Category Archives: Labor party

Australia news live: NSW premier refutes cover-up allegations over police Tasering of 95-year-old woman

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PwC should not be banned from government work but should face ‘significant sanction’, Dutton says

Following the damning interim Senate report into PwC, Dutton says he does not believe the consultancy firm should be cut from all government work, but says a penalty needs to be incurred for the breach of trust:

I think where people have breached a contract, they’ve breached trust, there’s a penalty and the price that should be paid. I don’t know whether that’s the company or whether there’s a solution that the government can provide to it but there’s there’s a significant sanction that’s that’s required – no doubt the government will be looking into that right now.

All of the pollsters at the moment, and credible commentators, believe that it’s either going to fail in October or, best case scenario for the yes case, that gets up 51-49. And in that scenario, our nation is split down the middle.

I think there’s an opportunity to unite our country here instead of divide, and that is that we should proceed with constitutional recognition.

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Labor under fire from crossbench over $1.5bn stake in Middle Arm industrial precinct

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Zali Steggall and David Pocock take aim at government over support of development on Darwin habour which will benefit gas industry

The Albanese government has come under pressure from the crossbench over its $1.5bn stake in a “sustainable” development precinct on Darwin harbour after documents revealed the project would benefit the gas industry.

In question time on Thursday, the independent MP for Warringah, Zali Steggall, asked the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, why his government had “backflipped” and blocked a Senate inquiry into the Middle Arm industrial precinct.

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Labor under pressure to freeze rents as Greens and Coalition back inquiry into housing crisis

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Greens urged to back government’s fund as advocates say housing is needed now and politicians need to ‘start taking action’

The Senate has set up an inquiry into the rental crisis, a process designed by the Greens to pressure the Albanese government to agree to freeze or cap rising rents.

On Monday the Greens voted with the Coalition to delay consideration of Labor’s $10bn Housing Australia Future Fund (Haff) until 16 October, despite pressure from housing groups to pass the bill after the government pledged $2bn of direct funding for social and affordable housing.

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Greens and Coalition unite to refer bill to its own inquiry

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Albanese takes swipes at the Greens

The Midwinter Ball was held overnight. It seems to have been a fairly staid affair but I am still ferreting out info.

Consulting firm PwC engaged in a “calculated” breach of trust by using confidential information to help its clients avoid tax and engaged in a “deliberate cover-up” over many years, a Senate committee has found.

PwC should be “open and honest” by promptly publishing the names and details of its partners and staff involved, the finance and public administration committee has recommended.

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Politicians dress up for Canberra’s night of nights – as it happened

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Lambie agrees with calls to have Iraq invasion decision referred to ICC

Jacqui Lambie says she also agrees with calls to have the leaders of the “coalition of the willing” – the leaders of the UK, the US and Australia when the decision was made to invade Iraq – also referred to the international criminal court. Beyond that, she says Australia has never really examined its role in that decision.

I absolutely agree with and when you go in to Iraq, and you say you have a reason to do that … when you work out three years later that the reason that they were using was not there at all, then we have a massive problem here and you continue to stay in a war that you probably should never have been involved in the first place because you didn’t have that information correct.

Then you have a problem. And quite frankly, politicians when they send us into war, they should be accountable as well.

If Australia – and both governments we’ve seen it from the Liberal party and now from the Labor party – if they’re not prepared to go in and look at senior command … I’m going to force them to.

Because you are not going to chuck all these diggers under the bus and not [front] up.

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Australia politics live: Don Farrell warns delaying housing bill could lead to double dissolution election

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Chalmers to herald record job growth

Treasurer Jim Chalmers will no doubt take a dixer on this today – the Albanese government has “had the strongest job growth in the first year of any new government on record”.

The number of Australians with a job is now more than 14 million for the very first time.

Australia’s participation rate is 66.9% – the highest on record, primarily driven by record high participation for women (62.7%).

The share of women in work is at a record high – with the employment to population ration for women at 60.5%.

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Greens and Coalition put Labor’s housing fund in a deep freeze as bill stalls in Senate

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Labor’s Don Farrell warns the government will regard the delay until October as a ‘failure to pass’ the bill

The $10bn Housing Australia future fund will not pass parliament this week, after the Greens and Coalition teamed up in the Senate to delay the bill until October.

The impasse prompted a blunt crossbench message that the Greens were “hurting people” while Labor’s Dan Farrell called the Greens and Coalition “the axis of evil”.

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Australia needs to reduce emissions to net zero by 2038 to do ‘fair share’ to contain global heating, analysis shows

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Exclusive: Researchers say government’s climate schedule needs to be brought forward by a decade to keep heating to 1.5C

Australia’s fair share of action to give the world a chance of keeping global heating to 1.5C would mean reaching net zero greenhouse gas emissions by the year 2038 – more than a decade ahead of the government’s schedule, according to new scientific analysis.

To stay on track to keep global heating of 1.5C within reach – a goal the climate change and energy minister Chris Bowen has described as vital – Australia’s 2035 target would need to see a cut of 90% on 2005 levels by 2035, the analysis says.

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Greens renew push for rent freeze as housing bodies say ‘time is of the essence’ to pass Labor bill

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Nick McKim to introduce private member’s bill in Senate to promote market intervention

The Greens will continue to push for a national freeze on rents and interest rate rises, declaring there is more the Albanese government can do to address Australia’s housing cost crisis.

Their call comes as the country’s peak housing bodies call for the debate deadlock to be broken and for Labor’s Housing Australia future fund to be passed this week.

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No pets allowed: NSW pushed to act on ‘urgent’ need to make rentals more animal-friendly

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Animal Justice party will put forward an amendment to the government’s bill that further strengthens laws allowing renters to own pets

The New South Wales government is being pushed to make rentals animal-friendly sooner as pet owners find it increasingly hard to find a home and pounds see an influx of renters giving up their pets.

Labor promised in the lead-up to the election that it would make it easier for renters to own pets, with plans to give landlords 21 days to respond to a renter’s request to own a pet. If the landlord refuses within the timeframe, they must put their reason to the yet to be established rental commissioner for a final decision.

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Greens say PM’s $2bn pledge for social housing is not enough for them to back Labor’s future fund

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Max Chandler-Mather says the Greens will keep pushing for a freeze and caps on rent increases

The Greens have claimed victory in securing an additional $2bn for social housing across Australia, but say it is not yet enough to secure their support for the government’s Housing Australia Future Fund.

Instead, the Greens plan to continue to push for federal action on rent caps and freezes in a bid to deal with the country’s housing crisis.

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Factions, power and Daniel Andrews: Victorian Labor prepares for its first state conference in more than three years

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They used to be the setting of some of the party’s most dramatic spats. But the biggest realignment of factional power has occurred behind close doors

It’s November 2019. Tones and I’s Dance Monkey has been on the top of the charts for so long, you’d be forgiven for thinking its actually crawled into your ear and started gnawing on your brain. Richmond are the reigning AFL premiers (again), Covid-19 is yet to exist and the Victorian Labor party is gathering for its annual state conference.

There are some factional tensions on show – members of the CFMEU and other left-wing unions walk out of the new Labor deputy leader Richard Marles’ speech – though it is largely a stage-managed affair that garnered few headlines.

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Labor announces $2bn for ‘thousands’ of new social rental homes and passes motion to make housing a human right

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Prime minister Anthony Albanese also lambasts Greens over Senate stalemate, saying they are ‘happy to promise the world, while organising a petition against every new apartment building’

The federal government has announced it will give $2bn to state and territory governments within weeks for a social housing accelerator fund as part of a last-ditch effort to convince the Greens to not sink Labor’s signature housing policy in the Senate.

“This is new money – right now – for new social housing,” the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, said as he announced the funding at Victorian Labor’s state conference on Saturday.

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Victorian Liberals to meet on senator’s future; Stoker says she’s ‘fine’ – as it happened

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Urgent meeting called for this weekend after allegations raised against the senator in parliament. This blog is now closed

Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe says “at this stage” she will be voting no on the government’s bill for a referendum on the Indigenous voice to parliament.

She’s told ABC Radio her position on the voice is:

At this stage, I’ll be voting no to the bill that is before us to change the constitution, given the government have not come forward with proof on what their interpretation of sovereignty is.

I know that for months now that they continue to say that this does not affect the sovereignty of First Nations people in this country, however, they’ve never provided any evidence.

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Senator removed from party room – as it happened

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Liberal senator David Van is speaking to Sydney radio 2GB about independent senator Lidia Thorpe’s allegations in the Senate yesterday.

Thorpe withdrew the remarks to comply with the Senate’s standing orders but said she would be making a statement on the issue today.

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Australia politics live: Labor blocks Zoe Daniel’s push to ban gambling ads but promises ‘comprehensive’ response to issue

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Tony Burke says Labor committed to strong consumer protections regarding online gambling and does not oppose principle behind independent’s bill

‘A sackable offence’

Here is how that “conversation” played out.

What we want understand now is whether this Labor minister was in fact complicit in politicising this event. That is unforgivable.

Not only that, misleading parliament is a serious offence, a sackable offence and standing by this minister, if she has misled parliament, has consequences.

You were in the Senate yesterday when Katy went through what happened and what I’d like to understand from you is how is it the two years after this event you are trying to make this somehow the problem of the current government when we were not even in government, not four years after this event occurred.

The real issue is the fact that a woman was allegedly sexually assaulted in our workplace and I would really like to focus on that is the main issue here because that is the main issue here, because that is the subject that matters.

What we are finding out now is what the minister knew and why her testimony to the Senate as different from that. There’s a lot of considerations here, I know people are talking about how this information came into the media and certainly the media has a lot of considerations to make.

There has to be respect for the parliament and the court and the law but that information is now out there and journalists need to make decisions about whether it is in the public interest.

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Liberal MPs break ranks to call for inquiry into Brittany Higgins’ leaked text messages

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Andrew Bragg and Bridget Archer make call after Network Ten asks AFP to investigate alleged leaking of evidence in Bruce Lehrmann trial

Liberals Andrew Bragg and Bridget Archer have broken ranks to call for an inquiry into how Brittany Higgins’ text messages were leaked, with Bragg labelling debate in the Senate where the Coalition is pursuing Katy Gallagher “very ugly”.

The pair made the call after the finance minister denied misleading the Senate about her knowledge of Higgins’ allegation before it aired and Network Ten asked the Australian federal police to investigate how Higgins’ texts became public.

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Katy Gallagher denies misleading parliament as she blasts ‘giddy’ reaction to Brittany Higgins texts

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Finance minister tells Senate she has ‘always acted ethically and with basic human decency on all matters to do with Ms Higgins’

Katy Gallagher has denied misleading parliament over her knowledge of Brittany Higgins’ rape allegation, hitting back at the Coalition over their “giddy” reaction to leaked text messages.

The minister for finance and women made a personal explanation to the Senate on Tuesday, after Peter Dutton claimed Labor had used the complaint for “political purposes” and “conspired” to maximise the damage to the Morrison government.

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Labor guarantees minimum $500m each year for housing in bid to win Greens support

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Housing minister says work for social and affordable homes can begin as soon as future fund is established but Greens say it should begin now

Labor has guaranteed a minimum of $500m will be paid out of the Housing Australia Future Fund every year in a last-ditch bid to win Greens support for the bill to help build social and affordable housing.

The housing minister, Julie Collins, wrote to the crossbench on Monday offering a “guaranteed fixed disbursement” of $500m from 2024-25, with a new power for the treasurer and finance minister to increase the amount by regulation, making it a floor not a ceiling.

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Australians’ support for Indigenous voice steady with 60% in favour, Essential poll finds

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Guardian Essential poll finds high level of backing for voice to parliament, despite other polls showing support flagging

Public support for the Indigenous voice to parliament is holding steady and remains high, the latest Guardian Essential poll shows, in contrast with other recent polls suggesting that support is sliding.

The poll of 1,123 voters, published on Tuesday, found 60% of respondents were in favour of the voice, up one point on the previous survey, while 40% were opposed to it.

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