Question time chaos – as it happened

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Tasmanian hospitals experiencing significant demand, public asked to reconsider attending

Tasmanians are being urged to stay away from the state’s two main hospitals unless it’s an emergency as they face “significant demand”.

The hospitals are closely managing elective surgery activity to maintain access for emergency demand. This includes working with private hospitals to access contracted bed capacity and elective surgery.”

I think the Qantas board has to seriously consider some of the decisions that they have been making. I mean, not for nothing, you’re in front of the competition watchdog for what is alleged to be quite egregious behaviour.

You have also sought to, as I said, keep on your balance sheet half a billion dollars of your customers’ money rather than giving it back in the middle of a cost of living crisis. (The flight credits)

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Labor thrashes out Aukus position at party conference amid dissent from MP and unions

Heckling, outrage and claims of ‘appeasement’ as stage-managed debate at ALP event gives way to genuine disagreement

There was a personal defence from Anthony Albanese. Aukus supporters lobbed claims of “appeasement” at its critics, which were angrily rejected by a Labor MP and leftwing unions. But in the end, Labor finally thrashed out its position on the Aukus nuclear-submarine acquisition.

Late on Friday morning, the deputy prime minister, Richard Marles, and the defence industry minister, Pat Conroy, sought to head off a party conference showdown, moving a 32-paragraph statement that argued spending $368bn on nuclear submarines would enhance Australia’s national security.

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Australia’s plan for long-range missiles would not deter aggressors without support from US

Military thinktank says plan to deploy ‘yet to be acquired’ weapons would ‘risk further escalation for no prospect of gain’

Australia’s push to develop and deploy its own missiles lacks credibility as a means to deter conflict unless backed up by US support, a new paper warns.

The report, published by the Australian Army Research Centre, points to the Australian government’s desire to increase the country’s “self-reliance”.

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Richard Marles moves to head off Labor conference fight over Aukus submarines

Deputy PM will offer reassurances on nuclear non-proliferation and waste amid grassroots dissent over the program

The Albanese government will stare down union and grassroots Labor dissent against the Aukus nuclear-submarine acquisition, offering reassurances about non-proliferation and waste but rejecting hostile motions at the party’s national conference.

The deputy prime minister and defence minister, Richard Marles, and the defence industry minister, Pat Conroy, will move a 32-paragraph statement arguing the submarines are important to deter “aggression” and committing to deliver “well paid union jobs”.

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Australia news live: Qantas supports voice with Yes23 logos on three planes; Bendigo Bank reports record earnings

EY criticised for lack of disclosure on Santos work during parliamentary inquiry. Follow today’s live news updates

Question of whether vape ban to be legislated by commonwealth or states, Butler says

Mark Butler was also asked about the government’s plan to ban all disposable vape products. He said they are working on it “furiously” with eight other jurisdictions for a uniform approach, but haven’t got a set timeframe yet.

… which will be, you know, difficult, complex and probably take some time.

We know that there will be a furious response by the industry – there has been every time we tried to regulate nicotine or tobacco – so we want to make sure that we get this right.

And one of the real problems is we don’t know how much nicotine. This black market that’s flourished [is] cynically targeted at kids.

You can tell that through the fact that they’re bubblegum flavoured and they’ve got pink unicorns on them. It’s not as if those sorts of things are targeted at the middle-aged hardened smoker.

In addition to that … small rural pharmacies, which is the vast bulk of them, will receive 100% of the reduction in dispensing income – that’s over and above the additional investment we’re making in all pharmacies across the country – which will amount … to hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding from taxpayers through the course of this four-year period.

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Julian Assange: US rejects Australia’s calls to end pursuit of WikiLeaks founder during Ausmin talks

Ministers’ meeting focused on military cooperation and agreed to increase ‘tempo’ of US nuclear-powered submarine visits to Australia as part of Aukus pact

The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has pushed back at the Australian government’s calls to end the pursuit of Julian Assange, insisting that the WikiLeaks founder is alleged to have “risked very serious harm to our national security”.

After high-level talks in Brisbane largely focused on military cooperation, Blinken confirmed that the Australian government had raised the case with the US on multiple occasions, and said he understood “the concerns and views of Australians”.

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Australian military helicopter crash: four feared dead as search and rescue teams discover aircraft debris

Four people were on board the Australian army helicopter when it went down at about 10.30pm on Friday in Whitsundays

Four pilots are feared dead after an Australian army helicopter crashed into water off Hamilton Island in Queensland on Friday night, with search and rescue teams discovering aircraft debris.

As the search continues, the Australian Defence Force has announced a temporary pause on the use of MRH90 helicopters as a precaution.

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Australia news live: voice support strong in Victoria because state ‘about ideology not common sense’, Nampijinpa Price says

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No campaign ‘offers no solutions and no vision’: young Indigenous leaders

The youth declaration urged Australians to educate themselves on the change, claiming “the no campaign offers no solutions and no vision for our young people’s futures, or our families and communities”.

We are excited that our Uluru Youth Dialogue, as the leading and only youth-led campaign, will be at the forefront of this referendum working alongside the senior leaders of the Uluru Dialogue.

These statistics are important. They paint a picture of a media debate that has shut out young people and their voices. Especially the voices of First Nations young people.

It is our future. Young people are crucial to this movement. We stand on the shoulders of our ancestors, carrying forward the spirit and legacies of warriors before us.

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Australia to gain priority access to US military equipment under Washington proposal

Aukus requests would be handled faster than almost all applications ‘other than from Taiwan and Ukraine’

Australian requests for US military equipment would be handled faster than almost all applications “other than from Taiwan and Ukraine” under a proposal before the US Senate.

The Australian government has long viewed the complex web of US export controls as a potential barrier to the Aukus security partnership.

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News live updates: hundreds charged after NSW domestic violence operation; South Australia moves to ban no cause evictions

Four-day operation results in 1,107 domestic violence charges being laid against 592 people. Follow live

‘Textbook fiscal policy’ from Labor about getting economy ‘in nick’

Chalmers is asked whether it’s possible to control inflation without the unemployment rate growing further.

Remains to be seen.

We’ve got the budget in better nick, not the expense of the economy but in addition, and cost-of-living help is targeted in out-of-pocket health costs, electricity, rent and some particular pressure points. We found $40 billion of savings over two budgets compared to zero in savings in the last Liberal budget.

So all of those things are about get getting the economy in nick at the same time we provide help for people to get through through a difficult period.

The point that Michele Bullock was making in that speech, which, again, I think is relatively uncontroversial, is that as the Reserve Bank forecast and the treasury forecasts, have inflation moderating in coming months, they have a tick-up in unemployment. I’ve been upfront. The challenges in the economy are unsubstantial, globally and domestically, I think the slow-down is expected in the forecasts to be significant. That will have implications for the unemployment rate, which is the point that Michele Bullock was making.

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‘A lethargic result’: Labor says it is ridiculous for Peter Dutton to take heart from Fadden byelection win

Deputy prime minister Richard Marles says byelection swing to LNP was ‘half the average swing you would expect against a sitting government’

Senior members of the Albanese government insist they are not troubled by Labor’s loss in the Fadden byelection, as they seek to reassure Australians their main focus is on the cost-of-living crisis.

The Liberal National party retained the safe Gold Coast seat on Saturday in a byelection caused by the resignation of former minister Stuart Robert. There was a swing of about 2.4% to the LNP after preferences.

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Media must not confuse voters about Indigenous support for voice, Anthony Albanese says

PM reels off names of prominent yes campaigners backing ‘a moment of national unity’

Anthony Albanese has suggested the media has a “responsibility” not to confuse voters about support for the voice among First Nations people, arguing that Indigenous critics are outnumbered by supporters.

The prime minister told ABC Coffs Coast radio that Indigenous leaders have been campaigning for the voice “for a long period of time” as their preferred model of constitutional recognition.

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Paul Keating sent explosive email to Labor cabinet two hours before attack on Aukus, FOI documents reveal

Exclusive: Former PM directly warned cabinet ministers over China, the Pacific and US hegemony prior to his pointed speech at the National Press Club

At 10.45am on Wednesday 15 March, an explosive email landed in the inboxes of all of Anthony Albanese’s cabinet ministers.

“Dear cabinet colleagues,” wrote Paul Keating, Labor luminary turned chief Aukus critic.

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Richard Marles meets Gen Li Shangfu, as Chinese defence minister refuses formal meeting with US counterpart

Defence minister is also believed to have raised concerns about the ongoing detention of Australian citizens and human rights issues

Australian defence minister Richard Marles has met his Chinese counterpart and called for “safe and professional interactions” between military planes and ships in the Indo-Pacific region.

Marles is also believed to have raised concerns about the ongoing detention of Australian citizens and human rights issues during talks with China’s defence minister, Gen Li Shangfu, at a regional security summit in Singapore.

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Australia news live: Lidia Thorpe to lodge human rights complaint alleging racist treatment from the Greens

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Sydney man arrested for alleged major heroin smuggling operation after deportation

A Sydney man has been charged for allegedly orchestrating one of the biggest heroin imports in recent history after being deported from Türkiye, the Australian Federal Police has said.

Police will allege the man has been based in a number of countries since March 2020 and is responsible for organising the importation of 347.9kg of heroin into Sydney in December 2020, while he was based in Thailand. It will also be alleged this man has extensive links to transnational organised crime groups, which helped facilitate this importation.

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MP questions referendum wording – as it happened

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Quad still a priority, White House says

Despite the postponement of Joe Biden’s visit, the White House says that partnerships like the Quad remain a priority.

Revitalizing and reinvigorating our alliances and advancing partnerships like the Quad remains a key priority for the President. This is vital to our ability to advance our foreign policy goals and better promote global stability and prosperity. We look forward to finding other ways to engage with Australia, the Quad, Papua New Guinea and the leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum in the coming year.

I think he will obviously be working very hard for this not to happen. We’ve danced this dance before, as the phrase goes …

I think we’ll get to a good place and I think that’s why he’s wanting to stay there, to focus on just that.

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Singapore backs Aukus and says Australia could play ‘bigger role’ in regional security

South-east Asia must not become ‘an arena for proxy wars’, the nation state’s foreign minister said

Singapore has strongly backed the Aukus defence pact, with ministers saying they trust Australia to play a bigger role in regional security and don’t want south-east Asia to become “an arena for proxy wars”.

After talks with Australian counterparts in Canberra on Monday, Singaporean ministers reaffirmed Australia’s nuclear-powered submarines would be welcome to visit once in service.

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Small businesses offered tax breaks for going green in federal budget – as it happened

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Marles on Australians caught in Sudan conflict

Asked about Australians caught in Sudan and the conflict there, Richard Marles says “there are still options out of Port Sudan which is on the Red Sea, which is, I think it’s about 800km out of Khartoum” to leave “what is obviously a deteriorating situation”:

There are ferries there and there may be other options coming out of that. I mean, the important thing is this – Australians in Sudan, and there do remain a number of Australians in Sudan, really need to make sure that they register.

We will continue to work with friends and allies and do everything that we can within our power to provide options for Australians who want to leave. Because we understand how difficult this situation is now.

Ultimately, our ambition is to establish a production line with companies in this country which would provide for the manufacture of those long-range strike missiles and doing as much of that as possible in the next couple of years. We hope that we can begin with the assembly of the strike missiles that go in the Himars system. But we want to build on that so that we’re actually manufacturing the full suite of these weapons in Australia.

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Reliance on Australia’s military during natural disasters comes at a cost, senator says

Climate change and humanitarian crisis are calling on too many ADF resources which should be reserved for conflict, Tony Sheldon says

Australia needs to rethink how it uses its defence force for natural disasters, reserving its troops for conflict and limiting their deployment except for in the most extreme events, according to the government’s special envoy for disaster recovery, senator Tony Sheldon.

After the release of the defence strategic review on Monday, the senator also said the government should help locals respond to emergencies before considering creating a new civilian agency.

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The defence review says Australia is at little risk of a land invasion – but that’s not where the threats end

Cyber-warfare and the ‘missile age’ have radically reduced Australia’s geographical defensive benefits, report argues

Australia’s defence strategic review paints an alarming picture of the “radically different” security outlook in the Indo-Pacific, including the risk of “major conflict in the region that directly threatens our national interest”.

But it is important to be very clear about what Monday’s document does and doesn’t say about the threats Australia faces.

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