What we learned: Monday, 24 March
With that, we will wrap the blog for the afternoon. We’ll be back first thing tomorrow, with all eyes on the budget that nobody expected.
For now, here were today’s major developments:
The prime minister has told his federal colleagues Labor will “unashamedly stand for workers” as it prepares to unveil its final budget before the federal election. The defence minister and deputy PM, Richard Marles, flagged an additional $1bn for defence to be revealed tomorrow, while the finance minister, Katy Gallagher, also spruiked more than $2bn found in budget savings.
Every school in Australia will be fully funded within the decade after the federal government secured a deal with Queensland – the last holdout state – on public schools. The sunshine state will receive $2.8bn to 2034 to be tied to education reforms and targets.
Kooyong MP Monique Ryan and her husband, Peter Jordan, have apologised after video circulated showing him removing a Liberal campaign sign from a Melbourne yard.
And the Trump administration’s temporary pause of funding to conduct a review into whether Australian university researchers promote administration priorities and avoid “DEI” and “woke gender ideology” does not amount to foreign interference, the education minister has said.
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University of Wollongong proposes drastic job cuts in face of major deficit
The University of Wollongong (UoW) has proposed slashing up to 185 full time roles as part of a major overhaul to reduce an ongoing deficit.
Potentially affected staff have been notified by the university and will participate in briefings this week. The proposal, now in its consultation phase, would also reduce the UoW’s faculties from four to three and its schools from 18 to 11.
Academic, student and research support services are proposed to be reconfigured as a “hub-and-spoke model within central portfolios to improve the efficiency and effectiveness”. The move is expected to reduce 155 to 185 full-time equivalent jobs. with savings of around $26m.
In a statement, the university said it was facing “significant financial challenges, in part due to the Australian government’s changes to visa processing and migration policy and a sharp reduction in international student numbers”.
As a result, UOW suffered a $35m drop in revenue in 2024, with ongoing impacts forecast for 2025.
Interim vice chancellor and president, Senior Prof Eileen McLaughlin, said the university “must continue to make challenging choices now to set the university up for a brighter future”.
Our priority is to strengthen our foundations and deliver a sustainable future for the university while ensuring that UOW remains competitive and innovative.
The final changes are expected to be released on 23 July.
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Family fights for change ahead of prison death inquest
The family of an Aboriginal man who died in custody in 2022 hopes his inquest will bring about change in the justice system, AAP reports.
Clinton Austin, a 38-year-old Gunditjmara and Wiradjuri man, died at Loddon prison in Victoria on 11 September, 2022.
Austin’s brother Shaun delivered an emotional statement outside the coroners court of Victoria on Monday ahead of the inquest:
I will not stop fighting for you. I will fight to make a change, any change possible, not only for Aboriginal people going through the justice system, but anyone who has to go through it. I know that’s what Clinton would want.
His family has said he was a proud father and artist who had a big heart and wanted to be an art teacher.
Austin had already served his two-year non-parole period in prison when he died. He was the second Indigenous person to die in custody in Victoria within the space of a month.
Almost 600 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have died in police or prison custody since the Royal Commission into Indigenous Deaths in Custody handed down 339 recommendations in 1991.
The inquest is scheduled to continue for three weeks.
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Victorian man charged with murder over 2006 disappearance
In Victoria, a man has been charged with murder after an investigation into the 2006 disappearance of then 38-year-old Christopher Jarvis.
The 72-year-old Wangoom man was arrested earlier today and has subsequently been charged with murder, due to face Warrnambool magistrates court this afternoon.
Jarvis was last seen when he left his house in Wangoom at around 6am on 13 June 2006. His car was later located on fire at Thunder Point, a popular coastal lookout in Warrnambool.
His disappearance initially wasn’t believed to be suspicious until new information from the public was reported to police. His remains are yet to be located.
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Trump's pause of Australian research funding over DEI not foreign interference, Clare says
The Trump administration’s temporary pause of funding to conduct a review into whether Australian university researchers promote administration priorities and avoid “DEI” and “woke gender ideology” does not amount to foreign interference, the education minister has said.
Jason Clare was asked about reviews being undertaken by the US government into funding agreements it has with Australian universities, including distributing questionnaires that request researchers confirm they align with Trump’s anti-DEI agenda.
Asked if he had a picture of the impact of those reviews, Clare confirmed seven universities had their research suspended or ceased.
This emerged out of a review the US government initiated into foreign aid and research has been caught in that … [I’ve] asked my department to work with those universities and get more information about potential research that might be affected and the Australian embassy in Washington is working with the US department to get a better understanding of this.
Pressed if the questions, which included whether the organisation espoused anti-American beliefs or received funding from China, amounted to foreign interference, Clare said “No, I don’t think it is”.
This is that US funded research, US universities working with Australian universities. Ultimately, it’s up to the US about what research it wants to fund.
He said individual researchers were responding to the questionnaires as the education department sought additional information. Asked if the Australian government would consider filling the funding gaps if they arose, he said it wasn’t “practical” to underwrite foreign research.
Clare said he expected the outcomes of the US reviews would be revealed in the second half of April.
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Early childhood support key to boosting year 12 completion rates, minister says
Labor has a year 12 completion target of 85% in public schools by the end of the decade. Is that achievable?
Clare said the key to reaching it was making sure people who fell behind when they were young got extra support to catch up. He pointed to early intervention through catch-up tutoring and year 1 phonics and numeracy tests.
It’s not about building classrooms, it’s about the children in the classrooms, it’s the investment in the children … this is a big deal, no government has ever done this before ever. This agreement that we have now struck with every state and territory means that every public school across the country is going to be funded at that level that David Gonski said they should be, and it ratchets up year after year after year to get to that level.
I’m a kid from a public school in the western suburbs of Sydney, I’m the first person I my family to finish school, first person in my family to finish year 10, I’m only here because of … the teachers who taught me, I understand how important it is.
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Growing number of public school students not finishing year 12 ‘a big challenge’: Jason Clare
The education minister, Jason Clare, is appearing on ABC’s Afternoon Briefing in the wake of a deal inked between Queensland and the federal government to fully fund public schools for the first time. Queensland was the last holdout state to sign up to the agreement.
Asked if money was the solution to disadvantage and inequity in the education system, Clare said it had to be tied to “real reform”.
Reforms that will help our children who fall behind to catch up at school and to keep up and to finish school.
The big challenge that we are confronting at the moment is the number of kids finishing high school [is] dropping. Not everywhere, not in the non-government system but certainly in our [public] schools, it’s dropped from about 83% seven or eight years ago down to 73% … we’ve got to turn that around.
Clare hailed the agreements as the “the biggest investment by the commonwealth government in public education ever” – equivalent to $16.5bn over 10 years.
But it’s not a blank cheque.
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Coalition plan to allow first home buyers to draw from super could cost budget billions, analysis suggests
The Coalition’s plan to allow homebuyers to access a house deposit from their superannuation would eventually cost the budget billions in increased costs for the aged pension, Parliamentary Budget Office analysis reports.
Labor MP Daniel Mulino, the chair of the parliament’s economics committee, said the analysis shows “it will cost first home buyers more in the short term and taxpayers more in the long term”.
The Coalition’s affordable housing policy would allow Australians to access up to $50,000 from their super to buy their first home, with the money initially withdrawn from super required to be returned when the house is sold to support retirement.
The Labor government has strongly opposed the idea, proposed at successive elections, saying it would affect retirement savings. On Monday, PBO analysis was released saying the parameters of the Coalition policy could increase age pension costs by $1.4bn a year by the 2050s.
The modelling assumes 20% of renters (about 300,000 people) would take up the chance to take $50,000 from their super. A range of other assumptions (including on the rate of super returns, tax on super earnings, mortality rates and that people wouldn’t make extra contributions to their super to compensate for withdrawing the initial deposit).
Labor has also highlighted University of South Australia research forecasting the policy could also inflate house prices by up to 10%.
Mulino said the PBO modelling showed that “if people withdraw money from their superannuation, all taxpayers would be footing the bill with the cost of the Age Pension to grow”.
Peter Dutton’s reckless plan to force first home buyers to raid their super will push house process up by even more than the $50,000 super withdrawal he is proposing. The real solution is to build more homes and help first home buyers without forcing them to rob from tomorrow to pay for today.
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Stan Sport criticised over digitally inserted ads for offshore gambling company
Stan Sport has become the second major streaming service to broadcast an offshore gambling company linked to bikini-clad croupiers in as many months, drawing inquiries from the media regulator.
The broadcaster digitally imposed ads for the bookmaker 8XBet during live coverage of a 9 March game between NZ Super Rugby Aupiki clubs Matatū and Hurricanes Poua. In February, Paramount+ broadcast ads for the same bookmaker during an A-League match between Wellington Phoenix and Brisbane Roar in New Zealand.
Both streaming companies have blamed the apparent breach of advertising policy on an unnamed third party. In 2022, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (Acma) found 8XBet allowed Australian clients to gamble, despite not having an Australian licence. The company has subsequently withdrawn from the country.
A Stan Sport spokesperson said:
Stan Sport understands that these virtual graphics were caused by a brief, one-off and unauthorised test by a third-party vendor involved with the production in NZ. We are working with our delivery partners in NZ to ensure this doesn’t happen again.
In a statement, a NZ Super Rugby Clubs spokesperson said:
This was an unfortunate human error by a third-party provider who the NZ Super Rugby Clubs work with to provide virtual advertisements and graphics on field during Super Rugby Aupiki games. We are working with the supplier to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
An Acma spokesperson said it was “seeking information from Stan so that we can consider the application of the rules in regard to these matters”.
In regard to the Paramount+ matter, we have sought information from Paramount+ and are currently considering their response.
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Northern and western Queensland brace for more flooding
Inland parts of Queensland are facing “significant flooding” that could become widespread, with communities threatened to become isolated and roads likely to be blocked off.
The Bureau of Meteorology’s Miriam Bradbury said on Monday afternoon isolated six-hourly rainfall of up to 90mm could hit some areas of Queensland as a low-pressure trough drew “significant moisture from the tropics”.
This is only likely to exacerbate the flash and riverine flooding that’s already unfolding in those areas, water moving over roads and access routes is likely to lead to lengthy delays or detours, and we may see … some communities being isolated or cut off, as well as impact for agriculture and industry … this situation is only beginning to develop and is likely to continue through much of this week.
Flood warnings are in place across multiple regions, with particular concern for the north tropical coast, where “grounds are wet and rivers are swollen”. The eastern interior of the NT, parts of north-eastern South Australia and far north New South Wales may also be impacted.
It comes as Western Australia faces a rare autumn heatwave and the possible development of a cyclone off the coast.
BoM forecaster Jessica Lingard told ABC radio the temperature would remain above 35C for the next five days – the first time the city had been hit with such a string of hot weather in 40 years.
The unseasonable weather was being accompanied by a tropical low forming off WA’s north-west coast – forecast to move westward as the weekend approached.
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More on HMAS Sydney’s three-month deployment
We have more from Ben Doherty on the departure of HMAS Sydney for a three-month deployment that will include training exercises alongside ships from Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, and the UK.
Australian vessels and aircraft “will continue to exercise our rights to freedom of navigation and overflight in accordance with international law, particularly the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea”, the department of defence said in a statement.
The departure of the Sydney for three months follows the circumnavigation of Australia by a flotilla of Chinese navy vessels earlier this year
The three ships – comprising the Jiangkai-class frigate Hengyang, the Renhai-class cruiser Zunyi and the Fuchi-class replenishment vessel Weishanhu – possibly accompanied by an undetected nuclear submarine – sailed down the east coast of Australia in late February conducting unannounced live-fire drills in the Tasman Sea, before sailing west through the Great Australian Bight. They then sailed north, up Australia’s west coast, into the Sunda Strait, between the Indonesian islands of Java and Sumatra. All of the flotilla’s activities – including the live-fire drills – were in accordance with international law.
HMAS Sydney is one of three Hobart-class air warfare destroyers in service in the Royal Australian Navy: it carries a complement of more than 200 personnel, and a Seahawk helicopter.
“As we embark on this deployment, we are proud to represent Australia and contribute to regional stability and cooperation,” Cmdr Ben Weller, commanding officer of the Sydney, said.
Deployments such as this allow us to exercise the ship’s capability across a range of areas and alongside different partners, ensuring we’re prepared to work together in future.
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Anthony Albanese has no interest in delving into the pre-election politics of Kooyong.
Asked about video footage reported today of Monique Ryan’s husband, Peter Jordan, removing a Liberal party sign, he replied:
I have no idea who Monique Ryan’s husband is.
The reporter replied that Jordan had removed a campaign sign of Amelia Hamer, the Liberal candidate for Kooyong. Both Ryan and her husband have since apologised, with Jordan suggesting he thought it was displayed illegally.
Albanese replied:
On a day where we have a $16.5bn national education announcement, I am asked about someone’s husband removing a Liberal party sign on a road somewhere!
Can I ask, is there any connection whatsoever with anyone in the Labor party with this alleged event of which I did not know? No.
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The prime minister is taking questions in Melbourne after announcing a boost to Victoria’s infrastructure funding.
He is asked about a new government safety campaign on the dangers of drinking alcohol while overseas, unveiled today.
It follows the deaths of two Melbourne teenagers, Holly Bowles and Bianca Jones, who died after drinking alcohol tainted with methanol in Laos last year.
Albanese said his heart went out “to the family and friends of Holly and Bianca, who lost their lives so tragically … and to their communities and to their friends”.
This was a tragedy that should not have happened and one of the things we’re doing is ramping up our advertising campaign to increase awareness of the alcohol related risks of overseas travel.
For some time young people have been warned about drugs overseas but people have thought – quite clearly wrongly – that having a drink in a bar, in this case in Laos … was a harmless thing to do.
It is fantastic for Australians to do what I did and what a lot of Australians do … we are one of the great travelling populations of the world, but it needs to be made safe. This campaign, funded by the federal government, is about doing that, is about making sure that young Australians who travel overseas are aware of the risk.
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All schools in Australia will be ‘fully funded for the first time’, Albanese says
Albanese also spruiked Labor’s school funding agreement, to which all jurisdictions have now signed on after receiving the seal of approval from Queensland today.
Victoria successfully pushed the federal government to double its funding offer from a 2.5% increase to public schools to 5% in January.
Albanese:
Schools will be fully funded for the first time right throughout Australia. Victoria earlier on had signed up to our schools funding agreement, we now have every state and territory signed up in our $16.5bn of improved funding, to make sure that every child gets the best opportunity in life.
I thank the Allan government for signing up very early to that school funding agreement, to see increased funding between now and 2034.
Read more about what it all means here:
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Albanese announces $125m for Melbourne road upgrades
The prime minister has been hopping all over the place today.
He just appeared in Melbourne, announcing a $125m upgrade to the Donnybrook Road and Mitchell Street intersection in the outer north, as part of Labor’s $1.2bn suburban roads blitz.
Anthony Albanese said the budget commitment came on top of infrastructure investments already announced to make sure Victoria got its “fair share” of funding after a 10-year deficit.
We want to make sure that Victoria and Melbourne’s growing suburbs get support. That’s why this weekend we’ve had the minister out there announcing support for regional roads funding, to deal with level crossings.
That’s why today, as part of our $1.2bn suburban roads blitz … we are making these commitments to make a difference so that productivity can increase, so that people can spend more time at home with their family and their kids, rather than stuck in traffic. And this important project, a $125m upgrade to the Donnybrook Road and Mitchell Street intersection, is a part of making sure that we keep up with this growing community.
The project will transform the current roundabout I’ve just been through, delivering additional lanes, a fully signalised intersection and a new bridge over the creek here … it’s part of the substantial infrastructure commitments that we’ll have in tomorrow evening’s budget. A budget that will continue to have responsible economic management whilst making a difference, providing cost of living relief, and always having own eye on the future.
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Greens urge Labor to cut spending on external consultants in upcoming budget
The Greens have urged Labor to reduce spending on consultants across all departments and agencies by 15% a year after the party released new figures showing the winding back of external labour.
On Monday, the finance minister, Katy Gallagher revealed more than $2bn in budget savings, including $720m from cutting back on consultants, contractors and labour hire, as Labor tries to rebuild the capacity of public service.
It means a total of $4.7bn has been saved from winding back the use of external labour since 2022.
But Greens finance and public service spokesperson, Senator Barbara Pocock, said the federal government’s unwillingness to separate the amount spent on consultants from the overall spend on external contractors made it impossible to tell the actual spend.
We have no way of knowing whether the government is actually spending less on consultants or not. We need a more transparent breakdown of the spending data before we can have confidence in Labor’s claims.
They say they want to eliminate wasteful outsourcing but there is no firm commitment to the kind of long-term reduction needed to bring down Scott Morrison’s record breaking spend of $20.8bn on private contracting. The Australian Greens have recommended a 15% reduction in spending on consultants every year over five years. Labor is yet to respond.
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Four people rescued after becoming stranded in SA outback
Four people stranded in the South Australian outback since Friday have been rescued uninjured.
The group left Oodnadatta by car on Friday afternoon, believed to be heading to Finke in the Northern Territory. But concerns were raised when they failed to arrive.
Shortly after 4pm on Sunday, contact was made with the missing group who had become stranded in the state’s far north after suffering mechanical issues with their car. Supplies, including food and a satellite phone, were provided.
Today, the four people were successfully retrieved and transported to Coober Pedy this afternoon. There were no reports of injuries.
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HMAS Sydney departs for three-month Indo-Pacific deployment
Turning to naval news, and the Australian defence force’s HMAS Sydney has departed from Fleet Base East for a three-month regional presence deployment throughout the Indo-Pacific.
The journey of the 200-personnel trip will include participation in Exercise Bersama Shield alongside Five Power defence arrangements nations Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore and the United Kingdom.
Chief of Joint Operations, Vice Adm Justin Jones, said regional presence deployments demonstrated Australia’s “ongoing commitment to supporting regional security and stability and promoting a peaceful and prosperous Indo-Pacific region”.
They highlight our contribution to the maintenance of the global rules-based order in line with our partners.
HMAS Hobart recently completed the first regional presence deployment for 2025, which included training exercises and activities with Indonesia, France and the Philippines.
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Thanks Krishani, I’ll be with you until stumps. Happy budget eve!
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That’s it from me today, thanks for sticking with me on the blog. I will be back with you tomorrow to bring you the highlights and the nitty gritty of the budget.
I’ll leave you this afternoon with the wonderful Caitlin Cassidy!
Albanese says Labor ‘kicking with the wind’ in pre-budget speech to caucus
The prime minister has told his federal colleagues Labor will “unashamedly stand for workers” as it prepares to unveil its final budget before the federal election.
At a party caucus meeting on Monday morning, Anthony Albanese said Labor could only deliver many of its achievements through careful economic management.
In his last speech to federal Labor members before the budget, and potentially before an election announcement later this week, the prime minister thanked the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, and finance minister, Katy Gallagher, for turning “deficits into surpluses” and delivering an economy where “inflation has gone down, wages have gone up, employment is strong, and we have delivered tax cuts”.
The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, was clearly front of mind, with Albanese making a number of digs. Albanese suggested someone give Dutton a map after the Liberal leader failed to mention the opposition’s foreign policies on South Korea, Papua New Guinea, the Pacific, India, Japan or Indonesia at a major foreign affairs event last week.
Albanese concluded with:
We’re kicking with the wind because we have a coherent set of values that are not about us – that are about a plan for Australians.
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Curriculum alone not enough to mitigate effects of harmful pornography on children, NSW inquiry told
School programs are not a “silver bullet” to reducing the harms of children viewing harmful sexual and misogynistic content online, a NSW government hearing has heard, with department officials saying there is much that is beyond the school’s control.
Dr Paul Cahill, the executive director of curriculum at the NSW Education Standards Authority, told a hearing today into the impacts of harmful pornography on children that there were a number of programs in the curriculum aimed at reducing the harms.
But he said the evidence shows there is “very little evidence to say it can just be the curriculum doing the heavy lifting”.
“There isn’t a silver bullet to address the issue of pornography,” he said.
He continued:
The reality is pornography is part of a broader suite of things that are happening in online and offline environments, and you need to address those range of issues. So within the curriculum, we have tried to make sure that we’re addressing issues of consent … that gender based violence is a problem.
There are so many levers at play that the curriculum is one part of … there are many other parts of society, things like the notion of behaviours online in terms of misogynistic behaviour, that’s something that is well beyond the control of a curriculum, but the curriculum can lay the foundation to outline that those sort of things are detrimental to people’s wellbeing and health.
Cahill appeared at the hearing on behalf of the NSW government with Megan Kelly, the executive director of curriculum and reform at the NSW department of education.
The public hearing will continue this afternoon, with appearances from advocacy and research groups, and faith groups.
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Marles flags additional $1bn in budget for defence
The defence minister and deputy PM, Richard Marles, is at the Avalon airshow in Victoria today and has provided an update on defence spending in the budget.
He says the government will provide an additional $1bn in the budget (that’s new money), plus $9.6bn in defence funding to be spent over the next four years that was already planned.
Last year Labor said it would spend an extra $50bn over the decade to increase defence spending from about 2% of GDP to more than 2.3% of GDP.
Part of the $10.6bn sees the bringing forward of an additional $1bn, and that’s because of the need to accelerate Australia’s capability development …
The acceleration of the $1bn is really there to ensure that the very ambitious timelines that we have in relation to all of this are going to be met.
This all comes as the US is trying to get Australia to spend even more money on defence (they’re talking about Australia spending up to 3% of GDP).
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Video: Monique Ryan’s husband confronted after removing Liberal campaign sign from Melbourne yard
Earlier we brought you details on the confrontation between independent MP Monique Ryan’s husband, Peter Jordan, and a Coalition supporter.
Ryan and Jordan have both apologised.
You can watch the video here of Jordan trying to move a sign of the Liberal candidate for Kooyong, Amelia Hamer.
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Federal budget 101: where does the money come from and where does it go?
While we’re all gearing up for the budget, you might be wondering …
Where does the money for the budget actually come from (like how much comes from my personal taxes and how much is paid by companies), and how exactly does it get spent?
If you’re curious about this and you like colourful graphs I have got the piece for you, by my colleague Patrick Commins.
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Monique Ryan and husband ‘should know better’, James Paterson says
Liberal senator James Paterson has also weighed in on the yard sign issue, and says Monique Ryan should “front up” to the cameras.
The Victorian senator is on Sky News, and says there should be a clean contest in the seat.
It’s totally inappropriate behaviour … He should know better and she should know better, and this never should have happened in the first place. And I really hope this is a once off. What we want in Kooyong is a clean contest.
Paterson is also asked about the Port of Darwin, which is currently leased by a Chinese company, but many are pushing for it to be returned to public hands.
Landbridge acquired a 99-year lease of the Darwin Port in 2015, while Scott Morrison was federal treasurer. Paterson says:
I think it should be returned to Australian ownership, and I hope that happens very soon.
I think there was a range of failures of the system at the time, and I publicly said repeatedly it was a mistake [for the] Territory government to release it. But because it was a lease, and because it was a Territory government [entity], not a private entity, it just fell through the cracks.
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Electoral commission responds to Kooyong campaign sign incident
Further to the Monique Ryan yard sign issue, the Australian Electoral Commission has now given us a statement. In a response to my colleague Adeshola Ore, an AEC spokesperson said they were “aware of the footage of a campaign sign being removed in Kooyong.”
The placement of signage is not regulated in electoral law, save for the requirement that campaign signs cannot be placed within 6 metres of the entrance to a polling place. The AEC is aware that some local councils have regulations in place around the placement of campaign signs or corflutes. Questions about signage on public land are generally a matter for local council.
The spokesperson said while the commission doesn’t regulate the placement of election signs, the AEC wanted to remind candidates about “the importance of civility while campaigning at this year’s federal election”.
More information about election signs is available on our website: Voter’s guide: Communication channels catalogue – Australian Electoral Commission.
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Monique Ryan and husband apologise after video showed him removing Liberal campaign sign
Kooyong MP Monique Ryan and her husband, Peter Jordan, have apologised after video circulated showing him removing a Liberal campaign sign from a Melbourne yard.
The Nine newspapers first reported a confrontation between Jordan and a Liberal supporter, after Jordan appeared to take exception to a yard sign for Ryan’s Liberal challenger, Amelia Hamer.
The video, also supplied to Guardian Australia by Coalition sources, shows Jordan walking down the street with the large sign, as the person filming the video asks why he took it down.
Jordan replied “because it’s on public land”, and declines to give his identity when asked by the person filming.
In a statement, Jordan said “I unreservedly apologise for removing the sign. It was a mistake.”
I believed the sign was illegally placed but I should have reported my concerns to council.
Ryan, looking to defend her seat from Hamer’s challenge, said in her own statement: “I apologise for the removal of the sign. It should not have happened.”
All concerns around signage should be reported to Council.
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Six University of Melbourne staff dismissed over sexual misconduct in 2024, report finds
Six staff members were dismissed from the University of Melbourne (UoM) following a finding of sexual misconduct last year and one student was expelled, a new report has found.
The UoM is one of the few universities that post annual, public sexual misconduct reports. This year’s report, released today found 21 complaints were made against staff in 2024, up from seven in 2023. Six people were dismissed.
A total of 23 complaints were made against students, down from 25 in 2023. Of those, one student was expelled, three were suspended with conditions places on re-enrolment and a range of penalties applied for three others.
University of Melbourne provost, Prof Nicola Phillips, said the university had made significant progress since the first report was published four years ago, but there was more work to be done.
No individual in our community should be subjected to sexual harassment or sexual assault as they go about their studies or work, and everyone should expect – and insist on – an environment which is characterised by professionalism and respect.
But it is not just about responding when these things happen. It is also about creating a positive culture right across our university in which these forms of abuse are not accepted, are not accommodated or enabled or trivialised, and are always taken seriously – regardless of who the perpetrator may be.
Universities Australia is due to release another national student safety survey this year. The last survey was conducted in 2021.
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TV networks announce budget night programming
TV networks are gearing up to cover the budget tomorrow night but only the ABC will carry Jim Chalmers’ speech live.
On the ABC, Jeremy Fernandez will present a budget preview nationally from 7pm on the ABC News channel. After the treasurer’s speech, Sarah Ferguson hosts a special budget edition of 7.30 featuring interviews with Chalmers and the shadow treasurer, Angus Taylor, and analysis from Laura Tingle. At 8.30pm David Speers anchors a special budget edition of Insiders live from Parliament House.
On Channel Seven, dedicated budget coverage starts at 9.30pm when host Michael Usher, chief political editor, Mark Riley, and national business editor, Ameila Brace, analyse the numbers and the impact they will have on households.
Nine’s budget special is at 10pm and will be hosted by Peter Overton, with analysis from Charles Croucher, Andrew Probyn, Effie Zahos and Chris Kohler. The special will include interviews with Chalmers and Taylor.
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School funding agreement ‘too little too late’, Greens say
The Greens are not impressed with the education deal inked between Queensland and the federal government today.
Spokesperson on primary and secondary education, Senator Penny Allman-Payne, said it was too little, too late.
The agreement, now reached with all jurisdictions in Australia, will ensure all government schools will be fully funded for the first time by 2034.
Allman-Payne said:
Labor’s plan ensures that it will be a quarter of a century before Gonski is delivered and every Australian public school receives its bare minimum funding.
That means kids currently in school are going to finish year 12 never having experienced the fully resourced education they deserve. That means not enough teachers, not enough in-class supports, inadequate facilities, and parents and teachers dipping into their own pockets to make up the shortfall.
Budgets are about priorities, and if public schools were a priority for this government they would fully fund public schools this year.
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Dutton 'wearing the legacy' of female voters who turned away from Scott Morrison, Littleproud says
As the election looms closer, the parties are looking at exactly which demographics they need to appeal to.
A big one is women.
The Coalition lost a significant amount of female support at the 2022 election, something they highlighted in their postmortem. But it seems that vote isn’t bouncing back.
David Littleproud was asked on Sky News earlier why women still aren’t returning to the party:
I don’t think we can run away from it. I think we lost a lot of female voters at the last election. They weren’t happy with how Scott Morrison handled it … I mean, I don’t think that there was a great love of Scott Morrison, particularly the way he handled some of the incidents that happened here in Parliament House … So Peter is wearing that legacy.
You’ll see as we get close to the election, is greater policies around women. And Peter [Dutton] has a very, very strong record in his support of women in this country.
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Would more gas decrease prices, or is this all hot air?
Analysts last year warned that gas was a “far more expensive power source” in the national grid compared with renewable energy or coal when the Coalition announced their nuclear plan.
They also said opening more gas basins would be unlikely to be cheaper, because Australia’s cheap gas has “already been extracted”.
You can read more about that here:
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Littleproud says increasing gas supply is key to lowering energy prices
Circling back to the opposition’s gas position, they’ve said they would work to increase the supply of gas to the domestic market, and claim that it will bring prices down.
David Littleproud was asked on ABC Radio National earlier whether the Coalition could ensure energy prices would go down during the first term of a Coalition government. He said gas was key:
If you increase supply, yes. That’s what we intend to do by bringing in gas and quickly. You’ve got the gas here. This is a thing in Australia. We have sovereignty of all our resources. So why wouldn’t we use them? We have a spread in our energy mix, not putting all our energy into one basket.
We will have renewables as well, make no mistake. There will be renewables as part of our grid. But you’ve got to have baseload power. To get [prices] down in the short term, the only way is to increase supply. That’s an economic principle that no one can run away from.
Just a reminder, independent senators Jacqui Lambie and David Pocock have also been up this morning talking about gas, but they say there isn’t a shortage of it, the problem is that we export too much of it.
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Why do we keep talking about fish in Tassie?
The Maugean skate, an endangered fish species found in Tasmania’s west coast has been the subject of a tug-of-war between environmentalists and the salmon farming sector.
Why? Because of scientific advice telling the government that salmon farms in Macquarie Harbour are having a “catastrophic” impact on the species.
The environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, has been considering the fate of the aquaculture business in Macquarie Harbour since November 2023, when three conservation groups requested she reconsider whether the industry had the approvals it needed.
But the PM has promised to introduce legislation into parliament this week, to allow sustainable salmon farming to continue, and to protect jobs. He was asked about that in his press conference earlier.
My government makes no apologies for supporting jobs. That’s what the Labor party does we support jobs, but we also support sustainability, which is why we’ve invested $37 million for sustainability, for oxygenation. That’s why we’re engaged as well in what has been a very successful breeding program as well.
But that legislation isn’t going down well with environmental groups, which my colleague Adam Morton has more details on.
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Watch: PM announces finalised public school funding deal with Queensland
Earlier this morning, the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, announced he had finalised a public school funding deal with Queensland.
It was the last jurisdiction holding out on the agreement between the commonwealth and each of the states and territories to fully fund public schools.
Albanese and the Queensland premier, David Crisafulli, labelled the deal as “historic” and you can see them talking more about it here:
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What a $5,000 ticket will and won’t get you at one of Canberra’s budget night fundraising soirees
Budget day goes hand in hand with budget dinners, and more specifically, budget dinner fundraisers.
There’s plenty of money to be raised by the political parties this week, as the parliamentary big wigs host dinners and drinks with lobby groups and businesses.
So how much will a ticket to one of these events set you back?
My colleagues Sarah Basford-Canales and Henry Belot have all the details for you:
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Tehan unable to confirm figures when asked about Coalition policy to reduce immigration
A bit earlier this morning, the shadow immigration minister, Dan Tehan, was challenged on Sky News on what the opposition plans to do on migration.
Peter Dutton had previously proposed a 25% cut to net migration in his 2024 budget reply, but then walked that back.
Yesterday, the shadow treasurer, Angus Taylor, wouldn’t confirm that 25% cut on ABC’s Insiders program, and neither would Tehan today on Sky.
Here’s a little of how that exchange went:
Peter Stefanovic: Will you cut net [migration] by 25% as you’ve claimed in the past?
Tehan: Well, we will bring it down significantly …. Now, we’ve got to wait and see …
Stefanovic: But not a figure?
Tehan: Well – we will – we will outline all that in our policy, but …
Stefanovic: So is that in your budget reply, or will that be by the election?
Tehan: Now that will be in our immigration policy. We will outline all that …
The exchange continues on, and Tehan won’t say what the immigration policy will be or when it will be announced, whether it’ll be before the budget or the election, or even after the election.
You can expect though, it’ll be an issue that keeps cropping up during the election campaign.
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PM says Australia wants to see ceasefire continue in Gaza
The PM takes a final question on the situation in Gaza and the Middle East.
Israel broke the ceasefire with Gaza last Tuesday, which had held for nearly two months.
Albanese is asked what Australia is doing in response, and he says Australia isn’t a major player, but wants to see the hostilities end.
We want to see the ceasefire be continued. We want an end to hostilities. We want to see hostages released … We will remain focused on, but we’re not major players in the Middle East. That’s just the truth of the matter. And so we remain incredibly concerned about the innocent loss of life that we’ve seen since October 7, whether that be in Israel or whether it be in Gaza.
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‘Common sense and cannoli’ the key to negotiations for Queensland Olympics
Albanese and Crisafulli are asked about the Brisbane Olympic Games, ahead of an infrastructure review expected to be handed down by the state government soon.
The question is, will the state government have to move to a plan B if Crisafulli can’t renegotiate with the commonwealth on moving federal funding away from earmarked games venues?
Crisafulli says he’s got a plan, and he and Albanese have been negotiating “well” together.
Two people of Italian descent, you’d expect that, but there’s nothing that can’t be solved over a bit of common sense and a cannoli.
Albanese adds:
And I can confirm that the premier has, on two occasions, given me cannolis, and I haven’t declared them, so I’ll declare them now, just in case I get into some trouble. We regard that as a cultural thing, rather than anything else.
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‘Gas has an important role to play’ in providing energy certainty, PM says
Asked about the Coalition’s slightly rejigged gas policy (that they want more in the system, as canvassed by David Littleproud earlier), Albanese says “gas has an important role to play” in the energy transition.
He says the government has a gas strategy, and incentives like the capacity investment scheme to get more renewable energy into the grid.
We’ve announced and delivered, publicly released our future gas strategy. That’s a strategy that understands that gas has an important role to play, along with batteries in providing certainty.
The former government had this big announcement when they were there about gas, a gas led recovery. Not much happened. You don’t need rhetoric, what you need is actual investment.
David Crisafulli says he hasn’t seen Littleproud’s comments, but if he’s talking about adding more gas in the market “he’s [Littleproud’s] 100% correct”, and argues Queensland has been doing the “heavy lifting” in getting gas into the market.
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PM attacks Coalition over calling energy rebate a ‘Band-Aid’ and ‘Ponzi scheme’ despite supporting it
The PM’s taken a stab at the opposition over their position on the electricity bill rebate.
Peter Dutton yesterday called it a “Ponzi scheme” and the shadow treasurer, Angus Taylor, has called it a “Band-Aid” fix (yep, more Band-Aids), but they’ve said they’ll support the policy.
Albanese says:
Whether it’s our Medicare tripling of the bulk bill incentive for all Australians, the 50 new urgent care clinics, the $25 for medicines on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the freezing of the beer excise for two years, or a range of other measures, including the extension of energy bill relief …
The opposition, having opposed all of these things for almost three years, have just said yes. I guess they’ve got to have something to say about policy, and they don’t have any of their own.
Unsurprisingly, the PM gets a question on when he’ll call the election now that he’s got some momentum … in a shock to no one, he says it’ll be “in May”.
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What is the commonwealth public school funding tied to?
The PM has said this funding is tied, but what exactly is it tied to?
It includes year 1 phonics and numeracy checks to help students that need more support earlier, more intensive small-group learning and catch-up tutoring, more access to health professionals and initiatives to attract and retain teachers.
The government says there are also targets on the agreements.
The first is to have the highest proportion of students finishing high school ever by 2030. Other targets include improving Naplan results and the engagement of students in classrooms. Albanese says:
The tying of this funding is for year one testing is making sure that if a young person needs that one on one help or small group help to make sure they’re not left behind, they get that really early on, they get to catch up. They don’t get to fall behind and then have issues later on.
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Queensland joins other states by signing deal with commonwealth to fully fund public schools by 2034
The Queensland premier, David Crisafulli, is with the PM and has welcomed the agreement that gives an extra $2.8bn to the state’s public schools to 2034.
Crisafulli says this will bring generational reform, and highlights the challenges Queensland has in its schooling system.
It is a historic agreement … This means a lot to Queensland, and it means a lot because we’ve got some challenges in our schooling systems that other states don’t have. We are the most decentralized state. We’ve got a large portion of rural and regional and Indigenous schools.
He says the agreement was an opportunity “too good to miss”.
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Queensland agreement is ‘biggest new investment in public schools by an Australian government ever’: PM
The negotiations have been a gradual process between the commonwealth, states and territories.
Albanese got Tasmania and NSW over the line earlier this month, South Australia and Victoria in January, and Queensland was the last state to sign on.
You can read more about that here:
The PM says the agreement signed today with the sunshine state is the biggest investment in public schools in Queensland by the commonwealth ever.
This money is tied to real reforms like evidence based teaching practices, phonics and numeracy, tutoring and more mental health support.
Today’s announcement contributes to an estimated $16.5bn in additional commonwealth funding to public schools across the nation, from 2025-2026 ahead to 2034. It represents the biggest new investment in public schools by an Australian government ever.
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PM announces federal government has reached school funding agreement with all states
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, is holding a press conference, announcing the federal government has now reached a school funding agreement with all states and territories.
Every student, regardless of which school they go to, will receive this funding.
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Jacqui Lambie adds support to gas reserve proposal, says energy rebate should be means tested
Pocock’s senate crossbench colleague Jacqui Lambie has also supported a gas reserve policy, i.e reserving gas for domestic use before it goes out to the international export market.
And like Pocock, she argues the government should be dealing with the root cause of energy price hikes rather than putting up another energy bill rebate “Band-Aid” for households.
We need to do something today, not in 20 years’ time. Something needs to be done, we need to talk about this gas reserve policy, and I’m sorry about if that hurts political donations, too bad, so sad, it is about what’s best for the nation.
Lambie also says the energy rebates should be means tested, and targeted towards the households that really need them.
People living on or below the poverty line actually need them. What I don’t support is people like me [getting them], because they’re not means tested.
Why am I getting that money, mate? Because, quite frankly, I’d rather my 150 bucks make $300 down to the next person below me that’s feeling it really tough.
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Pocock says power bill rebate a ‘Band-Aid’, not a cost-of-living cure
A little earlier, the independent senator David Pocock was on ABC News Breakfast, calling for gas to be diverted to the domestic market to keep energy prices from soaring.
He said there was a “gas export problem” in Australia that was driving up prices, and diverting it would address the predicted domestic shortfall.
We don’t have a gas supply shortage, we have a gas export problem in Australia … I’m calling for uncontracted gas [to be] diverted to the domestic market until that [shortfall] is fully met.
Asked about whether the $150 rebate was appropriate or whether that money should go instead to electrifying households, Pocock said it was “welcome” but described it as a “Band-Aid” solution.
We’re just putting Band-Aids on when we could be dealing with the root cause here. [It’s] 150 bucks versus thousands of dollars of savings if you could help households electrify.
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Littleproud claims ‘people are going broke’ and says energy bill solution is ‘more gas’
The Nationals leader, David Littleproud, has followed Katy Gallagher in the RN Breakfast studio.
Asked why the Coalition has also committed to the $150 energy bill rebate when they’ve previously called it a “sugar hit”, Littleproud says it’s because “people are going broke”.
Littleproud says the opposition will bring down energy prices by bringing more gas into the system before their nuclear plants are built and come online.
Our short term solution is more gas, and you can do that in 12 to 18 months. You can get that pressure into the grid. In the medium term, it’s about transitioning into nuclear energy.
Littleproud’s also asked about reports the Coalition would fast-track approvals for energy projects, and how exactly they would do that.
We’re going to make sure that we streamline the bureaucracy to be able to achieve that [fast-tracking] and make sure that we can cut down those times, because that gives investment confidence.
As to how that bureaucracy will be streamlined … well, we might have to wait a bit longer for those details.
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Gallagher says size of public sector workforce has not ‘grown out of pace’ with work
Katy Gallagher is continuing her media rounds, speaking to ABC RN Breakfast.
Spruiking her $2bn of savings in the budget, some of it found from reducing the number of consultants in the public sector, she argues the size of the public sector workforce is about right.
I think the public service is roughly the right size. Now, there’s always ons and offs and programs that stop and all that sort of stuff, but the public service as a proportion of population is smaller now than it was in 2006, so there is absolutely no evidence to say that it’s, you know, grown out of pace with the work that it needs to do.
Gallagher is also justifying the extra $150 the government has promised (and Coalition has promised to match) in energy bill subsidies, extending the policy for an extra six months.
She says the government is trying to balance household costs as the country transitions the energy grid.
What we’re trying to do is support households as we rebuild, essentially, the energy electricity grid to make sure it can get more renewables in, because we know that’s the cheapest form of energy. So we are trying to balance, you know, those costs households are getting with the work that needs to be done and the investments that need to be done.
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Jane Hume says Coalition would restore ‘fiscal guardrails’ to bring budget back to surplus in medium term
We heard Katy Gallagher this morning and the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, yesterday say “it remains to be seen” when the budget will be returned to surplus.
ABC News Breakfast has lobbed the question over to the shadow finance minister, Jane Hume, who says the Coalition would “restore those fiscal guardrails to try get us back to a structural surplus” over the medium term.
Hume admits that’s not going to be an “easy” thing to do.
We’re now seeing red ink as far as the eye can see. There are deficits now that are baked in to budgets for the next decade.
A Coalition government, a Dutton-led Coalition government will restore those fiscal guardrails to try to get us back to a structural surplus over the medium term. It’s going to take an awful lot of discipline to get us back to where Australians need to be.
What does medium term mean? Typically that’s been around five-ish years in budget speak, but Hume won’t commit to that timeline.
She says they’ll have to see the budget on Tuesday “before making a call like that”.
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Clamping down on working from home would affect women most, ACTU president says
The ACTU has released data claiming one in three Australian workers would be affected if the private sector followed Peter Dutton’s work from home policy.
The ACTU president, Michele O’Neil, says clamping down on remote work would be a “productivity killer” and would hurt women the most.
The employment minister, Murray Watt, spoke to Sky News a little earlier and said he had “not seen any evidence” that working from home reduces productivity.
There are many people who can work productively from home. And in fact, it’s very likely that the increase in work from home is one of the reasons that we’ve seen such an increase in the number of women participating in the workforce.
We’re currently at record numbers of women participating in the workforce in Australia. I’d say there’s a fairly good chance that that’s partly due to the work from home increase.
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Finance minister faces TV and radio interviews as budget looms tomorrow
The finance minister, Katy Gallagher, is in the hot seat this morning, facing the TV and radio interviews ahead of the budget release tomorrow.
She’s revealed that the government has found an extra $2bn in savings in this budget.
Gallagher tells ABC News Breakfast a chunk of that is from reducing the number of consultants being hired in the public service.
A big chunk of it comes through reducing the reliance on contractors and consultants, which is something that we’ve done in each budget … and that’s a big part of the $2.1 billion. But that is in addition to the savings we’ve found before. So across this Government, we’ve found $95 billion worth of savings, which has allowed us to repair the budget.
Labor is facing a long line of future deficits; asked when the budget will be returned to surplus, Gallagher says:
Well, that remains to be seen … but every budget that we have done, we have found savings. Our approach has been to look at this carefully and methodically and responsibly to find room to pay for things where we can and to find savings where we can, and over time, that will return the budget to balance.
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Three-quarters of Australians back total gambling ad ban, survey finds
Three-quarters of Australians support a total ban on gambling advertising to be phased in over three years as recommended by a bipartisan parliamentary review, according to polling of 2,000 people by The Australia Institute.
The survey, which has a 2.2% margin of error, found 87% of respondents supported banning gambling ads during primetime broadcasting hours for family and children.
The federal government is yet to respond to a June 2023 parliamentary inquiry’s recommendation to ban gambling ads due to high levels of community harm. It has faced significant lobbying from sporting codes and broadcasters.
Martin Thomas, the chief executive of the Alliance for Gambling reform, said the survey results should encourage politicians to take tougher policies to the election:
It is clear that the vast majority of Australian voters support a total gambling ad ban, and yet the government has sat on its own parliamentary report that recommends such an action for almost two years now …
With such a powerful move for change highlighted in this polling, it beggars belief that the two major parties are listening more to the gambling lobby and to other vested interests than they are to families across the country who are angry and demanding.
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Welcome
Good morning, Krishani Dhanji here with you for this budget week that many people didn’t think we would get.
We’re about 30 seconds away from the election being called, and you can feel it in the air. The politicians are buzzing around parliament house, there’s $150 on offer for your energy bills (that is not an “election bribe”, says the government), and there are political fundraisers as far as the eye can see.
We’re talking about everything this morning from energy to work from home, and of course the economy, which is facing deficits over the next decade.
So buckle up, it’s going to be a big one!
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