PM to attend Joko Widodo’s inauguration and hold talks on FTA, which opposition leader says will be good for jobs
Scott Morrison’s whirlwind trip to Indonesia is a “good thing”, his political opponent says, as Labor embraces bipartisan support for Australia’s latest free trade agreement.
Morrison travelled to Indonesia for Joko Widodo’s second inauguration as president, with talks between the two leaders planned at the presidential palace.
Continue reading...Lambie’s vote will decide the fate of the medical evacuation laws the previous parliament’s crossbench was instrumental in passing
She came in like a wrecking ball.
But Jacqui Lambie, the senator, has grown up.
Continue reading...In Question Time, the prime minister says opposition are addicted to panic and crisis. All the day’s events, live
This is not a sight you will see too often – a LNP senator sitting with the crossbench, against the government.
Susan McDonald chaired the committee that recommended the additional maintenance requirements be removed from charity flight operators – which is what Rex Patrick is calling for.
And from this, I think you can infer from this answer on the voice to parliament, Ken Wyatt has set out that the government will be pushing to legislate, before heading to the referendum
Patricia Karvelas: You do know you’ll break a lot of hearts by not putting the voice to the people?
We also have to be pragmatic and that’s a reality.
Some people have told me it will break their hearts. We have to think about whether we want to be recognised in the Constitution.
Recognition was in section 127 in the Constitution but in the sense of not allowing us to be counted. 127 was struck out.
The 1967 referendum created a number of myths around what it really meant to people. The reality was, was the striking out of that and then the amendment, the 51-26.
I’m going to wait to see what comes out.
I’ve been meeting with people and there is a degree of willingness to have recognition. I think that once we work through whatever the voice is, and that may give us another option.
Continue reading...Three-quarters of MPs want the caps, with 23% saying misrepresentation by media their greatest dislike
Three-quarters of federal parliamentarians want caps placed on both donations and election spending to help restore Australians’ trust in the democratic process.
On Wednesday, Democracy2025 will release the results of a survey of 98 out of 226 politicians in the last term of parliament, which shows while most politicians are satisfied with Australian democracy (61%) compared with the public at large (41%), they are still concerned about lack of trust and a growing disconnect with the public.
Continue reading...Anthony Albanese asks PM why he’s raising hopes on dam support. Plus Jacqui Lambie raises concerns over Turkish invasion. All the day’s events, live
Because it is only “radicals” who care about the climate, apparently.
#owningtheleft
Labor's declaration of a climate emergency is just a sop to the superglue protestors and radical greens. Labor remains desperate to receive the support of the radical activists despite what they've said since the election. Labor can't be trusted to fight for jobs.
Tony Burke jumps up to congratulate Tony Smith on the integrity award he received today (have a look a few posts down and check out Kenneth Hayne’s speech) and thanks him for some of the difficult decisions he took during the medevac debate (you may remember that Smith stuck to the parliament rules, and ensured the parliament had a vote, and also ordered the solicitor general advice Christian Porter was relying on to shut down the debate, be tabled – which revealed the advice was not iron-clad).
Scott Morrison then gets up to add his congratulations, and a few in Labor respond with “now you think about it” to which Morrison gets very upset and accuses Labor of politicising the moment.
Continue reading...Coalition MP accused of hypocrisy for disparaging Australian Extinction Rebellion protesters
Government backbencher Tim Wilson has defended his decision to join pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong and said environmental protests in Australia have a right to operate “so long as they stick within the law”.
Wilson joined protesters in Hong Kong last week but was accused of hypocrisy because of previous comments disparaging protests in Australia.
Continue reading...Joel Fitzgibbon’s climate change ‘settlement’ is rejected but Labor will allow the government’s ‘big stick’ energy policy to pass
Joel Fitzgibbon has copped a blast in the left and right caucus meetings for declaring Labor should adopt the Coalition’s Paris emissions reduction target rather than pursue ambitious cuts to carbon pollution.
The internal unrest came as the shadow cabinet was expected to sign off on Monday night on a shift in Labor’s attitude to the controversial “big stick” policy of the Morrison government.
Continue reading...Anthony Albanese and Jodi McKay announce the appointment of the Keating government attorney general
The former attorney general Michael Lavarch will lead a review into New South Wales Labor after the suspension of the general secretary Kaila Murnain over claims the party accepted $100,000 in banned developer donations from Huang Xiangmo.
The New South Wales Labor leader, Jodi McKay, and the federal leader, Anthony Albanese, announced the appointment on Sunday, promising to create structures to prevent a repeat of what McKay called “shocking and appalling” allegations at the anti-corruption watchdog.
Continue reading...Minister says Australia’s issue is with the Communist Party of China, not the Chinese-Australian community
The home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, has launched a wide-ranging attack on the Chinese Communist party, accusing it of engineering a series of cyber-attacks on Australian targets, stealing intellectual property and muzzling free speech.
The comments prompted a sharp rebuke from the Chinese government overnight, with China’s foreign ministry spokesman, Geng Shuang, telling reporters during a press conference that he hoped “Australia will reject the cold war mentality and bias, and work to advance bilateral relations and mutual trust”.
Continue reading...University also demands names of journalists who spoke to Gerd Schröder-Turk, after comments on Four Corners
Murdoch University is suing an academic whistleblower and demanding the names of journalists he spoke to and the dates of their interactions, court records show.
One of Australia’s leading integrity experts, AJ Brown, says the university’s actions highlight the “huge imbalance” in power between whistleblowers and large employers and shows protections for those who speak out “remain something of a mess”.
Continue reading...Labor criticises government for hiring The Block star, claiming it’s cut $3bn from vocational education since coming to office
Labor has blasted Michaelia Cash for refusing to say how much taxpayers are paying The Block star Scott Cam to promote vocational education in his new role as “national careers ambassador”.
At a press conference on Thursday the skills and employment minister said Cam’s pay for the 15-month role was “commercial in confidence” but suggested spending was “about outcomes” and reflected the fact the government had secured “one of the highest profile people in Australia”.
Continue reading...More than 50 men, including Benham Satah, who witnessed murder of Reza Barati, have been held for two months
Asylum seekers who have been approved for medevac transfers to Australia are among 52 men who have been locked up in Port Moresby detention without access to phones or lawyers for the past two months.
Among those detained is Benham Satah, the Kurdish Iranian man who witnessed the murder of Reza Barati in 2014, and who was allegedly about to be transferred to Australia for care.
Continue reading...ACL director Martyn Iles says businesses should have greater powers to hire and fire, but denies Christians have a ‘special vendetta’ against LGBT people
The Australian Christian Lobby has backed calls for religious businesses such as aged care providers to gain more powers of hiring and firing employees who do not conform to religious teachings.
In a debate at the National Press Club on Wednesday the ACL director Martyn Iles backed calls from the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference for greater powers to fire employees who don’t conform to a “Christian sexual ethic” but claimed Christians don’t have a “special vendetta” against the LGBT community.
Continue reading...Shadow treasurer calls for new banking inquiry after major banks failed to pass on full interest rate cut
Labor says the Morrison government should consider increasing the bank levy in response to the failure by the big players to cut interest rates in line with the central bank, and look at broader measures to boost competition in the sector.
The shadow treasurer, Jim Chalmers, told Sky News on Sunday the government needed to sign off on a new inquiry into competition in the banking sector by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, and consider all options, including hiking the bank levy, after the major banks declined to pass through the full rate reduction following the Reserve Bank’s latest cut to the official cash rate.
Continue reading...Ian Macfarlane says Australia facing the ‘most perplexing and difficult’ era for monetary policy ever
Former Reserve Bank governor Ian Macfarlane has weighed into the debate over interest rates, believing any further cuts will have very little power to do anything useful.
The central bank cut the official cash rate to a record low of just 0.75% this week, the third reduction in a matter of months.
Continue reading...NSW Nationals, Coalition MP Paul Fletcher, LNP MP Julian Simmonds and independent MP Bob Katter urge cut to number of pre-poll voting weeks
The New South Wales Nationals and the communications minister, Paul Fletcher, have joined growing calls for the length of pre-poll voting before federal elections to be shortened.
In a submission to the inquiry examining the 2019 election, Fletcher warned the record number of Australians voting in pre-poll was eroding the “integrity and quality” of the electoral process.
Continue reading...Andrew Giles says a well developed policy agenda means little if it has to contend with ‘resigned cynicism’
The Labor frontbencher Andrew Giles says the inevitable postmortem from the 2019 election needs to be broader than examining whether the electoral system is delivering for voters. It also needs to consider questions of accountability and trust.
Giles, the opposition spokesman on cities and urban infrastructure and a former deputy chair of the joint standing committee on electoral matters, told a seminar at the University of Melbourne that policy agendas meant little to voters in 2019 “if no one believes it could ever be delivered”.
Continue reading...The US president appears to believe Australian spies are part of a deep-state conspiracy. Australia should be wary of the risks of getting drawn into his defence
It really is a poke in the eye – the “Five Eyes”, that is. Donald Trump’s telephone call to Scott Morrison, revealed on Tuesday in the New York Times, where he pressed for help in investigating the origins of the Mueller inquiry, will doubtless put a further strain on what is otherwise a very close intelligence-sharing partnership between the United States and Australia.
Why? Because aside from the unwanted political distraction of putting Australia at the centre of another Trump tirade (just as Morrison was seeking to apply the blowtorch to Labor at home for what he called “naive and immature” remarks about China), the twisted logic of Trump’s allegation is truly extraordinary.
Continue reading...Sources insist Alexander Downer’s talk with America’s top diplomat in London about conversation with George Papadopoulos was unauthorised
Alexander Downer relayed information to the American chargé d’affaires in London in July 2016 about his now infamous conversation with George Papadopoulos, then a foreign policy adviser to Trump – a move that took the then prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, and senior colleagues by surprise.
Guardian Australia understands Downer’s conversation with Papadopoulos was recorded in a diplomatic cable back to Canberra.
Continue reading...New data shows Australia is second biggest arms importer but deals frequently shrouded in secrecy
The Australian government kept documents about its multibillion-dollar submarine project secret from the public to avoid offending a foreign power, and spent $150,000 over four years to stop their release.
Australia’s growing involvement in the international arms trade is frequently shrouded in secrecy. The government has routinely blocked freedom of information requests for documents on arms deals, including weapons exports to countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, by citing national security or potential harm to international relations.
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