Centre for Independent Studies

The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) is a conservative think tank based in Sydney and headed by Greg Lindsay.

History

The CIS was Australia's first neoliberal think tank. It was founded in 1976 by a Sydney maths teacher, Greg Lindsay. After struggling for financial support, Lindsay began meeting with Australian businessmen who wanted to establish an Australian version of the UK think tank the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA). These businessmen included Hugh Morgan, CEO of Western Mining Corporation (WMC), John Bonython, editor of the Adelaide Advertiser, John McLeod, chief economist at mining company CRA, Douglas Hocking, Chief economist at Shell Australia, and John Brunner, an economist at mining company BHP.

In 1979, six companies - WMC, CRA, BHP, Shell, Santos and the Adelaide advertiser - provided financial backing to the CIS, each pledging to donate $5,000 each year for five years.

Funding

The CIS is very secretive about its funding, often refusing to disclose who funds the CIS's research. Companies which have been publicly disclosed [1] include:

• McDonald's Australia
• John Fairfax (Publisher of The Age, Sydney Morning Herald and Australian Financial Review newspapers)
• Philip Morris
• BHP Billiton
• Shell
• WMC - Western Mining Corporation
• ICI

Individuals who fund the CIS include [2]:

• Richard Pratt - CEO of Visy Corp, largest individual donor to the Liberal party in 2003. [3]
• Dame Elisabeth Murdoch - Mother of media mogul Rupert Murdoch
• Neville Kennard
• Robert Champion de Crespigny

Personnel

Board Members

• Greg Lindsay, Executive Director

• Michael Darling, Chairman.
• Marco Belgiorno-Zegna
• Robert Champion de Crespigny
• Michael Chaney
• Bob Day
• Chum Darvall
• Peter Dodd
• Peter Farrell
• Ross Grant
• John M. Green
• Murray Horn
• Robert McLean
• Ruth Richardson
• Geoff Ricketts
• Chris Roberts
• Steven Skala
• Don Turkington
• Steven Wilson

Former board members

• John Calvert-Jones, honorary treasurer of the Liberal party [4], director of Liberal party fundraiser the Cormack foundation [5], and Rupert Murdoch's brother in-law.
• John Phillips, former Deputy Chairman of the Reserve Bank, Director of WMC

Research Staff

• Jennifer Buckingham - Research Fellow - Education
• Caspar Conde - Adjunct Scholar
• Miranda Darling - Adjunct Scholar
• Owen Harries - Senior Fellow
• Helen Hughes - Senior Fellow
• Wolfgang Kasper - Senior Fellow
• Barry Maley - Senior Fellow
• Andrew Norton - Research Fellow
• April Palmerlee - Visiting Fellow
• Peter Saunders - Social Research Director
• Susan Windybank - Director of Foreign Policy Programmes

Contact details

The Centre for Independent Studies
PO Box 92, St Leonards,
NSW 1590
tel: +61 2 9438 4377
fax: +61 2 9439 7310
Web: http://www.cis.org.au/

External links

• CIS 25th Anniversary Brochure (pdf)
• Cherelle Murphy, "Think tank pushes 10pc tax rate", Australian Financial Review, April 7, 2005.
• Senator George Campbell's speech on the CIS in parliament, Hansard, March 05, 2003
• Michael Duffy, "Modern Liberal Thinking", Counterpoint, ABC Radio National, July 11, 2005.
• Diana Bagnall, "How this man controls your future", The Bulletin, September 22, 2004.