John Roskam’s political sensibilities were kindled at age 14, when he read George Orwell’s “Animal Farm” in one night. Combined with his parents’ small-business, anti-Communist leanings, the book inspired a passion for free market liberalism that continues 30 years later.



“You could not be anything other than in favour of the individual and individual choice after reading “Animal Farm”, says Roskam, 44, the executive director of the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA). “It highlights the dangers of unrestrained collective action.”



Just don’t label Roskam – or the IPA – as “right-wing”. “If journalists describe the IPA as right wing, I email or ring them and ask them how is the IPA right wing?” he says. “Right wing is Pauline Hanson.”



Roskam prefers to describe the IPA, which he has led since 2005, as a free market think tank. Over the past four years, its member numbers have soared from 300 to 1500, taking its budget to $2.4 million, and broadening its funding base from big corporates to individuals.



“The Gillard government is bad for Australia but good for the IPA – we’re expanding,” says Roskam, but adds that all so-called “independent” think tanks need to diversify away from corporate funding.



His CV is a classic think tank mix of law, commerce, academia and politics, plus a stint at global mining company Rio Tinto. Indeed, it was a fellow law student at Melbourne University, John Daley - who now leads the Grattan Institute - who suggested that Roskam apply for his first job at the Liberal Party, as a junior research assistant for Victorian MP Don Hayward.



Roskam worked with Hayward for two years from 1990, when Hayward was shadow education minister, then for a heady year after Premier Jeff Kennett came to power in 1992 and shut hundreds of schools.



He continued his education focus with two years in David Kemp’s Canberra office, when Kemp was education minister for the Howard Government. As a senior adviser, then chief of staff, he says politics taught him the importance of working closely with people, especially in the public service.



“Successful reform, whether in the corporate sphere or the public sector, requires commitment and buy in and participation from all the people involved,” he says.



After two years working in corporate affairs for Rio Tinto in Melbourne and London, Roskam returned to Australia to begin a PhD on Robert Menzies, which he hopes to one day finish. “I have 80,000 words of a PhD and 200,000 words of notes.”



It was not long before he was back in politics, however, spending a year as executive director of Liberal Party think tank The Menzies Research Centre in Canberra, before moving to Melbourne to join the IPA.



As for the biggest issue facing Australia in 2012, Roskam says the country must take advantage of its economic strength to lift educational standards.



“Even with the GFC, Australians have become accustomed to living in a boom, but we are not taking advantage of it,” he says. “Our productivity is declining, our education standards are still low – I spent eight or nine years in education policy – and we still have a very high proportion of underachieving students, including year 10 students who can’t read.”



THE BIG QUESTIONS



Biggest break

Working for Don Hayward [the Victorian Education Minister 1992-96] and David Kemp [the Federal Education Minister 1996-01]. You can’t shut several hundred schools [in Victoria] and reduce teacher numbers by 10 per cent without sophisticated leadership and deep, intellectual commitment to policy.



Biggest achievement

That’s easy, family, they’re the most important thing [he has twins aged three, and an 18 month old baby with wife Penny].



Biggest regret

[Former Victorian Liberal Premier Jeff] Kennett losing in ’99 was bad. He was a great Premier and a great Victorian and he still had a lot more to add. Kennett was the last person we saw with a big vision for Victoria.



Best investment

Our house [in Melbourne’s east]. It’s the best investment because a house is your home, but in the current environment it may not be a good investment except for those psychological benefits.



Worst investment

CSL shares. I bought them at $15 but I wish I’d listened to my wife when she said to buy them about 10 years ago.



Attitude to money

I’m shaped by the understanding that I will probably work until I’m 75 at least and markets go up and down. You have to have the wherewithal and the reserves to withstand a downturn.



Personal philosophy

From Mark Twain: You will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do.