The policy choices to watch.

1. End diplomatic and security ties
2. Diplomatic isolation and broad sanctions
3. Maintain ties; suspend military cooperation
4. Maintain ties; restrict most arms transfers
5. Conditional cooperation and civilian safeguards
6. Continue cooperation with targeted restrictions
7. Maintain most existing security cooperation
8. Expand security cooperation with conditions
9. Expand cooperation with few conditions
10. Unconditional diplomatic and security backing

Measures policy toward the Israeli government, not attitudes toward Jewish people or Israeli civilians. Diplomatic recognition alone does not establish an arms-policy score.

1. Reject Palestinian statehood in principle
2. Oppose recognition and statehood initiatives
3. Defer recognition indefinitely
4. Recognition only after a final peace agreement
5. Support negotiated statehood with substantial preconditions
6. Support negotiated Palestinian statehood in principle
7. Support recognition with specified prerequisites
8. Support recognition and diplomatic relations now
9. Actively pursue recognition and full UN membership
10. Make recognition and full sovereignty a central diplomatic priority

Separate from the Israel scale. Support for statehood does not imply support for Hamas or attacks on civilians.

1. Prohibit most private firearm ownership
2. Allow narrow sporting exceptions only
3. Strict licensing and broad weapon restrictions
4. Licensing, checks and targeted weapon bans
5. Regulated ownership with purchase checks
6. Broader ownership with targeted restrictions
7. Ease licensing and expand lawful carry
8. Permitless carry with limited exclusions
9. Repeal most purchase and carry restrictions
10. Remove nearly all civilian firearm restrictions

Rates legal access, not concern about public safety. National legal starting points differ.

1. Ban abortion without exceptions
2. Ban except imminent threat to life
3. Allow life, rape and incest exceptions
4. Allow broader health exceptions only
5. Allow early pregnancy access with substantial limits
6. Allow first-trimester access with medical safeguards
7. Allow access through an extended gestational period
8. Protect access through viability with later medical exceptions
9. Remove major procedural and funding barriers
10. No statutory gestational cutoff; clinical decision-making

A higher score means broader legal access, not a moral endorsement. Gestation, funding and procedure rules can pull in different directions.

1. Near-total closure of legal entry
2. Sharp cuts and offshore-only asylum
3. Large admission cuts and narrow asylum
4. Lower admissions and tighter eligibility
5. Maintain admissions with stricter screening
6. Maintain admissions and asylum pathways
7. Targeted expansion of lawful pathways
8. Broader admission and regularization routes
9. Large expansion with strong asylum access
10. Minimal admission limits and broad regularization

This axis covers admission and legal status; border enforcement is a separate dimension. No score is inferred from rhetoric alone.

1. Repeal emissions targets and controls
2. Expand fossil fuels and weaken controls
3. Limit action to voluntary reductions
4. Retain narrow sector-specific controls
5. Maintain existing emissions policy
6. Strengthen selected sector targets
7. Binding economy-wide reduction targets
8. Accelerate clean-energy transition deadlines
9. Rapid transition with strict fossil limits
10. Near-term fossil phaseout across the economy

1. End public healthcare coverage
2. Restrict public care to emergencies
3. Large cuts to eligibility and benefits
4. Target public care to narrower groups
5. Maintain current public coverage
6. Expand selected public benefits
7. Substantial expansion of public eligibility
8. Universal basic public coverage
9. Universal comprehensive public coverage
10. Comprehensive public coverage with no patient charges

Coverage is distinct from public versus private delivery.

1. Flat or regressive taxes; no redistribution
2. Large cuts for highest incomes
3. Lower top rates and capital taxes
4. Modest cuts to top tax rates
5. Maintain current tax distribution
6. Modestly raise high-income taxes
7. Raise top rates and capital taxes
8. Add substantial wealth or inheritance taxes
9. Broad wealth taxes and large redistribution
10. Very high top taxes and extensive redistribution

1. Remove most statutory labor protections
2. Severely restrict collective bargaining
3. Reduce dismissal and bargaining protections
4. Modest labor-market deregulation
5. Retain existing worker protections
6. Targeted wage and workplace safeguards
7. Strengthen unions and collective bargaining
8. Broad protections including platform workers
9. Sector-wide bargaining and strong job security
10. Comprehensive worker control and bargaining rights

1. Sell most public housing; end new provision
2. Large reductions in social housing
3. Cut construction and eligibility
4. Reduce public construction modestly
5. Maintain current social-housing programs
6. Expand selected housing schemes
7. Increase construction and housing subsidies
8. Major social-housing construction program
9. Universal access to subsidized housing pathways
10. Universal publicly guaranteed housing provision

1. Prohibit all civilian nuclear electricity projects
2. Retain a prohibition without a review pathway
3. Retain a prohibition while permitting feasibility research
4. Permit research and limited noncommercial demonstration only
5. Permit a tightly limited commercial pilot
6. Permit a small number of commercial plants with strict approvals
7. Permit multiple commercial plants under standard safeguards
8. Actively fund a substantial commercial nuclear program
9. Prioritize broad nuclear deployment across suitable sites
10. Make nuclear the dominant electricity source through maximum feasible deployment

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. End recognition of collective Indigenous land rights
2. Severely narrow recognized native title and land rights
3. Broaden extinguishment and restrict new claims
4. Narrow claim eligibility and consultation duties
5. Maintain the existing land-rights framework at the cited evidence date
6. Resolve selected claims and strengthen implementation
7. Expand recognition and enforcement of land rights
8. Expand recognition and meaningful consultation requirements
9. Require strong consent safeguards and substantial land restoration
10. Pursue broad land restitution and territorial self-determination

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Nationalize most large private firms
2. Expand state ownership across sectors
3. Reverse major privatizations
4. Keep strategic firms; limited renationalization
5. Maintain current ownership mix
6. Sell selected nonstrategic assets
7. Broader sales with strategic exceptions
8. Privatize most commercial state firms
9. Sell strategic firms with narrow exceptions
10. Privatize nearly all state-owned enterprises

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Remove fiscal limits; major spending expansion
2. Large deficit-financed public expansion
3. Loosen spending rules substantially
4. Modestly loosen spending rules
5. Maintain current fiscal framework
6. Targeted savings within existing services
7. Binding debt reduction with selected spending cuts
8. Major spending cuts and administrative reduction
9. Deep structural cuts across public programs
10. Minimal public spending with near-balanced budgets

Higher indicates restraint, not evidence of better economic outcomes. Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Replace most imprisonment with alternatives
2. Large reductions in custody and penalties
3. Reduce penalties for nonviolent offenses
4. Expand alternatives and rehabilitation
5. Maintain current criminal penalties
6. Targeted increases for violent crime
7. Longer gang-crime sentences and more prisons
8. Broad sentence increases and fewer releases
9. Expand adult prosecution of younger teenagers
10. Maximum incarceration with minimal release pathways

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Remove criminal penalties for personal possession of all drugs
2. Remove criminal penalties for nearly all personal possession
3. Remove criminal penalties for cannabis and several other drugs
4. Remove criminal penalties for cannabis and expand diversion for others
5. Use diversion as the default for most first-time possession
6. Retain criminal penalties with broad treatment alternatives
7. Retain criminal penalties with limited diversion
8. Increase custodial penalties for repeat personal possession
9. Require custody for most personal possession offenses
10. Apply maximum feasible custodial penalties to personal possession

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Rapidly end extraction and new exploration
2. Binding phaseout; no new fields
3. Stop new exploration; manage existing production
4. Restrict expansion in sensitive areas
5. Maintain current extraction plans
6. Approve selected new fields
7. Expand offshore exploration with safeguards
8. Large expansion of oil and gas production
9. Open new frontiers and permit fracking
10. Maximize extraction with minimal permit barriers

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. End most public education provision
2. Large public-school funding cuts
3. Reduce coverage and higher-education funding
4. Modest funding cuts or freezes
5. Maintain current public education provision
6. Targeted expansion of school access
7. Expand technical schools and early education
8. Major expansion of full-time and higher education
9. Universal high-quality public provision at all levels
10. Universal public education with comprehensive student support

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Remove most existing legal protections
2. Roll back marriage and anti-discrimination protections
3. Broad exemptions from equal-treatment rules
4. Narrow existing protections in selected settings
5. Maintain existing civil-rights framework
6. Add targeted anti-discrimination safeguards
7. Expand employment, housing and service protections
8. Broad federal equality legislation
9. Broad equality and access protections including healthcare
10. Comprehensive equality, healthcare and identity-document protections

Measures stated legal policy, not personal identity, religious belief or attitudes toward individual people. Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.

1. Remove nearly all import tariffs
2. Reduce tariffs broadly
3. Cut most sector-specific tariffs
4. Targeted tariff reductions
5. Maintain existing tariff framework
6. Selective new strategic-sector tariffs
7. Broad strategic-sector protection
8. Large tariffs across several industries
9. Near-universal baseline tariffs with major country surcharges
10. Very high tariffs intended to sharply limit most imports

Editorial comparison rubric, not a statement of current Australian law or a politician rating. Assess Commonwealth and state or territory jurisdiction separately; cite the specific proposal and evidence date. Higher means more of the named axis, not a better policy. Initial framework reviewed 30 October 2026.