliating backflip. It is a broken promise of the first order.
Michelle Grattan
Headaches for Abbott as tactics falter
Michelle Grattan Stressing the need for unity during his address to his troops on Tuesday, Tony Abbott told the MPs that if they ever needed to get a message to him, they should just call direct - he would always...
Michelle Grattan
When those boats just keep on coming
Michelle Grattan If treasurer Wayne Swan is worried that he mightn't be able to achieve that razor-thin surplus, Immigration Minister Chris Bowen has to be terrified that the asylum seeker boats won't stop.
Michelle Grattan
Swan avoids risking too much with juggling act
Michelle Grattan The government has done what it had to do. It has kept its budget numbers in the black, in a fiscal exercise driven by the imperative of preserving its political credibility rather than by economic...
Michelle Grattan
Political necessity minimises the pain
Michelle Grattan The government has done what it had to do. It has kept its budget numbers in the black.
Michelle Grattan
Gillard stonewalls opponents
Michelle Grattan It looks like being a happier Christmas for the Prime Minister than either Rudd or Abbott might have expected.
Michelle Grattan
Road map to Asia
Michelle Grattan The government's white paper on the Asian century is released today. We ignore it at our peril.
Michelle Grattan
A toothy smile behind Labor's dental plan
Michelle Grattan Reality checks are needed to balance the political hype.
Michelle Grattan
Liberal premiers put politics before the disabled
Michelle Grattan The Liberal premiers have let politics get in the way of helping the disabled.
Bad blood runs cold for Labor
Michelle Grattan Gillard's future is once more uncertain, against ever worsening chaos. For the Labor party, the terrifying thing is that there seems no quick or ready way through the impasse.
Michelle Grattan
Semantics cannot hide rift in cabinet
Michelle Grattan PM and her ministers attempted to reconcile conflicting accounts of foreign worker deal.
Michelle Grattan
New referee for the numbers game
Michelle Grattan The opposition now has no excuses about how to handle its policy costings.
Michelle Grattan
The view from the back
Michelle Grattan Gillard's marginal-seat members fear for their political lives.
Michelle Grattan
Gillard faces an uphill battle
Michelle Grattan Julia Gillard faces a herculean task to sell her carbon pricing scheme.
Michelle Grattan
Polls and Kama Sutra aside, air of exhaustion pervades Labor
Michelle Grattan In politics hype can quickly become reality. Or reality can fall short of the build-up, which is what happened on Parliament's first day of 2012.
Michelle Grattan
Brown a Green man of many colours
Michelle Grattan There are two Bob Browns. One is the horse trader politician, the other thinks not just about the here and now but a century hence.
Michelle Grattan
Fair Work farce leaves reputations in tatters
Michelle Grattan The fallout from the Craig Thomson-Health Services Union affair is spreading like a shower of dirty black soot over all coming near it.
