What we learned, 21 February 2023
And that’s where we’ll leave you this evening. Thank you so much for your company. Here’s a wrap of the main events today:
• The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, confirmed the voice to parliament referendum will be held between October and December, most likely early October.
• Greens leader, Adam Bandt, has savaged the Labor government for approving a large new gas development in Queensland, claiming the decision was “straight out of [Scott] Morrison’s playbook”.
• Australian security agencies know China is carrying out “blatant” influence operations despite the lack of listings on the nation’s transparency register, the former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull told an inquiry.
• A former frontline Centrelink worker has hit out at former senior officials who have appeared at the royal commission into robodebt, telling the inquiry she “can’t forget” what staff were “forced” to do victims of the program.
• The Fair Work Commission ruled that the 15% pay rise for aged care workers needs to be delivered all in one hit from July this year, rather than splitting the increase over two years as the government had planned.
• The world’s biggest miner, BHP, will sell two more Australian coalmines as part of an ongoing review of its operations.
• Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO, released a report showing future increases in the strength of El Niño may accelerate the irreversible melting of ice shelves and ice sheets in Antarctica.
• The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, announced that Labor will tighten metadata retention laws in line with recommendations from the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security.
• Activists spray-painted the Woodside Energy logo on to the front doors of the WA parliament this morning to protest the government’s continued investment in fossil fuels.
Until tomorrow!
Updated
Victorian Liberal MP Moira Deeming’s first speech to parliament condemned
Liberal MP Moira Deeming has given her inaugural speech to Victoria’s parliament, in which she attacked gender affirmation practices for trans people and the rights of sex workers to care for their children, resulting in her being shunned by other members of parliament, one of whom described her views as “utterly vile”.
Deeming, a former teacher who represents the western metropolitan region, said the three areas of law she planned to focus on during her term were “sex-based rights”, “children in brothels” and “transgender affirmation practices on minors”.
She claimed “women and girls are suffering” in Victoria because the “government cannot or will not define what a female is”:
As a result, every woman and every girl in Victoria has lost the right to enjoy female-only sport, female-only change rooms and countless other female-only activities. As a result, what most women would consider to be sexual harassment and indecent exposure is now legal in Victoria.
Deeming also claimed state laws allowing children under 18 months on sex work premises for caring purposes would “inevitably” result in Victoria becoming “the child rape capital of Australia”.
Deeming also attacked the state’s ban on gay conversion practices, claiming the ban “made it illegal for parents and clinicians of gender dysphoric children to seek out any treatments at all, no matter how reasonable, if they’re designed to naturally alleviate the dysphoric feelings and leave the child’s body intact”.
Victoria’s 2021 ban on conversion practices provides safety for people with diverse sexualities and gender expression. Anyone found trying to suppress or change another person’s sexuality or gender identity faces up to 10 years’ jail or fines of almost $10,000 if it can be proved beyond reasonable doubt that their actions caused serious injury.
Some religious, medical and legal groups objected to the bill, but it was welcomed by LGBTIQ+ groups and is being used by NSW independent MP Alex Greenwich as the model for legislation he plans to introduce following the March state election.
Deeming’s comments are in line with those reported by the Guardian at the time of her preselection. At the time, then opposition leader, Matthew Guy, suggested her comments represented her past views rather than her current positions.
Greens leader, Samantha Ratnam, took to Twitter to describe Deeming’s views as “utterly vile”, while Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell did not partake in the parliamentary tradition of shaking her hand after the speech.
Labor MP and equality minister Harriet Shing also tweeted her support for the LGBTIQ+ community in the wake of the speech:
Today and every day I’m grateful for the resilience, respect, kindness, wisdom, & courage of everyone across our wonderful LGBTIQ+ communities.
— Harriet Shing MP (@ShingvWorld) February 21, 2023
Our safety, well-being, identities, and dignity matter.
Our stories, pain, & Pride all matter.
And our equality will always matter. pic.twitter.com/tzTLoW48H2
Updated
‘I can’t forget’: former frontline Centrelink worker blasts senior officials at robodebt royal commission
A former frontline Centrelink worker has hit out at former senior officials who have appeared at the royal commission into robodebt, telling the inquiry she “can’t forget” what staff were “forced” to do victims of the program.
Jeannie-Marie Blake, who has worked at the Department of Human Services (now Services Australia) for more than two decades, told the inquiry on Tuesday she and her colleagues had raised concerns about the robodebt scheme from its inception in 2015 but those warnings were ignored.
Blake, who is still employed by the agency, became emotional when she was asked why she chose to give evidence to the commission. She said:
All the management … that I’ve sat and listened to through this, who can’t remember, can’t recall, can’t recollect, ‘couldn’t put your mind to it’. I can’t forget. And I know there are many more staff like me, who can’t forget what happened and what we were forced to deliver to customers.
Blake continued:
We [staff] deserve a voice in this room. As much as every manager you’ve heard, everyone who can give you a reason on how they didn’t know … why they didn’t know … I may be the only person that wants to stand here and say I work for Services Australia and I have been proud to work for Services Australia … Customers have a right to know they were not crazy. Staff felt they were going crazy, the pressure that staff felt to do it.
Blake said after Scott Morrison’s “glib apology” to victims of the scheme in 2020, she also suggested staff should receive an apology.
She said:
My manager took it to the management team and she came back and told me I wasn’t entitled to an apology because I was a public servant being paid.
Blake’s evidence follows the testimony of another frontline worker, whose complaints to the head of the department, Kathryn Campbell, were not acted on.
The commission continues.
Updated
Government must deliver full 15% pay rise to aged care workers in July
The Fair Work Commission has ruled that the 15% pay rises for aged care workers need to be delivered all in one hit from July this year, rather than splitting the increase over two years as the federal Labor government had planned.
In a decision published this afternoon, the FWC said the 15% interim increase it had previously ruled on should “take effect from 30 June 2023”.
The pay rise is also going to apply to more people working in aged care than previously decided – the Health Services Union and others are pleased that the pay rise has also been extended to include personal care workers, recreational activity officers and chefs.
There is still another phase of the FWC decision to come, and that 15% increase may be upped even further – unions have been asking for a total 25% wage increase. The government will now consider whether it will meet the FWC’s ruling and deliver the pay rise all at once.
HSU president Gerard Hayes had previously blasted the government for planning to stretch the pay rise over two years, with 10% this year and another 5% next year, which ministers had blamed on financial pressures in the budget. Unions had warned that delaying the pay rise would see more workers dessert the under-pressure sector.
Hayes:
This is an important step forward. To prevent aged care from collapsing every link in the chain must be strengthened. There’s no point lifting wages for direct care workers if large chunks of the workforce miss out... we will continue to push to have the entire aged care workforce covered.
We also welcome the Fair Work Commission’s decision to apply this 15% wage rise from June 30 which will accelerate the delivery of higher wages and help stave off the collapse of the workforce.
Aged care minister Anika Wells has been approached for comment.
Updated
Rupert Murdoch’s South Australian tabloid, the Advertiser, appears to have largely boycotted the Adelaide Fringe festival after a sponsorship arrangement between Australia’s biggest arts festival and its hometown paper broke down.
Local art critics who review for the masthead claim an editor at the Advertiser contacted them individually and said “it’s all off; you’re not reviewing anything this year”, breaking a long tradition of support between the Fringe and the Advertiser.
The Fringe director, Heather Croall, has confirmed the festival has not placed any advertising with the Advertiser for the first time in recent years and says it is “deeply disappointing” there has been sparse coverage.
The festival’s opening weekend was largely ignored by the paper despite the attendance of 330,000 people and the opening of more than 1,280 shows.
The Strut & Fret producer, Scott Maidment, reportedly told the opening crowd:
The Adelaide Advertiser has decided not to come to any shows, not to review any shows and not to do any stories on the Fringe … I think it’s a really poor state of affairs when we have the whole community come together for the Fringe.
Read the full story here:
‘Hard conversations’ needed about super tax concessions, Pocock says
Senator David Pocock says hard conversations are needed about policies like superannuation tax concessions for the wealthy amid a cost-of-living crisis, after Labor raised the possibility of broader reform to the system.
The treasurer Jim Chalmers used a speech to super and pension fund managers on Monday to argue super should be “equitable and sustainable”, leading to speculation about the future of super tax concessions, which have already cost the budget more than $50bn in lost revenue and are set to eclipse the aged pension.
Shadow treasurer Angus Taylor said the government had “sold Australians a pup” and was on track to break an election promise not to change superannuation tax concessions, setting up another political stoush over Australia’s tax system.
However, speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Pocock, a powerful independent crossbench senator, suggested the government needed to show courage on the issue:
At a time where there is a huge cost-of-living crunch being felt by millions of Australians and we’re constantly told that there’s not enough money to raise something like jobseeker … but we can’t touch tax concessions for super, the stage-three tax cuts – $250bn – is somehow off the table.
These are the hard conversations that we’re going to be able to have and really be able to talk about them in a way that recognises who is getting the benefit from [these policies].
It’s not the majority of Australians. It’s not the Australians that are really struggling and making decisions between food and medicine. It’s Australians who I think are generally doing OK.
All the details here:
Updated
Stronger El Niño events due to global heating may accelerate rising sea levels and irreversible melting of the Antarctic ice sheet and ice shelves, according to research from Australia’s premier government science agency.
Previous studies have found that rising atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations are expected to increase the magnitude of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (Enso), the planet’s most significant year-to-year climate fluctuation and a major driver of extreme droughts and floods.
Extreme warm El Niño events and cool La Niña events are expected to become more frequent as the planet heats.
Relatively little has been known about the impact of Enso changes in Antarctica. A new study published this week in the journal Nature Climate Change led by CSIRO researchers found stronger El Niño events were likely to have divergent impacts in the ocean surrounding the southern continent.
The examination of 31 climate models found stronger El Niños may accelerate the heating of deeper ocean waters while slowing the pace of warming on the surface as westerly winds along the continental shelf become less intense.
Read the full story here:
Updated
Post-study work rights extended for international students to ease ‘chronic skills shortages’
Post-study work rights for international students who have graduated from an Australian higher education provider will be extended by the federal government in a bid to rebuild the sector and ease workforce pressures following the pandemic.
The federal government today released the list of occupations and the eligible qualifications that will enable graduates to access greater work rights, including health, teaching, engineering and agricultural fields.
Targeted skills will be considered on an annual basis and updated in response to the labour market. The commitment was made after the Jobs and Skills Summit and on the advice of stakeholders including the Council of International Education, the National Tertiary Education Union, Universities Australia and the departments of home affairs and education.
The extended work rights will come into effect from 1 July and increase post study work rights to four years for some bachelor degrees, up to five years for some master’s degrees and up to six years for all doctoral degrees.
In addition, the government will increase the allowable work hours cap from 40 hours a fortnight to 48 hours.
Minister for education Jason Clare said:
Businesses are screaming out for skilled workers, particularly in the regions.
We have got the second highest skills shortage in the developed world, according to the OECD. Skills shortages are everywhere.
We teach and train these skilled workers. This will mean they can stay on longer and use the skills they’ve gained in Australia to help fill some of the chronic skills shortages we have right now.
The industry advocacy body, Universities Australia, welcomed the changes, with chief executive Catriona Jackson saying:
Universities Australia has advocated strongly for this change, and we congratulate the Albanese Government for its strong leadership and solutions-driven approach to meeting our workforce needs.
The decision to extend working rights for PhD students, in particular, will provide a significant boost to the development of Australia’s knowledge economy.
Updated
Labor approval of new Santos gas project ‘straight out of Morrison’s playbook’, Greens say
Greens leader Adam Bandt has savaged the Labor government for approving a large new gas development in Queensland, claiming the Albanese government’s decision was “straight out of Morrison’s playbook”.
The government has approved an application from energy giant Santos to build up to 116 gas wells in the Surat Basin, in its Towrie gas development. Roderick Campbell, from the Australia Institute, brought the development to light in tweets on Tuesday morning:
Wow, @tanya_plibersek's department just approved a new coal seam gas project out to 2077.
— Roderick Campbell (@R_o_d_C) February 20, 2023
2077!! Fracking!! Santos!! Wow. pic.twitter.com/mogelGLjrR
The approval, posted on the website of the department of energy and climate change, said the project was given a green light “for an operational life of approximately 30 years followed by progressive rehabilitation”. The approval runs until 2077.
Our environment editor Adam Morton will have more for you on the development soon, but Bandt weighed in this afternoon.
The approval, of course, comes in light of the Greens offering to pass the government’s safeguard mechanism climate legislation if Labor agrees to stop new coal and gas mines – a request climate minister Chris Bowen rejected last week.
Labor has just approved 116 new gas wells to be fracked by Santos in QLD.
— Adam Bandt (@AdamBandt) February 21, 2023
Not only that, Tanya Plibersek has given them the green light to operate until 2077.
This isn’t what "ending the climate wars" looks like.
Labor is making the climate crisis worse.
“Approval was granted on Friday. No media release. No statement. No regard for the climate. For a Government that likes to talk about integrity & transparency, this is straight out Morrison’s playbook,” Bandt tweeted.
He went on to write: “We’ll continue to push Labor to ensure Australia takes the climate action we need to keep our communities safer. And that starts at the bare minimum: no new coal & gas.”
Kooyong MP Monique Ryan also commented on Twitter:
Santos donated $83 000 to the ALP in 2021-2022.
— Dr Monique Ryan MP (@Mon4Kooyong) February 21, 2023
You’d have to say they’ve received an excellent return on their investment. https://t.co/J99mlOn9ap
Other progressive campaigners also weighed in to attack the decision. Activist organisation GetUp! said there were bushfires in an area near the approved mine site, tweeting: “To expand fracking in this region spits in the face of people whose homes are being destroyed by climate change.”
Lock the Gate, a group campaigning against coal seam gas, also was unhappy. Lock the Gate Alliance national coordinator, Ellen Roberts, said:
To think the world will still be burning fossil gas by 2077 – the approval end date for this project – is totally inconsistent with the International Energy Agency’s 2021 recommendation that there must be no new fossil fuel projects if the world is to keep global warming to as far below two degrees as possible.
It’s also particularly galling that Minister Plibersek’s department appears to have made this approval late on a Friday afternoon, and suggests the government was attempting to avoid public scrutiny over a very poor decision.
Updated
Tabcorp has announced it will increase its online wagering profile in direct competition with Sportsbet and Ladbrokes after recording a $52m profit in six months.
Tabcorp, which is traditionally associated with in-store betting, launched its digital gambling app in September with advertisements airing during the Fifa World Cup broadcast. The company will now prioritise this online service and attempt to lure customers away from foreign-owned sports bookies.
After releasing the company’s financial results, its chief executive, Adam Rytenskild, said Tabcorp plans to increase its digital market share from 25% to 30% within the next two years.
We’ll do this with a transformation of our entire wagering ecosystem, including new products for punters, a reinvigoration of Sky Racing that will include a greater integration with TAB and the implementation of our new marketing strategy.
Read the full story here:
University of Sydney’s ‘sector-leading offer’ shows disrespect for staff, union head says
The University of Sydney has offered staff a 15.4% pay increase over three years as lengthy enterprise bargaining negotiations continue.
In a letter sent to all staff from deputy vice-chancellor Annamarie Jagose today, the university said the salary offer was “higher than any other offer proposed or agreed at any other university in the current round of bargaining”.
The proposal would increase wages by 4.6% in 2023, on top of a $2,000 sign-on payment, a further 3.25% increase up to 2025 and a 3.5% increase in 2026.
The higher salary increase in 2023 was due to “current cost of living pressures” while the one-off payment was equivalent to a further 2% in average salary for professional staff.
Jagose:
We have been in an unnecessarily protracted bargaining round, more than half a year longer than any I have seen at this University over the last decade. Since August 2021, the University has made a number of significant concessions in relation to its offer. Now that we have almost reached the end of the more than 100 claims put by the unions, I am confident that we have made a sector-leading offer that many colleagues will be impatient to accept.
The feedback from colleagues and the unions throughout negotiations has enabled us to put together a package that, in my view, addresses pressing concerns like workload and casualisation and is attractive and fair.
The University is keen to finalise negotiations as soon as possible, so that colleagues can receive the benefits of the pay increases plus a lump sum payment, and begin accessing the enhanced conditions on offer.
It also offered to reduce the casual academic workforce by 20% by 2026, facilitated by the recruitment of 300 new continuing positions.
They said the package had “not been fully agreed” with unions.
Senior lecturer at the university and NSW National Tertiary Education Union head Nick Riemer warned staff not to be “fooled” by the proposal and said it showed “shocking disrespect” for staff.
“It amounts to about 3.3% per annum from the expiry of the last agreement to the expiry of this new one, lower than any NTEU-negotiated wage offer at other unis,” he posted on social media.
Sydney Uni colleagues: don't be fooled by management's pay offer. It amounts to about 3.3% per annum from the expiry of the last agreement to the expiry of this new one: lower than any NTEU-negotiated wage offer at other unis. Shocking disrespect for overworked, hurting staff.
— Nick Riemer (@NickRiemer1) February 21, 2023
NTEU staff took strike action at the university for six days in 2022 after the university failed to meet core union demands including preserving research time, securing employment for casual staff and a pay rise above inflation.
Updated
RBA considered pause in rate rises, meeting minutes reveal
There are a few headlines around this afternoon that the Reserve Bank had (gasp) considered a “super-sized” half-point increase in the cash rate at its 7 February meeting.
The consideration was contained in the minutes of the meeting, which were released by the RBA today.
The focus on 50 basis points is perhaps a little overdone, though. In fact the RBA had considered such a rise in every month since June (save January when the RBA board had its usual summer break), so there’s not a lot of novelty.
The anomaly was really in December when the RBA considered a pause (that is, no change) as one of three choices.
A pause was something they hadn’t considered in the previous months, and a choice they also didn’t bother to look at this month. Tomorrow’s wage price index numbers for the December quarter will probably determine whether that “no change” option gets another look-in next month.
The last time they had more than two choices was in May when the rate rises began.
Back then, they considered 15, 25 and 40-basis point rises to the then record low 0.1% rate. (In the end, they went with 25, which is why we’ve ended up with not very round numbers, such as 3.35%).
Anyway, the other interesting elements in the minutes, according to CBA’s Belinda Allen, include the fact the RBA noted Australia’s cash rate was still lower than other wealthy nations, perhaps implying there’s some catch-up to come.
The RBA also noted Australia’s excess pool of savings was estimated to be higher than “almost anywhere else in the world”, Allen says:
This could also have added to the change in tone by the RBA about the need for higher interest rates in Australia.
On the other hand, the variable-rate mortgage market in Australia and high levels of household debt mean the cash‑flow channel of monetary policy tightening is stronger here than elsewhere – so perhaps we don’t have to go as high as elsewhere to chip away at excess demand in the economy.
Meanwhile, investors were betting prior to today’s minutes release that the RBA had about three more 25bp rises to come before it hits a peak:
Prior to the RBA minutes' release, investors were betting the central bank's cash rate would max out at almost 4.2% (vs 3.35% now). There's a three-in-four chance of a 25bp rate rise on March 7th. pic.twitter.com/izXkkO66uI
— @phannam@mastodon.green (@p_hannam) February 21, 2023
Updated
Today’s cartoon is from Fiona Katauskas: the Robodebt Robot finally breaks its silence.
Drive into any country town and you will see the remnants of old bank buildings. They have often been turned into smart cafes, serving flat whites and specialty teas to locals and passersby alike.
It is quite a fitting use. When it comes to rural banks – and rural politics generally – there is a lot of tea and sympathy but not much else.
You may have seen the headlines about the continuing closure of rural bank branches. While some branches have had a temporary stay, in most cases it appears to be a public relations reprieve while the lights of a Senate inquiry are upon them.
The truth is, the latest closures have simply continued a decline – well charted by independent journalist Dale Webster – that has been going for decades.
Read more here:
Severe storms and giant hail forecast for western NSW
There are storms forecast for western New South Wales as well. The updated warnings for severe thunderstorms warning say some may bring giant hail (that’s 5cm or larger), intense rainfall and damaging winds.
NSW State Emergency Service is recommending people in locations likely to be affected should move their cars undercover, away from trees and powerlines, and secure loose items around homes or anything that could blow away in strong winds.
People in the warning locations should move cars undercover, away from trees and powerlines. 🚗🌲
— NSW SES (@NSWSES) February 21, 2023
Secure loose items around your home, apartment balcony, and property that could blow away in strong winds.⛈️ https://t.co/T3zblq1Wvz
Updated
Time for a weather update, I reckon. If you’re in or near the ACT, there is a nasty storm cell with damaging winds, large hail and heavy rain all active in the area. Some flights into Canberra Airport may be delayed.
Cell based thunderstorm warning for #ACT and areas around #Queanbeyan is still current. DAMAGING WINDS, LARGE HAIL, HEAVY RAIN are all concerns. Canberra AP recorded 87 km/h at 03:06 pm. Warning https://t.co/c1IXY5Rke7 pic.twitter.com/fExnApLR7a
— Bureau of Meteorology Australian Capital Territory (@BOM_ACT) February 21, 2023
The Queensland government will override its own Human Rights Act to implement laws allowing children to be charged with criminal offences for breaching bail conditions, conceding its new laws are “incompatible” with human rights.
The police minister, Mark Ryan, said the Palaszczuk government’s strengthening community safety bill will include an amendment to the Bail Act which allows children breaching bail to be charged with the same offence as an adult.
Ryan wrote in a statement about exceptional circumstances tabled on Tuesday:
The government accepts that these provisions are incompatible with human rights.
Therefore, in this exceptional case, the [Human Rights Act] is being overridden and its application entirely excluded from the operation of these new provisions to protect community safety.
Read the full story here:
Thank you so much for that dramatic departure, Natasha! And for all your work today.
Blog friends, I’ll be with you, bringing you the news until early this evening.
Staying on the theme of Casablanca since our former PM raised it, where I’m going, you can’t follow. Here’s looking at you Steph Convery.
WA premier reveals his family link to forced adoptions
An inquiry into historical forced adoptions in Western Australia will provide an opportunity for truth-telling and recognition, the premier, Mark McGowan, says.
A parliamentary committee has been tasked with examining the issue after lobbying from the state Liberal opposition.
More than 150,000 babies are estimated to have been taken from mostly unmarried Australian mothers across several decades through to the 1980s.
The NSW-born premier says his government supports the inquiry, revealing the impact of the practice on his family. He told reporters on Tuesday:
My grandmother died when I was 12. I learnt subsequently from my mother that she had an older sister that my grandmother was forced to give away when she was a young woman.
It was a bit of a revelation to me. It was a different era – I think it was back in the 1920s or 1930s when it happened. But it obviously caused a lot of pain, I suspect, for my grandmother.
McGowan hoped the inquiry would consider what support and closure could be offered to those who were forcibly adopted and their birth mothers. Ensuring the issue was recognised as part of WA’s history was also an important consideration.
This is an awful thing that happened to many women. Inquiring into these things and providing some sort of truth-telling, and perhaps some recognition, is a good thing.
The Liberal leader, Libby Mettam, wrote to the premier last week calling for an inquiry into what she described as a dark chapter in the state’s history.
She said there were many elderly mothers who wanted to tell their now-adult children they were not willingly given up for adoption.
I strongly believe they should be given this opportunity of a platform for their experiences and concerns and to help end years of suffering.
Just as importantly, I understand that many of those who were removed from their mothers want to see urgent legislative reform that will allow them easy access to their birth records and birth identity.
WA’s parliament in 2010 became the first in Australia to apologise to unwed mothers for the removal of newborns, although other states have since gone further in holding their own inquiries into the practice.
- AAP
Updated
Universities discovered they would be included in foreign arrangements scheme ‘by reading the front page of the Australian’
The Group of Eight chief executive, Vicki Thomson, has told a review that universities only discovered they would be included in the foreign arrangements scheme “by reading the front page of the Australian”.
Under the 2020 foreign relations act, public universities are included in the scheme when they enter an arrangement with a foreign government or university that “lacks institutional autonomy”.
We were literally thrown in. We don’t have an issue with compliance and regulatory regime but if it’s not clear what the purpose is it makes it very challenging for us.
The foreign arrangements scheme has been a significant burden on universities … it’s a very different proposition to the Fits legislation. We knew we were thrown in by reading the front page of the Australian. If you want a case study in how not to develop legislation and bring your constituency with you, that was it, to be honest.
Updated
Trump’s niece to speak in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane
Mary L Trump, an American psychologist and niece of the former US president Donald Trump, has announced an Australian speaking tour in June.
Trump will delve into her life and family history in events in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney hosted by the Australian journalist Ray Martin.
Trump’s 2020 book, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man, was a scathing takedown of Uncle Donald. The statement announcing the tour promises Trump will deploy her skills as a trained clinical psychologist and intimate familiarity “to reveal what makes Donald, and the rest of her clan, tick”:
Trump shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who continues to threaten the world’s health, economic security, and social fabric.
… This show will shed a light on how the most powerful nation in the world works, how the Maga [“Make America Great Again”] movement came into being, what is happing now, and what we can expect in the future.
Updated
Cancellation of UN visit ‘shameful for the Albanese government’, Human Rights Watch says
Human Rights Watch’s senior Australia researcher, Sophie McNeill, says the fact that Australia now joins Rwanda as the only other country where the UN torture prevention body has terminated a visit should be a source of shame.
The termination of the UN inspector’s visit to Australia is shameful for the Albanese government. Australia now joins Rwanda as the only other country where the UN Subcommittee on Prevention of Torture has decided to terminate a visit.
The United Nations Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture (OPCAT) is an important international treaty which helps protect the rights of people in any form of detention, ratified by Australia in 2017. We have long documented human rights violations in prisons including overcrowding, physical abuse, and solitary confinement of people with mental health conditions.
Failing to cooperate with UN experts in providing unrestricted access to sites of detention sets a terrible example to other governments in this region who don’t need more excuses to defy the UN.
Updated
NSW defends its prisons after UN anti-torture group cancels visit
The New South Wales corrections minister, Geoff Lee, has defended the state’s prisons after the UN anti-torture group cancelled its visit to Australia after being blocked from facilities in the state.
The minister said the government was “not opposed, in principle” to the facilities being inspected but had concerts about “ongoing operational, security and funding issues” which had not been resolved with the federal government.
He said:
These issues have been raised with the commonwealth on a number of occasions, including in 2020 and again in recent months.
We will continue to engage with the commonwealth on these unresolved issues.
NSW has some of the best correctional facilities in the world. There are already significant oversight processes in place, including the inspector of custodial services and the ombudsman.
In October, Lee told 2GB radio that inspectors had been refused entry to a Queanbeyan facility when they attempted to inspect a cell.
He said:
The whole role of our jail system is to keep people safe, protect us from the criminals that we lock up every day. It’s not to allow people just to wander through at their leisure. They should be off to Iran looking for human rights violations there.
Updated
Universities say adding them to foreign influence scheme hasn’t reduced risk
Universities were added to the foreign arrangements bill for reasons that had “little to do” with the national interest, a review into the foreign influence transparency scheme (Fits) has been told.
The Australian Technology Network of Universities (ATN) executive director, Luke Sheehy, said it was “very apparent” universities were added to the bill at the last minute and it hadn’t led to a reduction in risk.
We have this arrangement of a whole lot of different compliance regimes … that become obsessed with ticking the boxes and ensuring we’re on the right side of the thin blue line instead of actually dealing with underlying risk. In my view, all these additional regimes without visibility of each other is increasing underlying actual risk. We are going backwards by trying to do all these additional things.
It was very apparent universities were added to the foreign arrangements bill at the last minute for reasons that had little to do with actual risk to the national interest. That has resulted in an enormous amount of work … harmonisation through the medium of UFIT is the way for us to address this.
The University New South Wales deputy vice-chancellor, Prof George Williams, agreed. He said the foreign arrangements bill in its current iteration wasn’t achieving its objectives due to a lack of clarity, “vague definitions” and badly calibrated objectives.
It misfires … it’s just not clear legislation … it’s a maze of vague definitions and language that makes it very difficult to apply and that gets in the way of people understanding their obligations, let alone complying with them appropriately … in one sense it covers too much but it also covers too little … it’s not clear we’re capturing the higher matters of foreign influence that we might expect to be covered.
He said while Fits was working well and successfully changing behaviour, high compliance was having little impact.
At the university sector we’d like to clearly know what we need to do to support the national interest and to be frank it’s just not clear … there’s no sense at our end what we should change, what we should be doing differently.
Updated
Universities say foreign influence regime is overly burdensome and under-regulated
Universities are “going backwards” in dealing with the risk of foreign interference due to overly burdensome and under-regulated regime requirements, a parliamentary review into the foreign influence transparency scheme (Fits) has heard.
The Group of Eight CEO, Vicki Thomson, a member of the foreign interference taskforce, said while procedures were being followed, there had been “no instruction” from the government as to how to address potential risks.
Having discovered an issue of potential foreign influence, what do we do with it? The answer [we’ve gotten] was we don’t need to know about it, we just need to know that you know about it. There’s a level of trust, and that’s a good thing, but there’s a need for dialogue between the agencies and universities.
The University of Melbourne deputy vice-chancellor, Prof Michael Wesley, said it “wasn’t clear” there was a coherent and mutually supportive regime of instruments for dealing with foreign influence and interference issues.
He said the university had estimated well over $2m had been spent in putting systems in place and found it “puzzling” there had been no follow up from the government about compliance.
We believe we’ve been fully compliant … we share experiences and we have a fairly good visibility across the sector … [but] there’s been no follow-up from government about our compliance, no one has come and looked at our systems, no one has expressed any interest in our systems. It’s almost as if we were asked to do things and trusted to go ahead and do them … we’ve had absolute silence.
From where I stand I think a good review would see areas of overlap, areas of redundancy, areas of ineffectiveness and quite frankly gaps.
The Universities Australia policy director in international and security, John Wellard, said last year that universities approached Asio around 60 times to seek advice on issues in the area.
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Pocock calls on government to show courage on social media regulation
The independent ACT senator David Pocock wants to see the government show some courage when it comes to regulating social media and how companies target children with gambling, alcohol and unhealthy and harmful products.
Pocock, along with researchers at the University of Queensland and Monash University, the Alliance for Gambling Reform, the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education and the Obesity Policy Coalition held a joint press conference at Parliament House, to push for change. New research between UQ and Monash, in partnership with VicHealth found Meta (owner of Instagram and Facebook) was sending damaging and harmful ads into the feeds of 16 to 25 year olds – and were specially targeting young people based on data it had collected on them.
Pocock says enough is enough.
Politicians need to be listening to the community, and then they need to be listening to experts.
And then we need the political courage to go ‘we’ve got to be making decisions and putting policies in place that are in the best interests of all of us, not not vested interests, and in the best interests of children.
If politicians aren’t here to make decisions that are in the best interests of children and future generations then I don’t know what we’re here for. That should should be our guiding light.
Pocock says the government inquiries into privacy and gambling should actually be combined for a whole-of-government approach to an issue impacting all Australians.
I think we need a real focus on this.
My concern is that we’re seeing a review of privacy laws and then a House of Reps committee looking at gambling. But clearly all of these things are linked. So we want to see the whole government approach to set out a framework that ensures that young people aren’t being exposed to things that we know are harmful for them. Alcohol, gambling, you know, unhealthy foods, junk foods. Those companies are making a lot of money. And all of us pay the price in some form later in life where we’re helping people dealing with these addictions and all the things that happen from them.
So I simply don’t accept the argument that it can’t be done. It’s been done in other countries. So there’s going to be plenty of starting points for us to pick up on.
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Cancellation of UN visit a ‘devastating blow’ to Australia’s human rights record, Save the Children chief says
Human rights and child advocate group Save the Children Australia have commented on the United Nations terminating its visit.
They’re labelling it a “devastating blow” to the country’s human rights record and have expressed particular concern about children in juvenile detention centres and their safety and wellbeing.
The Save the Children Australia CEO, Mat Tinkler, said the aborted visit damages Australia’s international reputation on human rights.
Over the last 15 years, the subcommittee has visited more than 60 countries. This is just the second time they’ve had to terminate a visit – a damning indication of our commitment to human rights.
How can we trust our State governments to care for children in detention if they won’t allow anti-torture inspectors to visit detention centres or speak to the children being held there?
The cancellation of this visit compounds multiple, recent reports of abuse of children occurring in youth detention centres across Australia. It’s clear some Australian states are risking the safety and wellbeing of children in their care, as well as Australia’s human rights credibility on the world stage.
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Wage theft in the university sector surpasses $100m since 2020, union says
Wage theft in the university sector has exceeded $100m since 2020, new estimates by the National Tertiary Education Union reveal.
Initial estimates in a landmark report released by the sector on Monday made the conservative finding that staff in the higher education sector had been underpaid $83.4m.
But the University of Melbourne recently revealed to staff that it has backpaid $45m – not $31.6m as initially estimated – while The University of Tasmania has also begun paying back $11m owed to workers. It brings the total tally to $107.8 million.
The NTEU national president, Dr Alison Barnes, said:
It’s deeply disappointing but not at all surprising that the staggering wage theft figure is even higher than the NTEU first calculated. Even more sadly, the true figure will rise well beyond $107.8m once ongoing cases are settled.
Systemic wage theft is endemic in our public universities. This is simply unacceptable. We need not only laws to criminalise wage theft, but legislation allowing unions to quickly recover stolen wages for their members.
We’re calling on the federal government to address wage theft through tackling its chief cause – insecure work. Wage theft in higher education is a deep crisis. We need urgent action to create the better universities that Australia deserves.
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Turnbull invokes Casablanca in parliamentary hearing
Malcolm Turnbull is holding court – via a video link to the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security – on the foreign influence transparency scheme.
The Liberal MP Andrew Hastie wonders whether there has been an “institutional failure to carry out the intent of the laws”.
Turnbull tells the committee:
I’d like to know why it is that there are no entities or individuals reporting an association with [China’s] United Front Work Department. The intelligence agencies, security agencies have a very good idea of who’s doing what. I wouldn’t even describe it as covert – it’s pretty blatant operations – I don’t know what the explanation is, Mr Hastie. I assume you’ve asked the relevant bureaucrats. It does remind me of that scene in Casablanca when the French police captain runs into Rick’s bar and says, ‘I’m shocked, shocked to see that there is gambling in this establishment’. I mean, is this same sort of pretence that’s going on? I mean, we know what’s happening and we just want people to be open about it – that’s all.
The chair of the committee, Peter Khalil, asks whether Turnbull would support reform to ensure a presumption leads to the power to register an entity (to avoids flaw in self-reporting).
Turnbull says authorities already have the power to issue a “please explain” and to investigate. He says changing the legislation, in some respects, is the easiest thing to do. Without “proactively” implementing and enforcing the law it would be “just a bunch of words really”.
Hastie contends that there has been a “lack of mission focus” at the departmental level (the Attorney General’s Department is the one that implements the scheme).
Turnbull tells the hearing:
The most active state and political party seeking to influence public affairs in Australia is that of China and the Communist party of China – we know that – but they don’t seem to appear on the register. But a lot of other countries do ... so there does seem to be a lack of enthusiasm. I’m not making any complaint, but spending bureaucratic time reading the newspapers noticing a former prime minister gave an interview to the BBC or gave a speech in South Korea and then writing a letter saying you should put this on the register, again I’ve got no complaints about that, but I do think the time spent on that could be more usefully disposed of focusing on what the legislation was about in the first place.
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Grassroots Labor lobby group says quality of credits a legitimate issue, but argues safeguard reform will be transformational
Good afternoon. Many readers have been following the ongoing political and stakeholder debate about Labor’s changes to the safeguard mechanism. If you haven’t followed this debate, I can summarise quickly –
The safeguard mechanism is a climate policy aimed at reducing pollution from Australia’s heaviest emitters.
The Greens want an amendment to Labor’s policy banning new coal and gas projects.
The Albanese government says it doesn’t have a mandate to do that.
Adjacent to the ongoing political deliberations is a lively debate among various experts and stakeholders about the quality of Labor’s safeguard redux.
Some of this external debate is focused on the quality of offsets – a key element of the policy.
The current safeguard proposal would see companies cut their carbon emissions intensity by 4.9% a year, either by curbing pollution on site, or buying carbon offsets.
Offsets are units of emissions reduction that has already occurred elsewhere, but credible concerns have been raised about the integrity of some carbon credit schemes.
The government commissioned a review (the Chubb review) that broadly backed the integrity of the system, but recommended systemic change to improve confidence and transparency.
If you are now intrigued by the safeguard debate and need a deeper dive, read our climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s explainer here.
I flagged in the summary a number of stakeholders have strong views about this policy. Labor’s Environment Action Network (a grassroots lobby group of Labor members) has circulated a missive to supporters. The new missive argues the integrity of carbon credits is a legitimate issue requiring further work.
While welcoming the Albanese government’s commissioning of the Chubb review, Lean makes a pointed observation:
There is still work to be done to ensure we have a world’s best carbon offsets system. We need to be ruthless about offsets that are not defensible and strip them from the system and we need to expedite the creation of offsets in landscapes where the carbon and biodiversity outcomes would be significant – like land clearing hotspots, prime agricultural land and native forests.
But the missive also takes on arguments ventilated in recent days that the safeguard redux isn’t worth doing because the regime is too favourable to polluters. Lean characterises the policy as “transformational change” and notes “the scale and importance of this reform should not be lost in the debate”. It notes the real power of the overhaul “is how it will influence that next set of investment decisions by tipping the economic balance towards low emissions technologies”.
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Councils and the RSPCA will no longer have access to telecommunications data under changes to metadata laws
City councils and the RSPCA will no longer be able to access telecommunications data under changes to federal law to close a loophole exploited since the federal government limited access under metadata laws in 2015.
Under the laws, passed by the then Turnbull government in 2015 with Labor support, the number of federal and state agencies such as law enforcement that can apply to a telecommunications company for access to metadata was narrowed down to just 21.
But as we reported in 2020, since then 87 agencies including local councils, the RSPCA and the South Australian fisheries department had been gaining access to the data under a different section of the Telecommunications Act.
The “loophole” will be closed as part of the government response released on Tuesday to a review of the Telecommunications (Interception and Access) Act by the parliament’s powerful joint standing committee on intelligence and security.
The government said it would introduce legislation to repeal s280 of the Telecommunications Act, and replace it with one that limits access to data to specified entities in situations where that access is “necessary and proportionate to achieving an allowable purpose”.
The government has accepted the overwhelming majority of the recommendations of the report, and will now limit the number of employees in an agency who can act as authorised officers to access the data, and will improve the record-keeping of what data is obtained.
There also will be more public reporting on whether the data was used to rule someone out of an investigation, and whether the person whose data was accessed was eventually charged, prosecuted and/or convicted of a crime and the role the data played.
The government will also develop a definition of “content or substance of a communication” so that agencies will be able to tell what is considered content rather than metadata, meaning they would need a warrant to access.
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BHP to sell more coalmines as profit slides
The world’s biggest miner, BHP, will sell two more Australian coalmines as part of an ongoing review of its operations, the company said on Tuesday.
BHP, which counts iron ore and copper as its two biggest revenue earners, will seek a buyer for the Daunia and Blackwater coking coalmines in Queensland that it co-owns with joint venture partner Mitsubishi.
It has previously flagged it wanted to assess its projects to prepare for a low-carbon future.
The miner still operates the Mount Arthur thermal coalmine in NSW, and nine coking coalmines in Queensland, used for steel-making.
On Tuesday, it reported a 32% fall in its underlying profit to US$6.6bn in the six months to December amid rising costs and volatile commodity prices caused in part by pandemic lockdowns in China. BHP’s share price dropped on Tuesday given the weaker-than-expected result.
The company also said on Tuesday it would not make any major new investments in Queensland via its joint venture coal operations, citing a decision by the state government to increase the royalty rate.
The investment environment was “no longer competitive or predictable”, BHP said.
Royalties are a price levied on commodities that miners must pay for the right to dig up the minerals, as opposed to a tax which is based on a company’s profitability.
Last year, the Queensland government decided to increase the royalty rate as coal prices surged, drawing strong opposition from miners and industry groups.
BHP is also reviewing its Mount Arthur operations, currently slated to run until 2030, in response to a decision by the NSW government to force miners to reserve a portion of their production for domestic use.
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Malcolm Turnbull says foreign influence scheme should not be a ‘box-ticking exercise’
Malcolm Turnbull has warned against the foreign influence transparency scheme (Fits) becoming a “robotic box-ticking exercise”. He has also mentioned his fellow former prime minister Kevin Rudd when giving evidence to the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security. Turnbull told the hearing he was “puzzled” that the legislation his government introduced was not more rigorously enforced:
There are challenges with being specific [about which countries should be targeted] because you will find things change and there are countries that we may have friendly relationships with but whose activities in Australia we would nonetheless like there to be transparency about. It’s a finely balanced exercise. But I think a key part of that is to make the legislation easy to comply with. I’ve raised this with the department in the past.
Their online interface was very clunky and not very intuitive. If you are going to compel people to report something to the govt online you have to make it really easy to comply [with]. It’s got to be as easy as buying a book on Amazon. It’s got to be that simple. And of course if you make it simple then the regulatory burden is much less. And then issues about country agnosticism become less material because the burden of complying with respect to relations or associations with countries for which there are absolutely no concerns are not very burdensome.
I would say based on my limited engagement with the legislation since I left office ... it would seem to me that the problems that have arisen are not so much in the legislation – although that no doubt could be improved, fine-tuned – but in the manner in which it has been administrated. Legislation like this has to be administrated in an intelligence and risk-based way. It shouldn’t be approached like a sort of robotic box-ticking exercise. It’s got to be administered with a view to where the real risks and concerns are and it’s got to be administered in a proactive way.
It is noteworthy that there is apparently, according to the transparency register, there is apparently no organisation in Australia that has any association with the United Front Work Department of the Communist party of China. I would love to think that was true but regrettably I can say absolutely that it is not true. If in fact it were true there would be terrible repercussions in Beijing for those responsible for the United Front Work Department. So I rather wonder why time would be spent seeking, you know, Kevin Rudd to record his interviews with the BBC, which is after all a state-owned broadcaster, and perhaps time might be better spent actually finding out why a whole range of organisations are not reporting associations that are widely known to occur. If the upshot of the register is that it simply records relationships, associations with foreign governments and foreign political parties – and really that is a small subject … If the register simply contains reports of associations that are innocuous and many of which are already in the public domain, it may be that officials could congratulate themselves for faithfully implementing the law but they are essentially doing work to rule and not fulfilling the object of the legislation.
We need to ensure that not simply the laws are right, but that they are being administered and enforced in a practical, risk-based, proactive manner.
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Malcolm Turnbull, who introduced foreign influence laws, gives evidence to review
The former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull, who introduced the foreign influence transparency scheme (Fits), is giving evidence to a parliamentary review into the laws.
Turnbull has had to register two speeches he gave in recent years – to a South Korean event and a Taiwanese event. He told the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence that both were public events with speeches broadcast and there was “nothing covert about it”.
Turnbull said he had “no problems” registering those speaking commitments (so long as the online register was made less clunky to use) but it was “absolutely not what we had in mind” when introducing the laws. He told the parliamentary committee:
We were concerned about foreign governments and foreign political parties seeking to influence Australian public affairs. We weren’t saying they shouldn’t do it – just that it should be open and public. Transparency is the key. If you’re writing letters to former prime ministers about why they haven’t registered a speech that the department has learned about because it was widely reported in the press, it rather does make you think that the object of the bureaucrats’ concern was not transparency but box-ticking.
Turnbull said the laws were world-leading at the time, and he was not coming to the hearing to criticise them. But he said it was important to adapt to the times.
The option of the Fits legislation was always transparency. We were not seeking to stigmatise or demonise people who were representing or acting on behalf of foreign governments or indeed foreign political parties. It was all about transparency. Sunlight is a great antidote to activity which may otherwise develop into covert and even coercive activity.
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Acts of foreign influence might be ‘flying under the radar’, expert warns
The federal government has been warned it is susceptible to influence from authoritarian nations due to the “country agnostic” nature of the Foreign Influence Transparency Scheme (Fits).
Speaking at a joint committee this morning, the ANU National Security College senior fellow Katherine Mansted said acts of influence might be “flying under the radar” due to the grey zones that were being exploited by countries including China, Russia and Iran.
Where it falls short is the legal definitions, it doesn’t take into account that influence that emanates from a foreign government looks different … acts of influence might currently be flying under the radar … that doesn’t mean we need a list of authoritarian countries … but it means that we need to have guidance that says if a company that is not a foreign government-related entity has embedded within it representatives of the ruling party of a government … it is automatically treated as a foreign entity that needs to go on the list.
We know interference and influence is one of the key strategies … so they’re going to do it more and more.
Mansted noted under the current drafting of the scheme, independent private companies including Huawei weren’t captured as subject to foreign interference. Australia’s Confucius Institutes were similarly not captured by the scheme despite their links to the Chinese government.
The way political relationships work in many authoritarian countries … is they are more informal, they’re not documented and that means current tests that we have, assuming ostensibly every country in the world is a carbon copy of Australia and its peers – they don’t work for countries with different political systems.
The way Fits is at the moment, it might be capturing a former minister on a BBC cooking show but not capturing former politicians with dealings with a company like Huawei.
Speaking at a Senate estimates committee last Thursday, the foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, said she expected Australian universities wouldn’t establish any new Chinese government-linked Confucius Institutes on their campuses.
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Thinktank says Australia needs a ‘coherent strategy’ for its foreign policy
Australia needs “a coherent strategy and narrative” for its foreign policy, according to a paper published today.
The thinktank AP4D says the country must better coordinate several arms of government including defence, diplomacy, development and domestic policy, so they are not working in different directions.
The executive director of AP4D, Melissa Conley Tyler, said as power shifted in the Indo-Pacific region, “Australia’s relative economic, diplomatic and military weight will lessen unless the government harnesses all the tools of statecraft”:
We have done this in the past, for example in our response to the 9/11 terror attacks where we activated a military, diplomatic and financial response. But too often the core institutions of Australian statecraft including Dfat, Defence, Home Affairs and Treasury adopt different worldviews and understandings of the national interest.
We need a body that can bring them together and help the government project a coherent policy agenda to advance the national interest.
The paper – titled What does it look like for Australia to use all tools of statecraft in practice – says:
Coherence across international policy helps ensure that Australia’s tools of statecraft generate maximum impact. It helps realise the multiplying effects of different actors and instruments acting in concert towards shared objectives. For instance, Australian defence cooperation and development programs working together to bolster the capacity of a partner country to manage its own security. It also helps prevent different elements of Australian statecraft acting at odds with one another. For example, Australia’s immigration policies could undermine bilateral diplomacy, national reputation, and capacity for influence in multilateral human rights forums. Coherence also enables Australia to proactively plan for and shape its region, a perceived shortcoming in engagement with the Pacific in particular.
International perceptions matter too. A coherent approach – where the arms of statecraft act in harmony – demonstrates the discipline and sophistication of Australia’s international policy apparatus.
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Albanese government to tighten metadata access laws
The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, has announced that Labor will tighten metadata retention laws in line with recommendations from the parliamentary joint committee on intelligence and security (PJCIS).
Among the new safeguards are:
That the government develop guidelines on the application of metadata retention laws.
A clearer definition of “content or substance of a communication”, which need not be stored.
Reducing the number of authorised officers at agencies that can access metadata.
Limiting which agencies can access metadata.
Dreyfus said:
The PJCIS raised concerns about the absence of clear guidelines for agencies that access and manage metadata under the mandatory data retention regime, inadequate record-keeping obligations and the fact that the legislation does not require officers who are authorised to access telecommunications data to undertake specific training. The Commonwealth Ombudsman echoed many of these concerns in September 2022.
The PJCIS also heard evidence that a large number of non-criminal law enforcement agencies, including local councils, were using other laws to gain access to people’s metadata outside of the Mandatory Data Retention Regime. The PJCIS argued that such practices should cease.
The Albanese Government shares these concerns and is determined to address them. The government is committed to ensuring the mandatory data retention regime continues to support the work of law enforcement and national security agencies while also ensuring that these powers are subject to appropriate safeguards. The government will now work to implement the committee’s recommendations as soon as practicable.
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Cancellation of UN visit should be a wake-up call for Australia, human rights expert says
Speaking of the cancelled United Nations trip:
The “extraordinary decision” by UN inspectors to cancel their visit to Australian places of detention reflects Australia’s own “fragmented approach to protecting the human rights” of detained people and requires urgent action, all eight members of the Australian Human Rights Commission have said.
The delegation from the UN Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture (UN SPT) suspended its tour last year after being refused entry to sites in New South Wales and Queensland; last night they terminated the visit.
The HRC says Rwanda is the only other country ever to have had such a visit terminated.
Australia’s Human Rights Commissioner, Lorraine Finlay, said in a statement:
This decision by the UN Subcommittee is disappointing but not undeserved. Australia has had years to meet our OPCAT obligations, but we have failed to deliver on our treaty promises.
Australian governments must take this as a wake-up call and urgently prioritise implementation of their responsibilities under OPCAT to implement systems of oversight for all places of detention.
The commissioners are calling on Australian attorneys general “to meet urgently to reaffirm Australia’s commitment to OPCAT [Optional Protocol to the Convention Against Torture] and to outline immediate and tangible steps for ensuring Australia complies with its OPCAT obligations”.
The commission’s president emeritus, Prof Rosalind Croucher, said:
This decision by the UN SPT reflects poorly on our country’s commitment to protecting the human rights of people in detention and is detrimental to Australia’s international standing.
This outcome could severely damage Australia’s reputation as a leading advocate for a rules-based international system.
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PM asked about the UN cancelling visit to examine the treatment of people in detention
Albanese is asked about whether the UN cancelling its visit to examine the treatment of people in detention in Australia is a poor reflection on the country. It appears the PM was not briefed on this:
Albanese:
I am not aware of that particular issue.
Reporter: “They wanted access to sites in New South Wales and Queensland and were denied.”
Albanese:
That is a decision for those state governments. I have a national government to run, along with my cabinet colleagues, and I will stick to answering questions on federal issues.
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Government aims to provide energy certainty through the safeguard mechanism, PM says
Now we’re getting into energy – in particular, the report from the Australian Energy Market Operator about the desperate need to future-proof our energy system.
Albanese says:
The Australian Energy Market Operator has been talking about this for a long period of time … The former government didn’t act on that at all. So we need to do that … If you’re having less investment in new energy, then [that is] energy that’s leaving the system with the closure of coal-fired power plants, then you will have these issues, which is why my government is absolutely determined to provide that certainty for investment through the safeguard mechanism.
Now, the safeguard mechanism was established under legislation by the Abbott government. It is one thing for the Coalition to oppose initiatives and commitments that Labor made in the lead-up to the last election. It’s absurd that they’re opposing their own policy, in spite of the fact that all of the energy market operators, all of industry, be it here in the west, Woodside, BHP, the Minerals Council, are all saying that the safeguard mechanism is the way to go forward. It’s been designed to make sure that we deal with these issues, and the Coalition, that has become the “no”-alition, who have said no to everything is standing in the way.
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When you consult people about matters that affect them, you get better outcomes, PM says of voice
More on the voice: it’s put to the prime minister that there is a disconnect between the issue of the debate about the voice, and issues such as the housing crisis in remote parts of WA and other parts of Australia. He’s asked, how can he convince those struggling families that the voice will result in practical solutions?
Albanese:
Well, we know that when you consult any group of people about matters that affect them, you will get better outcomes. And that is what the voice is. We know as well from experience that where Indigenous Australians have been directly involved in the design of programs – justice, reinvestment, park rangers programs, community health programs – then you get better outcomes.
The reporter says that in some cases Indigenous people haven’t been heard on issues, for example on the cashless debit card; so will the voice be heeded on these issues?
Albanese:
There will be a voice which will be able to articulate the views of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It’s not something that will give a right of veto but it will ensure that where matters directly [affect Aboriginal people] the questions will be asked, not just by us but by you about what the view of the national voice is on particular issues.
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Indigenous Australians want to be heard, Albanese says
There’s a bit of back and forth between the journalists in attendance and the prime minister now.
Albanese is asked something about social issues in Indigenous communities – the question isn’t audible – to which he responds:
What did come up was issues of housing. They raised issues of, in general, youth having somewhere to go at night. They raised issues of school retention, and they raised a broad range of issues as well. They were supportive of the constitutional change that will be proposed at the end of the year. It was a great opportunity – and can I thank the traditional owners and pay my respects to them for giving us as well the respect of coming and meeting with myself and Senator Dodson. It was a very humbling experience, frankly, to hear from people who have such real-world experience on the ground. It was very constructive.
As a follow-up, he’s asked whether the people he spoke to in those communities saw the voice to parliament as a long-term solution to those issues. Albanese returns to the same beats he’s hit over the last few days on this in response:
Well, they certainly saw the value in, one, having recognition in our constitution. Our nation’s birth certificate currently doesn’t acknowledge the great privilege that we have of sharing this continent with the oldest continuous culture on earth.
Secondly, they want to be heard. This was an opportunity to listen to them, but a structural body, a voice to parliament, which is enshrined, will ensure that over the long term, we can deal with issues that, we have tried, frankly, other ways for 122 years now since federation – decisions made in Canberra. What we need to do is to make sure that where matters affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people there’s a consultive body.
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McGowan confirms state is also funding Port Hedland upgrades for additional $100m
WA Premier Mark McGowan takes the mic. He says the ports project will mean that the state can better export lithium and other minerals, but also to import machinery required to generate renewable energy, including wind turbines.
McGowan explains that the state is also contributing to the project:
It’s a joint funding commitment by the commonwealth and state, the commonwealth very generously is putting in $560m [and the] state is putting in around $100m. It’s overall a $660m project, which is a massive boost for the West Australian economy.
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Albanese says he has visited WA more in nine months than Morrison did in nine years
Albanese also mentions the flood recovery in the Kimberley, saying government ministers will be heading up to Fitzroy Crossing and other areas in WA.
The full cabinet has been brought to WA for this trip, and the PM seems to be leaning on a suggestion that his predecessor didn’t pay any attention to what happened in the west:
This morning I had a meeting with Senator Pat Dodson, with the traditional owners throughout the Pilbara, and a really constructive engagement. After the cabinet meeting we’ll be having a community reception with 150 people from the community sector, from the resources sector, from the business community, all wanting to engage with cabinet ministers.
It is a good thing to bring the cabinet out of Canberra. It’s a commitment that I made. We’ll also be having a cabinet meeting in Perth later this year. My government is determined to represent the whole of Australia, and I think I have visited the west now as prime minister more in nine months than the previous prime minister did in nine years. But I am particularly pleased to be here, always working hand in hand with the McGowan government.
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Prime minister announces $565m for funding to upgrade Port Hedland
Anthony Albanese is speaking now in Port Hedland, WA, where he’s announcing funding of $565m for upgrades to port infrastructure.
Albanese says:
I’m working with the McGowan government to deliver based upon the strong economy that West Australia is the driver of. And here in Port Hedland, of course, we see something like 4% of our GDP go through this port. It is a great wealth creator here in the Pilbara, and that’s why my government is committing $565m for upgrades to port infrastructure in the Pilbara.
This will make an enormous difference. A common use of facilities will be important for making sure that there is access across the board to export and also to import facilities here at the port.
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Woodside logo spray painted on WA parliament
The Woodside Energy logo has been spray painted onto the front doors of the WA parliament this morning to protest the government’s continued investment in fossil fuels.
The woman who spray painted the logo is part of a direct action campaign by a WA-based group called Disrupt Burrup Hub, which is targeting Woodside.
It’s the same group who defaced the Woodside logo onto the Art Gallery of Western Australia’s most significant and internationally renowned painting, Frederick McCubbin’s Down on his luck.
A mother has spray-painted the logo of @WoodsideEnergy across the front doors of WA Parliament to highlight the government’s control by fossil fuel interests.
— DISRUPT BURRUP HUB (@BURRUPHUB) February 21, 2023
The DISRUPT BURRUP HUB campaigner is demanding no more industry at Murujuga on the Burrup Peninsula in WA's North West. pic.twitter.com/HpZRNJNtOO
You can read more about the McCubbin incident from our arts reporter Kelly Burke:
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Removing the Attorney General’s Department as the body to administer the foreign influence transparency scheme (Fits) is among a string of recommendations made at a parliamentary joint committee this morning.
Speaking at a review into the scheme, Katherine Mansted, a senior fellow at ANU’s National Security College, said Fits was a “world-leading” instrument, but there was a “pressing need” to recalibrate it so it remained fit for purpose.
Mansted said two key drivers had changed since the establishment of the scheme in 2018 – the strategic environment in Australia had “deteriorated more rapidly than any government policy or strategy anticipated” and adversaries had been closely watching the nation.
[Fits] doesn’t always capture the right information … it is capturing some low-threat activity that distracts from the fundamental purpose of cataloguing and exposing foreign influence … there are blind spots, particularly when it comes to capturing influence that emanates from authoritarian governments, which tends to be more complex, opaque and secret by nature.
It’s not reaching the right audiences in a way that’s meaningful and useful. It needs to be a powerful transparency tool that’s meaningful and used by the public and decision makers across our democracy … it’s not a well-used tool.
Mansted recommended making Fits a more widely used and accessible tool for the public, improving the quality of information on register, better resourcing the regulator and updating it to reflect “the reality that risk from authoritarian governments is different”.
She also suggested it should be considered whether the attorney general was the appropriate body to continue to administer Fits as it moved into its next stage.
Updated
Dogs seized by police after infant death on NSW South Coast
Police are investigating the death of a five-week-old baby on the NSW South Coast after seizing two dogs who lived at the family home.
Police said they were called to Moruya Hospital after a baby suffering a head injury was brought in by her parents about 10.40pm on Saturday night.
The baby died shortly after midnight on Sunday.
Police say:
Two Rottweiler-type dogs – which live at the home – have been seized by rangers from the local council.
Inquiries are continuing by officers attached to South Coast Police District.
Updated
Renewable investment halved as carbon offset projects doubled, research shows
New research from the Australia Institute shows investment in renewable energy in Australia has halved since 2018, while carbon offsets projects have doubled in 2022 on numbers since 2020.
The report released today raises concerns climate and energy policy is driving investment towards carbon credits of questionable integrity and away from investment in renewables and “genuine” decarbonisation of industry.
The report comes the same day as the Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo) has raised concerns about Australia’s ability to produce enough electricity to meet demand in coming years.
Polly Hemming, the director of Climate & Energy at the Australia Institute, said:
The Federal government is now at the policy crossroad
sbetween investment in renewables and genuine decarbonisation, or the previous government’s creative accounting tricks.Currently Australia has no policies that drive investment into real decarbonisation projects. The safeguard mechanism and the powering the regions fund offer enormous opportunities for genuine emissions reduction, but are poised to syphon money to the carbon offset industry.
Policies like the renewable energy target drive permanent decarbonisation in industry, while offset purchases simply allow polluters to delay this change. But the renewable energy target hasn’t been renewed and there is no policy to incentivise more investment in clean energy, resulting in the slowdown of new renewable energy generation.
It’s no accident that the carbon credit industry is booming in Australia – the federal government encourages offsetting through various policies. When industry or government buys carbon credits to offset emissions – even if they are of high integrity – they are not spending money on technology that permanently displaces fossil fuel use and permanently reduces emissions.
Every day we prevaricate is a day further away from Australia meeting its climate target. This data shows offsets are obstructing climate action in Australia.
Updated
Dominic Perrottet refuses to answer questions on brother
The New South Wales premier, Dominic Perrottet, has walked out of a press conference after refusing to answer a question about his brother Jean-Claude Perrottet.
Asked why his brother, the secretary of the NSW Young Liberals, was refusing to appear before a parliamentary inquiry into Hills Shire council, Perrottet refused to answer and ended his media event.
The premier had previously demanded the media leave his family out of the press after Jean-Claude and another brother called Charles Perrottet were asked to front the probe.
Charles this week confirmed he would not appear before the committee, calling it a “Labor/Greens circus”.
He said he was a resident of Victoria and as such would not participate.
The premier also refused to answer a question about who he wanted to see replace ousted upper house candidate Peter Poulos.
Updated
Albanese defends scrapping of cashless debit card
Back on Anthony Albanese’s tour around the dial on regional Western Australian radio, the prime minister has again defended his government’s decision to scrap the cashless debit card in favour of a new “smart card” for welfare recipients.
On ABC Goldfields (an interview recorded last night but broadcast this morning), Albanese said that fixing issues with alcohol and crime in regional WA was “about creating opportunity for people, overcoming educational disadvantage”.
Goldfields was one of a handful of sites that hosted cashless debit card programs, an income management tool that quarantined large amounts of a person’s income, until it was abolished by the government last year.
It comes down to an intergenerational issue and you don’t solve that with a media grab, you solve that with hard work and listening and being prepared to act.
The PM said the new program was an improvement on the old CDC, saying it had more scope for transitioning people off income management on to other social programs. The government has come under criticism from some local services in those regions for winding up the card, with claims the ceasing of the program has led to increased crime and alcohol abuse.
Albanese said of the CDC:
It did quarantine income but it took away, like a lot of the NT intervention, took away power from people.
The smart card will not only quarantine some income but provide for some services and ongoing support.”
He noted the government’s injection of $13m into Goldfields services and $17m into economic development in the Kimberley.
We’re not saying we’re going to leave people just on welfare and not give them hope of a better future, employment and training and things that lift people out of despair and poverty.
We’re working through those issues, with the state government, we’ll work with the local government.
Updated
RBA didn’t consider a pause in rate hikes at its February meeting
The Reserve Bank’s minutes from its 7 February rates meeting have just landed.
As you’ll recall, the RBA board lifted its cash rate at the meeting by 25 basis points to 3.35% and notably warned that it expected more rate rises in coming months.
Well, we get a sense of the bank’s anxiety that inflation wasn’t sufficiently contained more by what they didn’t consider than what they did. Unlike in the previous meeting in December, the board did not consider pausing its rate rises and instead only discussed whether to lift by 25 or 50bp.
(Mind you, there was only one paragraph devoted to a possible pause back in that December gathering.)
Anyway, as per previous refrains, the board members concluded that “inflation in Australia remained too high and that the incoming data on prices and labour costs had tended to exceed expectations”.
Among those concerns was that “private sector wages growth had been stronger than expected in the September quarter and a stronger outcome than previously forecast was expected for the December quarter”.
This was supported by information from liaison contacts, with around one-third of private sector firms reporting wage increases above 5%. Growth in the wage price index was expected to rise to 4.25% by late 2023, before easing to around 3.75% by mid-2025 as conditions in the labour market ease.
Members noted the high degree of uncertainty around this forecast.
This point is interesting and will be tested very soon. Tomorrow we’ll get the WPI numbers for December and we’ll see whether the expectations are beaten. (Market consensus is for a 3.5% annualised rise, up from 3.1% in the September quarter. The CPI was 7.8% and 7.3%, respectively, in those two quarters.)
As for the prospect of a 50bp rise, the board weighed the risk that “the longer inflation stayed high, the greater the risk of price and wage expectations moving higher”.
In the end, as we know, they settled for a 25bp rise, the fourth in a row of such size. Inflation was expected to have just passed its peak, and the outlook was for a softening in consumption growth and that there were many uncertainties around the outlook, the board member said.
With interest rates already having been adjusted substantially, there was less need to move by 50 basis points at this meeting.
The rise is so far 325 basis points and investors are pencilling in another 75 to come.
Updated
Government requests public feedback on Covid impacts on students with disability
The federal government is urging the public to provide feedback on the impact of Covid-19 on school students with a disability as part of its broader review into the sector.
The public consultation phase of the review – an election commitment – opened on 31 January and will remain open until 28 March.
The minister for education, Jason Clare, said the pandemic disrupted schooling for students all around Australia and has had significant impacts for students with disability:
The pandemic made it more difficult for students with disability to get reasonable adjustments and support, disrupted social connections with their peers, and hindered communication between teachers, students and parents.
We committed to undertake this review so we could learn more about the impacts for students with disability and determine the best way to support them and get their learning back on track.
The minister for social services, Amanda Rishworth, said the review would be an “important piece of work” to understand how to improve outcomes for the 4.4 million Australians living with a disability.
A commonwealth early years strategy is expected to be released later this year. The review will also examine how students with a disability could be better supported in future emergency events.
It follows the releaser of a report by the productivity commission which found there had been little improvement in educational outcomes since the National School Reform Agreement (NSRA) was established, with targets “too incomplete and vague” to drive reforms.
Importantly, it noted data gaps in a range of areas, including no outcome data for students with a disability and no real definition of “educational disadvantage”.
Updated
BoM issues storm warnings over eastern states
The Bureau of Meteorology has issued a couple of severe storm warnings for Queensland, NSW and the ACT.
The bureau is predicting storms for Sydney and the Central Coast which could bring flash flooding from late this afternoon, warning damaging winds and large hail are also possible in central and southern parts of the state.
Severe thunderstorms are predicted for Canberra as well as the southern Tablelands and south-west slopes, with large hail and heavy falls also possible.
In Queensland, thunderstorms are also predicted across the state, with storms in the Channel Country and Birdsville set to become severe.
Thunderstorm forecast today (21/2): Thunderstorms are possible across large parts of #Qld today. Storms in #ChannelCountry including #Birdsville may become severe, with a risk of DAMAGING WIND GUSTS (> 90 km/h). Monitor warnings: https://t.co/FBmpsInT9o pic.twitter.com/QpoD7LSlQh
— Bureau of Meteorology, Queensland (@BOM_Qld) February 21, 2023
Thunderstorms forecast today (21/02): Storms in #Sydney #CentralCoast may bring HEAVY FALLS/FLASH FLOODING from late this afternoon. DAMAGING WINDS LARGE HAIL HEAVY FALLS all possible with storms in central & southern ranges/slopes/plains. Monitor warning https://t.co/Ss766eSCrL pic.twitter.com/mojnpMcnmF
— Bureau of Meteorology, New South Wales (@BOM_NSW) February 20, 2023
Thunderstorms forecast today (21/02): Severe thunderstorms possible in #Canberra #ACT #SouthernTablelands #SouthWestSlopes this afternoon and evening, with DAMAGING WINDS/LARGE HAIL/HEAVY FALLS all possible. Monitor warning https://t.co/lRPVJyUlU1 and https://t.co/48nE7i9CTu pic.twitter.com/9S3FD1zJ1g
— Bureau of Meteorology Australian Capital Territory (@BOM_ACT) February 21, 2023
Updated
PM confirms voice referendum will be held between October and December
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has confirmed the voice to parliament referendum will be held between October and December, further narrowing down the window for the first referendum in 24 years. The latest detail points toward an early October voting day.
Albanese also said the referendum would be an even more powerful advance in Indigenous reconciliation efforts than Kevin Rudd’s apology to the stolen generation.
The PM is doing a quick tour of regional Western Australian radio as his cabinet meets in Port Hedland today. After a couple of interviews on ABC Goldfields and Triple M Port Hedland already, Albanese will shortly jump on Triple M Goldfields as well.
On Triple M Port Hedland, Albanese said the referendum would be held “sometime between late September and December”. He later narrowed the window further, saying it wouldn’t be held on AFL grand final day (the last Saturday in September) and would actually be between October and December.
The parliamentary sitting calendar has a four-week break between mid-September and mid-October, while the rest of the year is fairly packed with at least one house of parliament in session for 6 of the next 8 weeks - making it tricky to schedule a national vote in between. The October-December window confirmed by Albanese might make an early October vote more feasible.
Albanese told MMM that the referendum would “lift up our entire nation” and be “a huge opportunity for us to embrace reconciliation”, which he likened to Rudd’s apology in 2007.
In the leadup to the apology, it was resisted by the former Howard government, they said ‘it’ll lead to reparations’.
The truth is, it’s an important day in bringing the nation together … This will be the same, it’ll be even more powerful, not a statement in the parliament but a statement from the people.
Asked a final question about chivalry and whether he opens doors for his partner, Jodie Haydon, (presumably furthering an earlier discussion topic on the radio station) Albanese answered “I don’t even get to open my own door … I have minders wherever I go”.
“I don’t get to open a door any more, it’s a true story,” he said, before adding “politeness and manners are always a good thing”.
Updated
State police hold press conference on now-found bushwalkers
NSW police are giving a media conference in Katoomba following the location of the missing bushwalkers, who were well enough to make their own way home after the rescue.
The two elderly gentlemen are fine. They’ve been seen to by paramedics who were at the scene and made their own way home.
We were able to get communication up and going with the gentlemen last night and as a result, we could identify where they were in the bushland. An operation, as I said, was commenced and subsequently we pinpointed where they were. It was a trek to get in there.
Well, of course they had a plan initially to enter the bushland and the plan was to be out of there by last Friday, I believe. For one reason or another … they’ve got distracted and they’ve decided to stay a few nights longer.
They were difficult to locate in terms of communicating with from the outset but Sunday communication with other family members was able to get the ball rolling.
Updated
Found NSW bushwalkers say overgrown tracks caused them to become lost
The two missing bushwalkers found this morning in the NSW Blue Mountains say it was the overgrown tracks which caused them to lose their way.
Alfred Zawadzki, 69, and Klaus Umland, 81, were found alive and well in the early hours of this morning after their three day hike turned into six.
Umland told the ABC he’d been hiking in the mountains for 40 years and had never seen the tracks in such a state.
There used to be some really good tracks in here. They all are, I would say, overgrown.
Zawadzki, said it normally took three days to walk out of the valley, but the condition of the terrain slowed them down.
It wasn’t the weather. It was the bush.
Updated
Consumer sentiment picks up despite latest interest rate hike
Consumers may not be so crestfallen in the wake of higher interest rates after all. The latest weekly survey of their mood by ANZ and Roy Morgan points to a modest rebound, although the gauge remains in the zone of gloom:
Consumer confidence increased last week but remained lower than before the February RBA cash rate hike. Household inflation expectations softened to 5.1%, potentially a lagged response to the rise in interest rates. pic.twitter.com/Op0FNsVLbe
— ANZ_Research (@ANZ_Research) February 20, 2023
The Reserve Bank is particularly interested in whether the public gets used to higher inflation, and expects more to come.
The latest survey suggests consumers are buying into the idea that the inflation rate has peaked, and we’re on the downwards slope:
Inflation expectations are not becoming 'unanchored' if the latest @ANZ_Research and @RoyMorganAus's weekly survey is any guide. pic.twitter.com/vDp8WmpJMJ
— @phannam@mastodon.green (@p_hannam) February 20, 2023
Adelaide Timbrell, a senior economist at ANZ, reckons the drop in household inflation expectations to 5.1% was “potentially a lagged response to the rise in interest rates”. We’ll have to see.
As it happens, we’ll get a bit wider view of what the RBA thinks about inflation and interest rates in about half an hour. That’s when we’ll get the minutes to the bank’s latest board meeting that sent interest rates up for a record ninth consecutive time.
One point pundits will likely zero-in on is how seriously the RBA considered the need to lift the cash rate by more than the 25 basis points to 3.35% that they actually did.
Coming soon to a blog near you.
Updated
Stronger El Niño could cause irreversible melting of Antarctica, CSIRO says
Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO, has some pretty alarming research out this morning showing that future increases in the strength of El Niño may accelerate the irreversible melting of ice shelves and ice sheets in Antarctica.
Over 30 climate models showed that while an increase in the variability of El Niño Southern Oscillation (Enso) leads to reduced warming near the surface, it accelerated warming of deeper ocean waters.
Wenju Cai, the lead author of this study published in Nature Climate Change, said:
Climate change is expected to increase the magnitude of Enso, making both El Niño and La Niña stronger.
This new research shows that stronger El Niño may speed up warming of deep waters in the Antarctic shelf, making ice shelves and ice sheets melt faster.
Our modelling also revealed that warming around the edges of floating sea ice is slowed during this process, slowing down the melting of sea ice near the surface.
Models with increased ENSO variability show a reduced upwelling of deeper, warmer waters, leading to slower warming of the ocean surface.
Co-author Ariaan Purich, from Securing Antarctica’s Environmental Future at Monash University, said:
This could have broad implications for the global climate system, so continuing to understand how Enso will respond to climate change is a critical area of climate research.
There is still a lot more we need to understand about processes influencing shelf temperatures, and the finding is an important piece of the puzzle.
Updated
Attorney general responds on cancellation of UN torture prevention body’s visit
The UN torture prevention body has decided overnight to cancel its suspended visit to Australia, which ended prematurely in October last year after New South Wales and Queensland blocked access to some detention facilities.
A spokesperson for the attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, says the government “deeply regrets the decision by the subcommittee on prevention of torture (SPT) to terminate the visit”:
This is despite the fact that the SPT carried out successful visits to places of detention across almost all jurisdictions in Australia, and the progress made by Australia in addressing the concerns raised by the SPT.
Since the SPT suspended its visit in October 2022, the Australian government has been engaging cooperatively and in good faith with the SPT and with all states and territories to work towards a possible resumption of the visit.
This disappointing decision does not reflect the Australian government’s commitment to protecting and promoting human rights and does not change our commitment to implementing Australia’s OPCAT obligations and to facilitating future visits from the SPT.
Updated
BHP first-half profit slides amid global headwinds
Mining giant BHP has posted a fall in profits amid tough global economic conditions but is positive on the demand outlook as China opens up, AAP reports.
BHP today reported an underlying attributable profit of $US6.6bn ($A9.6bn) for the six months to December 31, down almost a third (32%) from a year earlier.
Profit from operations in the half fell more than a quarter (27%) to $US10.8bn ($A15.6bn) on lower prices for iron ore and copper, higher royalties paid on coal in Queensland and inflation.
But this was offset by record iron ore production and higher prices for coal and nickel.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation was $US13.2bn ($A19.1bn), down 28%.
Net operating cash flow was $US6.8bn ($A9.8bn), down 41%.
BHP’s chief executive, Mike Henry, said:
Significant wet weather in our coal assets impacted production and unit costs, as did challenges in securing sufficient labour.
We are positive about the demand outlook in the second half of FY23 and into FY24, with strengthening activity in China on the back of recent policy decisions the major driver.
Updated
Upholding Qantas’s decision to sack staff would weaken workplace rights, union warns
Upholding Qantas’s decision to sack staff ahead of industrial action would create “uncertainty” about accessing workplace rights and water down protections against other forms of discrimination, such as sacking workers before they accrue parental leave.
That is the submission of the Transport Workers’ Union in the airline’s high court case seeking to overturn the finding that it illegally outsourced 1,700 ground handler jobs.
Qantas is fighting on two fronts, against the union, which argues the protection against adverse action is not limited to “presently existing” rights, and against the workplace relations minister, Tony Burke, who has sought to intervene in the case.
On Wednesday the airline filed a notice arguing Burke has no automatic right to intervene, in a bid to force him to seek leave for submissions expected to favour the TWU.
Cyclone Gabrielle will force property buy-outs: NZ PM
New Zealand’s prime minister, Chris Hipkins, has warned cyclone-displaced families of a long wait for answers on their future, anticipating some will face compulsory buy-outs.
He told Newstalk ZB this morning:
[We are] clearly going to have to work through a process with those areas that can’t be re-inhabited. And of course, we’ll do that with respect to the people whose lives have been turned upside down.
The 2011 Christchurch earthquakes – which killed 185 people – produced vast areas of land deemed unsuitable for rebuild, and required forensic inspection of thousands of houses to assess whether they were structurally sound.
Hipkins – who wouldn’t be drawn on which areas may be unlivable after the massive storm – warned many would have to walk a similar path after Cyclone Gabrielle. He said on TVNZ:
It didn’t happen overnight after the Canterbury earthquakes. It won’t happen overnight now.
There were some people who did not want to move and there were some people who in the end had to move even though they did not want to.
There’s a lot of different issues that we will need to work through, including making sure people who do need to relocate are able to free up their finances and release themselves from their existing land ownership or property ownership, claim their insurance and get on with their lives.
Updated
Brittany Higgins responds on jacket claims
Brittany Higgins has responded to an article in the Australian, which had questioned the veracity of her claims about where the jacket came from that she wore walking out of parliament on the morning of her alleged rape.
Janet Albrechtsen wrote:
When Brittany Higgins walked out of Parliament House at 10.01am on Saturday, March 23, 2019, she was captured on CCTV wearing a black and white Carla Zampatti jacket.
... While the young staffer would repeat the claim that she took a jacket from a goodwill box in Linda Reynolds‘ ministerial suite in her testimony in the ACT supreme court last October during the rape trial of Bruce Lehrmann, members of Reynolds’ office have told The Weekend Australian that there was no goodwill bin or box or pile of clothes for charity in Reynolds’ ministerial suite.
Higgins has written on Twitter this morning explaining the context and saying the Australian should have asked her for her response before going to print.
Lehrmann consistently denied the allegation that he raped Higgins. His first trial was aborted due to juror misconduct and prosecutors decided not to proceed with a retrial because of the likely impact on Higgins’s mental health.
Reynolds moved from her Senate office to the Ministerial wing when she was promoted.
— Brittany Higgins (@BrittHiggins_) February 20, 2023
There was a box of stuff her office manager told me to take to good will. It was mostly filled with old clothes.
I borrowed the jacket from the box (after the assault) before it was donated.
To be honest, she was a Minister at the time so she probably had no idea.
— Brittany Higgins (@BrittHiggins_) February 20, 2023
Worse that the Australian didn’t put that particular allegation to me before they implied I was a liar ahead of publishing it to the entire country.
Updated
Victorian Liberals to handpick candidate for Aston byelection
The Victorian Liberals administrative committee will handpick the party’s candidate for the Aston byelection.
The committee met on Monday night after it was announced the byelection will be held on 1 April - the earliest date that complied with the required 33-day notice period that follows the NSW election on 25 March.
Victorian Liberal sources conceded the byelection date rendered it “impossible” to go ahead with plans for a ballot of local members on 4 March to select a candidate, as it would have given Labor a “headstart”.
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, on Friday announced the former union official and breast cancer survivor Mary Doyle will contest the seat after she slashed outgoing Liberal MP Alan Tudge’s margin from 10.1% to 2.8% in the May 2022 election.
The decision makes it likely a woman will be pre-selected as the Liberal candidate. The barrister and Melbourne City councillor Roshena Campbell has emerged as the frontrunner, ahead of the oncologist and Guardian columnist Ranjana Srivastava, the former Victorian upper house MP Cathrine Burnett-Wake and Emanuele Cicchiello.
Updated
Photographer Timothy Dean captured the north Canberra sky putting on a light show behind a mushroom-shaped cloud last night:
Bit of a light show to the North of Canberra this evening.
— Timothy Dean Photographer (@TimothyDeanAU) February 20, 2023
Old Well Station Road, Kenny.
Monday 20th Feburary 2023 9pm
Licensing available via @SevereWeatherAU pic.twitter.com/5K0FU4A3bY
Updated
Victoria’s assistant treasurer denies conflict of interest over shares
Victoria’s assistant treasurer, Danny Pearson, has conceded it was an “error of judgment” to hold shares in Commonwealth Bank while carrying out his ministerial duties.
The Australian today reported Danny Pearson held shares in the bank when he announced a new three-bank panel to deliver Victoria’s banking and financial services in August 2021.
The new arrangement, including the Commonwealth Bank, Westpac and NAB, replaced a contract with Westpac that had been worth an estimated $120m a year.
According to the parliament’s register of interests, Pearson has held the shares since 2014.
In a statement this morning, he said he was “not a decision maker in the awarding of the banking and financial services contract in 2021”:
The process was run by senior independent public servants and there was a probity auditor engaged throughout who signed off on the process. I noted the outcome of the tender once it had been determined by the Department of Treasury and Finance.
Despite this, I accept that it was an error of judgment to not recognise and manage the potential for a perception of conflict of interest and I unreservedly apologise for this oversight.
For avoidance of doubt, I have spoken to the premier and advised him that I will place all of my shareholdings in a blind trust.
Speaking to reporters this morning, Pearson said when he announced the outcome of the tender he did not recall that he held shares in Commonwealth Bank:
I’ve held these shares for over a decade so they predate my arrival as a member of parliament.
I recognise that this may have given rise to a potential of a perception of a conflict of interest and for that I unreservedly apologise.
Updated
Michelle Rowland says she will no longer accept donations from Sportsbet
The communications minister, Michelle Rowland, has faced calls to resign in the last couple of weeks, after she accepted donations from a gaming company before the election.
Independent MP Andrew Wilkie, a staunch anti-gambling campaigner, led the charge for her resignation, saying Rowland, who carries the policy responsibility for interactive gaming, was “completely and utterly conflicted” as a consequence of accepting the donations and hospitality and had made a “grievous error of judgment”.
That followed a report in Nine newspapers that Sportsbet paid for a campaign dinner and made a second donation to Rowland’s campaign in the lead-up to the federal election. Labor did not disclose the donations because they were below the reporting threshold.
Rowland had declared the donations as required under the law and Anthony Albanese and Tony Burke launched passionate defences of the minister, saying she had met every obligation in front of her and was leading the government’s harm minimisation policy for online gambling.
But Rowland had stayed rather quiet on the whole affair – until appearing on the ABC’s Q+A program overnight, where she said that while she had met her disclosure obligations, she understands the community wants better – and she will no longer accept donations from Sportsbet.
Rowland said:
I will not take money from Sportsbet.
Pressed on whether that included other gambling companies, Rowland said, “As I said, I am now the minister, I will not be taking money from Sportsbet.” Rowland looked like she was going to say more, but was cut off.
Rowland also pointed to what else she had learned from the outcry:
I think this highlights one very important aspect and that’s about disclosure of political donations.
I think this is an area of long overdue reform and the Albanese government has had a long held position for example of decreasing the disclosure threshold, so it’s a lower amount that needs to be disclosed, but also having real time reporting. And if this conversation encourages that to be sped up and we get results in that, I think that’s a good thing and I’ll be participating in that discussion.
Updated
One year since Australia opened to international tourists
A year to the day since Australia welcomed back international tourists, data shows the tourism sector is bouncing back from the pandemic-induced travel shutdown.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, international arrivals in December 2022 were at 60% of December 2019 arrivals – that’s up from only 20% in March 2022.
International visitor expenditure is expected to exceed pre-pandemic levels in 2024 and international visitor arrivals to exceed pre-pandemic levels in 2025, according to projections from Tourism Research Australia.
The government has pledged a $48m package in the October budget to support the industry, which included the unforgettable AI-generated kangaroo “Ruby Roo” as part of the Come and Say G’day campaign unveiled last year.
The trade and tourism minister, Don Farrell, says he is buoyed up by the positive trends:
The Australian visitor economy is bouncing back, which is great news for our tourism operators and the hundreds of thousands of Australians working in the industry. Tourism is the lifeblood of many communities around the country who were hit hard by the global Covid-19 pandemic.
The Albanese Government is supporting tourism recovery, and there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic with international travellers returning to our shores in growing numbers.
That trend is forecast to continue and, to ensure it does, Tourism Australia is vigorously marketing our tourism offering in key markets around the world inviting travellers to Come and Say G’day.
Updated
Australia has undermined its global leadership on human rights, commissioner says
Australia’s human rights commissioner, Lorraine Finlay, says Australia’s failure to comply with UN’s protocols to the conventions against torture (Opcat) undermines our global leadership on human rights.
She is responding to the news overnight that the UN has terminated its visit to Australia, which was suspended last year when they denied access to some detention facilities in New South Wales and Queensland.
Finlay told ABC Radio:
It’s neither unexpected nor can I say undeserved given the continued delays and failures around the implementation of Opcat.
And it really undermines our global leadership when it comes to human rights because what this says is that when Australia makes a promise, in this case, we haven’t actually kept our word.
Updated
Leaders in WA for federal cabinet meeting
If it seems like most of the government is in Western Australia, that is because it is.
Anthony Albanese is making good on his promise to keep wooing the west – WA helped deliver Labor government and Albanese is working to ensure it stays on side.
As reported a little earlier in the blog, that means holding a federal cabinet meeting in Port Hedland. The WA premier, Mark McGowan, will address the meeting before it gets down to business. While in Port Hedland, the prime minister will also meet community group representatives, Indigenous elders and community members at a special reception.
The message from Albanese?
We’ve always said WA is more than Perth, and Port Hedland is one of the engine rooms of the WA economy.
Albanese has made a point of holding cabinet meetings across Australia, with a particular focus on the regions. It’s all about soft diplomacy – and sending the message it is not all about Canberra.
Updated
Talk of changing super tax concessions a ‘mature conversation’ to have, Bowen says
Just before he was freed from Patricia Karvelas’ questions, Chris Bowen was asked about the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, opening the door to changing Australia’s superannuation tax concessions.
We reported about Chalmers on that yesterday – he sneaked it into his speech on defining superannuation, and then doubled down during the question and answer session. It is not going to be something that happens in the short term – the main focus is defining superannuation and making it more equitable, but Chalmers doesn’t say anything without thought. So, it’s on his mind (given it costs almost as much as the aged pension, you can see why).
Bowen though, knows how to avoid something he doesn’t want to answer. And he turns the question around.
Well, I think Jim Chalmers made a very thoughtful contribution yesterday about this and you know, having a sensible mature conversation with Australian people.
I was bit gobsmacked to hear the shadow minister on your program, just a little while ago say, you know, it doesn’t matter that women don’t get a fair share of superannuation concessions and just laughed that off that that really surprised me and I’m pretty hard to surprise these days in politics, that sort of glib dismissal of real issues that the treasurer is putting on the table – superannuation is magnificent national achievement which my side of politics is very proud of, and it means that Australians who have been on low and moderate income during their working life have a chance to have a dignified retirement. I think the treasurer pointing out that we need to ensure it’s equitable and sustainable, should be relatively uncontroversial.
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UN torture prevention body cancels visit to Australia
The UN torture prevention body has decided to cancel its suspended visit to Australia.
The UN subcommittee on prevention of torture (SPT) ended its visit to Australia’s detention facilities in October last year after New South Wales and Queensland blocked access to some facilities.
The subcommittee requested a number of assurances in order to resume its visit but says “some of the requested guarantees were not provided, and the subcommittee could not ascertain that it would be able to resume its visit in a reasonable timeframe.”
The chair of the SPT, Suzanne Jabbour, said:
Despite the good cooperation the subcommittee has with the Australian federal authorities following our initial mission, there is no alternative but to terminate the visit as the issue of unrestricted access to all places of deprivation of liberty in two states has not yet been resolved.
Nevertheless, a report based on what the SPT observed during its October visit before the suspension will be shared with the state party as soon as possible. It will enable ongoing communication with the Australian government.
BREAKING: The UN torture prevention body has terminated its visit to Australia because two states, NSW and QLD, refuse to give the access needed to prisons to check for torture. It’s extraordinary. The only other country where this has happened is Rwanda https://t.co/3kt2CiOGMU
— David Shoebridge (@DavidShoebridge) February 20, 2023
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Greens still pushing for tougher climate policy
So what about Chris Bowen’s negotiations with the Greens, who are trying to pull the government in the opposition direction to businesses like Bluescope and want the government to go further on the safeguard mechanism.
Will Bowen agree to a climate trigger (when projects would have to be assessed on the impact they would have on climate change).
He’s not going to negotiate with the Greens on live radio.
So consider that, ongoing.
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BlueScope Steel could go offshore if safeguard mechanism too tough, Bowen says
Chris Bowen is asked about steel maker BlueScope, saying that if the safeguard mechanism is too onerous, they will have to go offshore.
(If you need a refresher on the safeguard mechanism, this from Adam Morton is very, very good.)
Bowen says he has been talking to BlueScope and the discussions have been positive.
Of course I’ve been talking to BlueScope I’ve been talking to people across the board.
Welcome to policy [negotiations] Patricia [Karvelas] there’s people on your show saying the safeguards’ policy goes nowhere near far enough, there’s other people saying it goes too far. I believe we’ve got the balance right.
Bowen says it is all part of the consultation he promised, which finishes at the end of the month.
I’ll then read through every submission and update our policy in responses to submissions where I think a valid case for reconsideration has been made. But of course what we want to be is a country that makes things, of course steel is absolutely essential to our transition. So when we’re going to be a lot more steel, we’re going to need a lot more steel, in the transition.
Bowen won’t say what he would need to change to ensure BlueScope stays, but that the discussions have been “good”.
But of course when you know if you’re doing a big and difficult reform people will have views about it.
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Energy ministers to meet on Friday as regulator updates forecasts
Summer is almost done (according to the calendar) and we managed to get through it without significant electricity shortages. A heatwave building across southern Australia in coming days will add some extra demand.
Whether future summers avoid “reliability gaps” depends a lot on whether more renewable energy and storage projects come on line. That’s the view, at least, of the Australian Energy Market Operator in its latest forecast update.
The longstanding delays of building Snowy Hydro’s Kurri Kurri gas plant and the troubled pumped hydro project have now been recognised by the market operator. (It had been reporting “sensitivity” analyses assuming Snowy 2.0 wouldn’t be online by the end of 2026.)
The exit of probably five coal-fired power stations by 2030 is one issue regulators have to tackle. The reliability of the remaining ones is a wildcard in the pack, such as Queensland’s Callide C plant that had a cooling tower collapse last October and won’t be back on line until the end of June (in the latest postponement).
The report is timely, as federal, state and territory energy ministers will gather in Newcastle for a meeting on Friday joined by be the respective climate ministers (although in the case of the Commonwealth and a couple of the states, they are the same person).
Aemo’s report will no doubt help kick off those talks.
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New energy projects will prevent future shortages, Bowen says
Good morning from Canberra.
The energy minister, Chris Bowen, has had a chat to ABC RN Breakfast where he was asked about the Aemo report which says the east coast is facing an energy shortage by 2030.
Bowen says don’t worry, there are new projects coming which will mean that prediction won’t come to fruition.
Bowen says there is “huge interest” in Australia’s transmission opportunities, big interest in batteries and there are more projects in the pipeline.
I mean, yes, in nine months have we fixed every single reliability gap for the next decade? No, there’s more work to do.
Am I pleased with what we’ve done? Yes. Am I yet satisfied? No.
The Aemo works on committed projects, so when will it include the projects Bowen is including?
Bowen says the fact that the regulator has put out a new report in February, having just dropped the last one in August, shows how rapidly the government is working.
You know that this report normally comes out once a year or so, this is a report which has been put out in a much more rapid timeframe because Aemo has reached the view that the guidance they provided last August is out of date because we’ve seen a lot more investment coming through with renewable.
So the sorts of decisions we are making across the board are making a difference on that sort of a timeframe, I expect Aemo will provide further updates.
Is every is every update gonna say ‘you know, it’s all magically fixed?’ Of course not. This is a very big task. But every update, every update will show, in my view, very real and substantial progress.
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‘More work to do’ in filling electricity gaps, Bowen says
The climate and energy minister, Chris Bowen, is speaking to ABC Radio now. He isn’t able to say when these gaps in the electricity grid will be filled but he says the fact that the Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo) has needed to update its report earlier than expected is a positive sign.
This report is designed to achieve this outcome to let people know – governments and private sector investors - where the regulator sees gaps in coming years, and where investment should be focused towards fulfilling that.
The second point is the last report was just last August, has taken a decision that there have been so many developments, positive developments since last August, they will update the report just a few months later, to provide a new indication and that indicates that the reliability gaps that Aemo was concerned about in the next couple of years have been closed with a big uptake in renewable energy investment. And that is good news.
But yes, Aemo is correctly pointing out that there is still much much more work to do.
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Energy regulator predicts mainland states will exceed their energy capacity by 2030
Australian Energy Market Operator’s (Aemo) updated electricity statement of opportunities report is out this morning and it’s warning of electricity supply shortages as renewable projects lag behind coal plant closures.
Daniel Westerman from Aemo told ABC Radio this morning all mainland states will exceed their energy capacity by 2030:
What we’ll see towards the back end of the decade is increasing reliability on gas and those gaps hit every mainland state in the national electricity market, the analysis that Aemo undertakes only on what’s called committed projects. They really have to be there and with a firm expectation that they will be delivered.
You can read more about that report from our economics correspondent Peter Hannam:
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Stuart Robert criticises Chalmers’ super definition proposal
The shadow minister for financial services and shadow assistant treasurer, Stuart Robert, is continuing his criticism of the government’s plan to legislate the purpose of superannuation which the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, unveiled yesterday.
He told ABC Radio this morning that the government has come up with a “Sir Humphrey-esque” definition, compared to the “simpler” one which came out of David Murray’s review in 2014.
David Murray recommended it was simply something such as retirement income for supplemental support the age pension, and the government’s come out with a Sir Humphrey-esque word definition that talks about sustainability and equity and preserving it to ensure that the purpose of super is meant for Labor frankly, and for the industry super funds but not for the individual. This is individuals’ money. So this attempt is all about Labor’s nation-building scheme but it is not about the individual and what’s right for them. That’s our objection to what the treasurer is trying to do.
Robert didn’t hide his disappointment that the super funds hadn’t been as enthusiastic at the Coalition’s previous attempts:
We tried to legislate the objective of super in 2016. I was the assistant treasurer in 2018, I tried again, and these large super funds all of the super industry the opposition, no one was interested. But surprise, surprise, now with this great big nation building agenda and the treasurer wanting super funds to invest in everything and anything that supports his agenda, everyone’s now coming out saying this is wonderful.
Robert believes the government is prioritising creating another “great big Washington national monument” above the individual’s purposes for super. When pressed on what these were his eventual example was … the NBN, which was built by the Coalition.
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Missing bushwalkers found in Blue Mountains
Good morning, Natasha May on deck with you, and I have good news – two bushwalkers missing in the Blue Mountains have been found overnight.
The two men, aged 69 and 81, had intended to return back from the Megalong Valley on Friday. When the younger of the two men failed to show up to an appointment on Sunday, the search began for the bushwalkers.
The rescue party found the pair in good health near Mobbs Swamp about 1am this morning and escorted them out of the bushland, returning to the campground where they first went missing about 6.45am.
Blue Mountains police area command Detective Inspector Michael Marinello said he was pleased to have found them and had this safety messaging for the public:
No matter how experienced a bushwalker may be, it is imperative that they have with them all the relevant safety equipment including suitable clothing, food and water.
Another important aspect are communication devices. Whenever heading on a bushwalk, people should have a fully-charged mobile phone, along with additional charging devices. Taking a GPS enabled Personal Locator Beacon (PLB) will help rescuers should you find yourself in difficulty.
It is also important to let someone know your intended route, what tracks you are taking and your estimated return time. If there is any change to the original plan, then tell someone.
Please ensure you register your trip with the appropriate agency, such as the National Parks and Wildlife Service, and think before you trek – know what the weather conditions will be like, know your physical abilities and make your bushwalk a safe one.
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Robodebt hearing to get under way
A top government department lawyer will give evidence on the unlawful robodebt scheme when the royal commission into the scheme resumes, Australian Associated Press reports.
The second day of the final hearing block of the robodebt royal commission will hear from the former chief counsel for the Department of Social Services Paul Menzies-McVey.
Other witnesses scheduled for today include Services Australia’s compliance and debt operations officer Jeannie-Marie Blake and the Attorney General’s Department assistant secretary Michael Johnson.
The commission is examining who knew about the legality of the scheme and how robodebt was implemented.
The final round of hearings, which began yesterday, is focusing on the inquiry by the commonwealth ombudsman into the scheme, proposals to expand robodebt, the impact it had on victims and how it was wound up.
The impact on victims and their families was the subject of much of yesterday’s hearings, which heard from the mother of a robodebt victim, as Guardian Australia’s Luke Henriques-Gomes reported.
The final block of hearings will run for three weeks, with the final report due at the end of June.
Commissioner Catherine Holmes last week wrote to the government requesting a two-month extension of the inquiry.
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RBA board meeting minutes to be released
The reasoning behind the latest hike to the official cash rate will be revealed in the minutes from the Reserve Bank’s February board meeting, to be released today, Australian Associated Press reports.
The RBA lifted interest rates by another 25 basis points in February, taking the cash rate to 3.35%.
The central bank’s governor, Philip Lowe, has since fronted two parliamentary hearings where he was grilled about the RBA’s trajectory for monetary policy.
He said the inflation rate was still “way too high” at 7.8% annually in December quarter and the cash rate was unlikely at its peak.
NAB markets economist Taylor Nugent said the minutes from the meeting, due this morning, were unlikely to add much to the deluge of communications of late:
At the margin we might find out whether the RBA board considered a 50bp increase.
Also on today, ANZ and Roy Morgan will release their weekly consumer confidence survey, which plummeted after the February rate hike.
The index sunk 5.5 points to 78.1 last week, its lowest level since early April 2020 at the start of the pandemic.
PM and ministers head for Port Hedland
An Indigenous voice to parliament and crime gripping remote communities will be in focus as Anthony Albanese takes his cabinet to Western Australia, Australian Associated Press reports.
The prime minister and his senior ministers will meet in Port Hedland today, with the WA premier, Mark McGowan, to give an address.
Afterwards Albanese and his cabinet will meet about 150 Indigenous and other community leaders, amid criticism from the Coalition over Labor’s decision to scrap the cashless debit card.
The card, which was abolished in September, managed welfare payments for recipients in a bid to reduce the amount being spent on alcohol.
Regional communities including Laverton and Leonora in the state’s Goldfields are experiencing a spike in youth crime.
Opposition leader Peter Dutton, who is also visiting the crime-hit towns this week, said the decision to dump the controversial income management program had resulted in the “rivers of grog” reopening and a “step-up” in violence.
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Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our rolling coverage of the day’s news. I’m Martin Farrer, bringing you the best of the breaking stories this morning before my colleague Natasha May takes the controls.
A majority of voters believe the Reserve Bank of Australia has overreacted in jacking up interest rates to tame inflation, and more than 70% say the Albanese government has to to share some or a lot of the blame, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll. But it’s not all bad news for the prime minister, with Labor thought more likely to bring down the cost of living, improve public services and manage climate change. There will be more detail on how the RBA arrived at its latest decision when the minutes of its last meeting are published today.
A class action will be launched within weeks by over-65s who are seeking compensation for a decade of lower-quality disability support, potentially adding millions to the annual cost of the NDIS. Helen Bonynge, the proposed lead plaintiff in the NDIS class action, describes in today’s episode of Full Story how being deprived of help changed her life, while our political correspondent Paul Karp breaks down the legal arguments behind the case and what it means for the scheme.
Police in Papua New Guinea have launched a rescue operation to find an Australian professor and three local researchers who were taken hostage in the country’s remote highlands, the nation’s police commissioner has announced overnight. An armed gang had demanded a ransom for the captives, David Manning said, describing the gunmen as “opportunists” and the situation as “delicate”. The professor, whom we have chosen not to name, was taken hostage on Sunday.
