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Court to rule in Pauline Hanson-Mehreen Faruqi case
A federal court judge is ready to rule on whether Pauline Hanson made a racial slur when she told Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi to go back to Pakistan.
Continue reading...Opposition leader, who says Anthony Albanese is ‘obfuscating’ in his answers on Qantas upgrades, says he never personally asked mining magnate
Peter Dutton has admitted his office asked the mining billionaire Gina Rinehart’s company for a lift on a Hancock Prospecting jet to a Bali bombing memorial service, days after he said he had never personally asked Australia’s richest person for help with flights around Australia.
The opposition leader said his office’s request to Hancock came after he claimed the government would not help him get a flight on a special purpose flight, that commercial options were not available, and that a chartered jet would be too expensive. The admission came as Dutton again ridiculed Anthony Albanese for his explanations over the widening Qantas upgrades scandal, accusing the prime minister of being “dishonest”.
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Continue reading...Billionaire wrote to the National Gallery weeks before furore erupted, after a ‘concerned friend’ had told her about the now infamous painting
Gina Rinehart wrote to the National Gallery of Australia a month before the furore erupted about a portrait of her in the gallery, saying a “concerned friend” had brought it to her attention.
The email, released to Guardian Australia under freedom of information laws, was sent on behalf of Rinehart to Nick Mitzevich, the director of the NGA and Ryan Stokes, the chair of the gallery, on 15 April.
Continue reading...Technology figures including Afterpay founders rise up AFR rich list rankings, reflecting ‘changing nature’ of Australian economy
Australia’s rich have continued to grow their fortunes, with the tech and property sectors creating more of our top earners, according to this year’s Australian Financial Review’s rich list.
Gina Rinehart has kept her top spot for the fifth year in a row on the annual list, which reveals the total wealth of the 200 richest people in Australia increased 11% to $624.9bn, even as the country struggled with high inflation and a cost-of-living crisis.
Continue reading...Visitors have been flocking to the National Gallery of Australia amid the controversy over Vincent Namatjira’s painting of Rinehart, director tells hearing
The mining magnate Gina Rinehart gifted a painting of herself to Australia’s National Portrait Gallery, but there appear to be strings attached.
A Senate estimates hearing on Friday heard that the gallery’s board was processing a deed of gift made by Australia’s richest woman – an approved portrait of herself.
Continue reading...Dan Ilic wanted to project Vincent Namitjira’s work after Australia’s richest woman tried to have it removed from the National Gallery
An Australian comedian has dropped his plan to broadcast Vincent Namatjira’s contentious portrait of Gina Rinehart to thousands of tourists and New Yorkers in Times Square.
Dan Ilic told Guardian Australia on Tuesday lunchtime that, after exceeding his crowdfunding target of A$30,000, his stunt would go live in Times Square at 8pm on Friday night.
Continue reading...Swimming Queensland chief Kevin Hasemann says ‘I’ve never been to a gallery’ and furore has ‘evolved into something I could never have imagined’
The head of Swimming Queensland has defended a campaign that saw Olympic champions lobby the National Gallery of Australia to take down portraits of their patron, Gina Rinehart, because they were deemed “offensive”.
An acrylic colour portrait by Vincent Namatjira of Australia’s richest woman was the target of the campaign along with a second black and white portrait by Namatjira in ink and pencil.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Opposition leader travelled at own expense to lavish party, but documents reveal two staff also made the trip to Perth
Peter Dutton’s office claimed nearly $6,000 in public expenses for staff and security to travel to Perth with the opposition leader when he attended Gina Rinehart’s lavish birthday party.
Dutton’s office has said he travelled at his own expense to the party for Australia’s richest woman, which included a horseriding performance, multiple large cakes and onstage pyrotechnics. But travel information obtained under freedom of information shows members of Dutton’s team – which his office said included a staffer and a security detail – claimed travel from Melbourne to Perth and back again on 29 February, the night of the party on the banks of the Swan River.
Continue reading...Federal opposition leader told audience at Roy Hill mine that parents and teachers should instruct children about benefits of mining
Peter Dutton was flown to a party at the Pilbara mine of Australia’s richest person, Gina Rinehart, by another billionaire rich-lister, where he made a speech suggesting parents and teachers talk to children about the positives of the mining sector.
In a speech at Hancock Prospecting’s Roy Hill mine in November last year, Dutton repeatedly thanked those working in resources. He described the work carried out at the mine as a “national treasure”.
Continue reading...The $1.7bn offer for Azure Minerals comes during a rush of dealmaking for the metal used in batteries
Gina Rinehart has teamed up with a Chilean miner to take control of a prized lithium asset in the mineral-rich Pilbara, creating a path for Australia’s richest person to become a major producer of the key metal used in electric vehicle batteries.
Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting and Sociedad Quimica y Minera (SQM) lodged a $1.7bn bid for Azure Minerals, according to a stock exchange announcement on Tuesday.
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The minister for sport and aged care, Anika Wells, says her focus is on people in sport, not the infrastructure, following the announcement Victoria was pulling out of hosting the Commonwealth Games.
Wells has told ABC Radio she was not warned by Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, ahead of time about the decision, and found out along with the rest of the country when he stood up to make the announcement.
I care for our athletes. I think that that dream of competing on home soil for your country is one of the most potent dreams that motivate our high performance athletes and possibly our kids as well to go from from playground to podium.
But given how many events that Australia does already have on the green and gold runway and the World Cups – we’re hosting four Women’s World Cups across the next five years, including the one that is on right now – as long as we have opportunities for people to go from playground to podium.
Governments continue to make decisions that disregard or contradict the Agreement.
… Overall progress against the priority reforms has been slow, uncoordinated and piecemeal.
Here is potential for the proposed Voice to the Australian Parliament (as well as state and territory representative bodies), together with current treaty processes and justice commissions, to strengthen accountability for matters covered by the Agreement.
But regardless of the outcomes of these processes, governments will still be responsible for adopting a fundamentally new way of developing and implementing policies and programs that affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, as they have committed to do in the Agreement.
Continue reading...Senex Energy says extra fuel will be for domestic use but plans are yet to secure state or federal environmental approvals
Gas producer Senex, which is jointly owned by South Korea’s steel giant Posco and Australian billionaire Gina Rinehart, has planned a more than $1bn expansion to its Queensland gasfields with the bulk of the extra fuel apparently to be earmarked for domestic use.
The company, which is seeking federal and state approval for two sites adjacent to its Atlas and Roma North projects in the Surat Basin, made the announcement ahead of a speech by the resources minister, Madeleine King. It still has to clear some state regulatory hurdles, Senex said.
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Continue reading...Complex web of data reveals large swathes of country controlled by small number of billionaires and large companies
Continue reading...Australian PM Scott Morrison received a full-blown welcome from the US president. Katharine Murphy was on hand for an inside account
Scott Morrison has made his first visit to the United States as prime minister. It was a trip that included a close encounter with the unpredictability of the Trump White House, a foreign policy pivot, and a backlash about a lack of climate policy action. Guardian Australia’s political editor, Katharine Murphy, travelled, with the prime minister. Here is what she witnessed:
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