The PM's two-fingered salute

'Wilson is singularly under-credentialled when it comes to what's really going on in the free-speech marketplace.' Photo: Wayne Taylor

Chris Berg must be livid.

He's the man who's done the heavy lifting on free speech at the Institute of Public Affairs and authored the official text, In Defence of Freedom of Speech (subtitle: From Ancient Greece to Andrew Bolt).

Instead, Attorney-General George Brandis appoints Tim Wilson, the institute's policy director, to the Human Rights Commission with particular focus on free speech and everyone's right to hold opinions.

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Well, here's my opinion.

Wilson is singularly under-credentialled when it comes to what's really going on in the free-speech marketplace. His utterances since his appointment was announced show a slender grasp of the issues at stake and his outpourings beforehand are a collection of corporate-inspired outrages about government trying to protect the health and welfare of society.

He decries restrictions on cigarette advertising and the plain packaging legislation (a free-speech issue for the tobacco industry), attempted regulations on poker machines, taxes on alcohol, moves to control the intake of fatty and sugary foods, and banning tanning beds.

All of this, in Wilson's view, is paternalistic nonsense, along with global warming and the tax on carbon. Let the market rip and allow people to gamble, smoke, drink, get fat and artificially tanned until frizzled. No doubt these views are genuinely and passionately held and, entirely coincidentally, they are held by the corporate sponsors of the Institute of Public Affairs.

We don't know for sure, because the institute is so keen on free speech that it won't share with us who is paying the piper, but it seems to run along the lines of a massive cash-for-comment machine.

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The PM's two-fingered salute