Mark Kenny | Unlocking Australia's World Cup of social justice

He was the first reigning monarch to visit an English football ground. Royals had been frequenters of the tennis and cricket of course, chatting amiably with the fellow stiffs of hereditary privilege, and representatives from the dominions.

But football? In Britain's class-riven society, the Palace simply hadn't felt the need.

As a male kid from Australian Rules-obsessed Adelaide, I knew how equalising "the footy" was. For men, anyway.

In Melbourne, the then VFL felt even more universal, enthusing professionals and shopkeepers, business types, teachers and farmers. It was a licence to exchange greetings, a social commons.

Sport is the only reality television worth a jot - especially when viewed live - and the only one capable of binding a community. Recall Evonne Goolagong's seven grand slam wins, Cathy Freeman's 100-metre gold medal, and Lance "Buddy" Franklin's 1000th goal.

In an era of fragmented and hectoring media when we no longer read the same newspapers or watch the same bulletins, sport is the last pan-social event experience.

Technology allows us to follow Australians, in real time, through every fatiguing kilometre of the Tour de France, every ball of the Ashes (currently in Manchester also), and every lap of the Formula 1 season.

On Thursday night, lounge rooms and pubs, convenience stores and night-time security booths had their screens tuned to Australia's Matildas playing in their opening match of the FIFA Women's World Cup.

It was a major moment for the country and an even bigger one for female participation. The speed and excitement around women's sport is good news for sports lovers because it promises a near doubling of content, lickety-split.

Some of it is superior. A comparative analysis funded by a Swedish sports firm and led by an Oxford academic crunched the data from the 2022 women's European Championship and the men's World Cup in Qatar. It revealed that women's football was more creative. Women tended to be less risk-averse, driving the ball forward into scoring positions more freely, bringing more shots at goal. This resulted in higher scores and fewer draws.

When England's Lionesses defeated the Germans (this time on English soil) to seize that European Championship, they had a TV audience of 17.4 million. Women's cricket often makes for better viewing than the men's game. Tonight, the Tour de France Femme begins - live coverage on SBS.

This dramatic embrace of female sports coverage and sporting opportunity is both cause and effect of a real-time socio-economic renovation.

Appreciating the scale of this long-resisted change should give advanced democratic societies such as our own the confidence to shake off the "fright-wing" doom-saying, and rise instead to the opportunities on offer, principally the Voice. It turns out, inviting the marginalised and dispossessed into the civic space is the democratic equivalent of growing the economic pie - call it a boost in "social productivity".

"No" campaigners who focus on imagined and exaggerated dangers miss this completely.

Any risks associated with forging a respectful partnership with Australia's original inhabitants, given the appalling social outcomes we all "claim" to agree on, are on the upside.

Speaking of risks, of empire, and of participation, gleeful reaction to the sudden spiking of the 2026 Commonwealth Games in Victoria has been curious.

Premier Daniel Andrews justified the U-turn by warning the event would have cost up to $7 billion to stage.

On social media, talkback radio and the letters pages, many said good riddance to the last vestiges of the old Empire.

There are several things to say here. First, holding the Commonwealth Games in regional Victoria was always cockamamie, especially when Melbourne brags of being the sporting capital of the world. It already has the infrastructure.

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Second, these Games bids, replete with vastly elaborate opening ceremonies, schmick new athlete's villages and gold-plated everything, have, of course, become unsustainable. Governments and sports administrators did this.

Third, let us not forget how Australia's global reputation for sporting prowess was built. Often it was athletes excelling at the Games before going on to success at the Worlds and Olympics.

Fourth, many of the non-major sports - including track and field - gained exposure, funding and adherents, from international competition at the Commonwealth Games. Ditch that and Australia's Olympics performance will probably decline as a result.

Finally, to the diplomatic and strategic dimension. The familial Commonwealth Games grouping facilitates a dialogue and a sense of belonging to many small nations - especially in the Pacific. Australia, Canada, Britain, New Zealand and Singapore are really the only economies able to fund the games. They owe it to smaller members to provide this periodic celebration of amity, competition, and mutual validation.

Precisely because it was born of an exploitative colonial past, the Commonwealth is morally and historically obliged to assist those nations towards a better, more secure democratic future.

If the Solomon Islands - a member state - slides further towards Beijing under Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, Australia's strategic security will be worse. We should be looking for ways to retain soft power ties not assist their demise.

In a world being actively destabilised by Russia, China, Iran and North Korea, it is arguable that if the Games didn't exist, something like it would make sense for Australia, on foreign policy grounds alone.