Australians can now quickly review our nation's progress before selecting another parliament.

ACFP's new summary of their major report on The State of Australia 2025 shows how.

Australian Community Futures Planning (ACFP) has recently released its second major report on the state of the nation – The State of Australia 2025.

This is an extensive evidence-based report on the nation’s progress towards and away from the sort of future Australians have said they want in surveys, other research and community planning programs during the 21st century. Their descriptions of that preferred future and the safe routes toward it have been collected and summarised by ACFP in a draft statement called the Vision for Australia Together. This contains:

• 17 Vision elements – draft statements about the sort of life we have said we wish to be able to lead and the country we wish to live in by 2050 or sooner; and

• 57 draft Direction statements – or signposts – of the safe routes towards that Vision, including Directions for our society, natural environment, economy and governance.

The report analyses data and other types of evidence about policies to estimate progress in either direction – towards or away from each element of the drafted Vision. Analysis of forward and backward movements in relation to a selection of 368 indicators of the state of Australia is provided to help Australians get a sense of net progress overall and the evidence for it. It’s designed to draw clarity out of the detail.

The report assesses our progress over two timeframes:

• for the period of the 47^th parliament; and

• for the longer term, usually over a decade or more, depending on the availability of data.

It also looks at what we might be able to expect for our future based on our current performance and the prevailing policy trends of parliaments and governments over both periods.

Release of the report is timed to provide Australians with information they need about the 46^th and 47^th parliaments as they approach the election of the 48^th.

So what are the results?

It will perhaps not surprise many Australians that our nation’s net progress in the 21^st century has not been good. If Australians agree that the draft Vision for Australia Together does describe the better Australia we aspire to for ourselves and future generations, then the report shows that on balance we are not progressing towards a better Australia, we are travelling away from that preferred destination.

The balance of the result is not a fine one. It is stark and has been heavily tilted towards the negative. And the data strongly indicate that the nation has been drifting solidly that way for more than a decade. The speed with which it has drifted away from the Vision has slowed a little during the 47^th parliament but the direction of travel is still distinctly against the long term national and public interest.

Nevertheless, the report also shows that we have the means of reversing our current course of travel and we have full capacity to switch to safer paths – paths by which Australians as a community can make the Vision for Australia Together a reality, providing a place of wellbeing and security for everyone before it becomes impossible to do so.

This better future is not yet beyond our reach, although it will be soon – or very soon, if the parliaments we elect persist with policies that have not been working well.

The evidence in The State of Australia 2025 shows that the things parliaments and governments have been doing during the 21^st century and the polices they have persisted with simply aren’t working to help Australians build a better future. The negative effect of those policies is particularly evident in:

• the sharp and steep decline of the physical and mental health of Australians;

• the growth of poverty and inequality – especially political inequality and inequality of opportunity; and

• a staggering loss of biodiversity.

The weight of evidence indicates that the nation needs to set a new course for its governments in several policy areas; otherwise the parliaments we elect will not be able to deliver on our aspirations at all.

Provenance of the report

The State of Australia 2025 has been produced as part of a new process being offered to Australians for use in their democracy. It’s called National Integrated Planning & Reporting or National IP&R. This is a process that any Australian can become involved in to increase their influence with governments and to impress upon them the essentials of an agenda that arcs safely toward the future we all want. It’s a simple step we can add into the cycle of our elections.

Reports produced using National IP&R – like The State of Australia 2025 – contain extensive factual data and information that Australians can use to:

• figure out whether and when they are being misled or lied to by political parties, candidates, and the media; and to

• identify the policy choices that are most likely to reverse our declining fortunes.

But beyond that, the whole process of National IP&R is even more useful in that it can help Australians rise above politics by working together to build a long term integrated plan to safely achieve what matters most to them. That coherent plan can then be presented to parliaments as the agenda most likely to propel Australia towards the future we want. It’s like a job description for parliaments. Every parliament should be able to start each term of office with that job description in hand if we want to improve our chances of building the sort of future we want.

National IP&R offers every Australian a chance to participate more efficiently and effectively in their democracy than they have been able to do to date. From the mid 2020s onwards, Australians can benefit substantially from adding this step of National IP&R into the processes and institutions of their democracy. Instead of electing parliaments and letting them do whatever they want purely on the basis of their narrow and increasingly indistinguishable agendas (in which the voters have had no real input), we can tell them what we want and what we are trusting them with, and then judge their performance against that, come the next election.

An accessible summary

The State of Australia 2025 is necessarily a very big report. So an accessible summary of the report has also been released. The summary report provides quick insights into the results and links to the information on which the results are based.

More detail about the results and insights into the implications for our future will be available throughout the election period.

Find out more about the Vision for Australia Together

The Vision for Australia Together is a yardstick we can use to see whether the parliaments and governments we elect are working together well enough to help us build the future we want.

If the draft Vision for Australia Together describes the sort of country and future we want as a nation, then the information in The State of Australia 2025 on our progress towards that country and future can help us with selection of the parliaments most likely to work with all Australians to build it.

Find out more about the Vision for Australia Together here.

Want to know more about ACFP?

Find out all about ACFP and how to become involved here.