Category Archives: Scott Morrison

Australia’s conservatives praise Trump’s ‘self-belief’ as PM welcomes likely US counterpart

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Anthony Albanese, Peter Dutton, Tony Abbott and Scott Morrison offer congratulations as Adam Bandt criticises ‘dangerous demagogue’ and calls on PM to cancel Aukus

The Australian government is bracing for foreign policy turbulence with Donald Trump’s likely election as US president throwing the defence of Ukraine, Taiwan and combatting the climate crisis into doubt.

Although Kamala Harris is yet to concede defeat in the election, several networks have called the key swing state of Pennsylvania for Trump, and world leaders have moved to acknowledge their new counterpart. The Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, released a statement on Wednesday evening local time to congratulate him “on his election victory”.

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Closing arguments expected to be heard on Monday in Reynolds v Higgins defamation trial

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Linda Reynolds has argued that social media posts by former staffer contained mistruths that damaged her reputation – which Brittany Higgins denies

Closing arguments in a defamation case brought against Brittany Higgins by her former boss the Liberal senator Linda Reynolds are expected to be heard on Monday.

Reynolds is suing Higgins over social media posts made after the former political staffer alleged she had been raped by her colleague Bruce Lehrmann in the then defence minister’s office in Parliament House.

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Claims of government cover-up after Brittany Higgins’ alleged rape ‘completely and utterly false’, Scott Morrison says

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Linda Reynolds suing former staffer over a series of social media posts WA senator believes damaged her reputation

Scott Morrison has defended Linda Reynolds’ handling of Brittany Higgins’ alleged rape and dismissed claims of a government cover-up following the allegations as “completely and utterly false”.

And the former prime minister also told the Western Australian supreme court that he did not remove Reynolds from the defence portfolio because she called Higgins a “lying cow”, but instead because she could not continue in the role due to her mental health.

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IT expert wins long-running freedom of information court battle over robodebt documents

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Justin Warren first lodged request with the then Department of Human Services in January 2017

The federal court has ruled against a decision blocking access to early robodebt documents drafted under the former Coalition government, as part of one man’s long-running fight to shed light on the scheme’s origins.

Justices Geoffrey Kennett, Anna Katzmann and Shaun McElwaine ruled that a December 2022 decision made by the administrative appeals tribunal (AAT) to keep some robodebt documents exempt, including draft costings and new policy proposals, should be set aside due to procedural unfairness and because the AAT had incorrectly agreed with the cabinet confidentiality exemptions Services Australia applied.

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Coalition hopes to exorcise the ghost of Scott Morrison as Cook goes to the polls

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Byelection in the south Sydney seat expected to be won by Liberal candidate Simon Kennedy as AEC warns voter turnout could be low

The Liberal party will be hoping to the exorcise the ghost of Scott Morrison on Saturday as voters in Sydney’s south go to the polls to elect his replacement.

The byelection in the seat of Cook, which comes after Morrison announced his resignation from politics in January, is almost certain to be won by the Liberal candidate Simon Kennedy.

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‘Humility keeps you real’: Scott Morrison tells podcast he was always wary of power

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Former PM, who took on five extra ministries in secret, tells Olympian Sam Fricker that listeners might say ‘Oh, I didn’t think you were that humble’

The former prime minister Scott Morrison has declared himself more into humility than power, detailing in a lengthy post-politics interview how the Aukus submarine deal was sealed and that the Quad regional dialogue was dreamed up over dinner.

Speaking on champion diver Sam Fricker’s Diving Deep podcast – a series of interviews with “high performers” – Morrison reflects on his time in office, the pressures facing prime ministers and how he approached the job.

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Liberals pick management consultant Simon Kennedy for Cook byelection

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The party misses the chance to have a female candidate in the safe seat vacated by former prime minister Scott Morrison

Simon Kennedy will contest Scott Morrison’s seat of Cook for the Liberals in the byelection triggered by the former prime minister’s resignation.

Kennedy, a consultant and the former candidate for Bennelong, won preselection in the first round on Monday night with 158 out of 296 votes, beating the mayor of Sutherland shire, Carmelo Pesce, and war widow and veteran family advocate commissioner, Gwen Cherne.

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Lidia Thorpe backs Mardi Gras over NSW police decision – as it happened

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The trade minister, Don Farrell, is at the World Trade Organisation ministerial conference in Abu Dhabi where he had a sideline chat with China’s commerce minister, Wang Wentao, overnight.

Sideline chats are the unofficial official talks – it’s not considered a bilateral, but both sides have to agree to the talk in order for it to happen. So it’s not just a see them and grab situation between sessions. It’s a little more planned than that.

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Commuter chaos as wild weather leaves half of Melbourne’s train lines offline – as it happened

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Today is the 16th anniversary of Rudd’s national apology

It is National Apology Day, which marks the anniversary of the day the former prime minister Kevin Rudd formally apologised to Indigenous people for the stolen generations.

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Scott Morrison to resign from politics for ‘new challenges in the global corporate sector’

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Former prime minister quitting after 16 years in parliament to also ‘spend more time with my family’

The former prime minister Scott Morrison has announced he will quit parliament at the end of February, triggering a byelection in his seat of Cook.

In a statement on social media on Tuesday, Morrison said he had decided “to take on new challenges in the global corporate sector and spend more time with my family”.

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Brittany Higgins told senior colleague she remembered Bruce Lehrmann on top of her, defamation trial hears

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Linda Reynolds’ then chief of staff Fiona Brown was first to interview pair after alleged rape, which Lehrmann has always denied

Former Liberal staffer Fiona Brown was dramatically compelled to give evidence in Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation trial on Monday on the proviso the federal court’s live stream was disabled while she was in the witness box.

Brown was Senator Linda Reynolds’ chief of staff at the time Brittany Higgins claims Lehrmann raped her on the ministerial couch, and was the first person to interview both of them. She took contemporaneous notes.

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Politics live: cyber chief takes leave as defence department announces recall over ‘workplace matter’

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Follow the day’s news live

And here is the standard of some of the “debate” among senior parliamentarians.

Meanwhile, Australia’s sense of social cohesion is at its lowest recorded ebb.

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Former PMs pour cold water on claims Anthony Pratt told them Trump’s US submarine secrets

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A US news report claimed Donald Trump discussed secret US naval capabilities with the billionaire Australian businessman

It was a revelation that could have had explosive ramifications.

US news outlet ABC News reported that an “excited” Donald Trump allegedly discussed top-secret details of US nuclear submarines with the Australian billionaire Anthony Pratt, who later allegedly shared the information with at least 45 people, including “three former Australian prime ministers”.

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Barnaby Joyce-backed push to strike net zero emissions target from Nationals policy fails

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Amended motion calls on party to ‘take a practical approach to lowering carbon emissions as a substantive move to nuclear power is made’

A Barnaby Joyce-backed push to strip net zero from the Nationals’ policy platform has effectively been defeated as the former leader’s shadow cabinet position is brought into question.

Joyce backed a motion to strip net zero emissions by 2050 from the party platform at its national conference in Canberra on Saturday.

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Facility accused of exorcisms and gay conversion practices applied for funding a month after Morrison announced it

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Freedom of information documents show officials scrambling for information after then PM announced $4m for Esther Foundation

The Esther Foundation – a rehabilitation facility accused of performing exorcisms and gay conversions – applied for “promised funding” a month after the funding had been announced.

Freedom of information documents show the health department rushing to get information after the then prime minister, Scott Morrison, announced $4m for the group in the lead-up to the 2019 election.

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Scott Morrison a ‘bottomless well of self-pity’ with no ‘mercy’ for robodebt’s real victims, Bill Shorten says

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Minister for government services says ‘real victims are all those Australians who lost trust in government’ due to scheme

Bill Shorten has accused Scott Morrison of being “a bottomless well of self-pity” with “not a drop of mercy for all of the real victims of robodebt”.

That outburst in question time followed the former prime minister’s defence of his involvement of the scheme in parliament on Monday, claiming Labor was pursuing a campaign of “political lynching” against him.

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Early robodebt critics outraged by how long Coalition persisted with unlawful scheme

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Shocking to learn politicians and public servants ‘were basically just lying to us’, Andrew Wilkie says

Early critics of robodebt have said they are shocked, appalled and outraged by how long the Coalition government persisted with the unlawful scheme.

The independent MP Andrew Wilkie and former the administrative appeals tribunal member Terry Carney were responding to the release of the royal commission report on Friday.

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Scott Morrison rejects robodebt royal commission findings but won’t say if he was referred for prosecution

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Anthony Albanese highlights commission’s ‘extraordinary’ conclusion that former PM’s evidence was ‘untrue’

Scott Morrison has rejected the robodebt royal commission’s findings but not said whether he has been referred for further civil or criminal actions, in contrast to claims from former Coalition ministers Christian Porter, Alan Tudge and Stuart Robert ruling themselves out.

In a statement on Friday, the former prime minister said he “completely” rejects adverse findings, claiming they were “wrong, unsubstantiated and contradicted by clear documentary evidence presented to the commission”.

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‘Crude and cruel’ scheme: robodebt royal commission report recommends civil and criminal prosecutions

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Recommendation of referrals included in ‘sealed chapter’ of 1,000-page report with findings handed to federal government and released publicly

The “crude and cruel” robodebt scheme has resulted in a recommendation that unnamed individuals be referred for civil and criminal prosecutions, the royal commission has revealed.

The commissioner, Catherine Holmes, submitted her report to the government on Friday and revealed it contained a “sealed chapter” that recommended referrals of individuals for what it labelled a “costly failure of public administration”. The report said robodebt was “neither fair nor legal”.

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The robodebt royal commission revealed the worst of ‘welfare cop’ politics. But what happens next is up to us all

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Catherine Holmes’ report is damning for the Coalition and the public service, yet the reckoning she advocates will take more than policy change

Robodebt royal commissioner Catherine Holmes’ report is damning for the Coalition and former ministers, including Scott Morrison, Alan Tudge and Stuart Robert.

And it is disastrous for the public service – certain individuals within it and the entity as a whole; or what some might call the bureaucracy’s soul, if such a thing can exist.

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