NSW Cost of Living 2026: Is Government Waste Spending Your Taxpayer Money?

LET ME EXPLAIN THE TRUTH OF WHY THE COST OF LIVING IS SO HIGH TO MY FELLOW AMERICANS

There is a core question that belongs at the dead center of why the cost of living is so high. I learned this while doing my Bachelor’s degree at the University of Wollongong in New South Wales (NSW), Australia, and it helps answer it:

Does the public benefit actually correspond to the economic value of the additional development rights, regulatory budgets, or systemic interventions granted?

Because once you follow the money through housing, utilities, transport, employment, workers’ compensation, banking, agriculture, and public health, a recurring pattern appears across multiple sectors and warrants closer examination. It is not necessarily a pattern of outright corruption. Government creates benefits and costs, but those costs are ultimately paid by someone. It is all about money, and if you follow it, you will eventually find a pattern worth auditing.

BANKING REGULATION: A CASE STUDY IN COST, OVERSIGHT AND REFORM

Look at the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry—the Hayne Royal Commission.

The Commonwealth established the Commission on 14 December 2017. Commissioner Kenneth Hayne delivered the final report in February 2019, containing 76 recommendations.

The cost of conducting the Commission is commonly reported in the range of approximately $75 million to just over $100 million, depending upon which expenditure measure is used. Rather than pretend there is one uncontested number, I will use the broader range until the underlying Commonwealth expenditure statement is placed directly beside the figure.

But the administrative cost of the inquiry was only one part of the economic story.

The Royal Commission examined misconduct and regulatory shortcomings across banking, financial advice, superannuation and insurance. It recommended substantial changes to financial regulation, accountability, adviser standards and enforcement.

That is where this gets bigger than a Royal Commission.

Because banking does not exist in isolation from the rest of the economy.

Banks sit in the middle of the financial system through which households save, businesses borrow, governments finance expenditure and households obtain mortgages. The Reserve Bank of Australia sets monetary policy through the cash rate; commercial banks then transmit those monetary conditions into the economy through the interest rates they charge borrowers and pay depositors.

At the same time, governments borrow to finance deficits and infrastructure. That borrowing creates interest obligations. Those obligations become part of future government expenditure.

The household therefore encounters the same financial system from several directions.

The mortgage rate.

The business loan.

The return on savings.

The price of goods and services affected by financing costs.

The tax required to fund government expenditure.

And ultimately, the interest paid on public debt.

This is why simply asking what a bank charged a customer misses the larger question.

Who ultimately pays for the entire financial system?

The customer pays interest.

The taxpayer funds government expenditure.

The government pays interest on its borrowing.

Businesses incorporate financing costs into their operations.

Consumers ultimately encounter those costs through prices, rents, employment conditions and household debt.

And when monetary policy changes, the consequences move through the entire system.

This does not mean commercial banks set Australia's interest rates or that government spending alone determines inflation. Those claims would be too simplistic. The Reserve Bank has responsibility for monetary policy, while inflation is influenced by multiple domestic and international factors, including demand, supply constraints, wages, energy, exchange rates and fiscal conditions.

But that complexity makes the accounting question more important—not less.

Because if the financial system is this interconnected, Australians deserve to understand where the money enters the system, where it travels, who earns from it, who bears the risk and who ultimately pays when something goes wrong.

And then there is another transformation occurring directly in front of the customer.

Australian banks are increasingly reducing traditional branch and teller services as banking becomes digital.

For the customer, that can mean fewer physical branches and greater reliance on digital banking, automated services and self-service channels. For the institution, technology can change the cost structure of delivering banking services.

That raises another legitimate question:

When the physical cost of serving customers falls, where does the economic benefit of that efficiency go?

Does it appear through lower fees?

Better deposit rates?

Lower lending costs?

Greater investment in service?

Higher shareholder returns?

Or some combination of all of them?

That is not an accusation.

It is a balance-sheet question.

And it brings us back to the Royal Commission.

THE REGULATORY FEEDBACK LOOP

SYSTEM EXPERIENCES MISCONDUCT

GOVERNMENT INVESTIGATES

TAXPAYER FUNDS INQUIRY

COMMISSION IDENTIFIES STRUCTURAL PROBLEMS

GOVERNMENT REFORMS REGULATION

INDUSTRY ABSORBS NEW COMPLIANCE COSTS

BUSINESSES ADAPT PRICING AND OPERATIONS

CONSUMERS ULTIMATELY PARTICIPATE IN THE COST

That does not mean every compliance cost is waste.

Regulation can produce enormous public value.

The question is whether the cost of regulation, enforcement and reform produces benefits proportionate to the problem it is designed to address.

The Royal Commission also recommended stronger professional standards and a single disciplinary body for financial advisers. Australia subsequently developed additional regulatory and enforcement mechanisms, including the Financial Services and Credit Panel within ASIC and expanded adviser registration and compliance arrangements.

The lesson isn’t that regulation is inherently bad.

The lesson is that regulatory failure is expensive—and fixing regulatory failure is expensive too.

But there is an even bigger question.

If the government is simultaneously borrowing enormous sums, paying billions in interest, regulating the banking system, relying on banks and financial markets to transmit monetary policy, and asking households to absorb higher costs when financial conditions tighten, where exactly does the public benefit appear in the final ledger?

How much did Australians pay for the original regulatory architecture?

How much did misconduct cost?

How much did the investigation cost?

How much did reform cost?

How much did industry compliance cost?

How much did digital transformation change the cost of providing banking services?

How much of those efficiency gains reached customers?

How much did government borrowing cost taxpayers?

And ultimately:

What measurable benefit did the citizen receive?

That is the ledger.

And that is where following the money gets interesting.

HOUSING: WHO GETS THE VALUE?

New South Wales is attempting to increase housing supply while simultaneously changing planning rules to accelerate development. Under NSW’s Housing SEPP affordable-housing provisions, qualifying developments can receive additional floor-space-ratio and height capacity in exchange for including affordable housing. Depending on the applicable planning pathway, the incentives can include approximately 20–30% bonuses, with affordable-housing components generally beginning around 10% and incentives encouraging higher contributions. The affordable component is subject to long-term requirements, including management by a registered community housing provider for at least 15 years.

That sounds straightforward. But there is an economic question hiding inside the planning decision.

Development rights have value.

When government planning rules permit a property to support substantially more floor space or height than would otherwise be permitted, the development potential of that property can increase. That can materially change what the site is worth to a developer.

That does not mean the uplift is automatically “free money.” The developer still assumes construction, financing, planning, market and sales risk, and a larger project requires greater expenditure. But those risks do not eliminate the economic value created by additional development capacity.

So if a developer can construct a substantially larger and more valuable project by providing the minimum affordable-housing contribution required under the planning framework, what is the economic value of the additional development capacity being granted compared with the value of the affordable housing returned to the community?

A multimillion-dollar development can therefore be examined without assuming the developer has done anything wrong.

Government grants additional development capacity. The developer receives an opportunity to create additional private value. The community receives affordable housing and potentially other public benefits.

What is that exchange actually worth?

The original permitted floor space and height can be compared with what was ultimately granted, alongside construction and financing costs, market values, affordable housing delivered, public contributions and the developer’s expected return. Not every dollar of additional development potential becomes profit, but neither should the public assume that additional development capacity has no economic value simply because the developer incurs costs to use it.

If government grants additional development rights worth millions of dollars, what exactly does the public receive in exchange?

And if the policy requires only the minimum affordable-housing contribution to unlock the maximum planning incentive, is the public receiving an appropriate share of the value created?

That is not an accusation of misconduct. It is not an argument against development or private investment.

It is an argument for value capture, transparency and measurement.

The same question applies when the asset being developed is not privately owned land, but land belonging to the public.

NSW is simultaneously allocating billions toward new social and affordable housing while determining how existing public housing estates and government-owned land should be developed. The Building Homes for NSW program represents approximately $6.6 billion in government investment, while NSW is working within a broader target of approximately 377,000 additional homes by 2029 under the National Housing Accord framework.

Those are enormous numbers.

And public land is an asset.

When government sells it, leases it, redevelops it or enters a public-private arrangement, the transaction is not simply about constructing buildings. It is also about what happens to the underlying economic value of an asset that belongs to the public.

How much was the land worth?

What development capacity was granted?

What was ultimately built?

How many social and affordable homes were produced?

How many market-rate homes were produced?

Who captured the development uplift?

Who receives the ongoing economic yield?

And what did the public surrender to make the transaction possible?

There is also a human consequence that cannot be reduced to a balance sheet. If redevelopment results in existing public-housing residents being displaced from high-value areas, the government must account for more than the sale price or construction statistics. Location itself has economic value: access to employment, transport, schools, healthcare, family networks and established communities all matter.

The question therefore isn't simply how many homes NSW builds.

It is who receives the benefit from the land, planning capacity and public expenditure used to build them—and who ultimately pays the cost.

Again, this isn't an argument against development.

It is an argument for auditing the transaction.

ENERGY: WHO OWNS THE PIPE?

Follow the same question into electricity.

Australia has permitted substantial private and foreign investment throughout portions of its energy generation, retail and network infrastructure.

EnergyAustralia is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hong Kong-listed CLP Holdings.

Jemena’s parent company is approximately 60% owned by State Grid Corporation of China and 40% by Singapore Power.

Other major infrastructure remains Australian-owned or state-controlled. In 2016, the Commonwealth rejected State Grid’s proposed acquisition of Ausgrid on national-security grounds.

That fact matters because it demonstrates something governments themselves have acknowledged: ownership of critical infrastructure can become a national-security issue.

But ownership alone does not establish misconduct.

The harder economic question is what happens when an essential asset moves from public ownership or control into private or foreign ownership, while the public continues to depend on that asset and pay for access to it.

Who originally financed the infrastructure?

Who owns it today?

Who regulates it?

Who receives the revenue?

Who carries the operational risk?

Who carries the systemic risk?

Who pays when infrastructure requires major investment or replacement?

And what did Australians receive in exchange for transferring ownership, control or long-term economic rights over an asset that provides an essential public service?

Because an electricity network is not an ordinary commercial product.

A household cannot simply decide it no longer needs the electricity network.

A business cannot relocate its factory because the distribution network charges have increased.

The consumer is connected to the system, and the cost of maintaining, financing and operating that system ultimately has to be recovered from somewhere.

An electricity bill therefore isn't simply the cost of generating electricity.

It can contain costs associated with generation, wholesale markets, transmission, distribution, retail operations, network charges, regulatory mechanisms and government charges.

And the infrastructure itself has a lifecycle.

Build it. Finance it. Own it. Operate it. Maintain it. Upgrade it. Regulate it. Eventually replace it.

At every stage, someone pays.

This is where the public-versus-private question becomes important.

If taxpayers helped establish infrastructure, government later transfers ownership or economic control, and consumers then continue paying regulated or market-based charges to use that infrastructure, the public ledger should be capable of showing the complete transaction.

What did the asset cost to build?

What did government receive when ownership or control changed?

What investment obligations were transferred to the private owner?

What obligations remained with government?

What revenue has subsequently been generated?

What has been reinvested?

And what portion of the economic value ultimately flows back to Australian households, businesses and governments?

None of those questions require an assumption that privatization is inherently bad.

Private capital can bring investment, expertise and efficiency.

Foreign investment can bring capital that governments may otherwise have to raise themselves.

But those benefits have to be measured against what the public gives up.

Because when an essential asset changes hands, the sale price is only one line of the ledger.

The real question is the lifetime economic transaction.

Who owns the pipe, who gets paid when the water runs through it, and who is still responsible when the pipe eventually needs replacing?

The citizen sees an electricity bill.

Capital sees an entire ecosystem.

TRANSPORT: THE ROAD BECOMES THE BILL

Look at Sydney’s transport network.

Government builds infrastructure. Private companies may finance, operate or maintain infrastructure through concession arrangements. Drivers use toll roads. Drivers pay registration and licensing fees. Fuel carries taxation. Enforcement produces fines. Government can also create rebate programs intended to offset particular transport costs.

The citizen encounters these mechanisms separately.

Economically, however, they can form one larger system.

The question becomes particularly important when infrastructure moves from direct public provision toward private operation or concession. The government may reduce or defer some direct expenditure, while the private operator receives a contractual right to generate revenue from the infrastructure. That does not automatically make the arrangement good or bad. It means the complete transaction needs to be examined.

What did government spend to build the infrastructure?

What did private capital contribute?

What rights were granted to the private operator?

For how long?

What revenue can be collected?

What risks remain with government?

What risks were transferred to the private sector?

And what does the public ultimately pay for access to an asset that may have been created, supported or regulated by government?

Then there is the cost that never appears as a separate line on a government invoice: time.

When congestion forces a driver to choose between paying money to use a toll road or paying additional time sitting in traffic, the citizen pays either way.

For a worker, that can mean additional commuting time.

For a business, it can mean higher transport costs.

For a parent, it can mean more time and fuel getting children to and from school, sport, medical appointments and other activities.

For a family already under financial pressure, the decision may not really be a choice at all.

My own experience of spending approximately $1,600 over seven months using Sydney toll roads is my personal experience, not a claim that every Sydney driver experiences that cost.

But it illustrates the mechanism.

Congestion creates a cost.

The question is who pays it, how much, and why.

And that brings us to one of Sydney’s most significant transport case studies.

SYDNEY LIGHT RAIL: FOLLOW THE MONEY

Sydney spent decades without CBD street trams. The last traditional tram services through the CBD ended in 1958.

Light rail returned to Sydney in 1997, initially operating between Central and Lilyfield. That was a different system from the later CBD and South East Light Rail project.

In 2012, NSW announced plans for the CBD and South East Light Rail project.

The original business-case estimate was approximately $1.6 billion.

Then the numbers changed.

In 2014, the estimate increased to approximately $2.1 billion. The NSW Auditor-General later identified significant mispricing and omissions in the original business case. Of approximately $549 million in additional cost identified at that stage, approximately $517 million was attributed to mispricing and omissions rather than simply construction inflation.

In 2015, the main PPP contract was signed, with an approved project cost of approximately $2.1 billion.

In 2016, the NSW Auditor-General’s performance audit identified weaknesses in planning and procurement and warned that the project was heading toward higher costs and lower benefits than the approved business case anticipated.

Then the contractual dispute between Acciona and the NSW Government became a major issue. Between 2018 and 2019, the dispute ultimately resulted in a settlement of approximately $576 million.

In 2019, the government reported project costs approaching approximately $2.9 billion. The Auditor-General subsequently identified approximately $153.84 million in additional costs that had not been incorporated into the government’s reported figure, including enabling works, small-business assistance and financing costs associated with delays.

The system opened in stages during 2019 and 2020, with services to Randwick and Kingsford commencing.

By 30 June 2020, the project cost recorded in the state’s financial accounts was approximately $3.3 billion.

So the progression is approximately:

That is approximately $1.7 billion above the original estimate, or roughly 106% higher.

There were legitimate factors involved: contractual disputes, utility relocation, scope and delivery issues, construction complexity, financing and delays.

Those factors matter.

But they do not eliminate the economic question.

They make the question more important.

The NSW Auditor-General specifically recommended greater public reporting of the project’s final cost, updated expected benefits, benefits achieved during the first year and average weekly journey times.

So I don't have to call the entire project “waste.”

Instead, I ask:

The business case said approximately $1.6 billion.

The project ultimately cost approximately $3.3 billion.

What additional public benefit was delivered for the additional approximately $1.7 billion?

And we can ask the question at every stage.

What was the benefit-cost position at $1.6 billion?

What was it at $2.1 billion?

What was it at $2.9 billion?

What was it above $3.1 billion?

And what was it at approximately $3.3 billion?

Because when the cost denominator more than doubles, the economic case deserves to be recalculated.

That is the Twin Latitude method:

Now we're not simply telling Australians their government wastes money.

We're making them watch the numbers climb.

AGRICULTURE: FOLLOW THE SHEEP

And then Australia did something uniquely Australian.

After years of investigating the sheep, regulating the sheep, restricting the sheep, arguing about the sheep, and ultimately legislating an end to the live sheep trade by sea, the government is now spending almost $140 million to help the industry transition.

Follow the sheep.

Follow the money.

The government did not simply wake up one morning and make this decision. The live-export controversy had been generating investigations, regulatory changes, scientific analysis, political debate and public scrutiny for years.

That provides another example of the feedback loop:

Let’s establish the timeline.

2017

Serious heat-stress events involving exported sheep generated increasing scrutiny.

2018

Footage from the Awassi Express became a major national controversy. The government responded with reviews, stronger penalties, a whistleblower hotline and additional scrutiny of the trade.

The McCarthy Review examined animal-welfare risks associated with sheep exports, while the Moss Review examined regulatory oversight. Additional regulatory requirements followed.

2019

Australia introduced restrictions on certain Northern Hemisphere summer voyages.

2020

Additional restrictions and prohibition periods were implemented.

2021–2022

Further review examined sheep exports during Northern Hemisphere summers, including voyage data, scientific literature, climate information and public submissions.

2019–2022

The Labor Party made commitments to end live sheep exports by sea.

2023

An independent panel examined the issue and received hundreds of written submissions and thousands of survey responses.

May 2024

The government announced the phase-out and an initial $107 million transition package.

10 July 2024

The legislation establishing the phase-out commenced.

1 May 2028

Live sheep exports by sea are scheduled to end.

And now the number:

The government subsequently increased the transition assistance by approximately $32.7 million, bringing the package to almost $140 million.

This isn’t an argument that sheep welfare doesn’t matter.

It does.

Nor is it an argument that the government cannot change policy when evidence or public expectations change.

It can.

The stronger economic question is this: Australia spent years regulating a commercial trade after serious welfare problems became public. It conducted reviews. It changed regulations. It imposed restrictions. It ultimately decided the trade should end by sea. Now it is spending tens of millions helping affected industries transition away from that trade.

So let’s complete the ledger.

How much did the regulatory system cost?

How much did the investigations cost?

How much did enforcement cost?

What economic activity did the trade generate?

What did the restrictions cost producers?

How much is government spending on transition?

What economic activity will replace the trade?

What happens to the animals that previously would have been exported alive?

What measurable welfare outcome is expected?

What measurable economic outcome is expected?

What did the old policy cost?

What does changing it cost?

What measurable benefit does the new policy produce?

Same question.

Different sheep.

COUNTRY, FIRE AND THE KNOWLEDGE OF MY ELDERS

There is another part of this conversation that cannot be reduced to a government expenditure line.

For thousands of years, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples developed highly localised relationships with Country, including sophisticated cultural fire practices. Indigenous cultural burning was not simply a matter of setting fire to the bush. It involved understanding Country, seasons, vegetation, animals, weather and the appropriate timing, intensity and location of burns. CSIRO describes Indigenous cultural burning as the manipulation of cool-season fire to create a mosaic of burned patches across the landscape and recognises that Indigenous fire management practices have played an important role in managing Australian landscapes for thousands of years. CSIRO also distinguishes cultural burning from modern hazard-reduction burning: the two can overlap in their effects, but cultural burning has broader ecological and cultural purposes.

That distinction matters.

It would be historically and scientifically careless to claim that Aboriginal burning alone could have prevented every catastrophic Australian bushfire. Bushfire behaviour is driven by a combination of weather, vegetation, terrain and ignition sources. CSIRO has specifically identified extreme heat, drought, low humidity, strong winds and abundant dry fuel as major factors in severe fire conditions.

But it would be equally careless to dismiss Indigenous fire knowledge.

Fuel is one of the few major components of bushfire risk that humans can directly influence. CSIRO identifies targeted hazard-reduction burning as one tool that can reduce fuel loads and therefore reduce the likelihood of ignition and the initial rate of fire spread in high-risk areas when undertaken under appropriate conditions.

The 2019–20 Black Summer fires demonstrated what happens when extreme weather, drought and fuel conditions converge. CSIRO records that more than 10 million hectares were burned during the fires, with enormous environmental, social and economic consequences.

So this is where I want to acknowledge my Aboriginal brothers and sisters and, particularly, my Elders.

You understood Country long before governments created departments to manage it.

You understood that fire could destroy Country, but that carefully managed fire could also protect and regenerate it.

You understood that Country is not simply a piece of land to be owned, taxed, developed or administered.

It is something to be cared for.

Modern Australia does not need to pretend that ancient knowledge provides every answer to a modern bushfire environment. Climate change, population growth, development patterns and changing land use have created challenges that require modern science as well.

But modern science itself is increasingly recognising the value of Indigenous fire knowledge and the importance of working with Indigenous practitioners rather than treating that knowledge as something belonging to the past. CSIRO explicitly identifies Indigenous fire management as an area of contemporary research and collaboration.

That raises another question for the ledger.

How much does Australia spend responding to catastrophic fire after it happens?

How much does it spend on prevention?

How much does it spend on emergency response, reconstruction, insurance losses, environmental recovery and rebuilding communities?

And how much could be saved by combining modern fire science with the knowledge of the people who have been managing Australian landscapes for thousands of years?

That is not nostalgia.

That is risk management.

And perhaps the lesson is bigger than bushfire policy.

Sometimes the most expensive thing a government can do is ignore knowledge that was already there.

To my Elders: I have not forgotten what you taught me.

Country remembers.

And perhaps Australia should listen.

TENANCY, WORKERS’ COMPENSATION & THE LAW: THE LITTLE MAN AT THE TABLE

My experience highlighted where macroeconomic policy hits real people.

NSW tenancy law provides a mechanism for tenants to challenge rent increases they believe are excessive.

But there is no simple statutory percentage cap determining that an increase is automatically excessive. The tenant may have to challenge the increase and provide evidence concerning comparable rents and the relevant property.

That means the practical burden can include understanding the legislation, gathering comparable-market evidence, meeting procedural requirements, preparing the application, taking time away from work, appearing before the tribunal and ultimately fighting the increase.

The law may exist on paper to protect the little man.

But the little man still has to activate the protection.

Rights on paper and rights that are practical to exercise are not always the same thing.

And that distinction becomes even more important when the person fighting the system is already financially vulnerable.

A tenant facing a significant rent increase is not necessarily choosing between two equally positioned parties. The landlord may have professional property management, legal advice, access to market data and the financial capacity to absorb the cost of a dispute. The tenant may simply be trying to keep a roof over their head while continuing to work and pay the bills.

The same principle applies to workers’ compensation.

I experienced this firsthand after my accident.

Entering the NSW workers’ compensation system means dealing with a complex network involving icare, the State Insurance Regulatory Authority, scheme agents, insurers, medical practitioners, legal representatives and dispute-resolution mechanisms.

Every one of those institutions has a role.

Every one of those institutions also has an administrative cost.

For the injured worker, however, the system can become a second battle layered on top of the original injury.

There is a difference between having a legal entitlement and being practically capable of enforcing that entitlement.

An injured worker may have to understand the scheme, attend medical assessments, obtain documentation, communicate with insurers, meet deadlines, respond to disputes, obtain legal advice and potentially participate in formal proceedings while simultaneously dealing with the consequences of being injured and potentially unable to work normally.

My experience is my experience. It should not be treated as evidence of what happens in every workers’ compensation claim.

But it raises a legitimate system-level question.

How much does the machinery surrounding workers’ compensation cost compared with the amount ultimately reaching the injured worker in income support, treatment, rehabilitation and care?

That question requires scheme-level evidence.

It cannot be answered honestly from one person's experience.

So the ledger must follow the entire system: government administration, regulatory costs, insurer and scheme-agent costs, legal expenditure, medical assessments, dispute resolution and rehabilitation, alongside the benefits ultimately delivered to injured workers.

The question is not whether those services have value.

They do.

The question is whether the structure delivers that value efficiently and whether the person the system was designed to protect remains the least powerful participant in a process increasingly dominated by institutions.

Because if a person must spend money, time, legal resources and physical and emotional capacity simply to obtain what the law already says they may be entitled to receive, then the cost of exercising the right is itself part of the economic equation.

That is the little man at the table.

He may technically have a seat.

The question is whether he can afford to stay there long enough to be heard.

POLICING & CORRECTIONS: THE HIDDEN EXPENSE

NSW Police operates a multibillion-dollar public institution.

Major taskforces and operations can involve substantial numbers of officers and resources and can produce significant seizures of drugs, weapons, vehicles and criminal assets.

Those outcomes matter.

Public safety matters.

Crime prevention matters.

Deterrence matters.

But the public ledger should still exist.

For a major operation, we should be able to ask:

What did it cost?

How many officers were involved?

What overtime was incurred?

What intelligence resources were used?

What forensic resources were used?

What prosecution resources followed?

What assets were recovered?

What measurable reduction in offending resulted?

What longer-term public-safety outcome resulted?

Not every benefit can be reduced to dollars.

Deterrence.

Public confidence.

Reduced victimisation.

Community safety.

These are real benefits.

But every major public program should still identify measurable indicators of effectiveness.

The same principle applies behind prison walls.

Corrections is not simply a government building with prisoners inside it. It is a system involving public facilities, government employees, private contractors, healthcare providers, transportation, security, rehabilitation programs, technology, food services, maintenance and major infrastructure.

And where private providers are involved, the question becomes even more important.

Who is paying?

Who is providing the service?

Who is receiving the contract?

What contractual obligations were established?

What did the government actually spend?

What did the private provider actually deliver?

What portion of the expenditure was administrative or contractual overhead?

What measurable rehabilitation and public-safety outcomes resulted?

Public delivery does not automatically mean efficient delivery.

Private delivery does not automatically mean inefficient delivery.

The point is that neither should receive a free pass.

If government provides the service, the taxpayer should be able to examine the cost and outcome.

If government contracts the service to a private entity, the taxpayer should still be able to examine the cost, contract, performance and outcome.

The fact that a service is delivered through a private company does not make the public expenditure private.

The same audit principle applies to corrections as it does to every other sector examined in this investigation:

What was promised?

What was spent?

Who received the money?

What was delivered?

What measurable outcome resulted?

WHEN THE TARGET IS A CHILD: THE THOMAS CARRICK CASE

This case is not NSW Police. It occurred in Victoria and involved the Australian Federal Police, Victoria Police and ASIO through a Joint Counter Terrorism Team. I include it because the question is bigger than one state: what happens when the machinery of national security is deployed against a vulnerable child, and what does that operation actually cost the public?

Thomas Carrick, a pseudonym used by the courts, was 13 when the investigation began. He was autistic, had an IQ assessment of 71, and was described by the Victorian Children's Court as an isolated child with a tendency to fixate. His parents had approached police because of concerns about his fixation with Islamic State material.

Carrick was subsequently engaged online by an undercover operative as part of a Joint Counter Terrorism Team operation. The operative communicated with him for 55 of 71 days, with extensive online conversations eventually becoming evidence in the proceedings.

The operation, identified as Operation Bourglinster, cost $507,087, according to documents obtained under freedom-of-information laws.

The original terrorism proceedings did not ultimately survive. In 2023, the Victorian Children's Court ordered a permanent stay. The magistrate found that the undercover operation had thwarted rehabilitation efforts and criticised aspects of the police conduct in exceptionally strong terms.

There is an important complication that should not be hidden: the story did not end there. Carrick later faced separate terror-related charges arising from conduct in 2025 and pleaded guilty to two offences in 2026. He was subsequently placed under supervision.

That later development does not erase the earlier court findings, nor does the earlier permanent stay erase the later offending. Both facts belong in the ledger.

So what does the public receive for the $507,087 spent on the original operation?

Was the operation effective?

Did it reduce the threat?

Did it assist rehabilitation?

Did it increase the risk?

And when a court subsequently finds that an undercover operation undermined rehabilitation efforts, what accountability mechanism determines whether the public received value for that expenditure?

Those are not questions about whether terrorism should be taken seriously. Of course it should.

They are questions about proportionality, effectiveness, accountability and public expenditure.

That distinction matters.

HEALTHCARE & THE PUBLIC COST

Australia’s universal healthcare system provides substantial public value.

That should not be ignored simply because this investigation is examining expenditure.

Universal access does not mean every healthcare cost disappears.

Households can still encounter ambulance charges, private medical costs, prescription costs and gaps in access.

In NSW, for example, Medicare does not cover ambulance services. NSW Ambulance charges patients for services provided, although the NSW Government subsidises 49% of the charge for NSW residents and exemptions or insurance arrangements can apply. From 1 July 2025, the standard NSW resident emergency road ambulance charge became $464 plus $4.18 per kilometre, subject to the applicable rules and maximum charge.

That is not an argument that ambulance services should be free.

NSW Ambulance itself states that the fees are intended to recover the costs of providing the service, and that revenue from ambulance charges is used to provide ongoing ambulance services in NSW.

It is an example of the larger question:

Where does the cost of a supposedly universal public service ultimately land?

The distinction between public and private healthcare matters here as well.

Public hospitals are funded through governments, while private hospitals are owned and operated by private-sector organisations. Private hospitals can receive revenue from private health insurers and patients, but governments can also contract private hospitals to provide public hospital services.

So when examining healthcare expenditure, the ledger cannot simply be divided into “government” and “private.”

Money can move between both systems.

The public system also carries enormous costs associated with staffing, hospitals, infrastructure, ageing populations, chronic illness and emergency care.

So the question remains:

What does the system cost, what does it deliver, and where are the gaps between expenditure and outcome?

A public service can be expensive and still be worth every dollar.

The purpose of an audit is to determine that—not assume the answer beforehand.

Stop telling the little man there is no money while squeezing him for more. Just like in the olden days, when the church or king could take your life if you had nothing left to give, the pressure on ordinary people continues under different names and systems. Nothing fundamental has changed in the dynamic of extraction from those with the least power to resist.

THE MASTER AUDIT FRAMEWORK

This isn’t an anti-Australia rant.

It is a government capital-allocation audit from the citizen’s perspective.

Across banking, housing, energy, transport, agriculture, workers’ compensation, policing, corrections and healthcare, I apply the same framework.

THE FIVE-POINT LEDGER TEST

1. PROBLEM

What specific problem existed or was claimed?

2. EXPENDITURE

What did government spend to address it?

3. RECIPIENT

Who actually received the money?

4. OUTCOME

What measurable result occurred?

5. PUBLIC BENEFIT

Did the public benefit justify the economic cost?

That framework can be expanded:

That is how you follow the money without starting with the conclusion.

Show me the ledger.

THE LEDGER BREAKDOWN

To evaluate government intervention properly, we need to separate different types of cost.

=

+

+

+

+

−

That distinction matters.

The $104 million commonly associated with the Hayne Royal Commission, for example, represents the cost of conducting an inquiry—not the cost of the underlying misconduct.

The cost of misconduct is a separate economic category.

The cost of reform is another.

The cost of compliance is another.

And the benefit generated by the reform is another.

If we lump them together, we don’t have an audit.

We have a political argument.

One would is intended to be the opposite.

Show me the ledger.

THE STATE BUDGET REALITY: EXPOSING THE END-OF-YEAR TRUTH

When the political smoke and mirrors clear, the final bill comes due at the end of the financial year.

The NSW Auditor-General’s State Finances 2025 report puts the audited numbers on the table.

For the 2024–25 financial year:

The General Government Sector recorded a $5.1 billion deficit.

That was approximately $1.4 billion worse than the originally budgeted $3.6 billion deficit.

NSW borrowings were approximately $165.2 billion at 30 June 2025.

Net debt was approximately $105 billion.

Interest expense reached approximately $7.1 billion.

That equates to approximately $19.6 million per day in interest expense.

Employee-related costs represented approximately 43.5% of operating expenses.

These figures don’t prove that government spending is inherently wasteful.

They prove something more basic:

The NSW government operates at enormous scale.

And when an institution operates at enormous scale, relatively small inefficiencies can become enormous dollar amounts.

Persistent deficits, infrastructure spending, healthcare costs, disaster recovery and economic stimulus have all contributed to the state’s financial position.

The public therefore has a legitimate right to inspect the books.

Not because every dollar is wasted.

Because every dollar matters.

In conclusion,

To my Aboriginal brothers and sisters all around Australia, I want to acknowledge the Elders past, present, and emerging, and extend my respect and a heartfelt thanks for accepting me as one of your own. You opened your hearts and arms, you taught me your ways, and you showed me your past. For that, I am so thankful to have gotten to experience it and understand it. I apologize for what you have endured, and for what I’ve seen you go through to be properly recognized and to have the wrongs done to you heard. Sadly, I too was subjected to wrongs and had to leave. How I wish I could return and be one with the breathtaking land, like I experienced and you all showed me. But the peace and tranquility outside the city is what I truly miss the most.

To the Australian citizen who has watched prices rise and complained: I hope this will enlighten you more than your local news about how your government spending keeps growing. You couldn’t see because your government hands out cash like an endless stream—but that has to come from somewhere, right? There is a reason you hear the term "Hard-Working Americans." We know our worth, but we also know that it’s better to work hard for your money than just have it handed to you. In the end, your NSW Government uses wage and superannuation increases as blinders for you sheep!

To the NSW Government: You fucked with the wrong blue-blooded true American. You didn’t realize, like the Aboriginals did, that I am a TRUE NATIVE AMERICAN, growing up watching my people fight. You wondered why I switched my name to Phoenix in the end? Here’s why: I was waiting for my time to rise, and while I did, I monitored your core while I audited your core and built a business off it: (twin latitude logo goes here!)

Phoenix has risen. Did you miss me? I have been silent for way too long! So I have devised another business from the art therapy I learned going to all those pyschatrist appointments ordered by the insurance companies: (wolf logo goes here!)

And now we leave the ledger.

Because numbers can tell you what happened.

They can’t always tell you what it felt like to live through it.

That’s where Silenced Wolf comes in.

One would asks the questions.

Silenced Wolf tells the stories.

On the podcast, I’ll tell you what happened to me in Australia—not as a government report, not as a courtroom brief, and not as some polished fucking autobiography.

I’ll tell you what I experienced.

What I saw.

What I learned.

What I lost.

What I survived.

And what happened when somebody who had spent years being told to keep his head down finally decided to stand the fuck up.

The ledger tells you where the money went.

Silenced Wolf tells you what it cost a human being.

FACTUAL REFERENCES

NSW Auditor-General — State Finances 2024–25 / State Finances 2025

Primary source for the NSW General Government Sector deficit, borrowings, net debt, interest expense and employee-related expenditure.

NSW Auditor-General — CBD and South East Light Rail

Primary source for the project’s original business-case estimate, subsequent cost increases, planning and procurement findings, omitted costs and recommendations concerning public reporting of final cost and benefits.

NSW Government — Housing SEPP / NSW Planning

Primary source for affordable-housing planning incentives, floor-space-ratio and height bonuses, affordable-housing requirements and community-housing-provider obligations.

NSW Government — Building Homes for NSW

Primary source for the approximately $6.6 billion housing investment program.

Australian Government / National Housing Accord

Primary source for the broader national housing target, including the approximately 377,000 additional-home objective by 2029.

CLP Holdings / EnergyAustralia

Primary corporate source for EnergyAustralia’s ownership by Hong Kong-listed CLP Holdings.

Jemena / SGSP Australia Assets

Primary corporate ownership information concerning Jemena’s approximately 60% State Grid and 40% Singapore Power ownership structure.

Australian Government — Foreign Investment Review Board

Primary government material concerning foreign investment in critical Australian infrastructure, including the 2016 decision concerning the proposed State Grid acquisition of Ausgrid.

Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry

Primary source for the Commission’s establishment, Commissioner Kenneth Hayne, final report and 76 recommendations.

Australian Government / Department of Finance

Relevant source for expenditure associated with the Hayne Royal Commission. The precise cost figure should be described cautiously because published figures differ depending upon the expenditure measure used.

Australian Government — Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Primary source for the live sheep export phase-out, legislation, transition arrangements and the approximately $139.8 million total transition package.

Export Control Amendment (Ending Live Sheep Exports by Sea) Act 2024

Primary legislative source establishing the 1 May 2028 end date for live sheep exports by sea.

CSIRO — Indigenous Fire Management and Bushfire Research

Primary scientific source concerning Indigenous cultural burning, Australian fire regimes, hazard-reduction burning, bushfire risk and the interaction between fuel, weather, landscape and fire behaviour.

Australian Government / Victorian Children’s Court — Thomas Carrick Proceedings

Primary and official material concerning the Victorian terrorism proceedings involving the child known publicly under the pseudonym Thomas Carrick, including the permanent stay of the original proceedings and subsequent court proceedings. The reported operational expenditure of approximately $507,087 should be attributed specifically to the underlying freedom-of-information material rather than presented as an independently established court finding.

NSW Police / NSW Government — Policing and Corrections

Primary government sources for NSW Police operations, policing expenditure and the structure, administration and delivery of corrective services. Operational costs and measurable outcomes should be attributed to the specific operation or annual reporting period being examined rather than inferred from seizure statistics alone.

NSW tenancy legislation / NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal

Primary sources for NSW rent-increase rules and the mechanism for challenging an excessive rent increase.

NSW Government — SIRA / icare

Primary sources for the structure and administration of the NSW workers’ compensation system.

NSW Ambulance / NSW Government — Ambulance Fees and Exemptions

Primary source for NSW Ambulance charging arrangements, applicable fees and available exemptions or concessions. Ambulance services are generally not covered by Medicare, with charges and exemptions determined under NSW arrangements.

Australian Government / NSW Government — Public and Private Infrastructure

Relevant primary sources should be used to distinguish government-owned infrastructure, publicly funded infrastructure, private concessions, outsourcing arrangements and public-private partnerships. Ownership, operation, financing and regulatory responsibility are separate questions and should not be treated as interchangeable.

Methodological Note

Where this investigation identifies a question rather than an established finding, the question is deliberately presented as a question. Where a figure is approximate, it is identified as approximate. Where a claim is based on personal experience, it is identified as personal experience rather than presented as population-level evidence.

The purpose of these references is not to predetermine the conclusion. It is to make the ledger auditable.