The Chaser Report - The Clare Reforms

Episode Date: August 9, 2026

If you or anyone you know has struggled with bullying, the government has your back. Just visit www.bullyingnoway.gov.au/ and BAM, the bullying is gone. Plus, Dom breaks the silence. ---Listen AD FREE: https://thechaserreport.supercast.com/ Follow us on Instagram: @chaserwarSpam Dom's socials: @dom_knightSend Charles voicemails: @charlesfirthEmail us: [e-mail] CEO’s Super-yacht upgrade Fund: https://chaser.com.au/support/ Send complaints to: [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gatigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report with Dom and Charles. And we're back for another week of podcasting action. Another week of keeping our finger on the nation's pulse. Yes. And then another finger on the world's pulse. Yes.

And then another finger still on Johnny and Fittino's pulse, which seems to regrettably still be in operation. Yes, unfortunately. But today, Dom, something that you're an expert in. Oh, my goodness. That's what we're talking about, which is, Dom, you're... I have no idea what this is about, by the way. You're in the tertiary sector. I mean, there's so many things I could...

In the tertiary sector, yes, yes, I am in a manner of speaking. And so your minister is Jason Clare. Jason Clare. Yes, he's the Federal Minister for Education. Yes. Now, we're in the early stages of their second term in government, right? Yep. So this is the moment when the government...

can finally get some big reforms done. Well, it's got a lot in the tank. It's got a lot in the tank. It's got a huge majority. Yes. It's quite a while until the election. This is go time. This is go time. Halfway through your second term.

Yes. This is where you introduce a GST. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Or is that in the Howard's first term, maybe. No, but yeah, you do the big reforms. Heavy lifting. Yeah. And so obviously.

The voice is what you do. The voice to Parliament. And you know, Dom, being in education, what is the absolute biggest crying at issue in education in Australia? Like if there was one thing that you could do in education, what would it be? Increase phase. I just say, they're not hired. Don't give them ideas. I mean, they call them job graduates, Charles.

But are they really ready? No. Can we make them readier? You've got to make them ready by loading them up on so much debt that they just have to get a job. Yeah, and a better paying job. No, Dom. The federal government's done something much bigger than that, much, much bigger.

We'll get to it straight after the brand. After the ads. Yeah. And by the way, I mean, you can obviously pay to remove those ads, but I think advertising is another thing that we could load into higher education. Yes. Not a single, I haven't ever given a sponsored lecture. Yeah.

Surely that's a massive opportunity. Oh, well, it's so funny because my wife works at the university. She's far more senior time. And I keep on saying to her, just like mention some supplements. I think she could sack me. I'm not entirely sure how that works. I'm going to ask her. But, you know, like...

Supplements, yes. Yeah, like, you know, this lecture, which is all about political theory, is sponsored by Alpha GPC. Yeah, that's good. Get cut today. Yeah. You know what I mean? Creatine, or whatever it is.

Or sports bet. You know, actually gambling advertising. Yeah. What are the odds you'll actually finish this degree? What are the odds you recoup your hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in doing the degree? No, but you want betting that's also educational. So it'd be things like, what are the, you know, who's going to turn out to be correct? Marks or Weber?

You know what I mean? What a nerdy joke? Blum it. What are the odds that your flagrant use of chat GPT will be sent by anybody? Yes. Yeah, no, so Dom, big reforms announced on Sunday. Jason, Clair. Really?

Like today. Today. Well. Sorry, yesterday. Yesterday as we record this at 4 a.m. By the way, you're just to just so bad. Charles is wearing a t-shirt with Monash University and the University of Sydney's logos on them, which is a weird bit of cognitive dissonance.

Anyway, so you're tertiary up. Well, yes. But the big reform. I honestly don't know what it's going to be. Roll the drums here because this is, I think, going to go down as Jason Clears. The Claire reforms, will they call it? Yes, exactly. You remember the Dawkins reform?

Yes, the door contraforms. In the 80s, they actually broadened education out, introduced hex. Yeah, introduced hex and made new universities. And led to literally millions of people opening up to the university. Yeah, a lot more people enrolled. Yes, true. So similar sort of vibe. What Jason and Claire announced on Sunday was an anti-bullying campaign for schools, right?

Well. So really tacking it. You know, like we're facing. an education system which charges $50,000 for an arts degree. Yeah, but it's a, you know... But you've got to be balanced, Charles. It's a job-ready arts degree. It's a job-ready arts degree.

I mean, we used to make jokes about doing, like, going and working McDonald's with your arts degree. Not anymore. You can't afford to go to work at McDonald's. It's not a job. You've got to, I don't know, work for sports bed or something. So, you know, there's so many other things that, you know, were lesser things on the agenda.

But this is an anti-bullying campaign. it's basically, as far as I can work out, blaming the kids for bullying, right? Which is always a good idea. The kids who bully or the kids who are bullied? Are we victim blaming at a national level? Is that what we're doing? Well, what's the problem with bullying? Like, where do you lay the...

Anyway, no, but the thing... See, look, I faced bullies when I was young. I'm sure you did, Dom. I was so bullied. Still am. But the whole thing is, what it is, is it's $10 million towards running some TV ads because if you know anything about the kids, it's that they still watch TV, right? Oh, oh.

And, and the, in particular, the bullies, in particular. Like, are you saying like linear TV, like Channel 9? Yeah, they're running a TV campaign. And the, um, and that the bullies, you know, like, I just wish when I was young that, you know, when bullying was happening to me, the bully was subjected to a TV ad to remind them not to bully. And then I wouldn't have had all the troubles. I mean, if the TV ads, if they had their kind of, they were strapped down with their eyelids wide open,

a bit like Alex in a clockwork orange. And the ads were just subliminally sort of a bully the bully. Yeah, that's right. That was the whole point with the Clockwork Orange. The bullies got bullied and they, you know, brainwashed to love Jason Clare. That might work. Charles, can I have any of the $10 million as compensation

for my treatment at the hand of the chaser for the first? I don't know, 20 years of our operation. Well, look, Dom. No, I don't think you can because I don't think that that's what this... Can I be in the ads? This doesn't go to victims. This goes to TV networks. Well, Charles, come on.

Surely if we want to... Can I just... Surely if they want to give money. Could I just tell you the name of this campaign? Can you guess, please guess the name of this campaign? Say no to bullies? No. But very close.

Bullying is bull. I don't know. See, you're getting there. Bullying is bad? I know, it's got to be like, is it sort of like an 80s? I'll give you a hint. It's got an exclamation mark in it.

Bullies out. Ooh, oh, that's very close. Yeah. I should, we should have, we should have charged for this. It's bullying no way. Are you serious?

It is. So you can actually go to bullying no way. dotgov. They've just launched it. And you can get some bullying prevention, some bullying resources. It looks like a sign.

And some bullying support. Oh. It looks like a sign, Charles, where there are two directions. One of them is bullying and the other one is no way. Which means everyone has to go to bullying because the other one has no way. Oh, okay. All right. So we've ended bullying, have we?

By building a website and running some TV. That was the thing that as I was being bashed up in the school playground, repeatedly. Admitted, this is mostly in England. So it was for being Australian, even though I'm British. I took one for the team. Knowing that decades later we'd beat them in cricket. so we'd win in the long run.

What I really wanted to that point when I was sort of on the ground with someone sitting on me and punching me was for the government to come in. We didn't have websites back there. No, exactly. That's why I got bullied. That's why you got bullied. If I could have said, guys, guys, don't pull out your phones and look up bullying no way. What, dot gov.gov.

They do you? And they would have gone, oh, Jason Clare says, we can't ask, sorry, mate, let's all be friends. So did you, when you were bullied, Dom, then go and tell the authority? Yeah. Snitch on the bullies. In this one particular case that was really bad, yes I did. Right, okay. No, it was, I think,

I think it was only a mild exacerbation that resulted from doing that. No, it was, I won't, it was horrible, but it was, my, my favorite version of the bullying, just as a little sidebar. Yeah. The weediest guy,

the weirdest guy in my class in London when I was there, beat me up because there was no, there was no one else to, like, it was like the second weakest. Second weakest. beat up the run. Feed up the nerdy run. But then at the end of the year,

we did this school production of Cinderella, like big school production of Cinderella. And I was told I had to be Prince Charming because no one else was willing to do it. Oh, lovely. I was like, oh, okay. So, I mean, my stocks couldn't fall any lower. I was Prince Charming.

And which was, you know, super embarrassing. But my, I had like a retinue of like courtiers. I had like a page and all this. And a whole team. Lovely. And my page, I don't know what the gig was, but my page or something was the younger brother of the bully, like two years younger brother. Yeah. And I shit you not.

At one point in the playground after I was beaten up, probably for being Prince Charming, I don't remember why. But this guy, his name was James Stringer. Hello, James is you out there. He was betting me up yet again to try and prove that, and I went to karate classes, by the way, to try to stop this. Oh, my God. I've never told you this story, probably because it's so embarrassing. And anyway, so I was actually getting a few, you know, I was not completely humiliated. But anyway, about a minute into this thing and everyone would circle around you in the playground in London and go, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, fight, anyway, briefly into this conflict, his little brother goes, that's my prince.

And beats his shit out of his big brother to defend his prince. I thought, impressive, impressive levels of method acting. Yeah, that's great. So there's a point where I lent into the nerdiness to the point where I had. A bodyguard. There was a suspension of disbelief. And it was that moment that made me think that the monarchy is actually a good thing. The Chaser Report, now with extra whispers.

Anyway, so again, the government website would have saved the situation. I feel like, because the theme of this week's bullying no way campaign is break the silence. Oh, okay. I just did. I just assumed it was like to blame the victims for not dobbing on. their things. But we're breaking the silence here. Like, I think the campaign's working already, yeah, I haven't told that story in 1,300 episodes of podcasting. Because I've told all the less embarrassing stories already. I think that what's going to happen is, like, by the end of the

week, there won't be any bullying. They won't be any bullying. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the federal government can move on to say other reforms, like stopping 50,000 fucking dollar arts degrees. So that our entire society can start asking questions like, what does life mean once again without fucking charging them up the wazoo? Look, Charles, it's easy to be cynical about politics. It's easy to be, oh, you know, the politicians don't ever do anything in it for themselves. They're destined to buy more investment properties. They're just in it to get the Australian taxpayer to pay off their investment property in Canberra,

which so many of them do. Oh, you know, they want it for the power and the ego trip and whatever. So cynical. It's so easy. But Charles, of all of the policy initiatives in the many years, decades that we've been covering Australian politics, this is the one more than any other that I believe Australia's politicians truly support. Because you cannot tell me that a single member of federal parliament was not horribly

bullied in school. Honestly, I'm willing to bet that Albo gave as good as he got. You reckon he did? Yeah, I reckon he. He shouted back. There might be some co-wrecks who've got some thoughts on. I reckon all around Parliament they've gone, you know, we need a no bullying campaign. And Jason Clare's picked it up thinking, oh, yeah, it's for schools, not realizing that what they're actually after was a bullying no-wank way campaign.

Bullying no-wank, yeah. That was the previous. That's the prayer room. Charles, it's not called bullying. It's called tight control of the backbench. Yes, that's right. Discipline. Discipline.

Discipline. That's what the bullies. in the schools are just doing. They're just exercising discipline. And it's called, isn't it called a strong cabinet model of... Yeah. Caucus Solidarity. That's what it is.

If you go outside the caucus, someone solid will sit on you. It's the way that I think it works. Well, look, this is, this is impressive. So, a federal education minister, I mean, normally... You would think that this would be... You'd think it would be a school thing. But I think... Sorry, you think it'd be states dealing with primary schools and stuff.

What it's showing is that there's nothing else that the education people in Canber can do because obviously the rest of Jason Clair's responsibilities, which is basically Catholic schools and tertiary education. Well, Catholic schools is an embarrassing point at the moment in the state of New South Wales.

Well, yes. With certain ICAC investigations going on. Great way to get to get yourself added to the Liberal Party membership rolls, by the way. If you're interested in a free membership, liberal party, you want to talk to Catholic schools in New South Wales. But look, no, but the thing is

that, As Inclair's obviously looked around gone, I don't need to do anything that the feds would normally do because education's going so perfectly. There's no crisis in universities at all. Like if you walk onto campus, there's no academics going, oh, we've got a crisis in funding.

Well, unless you talk to ANU, which is very near Parliament House, or UTS or Macquarie or... Or UNSW. Yeah. Yeah, or... Monash or... Pretty much.

Deacon, Christopher. And let's not even talk about USA and University of Adelaide. They just merged. UnisA, yeah, that's true. They're now Adelaide University. I think one of them was almost bankrupt. Do you need? One of them was almost bankrupt,

and now two of them are almost bankrupt. I think it's going to be one of those hilarious amalgamation stories. But they didn't need to do anything about that. What they needed to do was reach into the responsibility of states and then roll out an ad campaign. So just to tie this all together, Charles, obviously the reason that Jason Clare doesn't need to do anything is because AI is just going to render education unnecessary.

I asked ChatGPT just now, can you think of a better name for an anti-bullying campaign than bullying no way? Chat ChitpT says, yes, bullying no way is clear but feels a little dated and slogan-like. If I was doing this for Australian schools, I look, something short, positive, memorable and not overly earnest. Oh, okay.

Good notes, Jason Clare. Yeah, very good. Stand up, speak out. Oh, okay. What about just not okay? I mean, I'm not okay. It's not good. Are you okay?

No, okay. Choose kind. Okay, that's actually not very good. Be the difference. Look out for each other. They're all real, by the way. We've got your back. Speak up.

Belong. Now, that's a telco. That's getting, it's getting way. Everyone belongs. The tilstra. No. No bullying campaign. Actually, Telstra might be up for that at a moment.

It's got to be the sports bet, no bully. The sports bet. The palais. Very good. Make room. You know what? You know what I've learned from this? I think education is safe from chat GPT.

Okay. Well, Dom, have a good week. I hope nobody sits on you. Yeah. Yeah. We have an exciting. We don't normally bother with guests, Charles. But we actually have in the pipeline,

potentially, doing extraordinary things. Yes, we probably shouldn't plug it until... No, no, no, to... But, yeah, no, we've got somebody who really is the talk of the entire world at the moment. Yeah, yeah. We're so lucky Craig Rookastel was free on that day. And we'll see you soon.

So stay tuned. We are part of the Aconiclass Network. Guest not confirmed. This podcast is in no way binding on us having a guest at any point, including Craig. See ya.