Institute of Public Affairs
(IPA)

Established	1943
Focus	The free market of ideas, the free flow of capital, a limited and efficient government, evidence-based public policy, the rule of law, and representative democracy.
Chairman	Rod Kemp
Executive Director	John Roskam
Budget	FYE June 2012 Income: A$4,002,427 Expenses: A$3,689,095[1]
Location	Level 2, 410 Collins Street Melbourne Victoria 3000 Australia
Coordinates	37.8170°S 144.9606°ECoordinates: 37.8170°S 144.9606°E
Website	www.ipa.org.au

The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) is a conservative public policy think tank^[2][3][4] based in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It advocates free market economic policies such as privatisation and deregulation of state-owned enterprises, trade liberalisation and deregulated workplaces, climate change skepticism,^[5] the abolition of the minimum wage,^[6] and the repeal of parts of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975.^[7]

History[edit]

1940s to 1970s[edit]

The Institute of Public Affairs was founded in 1943 as the Institute of Public Affairs Victoria, with Charles Denton (“CD”) Kemp as its inaugural director and George Coles as its inaugural chair. The founders were prominent businessmen,^[8] and current executive director John Roskam says of the occasion: “Big business created the IPA”.^[9] The idea to form the Institute of Public Affairs was first floated in the Victorian Chamber of Manufactures.^[10]

The IPA’s formation was prompted by the collapse of Australia’s main right-wing party, the United Australia Party.^[11] The IPA’s initial purpose was to influence Australia’s post-war reconstruction, with business interests concerned that popular sentiment supported a Labor-led, collectivist post-war construction, a “prevailing clamour for a new kind of society”.^[8][12]

By the end of 1943, branches had been set up in NSW, SA and Queensland, although the state branches remained administratively and ideologically distinct (the SA and Queensland branches closed in the 1950s).^[13] The IPA NSW engaged in “party political activism”,^[12] while at the IPA Victoria’s first annual meeting in 1944 chair GJ Coles said that they “did not wish to be directly involved in politics”.^[8]

In October 1944, the IPA printed 50,000 copies of Looking Forward, an 80-page booklet which set out the possibilities of post-war reconstruction.^[8][12] Robert Menzies described Looking Forward as “the finest statement of basic political and academic problems made in Australia for many years”.^[12]

The IPA had no formal association with the formation of the Liberal Party of Australia by Menzies in 1945. Political scientist Marian Simms says that the IPA’s role was to act as “an interim finance collector for non-Labor political interests”, initiate “the unification of the non-Labor organizations in Victoria … and then [mediate] among them” and provide “much of the content of the federal platform of the LPA and propaganda for political campaigns”.^[13] Looking Forward was influential in the Liberal Party’s inaugural platform.^[12]

Norman Abjorensen credits the IPA in this period with the collapse in ALP support, saying that the IPA was “the architect of a stream of propaganda that sought, successfully, to discredit Australia’s very moderate Labor Party as a socialist tiger waiting to pounce once the war had ended.”^[14]

In 1962, the IPA dropped “Victoria” from its name, an act that caused relations between it and the IPA NSW to “deteriorate further”.^[13]

In the 1970s, the IPA and IPA NSW cooperated to establish Enterprise Australia. This organisation had as “an immediate target … the removal of the present Labor Government in Canberra”, while the IPA ostensibly stayed at arm’s length in an attempt to be perceived as above party politics.^[13]

1980s to 1995[edit]

From its founding to the late 1970s, the IPA had been associated with anti-socialist Keynesian economics and protectionist industry.^[12][15] The appointment of Rod Kemp (CD Kemp’s son) as executive director in 1982, along with other administrative changes that had occurred in the late 1970s and early 1980s, marked a shift to neo-liberal ideology that continues to this day.^[15]

In 1989, the IPA NSW – which had always been administratively and ideologically distinct – changed name to the Sydney Institute, and transitioned from neo-liberal think tank to discussion forum.^[12][15] The IPA NSW had a budget of $120,000 in 1985, compared to the IPA Victoria’s $300,000.^[12]

Rod Kemp left his position as executive director in 1989 as he had been elected to Parliament.

In 1991, the IPA amalgamated with the Perth-based Australian Institute of Public Policy and John Hyde moved from executive director of the Australian Institute of Public Policy to executive director of the IPA.^[11][12] The AIPP had been founded by Hyde in 1983 as a neo-liberal think tank, and the merger brought its annual revenue of about $300,000 or $400,000 to the IPA. Hyde described the merger as “joining forces with old friends”.^[15]

The IPA cooperated with the Tasman Institute on Project Victoria, which provided a blueprint for the privatisation and deregulation of the Victorian economy when Jeff Kennett became premier in 1992.^[16]The research was done with the assistance of Westpac staff seconded to work on the project.^[15]

Roskam era[edit]

John Roskam replaced Mike Nahan as executive director in 2005, although he had worked at the IPA for a number of years before that.^[17]

Between 2009 and 2013, the IPA’s annual revenue doubled to $3.2 million a year, an increase attributed by Roskam to the IPA’s campaign against parts of the Racial Discrimination Act and the Gillard Government‘s media regulation proposals.^[18]

In 2008, former executive director of the IPA Rod Kemp was appointed chair of the IPA.^[19]

In 2013 the IPA celebrated its 70th anniversary. Notable in attendance at the celebrations were:^{[citation needed]}

• Gina Rinehart
• Rupert Murdoch
• Tony Abbott
• George Pell – Australian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church
• Michael Kroger – President of the Victorian division of the Liberal Party of Australia and former director of the IPA
• Mitch Fifield – Communications Minister

Donors[edit]

The IPA is funded by its membership which include both private individuals and businesses. Among these businesses are ExxonMobil,^[20] Telstra, WMC Resources, BHP Billiton, Philip Morris,^[21] Murray Irrigation Limited,^[22] and Visy Industries.

IPA donors have also included Clough Engineering, Caltex, Shell, and Esso.^[3] Other donors were electricity and mining companies, as well as British American Tobacco (BAT).^[3]

In 2003, the Australian Government paid $50,000 to the Institute of Public Affairs to review the accountability of NGOs.^[4]

In July 2018, a subpoena issued on the IPA by Bianca Hope Hayward, as part of a lawsuit against her mother Gina Rinehart, in the Supreme Court of NSW, revealed an undeclared donation of A$4.5 million to the institute. The donation from Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting, was not declared in the IPA’s Annual Report. It was also revealed that shortly afterwards the IPA bestowed life membership upon Gina Rinehart.^[23]

Political links[edit]

The IPA Victoria was founded during World War 2 by businessmen in response to the feared growing power of the Labor Party and international socialism, with founder C. D. Kemp putting the case to the Victorian Chamber of Manufactures sub-committee as such:^[24]

The freedom of Australian business is today gravely threatened by forces whose unswerving and rigid purpose is the entire nationalisation of industry and the establishment of socialism as the permanent form of Australian society; this would mean the elimination of private capital and shareholding, profit, freedom of private enterprise and the transfer of the control of industry to civil servants and union leaders. These forces are centred politically in the Labor Party and industrially in the Trade Unions; they are supported by an extremely powerful and growing section of public opinion.

— Charles Denton Kemp

The IPA Victoria was founded as an apolitical organisation, and rejected the IPA NSW’s strategy of “direct short term political action to defeat the Labor Party with an emphasis on propaganda”. However, the IPA Victoria acted as a finance committee for non-Labor parties in its first year, and the IPA Treasurer at the time reportedly said that much of the IPA Victoria’s funding was conditional on it being spent to “fight socialism at the coming election” (the Australian federal election, 1943).^[25] Its Publicity and Research Bureau wrote political broadcasters, provided speakers’ notes to all endorsed United Australia Party and United Country Party candidates and producing advertisements.^[25]

The IPA Victoria’s direct involvement in federal politics was reappraised after the 1943 election, and the organisation handed over responsibility for fundraising to the extra-parliamentary wing of the United Australia Party. The IPA Victoria remained involved in non-Labor politics, including financing by-election candidates and participating in the foundation of the Liberal Party of Australia.^[25]

The IPA Victoria was less involved in the 1949 federal election than the 1943 election, but the IPA Review did publish articles arguing against socialism and with tactical advice for the Liberal Party.^[25]

During Charles Kemp’s time as Director, the IPA Victoria focused its political engagement on the non-Labor parties, and did not “seriously attempt” to influence Labor politicians.^[26] Academic and public servant Finlay Crisp described it as a “satellite” of the Liberal Party during this time, and the IPA Review had a policy of not approaching Labor figures for submissions and of muting criticism of the Liberal Government.^[25]

In 1978, the IPA and the Australian Council of Trade Unions prepared a booklet on partnership in industry, but the ACTU baulked at the association and its name was not on the final publication.^[27] By the 1980s, the IPA had changed its policy and made space in the IPA Review for Labor politicians and “others not of the free enterprise persuasion”.^[25]

Today, the Institute still has close ideological and political affinities with the Liberal Party in Australia. For example, IPA Executive Director John Roskam worked on the Liberal Party’s election campaign during the 2001 federal election^[28] and has run for Liberal Party preselection.^[29] Tony Abbott delivered the 57th C D Kemp lecture in 2001 on the Coalition Government’s Work for the Dole program^[30] and Prime Minister John Howard delivered the 60th C D Kemp lecture in 2004, titled Iraq: The Importance of Seeing it Through.^[31]

Research focus[edit]

The IPA has affiliations with think tanks in the U.S., Canada, UK and Asia.^{[citation needed]} It has a close relationship with the American Enterprise Institute, an American think-tank.^{[citation needed]}

Following the 2013 federal election of the Abbott Coalition Government, the IPA released a list of 75 policy initiatives (later adding another 25) to “transform Australia” which encapsulated the present direction of the IPA.^[32][33]

Economics[edit]

The IPA Victoria’s ideological position was initially “an amalgam of Keynesianism control and Hayekian regulation”, with IPA President Eric Lampe in 1961 saying that the IPA considered government responsibility for full employment, social security, the speed of development, living standards and financial stability “all very necessary”.^[34]

This changed during the late 1970s and 1980s,^[27] when the IPA adopted an economic rationalist or neo-liberal position, with the IPA saying in 1988 that:^[34]

the material condition of all sections of the community is most effectively enhanced by encouraging economic growth through a private enterprise, market-oriented economic system, involving vigorous private enterprise and minimal government interference

Recent economic positions of the IPA include:

• lower taxation;^[35]
• abolish the minimum wage^[36]
• deregulation of the Australian economy;^[35]
• privatisation of government bodies like Australia Post, Medibank, the SBS, the Australian Institute of Sport, the National Broadband Network, CSIRO^[35] and the ABC;^[37]
• reduced government spending;^[35]
• greater transparency in government;^{[citation needed]}
• the elimination of existing programs of welfare targeted at Indigenous Australians, with the aim of encouraging transition to work, self-reliance and high incomes;^{[citation needed]}
• maintain or increase the current level of immigration;^{[citation needed]}
• the reduction of Australian Public Service benefits and allowances.^[38]

Tobacco[edit]

The IPA has made the following criticisms of proposals by the Australian government to introduce plain packaging of tobacco products:

• Plain packaging may not affect the consumption of those products and ^[39]
• Plain packaging may infringe intellectual property rights in tobacco trademarks and logos.

Climate change[edit]

The IPA adopts a position of doubt about climate change and finances several Australian climate change science doubters.^[40]

In 2008, the institute facilitated a donation of $350,000 by Dr G. Bryant Macfie, a climate change sceptic, to the University of Queensland for environmental research. The money is to fund three environmental doctoral projects, with the IPA suggesting two of the three agreed topics.^[41]

In 2010, the IPA published a compilation of essays by prominent climate change skeptics titled Climate Change: The Facts and edited by John Roskam and Alan Moran.^[42] An expanded version with 22 essays was published in 2015 through Stockade Books^[43] and a follow-up edited by Jennifer Marohasy was published in 2017,^[44] both in Kindle format.

In 2017, Marohasy and IPA colleague John Abbot publisher a paper on climate change in the journal GeoResJ,^[45] also discussing the work on the IPA website,^[46] in The Spectator Australia,^[47] and in Marohasy’s blog.^[48] The research concludes that much of recent warming could be attributable to natural variations, and that the “world was about as warm in 1980 as it was during the Middle Ages.”^[46][49]This conclusion was welcomed by conservative media outlets^[49][50][51] but heavily criticised by climate scientists who pointed to methodological flaws in the research and declared it unworthy of publication.^[52] Gavin Schmidt, the Director of NASA‘s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has pointed out that some data were shifted in time by approximately 35 years, leading to the omission of warming that has occurred since 1965.^[53][54] Schmidt described the research as “worthless” and an example of “what happens when people have their conclusions fixed before they start the work.”^[52]

Notable people[edit]

The following individuals are or were associated with the Institute of Public Affairs.

Senior office bearers[edit]

When the IPA Victoria was founded in 1943, it had a chairman (Sir George Coles); a chairman of the Executive Committee was chosen in 1944 (G. H. Grimwade) and a director (Charles Denton Kemp) in 1948. The Executive Committee was also referred to as the Industrial Committee or the Executive & Editorial Committee, and the role of chairman was subsequently renamed to president. From July 1983, the roles of president and chairman of the Executive Committee were combined.^[55]

Staff, fellows and board members[edit]

Donors, members and associates[edit]

Publications[edit]

The IPA Review is published quarterly.^[73]

See also[edit]

• List of think tanks

References[edit]

External links