Tony Abbott > Quotes

“Fraser was naturally economically cautious: a pragmatist who disliked utopian thinking of any kind. We have to accept, he once said, ‘that while we strive for perfection, we will not reach it in this world, nor our sons after us. Recognition of this truth,’ he continued, ‘should soften the radical, bring tolerance to the fanatic, temper the extremes of love and hate.’1 This bent of mind (perhaps best encapsulated in his wry observation that ‘life wasn’t meant to be easy’) made him a formidable foe to the utopianism of social democrats, but also – to the consternation of some of his colleagues – sceptical of small-government enthusiasm on his own side.”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History

“In mid-2025, Australia remains relatively prosperous and untroubled. Yet as much as ever before in our history, there is a nagging sense that the country has been marking time or even drifting backwards, influenced by the politics of climate and identity. In common with much of the Anglosphere, we’re materially rich but spiritually poor. The explosion of mental ill-health is one symptom of people’s widespread loss of a sense of life’s deeper meaning and purpose. It’s worth noting that Australians telling the census that they adhered to a religious faith has dropped from over 90  per  cent in the 1960s to just over 50 per cent in 2021. An early chronicler of this growing malaise was (my one-time mentor) B.A. Santamaria, of whom Cardinal George Pell said: ‘He could not remove or much deflect the mighty forces damaging faith and morals in the Western world but … managed to alert an increasing number of us to the folly of embracing the forces seeking our destruction.’8 Religious faith, it should be said, is not the only source of meaning and purpose but it’s long been our main one.”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History

“Its frankness made the government uncomfortable. The report found ‘many Australians are not convinced that immigrants are making a commitment to their new country’.6 It blamed this failure on government policy that was too often dictated by sectional interest groups. It was a prophetic anticipation of subsequent recurring backlashes, yet it was not anti-immigration: it recommended, in fact, an increase in migrant numbers. Rather, it focused on what had to be done to win community support by encouraging migrants to integrate. In doing so, it broke a number of progressive shibboleths, reaffirming the need for a positive Australian identity based on a common commitment to: ‘parliamentary democracy, the rule of law and equality before the law, freedom of the individual, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, equality of women, universal education’. It recommended ‘linking the grant of citizenship with a declaration to respect the fundamental institutions and principles in Australian society’.7 The FitzGerald Report demonstrated that concern over migration was not limited to a handful of conservative commentators. In August 1988, Newspoll research found 77  per  cent of respondents believed that Asian migration should be slowed.8 Even Charlie Perkins, by then the head of the Federal Department of Aboriginal Affairs, suggested a curb on Asian migration and a rebalancing of immigration policy.9 So, this was hardly the expression of racist grievance that some progressives made it out to be.”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History

“Strangely, in a country accustomed to holding royal commissions into almost all disasters, there was no comprehensive inquiry into why Australia had implemented a version of the Wuhan plan rather than the pandemic plan carefully prepared and revised over two decades. Both sides of politics were complicit, hence neither side wanted to be held accountable for the policies of a dispiriting time that everyone would rather forget.”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History

“I do not believe that you can compromise about the vital things in civilisation, about peace and justice and freedom and the sane settlement of disputes. Either you have them or you do not have them. And there are no people more interested in securing them than the people of small and weak nations, and the small and weak people of every nation. Our cause is that there shall be justice and a quiet living for the weak as well as for the strong. It is a great and humane cause. It has been the dynamic force in our domestic political growth for centuries; from now on it must animate our international affairs and give direction to the policies of nations.6”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History

“The special forces did sterling work hunting down Taliban leaders and bomb-makers, the infantry helped to improve the effectiveness of the Afghan Army and the reconstruction element facilitated the construction of schools, clinics and roads. In important respects, Afghanistan was changed and improved by this ‘nation-building’ exercise but not enough to turn a feudalistic, clan-based society into a modern liberal one in under two decades.”
― Tony Abbott, Australia: A History