Category Archives: Coalition

Angus Taylor says unnamed Yass farmer, not his family, spurred grassland meetings

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Minister tells parliament he requested briefings because of constituents’ concerns, not family business interests

A conversation with an unnamed Yass farmer, not the interests of his farming family, had spurred the minister for energy, Angus Taylor, to seek briefings from the environment department about a listing to protect native grasslands, he told parliament on Monday.

In a personal explanation to the House of Representatives, Taylor sought to deflect further questions and a possible Senate inquiry into meetings he had with bureaucrats on the grasslands laws in 2017.

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Angus Taylor remains in Labor’s sights over grasslands and power prices

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Push to set up Senate inquiry takes a step forward, as Coalition faces questions on why energy prices keep rising

Labor will continue to target the energy minister, Angus Taylor, as the government’s weak link, citing power price rises since 2015 and renewing its push to set up a Senate inquiry into his meetings with the environment department over endangered grasslands.

On Sunday the mooted inquiry took a step forward with Rex Patrick reversing Centre Alliance’s position and pledging to support the move, although Labor and the Greens still need Cory Bernardi or One Nation’s votes to succeed.

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Labor grills Angus Taylor over company interests – politics live

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Energy minister accuses opposition of ‘grubby smear campaign against my family’ and ALP pursues Coalition over its superannuation schism. All the day’s events, live

With the chambers all quiet and the rush to the airport in full swing, we are going to go collapse in a heap and stare at a wall.

Until Monday, when the parliament is back for the last sitting ahead of the winter break.

Here’s how Mike Bowers saw some of the day

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Repealing medevac would be ‘a wicked thing’, Centre Alliance says – politics live

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Rebekha Sharkie says if the government is successful in repealing the legislation it will cause ‘needless harm’

On the ensuring integrity bill, Rex Patrick says there are political elements to the bill it can’t support:

The aim was to deal with misconduct and there is no question that has been in the union movement.

I have seen the fairly significant sheet of judicial rulings against some of the unions and in some instances we have some very conservative, considered judicial officers stating things like this union is simply using the fines, treating the fines as the cost of business.

Rex Patrick is speaking to Patricia Karvelas on Afternoon Briefing and says while Centre Alliance supports the intent of the temporary exclusion order bill, it will abstain from voting for it, because it can’t support it in its current form.

Labor will be passing it, although it has raised its own concerns.

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Labor supports exclusion orders for foreign fighters – politics live

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Opposition will try to introduce amendments but if that fails it will pass the bill. All the day’s events, live

tl;dr - shut the hell up.

I'm also told @ScottMorrisonMP told backbenchers who have been out and about on issues, including, lately, superannuation, to calm their farms and work through party processes. Words to that effect @AmyRemeikis #auspol

You know what it absolutely is not, and was never, going to be? A third chamber.

I'm told @SenatorMcGrath raised constitutional recognition in today's party room meeting. He asked what the position was. @ScottMorrisonMP and @KenWyattMP told him the voice could be many things & constitutional change wouldn't be radical @AmyRemeikis #auspol

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Coalition accused of ignoring bipartisan advice over scrutiny of security powers

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Labor and Centre Alliance fear government will proceed with two key bills without recommended safeguards

The Morrison government is being accused of ignoring bipartisan recommendations and breaching commitments to reform the spy agency’s powers as it prepares a fresh push on national security when parliament resumes on Monday.

Labor and Centre Alliance fear the government is set to ignore advice to improve scrutiny of proposed new powers for the home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, to exclude citizens from Australia and to phase out Asio’s detention powers.

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Labor can’t appear to ignore economic wellbeing over ideological values | David Hetherington

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Progressive politics must find ways to build areas of consensus while keeping an eye on hip pocket issues

Bob Hawke, a political superstar, was a social democrat. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, an up-and-coming star today, is a democratic socialist. While the vernacular has changed, the focus remains on the “social” part of the equation rather than the “democratic” one. The social bias draws support and condemnation in equal measure.

Yet perhaps the left misses a trick when it allows the democratic aspect to be downplayed. Almost all in the broader left accept that you can’t implement a social program if you can’t build a democratic mandate for it.

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Peter Dutton says he renounced financial interest that could have disqualified him

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Statement comes as Turnbull defends his threat to use eligibility question to thwart Dutton’s prime ministerial ambitions

Peter Dutton has revealed that he renounced a financial interest that could have seen him disqualified from parliament before the May election, as he fends off calls for his eligibility to be tested in the high court.

The decision by the home affairs minister to rid himself of the financial interest comes amid fresh revelations about how Malcolm Turnbull threatened to use the constitutional cloud hanging over Dutton to thwart his bid to become prime minister.

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Peter Dutton claims asylum seekers refusing resettlement in US due to medevac laws

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Home affairs minister alleges 250 applications for medical transfer being reviewed by ‘activist’ doctors

Peter Dutton claims asylum seekers and refugees on Manus Island and Nauru are refusing resettlement offers in the United States because of the medevac legislation, claiming 250 applications for medical transfer were currently being reviewed by “activist” doctors.

Despite conceding last week the US was “unlikely” to resettle 1,250 refugees under the deal Malcolm Turnbull struck with the then US president, Barack Obama, and begrudgingly held to by Donald Trump, Dutton said the medevac legislation had upended the process and claimed asylum seekers and refugees were still holding out for Australia.

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Culture shock: politics upended in era of identity

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Two worldviews face each other uncomprehendingly – and the flashpoint is the climate emergency

This is the first piece in a new series on what the election result means for the progressive side of politics and the path forward

Political commentators reflexively overinterpret election results. The story we’ve been told is that the Coalition’s win means that “Australian voters” have rejected Labor’s radical plan for reform of the tax-and-spend system, confirming that Australians prefer stability and incremental change.

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Kristina Keneally says there is ‘no evidence’ medevac laws are not working

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Shadow home affairs minister says Labor would examine government amendments to laws, if necessary

Labor says it is prepared to consider government amendments to medical evacuation laws if necessary, but sees “no evidence” to suggest the laws are not working as intended.

As the home affairs minister, Peter Dutton, ramps up pressure on Labor to side with the government to scrap the so-called medevac laws passed against its will in February, Labor’s shadow home affairs minister, Kristina Keneally, said the party was standing firm in support.

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Coalition awarded $1.4bn in grants in election lead-up – half without an open tender process

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Battleground states of Victoria and Queensland were biggest beneficiaries, receiving $422m and $331m respectively

The Coalition awarded almost $1.4bn in grants through its regional development program in the lead-up to the election, with about half of the funding not subject to a competitive tender process.

The spending included grants made through the Stronger Communities program, a political slush fund that gives every lower-house MP $150,000 to spend on small community projects costing between $1,500 and $20,000. Almost $100m has been paid out under the scheme since it was first announced in the 2015 budget.

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Keneally backs medevac laws after Dutton claims Labor may help repeal bill

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Peter Dutton says legislation creates ‘broad power’ to overrule minister but Keneally says this has been ‘misconstrued’

Kristina Keneally has reaffirmed Labor’s support for the medevac legislation after Peter Dutton claimed the opposition is looking to repeal or amend the law which facilitates medical transfers from offshore detention.

On Sunday the home affairs minister said that more than 30 people have come to Australia under the medevac bill and gave new details about the refugee swap deal with the United States, including that two Rwandans accused of murder are the only people to have come to Australia under the deal.

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Nothing new in Coalition’s nuclear awakening. No wait, perhaps there is

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Could this be the catalyst for the Coalition of 2019 to reconnect itself with the position it adopted in 2007 for sound reasons?

Fair warning before we kick off this weekend. Increasingly, I’m reaching that stage of my professional life where I can be heard muttering, and sometimes shouting, I’m too bloody old for this.

My long-suffering colleagues in the Canberra bureau of Guardian Australia have absorbed bouts of muttering and shouting over the past few weeks as various Nationals and some Liberals have lined up post-election to support a new inquiry into nuclear energy, as if this might be a light bulb moment.

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Coalition unlikely to get full tax cut package passed, key crossbencher says

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Centre Alliance demands gas export controls, fearing any tax cut will go into the ‘pockets of overseas energy companies’

The Centre Alliance senator Stirling Griff says it is “most unlikely” the Coalition will be able to pass its full income tax cut package in the first week of July when parliament returns, and has joined Labor’s call for the government to split the legislation.

Griff, who is one of two key crossbench senators in negotiations with the government over the $158bn tax cut package, said he was waiting for a response from Treasury and the Coalition after the party outlined its demands on energy policy.

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AFP signals journalists could face charges for publishing secrets

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Acting AFP commissioner denies the government directed the investigations, which have led to raids on the ABC and News Corp this week

The Australian federal police have all but confirmed that ABC and News Corp journalists could be charged for publishing protected information after two dramatic days of raids which prompted outrage and drew international attention to Australia’s draconian secrecy laws.

The acting AFP commissioner, Neil Gaughan, held a press conference on Thursday to contain political fallout, denying suggestions the police had waited until after the federal election to execute warrants and claiming no contact had been made with the executive since they informed home affairs minister Peter Dutton’s office when the investigations started.

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Queensland Coalition MPs push for inquiry to lift Australia’s nuclear power ban

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Keith Pitt and James McGrath behind move, saying ‘we have to be able to investigate all options’

A group of Queensland Liberal National party MPs reportedly want parliament to consider the feasibility of nuclear power in Australia.

The energy source is banned as a source of power but several Coalition MPs will put forward a motion in the Senate to create a committee to investigate using nuclear power in the energy mix.

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It’s dangerous for journalists to say this, but we can be wrong | Katharine Murphy

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Everything pointed to a Labor win in the 2019 election. But it is only a pretence that we are in the certainty business

The federal election wash-up is a quaint sort of ritual. There are, inevitably, explosions of feelpinion about why one side won and the other side lost. The victors rush to write the first draft of history, and on the losing side there is a frenzy of backside covering and jostling for future advancement, masquerading as deep insights about who failed to do what and when.

All of it, the initial download – masters of the universe versus the vanquished – is inherently unreliable because the protagonists are unreliable. They are still processing what has happened and they are positioning for the next thing, because that’s how the psychology of politics works. Everything is refracted through post-campaign decompression and self-interest.

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Australia to achieve 50% renewables by 2030 without government intervention, analysis finds

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RepuTex modelling suggests surge in state schemes and rooftop solar will reduce wholesale prices, making gas- and coal-fired power less competitive

Australia is on track to achieve 50% renewable electricity by 2030 even without new federal energy policies, according to modelling by the energy analysts RepuTex.

The analysis, to be released on Wednesday, suggests that a surge in renewable energy driven by state schemes and rooftop solar installations will reduce wholesale prices from $85 per MWh to $70 over the next three years.

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Josh Frydenberg: low-emissions future is inevitable and a huge opportunity

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Treasurer signals new infrastructure for renewable zones, and says Coalition will pursue climate policy it took to the election

Josh Frydenberg says Australia needs to roll out new infrastructure in the coming term of government to support renewable energy zones, and has declared that the “inevitable” transition to low-emissions sources creates an opportunity for the country.

In his first wide-ranging interview since holding his Victorian seat last weekend, where he was subjected to a concerted campaign from the Greens and the climate-focused independent Oliver Yates, Frydenberg told Guardian Australia the Coalition would implement the $3.5bn climate policy it took to the election rather than pursue a reboot.

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