Tony Abbott: Our fair go under threat from overzealous rules and regulations

That which makes us special will be a thing of the past if the COVID pandemic leaves us fearful and isolated, writes Tony Abbott.

It’s only fitting, on our national day, to affirm that anyone with the right to reside in Australia has won the lottery of life.

Successive generations of Australians have produced a nation that’s as free, as fair, and as prosperous as any — one that’s been uniquely shaped by an Indigenous heritage, a British foundation, and an immigrant character.

We have so much to be proud of; our challenge is to keep it that way, because who we are and how we live is under more stress than we’d usually admit.

Here’s a small but telling example; along with calling everyone by their first name and expecting everyone, even national leaders, to be in the stands with the general public at the footy.

Most of us are happy to see leaders like Prime Minister Scott Morrison attending the footy. Picture. Phil Hillyard

It was almost the mark of an Australian to sit alongside the driver in the front seat of a taxi, because here, in this country, no-one’s “better” than anyone else — but like so much, that’s currently against the rules, along with singing, dancing, and having too many friends and family around for a barbecue.

Thanks to the pandemic, we’re now told to form orderly (and socially distanced) queues, as if we were Londoners. For our own good, of course; as no one ever makes rules without a reason; it’s just that if we’re not careful, ­freedom and self-reliance can evaporate.

Sure, for the past year, we’ve been coping with a potentially deadly disease, but it takes a fair dose of virus hysteria and health despotism for Australians to be barred from Victoria without first getting a visa, and to be banned altogether from Western Australia — due to a few cases of disease with an infection fatality rate, for people under 50, of less than one in 5000.

During the pandemic we sometimes have been treated as if we live in London. Picture: Tolga Akmen/AFP

Better than almost any other country, in this pandemic, we’ve certainly saved lives, but in the process, we’ve damaged them too — the old people who’ve spent their last days in forced isolation from family and friends; the families separated by capricious border closures; the businesses ruined, and the jobs lost in a stop-start command economy; and the spirit-sapping constriction of living under rules that were rarely explained or justified, and often seemed contradictory, even absurd, like having to wear a face mask while driving alone.

So, while grateful that the pandemic has not been worse, let’s not underestimate the damage that’s been done in doing good.

After a lost year, it is time for a reset, but not the politically correct “woke” reset that seems to be brewing.

How can there be anything fundamentally wrong with a country that is admired and even envied around the world, and that attracts millions of migrants every decade because of the welcome we give?

Australia is a country that gives all a fair go. Picture: Lachie Millard

It’s this welcome that’s characteristic of a country that gives everyone a “fair go”.

And the flip side of giving everyone a fair go is expecting people to do their best to “have a go” too.

That’s the issue — these days, there’s more of the former and less of the latter. And the pandemic is making it worse.

For a full year, we’ve let a virus dominate our lives and, in the process, put safety before freedom, prudence before courage, and avoiding danger before accepting risk — even though courage, conviction and character ­remain essential to our success as a people and as a nation.

As well as cherishing the great tradition of the fair go, we need more focus on that equally Australian tradition, to have a go, because you won’t get a fair go if you’re not prepared to give one too.

If we are disappointed or frustrated with our politics — and at different points, most of us are — what’s needed is to rebuild and to strengthen our culture, and to renew our sense of what’s Australia’s best self.

Australia’s best self won’t come from imported gestures like “taking a knee”. Picture: Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images

That won’t come from deconstructing our history and our heroes, or from politically correct, imported gestures like “taking a knee”.

Because if there are to be better ways of dealing with a virus than hiding under the doona whenever there’s a new cluster, or locking out the world for the duration, all those Australians who’ve ever turned adversity into opportunity will inspire us to find them.

These are the stories we need to re-call to steel us to keep calm and to carry on in the face of any peril.

This “lucky country” of ours has only really succeeded because enough of us have made the most of all our blessings.

Timid and fearful is not who we are.

We don’t know whether our luck will hold — but we can readily expect that the braver we are the better our future will be.

This is an edited version of Tony Abbott’s Australia Day podcast for the Institute of Public Affairs.