What we learned: Wednesday, 5 June
What a day it has been. Let’s leave it there, shall we? Enjoy your respective Wednesday evenings - the unparalleled Amy Remeikis will be back first thing tomorrow. I will be sleeping in and hiding from the cold.
Here were the major developments of the day:
Australia’s economy slowed to just 0.1% in the March quarter, which was slower than expected. The nation’s gross domestic product barely grew, expanding just 0.1% in the first three months of 2024. On an annual basis, growth was 1.1%.
Question time was certainly A Time. The opposition leader, Peter Dutton, accused some pro-Palestine protesters of being Holocaust deniers. And the Greens leader, Adam Bandt said “severe and direct misrepresentations” were made of him after a move to suspend standing orders to debate the issue of whether Australia is sending parts which are being used in F-35s used by Israel was rejected, with the PM using the Greens of inflaming “tension” at pro-Palestine protests outside electoral offices.
Elon Musk’s X has said “free speech has prevailed” after the eSafety commissioner dropped the federal court case over X’s refusal to remove tweets of the Wakeley church stabbing attack. Speaking on ABC, the commissioner revealed she had received death threats as a result of Musk’s tweets.
An internal survey of ABC news staff has found 25% of people who answered the survey experienced bullying and 13% experienced sexual harassment.
Townsville council has passed a unanimous motion of no-confidence in its embattled mayor Troy Thompson.
And the federal government will spend almost $1bn in the next four years to provide infrastructure to private schools while the public system has been allocated just $225m.
Updated
Report calls for urgent action to prevent another Stolen Generation
Urgent action is needed to address a growing crisis in the removal of Aboriginal children from their families which are “approaching levels akin to the Stolen Generations”, an inquiry warns.
On Wednesday, commissioner for Aboriginal children and young people April Lawrie released Holding On To Our Future, the final report of the inquiry into the removal and placement of Aboriginal children in South Australia.
It found Aboriginal children are over-reported, over-investigated and over-represented in removals and long-term guardianship orders.
“If nothing changes, in South Australia, 140 in every 1000 Aboriginal children will be in state care by 2031,” the inquiry report says.
Lawrie conducted the inquiry as a result of the concerning rates of Aboriginal child removals, extremely low rates of reunification with family of origin, and high levels of non-Aboriginal care for Aboriginal children in SA.
She called on the SA Labor government to act, saying it already knows its investment in early intervention and support is insufficient.
Failure to act means that struggling, vulnerable families will continue to encounter the child protection service system at increasing rates, and that Aboriginal children being removed from their families will mean the government will pay the cost one way or another, for matters that are preventable.
- AAP
Updated
PM reportedly reaffirms Australia’s security relationship with Nauru
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has held talks with visiting Nauruan president David Adeang in Canberra but his office has declined to say whether they discussed the offshore detention arrangements for asylum seekers.
Guardian Australia reported on Tuesday that the number of asylum seekers on Nauru now topped 100, with 37 people transferred there from Australia this week – the fourth such transfer since September last year.
Senate estimates has been told that over the nine months to March, Australia’s offshore processing regime on Nauru cost $240m.
In today’s meeting, Albanese is understood to have told Adeang that Australia was committed to remaining Nauru’s development and security partner of choice.
The talks follow Nauru’s decision early this year to cut its diplomatic ties with Taiwan and restore them with Beijing.
Albanese is believed to have also committed to work with Nauru to ensure its economic structures adequately support its economy.
It is not clear whether this involved a further financial commitment from Australia, although the government is committed to expanding cooperation with Nauru on climate change along with security, boosting sporting ties and increasing aid and development.
Updated
Greens accuse Labor of trying to stifle criticism of Israel over Gaza
Greens leader Adam Bandt says Labor’s comments in parliament earlier today targeting the party’s role in pro-Palestine protests is an attempt to silence criticism of the federal government’s position on Gaza.
Following question time, Labor and Liberal voted to gag Greens members to prevent them from suspending standing orders over the recent sale of 25 F-35 fighter aircrafts to Israel that use Australian components.
Bandt:
Labor continues to back the invasion, refuses to take any diplomatic actions against Israel and continues two-way arms trade with Israel. Just today, Israel has ordered another 25 F-35s that use components only made in Australia to drop bombs in Gaza.
Labor and Liberal abused question time to defend the invasion of Gaza and shut down any debate about Labor’s ongoing refusal to recognise Palestine, stop the two-way arms trade with Israel and call for a permanent ceasefire.
People want a permanent ceasefire now, and as a party of non-violence that has repeatedly called for any protests to be peaceful, the Greens won’t be lectured about peace by a prime minister that backs the horrific invasion of Gaza.
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eSafety commissioner accuses Elon Musk of ‘dog-whistle’ against her over attempts to remove content from X
The eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, has appeared on ABC’s Afternoon Briefing after revelations the federal court case on Elon Musk’s X platform has been withdrawn.
She says she received death threats following the public “dog whistling” of her by Musk.
The case was centred around the company’s refusal to take down the video of the stabbing of a bishop at a church in Sydney in April. Inman Grant says the body is fighting the battle “on dual fronts”, while also balancing the “prudent use of public funds”.
We have got five different cases going with X corp right now. They are consistently noncompliant. I think the average Australian is with us here. We don’t expect to see violent attempted murder videos on broadcast because there have been laws that have been in place that broadcasters comply with. Why do we think it is OK to have that content on the internet, which is available 24/7 to a bunch of overseas companies that have no regard for our children’s safety and don’t even have age assurance or age verification tools in place?
[Musk] issued a dog whistle to 181 million users around the globe which resulted in death threats, directed at me, which resulted in doxing of my family members, including my three children. I think with great power comes great responsibility and exercising that restraint, in terms of targeting a regulator who is here to protect the citizens of Australia – that is really beyond the pale but it is not surprising, given that we have seen him litigate and target and personally tarnish NGOs, academics and other researchers that dare to criticise the safety of the X platform …
I will not be cowed by those kinds of threats. I am sure more will come. I am here to do the right thing, to keep Australians safe online.
Updated
If you missed the chaotic scenes in parliament today, we have you covered.
Have a watch here, including the PM accusing Greens MPs of inflaming ‘tension’ at pro-Palestine protests outside electoral offices, before the opposition leader Peter Dutton weighed in:
And you can see an angry Tony Burke here:
'Concerned about attacks' on MPs offices, AG says
Dreyfus is asked about recent revelations that there have been 725 threats to parliamentarians in the current financial year.
How many MPs’ electorate offices are either unused or substantially unused because of attacks on them or threats made to them?
He says this is “variable”, however “quite a number of MPs’ electorate offices have been attacked, criminally damaged”, then points his finger at the Greens.
There have been threats made against electorate office staff, including criminal damage to my own electorate office just last Friday when the office was unable to be used. Of course it is a concern. I am very concerned about the role of the Greens political party has played in this …
We will question them about that if we get the opportunity.
Updated
Dreyfus talks up deepfake bill
Dipping over to ABC’s Afternoon Briefing, where the attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, appeared earlier fresh after introducing a bill into parliament that would criminalise the making of “deepfake artificially generated sexual imagery and video”.
Dreyfus said the material, which often links to a real person, was a “deeply humiliating and degrading form of abuse”.
It overwhelmingly effects women and girls and we think it’s past time for legislation that expressly deals with this kind of behaviour … we have worked closely with the Australian federal police who have expertise in investigating and bringing prosecutions for digital offences like this.
Pointing to news coming out of X today that pornographic material will be permitted on its platform, Dreyfus says:
That raises the possibility of very undesirable contact that children might have with this material and we are going to accelerate our efforts to get to some kind of age verification system that protects children against contact with this kind of material.
Updated
Study reveals ‘profound’ depths of housing crisis
A seven-year study by RMIT University and Unison Housing Research Lab has revealed more than 70,000 households have accessed help from frontline homelessness services across those years.
There’s been an increase in presentations at the front end of the homelessness service system from people who are employed – which rose from 4.5% in 2014 to 7.7% in 2020 and a near doubling of those reporting family and domestic violence at their first presentation: increasing from 7.5% to 15.8%.
Most people (57.5%) were light users – that is they used services once and did not return. Just fewer than one in four (24.5%) were regular users, who repeatedly returned.
While there was an uptick in people with work accessing the service, 45.5% were on income support, not including the pension.
Guy Johnson, an honorary professor at RMIT, said the number of employed people seeking support is “a clear sign that problems in the housing market are more profound and more far reaching than ever before”.
While some households have a range of vulnerabilities, most do not – other than being on a low income and struggling to meet their housing costs or find affordable housing.
Toni, a social worker at an inner-city Launch Housing entry point, said:
I’ve seen clients returning again and again and when that happens, my heart often drops. It’s nice to know that they are alive, but at the same time we recognise that the service system has failed them yet again.
Homelessness service entry points work at the intersection of multiple struggling service systems, often with clients deemed too challenging for other supports. Our limited resources mean that securing appropriate, affordable, long-term housing for clients is near impossible.
Updated
Disparity in Covid funding between private and public schools ‘difficult to comprehend’, union says
Over in education estimates, the department has been asked about the $200m provided to schools for student wellbeing after Covid-19, and what it’s been spent on.
The funding will not be evaluated, the department confirmed, though states and territories will be required to report back on how it was used.
Its distribution was determined by states and territories, the department said, averaged at $20,000 for each school and factoring in population size.
Greens senator Penny-Allman Payne pointed out apparent inequity in the funding, noting public schools which only received around $7,500 and private schools which received in excess of $80,000.
The Australian Education Union (AEU) has been critical of the funding distribution, with its federal president, Correna Haythorpe, describing it as “deeply concerning”.
To see elite private schools getting more funding than disadvantaged public schools is difficult to comprehend.
Right now, only 1.3% of public schools are fully funded while private schools are either overfunded or fully funded in every state. What is the point of giving $50,000 or $80,000 to schools that have total incomes of $40m or $50m a year?
Updated
Avian influenza detected at fourth site in Victoria
Avian influenza has now been detected at four poultry farms in western Victoria, with Agriculture Victoria confirming this afternoon that another property had tested positive for the virus.
In a statement, Agriculture Victoria said three “infected properties” near Meredith, 100km from Melbourne, are confirmed to have the high pathogenicity H7N3 strain of the virus, while a fourth property at Terang has the high pathogenicity H7N9 strain.
It said:
Three of the infected properties are located in the Restricted and Control Areas in Meredith and Lethbridge, in the Golden Plains shire and one is in the Corangamite shire where movement restrictions were already in place.
All properties have been placed in quarantine and all poultry will be safely disposed of. The sites will be cleaned and cleared of the infection.
For those trying to follow the timeline: the first infection at an egg farm in Meredith was reported on 22 May, the Terang property which shares ownership was detected on 23 May, the infection at another property within the 5km restricted area near the first Meredith egg farm was reported yesterday 4 June, and the fourth property, also within that 5km zone, was reported today, 5 June.
Updated
Well, that was certainly A day.
Caitlin Cassidy has bravely stepped up to take you through what is left of it, while I go stare at a wall and eat another cupcake.
There is more estimates and news to come, so please keep checking back – it has been so wonderful having so many of you along for another day of watching politics in action.
There is one more day of politics live ahead of us until the parliament adjourns ahead of the 24 June sitting, and I’ll be up early to take you through it.
Until then – take care of you.
Updated
Peter Garrett welcomes Jabiluka decision
Former federal environment minister and Midnight Oil frontman Peter Garrett has welcomed the Northern Territory’s decision to issue a reservation order over the Jabiluka uranium mine which will take effect from when the mining lease expires in August.
The order prevents any mineral exploration or extraction, or any new mineral title to be issued to the land, until a lease extension application has been resolved.
Garrett has posted on social media site X, calling for territory and federal governments to confirm they will reject the Energy Resources Australia application for another 10-year extension to the lease and give the area heritage protection instead.
Now for the final step after decades of waiting. C’wealth & NT please don’t renew existing lease, instead commit to Jabiluka going into Kakadu National Park.’
The order giving the area temporary reserve status will be reviewed within two years, if no decision is made by then.
Updated
Quarter of ABC staff surveyed have experienced bullying
An internal survey of ABC news staff has found 25% of people who answered the survey experienced bullying and 13% experienced sexual harassment.
In the first survey of its kind undertaken by the ABC, a total of 745 news people, or about a third of the division, took the anonymous survey.
The most commonly identified behaviour was intimidation and belittling and humiliating comments, ABC staff were told today by managing director David Anderson. He told staff:
The report findings show that staff in ABC News have experienced bullying and sexual harassment in the workplace during their employment at the ABC.
Bullying behaviour and sexual harassment is unacceptable in any workplace.
Updated
Angus Taylor shocked by economic growth figures
Just returning to earlier, before question time distracted us, and Angus Taylor has condemned the government’s economic management after the flatlining growth figures contained in today’s national accounts.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics reported earlier that the economy grew just 0.1%, seasonally adjusted, in the March quarter.
The shadow treasurer says they are “a truly shocking set of numbers”.
This is the weakest annual growth in the economy since 1991. There is a whole generation of Australians who’ve never seen anything like this before.
He highlights the per capita growth figures, which show five consecutive quarters of growth figures with a minus in front of them.
We’ve got a household recession. Households are facing stagflation.
Taylor says this is “a homegrown situation” – that the treasurer had failed to curb inflation and grow the economy.
In light of the very flat growth figure, he was asked at a news conference if the Coalition would proceed with its policy to cut permanent migration by 25%, even if it tipped Australia into recession.
He declined to say one way or the other.
Updated
Adam Bandt also would like some clarification over what just happened
Greens leader inquires about the indulgence speeches, particularly with the leader of opposition’s and with his own request being shut down:
One is that as you consider whether the leader of the opposition speech was actually simply an agreement with what the prime minister said or in fact extended to other matters beyond what the prime minister had raised.
And secondly, if that is the case, to consider whether it is appropriate in circumstances where speeches turn into wide ranging political debates and political attacks, whether there is in fact any requirement, because it is not apparent to me from practice, that indulgence is only ever granted when there is agreement.
It is clear that indulgence as I read practice that indulgence can be granted on significant matters and can be granted to other members.
And in that instance, Mr Speaker I ask you to reflect about whether there is in fact a requirement that you can only speak on indulgence if there is agreement and especially considered the leader of the opposition’s speech and in a parliament, where there is wide ranging representation from parties and independents other than the opposition and the government, whether it is appropriate for indulgence to be used only for to two parties that opposition and a government to attack others and then to those others not to be able to participate in the debate.
Milton Dick says he will take it all under consideration.
I appreciate the sensitive nature of today’s question time, and I’ll reflect on the matter
Updated
Independent MP Zali Steggall wants to know how it all happened
I would like to clarification in relation to events that have occurred just now and during question time in terms of procedure when it comes to indulgence.
The observation was that in response to a question from the member from Mackellar, the prime minister exceeded the allocated three minutes of time for answer and proceeded to continue –I was not aware that any indulgence was sought at that time to continue beyond the the allocated period of time.
And the concern that I have and I wished to seek clarification is, if indulgence is then is used to essentially mount a criticism or attack of members of this place or the other place, and it is then open on indulgence for the leader of the opposition to to join in that.
I’m concerned that that means indulgence is now used as a precedent for a criticism or attack of members of parliament in circumstances where there is limited opportunity to reply and I don’t understand that that’s the accepted and convention on how indulgence has been exercised today.
She also asks about personal explanations and how they can also be abused.
Milton Dick says he will reflect on what Steggall has raised.
The simplest way to understand it is that it’s by convention of the house over a long period of time that everyone’s agreeing on the same topic.
Now I will reflect on what the member has said and regarding to how indulgence is granted on the issue.
Steggall wants a little more clarification when it comes to the use of indulgence:
Could I just ask for clarification in respect to in the listed instances where indulgence can be granted?
I am concerned with if that is going to extend to an opportunity to mount a criticism or attack of members of parliament in this place or that place [the senate] because that that does not does not appear in the listed circumstances where indulgence is traditionally granted and I think opens a dangerous precedent.
Updated
Here is how some of all of that played out in the chamber over the last couple of hours, as seen by Mike Bowers:
Updated
The leader of the house, Tony Burke has now stood up in the chamber and he is FURIOUS
The days of these wedge motions being put to the parliament and going to a vote end now!
The harm that has been done is beyond belief – to be telling people when there is a government calling for ceasefire, that somehow it is calling for conflict is deliberate misinformation.
And I don’t see why misinformation coming from the left is somehow noble when misinformation coming from the right is so wrong.
People in our electorates genuinely have real fear of what is happening for them. It is not a political game.
And can I just put this one point when the resolution was put on a suspension of standing orders from the Green party last time, it was a procedural motion.
The question of recognition was never before this parliament and yet the Greens chose to message something to Australia and to the world that was in accurate and they got headlines around the world that hurt the Palestinian cause, but helped the Greens harvest votes.
What sort of party on an issue like that, makes a decision to harvest their own votes?!
I move the debate be adjourned.
Updated
Pat Conroy is asked to withdraw an ‘unparliamentary remark’
The speaker says he didn’t hear it, but still asks him to withdraw to assist the house, which Conroy does.
We are told the remark was “you are scum” by people in the chamber, which you can just make out in the broadcast.
Updated
Back to the chamber…
As expected, the chamber votes that Adam Bandt no longer be heard.
Max Chandler-Mather rises to his feet to support Bandt’s motion to suspend standing orders and manages to get out:
This government is engaging in an arms trade with the state of Israel as it carries out a genocide in Gaza…
But then he do is shut down. The house goes to vote. There is more shouting across the chamber, with yet another male MP yelling “you’re a disgrace” in the direction of the Greens.
You can hear a woman yell “shame, shame” as the division count is carried out.
Updated
Victoria sets up new rental property complaints system
A new complaints system has been established to report properties available for rent that are being falsely advertised or do not meet minimum standards.
The minister for consumer affairs, Gabrielle Williams, has announced the new form on the Consumer Affairs Victoria website, which she said only takes about five minutes to complete and can be submitted anonymously.
She says it will make it easier to report issues with properties being put up for rent – including inaccurate descriptions or images used to advertise the property, and breaches of rental minimum standards such as the lack of a functional kitchen or lockable external doors.
The form includes an option for people to upload photos to show the difference between the property advertisement and the property at inspection.
Williams says significant penalties apply to estate agents and residential rental providers who do the wrong thing, with maximum penalties for individuals exceeding more than $11,000 and $57,000 for businesses.
She says work is underway to set up a renting task force within Consumer Affairs Victoria, with recruitment of extra intelligence analysts, investigators and lawyers in progress.
Her statement says:
Anyone with concerns that a property up for rent is not being advertised fairly or does not meet the legal minimum standards for a safe and secure home can now more easily alert Consumer Affairs Victoria.
The rental complaint form is backed by our renting taskforce and rental minimum standards campaign. These measures are making our rental market fairer for all Victorians and ensuring that all rental properties can be called a home.”
Updated
Queensland yet to commence condoms for prisoners trial
A Queensland Health spokesperson said the department “remains ready and committed to provide prisoners with condoms, dental dams and lubricant as soon as it is permitted.”
The government said it would consider a trail six months ago.
The spokesperson said the working party established by the Queensland Corrective Services continues to meet and “further examine the safety and security elements of providing prisoners with access to condoms.”
A trial of providing prisoners with access to condoms has not commenced.”
The sunshine state is the only jurisdiction that does not provide condoms to prisoners – New South Wales and Western Australia started doing so in the 1990s, and every other state and territory implemented them a decade ago.
The World Health Organization has long advocated for condoms to be provided to prisoners to prevent the spread of blood-borne viruses and sexually transmitted diseases.
Updated
Senate health estimates hears details of delayed reproductive health report
Jumping back to the Senate health estimates where Senator Larissa Waters is asking the department about the government response to the Senate Inquiry into Universal Access to Reproductive Healthcare, which is 10 months overdue.
The Senate’s consensus report was tabled 13 months ago. Waters said the last time the inquiry was brought up in Estimates Dr Liz Develin said she had seen a draft in February and it was very close.
Develin today said the government response has continued to evolve since February, but the response has not been finalised.
Waters had further questions about the items in the budget she said bear a resemblance to some of the inquiry recommendations:
$8m for funding the creation on data sets on miscarriage and sexual and reproductive health for early pregnancy assessment services
$5.2m support placement costs for practitioners to undertake long acting contraception training.
$1.2m for menopause training for GPs, covering the $75 fee for the online course co-designed by the college of GPs and administered by Jean Hailes.
The department secretary, Tiali Goodchild, says the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare will create the data sets, which will be able to distinguish between terminations and miscarriages which are currently not distinguished in the data.
Goodchild also clarified that the grants to support placement costs around long acting contraception training covers all costs health practitioners incur including the cost of the training, their travel as well as the replacement cost of someone doing their work while they are doing training.
In response to Waters’ question, Goodchild said no other organisations had been invited to the tender to administer menopause training besides Jean Hailes because considering current uptake, they selected the course that had been used the most by health professionals at the moment.
Updated
Adam Bandt wants the house to debate:
That this house one notes that
a) the state of Israel has signed a $3 billion contract with the United States for a further 25 F-35 fighter aircraft
b)Australia plays a significant role in the F 35 fighter aircraft global supply chain with a range of components manufactured here in Australia, including the sole manufacturing of F-35 fighter aircraft up lock actuator system, which allows the F- 35 to drop its payload and
c) the F-35 fighter aircraft are being used to bomb the people of Gaza and
d) calls on the government to immediately end all direct and indirect trade of military equipment with the State of Israel including the provision of critical components of the F-35 fighter jet supply chain.
Now it is critical, Mr. Speaker, that we debate this motion now because labour is attended to anything to distract from their complicity the unfolding genocide…
He is shut down by Mark Butler who asks that he no longer be heard, and as the house divides on that, Bandt continues to shout his speech across the chamber. You can hear him yell about “glass jaws”, and how the government will have any debate other than what is “happening in Gaza”.
You want me to get rid of him,” one male MP can be heard asking on the chamber broadcast with a laugh.
Shut him down!” another yells.
Adam Bandt says ‘severe and direct misrepresentations’ were made of him in question time
As expected, Adam Bandt gets to his feet, the first with a personal explanation (which is the standing order MPs can use to correct things which have been said about them during question time).
Bandt:
This prime minister is so desperate to deflect and distract from Labor’s complicity and backing up the invasion that is taking place at the moment they will come in here and make spurious allegations …
There are so many interjections, Milton Dick has to call for order. The member for Canberra, Alicia Payne, is booted for being disorderly.
Mark Dreyfus is booted for being disorderly.
Bandt continues:
We have been crystal clear in making it clear that the Australian Greens is a party of peace and nonviolence, and support protest that is peaceful, and we have made that crystal clear, on the record, that that should be the case.
There are more interjections. Bandt is offered another go:
I’ve made it clear that the prime minister and the leader of the opposition made a number of severe and direct misrepresentations about actions that are taking place outside this place when we have been crystal clear on the record about our approach to how people should exercise protests, and instead a number of severe misrepresentations were made. Why? Because they are attempting to distract from their complicity [in what is happening in Gaza].
Bandt then moves to suspend standing orders to debate the issue of whether Australia is sending parts which are being used in F-35s used by Israel.
Updated
Anthony Albanese calls an end to question time, but I would imagine some people might have a bit to say about what happened during that session.
NDIS fraud taskforce set up by current government, Shorten says
You can always tell when Michael Sukkar has a late question in QT, because he doesn’t tend to interject as much (Sukkar often gets booted out for interjections). Sukkar:
Minister, NDIA officials told estimates that under the Albanese Labor government, up to $2bn of the $45bn per year devoted to the NDIS has been spent on illicit drugs, holidays and expensive cars, just to name a few, and that 90% of NDIS plan managers have significant indicators of fraud. Why has the minister and his handpicked CEO allowed this to happen?
Bill Shorten gives a fairly similar answer to the one he has been giving the media all day – you know about this evidence, because we set up the fraud taskforce that is looking at the NDIS.
The member opposite is referring to some evidence that was given in estimates … in the last couple of days, the didn’t mention the person who gave the evidence.
The gentleman who gave the evidence, his name is John Dardo. The reason why he was giving that evidence is because I picked him to come and work at the NDIA because those opposite did not take seriously fraud in the NDIA!
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Treasurer says Labor committed to more funding for community and women’s legal services
Independent Curtin MP Kate Chaney asks Jim Chalmers:
So many women struggle to navigate the legal system that’s meant to protect them when they fear violence. Women’s legal services turn away more than 50,000 women a year due to resource constraints and with no new funding in the budget and now having to reduce services.
Why didn’t the budget prioritise increasing the services and will the treasurer increase funding and certainty for community legal services so women can get the support?
Chalmers:
There was some new money in the budget for legal services working closely with the attorney general, but I do acknowledge that we have to finalise the agreement in order to provide some more funding to make sure that these really crucial legal services that we’re all familiar with in all of our communities, particularly for women at risk – that that funding can continue.
I’ve had a number of meetings with the attorney general, we’re very conscious of the pressures on these legal centres and these legal services.
We provided a small amount of funding to keep things going for the time being but we do know and we are committed to a new agreement that provides more funding.
Updated
MediSecure goes into voluntary administration weeks after cyber-attack
MediSecure, the electronic prescription provider that was hacked several weeks ago, has gone into voluntary administration.
FTI Consulting has been appointed as the company’s administrators.
It comes after the company – which does not run the national electronic prescription service – had faced calls to detail the number of customers whose personal information had been compromised in the attack, but had not yet provided the information weeks after the attack.
Guardian Australia understands the company had sought a bailout from the federal government to keep operating, but that request was denied. In a statement last month, MediSecure said the funding sought was “limited” and confined to the purpose of responding to the incident and “the request was not for funding MediSecure’s operational costs unrelated to the cyber-attack. In any event, that request was denied.”
Last week, the home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, said MediSecure had taken an “unacceptably long time” to provide clarity on the extent of the breach and the customers affected, especially given it is private medical information.
The first meeting of creditors will be held on 14 June.
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Communications minister expresses support for eSafety commissioner’s move to drop legal action against X
The communications minister, Michelle Rowland, has spoken on the eSafety commissioners’s decision to bring legal action against X and then drop it, as Josh Taylor has reported today:
The government acknowledges the decision of eSafety as an independent regulator to both bring and discontinue legal proceedings in the federal court against X in court.
The government backs our regulators and we back the eSafety Commissioner, particularly in light of the possible threats to her physical safety, and the threats to her family, in the course of doing her job.
Updated
Here is what Anthony Albanese said during question time about Israel, Gaza and the protests which have been held in Australia:
Back to question time, and Ted O’Brien makes Chris Bowen’s day by asking:
Does the minister support the New South Wales Labor government’s extension of coal-fired generation station Eraring?
Bowen says he hasn’t just held one press conference saying he supports this – he has held multiple press conferences saying this.
Bowen then goes through what he sees as some of O’Brien’s top hits when it comes to talking energy policy.
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‘Do you want a teddy bear?’ Gallagher asks shadow health minister after question on distribution of ‘promotional props’
Back at health estimates, the shadow health minister, Senator Anne Ruston, has accused the government of using urgent care clinic teddy bears “purely as promotional props for Labor party senators” – without spreading any of the bear hugs the coalition’s way.
Senator Anne Ruston asks:
The department responded to me that 200 UCC teddy bears were delivered to the office of the minister for health and aged care. I was just wondering if we could get any advice as to whether any of those teddy bears were distributed to any Coalition members of parliament?
Neither the department representative nor Senator Katy Gallagher know how the bears were distributed.
Ruston:
Would it be possible to find out? In scrolling through social media it appears as if these $16 Chinese manufactured …
Gallagher:
Do you want a teddy bear?
Ruston:
No, I’m actually quite serious here, I would like to know whether any of them were distributed to any Coalition members.
Gallagher:
I’ll see what information I can provide you.
Ruston:
From a social media scroll there seem to be no Coalition Senators [who] were provided [with them]. They seem to be used purely as promotional props for Labor party senators and I believe some may have went to the Greens.
Today marks the 40th anniversary of Australia’s universal health insurance system - Medicare.
— Richard Marles (@RichardMarlesMP) February 1, 2024
Medicare was introduced in 1984 by the Labor party. 40 years later we’ve made the biggest investments ever in Medicare and these two patients couldn’t be happier. pic.twitter.com/4WdG2cHoPn
It’s not the first time the bears, which were distributed on the occasion of Medicare’s 40th anniversary in January, have come under scrutiny at Senate estimates with their $4,000 price tag questioned in February.
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Question time is a bit of a mess today.
Sussan Ley asks Mark Butler about bulk billing rates and Butler thanks her for the dixer and then says she wouldn’t be recognised as the worst Coalition government health minister (that is a reference to Peter Dutton) but “the second worst”.
This then kicks off a bunch of points of order about reflections on members, and serial offenders, and standards in the house.
The transcription service Tveeder knew that today was going to be a messy one and went down just as QT began (I do not blame it).
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Keogh targeted with question on foreign nationals joining ADF after incorrect comments yesterday
The shadow defence minister, Andrew Hastie, asks the minister for veteran affairs, Matt Keogh:
Was it ever the policy of the government to accept foreign nationals from any country permanently [residing] in Australia into the Australian defence force from 1 January [2025]?
That is in reference to Keogh’s freelancing on the policy yesterday, where he said in a doorstop that from 1 January, the policy would allow all eligible permanent residents to apply for the ADF. This was wrong. The policy, detailed in the media release, was New Zealand permanent residents from 1 July 2024, and permanent residents from the other Five Eyes nations – the UK, Canada and the US – from 1 January 2025.
Keogh’s comments kicked off a day of confusion, which ended with “clarifications” from both himself and the defence minister, Richard Marles, at the end of the day.
Not the greatest day for Keogh.
Hastie brings him back there, but Keogh points out how Hastie, just last year, was supportive of the policy that he now says is “watering down” the ADF.
During this, the member for Barker, Tony Pasin, is told to stop eating by the Speaker, who says it is the fourth time this has happened.
Pasin says it’s ice.
Dick tells him to chew it slowly.
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Paul Karp was in the chamber throughout that entire few minutes, and he said the Greens mostly sat quietly through Anthony Albanese’s answer, but did begin to speak when Peter Dutton began his indulgence contribution, particularly as Dutton turned his attention to protesters.
Max Chandler-Mather can be heard saying:
“Stop trading in weapons with Israel” and something that sounds like “that is supporting a genocide”.
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The Greens leader, Adam Bandt, attempts to get the call, so he can respond to what has been said.
He is given the floor to speak on indulgence, but can’t respond directly to what has been said (under the standing orders, that is not how indulgence works).
Bandt:
This house is united in condemning antisemitism and condemning Islamophobia and we also condemned the invasion of Gaza.
Now, I will not be lectured to about peace and non violence by people who back the invasion of Gaza.
Children, children they are being starved ….
Bandt is told this is not what indulgence an be used for, and is told to sit down.
The chamber moves on.
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Continued from previous post.
Peter Dutton finishes with:
And we want peace delivered as quickly as possible. It is in the hands of Hamas right now. There is a deal on the table. And that’s hopefully going to bring this to an end. But of course they won’t. Because they don’t care for Palestinians, they don’t care for Israelis. They care for their own power.
And the world should stand together to condemn the actions of antisemitism and we should stand as one to make sure that we condemn the unacceptable levels of antisemitism that we see playing out on our streets. It has no place and we will take every action we need as a chamber to make sure that we can do those acts of antisemitism in our country, and the Greens political party today is properly and rightly condemned.
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Dutton suggests some pro-Palestine protesters are Holocaust deniers
Continued from last post:
Dutton:
It is completely and utterly unacceptable and to be condemned.
We see now the offices of elected members of parliament have been targeted with red paint with vile messages of hate and discrimination and antisemitism and it should be condemned, and the Greens should condemn it instead of condoning it.
Our country has an amazing Jewish community. And we know specifically speaking to some of the Holocaust survivors, that they fled war-torn Europe at the end of the second world war and they have lived in our country and peace and harmony have contributed to our country into the great, amazing country it is today without concern, without condemnation without fear.
And we know today that those people are telling us these people who are in their 80s and 90s are telling us that for the first time in their lifetime, they fear their presence in our country.
They are now talking about moving from our country, and finding a safe haven somewhere else.
Six million people were gassed in the second world war, and we’ve got people in our country today, out there on university campuses and outside electoral offices denying that that took place, or saying that the biggest attack on the Jewish population since that time, the slaughter of 1,200 people, somehow doesn’t count for anything and it shouldn’t be condemned. And they should be ashamed of their actions, and it has no place in our country.
We know that Hamas is using people, Palestinians, as human shields, as many terrorist organisations have done through the course of history. Why would they be any different from al-Qaida or other terrorist organisations that we’ve known? Why would they value human life when many people who have had the depraved approach that they have over the course of history – why would they be any different? Of course they’re not.
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Dutton accuses protesters of ‘hatred directed towards academics’ and ‘students' over Jewish faith
Peter Dutton now stands up to speak on indulgence:
I will make it very clear to the Australian people that there is a bipartisan position now in this chamber and that we speak with one voice when we condemn acts of violence wherever they take place, but particularly that country at a period where there is heightened concern legitimately within the parts of the country.
Last week, I was at a school in Sydney where armed guards have a permanent presence to protect young children going to school, to protect young kids going to daycare centres.
Not because they’ve done anything wrong, not because their families have done anything wrong … because they are Jewish. That’s why. And that has no place in our country whatsoever …
It needs to be condemned, and … those who seek for their own political purposes and their own political advancement to pour fuel on this fire deserve condemnation of this chamber, and they should from day one, from day one, in fact, after October 7, when 1,200 people were slaughtered by a terrorist organisation.
To this day, people are still held in a tunnel network, women and children still held by that terrorist organisation.
As we know, the Greens political party didn’t wait for advice or evidence or security briefing. They’re out there condemning the Israelis immediately and without hesitation.
And now we see on university campuses, the hatred directed toward people who are academics who are students, not because of views that they hold or causes that they support, but because they are [of] a Jewish faith.
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(Continued from last post)
Albanese:
I’ve supported justice for Palestinians my whole life and still do. And it’s tragic that legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian people are undermined by some people engaging in activity that completely alienates the Australian public … No one should be targeted for who they are.
The targeting of people because they are Jewish, because people will disagree with some of the actions of the Netanyahu government, [is] completely unacceptable. Political debate must be respectful.
As political leaders we have a responsibility to lower [the] temperature, not to [inflame it].
We must foster the unity and combination and diversity that has always been our nation’s greatest strength.
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(Continued from last post)
Albanese:
It is unacceptable that misinformation [was] consciously and deliberately spread by some Green members that have been engaged in demonstration, outside offices and knowingly misrepresenting motions that have moved in this parliament.
All of us have a responsibility to prevent conflict in the Middle East from being used as a platform for prejudice here. There is no place for antisemitism, prejudice of any sort, including Islamophobia in our communities and our universities …
Our staff work to provide assistance to people dealing with Medicare, social security, migration and other issues.
They deserve respect. Not abuse, not assault. Not attacks on the office that cost taxpayers money, but cause, more importantly, considerable emotional distress and [are] anti-democratic by their very nature, because they stop people participating in our democratic process and receiving services from members of the House of Representatives or of the Senate.
Enough is enough.
The time for senators and members of parliament to continue to inflame tension outside of these offices must end.
The fact is that denying people the right to seek out assistance achieves nothing and tragically and undermines the cause of protesters purport to advance.
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Australian communities ‘distressed’ over Israel-Gaza war, PM says
Independent MP Dr Sophie Scamps asks:
My electorate office continues to receive hundreds of emails about the events in the Middle East. The people of Mackellar were utterly appalled by the atrocities committed by Hamas and our hearts broke for the people of Israel. Now, my community is deeply distressed also by the immense human suffering in Gaza. I’m concerned that this conflict is impacting social cohesion here in Australia. Prime minister, what is your government’s message to my community about the importance of bringing the hostages home and bringing an end to this conflict?
Anthony Albanese:
I thank the member for Mackellar for her serious and constructive engagement on this issue along with so many of her colleagues.
It’s an approach shared by this government, but one that has been tested by the actions of some members
… Six months ago, Australia voted for a ceasefire at the United Nations along with 152 other countries. This government strongly supports President Biden’s ceasefire proposal announced this week, hostages must be released and civilians must be protected. As President Biden has said, a deal would allow the United States and our partners to begin to work to rebuild homes, schools and hospitals in Gaza, to help repair communities destroyed in the chaos of war.
Australia is not a participant in this conflict. We have been a consistent voice for humanitarian concerns. The point that I’ve made as prime minister from the very outset is that every single innocent life matters. Every Israeli, every Palestinian.
This government supports a two-state solution and an enduring peace [for] Israel and Palestine living peacefully side by side with security and prosperity.
Every one of us has a responsibility to keep our community safe. Social cohesion is a national asset to all of us. All of us have a responsibility to uphold and defend. Right now communities are distressed – particularly with relatives in Israel, or the occupied territories, are distressed. We have a responsibility to not add to that distress through misinformation.
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Treasurer talks up wages growth amid opposition attack
Back to question time, and the LNP MP for Dawson, Andrew Wilcox, asks:
The latest national accounts show that compared to before the election, real disposable income has fallen by 7.8%. Productivity has fallen by 5.2%. Personal income taxes are 20% higher, interest on mortgage repayments have almost tripled.
Why are Australians paying the price? The Albanese Labor government incompetence in this management falls to the treasurer.
Jim Chalmers enjoys this:
Mr Speaker, some questions even the shadow treasurer won’t ask for that very good reason. If they want to ask us about productivity, Mr Speaker, perhaps they could mention their decade in office.
If they want to ask about disposable incomes, Mr Speaker, perhaps they could mention in passing at least that when we came to office real wages were falling by 3.4% and now they’re growing again.
Perhaps somebody could explain to the honourable member up with this unfortunate timing in his question about the tax sector – the tax income stream is down again. They’ve been down in national accounts this quarter and right down in the quarter before, Mr Speaker.
Angus Taylor has a point of order which is not a point of order.
Chalmers:
The same guy who can’t get two questions in a row on national accounts day wants to talk about relevance.
Chalmers finishes with:
Mr Speaker, the shadow treasurer has the MPI [matter of public importance debate] shortly, so he’s got 10 minutes looking at himself in the camera, like a budgie looking in the mirror, but without the insight.
Luke Howarth (yes, he is still there, and still jumping up at any perceived slight on a Coalition MP) says Chalmers is a “serial offender” when it comes to reflecting on members.
Milton Dick very politely and speakerily tells him to sit down.
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Queensland Labor swipes at LNP over budget
Queensland treasurer Cameron Dick has mocked the opposition for signing up to Labor’s budget before the party even does.
Opposition leader David Crisafulli yesterday promised not to cut or change planned funding for infrastructure or social services in a first LNP term.
Dick said:
David Crisafulli has agreed to a budget that has yet to be agreed to by the government. It’s yet to go to the cabinet and the parliamentary party before I introduce the appropriation bills, so I just think this doesn’t add up. It doesn’t make sense.
And I think he needs to be upfront with Queenslanders – how will he deliver on his promises for lower debt, lower taxation for big corporations, including mining companies, and delivering unfunded projects, currently, like the rail line to the Sunshine Coast?
The government today announced it will budget for $20.9bn in the 2024-25 budget documents.
Crisafulli said Queenslanders would want an incoming government to back the projects of its predecessor and they were “fully funded if they’re in the budget, if they’re under way”.
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The president of Nauru, David Adeang, and his delegation are in the parliament today and will meet with Anthony Albanese and MPs a little later.
Peter Dutton says he hopes Adeang will be cheering on the Maroons in tonight’s State of Origin.
PM welcomes the president of Nauru David Adeang to #qt.
— Paul Karp (@Paul_Karp) June 5, 2024
Yesterday we reported asylum seekers we've sent to Nauru appears to have topped 100, with a further 37 people sent to the Pacific Island #auspol https://t.co/T1CK4vI724
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Question time begins
Angus Taylor gets to kick off question time – what a treat.
It is, of course, on the national accounts.
Taylor has a somewhat different view to Jim Chalmers:
This is the slowest growth since 1991 outside of the pandemic. [At] the same time living standards have collapsed by 7.8% under Labor. Our inflation remains the highest and most persistent in the developed world. Why are Australians paying the price for this government incompetence and mismanagement?
Chalmers:
I welcome the opportunity from the shadow treasurer to talk about today’s national accounts. What today’s national accounts show beyond any doubt is the economic strategy in the budget is exactly the right thing for the combination of challenges we confront together.
If we had taken the advice of those opposite, talking about $315 billion into much spending and all the rest of the rubbish they peddle, that would have been diabolical.
He continues with what he have heard from his statement and his press conference, so you get the idea.
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Peter Dutton has discovered talking-to-camera social media videos.
It’s time for a mature debate on Australia’s energy future, @AlboMP. pic.twitter.com/BPB26bfk9a
— Peter Dutton (@PeterDutton_MP) June 5, 2024
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The inner-city Sydney MPs currently sweating the AEC’s NSW redistribution decision will have more of an idea come next Friday, when the electoral commission will release its draft proposal.
We saw the flurry the Victorian redistribution created (Josh Frydenberg wants back in! Maybe! Wait, no, he doesn’t!) and there will be just as much if not more interest in what happens to those inner north seats in Sydney once the draft boundaries are released – keep an eye on the former Mackellar Liberal MP Jason Falinski talk.
The NSW redistribution proposal will be released on Friday 14 June (next Friday).
— AEC ✏️ (@AusElectoralCom) June 5, 2024
It'll be around lunchtime. We will of course post here when it is available. Info on the process thus far is available via the dedicated redistributions website. https://t.co/zXQ9KNexSY
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TV debate over direction 99 descends into farce
I didn’t run this earlier because, frankly, the transcription was a complete mess and it would have taken too long to unpick.
But the weekly “debate” between Clare O’Neil and Jane Hume on the Seven Network’s breakfast program descended into an absolute farce, which ended with the host pulling the pin early with:
You know what? No one likes the arguing, do we? I think we’ll leave it there. See you next week, guys.
It was all about ministerial direction 99 and who was worse when it came to cancelling visas.
Here is a taste:
Host: We’ll move on to our final topic. Jane, we had a bit of a moment in Senate estimates –
Hume: Really? (This was after a couple of minutes of O’Neil and Hume talking over each other and the interview having completely derailed.)
O’Neil: What I don’t like, Jane, what I don’t like is hypocrisy.
Host: … yesterday when….
O’Neil: What I don’t like is hypocrisy, and that’s what you have to answer for.
Hume: Really? I don’t like shameless behaviour or bad taste.
And that’s where the host gave up.
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X says ‘free speech has prevailed’ after eSafety commissioner drops case over Wakeley church attack posts
Elon Musk’s X has said “free speech has prevailed” after the eSafety commissioner dropped the federal court case over X’s refusal to remove tweets of the Wakeley church stabbing attack.
We welcome the news that the eSafety Commissioner is no longer pursuing legal action against X seeking the global removal of content that does not violate X’s rules.
— Global Government Affairs (@GlobalAffairs) June 5, 2024
This case has raised important questions on how legal powers can be used to threaten global censorship of speech,…
In a post following the earlier announcement that eSafety would focus on the AAT merits review of the decision, X said:
We welcome the news that the eSafety Commissioner is no longer pursuing legal action against X seeking the global removal of content that does not violate X’s rules.
This case has raised important questions on how legal powers can be used to threaten global censorship of speech, and we are heartened to see that freedom of speech has prevailed.
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That is the end of the question and answer section of the Michael Miller press club address.
Question time will be in just under 30 minutes, but I think we all probably need a little break right now to take some of that in.
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‘Uncomfortable’ views published by News Corp on migration ‘part of contest of ideas’: Miller
On some of the headlines News Corp has run when it comes to issues like migration, Michael Miller says:
Migration is definitely the theme of the moment. When I think of Australia, we’re a very accepting country … Any particular news bulletin, you can find an exception and you can find an exception on a page across the many papers that we publish, across the year.
And so while I understand that some people might take exception to one news story, there’s also a lot of news stories which they would agree with.
That is, you know, part of that contest of ideas and that spread of thinking. I would want to protect our Australian values and our Australian acceptance of new cultures, and that’s what’s made us now the most multicultural country in the world, particularly Sydney, and … I can understand that there are some who are going to take exception to different headlines at different times, but that’s not the intent.
It’s about the intent of making sure Australia is a better place, a safer place, a fairer place for all.
… I’m proud of the advocacy work we undertake, the campaigns we run, and the various discussions which others, you know, aren’t prepared to necessarily raise. I understand that in debate, there are some uncomfortable places that you go, but I’m a great believer that – you [have] got to surface those [views] to arrive at a place which is socially acceptable, and that is ensuring there are various views and voices being surfaced.
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Australian media choice ‘has never been greater’, says Miller
Asked about News Corp’s tax record, Michael Miller says:
We have no issues with the tax department. We resolved those any disputes a number of years ago. We had no adverse findings since.
And on media concentration, Miller says:
Australians [have] never had more choice for media. We have seen the Daily Mail, the Guardian; the New York Times has a large bureau here. The number of streaming options that Australians have from offshore has never been greater. We subject ourselves to the ACCC as every company should. So we are meeting our obligations, and that media choice, as I said, has never been greater. We don’t have a monopoly on news.
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There is a follow-up question there:
A lot of these social media companies probably argue they don’t intend to bully either. They poured money into mental health campaigns. You don’t think that’s a similar situation?
Michael Miller:
… The way they behave and the little care they have for the country, the little they give back – the fact they don’t play by Australian rules, they don’t subscribe to Australian values – is quite different.
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Miller asked about News Corp reporting that caused ‘harassment’ and ‘distress’
Michael Miller is asked about times when News Corp has been seen to “bully” people, given Miller’s comments about social media and bullying:
We have [Yassmin Abdel-Magied] who famously left the country after a lot of controversy around some of her comments. Antoinette Lattouf has been at the centre of a lot of harassment because of reportage as well, and Brittany Higgins.
Also in 2021 there was a report that found 45% of News Corp articles [on] transgender kids caused distress among those communities. Was it OK for News Corps’ work to bully these demographics and people?
Miller:
The work wasn’t intended to bully. They raised issues. I’d also point you to [the] substantial body of work in campaigns our mastheads have run to stop bullying …
A campaign run by the Sunday Telegraph which asked for a counsellor in every single school … the New South Wales government [made that change].
So I’d actually stand by a lot of our journalism and the positive impact it has and the advocacy we undertake.
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Australia must ‘keep our kids safe’, News Corp chair says on raising social media use age
On News Corp’s campaign to have the social media use age increased from 13 to 16, Michael Miller says:
I’m not sure you need to pass over technical documents. I think – both face and identity checking that you are 16 or older, it’s – referencing what’s happened in the past. In New York, that state is wanting to introduce legislation … that restricts social media usage to [people over] 16, and [so] that the tech platforms cannot – will have to change their algorithms to not target under-16-year-olds.
And so I think we’re protecting the kids, I think. I don’t know [if] we’re necessarily in the best position to work through the technology, but there’s no way we’re suggesting handing over of more privacy data.
We know that the tech platforms can turn things off and turn things down and target when they wish, and that’s what we’re proposing here, we [have] got the keep our kids safe and the tech platforms [have] got to take more responsibility and they won’t do that unless, you know, they’re legislated to and that’s what we’re encouraging the Australian government to do.
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Miller defends partnerships with AI companies
News Corp was once warning against the use of AI in media and is now doing deals to incorporate AI into its media coverage – what changed?
Michael Miller:
What has changed over the past year is that a lot of those AI companies have learnt from the tech platforms to engage with media earlier and that’s what I think all media companies are seeing, that they are wanting to have conversations around how they – they see media as being important partners and that I think that media companies should be open to having those conversations …
It’s no doubt those AI companies need media companies and that, you know, if the partnership is right, then I don’t think media companies should be close-minded to working with AI companies either.
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‘We’re not obsessed’ with ABC, News Corp chair says
A reporter from the ABC asks:
The ABC’s managing director was asked last week if News Corp was obsessed with the ABC to which he responded, “Yes, they are.”
My question to you is – do you think the level of News Corp’s reporting on the ABC is justified?
And supplementary to that – do you think media companies like News Corp and the ABC should be working more together to combat some of the issues and challenges you have talked about today?
Michael Miller:
A few questions in there. OK. On any single day of the week, there’s a small group of, you know, the ABC that will review and critique News Corp and other media, not just News Corp.
And at News Corp there’s a small cluster that will review and critique other media and not just the ABC.
I got a bit of critiquing of my own this morning on the ABC, but I, you know, do feel that – we’re not obsessed.
I think that’s – we look at Media Watch every Monday.
… We accept that’s part of having varied media and giving Australians choice. So I think if we just look at one aspect of the ABC, you get a pretty narrow vision. I look more broadly than that.
… I disagree with David [Anderson], I don’t think either organisation are obsessed as what make it amplified within the industry.
And to your question – should we be working together? Um, yeah, I – Australia’s right to know is a platform that all media companies, you know, work together on, to ensure Australians’ right to know is protected and there’s a lot of – lot more we could be doing in that area …
What I have talked about today is an industry issue. It’s not a News Corp issue. It’s an Australian issue, it’s [an] Australian business issue, and that’s why a licence would encompass far more than just media.
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Miller says Sky After Dark presenters are ‘commentators’ in response to factchecking question
Given everything Michael Miller has just said, what is News Corp’s commitment to factchecking and accuracy?
We are subject to Australian laws and we’re subject to defamation. We’re members of the press council. We put ourselves out there to the – plenty of comment, heard some today myself about News Corp, but it’s important that various ideas are surfaced across all media and that includes News Corp.
In terms of internal processes, you asked about factchecking, yep, we have very diligent legal and subbing processes in place to check what we write.
I understand that … what is written and produced [is not always] liked by all, but that is part of what our democracy is, ensuring that various views are surfaced.
And what about what of some of the Sky After Dark personalities say?
Miller:
They’re commentators and we got to understand the difference between news reporting an opinion and commentary, and that I’d say that Andrew [Bolt] is definitely a commentator, and that his views are part of the, you know, News Corp group but not the only view.
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News Corp chair says global social media platforms are destroying lives
The executive chairman of News Corp Australasia, Michael Miller, has called for government regulation of the tech companies as well as the enforcement of the news media bargaining code. Miller told the National Press Club:
Meta [Facebook] must be designated under the media bargaining code and challenged to negotiate in good faith.
A requirement for tech platforms proven to be the media’s unavoidable trading partners, would be to honour the media bargaining code and compensate publishers and media companies.
Meta has indicated it may not renew its voluntary agreements when they expire, arguing users are no longer interested in news.
Miller laid blame for many of society’s ills at the feet of Facebook, TikTok and X, saying the global platforms were destroying lives and should be held accountable, including making a contribution to fixing mental health problems.
He said the platforms were responsible for youth suicide, online scams and blackmail, cyberbullying and “revenge porn”, doxing and trolling, deep fakes and conspiracies, the surveillance economy and political interference.
The executive in charge of Rupert Murdoch’s Australian mastheads including the Australian, Daily Telegraph and news.com.au said it was time to reset our digital environment to protect vulnerable people in society:
Just about every problem that we have as a country is either being exacerbated or caused by social media, and we’re not seeing a skerrick of responsibility taken by these companies.
In order to attain a “social licence” to operate in Australia the tech companies should abide by a package of laws.
Under this licence the Australian government would be able to make the platforms liable for all content that is amplified, curated, and controlled by their algorithms or recommender engines – no hiding behind Section 230 in Australia.
The licence should require that each platform has an effective consumer complaints handling system, including call centres contactable by telephone with expert staff in Australia.
The controversial Section 230 law in the US protects internet companies such as Meta from taking responsibility for content posted on their services.
Miller called for penalties including criminal sanctions which break the rules, and:
… the power to ultimately block access to our country and our people if they refuse to play by our rules.
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Miller likens tech companies to mining companies that ‘mine our lives’
Back to Michael Miller, and the News Corp exec uses mining as an example of how he thinks social media companies should be regulated:
This idea of a social licence is neither overreach nor pie-in-the-sky. Let’s go back to a real world example. A company may want to come to Australia to mine the mineral of the moment – copper.
We rightly regard copper as Australian property and if you want to extract it, here are just a few of the things that Australia requires.
You will pay a royalty on the copper to access the copper. You will fairly negotiate with the landowners. You will hire Australians and meet all our industrial relations standards, safety requirements and awards. You will meet all environmental requirements and you will pay to fix any damage you cause or face penalties.
In my view, the tech monopolies are also mining companies.
But they don’t mine our minerals, they mine our lives. And those lives are Australia’s greatest resource and we have a responsibility to protect … ourselves and the way we want to live.
If a company wants the right to access our every part of our lives so they can profit off our habits and choices, so it can sell us the goods its machine thinks we want, so it can take on our existing industries and business practices, then there’s a price to pay for that access. Penalties to pay for any damage caused.
While some may be shocked by this list of requirements, no business leader here would be surprised.
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NSW has ‘real legacy issues’ over use of asbestos, environment minister says
Wednesday’s motion follows earlier questions in the NSW upper house on Tuesday afternoon about the regulation of waste in the state and a chief scientist’s report that is considering how asbestos is managed in recycled products.
That report is expected later this year. Sharpe told the parliament on Tuesday the state had serious legacy issues related to asbestos.
I have spoken in this place a number of times about the legacy of asbestos. New South Wales was one of the highest users of asbestos in the world. We have real legacy issues across the state in a number of contaminated sites.
Sharpe said her expectation was “the government would make the review of the office of the chief scientist public and it will respond to it as quickly as possible”. Earlier this year the government responded to asbestos-contaminated mulch by tightening penalties and introducing new recall powers for the EPA. Sharpe said these were the “first tranche” of planned reforms:
I know members are very interested in what is happening with the recovered fines. That will be picked up in the review.
We have to be open and honest about the challenge of asbestos. It is not cheap or easy to fix, but the government is determined to work through this methodically, and that is what it is doing.
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Motion calling for action on contaminated soil passes NSW upper house
The New South Wales upper house has agreed the state needs to do more to prevent harmful materials from being spread through recycled landscaping products after a Guardian Australia investigation revealed asbestos had been found in landscaping soil bought in Sydney.
The parliament passed a motion, moved by NSW Greens MLC Sue Higginson, on Wednesday morning calling on the Minns government “to take action as necessary to prevent contaminated products from being produced and sold in NSW” and to give the state’s environment watchdog “the resources necessary to stop asbestos from being spread across communities”.
It comes after Guardian Australia reporting revealed the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) had known for more than a decade that waste facilities producing soil fill made from recycled residues from construction and demolition sites, known as “recovered fines”, were not complying with regulations intended to limit the spread of contaminants. Last week, the environment minister, Penny Sharpe, said she was “very concerned” by revelations contaminated soil fill could be bought at landscape and garden stores in Sydney.
The upper house noted two investigations – one in 2013 and one in 2019 – by the EPA had found industry-wide deficiencies but the regulator had abandoned plans to tighten regulations in 2022 after pressure from the waste sector.
The parliament also noted revelations that waste companies had asked private laboratories to repeatedly retest samples that had been found to contain contamination until they passed.
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News Corp chair hails ‘early wonder years of the internet’
The News Corp executive chair Michael Miller continues at the press club:
No company should be too big to regulate. Let’s pause here and go back in time to those early wonder years of the internet and imagine for a moment we had a crystal ball.
If we could have looked into the future and seen a world where a handful of companies had privatised the internet, created multibillion-dollar advertising monopolies, and exposed billions of people to harmful content while turning their noses up at nations around the world, would we have been OK with that?
(He is talking about big tech companies like Meta, in case you were wondering.)
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Crossbenchers and Bridget Archer urge PM to publicly support ICC and denounce Dutton’s comments
A number of crossbenchers and the Liberal MP Bridget Archer have written a letter to the prime minister urging him to “actively uphold the integrity and autonomy of the ICC in its investigations”.
As my colleague, Daniel Hurst, has been following in recent weeks, the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, has strongly criticised a recent announcement from the international criminal court’s top prosecutor revealing he would pursue arrest warrants against three Hamas leaders, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and the Israeli defence minister, Yoav Gallant, for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity on 7 October and in the Gaza Strip since.
Dutton said Australia must “put pressure on the ICC” not to proceed with the pursuit of Israeli leaders, and said last month he was “very open” to cutting ties with the ICC. The shadow defence minister, Andrew Hastie, similarly said he “had no faith in the ICC” in a newsletter to supporters.
On Monday, the foreign minister, Penny Wong, condemned the “reckless” comments, but Dutton has continued to threaten Australia’s withdrawal from the ICC under a Coalition government, labelling the move against Israeli leaders “appalling” on Tuesday.
Dutton said:
I think it’s important for Australians to have faith in a body that could ultimately decide guilt or innocence of our men and women from the Australian defence force.
The letter sent to Anthony Albanese on Wednesday, and signed by Archer, the Greens, and some crossbenchers, including David Pocock, Lidia Thorpe, Monique Ryan, Zali Steggall and Sophie Scamps, calls on the Labor government to “strongly denounce” the calls.
We are disturbed by, and strongly condemn, any threats or efforts to undermine the independence and impartiality of the ICC. This includes calls from some in Australia to withdraw from the Rome Statute. It is imperative that the Australian government takes decisive action to both publicly support the ICC’s work, as well as strongly denounce any attempts to pressure the [office of the prosecutor] into withdrawing its applications for arrest warrants.
Independent judicial processes must be permitted to operate free from political interference and threat of punishment.
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News Corp's Michael Miller savages social media firms
Back to Michael Miller’s speech at the national press club:
In the words of cybersecurity minister Clare O’Neil, just about every problem that we have as a country is either being exacerbated by or caused by social media and we’re not seeing a skerrick of responsibility taken by these companies.
And why is this happening?
Because on social media, bad behaviour is good for business.
The social media giants, they profit from evil videos, they profit from bullying, they profit from online con artists, they profit from glamourising eating disorders. In the words of a British father who like Wayne lost their child to suicide, they monetise misery.
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Serving in ADF would fast-track Australian citizenship eligibility for foreign nationals
Defence officials have confirmed that foreign nationals joining the Australian defence force would gain a fast-track to Australian citizenship.
At a Senate estimates hearing, officials reiterated that the new eligibility rules will begin with New Zealand nationals from July this year and then nationals of the UK, the US and Canada from January 2025.
It is not a free-for-all: the government says that “as well as meeting ADF entry standards and security requirements, permanent residents wishing to join the ADF must have lived in Australia for at least one year immediately prior to applying, not have served in a foreign military in the preceding two years, and be able to attain Australian citizenship”.
The Liberal senator Simon Birmingham said that for most visa classes, a person must have been a permanent resident for four years before they become eligible to apply for Australian citizenship. However, officials confirmed that under the existing Australian Citizenship Act 2007, 90 days of service in the ADF qualifies someone to apply for Australian citizenship.
When asked whether the four-year wait would be waived for those people who join the ADF under the new scheme, Fiona McSpeerin, a first assistant secretary at the Department of Defence, said:
Yes, senator, it is a faster way to become eligible to apply for Australian citizenship.
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News Corp chair begins national press club address
Michael Miller, the executive chair of News Corp, has started strong in his arguments about why tech companies are terrible:
Before we look at the now, let’s go back to the internet’s wonder years.
In the space of just one generation, we have gone from the magic that Tom [Connell of Sky News, who is MC-ing today’s event] talked about to madness.
Remember when we first discovered search and when we learned we could find anything we wanted to know at the click of a button?
Remember when our phones became smart, we started sharing photographs and memories with joy and delight?
Remember our first video calls with family, we hadn’t seen for years, when we first bought something online?
That was before the online scams and blackmail, before cyberbullying and revenge porn. Before doxing and trolling, deepfakes, conspiracies, the surveillance economy, and political interference.
Before terrorists livestreamed massacres and sites celebrated anorexia as a glamorous lifestyle.
Before the pandemic of loneliness and anxiety, and before the algorithms turned us into addicts.
The wonder years seem a very long time ago.
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Victoria University staff walk off as union says no reasonable pay offer proposed
Staff at Victoria University have walked off the job from midday to midnight in a bid for a decent pay rise and fair workloads.
The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) says despite VU management receiving its claims more than 12 months ago, it’s yet to propose a reasonable offer.
A spokesperson for VU said staff were given a 4% salary increase in March “in recognition of their contribution and ongoing commitment” to students.
VU is very keen to conclude bargaining without delay, building on this with further competitive salary increases plus new leave entitlements for staff.
The NTEU says staff are under unhealthy workloads after a 20% decrease in the workforce since 2023, adding the university had launched a “hardline attack” by increasing teaching workloads to spread from 36 weeks a year to 40.
Staff have endured hundreds of colleagues being made redundant, an unsafe teaching model and a cost-of-living crisis, yet management clearly thinks they don’t deserve to be paid fairly.
WorkCover data reveals VU has more claims against it in the past two years than any other Victorian university.
The VU spokesperson said welfare of staff was of “paramount importance”, adding it had recently implemented a wellbeing program.
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Cranbrook school yet to answer key questions on welfare complaints process, estimates hears
Over at education estimates, it has been revealed Cranbrook school is yet to have answered key questions on how it deals with, and whether it formally records, welfare complaints, months after a federal education department investigation into the private school began.
The investigation followed allegations, first reported on Four Corners, of harassment and discrimination at the Sydney’s boys school from former female staff members.
Speaking in Senate estimates, Greens senator Penny Allman-Payne outlined the trajectory of the department investigation, which began in March with an initial due date for responses of April and was extended until May.
As of 4 June, three questions remained outstanding, including “how are complaints, welfare matters, bullying, harassment [and] other forms of behaviour deemed not compliant with school values … dealt with at Cranbrook?” and whether they were recorded.
Allman-Payne pressed whether the school, which has received $34m in federal funding in the past decade and $480m in fees, should continue to receive Commonwealth money at this point in time.
The assistant minister for education, Anthony Chisholm, agreed it was a “serious matter”.
I certainly know minister Clare is aware and concerned at the behaviour of the school … I think we’ve got to allow the department to do their work in terms of getting to the bottom of this. We would hope the school would be more cooperative in this matter … but I think we should allow that to be completed before casting judgments.
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The national press club address with News Corp executive chair Michael Miller is about to start. Amanda Meade will be covering that for you, but we will dip in and out of the speech and the Q and A as needed.
One-off events like Taylor Swift tour ‘not the primary determinant’ of March quarter conditions: treasurer
And of course, there is a Taylor Swift question. Thankfully no Taylor Swift lyrical references though.
The ABS noted that record attendance at sporting and music events saw increased spending. How much do we have Taylor Swift to thank for that?
Chalmers:
I was expecting this earlier in the conference. There were one-off factors in the consumption figures, which is why we shouldn’t get too carried away with the growth we saw after a flatter quarter in the quarter before. There are other bigger issues at play in the consumption data.
Yes, there were some one-off events, whether they be concerts or sporting events, but not the primary determinant of the conditions revealed in the national accounts.
In conclusion, calm your farms, Taylor Swift did not save the Australian economy in the March quarter.
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Does Jim Chalmers anticipate things getting worse, in terms of growth for the economy?
Chalmers:
We still expect the economy to continue to grow. The Treasury forecasts anticipate growth in the economy, but weak growth in the economy.
And what we’ve seen today is whether it’s the private forecasters that you’ve all covered or the Treasury expectations, everybody anticipated the March quarter to be weak, and it’s been weak. I think we can expect June to be similarly difficult.
And as we said around budget time, we expect growth to begin to pick up pace towards the end of the year, but again, not to stratospheric levels.
And, again, you know, I take you back to the fiscal strategy and the budget strategy, and our job is to fight inflation and we’re putting downward pressure on inflation in the budget.
We’ve made that welcome and encouraging process compared to the inflation that we inherited but we’ve got to do that in a way that doesn’t smash the economy.
So you would know that in the second half of the year, our cost-of-living help arrives and that will support activity in our economy as well.
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Chalmers avoids weighing in on possibility of recession
Would one more interest rate increase push the economy into (an official) recession?
Jim Chalmers:
I’m very reluctant to engage in anything that would be confused with commentary about the future trajectory of interest rates and I think we’ve heard for a substantial bit of time this morning from Governor [Michele] Bullock, who’s been able to address some of these issues from her point of view.
And Governor Bullock made it clear that the Reserve Bank takes into consideration a range of factors when they make decisions about interest rates, not any one number or indeed any one quarter. They weigh up all of this together.
I think it’s very clear to us – I don’t speak for the bank, but it’s clear to Australians more broadly – that the economy is barely growing and although we have a lot going for us in the labour market, in the budget, in terms of real wages, you know, there are some very concerning elements in this, and whether it’s policymakers in my part of the shop or the governor’s part of the shop, we take that all into consideration.
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Budget strikes ‘the right balance’, treasurer reiterates
The treasurer is so sure of his opening point, that he also closes with it:
The main point I wanted to leave you with before I took your questions is that our responsible and methodical and measured approach to the Budget is keeping pressure off inflation without crunching the economy and that was the objective of the Budget we handed down not that long ago.
We are striking exactly the right balance between addressing that inflation, providing that cost-of-living help, supporting sustainable economic growth and strengthening our public finances at the same time and today’s data really confirms that our responsible fiscal strategy is exactly right for the conditions that we confront together in the economy, which have been laid bare in today’s figures.
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Higher interest rates and persistent inflation produced ‘really flat’ economy, Chalmers says
Jim Chalmers has opened his press conference with a statement:
Today’s national accounts showed what we already knew and that is that the economy was really flat in the first three months of the year. The primary cause of this very weak growth in our economy was higher interest rates but in combination with moderating but persistent inflation and global economic uncertainty as well.
These numbers show that we got the budget exactly right.
This is a justification for the government’s approach to fighting inflation without smashing the economy, given growth was already soft and people were already under pressure.
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Senator presses health department on evidence to support increase in urgent care clinics
(continued from previous post)
Ruston is pressing on what evidence base the government has decided to increase the number of urgent care clinics by 50%.
Develin says the number and kind of presentations, as well as the demographics of the patients are “the right sort of presentations”. However, a consultancy firm is currently evaluating the data on the effectiveness of these clinics which “will take considerable time,” she said.
Blair Comley, also from the department, admits:
There’s a little bit [of] building a plane and flying it at the same time in terms of what is the perfect dataset you’d like to have.
Ruston:
They don’t usually work very well.
Comley says the self-reported data from patients is that half would have gone to a hospital emergency department and that most would have been triage category 4 and 5 if they’d gone to the ED, “which states and territories have been urging us to do everything we can to keep out”.
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Locations of urgent care clinics chosen by minister from recommendations, estimates hears
Senate health estimates are now turning to questions around the government’s new urgent care clinics. Dr Liz Develin says the health department provides advice on where new urgent care clinics should be located.
In response to senator Anne Ruston’s question of whether the minister has ever deviated from recommended locations, Develin says:
There are more than one possible location in any state or territory, so there is a matter of choice … There is never really a clear-cut answer about absolutely where a clinic should be, so choices are made by ministers.
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Bill Shorten spoke to Ray Hadley on Sydney radio 2GB and managed to out-Hadley, Hadley and all in the opening salvoes:
Hadley: I think it’s fair to say I’ve given you a fair suck of the sav, to use one of your former colleagues’ expressions. I think I’ve been more than patient with all of this, but I’ve got document after document after document in front of me from people, including documents from your own head of fraud and integrity, John Dardo, who tell me that the whole system is basically not far away from collapsing.
Shorten: Is there a question after that, Ray?
Hadley: Yeah. Is it going to collapse? Are you going to keep spending billions of dollars, or what are you going to do about it?
Shorten: No, it’s not going to collapse. We’re fixing it. And you know, I get the frustration. But, you know, the very fact you’re quoting John Dardo. Do you know much about him?
Hadley: No, I don’t.
Shorten:
Let me tell you a bit about him. I hired him. He’s a gun in tax, he was in the ATO. He’s very good at creating systems to stop rorts. Now it’s taken years. He spent six years working in tax in terms of the digital transformation.
Now, I become the minister. I look at the existing stock of people I’ve got in the old agency – people, nice people, but I didn’t think they were good enough. So, I personally went out to John, who had a reputation across government. I said, I just need someone hard. And I tried to persuade him, and he did agree to come on board.
So, the very fact that we’re talking about what John Dardo is uncovering is because I hired him. You know, I wish that I could click my fingers and sort it all out in one day and you’ll, you know, you’ve said, oh, you know, you’ve given me a fair suck of the proverbial sav. Thank you.
But we are doing a lot more today than the mess that I inherited two years ago. And the very fact we’re talking about John Dardo is because the bloke you’ve got on the phone, Bill Shorten, convinced him to come and work for us so we could get the best of the best.
(Yes, that is Bill Shorten talking about himself in the third person there.)
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Coalition questions $3,280,311 cost of industry department legal contract that started out as $282,300
The Coalition wants to grill industry department officials about a contract for King & Wood Mallesons to provide legal services checking the probity of the $1bn deal for PsiQuantum to build a quantum computer in Brisbane.
The one-year contract was initially worth $282,300 when first published in August 2023 but has undergone a series of nine variations, and is now worth $3,280,311. The Coalition wants to ask why.
But when Liberal Andrew Bragg tried to get the ball rolling with the department’s corporate group, he was told to ask the technology and investment taskforce which is responsible for the procurement, who is due to appear after 6pm.
After a short adjournment, Bragg returns with some questions about the legal division. Officials said it is “not unusual” to contract external lawyers, as occurred for the PsiQuantum probity contract. Labor’s Tim Ayres said the internal legal capability tends to deal with HR, commercial leases, and risk management. But “executing a process around an investment” is done externally.
Ayres said he anticipates that the Coalition’s “very good questions” will have “very good answers”. “You’re not going to be able to get much satisfaction [from these officials],” he suggests.
Still, Bragg ploughs on. The department’s secretary, Meghan Quinn, said it is “not unusual” for a contract value to be increased if the department is taking a “phased approach” to a procurement, as occurred for the PsiQuantum due diligence and commercial process. As one negotiates complex legal documents that stand for decades, one needs more legal services, she said.
Ayres said the PsiQuantum deal is a “significant investment, not handing out a grant”. Ayres said it was “quite odd” for the Coalition to pick on increasing the value of the contract when it is “absolutely normal” to require more legal services after each phase of due diligence concludes.
Bragg hands over the call. I think we’ll only find out more after 6pm.
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eSafety commissioner drops case against X over Walkley church attack tweets
The eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, has decided to drop the federal court case against Elon Musk’s X over the tweets of the Wakeley church stabbing attack.
Instead, Inman Grant said, eSafety would focus on fighting the AAT review launched by X over the merits of the removal request decision.
She said:
Our sole goal and focus in issuing our removal notice was to prevent this extremely violent footage from going viral, potentially inciting further violence and inflicting more harm on the Australian community. I stand by my investigators and the decisions eSafety made.
Most Australians accept this kind of graphic material should not be on broadcast television, which begs an obvious question of why it should be allowed to be distributed freely and accessible online 24/7 to anyone, including children.
While backing down, the commissioner noted other social media companies had complied with the removal requests “because the video violated their terms of service and their standards of decency”:
So, it was a reasonable expectation when we made our request to remove extremely graphic video of an attack, that X Corp would take action in line with these publicly stated policies and practices.
The case was due to be heard in court at the end of the month. Last month the federal court refused to extend an injunction on X to hide the posts in question, in an early victory for X.
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Private schools to get nearly $1bn in infrastructure funding over next four years
The federal government will spend almost $1bn in the next four years to provide infrastructure to private schools while the public system has been allocated just $225m.
Asked in Senate estimates how much the commonwealth would spend on its capital gains program to non-government schools over forward estimates, the education department confirmed the figure was $975m.
At the same time, public schools will receive just $224.9m to 2024, as part of a temporary Schools Upgrade Fund introduced by Labor. There is nothing for public schools beyond 2024.
Asked by Greens senator Penny Allman-Payne why the discrepancy was so significant, she was told states and territories do the heavy lifting on upgrading government school infrastructure.
I know you were going to give me that answer, but I also note St Marys in Sydney, the PM’s former school, has just been awarded $5m to expand its facilities from the federal government whilst we had 202 of Australia’s 6,700 public schools – so that’s 3% of schools – get money in the Schools Upgrade Fund and they were spending it on things like repairing the basketball court.
The assistant minister for education, Anthony Chisholm, said it was “important the federal government support all schools”, adding “I know there’s a lot of need out there across all school communities”.
Allman-Payne replied:
50% of schools needed that money to fix their toilets.
Chisholm:
I’m pleased the government provided support to do some of that.
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Sky News appeared to have a bit of its own tech glitch this morning, when the background image behind Bill Shorten in the Canberra studio went on a magical mystery tour, throwing up a variety of different back drops.
It was a lovely visual journey.
Sussan Ley saw an opportunity though, and seized it.
Where in the world is Bill Shorten?
— Sussan Ley (@sussanley) June 5, 2024
Today he will go anywhere he can to avoid taking responsibility. pic.twitter.com/5xN37S6yK2
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GDP went backwards by 0.4% on a per-capita basis
The year-on-year growth pace was the slowest since the December quarter of 2020 when the economy was mired in the Covid pandemic, the ABS said.
There was a small revision of December’s quarterly growth to 0.3%, underscoring the slowdown at the start of this year. On a per-capita basis, GDP went backwards by 0.4%, making it five quarters in a row of no growth or a retreat.
The markets aren’t too fussed, with the Aussie dollar hovering at about 66.5 US cents while stocks have slightly pared their gains for the day. On that reaction, today’s weak economic figures aren’t expected to make much of an impression when the RBA board next meets on interest rates on 17-18 June.
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Treasurer says March quarter GDP results show ‘we got the budget right’
Jim Chalmers has already released his statement on the March GDP results:
Today’s National Accounts confirm growth in the Australian economy was flat in the first three months of the year.
The primary cause of this very weak growth was higher interest rates, combined with moderating but persistent inflation and ongoing global uncertainty.
These new numbers show we got the Budget right.
This justifies the Government’s approach to fighting inflation without smashing the economy, when growth was already soft and people were already under pressure.
Treasury expected our economy to be weak so it is not surprising to see the economy barely grew in the quarter.
Economic growth was 0.1 per cent in the March quarter 2024, to be 1.1 per cent higher though the year, according to data by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
This was below the median market expectation, but any growth is welcome in the domestic and global circumstances we confront.
Many economies around the world are feeling the impact of higher interest rates and high but moderating inflation.
Over the past year, around three quarters of OECD economies have recorded a negative quarter while Australia has avoided one to date.
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And on households, there is some interesting data:
Households saved less. Households saved only 0.9% of their income this quarter. This contributed to total savings remaining below 2.0% for a year, for the first time since March quarter 2008. Interest paid on mortgages rose by a more subdued 3.9%, which was the slowest quarterly rise since March quarter 2022.
People spent more on essential services. Household spending rose 0.4% in the quarter, after a quarterly rise of 0.3% in December. Spending on essential services contributed to the quarterly rise, with spending on electricity and gas rising 4.9%. Compared to March quarter 2023, total household spending on goods fell 0.6%.
Taylor Swift and the Formula One got hearts racing. It was a huge quarter of live entertainment in Australia, as Taylor Swift and Pink performed sold-out concerts. The Australian Grand Prix was also held in the March quarter for the first time since 2019. Our accommodation, catering, and arts and recreation industries all felt the benefit of these events.
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There were some titbits of good news in the ABS March national accounts release:
Annual inflation continued to ease. The consumer price index rose 1.0% in the March quarter and was up 3.6% compared with the March quarter of 2023. This marked the fifth consecutive quarter of lower inflation compared with the previous year. Inflation for tradable goods slowed, as some imported goods like footwear, furniture and household appliances were cheaper than a year ago.
Wages continued to grow. The wage price index rose 0.8% in the quarter, reaching three consecutive quarters of being above 4.0% compared with a year ago. The last time this happened was in the March quarter of 2009. During the quarter, private sector wages grew at a faster pace than those in the public sector.
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GDP figures show Australian economy barely grew in March quarter
Australia’s economy slowed to just 0.1% in the March quarter, which was slower than expected.
The nation’s gross domestic product barely grew, expanding just 0.1% in the first three months of 2024, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has just reported. On an annual basis, growth was 1.1%.
Economists had forecast GDP growth for the March quarter to come in at 0.2%, with the annual pace at 1.2%. The ABS’s previously published figures for the final three months of 2023 had GDP growth at 0.2% for the quarter and 1.5% from a year earlier.
Excluding population growth, the economy in per capita terms has been flat or in retreat since the start of 2023 as the Reserve Bank’s interest rate increases aimed at curbing inflation has squeezed mortgage-holders and other borrowers.
The year-on-year growth pace was the slowest since the December quarter of 2020 when the economy was mired in the Covid pandemic, the ABS said.
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GDP growth is down, even from expectations (which were 0.2%)
From the ABS:
The Australian economy rose 0.1% in seasonally adjusted chain volume measures
In nominal terms, GDP rose 1.4%
The terms of trade rose 0.2%
Household saving to income ratio fell to 0.9% from 1.6%
Cost-of-living crisis affecting charities as costs outstrip revenue
The March quarter GDP figures will be released in just a few minutes, but I think we all know which way it is heading.
Here is the latest data from the Australian Charity and Not-for-profits Commission, which found that while Australian charities received an extra $11bn in revenue over the 2022 reporting period, that was outstripped by demand.
As AAP reports:
Total revenue soared past $200bn for the first time, however those gains were far outstripped by expenses, which jumped $22bn.
Extra large charities raked in 54% of revenue, despite making up just 0.5% of the sector.
A five-year analysis of 51,536 charities revealed almost nine in 10 extra small charities operate with no paid staff and also experienced a 17% drop in volunteer numbers during that time.
“The cost of operating and delivering services has increased but extra small charities haven’t received sufficient revenue or donations to keep pace,” ACNC commissioner, Sue Woodward, said.
“When we talk about charities or when policy is made, we must be mindful of the difference in resources and capacity – variation between the charity sector and the business sector but also within the charity sector itself.”
The latest ACNC data has just been released and shows cost of living issues have impacted charities. Read more: https://t.co/AYYHNVfSjw pic.twitter.com/9zqeN4XeV3
— ACNC (@ACNC_gov_au) June 5, 2024
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ADF’s recruitment problems in spotlight at Senate estimates
The Australian defence force’s recruitment and retention problems have been a major theme in the Senate estimates committee hearing on defence this morning.
The secretary of the Department of Defence, Greg Moriarty, told the committee he was “not hiding” the scale of the challenges under questioning from the Greens senator David Shoebridge.
Shoebridge:
Secretary Moriarty, every year you’ve put forward a budget that you’ve been secretary, saying the ADF would grow, sometimes by thousands, sometimes by multiple of thousands, and every year it’s failed and in fact gone backwards. Why should this parliament have confidence in you being about to achieve the target this year when history shows that every year you’ve been secretary you’ve failed to meet your targets and indeed the ADF has shrunk? Why should we have faith – what’s different about this year?
Moriarty:
Senator, I think we’ve continued to inform the parliament that recruiting and retention is an ongoing challenge and it will continue to be. We’re not hiding that.
I think some of the initiatives that the CDF [Angus Campbell] has outlined, that we’ve outlined at this committee previously, are designed to tackle some of the underlying challenges here particularly around retention. There are new initiatives around recruitment and an attempt to bring in additional medical and psychological staff to process the applications more quickly. There is a backlog in our recruiting system.
So the propositions, the positions that are outlined are what we are seeking to achieve. We have acknowledged that while we will seek to achieve these, there are very significant recruitment challenges and retention challenges. These are the case in Australia. [From my conversation with a] number of my colleagues in other Five Eyes and beyond: they are all experiencing similar challenges.
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Health officials questioned about Australia signing international agreement on pandemic prevention
Health officials in Senate estimates this morning are being asked about the health minister, Mark Butler, signing Australia on to an international agreement on pandemic prevention at the 77th World Health Assembly in Geneva on May 26.
There’s interest from the shadow health minister, Anne Ruston, and One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts about the binding nature of the World Health Organisation agreement.
The nation’s chief medical officer, Prof Paul Kelly, who was also at the meeting in Switzerland said Australia’s leadership on the agreement was one of the proudest moments of his life. In response to what Australia is now bound to, he said:
The main issue that was talked about in terms of binding was that states should – when something happens which could be of benefit for the world to know – tell people.
If we had an outbreak of something – as happened in the first case of avian influenza in a human – we were bound to tell WHO about that and bound to tell other countries where that case had been to help their public health response.
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Chalmers calls presser for today after relase of quarterly GDP figures
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has already called dibs on the Blue Room (the second fanciest of press conference locations for the government, after the prime minister’s courtyard) to discuss national accounts.
The GDP figures for the March quarter will be released at 11.30 by the ABS (spoiler, they are not expected to look good, which anyone who has been anywhere near a shopping centre or attempted to make their budget stretch to the essentials would be able to tell you) and Chalmers will be up at midday.
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Andrew Bragg takes aim at Labor housing policy
Liberal senator Andrew Bragg has had fun with estimates hearings so far. Bragg has taken up the lead on the Liberals’ fight on housing, and spent the hearings asking each relevant department, and minister, what was happening with Labor’s housing policy.
He then clipped up his favourite bits for YouTube. (We are but all hustlers in a content hungry world). No word on whether or not he is considering a TikTok or Reels foray, but you never know.
Bragg:
Senate Estimates has revealed the dire state of Labor’s failure on housing.
Labor governs only for narrow vested interests. They have no time to solve the pressing economic problems of the day as a result.
Labor has given up on governing for the Australian people. Labor isn’t keeping our community safe, easing the cost of living pressures or tackling the housing crisis.
Labor’s warped and misguided priorities have made Australians worse off than just two years ago.
(I couldn’t afford a house two years ago either, and Australia’s housing problems were not created in the past two years – this has been a slow burn since the Howard government, but particularly over the last decade – when the Coalition were in charge).
For the record, here are Bragg’s favourite bits (as taken from his statement. These are his characterisations)
Labor will fail to meet their own housing supply targets by 25%;
Help to Buy is unusable for a first house in every capital city bar Melbourne;
The Housing Australia Future Fund has already cost taxpayers $30m without a single new home being built;
Big super funds will receive tax breaks to construct Build to Rent projects;
Labor’s housing agency has established a six person government and corporate relations team; and
Perhaps worst of all, housing construction is at a 10 year low.
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We don’t usually cover off council meetings in politics live, but it is always good to have a reminder that all politics is local.
Eden Gillespie covered off the Townsville council vote of no confidence in the recently elected mayor Troy Thompson a little earlier this morning. Given the tech issues the live stream had with so many people attempting to log in at once to watch it, our video team have pulled it together for you.
New laws supporting build-to-rent introduced
The assistant treasurer, Stephen Jones, has introduced new tax legislation in the house which is offering incentives for investment in the build-to-rent plan.
Build-to-rent developments are specifically designed to be rented out rather than sold to individual buyers, which the Albanese government says is a model which has been used “successfully overseas to increase housing supply”.
Jim Chalmers and Julie Collins says the incentives will “apply to build-to-rent projects, consisting of 50 or more apartments or dwellings, made available for rent to the general public.”
The dwellings must be retained under single ownership for at least 15 years and a minimum 10% of dwellings in a development need to be made available as affordable tenancies.
The incentives apply to eligible new projects that started construction after the policy’s announcement in last year’s budget (7:30 pm AEST on 9 May 2023).
This legislation will operate separately from state and territory initiatives designed to support the build-to-rent sector.
There has been research looking at build-to-rent programs which has found it may not be the panacea for Australia’s rental crisis, which is also worth noting.
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Sorry about the double-ups
Just a small note – we are aware of an issue where some people might be seeing the same post published twice, with the second post disappearing when you refresh the blog.
The tech gremlins be gremlining.
Just to let you know – we are on it, and hope to have it fixed soon, and apologise in the mean time.
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Argument over questions on notice responses rolls on
Health officials in Senate estimates this morning were asked about whether ministers usually intervene in responses to questions on notice.
To recap, if an official cannot answer a question, or needs to consult with other areas, they are able to take the question “on notice” to answer within the month.
The transparency process has been a point of contention in recent years as the number of questions on notice have soared. In one case, Liberal senator Jane Hume has asked nearly 13,000 questions on notice since May 2022, far surpassing other senators for that period.
Following the release of guidance from the prime minister’s department – the opposition has characterised it as a “secret manual” for dodging accountability – Liberal senator Anne Ruston asked officials whether it was usual practice for ministers to tweak department responses.
Rachel Balmanno, first assistant secretary, said it was usual practice for ministers to suggest alternatives or query department responses.
As has always been the practice, our ministers note the responses we provide, they sometimes ask questions or suggest an alternative way to respond to a question, but we haven’t been discussing the PM&C [prime minister and cabinet’s department] guidance with them. That hasn’t been the nature of the dialogue. It’s been the same as it’s always been.
The finance minister, Katy Gallagher, said she “rarely” intervened in responses but admitted “occasionally” she has. Gallagher said the “sheer volume” of questions on notice is impacting agency work “without a doubt”.
This is unprecedented the approach that the opposition is taking to questions on notice. It devalues them in a sense.
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RBA governor says ‘board will do what they think they do’ on inflation regardless of election campaign season
The timing of the RBA’s next interest rate moves will probably have a bearing on the federal election (according to political pundits) and Liberal senator Dean Smith wanted some assurance from governor Michele Bullock that politics wouldn’t have a bearing on its actions.
You will raise interest rates if necessary during a campaign period, an election campaign period?
Bullock reacted promptly, saying she wouldn’t speculate about elections.
The board will do what they think they need to do on inflation.
The Morrison government’s election prospects weren’t helped by the RBA (led at the time by Bullock’s predecessor, Philip Lowe) starting its interest rate increases in May 2022, right smack in the middle of the federal election.
Despite some economist’s calls that the RBA needs another interest rate hike to ensure inflation continues to retreat towards its 2% to 3% target band, the next move still looks more likely to be a rate cut than an increase.
Indeed, a rate reduction might be the signal the Albanese government will be wanting before it calls an election.
The Coalition remains suspicious that the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, will “stack” the RBA with friendly appointees. It’s refusing to support the creation of a specialised RBA monetary policy board unless the current nine=member board gets appointed to it.
Such a move, though, would rather nullify the point of having more monetary expertise steering rates decisions. No questions for Bullock on that board - yet.
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Coalition target response guidance as manual to avoid questions
The shadow education minister, Sarah Henderson, is grilling education department officials about the guidance the Department of Prime Minister And Cabinet provided about how to answer questions on notice, which the Coalition has characterised as a manual to evade questions.
Henderson asked Marcus Markovic, the department’s deputy secretary and chief operating officer, if he provided misleading answers in February when he said there was no collusion between agencies and his department had “not to [his] knowledge” provided the guidelines to other agencies, such as Teqsa (the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency).
Markovic said that he had a copy of the document which he used to clear the department’s questions on notice. But he denied misleading the Senate committee with his answer that he was not aware if departmental staff had provided it to other agencies:
It was a correct statement, senator.
Labor’s assistant education minister, Anthony Chisholm, said Henderson’s characterisation of the evidence was “completely inaccurate”.
Henderson said the Coalition knew there was “something fishy” when agencies began providing answers in an identical format. She said the government and department’s responses were “a joke”.
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Labor MPs complain protests are having an impact
Labor MPs have been speaking more and more about the protests outside their offices and the impact they say that is having on their ability to serve constituents. The issues Labor MPs have raised that are being protested include Gaza and climate action.
As Paul Karp reports, Anthony Albanese raised it in the party room yesterday:
Chris Bowen spoke about it this morning:
There’s a place for peaceful protest, we respect that. We more than understand it, it’s an important part of Australian democracy. But electorate officers are there to help people who need help from their MP, people who aren’t protesters, people who aren’t engaged in the political process, but need help from their MP on their pension and their Medicare claim, on their immigration claim.
In the case of the prime minister, that has been very, very hard for him and his office to provide because of this action in effectively blockading his office. I mean, people who are - the people of Grayndler deserve to be able to see their MP’s office.
And you can have views about the situation in the Middle east, we’ve called for a ceasefire, we’ve voted in relation to Palestine’s representation in the UN according to our views, etc. That’s been controversial in some elements, in some areas, there are myths out there about Australia selling arms to Israel that are perpetrated by some, but you can have debates about all that - there is absolutely no place for stopping an MP doing their job.
Now, the prime minister’s staff are still working from a different office, but it’s a lot harder to provide that support for constituents. In my case, my office was vandalised, all that achieves is taxpayers’ money to wash the graffiti off the window. I mean, I’m not sure what they’re trying to achieve, so, I think that people who have you know, valid contributions to making the political debate about the future of Middle East should really think about the way they engage and destructive and juvenile attempts to block constituents going to MP’s offices have no place.
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No-confidence motion in Townsville mayor Troy Thompson passes unanimously
Townsville council has passed a unanimous motion of no-confidence in its embattled mayor Troy Thompson.
Councillor Brodie Phillips brought forward the motion on Wednesday morning for the council to;
Resolve that the council does not have confidence in the mayor;
Request the mayor resign from his position;
Remove the mayor as the council’s representatives on all bodies, committees and boards, except when his membership or representation is required by law;
Ensure the operational arm of the council notify all councillors when the mayor meets or seeks to meet with any members of the body; and
Ensure the CEO of the council writes to the CEO of the department of the local government requesting they recommend the minister either suspend the mayor “pending the outcome of relevant investigations into his conduct” or dismiss him if “the information which is publicly available... is sufficient”.
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Greens blast lack of movement on domestic violence support criteria
Going through the late-night estimates hearings, the community affairs estimates hearings spent some time looking over the some of the escaping violence payments the Albanese government has been promoting as part of its domestic and gendered violence policy response.
The Greens’ Larissa Waters, who led the questioning of the social services department, learned there was to be no changes to the eligibility requirements to receive $5,000 in financial support despite 17% of applicants being found to be ineligible and up to half of people who apply not receiving the payment.
Waters:
Restrictive criteria doesn’t help keep women safe, it forces them to stay in unsafe relationships and living situations.
The Department confirmed last night that at least 17% of women seeking the current escaping violence payment are being rejected, but there are no plans to change the criteria.
One of the reasons for ineligibility for the program is a lack of a safety plan to move soon - this is not an inherent skill, it should be standard practice to support women to establish one, not a reason for rejection.
Waters said the eligibility requirements were out of date:
Six women killed by violence this year were allegedly murdered by their sons. Escaping violent homes is not limited to escaping intimate partners, so the payment shouldn’t be either.
Even though it takes an average of seven times before a woman is able to finally leave an abusive relationship, you can’t get the Escaping Violence Payment more than once within a 12 month period.
The department was also unable to provide details about the time women have to wait between first request for payment and actually receiving it.
Waters also said without meaningful funding increases to frontline services, the referral pathways didn’t meet their goals.
What good is it to refer someone to a support service that is already full?
We are still no closer to understanding how many women are turned away from frontline services due to funding constraints, because despite me asking for 2.5 years what’s being done to quantity unmet need, there is not even a timeframe for when a scoping project will complete.
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Troy Thompson removed as chairperson of Townsville council meetings
Townsville’s controversial mayor, Troy Thompson, was a no-show at council chambers on Wednesday morning after news the city’s councillors would bring a no-confidence motion against him.
A unanimous motion was carried on Wednesday morning to remove Thompson as the chairperson of the council meetings.
The deputy mayor, Paul Jacob, was instated as chair of the meeting but then stood aside from the position due to statements by Thompson on social media.
The reason I give is because of the perceived statements by the mayor that I, as a member of the Labor party, or the people in the Labor party, have brought about this situation and called it a witch hunt. So I would like to step down from that position now so I bring it to the councillors to appoint it.
The council then adjourned for a short break as the Townsville city council livestream crashed due to the site being overloaded.
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Bullock says energy rebate unlikely to contribute to inflation
The RBA’s governor, Michele Bullock, is still being peppered with questions about inflation and the budget, this time from (former productivity commission economist) LNP senator Matt Canavan.
Canavan spends a bit of time asking about trimmed mean and other core inflation questions (look up the RBA’s statement on monetary policy if you want to know what they forecast).
He does, though, eventually zero-in on whether the government’s main new initiative (the $300 energy rebate per household) is likely to affect inflation. Bullock rightly highlights the fact the $300 will be spread over four quarterly instalments of $75 (which Canavan doesn’t seem to have twigged on).
She doesn’t think people are “going to go out and spend up big on that”.
“On the margin, I don’t think it’s going to have a big effect,” Bullock said. “It’s not that material.”
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Defence estimates hearing begins
The Defence estimates committee hearing has begun, with the Coalition seeking to prosecute the government’s mixed messages yesterday about opening up the Australian defence force to non-citizen applicants.
Officials have confirmed it applies only to New Zealand citizens from July and then the US, the UK and Canada from January.
There is a lot of talk of “widening the aperture” of eligibility to the ADF.
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Bullock does not give answer on whether May budget was ‘expansionary’
The RBA’s governor, Michele Bullock, has dodged her first question about whether May’s federal budget was “contractionary or expansionary” and hence easing or stoking inflation in the economy.
The Liberal’s Jane Hume was hoping to hear Bullock say the budget was expansionary, saying that it contained $4 of extra spending for every dollar of extra revenue. (Not fact-checked, but it seems on the high side.)
Bullock didn’t give a clear answer since the issue is “not simple”. She named developments in China and elsewhere to say the RBA needed to take a lot into account.
The RBA’s May forecasts get updated in August and will take in the budget’s contribution then.
I think we can expect more questions about inflation and, say, whether the RBA accepts treasury’s (and the treasurer’s) line that energy rebates and other assistance “mechanically” lowers the consumer price index and therefore inflation.
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News Corp chief says no regrets over ‘important’ Higgins case coverage
News Corp’s chief, Michael Miller, says he has no regrets about his media company’s coverage of the Brittany Higgins case. Miller was speaking on ABC Radio ahead of his National Press Club address about AI and the tech giants today.
I think [Higgins] was… an important case where varying views were put out in public and Australians deserve to know all the facts behind the case. As I say, it was one of national interest.
Q: News Corp has been accused of bullying people. There’s been an absolute obsession with Brittany Higgins, for instance. Do you think that’s appropriate? Is that using your social licence appropriately?
Miller: “No, I think that it’s been a very important case which all media have covered in a lot of detail.”
Miller denied News Corp had “weaponised” Higgins’ text messages which had not been heard in court, saying “I refute that”.
I don’t have regrets, no … I think it’s a very difficult and unfortunate period for Australia. I think that that could have been a moment from which we learn a lot more from as a nation.
Miller said phone hacking happened elsewhere in the organisation but had never happened in this country.
That is not a practice that has existed in the Australian market.
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RBA governor fronts estimates
The Reserve Bank’s governor, Michele Bullock, is appearing at Senate estimates this morning, and unsurprisingly the opposition – led by Liberal senator Jane Hume – is stressing the “very weak economy”.
Asked about today’s March quarter national accounts figures (due to land at 11.30am Aest), Bullock said she expects GDP growth “to be quite low”.
The market agrees, with economists tipping 0.2% quarter on quarter growth and an annual pace of 1.2%. (The December quarter posted 0.2% and 1.4% growth, respectively, and both might be revised.)
Bullock (slightly surprisingly) didn’t know the answer the question of how many quarters in a row have had no growth or a retreat in per capita growth. She said, “one or two”, when actually the last quarter of GDP per capita growth was the December quarter of 2022, so today’s numbers should make it five quarters of no growth. (The first of that series, the March quarter of last year, was flat.)
The Australian economy, though, is still on its “narrow path” of slowing without stalling. Inflation is in retreat but “coming down only slowly”.
The next RBA board meeting is on 17-18 June, and for now, markets aren’t expecting the central bank to move its cash rate from 4.35%.
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Liberals unhappy over Labor ‘bargaining chip’ defence committee position
There is a battle going on over the Albanese government proposal to leave open a spot on a new parliamentary defence committee for a crossbencher.
The new committee would join a handful of other permanent committees in the parliament, which – like the parliamentary joint committee on security and intelligence – would have quite a lot of power and influence over legislation (it is rare for the government not to accept recommendations of the intelligence and security committee, although it did happen under the Morrison government).
The Albanese government has one eye on the next election and the very real possibility it will be in minority government – and is leaving open the possibility a crossbencher could join the committee, rather than just have it Liberal-Labor.
The Liberal party is not happy – as Greens senator David Shoebridge notes.
Liberals are trying to stop the Greens from joining a new Defence committee because of policies like
— David Shoebridge (@DavidShoebridge) June 4, 2024
-Be a good global citizen
-Close foreign bases & Pine Gap
-Renegote the US alliance
-End AUKUS
Could you imagine if the ALP/Liberals had to consider these very popular policies! pic.twitter.com/BZGZLHdZC0
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Deepfake porn laws introduced but debate adjourned until next sitting
Mark Dreyfus is now introducing legislation which will criminalise the sharing of deepfake pornography images.
The debate has been adjourned until the next sitting.
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House of Representatives begins session
The bells have rung and prayers have been delivered in the House of Representatives, signalling the start of the sitting session.
There is a bit of legislation to get through today, but the Senate won’t sit until the 24th, so the parliament won’t be passing legislation again until the end of the month (which is normal during the estimates period)
Tony Burke has just announced a reordering of business to get through some legislative business – which could mean the house sits until 10pm tonight. Apparently, at least one member wanted to “know the implications for State Of Origin this evening” but Burke said it is up to members to make up their minds on who speaks.
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Independent senator David Pocock has weighed in on the government’s battle to try and keep documents secret when a minister (or government) leaves office:
Disappointing to see Labor pushing for a right to shred documents when they leave office, despite what they said about the Morrison Govt’s secrecy. Transparency can’t just be something major parties want while in opposition.
The morning estimates hearings are about to kick off.
Community affairs will focus on health today, with the urgent care clinic plan and bulk billing on the agenda
Economics will feature the reserve bank, with Michele Bullock appearing early in the session. It is also National Accounts (GDP) for the March quarter, so it’s a big economics day.
Education and employment is focussed on schools today, with a dash of early childhood education
Foreign affairs, defence and trade has moved on to defence, so you can bet your bottom dollar the ADF, recruitment and morale is all covered (as well as submarines, because you can’t talk defence without talking submarines in this country)
Estimated $2bn of NDIS funding being rorted, integrity chief says
The NDIS continues to be under the spotlight, with more revelations from budget estimates, as AAP reports.
An estimated 5% of the National Disability Insurance Scheme spending – about $2bn – is not being used for genuine needs, the National Disability Insurance Agency’s integrity chief, John Dardo, told a budget estimates hearing on Monday.
Some NDIS providers have allegedly forced participants to give cash to criminals for drugs and encouraged participants to engage in fraud, with revelations tens of thousands was spent on holidays and $73,000 on a new car.
The health minister, Mark Butler, said there were too many dodgy NDIS providers. “It’s incredibly alarming,” he told the Today Show on Wednesday.
This is a terrific scheme that’s providing support to people with disability. But we know there’s simply too much waste, there are too many rorts, there’s certainly too many dodgy providers.
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News Corp chair to front press club
Today’s press club address will be given by the executive chair of News Corp, Michael Miller.
Miller will be talking about “Australia and Global Tech: time for a reset”, which will outline what News Corp sees as the big challenges with social media companies.
Not sure if that is what the questions will focus on though.
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Medibank facing fines after cyber attacks
Medibank could face fines of up to $2.2m over alleged failures to protect the privacy of customers who had their personal information stolen in the 2022 cyber attack on the health insurer.
The Australian information commissioner this week launched proceedings in the federal court this week seeking civil penalties against Medibank. The commissioner alleges that between March 2021, and October 2022, Medibank seriously interfered with the privacy of 9.7 million Australians by failing to take reasonable steps to protect their personal information from misuse and unauthorised access or disclosure in breach of the Privacy Act in the information ending up on the dark web.
The acting Australian information commissioner, Elizabeth Tydd, said:
We allege Medibank failed to take reasonable steps to protect personal information it held given its size, resources, the nature and volume of the sensitive and personal information it handled, and the risk of serious harm for an individual in the case of a breach
We consider Medibank’s conduct resulted in a serious interference with the privacy of a very large number of individuals.
It comes after the Australian Communications and Media Authority (Acma) last month launched court action against Optus over its 2022 data breach.
Both companies are also facing class actions and have been fighting against the class action litigants from obtaining Deloitte and cyber security reports on the nature of the attacks. The full federal court last week refused Optus’s appeal against handing over the report.
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Liberal Hollie Hughes criticises party after losing preselection battle
NSW Liberal senator Hollie Hughes – who proudly defended the Liberal party through almost everything – now has some thoughts on the NSW branch, after she lost the preselection battle for a winnable spot on the NSW Senate ticket to Dr Jessica Collins.
Hughes, who once said:
I don’t think there’s a woman in the Liberal party who wants to be considered a number, to be making up the numbers, to be a quota girl. We certainly see plenty of them in the Labor party. I don’t think it is something that we should go down the path towards.
… now has some thoughts about how the Liberal party treats women, telling Sky News:
It does look like being good at your job as a woman in the New South Wales division is not a good thing.
Hughes said Peter Dutton having to step in to save Melissa McIntosh from a preselection fight was another example of that.
There does seem to be a bit of a pattern.
Hughes said she was “devastated”:
This has been my life for twenty-plus years that I’ve given to the Liberal party so you know, it’d be a lie to say I’m not disappointed, devastated.
Hughes said what has been “most telling” is “the fact people have been so shocked and horrified by this” (This being losing preselection).
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Sussan Ley calls one-day ADF recruitment confusion a ‘national embarrassment’
The deputy Liberal leader, Sussan Ley, is yet to come across a political issue she won’t ramp up to a hyperbolic 11.
This time, it’s the ADF opening up recruitment to foreign nationals mess Matt Keogh created yesterday. Richard Marles and Matt Keogh’s names were on top of a media release yesterday which announced a policy change for recruitment for the ADF.
From 1 July 2024, New Zealand born permanent residents of Australia will be able to apply for the ADF. And from 1 January 2025, Canada, United Kingdom and United States born permanent residents of Australia will be able to apply for the ADF.
There are a couple of other requirements – you can’t have served in a foreign military for at least two years before applying and you have to have lived in Australia as a permanent resident for at least one year and be ready to apply for citizenship (as well as the usual ADF entry requirements and security checks).
All was pretty simple, until Keogh came along and muddied the waters by saying that from 1 January, any permanent resident could apply, not just those from the Five Eye partner nations which were mentioned.
By the end of the day, Keogh and Marles had both “clarified” the position – which was the original position stated in the media release.
Was it messy? Yes, absolutely. But speaking to Sky News, Ley gave it the Sussan Ley treatment:
Australians think deeply about issues to do with defence and Anzac Day.
And it is a national embarrassment, that the Government is now saying permanent residents maybe from some countries, maybe from the Pacific, maybe only from the Five Eyes and actually not explaining this properly.
It’s just one more national embarrassment among many.
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Buy now, pay later laws to be introduced today
Also being introduced into the house today – legislation to regulate buy now, pay later providers like Afterpay.
The minister for financial services, Stephen Jones, will introduce “consumer protection” legislation which will see BNPL operators regulated as consumer credit.
Currently, people applying for a buy now, pay later product do not have to undergo a credit check (like when you apply for a credit card or loan). This legislation will change how people apply for one of the products and will:
amend the Credit Act to require BNPL providers to hold an Australian credit licence;
mean operators will need to comply with existing credit laws, regulated by Asic;
establish a new category of “low-cost credit” under the Credit Act to reflect the lower risk and cost of BNPL compared with other regulated forms of credit
A lot of people on welfare and low incomes use buy now, pay later products to pay for essentials such as groceries, so expect to hear more on this legislative change as the day rolls on.
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Dreyfus clarifies targeting for those who share non-consensual deepfake pornography
Mark Dreyfus said the government was only interested in non-consensual pornography images, which includes the use of celebrities – the most prominent example of recent times being deepfake images of Taylor Swift which were shared millions of times. Dreyfus said not everyone involved in the sharing would be targeted in a case like that, but those involved with the images becoming viral would be:
Prosecuting millions of individuals who would probably be not what the Australian federal police would engage in, but we would look for the originator of the images. Someone who has been directly involved in starting off the viral phenomenon that you mentioned that occurred in the case of Taylor Swift.
The new legislation also applies specifically to people over the age of 18, with the criminal code already including detailed provisions when it comes to the sharing of child abuse material – which includes deepfake images. But teenagers sharing a deepfake image could still be caught up in any prosecutions, Dreyfus said:
Potentially, they are able to be prosecuted. It’s just that they will be treated as a child and we have different processes in the criminal law to deal with children when they are prosecuted.
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Labor to introduce anti-deepfake porn laws today
The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, will introduce legislation in the House of Representatives today which will make it illegal to share deepfake pornography (that’s pornographic images which have been created with digital enhancement or AI, using someone’s image to create pornography).
The legislation is focussed on sharing the images, not creating them. Dreyfus told the Briefing podcast the distinction came down to the commonwealth’s powers:
There’s a limit on the commonwealth’s reach here. We can pass legislation that deals with use of telecommunications providers, which is why we are criminalising the sharing.
We are also taking the opportunity to create an aggravated offence which will increase the penalty for someone who is also the creator of the deepfake sexually explicit material.
And these are very serious penalties that we are going to provide. It’s a maximum of six years for sharing and for the aggravated offence it will be seven years. That’s if you have both created the material and shared it.
But because the commonwealth’s jurisdiction is limited to the activity of sharing, we’ll have to wait perhaps for states to catch up and criminalise the creation activity.
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Australia’s existing submarines won’t get Tomohawk missile upgrades
Australia’s existing Collins-class submarines will not be fitted with Tomahawk cruise missiles as part of work to extend their life before the Aukus submarines come into service.
Before the election, Anthony Albanese pledged to consider ways to boost defence capability in the decades before these submarines are ready, saying Labor would need to “deliver a frank assessment of our capabilities and pipeline on arrival in government”. He told the Lowy Institute in early 2022:
For instance, we will consider whether tomahawk missiles can be fitted to the Collins-class submarines.”
But a statement issued today by the defence industry minister, Pat Conroy, said:
The government has also received advice from Defence, in consultation with the United States, that adding Tomahawk cruise missile capability to the Collins class submarines is not viable and does not represent value for money.
The Virginia class nuclear-powered submarines Australia will receive in the early 2030s will come with the Tomahawk as standard equipment. Tomahawk cruise missiles will also be used by Navy’s Hobart class destroyers and the government has agreed in-principle to fit the Hunter class frigates with Tomahawks, subject to a feasibility study. [end quote]
The government revealed the advice as it announced that HMAS Farncomb would be the first of Australia’s six Collins class submarines to undergo sustainment and capability enhancement under a life-of-type extension program.
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Disability report finds workforce issues ‘entrenched’
A new workforce report released by the peak body for disability, National Disability Services, has found the workforce issues in the sector are now “entrenched” with providers struggling to find and retain staff. Workers are moving from disability care into aged care following the increase in wage in that sector (early child education has recently also been promised an increase for the same reason) with NDS saying the sector is facing a workplace crisis.
NDS’s CEO, Laurie Leigh, said:
NDS agrees with the government that managing the sustainability of the NDIS is critical — the community expects no less. We need fundamental and systemic reform, and that must be accompanied by proper resourcing for sector transformation.
The system is broken. Training, supervision and retaining highly skilled practitioners to provide quality care is essential, but not adequately covered in the current funding model.”
Other findings included:
A continuation of previous workforce trends showing that workforce issues in the disability sector have become entrenched.
The disability sector continues to rely heavily on casual disability support workers, who have a very high turnover.
The biggest variation this year was a in proportion of permanent employees who work full time – with the number of full-time employees growing by 10%, the highest in close to a decade.
Conversely, part-time employment dropped to 70% this year. The increase may be related to the current cost-of-living crisis.
Turnover continued the upward trend growing to 24% this year, while permanent staff turnover jumped to 16%, the highest it has been since this survey began. These figures represent a churn of almost 16,500 individual employees leaving their jobs and over 19,000 new appointments over a one-year period.
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Townsville mayor faces no-confidence vote
Townsville councillors are expected to bring a no-confidence motion against the city’s embattled mayor on Wednesday morning after he made false claims about his military service.
In an interview with A Current Affair last week, the city’s mayor, Troy Thompson, conceded he had not spent five years in the military (as he claimed during his campaign) and blamed “100-plus” concussions and epilepsy on his poor recollection.
He also apologised to veterans and the defence force for embellishing his military service – including claims he spent time with the SAS in Swanbourne and had served at 105 signals and 152 signals.
Thompson’s military service history is now being investigated by the state’s Crime and Corruption Commission and the Office of Independent Assessor.
All 10 councillors signed an open letter last week calling on Thompson to stand aside over issues of transparency. In response, Thompson threatened to dissolve the council and claimed he is the victim of a political witch hunt.
Thompson also addressed the local government minister, Meaghan Scanlon, and said “due process should always take precedence over media play, and not political interference.”
I call on all correspondence from all local, state and ministerial staff to be investigated, and if conflict is found, TCC council is dissolved in its entirety, and all positions compromised should be put up for re-election, the witch hunt should stop until there is a real outcome by the CCC.
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Bluey dollarbucks set for pressing
There is a battle being waged by crossbenchers Andrew Gee and Bob Katter to keep cash alive in Australia. Use of cash has decreased since before the pandemic, but the shutdown moved more people into card and digital transactions only, prompting Gee and Katter to create legislation that will ensure cash remains a legal tender at all Australian businesses.
That legislation hasn’t moved beyond being introduced as yet but they may have received a boost in their mission, with the Royal Australian Mint announcing a limited run of Bluey-themed Australian coins.
From tomorrow (and you’ll only be able to buy one, unless someone spends one and it ends up in the currency) the mint will be releasing the “Dollarbucks” collection featuring the world’s favourite Queenslanders. Three Bluey-themed $1 coins have been produced – you can purchase them from tomorrow through:
EQL ballot
Temporary Mint Coin Shop (Canberra Museum and Gallery location) from 8.30am Thu 6 June 2024
Mint Contact Centre on 1300 652 020 from 8.30am Thu 6 June 2024
From participating authorised distributors
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Good morning
Happy hump day to those who celebrate.
Thank you to Martin for getting us up to date and starting us off this morning – you have Amy Remeikis with you for most of the day now.
It’s a three-coffee morning with maybe a cupcake for breakfast kinda day. Hard to say for sure yet, but the coffee is a must.
Ready? Let’s get into it.
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Labor grants non-NDIS disability schemes a one-year funding lifeline
The federal government has given disability advocacy and support groups a $50m funding lifeline for 12 months to continue offering critical information and support for the wider disability community.
On Wednesday, the NDIS minister, Bill Shorten, and the social services minister, Amanda Rishworth, announced a total of $140.3m would be guaranteed for the Information, Linkages and Capacity Building (ILC) program - a program considered a precursor to a planned wider system of disability services (or “foundational supports”) for those outside of the National Disability Insurance Scheme in the coming years.
It comes as the federal government prepares its response to the NDIS review in the coming months, which recommended the fast-growing $44bn scheme be overhauled to refocus on supporting functional impairment, rather than diagnoses.
Shorten has already expressed his support for the review’s proposal for a five-year plan to build up mainstream disability services outside the NDIS for those who cannot access the scheme.
Of the figure guaranteed for disability organisations in Wednesday’s announcment, $50.3m will offer 130 organisations a one-year extension to continue their work supporting people with disability, and the broader community, to access information and services. The remaining $90m has recently been finalised for the program as part of the ILC’s competitive grant round.
Shorten said:
We’ve awarded funding to these organisations so they can help people with disability and their supporters learn about and confidently advocate for their rights.”
The announcement follows concerns raised by disability community groups about the looming funding drop-off at the end of June.
It’s expected the foundational supports infrastructure will begin from the middle of next year, offering services to those with “less severe” disabilities in an effort to curb the NDIS’s exponential growth. Around 650,000 Australians are currently accessing the scheme but Shorten has warned it cannot continue to grow at a rate of 20% per year.
Last year, national cabinet agreed to an annual growth rate target for the scheme of 8% from 2026.
Some estimates have placed the cost of foundational supports for federal, state and territory governments at around $2bn per year.
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Marles notes foreign nationals joining ADF would eventually need to take citizenship
Richard Marles also said any foreign nationals who joined the ADF would undergo the “same vetting” that Australian citizens. They would need to become Australian citizens within 90 days:
You are not accepted into the Australian Defence Force unless you are able to complete a thorough security check and the same threshold will apply to any of these non-citizens.
Marles said the government believed the offer of ADF membership would be an “attractive offer” to New Zealanders, and also to those from the Pacific, “but there is more work that needs to be engaged in to get to that point”.
Marles added that opening up the military to foreign nationals was “something other countries do”, and it was necessary due to retention and recruitment challenges:
We do need to open up the field of who can serve in the Australian Defence Force … This is a Rubicon that has been crossed by other countries – Britain recruit out of Fiji and out of Nepal, the Gurkhas [of Indian], the US recruit[s] out of Micronesia, the French have the French foreign legion.
Marles clarifies which non-Australians will be able to join ADF
The defence minister, Richard Marles, has said only foreign nationals from New Zealand and the Five Eyes alliance will initially be eligible to join Australia’s defence force, though the government will consider opening the program to the Pacific in future.
The government revealed yesterday that eligible permanent residents from New Zealand, the United Kingdom, the US and Canada could soon sign up to Australia’s defence force, but the defence personnel minister, Matt Keogh, had added said those from “other countries” would also be able to join.
Speaking on ABC 7.30 on Tuesday night, Marles said the government did have “an eye beyond that to the Pacific”, but said the current “slow and considered” pathway was for just New Zealand and the Five Eyes countries.
Asked if the government was also opening the program to other permanent residents, Marles said:
That not on the agenda and is not happening.
There are all sorts of scare campaigns going but other than that. This is New Zealand, Five Eyes [countries] and we have a more medium term, a view to the Pacific.
Keogh’s comments prompted criticism from the Coalition that the policy was “half-baked”, with questions about whether people from China or Russia may be eligible.
Pressed if Keogh had misspoken on Tuesday, Marles said only that the government’s position was “crystal-clear … I’ve just articulated it and Minister Keogh did this afternoon as well”.
The Coalition’s spokesperson, Andrew Hastie, lambasted the plan on Tuesday, but Marles noted he supported opening up the ADF to foreign nationals in the past.
‘Short-sighted’ international student crackdown risks jobs, uni spokesperson says
The tertiary sector could lose 4,500 jobs as a result of an ongoing crackdown on international education, the CEO for Universities Australia will warn.
Speaking at the ITEC24 Higher Education Symposium on Wednesday, Luke Sheehy is expected to slam the federal government’s approach to international education as “policy chaos”, starting with last year’s rollout of stricter visa processing arrangements, according to notes released in advance.
Framed as measures to shore up the sector’s integrity, we now have every reason to believe these changes were a cap by stealth on international students. And it has only gotten worse ... seldom has another major export industry been treated as a political plaything in the way international education is right now. This bipartisan attack on international students is short-sighted and politically expedient.
Sheehy will forecast a collective shortfall of more than $500m in 2024 due to slower visa processing times and high cancellations, lamenting the sector’s dependence on international students as “the cards we’ve been dealt with through more than a decade of successive and consistent changes to policy and funding settings”.
Inevitably, this will lead to cuts. Cuts to infrastructure ... cuts to research and development funding ... a funding shortfall of $500m could claim as many as 4,500 jobs across the sector.
Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our rolling news coverage. I’m Martin Farrer and here are some of the best overnight stories to keep you going until my colleague Amy Remeikis gets into the main action.
The prime minister is hoping to use the offer of a seat on a powerful new defence committee as leverage with independents in future crossbench negotiations. Our top story explains how Anthony Albanese has left room to appoint an independent to a new defence committee which will scrutinise defence strategy, funding, procurement and operations.
Two top Australian universities have risen up the global rankings with the University of Melbourne reaching a historic high of 13th in the world, up from 14th last year. The University of Sydney rose one place to 18th and the University of New South Wales remained at 19th in the QS world university rankings, run by the global higher education specialist Quacquarelli Symonds.
Meanwhile, a senior university leader says the government’s international student cap is driven by polling numbers rather than economic benefits. Universities Australia’s chief executive, Luke Sheehy, will deliver a damning speech outlining why the Albanese government’s plan to reduce international student numbers will hinder rather than strengthen the nation. More coming up.
The federal government is fighting for the right to destroy documents when it loses office after a judge warned the practice of shredding paperwork to keep it from incoming opponents is possibly criminal and must stop. The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, is appealing a federal court ruling in a freedom of information case that a minister must preserve a predecessor’s documents if an FOI access application remains unresolved when the minister leaves office. It found this applies whether the job changes hands through an internal ministerial reshuffle or an election.
And the defence minister, Richard Marles, has clarified which foreign nationals will be eligible to join Australia’s defence forces, after another minister, Matt Keogh, seemed to imply it was broader than had been announced. More on that soon.
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