Australia: Land of Sunshine and Struggle

Whenever people find out I’m Australian, the first question they usually ask is: Why would you choose to live in the UK?
They imagine Australia as some sort of real-world Oz: endless sunshine, daily beach barbecues, and an enviable quality of life.
This fantasy rests on the false idea that the issues we face in the UK—rising living costs, decaying infrastructure, worsening access to health and education, growing inequality, and increasingly authoritarian governance—are unique to Britain. That somehow, things here have gone wrong only because of the current government, or due to immigration, or some other convenient scapegoat.
But the truth is: the crisis of working-class life is global. And a recent trip south confirmed what I already knew—Australia is on the exact same path. It may not yet have reached the depths of British decline, but it’s heading in the same direction, fast.
Here are some observations from three weeks in the “lucky country”:

1. A Generation Abandoning Parenthood
The number of young Australian women choosing not to have children has doubled. Their reasons? Global instability, career pressures, and a desire for autonomy. Translated: the world is broken, work doesn’t pay, and children are an unaffordable luxury.

2. Supermarket Theft as Hunger
Theft is reportedly rising in supermarkets—but not in the ways you might think. People are eating food in-store before they get to the checkout. Cooked chickens, butter and jam rolls are the top targets. Media coverage blames drug addiction. The response? AI surveillance and harsher punishments. As if poverty, addiction, and hopelessness weren’t punishment enough.

3. Debt Politics, Copy-Paste Edition
Australia’s national debt now sits at $1.2 trillion. The right-wing Liberal Party (Australia’s version of the Tories) blames the Labor government for poor spending, as if that degree of debt was amassed in just a few years. Typical blame game crap. Sound familiar?

4. The Blame Game: Immigrants Again
Who’s responsible for the economic hardship faced by working-class Australians? Sensible folk would know it is the corporations and banks bleeding workers dry and making record profits. But no—apparently, it’s migrants. Yes, in a country built on colonisation and migration, some are calling for an end to mass migration. Neo-Nazis joined recent anti-immigration rallies, shouting about an “invasion” of the Aussie nation. It’s a pattern we’ve seen before and are experiencing in the UK right now too – almost as if it is choreographed across struggling western nations: capitalism fails to provide, so the ruling class blames the vulnerable. Just like in the 1930s Germany, Italy, Spain, and Japan. Redirect anger from the elite minority growing richer, to the poor and desperate just trying to survive.

5. Crime, Protest, and Political Priorities
You may have heard in the news about Des Freeman, an anti-establishment nutter turned double cop killer who has been on the loose for nearly a month. During a massive manhunt for Des, a record police deployment was launched, involving federal forces, state police, NZ officers, and the military. Guess who footed the bill? You know the answer.
But police weren’t angry at the cost. They were angry at… pro-Palestinian protesters, blaming them for “diverting resources” from the search. How dare people oppose genocide while a cop killer is on the loose!

6. Protesting Genocide Is Now “A Disgrace”
And while we are on the Palestinian genocide being committed by Israel with the full support of Anglo-American imperialists and their comprador supporters, of which Australia is one. When Australian protesters gathered outside the Prime Minister’s electorate office to protest the nation’s complicity in Israel’s genocide in Gaza, the office was closed temporarily. The Deputy PM called the protesters “a disgrace” and claimed they’d harmed local people more than helped Gazans.
So, opposing war crimes makes you the problem now. Not complicity in genocide but protesting it.

7. Economic Decline in the “Lucky Country”
Housing Crisis
New statistics report that 20% of parents and grandparents are helping younger family members to either buy or rent a place to live. There is lots of wealth tied up in housing and whilst those with houses (probably the same 20%) can help family members, everyone else is screwed. There are just 400 homes for every 1000 Australians, the worst housing statistics in the western world. Buying and renting in equal measure have become unaffordable for the average Aussie.

b. Mass Layoffs
The banking sector shed thousands of jobs and was more recently joined by the mining sector. BHP cut 750 jobs in QLD mines, coal miners Anglo American shed hundreds more and Mitsubishi Alliance disgracefully announced major cuts to its workforce by video. Mining represents some 65% of Queensland’s regional economy and that means when jobs are lost it affects the wider local economies badly. The mining companies cite unsustainable state govt royalties (aka taxpayer subsidies) have forced them to cut jobs. Damn those tax payers!

c. Indigenous Regions in Crisis
There is an acute cost of living crisis in indigenous regions in Northern Australian and the Torres Straits. The Federal Labour government’s solution is to use taxpayers’ money (again) to subsidise participating retail outlets to reduce the prices of 30 essential food items. A band-aid on systemic neglect.

d. Bread and Circuses
Meanwhile, commodification of sport continues. A $1.3 billion Australian Football League stadium is planned for Tasmania as a condition of it joining the league—paid for by taxpayers, of course. Apparently, if you can’t afford rent or food, at least you can watch the footy.

8. Education: Now Brought to You by Microsoft
The commodification of education continues. A program called “EdChat” is being rolled out in South Australian public high schools—an AI chatbot, built with Microsoft. More cost-cutting, more outsourcing of learning, more consolidation of the indoctrination and dumbing down of Australia’s future generations. 

9. Foreign Policy: Australia’s Imperial Collar
A comprador country, Australia dances to the tune of its Anglo-American masters and the Israeli lobby. Just a few illustrations during my three-week stint there.
a. Anti-Iran Scapegoating
The Iranian ambassador was expelled over unproven links to alleged antisemitic attacks. When questioned about evidence, ministers said they were “confident” in intelligence agencies—but knew no details. Shortly after, the propaganda arm of Murdoch went into overdrive.  Coincidence? I think not! A report on the persecution of Iranian women by the ‘regime’ for not wearing hijabs featured shortly after this proclamation aimed at cementing derogatory views of Iran that justified the baseless accusations.

b. China, Murdoch, and Manufactured Enemies
The overt propaganda of the Murdoch media in Australia knows no bounds. Coverage of the recent Chinese celebrations of the defeat of Japanese fascism went something like this: “China shows off its military muscle in front of some of the world’s most notorious leaders, some of whom are part of the axis of upheaval. (Namely Iran, Russia, China and DPRK.)
“Expect goose stepping soldiers, military fire power and leaders heaping praise on President Xi. It is a gathering of the most heavily sanctioned nations. China and Russia even suggest they were the leading victors of WW2. (Erm, they were! China did defeat Japanese fascism. The USSR did crush Nazi Germany.)

“The event suggests that the US was not important in WW2 and is not important now.” (Which was the only bit of commentary that rang true.)

c. AUKUS and War Prep
Meanwhile, back in the Pacific, and gearing up for future war there, those ‘rich Aussie taxpayers’ who seem to have endless funds are coughing up a further $12b for the expansion of an AUKUS defence facility in Perth, providing docking and repair facilities for US nuclear subs. We’re told it will create 10,000 jobs. So workers be grateful, shut up about war, and your deteriorating material conditions and enjoy your new jobs in the military-industrial complex.

d. Militarising the Pacific
Australia’s long-neglected defence pact with Papua New Guinea is being revived, with talk of integration and recruitment of non-citizens. Translation: Pacific Islanders will be frontline fodder for Western wars.
There was a big deal made of the imminent signing of an arms agreement and defence pact between Papua New Guinea and Australia. The transformational agreement not updated since 1977 sees the integration of militaries. Suffering recruitment challenges itself, the agreement opens up the Australian defence forces to non-Australian citizens with an eye to the Pacific. In other words, Islanders, not Australians, will be first line fodder in future wars in the Pacific.
There is a race to secure other pacific nations including Fiji and Tonga to the western cause as some, like the Solomon Islands, already have treaties in place with China. As the threat of war looms in East Asia, alliances are being forged. Whilst the signing of the agreement with PNG was supposed to have taken place with great fanfare, political division in the PNG cabinet meant negotiations were stalled. We shall see if the pro west or pro PNG forces win. 

10. Climate Crisis: Sunny Hell
Australia still conjures images of great weather. But climate change is wrecking that illusion:
Australia ranks 52nd of 67 countries on climate targets.
It emits three times more CO₂ than the global average per capita.
Northern and coastal regions are becoming uninhabitably hot.
Skin cancer rates soar under a depleted ozone layer.
Bushfires, cyclones, and floods are growing in frequency and intensity.
And who profits from the fossil fuel industry that’s driving this destruction? Not the workers. Not the communities. But the same mining corporations now cutting jobs and demanding subsidies.
Climate catastrophe, like all capitalist crises, is a class issue. The profits are private; the pain is public.
Conclusion: This Is a Global Fight
So you see—the issues crippling the British working class are not uniquely British. They are global. They are systemic. They are caused by the same forces: capitalism and its ruling class.
There aren’t dozens of problems to fix or separate causes to blame. All roads lead back to a single source: the global capitalist elite whose wealth depends on our exploitation, division, and despair.
So to those who still believe there’s some capitalist utopia to escape to, let me be clear:
There is no escape. There is only struggle.