History of Australia Since 1945 - Turn of The Century

Turn of The Century

John Howard served as Prime Minister from 1996 until 2007, the second-longest prime ministerial term after Robert Menzies. One of the first programs instigated by the Howard government was a nationwide gun control scheme, following a mass shooting at Port Arthur. The government sought to reduce Australia's government deficit and introduced industrial relations reforms, particularly as regards efficiency on the waterfront. After the 1996 election, Howard and treasurer Peter Costello proposed a Goods and Services Tax (GST) which they successfully took to the electorate in 1998. In 1999, Australia led a United Nations force into East Timor to help establish democracy and independence for that nation, following political violence.

The government also accelerated the pace of privatisation, beginning with the government-owned telecommunications corporation, Telstra. Howard's government continued some elements of the foreign policy of its predecessors, based on relations with four key countries: the United States, Japan, China, and Indonesia. The Howard administration strongly supported US engagement in the Asia-Pacific region.

Australia hosted the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney to great international acclaim. The Opening Ceremony featured a host of iconic Australian imagery and history and the flame ceremony honoured women athletes, including swimmer Dawn Fraser, with Aboriginal runner Cathy Freeman lit the Olympic Flame. At the Closing Ceremony, President of the International Olympic Committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch, declared:

Sydney played host to other important world events over the decade including the 2003 Rugby World Cup, the APEC Leaders conference of 2007 and Catholic World Youth Day 2008. Melbourne hosted the 2006 Commonwealth Games.

In 2001, Australia celebrated its Centenary of Federation, with a program of events, including the creation of the Centenary Medal to honour people who have made a contribution to Australian society or government.

The Howard government expanded immigration overall but instituted often controversial tough immigration laws to discourage unauthorised arrivals of boat people. While Howard was a strong supporter of traditional links to the Commonwealth and to the United States alliance, trade with Asia, particularly China, continued to increase dramatically, and Australia endured an extended period of prosperity. Howard's term in office coincided with the 2001 11 September attacks. In the aftermath of this event, the government committed troops to the Afghanistan War (with bi-partisan support) and the Iraq War (meeting with the disapproval of other political parties).

Southern Australia was affected by a very severe drought, through much of the first decade of the 21st century. By late 2006 water storage throughout southern Australia were at record low levels. Severe restrictions on urban water usage were put in place in every state capital city (except Hobart and Darwin) in 2005-06, and irrigation in the Murray-Darling Basin was heavily curtailed. Consequently, issues relating to fresh water supply became an important topic for political discussion, though the economic impact of the drought was felt most keenly only in Australia's sparsely populated agricultural areas.

Howard lost his substantial majority at the 1998 Federal election, improved on it at the 2001 Federal election and at the 2004 election against Labor's Mark Latham. The government however resoundingly lost the 2007 Federal election to the Labor Party led by Kevin Rudd with a wave of support for change and a slogan for "new leadership" for the country.

Kevin Rudd held the office until June 2010, when he was replaced following internal Labor Party coup by his colleague and deputy Julia Gillard. Rudd used his term in office to symbolically ratify the Kyoto Protocol and lead an historic parliamentary apology to the Stolen Generation (those Indigenous Australians who had been removed from their parents by the state during the early 20th century to the 1960s). The mandarin Chinese speaking former diplomat also pursued energetic foreign policy and initially sought to instigate a price on carbon in the Australian economy to combat Global Warming. His prime ministership coincided with the initial phases of the Financial crisis of 2007–2010, to which his government responded through a large package of economic stimulus - the management of which later proved to be controversial.

The Black Saturday bushfires struck Victoria on and around Saturday 7 February 2009. The fires occurred during extreme bushfire-weather conditions, and resulted in Australia's highest ever loss of life from a bushfire; 173 people died and 414 were injured as a result of the fires.

Amidst increasing controversy on management of stimulus spending over policy directions on taxation, immigration and climate change, the Labor Party replaced Rudd with Julia Gillard, who became the first woman Prime Minister of Australia and narrowly retained office against the Liberal-National Coalition led by Tony Abbott, at the 2010 Federal election by securing the support of independent members of the first hung parliament in Australia since the 1940 election.

The drought was broken difinitively by severe flooding associated with the la niña weather effect in the summer of 2010-2011. Queensland in particular suffered dramatic flooding which swept through parts of the capital city of Brisbane and caused some deaths and serious financial loss. Soon after tropical cyclone Yasi struck the already belaguered coast.

Following two and half decades of economic reform and amidst booming trade with Asia, Australia—in stark contrast to most other Western nations—avoided recession following the 2008 collapse of financial markets. Following the 2010 election, the Gillard Government entered an alliance with the Australian Greens and was destabilized by breaking an election promise not to introduce a carbon tax, by leadership rivalry and by lacking the numbers to push some controversial legislation through the Parliament. Nevertheless, the cross-bench alliance continued to operate and though facing declining poll support and firm opposition from the Liberal-National Coalition, in October the government successfully passed its Clean Energy Bill 2011 aimed to restructure the Australian economy in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with global warming by increasing costs to industry for carbon emissions. A carbon tax was introduced in Australia on 1 July 2012.