Category Archives: Scott Morrison

Australia Covid live news update: Victoria records 1,838 cases, five deaths; NSW reports 646 cases, 11 deaths; restrictions eased in south-east Qld, Townsville

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Greg Hunt says Australia’s vaccination rate has hit 81.5% first dose and 60.2% second dose; Victorian premier Daniel Andrews is being investigated for not wearing a mask in public; Victoria reports record high number of new Covid cases; NSW records 646 local cases, 11 deaths three days ahead of reopening; Dr Kerry Chant says a new strain of Delta is circulating in Sydney; restrictions eased in Townsville and south-east Queensland; 44 new cases in New Zealand. Follow all the day’s news live

So, today is the final Friday under (this) lockdown in NSW, with the state due to emerge from stay-at-home orders on Monday.

But you’d be forgiven for losing track of what you can and can’t do once lockdown is lifted, considering the changes made and many, many annoucements.

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Australia Covid live news update: FTA negotiations with Europe postponed after submarine snub; national cabinet meeting

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Trade negotiations with Europe postponed; Scott Morrison expected to discuss international travel rules; outbreak in Newcastle maternity ward grows. Follow all the latest news

Victoria’s case numbers are delayed:

No clue if this is a good sign or not. Here’s hoping.

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‘Someone lied’: French foreign minister accuses Australia of submarine betrayal in latest broadside

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Jean-Yves Le Drian says Australia reassured France everything was fine right up to the day the Aukus pact was announced

France has accused Australia of lying shortly before Canberra cancelled a major submarine contract, with the French foreign minister declaring “someone lied”.

With no sign of any imminent easing of tensions between the two countries, Jean-Yves Le Drian told a parliamentary hearing that Australia had never expressed doubts about the €56bn (A$90bn) submarine contract or the strategic Indo-Pacific pact before breaking the contract.

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France cool on efforts by Australia to repair Aukus rift damage

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Élysée says future talks must have substance after Canberra’s decision to cancel submarine contract

France has said any future talks between Emmanuel Macron and the Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, over the fallout from Canberra’s decision to tear up a €56bn (£48bn) submarine deal will have to be “seriously prepared” and have “substance”.

The Élysée Palace has denied it is refusing to take Morrison’s calls, saying the president is “always available to talk on the phone”, but has admitted it is not in any hurry to resume contact with Canberra.

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Over 50% of Australians over 16 are fully vaccinated; Berejiklian reopening plans coming ‘next week’ – as it happened

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All the day’s news, as it happened. This blog has now closed

Enjoy your evening, all, and thanks for having me! Here’s just a taste of what we learned today:

In case you missed this earlier (I did) please enjoy this piece by Arwa Mahdawi on cancel culture, critical race theory and ... sexy seahorses.

It’s very easy to laugh at a bunch of rightwing moms clutching their pearls over sexy seahorses – but there’s nothing funny about the systemic, organised way in which conservatives are trying to rewrite history and restrict freedom of speech.

Related: Laugh at the outrage over ‘sexy seahorses’ – but there’s nothing funny about conservatives trying to rewrite history | Arwa Mahdawi

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Macron yet to take call from Australia’s Scott Morrison over sub snub

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Australian PM hopes to speak with French president ‘when the time is right and the opportunity presents’

French president Emmanuel Macron has not yet taken a call from Scott Morrison amid continuing fury in Paris over the torn up submarine deal.

Morrison, the Australian prime minister, said he hoped to speak with Macron “when the time is right and when the opportunity presents” but he understood “the hurt and the disappointment” felt by France over the cancellation of the $90bn arrangement.

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‘We felt fooled’: France still furious after Australia scraps $90bn submarine deal

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‘Maybe we’re not friends,’ recalled ambassador says, claiming Scott Morrison ‘kept us in the dark intentionally’

French anger at the Morrison government’s decision to scrap its $90bn submarine program with France continues to boil over, with the country’s recalled ambassador saying it felt “fooled” by the announcement.

Jean-Pierre Thebault was ordered back to Paris in the wake of the Aukus announcement, which will see Australia enter into a strategic “forever partnership” with the US and the UK.

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‘We thought we were mates’: French ambassador laments subterfuge en route to Sydney airport

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Jean-Pierre Thebault was angry about Aukus as he left Australia on Saturday night, saying: ‘It’s like in a couple, you know, when you commit … you don’t run away’

The French ambassador to Australia was in a car heading to Sydney airport for an urgent flight back home when he revealed he was “sad like any decent person would be”.

Jean-Pierre Thebault left Australia on Saturday night after Australia’s $90bn submarine deal with France was scrapped late last week, causing an unexpected rupture in the relationship between two friendly countries.

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France recalls ambassadors to US and Australia after Aukus pact

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First time France has recalled a US ambassador in alliance dating back to American revolution

France has recalled its ambassadors to the US and Australia for consultations sparked by the “exceptional seriousness” of Canberra’s surprise decision to cancel an order for French-built submarines and its security pact with Washington and London.

The French foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, said the order to bring the ambassadors back to Paris “immediately” was made at the request of the French president, Emmanuel Macron.

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New Doherty modelling advises ‘medium’ Covid restrictions until Australia reaches 80% vaccination

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Exclusive: Summary of sensitivity analysis to be presented at national cabinet says pandemic will continue to be ‘a fire fought on multiple fronts’

New Doherty Institute modelling presented to national cabinet warns that maintaining “medium” public health and social measures would be “prudent” until Australia reaches 80% vaccination if caseloads are high – with “medium” measures previously defined as including stay-at-home orders except for work, study and other essential purposes.

The institute – which conducted the modelling informing Australia’s four-phase reopening plan – has updated its work after a dispute erupted within the federation about whether or not it was safe to ease restrictions once 70% of Australians over the age of 16 were vaccinated.

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Aukus pact: UK and US battle to contain international backlash

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Nuclear submarine deal with Australia draws criticism from allies and China amid fears of conflict

Britain and the US are battling to contain an international backlash over a nuclear submarine pact struck with Australia amid concerns that the alliance could provoke China and prompt conflict in the Pacific.

Boris Johnson told MPs that the Aukus defence agreement was “not intended to be adversarial” to China. But Beijing accused the three countries of adopting a “cold war mentality” and warned they would harm their own interests unless it was dropped.

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Diplomacy dialled up to 11: Australia saddles up with US as Indo-Pacific heads for cold war | Katharine Murphy

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Australia didn’t announce the ‘forever partnership’ while Donald Trump was in the White House. What happens if he returns?

Ever flexible, ever the pragmatist, Scott Morrison started thinking about his new “forever partnership” with the United States and Britain 18 months ago while Australia was still tied to a $90bn contract with France to build submarines.

Australia looked to America because of a practical consideration. If the Morrison government was going to jettison the troubled French proposal, and countenance the acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines, the US possessed the technology that would suit Australia’s purposes.

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‘They couldn’t come into our internal waters’: Ardern responds to Aukus submarine deal – video

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New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern says her country was ‘not approached’ to be part of a new security pact between Australia, the UK and US. ‘Nor would I expect us to be,’ she adds. ‘The anchor of this arrangement are nuclear-powered submarines and it will be very clear to all New Zealanders and to Australia why New Zealand would not wish to be a part of that project.' Since the mid-1980s, New Zealand has had a strict policy keeping its territorial sea, land and airspace as nuclear-free zones 

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‘That fella down under’: Joe Biden forgets Scott Morrison’s name during historic pact announcement

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US president calls Australian prime minister ‘that fella down under’ at press conference for new trilateral security partnership

Scott Morrison has been called many things, but “that fella down under” may be the one that stays with the Australian prime minister the longest.

The blunder came as the US president, Joe Biden, announced a trilateral security partnership with Britain and Australia, called Aukus. It will see the US share nuclear technology that will help Australia create a multibillion-dollar fleet of nuclear-powered submarines.

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Watch in full: Biden, Johnson and Morrison announce Aukus and nuclear-powered submarine deal – video

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The US, the UK and Australia have announced they are setting up a trilateral security partnership aimed at confronting China, which will include helping Australia to build nuclear-powered submarines. US President Joe Biden, UK prime minister Boris Johnson and Australian prime minister Scott Morrison announced the deal together virtually

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Australia Covid updates live: NSW due to hit single dose target; Singapore Airlines cancelling dozens of international flights

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Wednesday: NSW is on track to hit its 80% single dose vaccinations today, while Victoria is heading towards 70% by the end of the week – follow updates live

Hmmmmm it’s 8.56am and no Victorian Covid-19 numbers yet. Not happy Jan.

Federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg says businesses should be free to deny entry to people based on vaccination status.

He spoke with Nine Network a short time ago:

They control their premises. If they want to stop someone coming in based on the fact they’re not vaccinated then that is their right to do so.

Not only are they protecting their customers but they’re also making for a safer workplace for their staff. We’ve been very consistent on that.

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In hindsight there was no foresight: how Australia bungled its Pfizer Covid deal

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Missed opportunities, gaps in correspondence and a failure to plan ahead. If this was a vaccine race, did Australia fall at the first hurdle?

On 30 June 2020, Victoria’s Covid cases were doubling. Within a week the state would be in its second lockdown.

That same day Pfizer wrote to the federal health minister, Greg Hunt, with a clear sense of urgency, wanting to discuss a vaccination deal.

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Australia Covid live news update: NSW records 1,405 new cases; Berejiklian unveils roadmap out of lockdown; Victoria records 324 cases; ACT records 15

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NSW freedoms come into effect the Monday after 70% over-16 vaccination is achieved; state confirms five more deaths; new case in Qld quarantine; 107 of Victoria’s new cases linked to known outbreaks – follow the latest updates live

An update on another story I did this week regarding those Craig Kelly text messages everyone has been getting.

We know that under the current legislative situation, there’s nothing preventing political parties like the United Australia Party from sending out those text messages, and people cannot unsubscribe from them.

The carriage of messages is generally a commercial matter for telecommunications providers, except in circumstances where there may be offences against the laws of the commonwealth or states or territories.

Both the Telecommunications Act 1997 and Spam Act 2003 contain provisions about implied freedom of political communications. These provisions set out that the acts or parts of them do not apply to the extent they would infringe on any constitutional doctrine of implied freedom of political communication.

There’s a press conference with the PM at 1.40pm AEST.

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Australia Covid live update: NSW hospitals brace for cases surge, Scott Morrison faces questions over Father’s Day travel exemption

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Gladys Berejiklian under pressure over modelling showing state’s health system to be ‘overwhelmed’ by Covid cases; rapid antigen tests approved for use at home. Follow the latest updates live

The New South Wales government has set a target of zero extinctions of native wildlife in the state’s national parks estate, the first time an Australian government has set the goal.

The environment minister, Matt Kean, said the target, which will apply to all parklands in NSW, was a response to the continued decline of threatened plants and animals and Australia’s status as the country with the highest rate of mammal extinctions.

Related: Zero extinction target for NSW national parks welcomed by environment groups

And the Victorian Liberal’s deputy position is filled, with member for Caufield, David Southwick, scoring the gig.

New VICLib team: Guy and deputy David Southwick. #springst

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Scott Morrison unveils ‘dose swap’ deal with UK to provide extra 4m Pfizer vaccines

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Prime minister says deal will boost supplies in September as 12-to-15-year-olds join vaccination rollout

Australia’s vaccine program has received a boost, with a doubling of the number of Pfizer vaccines flowing into the country, after a “dose swap” deal was secured with the UK.

The prime minister, Scott Morrison, says the deal will “break the back” of the September supply issues, with his UK counterpart, Boris Johnson, agreeing to send 4m Pfizer doses to Australia, which will be distributed to the states and territories on a per capita basis.

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