‘Sledgehammer to crack a nut’: Canberra’s China crackdown to chill foreign collaboration with states

FOCUS: CHINA, AUSTRALIA AND THE PUBLIC SECTOR. A new wave of bureaucracy is about to descend on subnational governments as Canberra moves to leash interactions with foreign powers.

Four years ago, Canberra’s relationship with Beijing was on much less complicated footing than it is now. Outbound trade with the people’s republic was rebounding to a five-year high, the government-owned postie was talking up the market ad nauseam, and public officials were attending all manner of ceremonial signings.

It was at one of these memorandum ceremonies — routine in China’s business culture — that Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews signed the dotted line on four pages of meandrous proclamations that immediately became a potent political irritant in Canberra — pledging some loose form of participation in China President Xi Jinping’s $1.44