John Singleton with Bob HowardRip Van Australia (Stanmore: Cassell Australia, 1977), p. 1, under the heading “Introduction”.

There is only one thing that will solve Australia’s social, political and economic troubles and that is some new ideas. As it is, all we are offered by our politicians are the same old theories with the occasional new colour scheme, or something equally irrelevant. All our major political parties, institutions, pressure groups and academics can offer are ever more ingenious ways to screw the system a little more, or just prop it up a little longer. And while they muck around, our lives and our country are getting steadily worse: runaway inflation, record unemployment, industrial chaos, crippling taxation are rife, all bringing widespread misery.

And in the end the whole problem is caused by the fact that, in Australia today, our governments are involved in just about every important and unimportant aspect of our affairs. And every time something goes wrong, most of us are equally at fault in hoping, asking and even demanding that the government do something about it. The whole thing is one great race by every vested interest from trade unionists through to big business to rip some new privilege off the government at the expense of any other group.

Naturally the only alternative to more government is less government. We believe that in most cases our government is the problem not the solution. In this book, we look at our nation, its problems and its opportunities and follow the concept of limited government through to its logical conclusion.

After all, Australia has tried just about everything else, so what have we really got to lose by trying some new ideas? What have we got to lose except inflation, taxation, unemployment, regulations …