Politics in the Pub with Brian Toohey
6 PM, Wednesday 23 October 2019
at Union Bar, 3 Rimmer St, Acton ANU.

Join the Australia Institute in conversation with journalist and author, Brian Toohey, to discuss his new book: Secret: The Making of Australia’s Security State.

With decades of experience in covering national security, Toohey shows how governments are making Australians less secure while promising to make them safer. 

Political leaders increasingly promote secrecy, ignorance and fear to erode individual liberties once at the core of Australian values, such as habeas corpus and freedom of expression. Receiving or publishing a wide range of information that has nothing to do with national security is now a criminal offence. The defence forces are now so tightly integrated into the Pentagon that Australia could be dragged into a devastating war escalating into a full-scale nuclear catastrophe. 

Against this backdrop, Secret: The Making of Australia’s Security State provides fresh information on Australia's 13 wars (12 unnecessary), foreign interference, the British nuclear tests, the Whitlam era, what the US bases in Australia really do and the serious risks of accidental nuclear war, and Australia’s phony claims to own 42% of the Antarctic.  It also gives fresh insights into clumsy attempts to investigate and initiate court cases involving leaks of embarrassing information. 

Toohey is a columnist with the Australian Financial Review and has written for The Nikkei Asia Review, The West Australian and The Sunday Age. He was editor of The National Times and both Canberra and Washington correspondent for the Australian Financial Review.

Copies of Secret: The Making of Australia’s Security State will be available for purchase at the event. 

NEW VENUE: Please note we have relocated to ANU Union Bar, 3 Rimmer St, Acton.

There are multiple parking options: 
The Marcus Clarke secure parking car park is a short walk from the venue located off Childers St. Kingsley St Parking Station is also within easy walking distance. Barry Drive has secure parking, as well as two secure car parks located on Moore St. 
Alternatively, Union Bar is located within the Rimmer St bus stop so you could catch either number 50,51,3,2,4,32 and simply step off the bus and walk inside.