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Sky News AU
28-06-2025
- Politics
- Sky News AU
Labor's Veteran Affairs Minister Matt Keogh's 'strategically incoherent' naivety on the Middle East war is cause for concern
Neville Shute's haunting Cold War parable On the Beach imagines Australia as the final, fading refuge from a nuclear apocalypse. 'The world will go on just the same,' says naval officer Peter Holmes, 'only we shan't be in it. I dare say it will get along all right without us.' The line captures a persistent illusion in Australian foreign policy: that we can remain untouched by conflicts beyond our shores. This delusion has become dangerously entrenched, reflected most recently in the Albanese government's hesitant response to war in the Middle East. On Wednesday, Veterans Affairs Minister Matt Keogh provided the standard government response to a question on ABC Perth about potential involvement in the Middle East. "It's not our primary focus area," he replied. "We are very much focused on our region." Yet only two days earlier, a Qantas Boeing 787 from Perth to Paris was forced to turn back more than seven hours into its flight, prevented from reaching its destination by the closure of air space over the Gulf. The geographical reality for an open trading nation like ours is that Australia has had a stake in peace in the Middle East since 1869, when the opening of the Suez Canal reduced the journey to Europe by weeks. Australian troops fought and died in the Middle East in two world wars, not just out of imperial loyalty but because it was in our interests. Our trading links have diversified, and freight handling is more sophisticated. Yet, Dubai, Doha, and Abu Dhabi are the first or last ports of call for nearly 400,000 passengers a month arriving or departing from Australia. Last year, more than 100,000 tonnes of air freight came by that route. As Australians, we should understand better than most that the threat to aircraft flying 30,000 feet over a war zone is not merely theoretical. Malaysian Airlines flight MH 17 Is one of three commercial airliners confirmed to have been brought down by surface-to-air missiles. Among the 298 people who died when the plane came down over eastern Ukraine were 38 Australians. What is unfolding in the Middle East is not an isolated conflict - it is part of a broader confrontation between liberal democracies and revisionist regimes. Iran, through its proxies, joins Russia and China in challenging the rules-based order that underpins global security. Australia's security and prosperity depend on that order. We are a trading nation that relies on open sea lanes, established legal norms, and stable regions. The notion that we can "focus on our region" while ignoring wider threats is strategically incoherent. In short, trade routes, military engagements, and energy security irrevocably bind Australia to the region. Far from being a distant or irrelevant conflict zone, the Middle East is - and always has been - part of Australia's geopolitical backyard. The Middle Eastern diaspora in Australia provides a human link to countries across the region and a profound interest in maintaining their sovereignty. Add to that Australia's historic resistance to nuclear proliferation and naivety of the Albanese government's attempts to distance itself from events in the Middle East becomes screamingly clear. Australia was drawn irreversibly into the geopolitics of the Middle East and, more broadly, the global system that binds the liberal democratic world together. The idea that we can stand aside from today's conflicts - whether in Gaza, the Red Sea, or the broader confrontation between open societies and authoritarian powers - is not just naïve. It is dangerous. Yet there is more to Albanese's foreign policy error than cartographic illiteracy and topographical detachment. The insistence of the intellectual Left to view every conflict through a colonial lens has created uncertainty about which side to support. The framing of Israel as a Western colonising force is no longer a fringe position on the Left. The resale to acknowledge the Jewish people's ancient historical ties to the Middle East and brush aside the significance of international involvement in Israel's creation has become mainstream thinking in Labor. Counter-evidence is dismissed through the selective use of colonial framing. The October 7, 2023, atrocities have not tarnished Hamas' reputation as freedom fighters. Open calls for the destruction of Israel, a genocidal objective incompatible with any liberation narrative, are discounted or justified. The narrative ignores genuine colonial regimes like China in Tibet or Russia in Ukraine, where national cultures are actively suppressed. Nick Cater is a senior fellow at Menzies Research Centre and a regular contributor to Sky News Australia
The Guardian
02-03-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
Fast food chains are mushrooming across Australia – but at what cost?
It wasn't that long ago Australians had only a handful of fast food options. Want a burger? Then it was probably McDonald's or Hungry Jack's. Desire for a chicken dinner would have led you to KFC, Red Rooster or, for those in Western Australia, Chicken Treat. Many will still remember Pizza Hut's phone number jingle – unless you preferred Domino's. The number of fast food options have exploded over the past two decades. According to those who track the industry, store numbers will rise even faster over the coming years as international chains see massive growth potential in Australia amid a cost-of-living crisis. But at what cost? Sign up for Guardian Australia's breaking news email Major fast food chains opened more than 300 new stores in Australia last year, according to data analysis firm GapMaps, led by heavyweights KFC, McDonald's, Subway and Hungry Jack's. Guzman y Gomez and Zambrero also contributed strongly to the expansion in what was a golden year for Mexican-themed food. Mad Mex, Betty's Burgers and El Jannah each added 10 stores to their networks. Overseas chains not already in Australia also want a piece of the market. The US burger giant Wendy's re-entered Australia in January by opening a store on the Gold Coast, the first of an anticipated major expansion. US chains Chuck E Cheese and Firehouse Subs are also planning to open local stores. According to researcher IbisWorld, more than 40% of fast food and takeaway services have a burger-based menu, followed by chicken (20%) and pizza (16%). The decision to expand store networks – which, for some chains, has more than offset closures – was made despite the prevailing cost-of-living pressures that have prompted many households to cut back on restaurant and cafe eating. Peter Holmes, the chief operating officer at GapMaps, says fast food chains see Australia as a growth market. 'If you go to LA you'll have 10 options in a row; we still only have a handful of the big players,' says Holmes. 'They do recognise that consumers are probably spending a little less per ticket due to cost of living, but they are trying to make sure they make themselves more accessible and broaden their offering. 'In general, fast food is cheaper than dining out, and they are working hard to attract customers.' Analysts at IbisWorld credit the trend to consumers 'trading down' from expensive restaurants to more affordable outlets amid persistent living cost pressures. The researcher expects the number of fast food and takeaway businesses in Australia will rise from about 36,000 currently to more than 39,000 by 2030, marking an 8% lift in numbers. Australia's growing population is opening up new areas for fast food outlets. Major chains tend to work on a ratio of one store per 20,000 to 30,000 residents, according to GapMaps. Many of those stores are in outer suburban fringes, described by Holmes as the 'heartland' for the sector. Prof Nicky Morrison, the director of Urban Transformations Research Centre at Western Sydney University, says fast food outlets target young families in outer suburban communities where there is often less competition from independent restaurants. Sign up to Breaking News Australia Get the most important news as it breaks after newsletter promotion She says those communities are 'doubly penalised' because they have less access to healthy fresh food, including supermarkets. Morrison was part of a 2022 study using Penrith in Sydney's west as a case study that found suburbs with the highest concentration of fast food outlets also had the highest obesity and cardiovascular disease rates. Dr Priscila Machado, a research fellow at Deakin University, says all fast food brands – even chains that make sandwiches in front of you and promote their burgers as healthy – are considered ultra-processed foods, which carry their own health harms, including increased risk of cancer and cardiometabolic multimorbidity. 'These are ultra-processed foods that are made of industrial ingredients that have been modified … [they] go through several processing techniques plus the use of artificial ingredients like additives,' says Machado. Machado points to fast food buns being so soft and fast food cheese being so melty as examples of how ultra-processed foods are designed to be easily consumed. The refined ingredients, which tend to have less fibre and protein, make it difficult for the brain to recognise when you are full. 'We tend to have higher eating rates when consuming these ultra-processed foods [because] you're eating more per minute without realising it,' she says. Guzman y Gomez's ingredients list shows it uses a range of industrial ingredients used in ultra-processed foods, such as modified starches, thickeners such as maltodextrin in its seasoning, and anti-foam agent in its corn chips and churros. These are often used to help foods maintain their texture when high temperature and high-pressure techniques are used in food processing. Guzman y Gomez told Guardian Australia that while they aim for 'minimal processing … some menu items require functional additives to ensure guest safety and maintain product integrity'. Their definition of clean is taken to mean no added preservatives, artificial flavours, added colours or 'unacceptable' additives, the spokesperson said. Fast food is set to become even more prevalent across Australia. To get people to visit more often, stores are heavily promoting their breakfast and snack menus alongside their traditional lunch and dinner items, while making their menu items more convenient to purchase. Subway and Grill'd are among those to recently open drive-through options, while Guzman y Gomez now has stores open 24 hours a day. New entrants, including Wendy's, also want to open lots of stores, quickly, given chains rely on expanding networks to improve name recognition and economies of scale. Almost all major fast food chains have partnered with delivery platforms such as Uber Eats, DoorDash, and Menulog and many have their own apps, making unhealthy food more accessible than ever, especially to younger, digitally savvy customers. Morrison said she wants to see local and state planners implementing zoning regulations to limit the concentration of fast food outlets in certain areas, particularly near schools and residential zones, and encouraging a wider variety of healthy food options and pedestrian-friendly spaces to reduce dependence on car-centric fast food options. Dr Kate Sievert, from Deakin University's Global Centre for Preventive Health and Nutrition, said the policy solutions put forward in Australia have generally been 'piecemeal' and only focus on consumer choice, for example improving food labelling. However, 'choice is a very small part of the picture when it comes to food', she says, with more policies needed that target every level of the supply chain, from distribution to retail. When it comes to fast food companies, she says, 'their goals are to grow and to nourish their shareholders essentially, instead of nourishing their customers'.
