The battle for the Australia we want far from won

Posted on 23 Apr 2025

By Greg Thom, journalist, Institute of Community Directors Australia

A harder edged Australia appears to have embraced the idea of locking up more of its citizens and is less generous when it comes to charitable giving and volunteering, according to a landmark new report assessing the nations values.

Australia We Want 2025 also draws back the curtain on an apparently meaner nation less willing to support poor countries around the world.

The comprehensive study led by the Community Council for Australia and funded by the AMP Foundation, measured Australia’s performance against an agreed set of core values the nation should aspire to.

Just, fair, safe
Inclusive, equal of opportunity, united, authentic
Creative, confident, courageous, optimistic
Kind, generous, compassionate

The four key indicators were agreed to in 2015 by a group of 60 charity and not-for-profit sector leaders who were asked to consider and discuss ways in which they might describe the core values of the “Australia we want.”

The latest report is the third in the series and follows earlier iterations published in 2016 and 2019.

Since the publication of the 2019 report, Australia has endured the Black Summer bushfires, the covid pandemic, the failed referendum on a First Nations Voice to Parliament, and the ongoing cost-of-living crisis.

While some measures, notably educational attainment and employment access, are tracking in the right direction, Australia’s overall performance was rated significantly lower than in the previous report.

The latest report found:

Australia’s incarceration rate is almost double that of Canada, double most European countries and five times the rate of Japan
Incarceration rates in the Northern Territory are not only four times higher than the national average but higher than in the US, a global outlier
One third of prisoners in Australia have disabilities and chronic health conditions
More than a third of prisoners are Indigenous
80 per cent of people in the prison system have not completed secondary schooling
Less than 25 per cent of prisoners were incarcerated because of acts intended to cause injury to others
Australian men feel safer than the OECD average, but Australian women feel less safe.

An average of eight people die by suicide each day in Australia
The rate of suicide among Indigenous Australians is double that of non-Indigenous Australians
Remote and regional Australians have lower education levels than city dwellers
Women significantly outnumber men in achieving higher educational qualifications
The gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians in educational attainment - measured as completion of Year 12 or equivalent - has narrowed, falling from 34 to 23 percent points over the past decade
Although in decline since 2014, the gender pay gap remains high at almost 22 per cent.

Australia's per capita CO2 emissions are still the highest in the OECD
Consumer and business confidence increased slightly in 2024 following a roller coaster ride caused by the global financial crisis and covid

Levels of giving in Australia are not increasing despite increased wealth and perceptions of Australia as a generous country
Australia has experienced a significant drop in volunteering since covid

Australia's overall score on core values assessed fell from minus one in the 2019 report to minus three.

“The findings in this report matter. They shape the kinds of communities we live in,” the report found.

“What we do to change our performance as a country is up to us. The good thing about all these findings is that they reflect outcomes we can change, if we have the collective will to do so. Together, we can achieve the kind of Australia we want to live in.”

Community Council for Australia CEO David Crosbie said the study represented an ongoing journey to a stronger and more resilient Australia, but one that must be imagined, planned for, enacted and monitored.

“During this election campaign you could be forgiven for thinking Australia is nothing more than an economy, and Australians see themselves only as individual economic units,” he said.

“We seem to have embraced the idea of locking up more and more of our citizens, we are less generous in giving and volunteering, and we allocate a lower proportion of our income to poorer countries than most OECD countries.”

Community Council for Australia CEO David Crosbie.

Crosbie said the competition of policy ideas was almost entirely focused on economic proposals.

“The latest AusWeWant report reveals that charity leaders think Australia is partly an economy, but also that the contest of policy ideas should also be about building and sustaining communities that are just, fair, safe, and where our opportunity to fulfill our capacity is not defined by our postcode or bank-balance."

Crosbie said the report presented a mixed scorecard on Australia's performance against these values.

“We seem to have embraced the idea of locking up more and more of our citizens, we are less generous in giving and volunteering, and we allocate a lower proportion of our income to poorer countries than most OECD countries.”

Community Council for Australia chair Rev Tim Costello said that when CCA brought together a diverse group of leaders and thinkers at the National Portrait Gallery a decade ago, the group dared to imagine the Australia they wanted and to talk about the measures that mattered to them most.

“The ABC AM radio program reporting on the event described it as a “council of war - charities and not-for-profits seeking to claim their place in national policy making,” said Costello said.

“CCA want many more people to join us in our efforts to reshape our future and build our communities and our nation on a foundation of human values, the substance of our true wealth, the Australia we want.”

More information

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