A Conservative Manifesto to rescue Australia from Albo

Now’s the time for conservative Australians to shake a leg.

The once-formidable Liberal Party, now a defunct shell of its former self, is ideologically adrift and electorally diminished, and appears content to nod along with Labor’s agenda, offering little more than token resistance.

Beneath the rhetoric of unity and fairness lies a stark reality. Our nation’s conservatives are fractured, leaderless, and in desperate need of a unifying force.

It is time to rally around a bold conservative manifesto, one that repurposes the remnants of the Liberal Party as a launchpad to challenge this creeping authoritarianism and restore Australia’s economic vitality.

My latest in The Spectator Australia, A Conservative Manifesto to rescue Australia from Albo.

MICHAEL DE PERCY | "It is time to rally around a bold conservative manifesto, one that repurposes the remnants of the Liberal Party as a launchpad to challenge this creeping authoritarianism and restore Australia’s economic vitality."https://t.co/NqxrhmCluJ

— The Spectator Australia (@SpectatorOz) September 19, 2025

Remembering Robert Redford, the man who lit up my youth

Redford as The Great Waldo Pepper, a daredevil aviator chasing glory in the skies after the Great War.

This week, Robert Redford, that golden-haired icon of American cinema, quietly slipped away at age 89, the same age my grandfather passed a few years ago.

Redford passed peacefully at his Sundance retreat in the Utah mountains. The man who embodied the rugged individualism of the West, played the heist, and soared through the skies on screen, now rests among the peaks he so fiercely protected. It’s a fitting end for a life that was anything but ordinary, a life that provided the soundtrack and scenery to my coming of age.

In the Unfiltered newsletter, Alexandra Marshall wrote:

The golden era of Hollywood has lost one of its most dearly loved stars. Robert Redford slipped away at 89. As Michael de Percy writes, ‘Redford passed peacefully at his Sundance retreat in the Utah mountains. The man who embodied the rugged individualism of the West, played the heist, and soared through the skies on screen, now rests among the peaks he so fiercely protected. It’s a fitting end for a life that was anything but ordinary, a life that provided the soundtrack and scenery to my coming of age.’

In the Morning Double Shot newsletter, Terry Barnes wrote:

Michael de Percy reveals a romantic streak in his otherwise ruthless political persona – although Redford’s politics and Michael’s would be polar opposites. As an actor and director, Redford made great films although, as Christopher Tookey points out in his appreciation, he didn’t fancy himself a great actor. Too many well-known people of the 60s and 70s are popping their clogs this year, but let’s make one thing clear as many of us mourn our lost youth through them: they died, not passed, or passed away. Why is it, in an age where social media brutalises the public discourse, everyone now says dead people ‘pass away’, not ‘die’?

My latest in The Spectator Australia, Remembering Robert Redford, the man who lit up my youth.

Charlie Kirk's Assassination #NoMore Double Standards

It's time to start the #NoMore movement. No more double standards. No more two-tier policing.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk in the United States this week has sent shock waves around the world. Why did a young man ruin his life by taking the life of another? 

One of the things that I think we need to seriously look at now is our education system and how our education system, which has moved further and further to the left, is now arguing progressive points of view. 

We heard Black Lives Matter and the Me Too movement and we saw the extremes that these went to. 

Rather than riots in the United States, what we've seen as a result of Charlie Kirk's assassination have been prayer vigils. 

So for the conservative movement, a tragedy, but at the same time, we really need to start looking at what causes university students to behave this way. And I blame our education system. I think our education system has made it okay, much like the two-tier policing we've witnessed in the United Kingdom, and we're starting to see that in Australia as well. 

Two-tier policing, where leftist progressive causes are okay and conservative causes are not, represents the double standard that we're now starting to see in social and political commentary. It was okay for some to make light or even make fun of or rejoice and celebrate the assassination of Charlie Kirk. 

We saw this in particular with the incoming president of the Oxford Union in the United Kingdom. Repeatedly we hear that freedom of speech is sacrosanct. However, this only applies to the left. Anything that's said by the right is determined to be hate speech. 

Now there are extremes and I'm not arguing for extremes on either side but we need to have a much more centrist approach to this and this has been part of the great conversation and the great contest of ideas that is a hallmark of liberal democracy. 

The problem with moving too far to the left is that we're leaving behind liberal democracy and we're getting ever closer to socialism. 

Two-tier policing is a result of the double standard that is being applied. And we see this in particular with the assassination of Charlie Kirk. 

In the United Kingdom, you can lose your position for misgendering somebody, but for laughing about the assassination of somebody else. These are people in positions of responsibility. If this had happened in the private sector, there would have been outcry. 

However, when it happens in the education system, it's okay because the system looks after itself. 

Our education system has been overtaken by progressive ideas, but not just progressive ideas, but extreme leftist ideas. And this needs to change. 

It's time to start the #NoMore movement. No more assassinations. No more double standards. No more two-tier policing. No more putting up with criminal activity. It's time that our country got back on track.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk points to the radicalisation of our education system. I'm calling for #NoMore double standards. pic.twitter.com/qFkBM6RJFc

— Dr Michael de Percy (@FlaneurPolitiq) September 14, 2025