THE LOUDEST VOICE
Katherine Deves will nominate for the Liberals’ NSW Senate seat vacated by the late Jim Molan. It’s just one year since Deves doubled down on her views after tweets surfaced where she called trans children “surgically mutilated and sterilised”. Deves said her decision to nominate was bolstered by World Athletics’ decision to bar trans women from the women’s category, as The Guardian reported. Could she win preselection? Moderate NSW Liberal Party president Maria Kovacic is the favourite, but Deves reckons a conservative should replace a conservative (Molan). She also told The Australian ($) she would oppose the Voice to Parliament if she won, despite supporting “Indigenous voices, particularly grassroots voices”. Her issue is “a group right in the constitution”.
Meanwhile Country Liberal Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price says foster parents have told her NT’s child protection agency is putting kids back in abusive homes, Guardian Australia reports, and called for a royal commission into sexual abuse of Indigenous children. But NT Police Minister Kate Worden says that isn’t happening, news.com.au says, and added neither Price nor Opposition Leader Peter Dutton had approached police with their allegations. It’s “classic, drop-a-bomb-walk-away” politicking, Worden says. The peak body for the care of Indigenous kids agreed with Worden, the ABC reports, saying the issue was being used as a “political football”. OK, so what do the stats say? The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare says about a third of the 102 reported cases of child sexual exploitation in the NT in 2021-22 were substantiated. That’s not to say it’s not happening and just going unreported, however.
DRONING ON
The Australian Defence Force (ADF) is using Chinese drones from a company blacklisted by the US, The Australian ($) reports. DJI drones are being used mainly for training, the paper says, but six months ago the Pentagon banned the company over worries it was linked to the People’s Liberation Army. Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles says there’ll be an audit of the entire supply chain, though didn’t name DJI specifically. It comes as Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong will speak to the National Press Club today, though it’s hard to find a top line for you folks — a lot of vague broad strokes about our regional advancement and keeping the peace, as Guardian Australia reports. Wong indicated all this chatter about superpowers can mean countries don’t shine in their own right, which is nice.
Over the weekend a Bondi man named Alexander Csergo, 55, was charged with selling Australian defence, economic and national security secrets to two foreign spies working for the People’s Republic of China, The Australian ($) reports. The cops alleged a person who claimed to be from a think tank approached Csergo on social media, who met with them in Shanghai and elsewhere. It’s just the second time a person in Australia has faced a foreign interference charge since the legislation was introduced in 2018. Meanwhile we’re about to host the largest-ever military operation that will see 30,000 military personnel across Queensland, Western Australia, the Northern Territory and NSW, with “large-scale logistics, multi-domain firepower demonstrations, land combat, amphibious landings and air operations”, Perth Now reports. Marles says it’ll be a “practical demonstration” of Australia’s alliance with the US.
CLOSE QUARTERS
SA Deputy Premier Susan Close and her companion, Department of Industry, Innovation and Science chief executive Adam Reid, had a pretty fancy jaunt to Europe in September last year, The Advertiser ($) reports. Reid’s “multi-night” stays in Glasgow, London, Paris and Oslo included two five-star hotels, with his bill coming in at $6400 for accommodation, credit card expenses showed. Close’s entire European jaunt cost taxpayers $44,729, including some business class flights, the paper adds, though the final line grudgingly admits she attended “28 meetings, signed two research exchange agreements and attended an international space conference”. It wasn’t good enough for Colton Liberal MP Matt Cowdrey, who reckons Close is “notorious for being the laziest government minister”.
Meanwhile NSW Liberal MP Taylor Martin says he suffered “permanent damage” to his lungs from the air quality inside the 200-year-old state parliament building, the SMH ($) reports. He says the air-con was linked to a greenhouse that carried mould and bacteria into chambers. Parliament is getting a facelift at the moment, but the bill has blown out from $22 million to $90 million (over three years). It comes as ICAC raided the homes of past and present NSW Liberal Party members, the AFR ($) reports, thought to be linked to Liberal MP Ray Williams’ allegations — you may remember him claiming senior party members were paid big money to install new councillors into the Hills Shire Council who would “be friendly”, as the paper put it, to a Sydney developer. The paper didn’t name names.
ON A LIGHTER NOTE
Folks, do you know Robert “Bob” Peterson, a gentleman in his late 70s who drove a taxi and lived in Mount Druitt? A Sydney family named the Kabas are trying to track him down to thank him for a heroically kind gesture that has become their treasured family lore. Ish Kaba knows the story by heart, he tells the ABC. It’s 1969 and his mum, Muzeyyen, and dad, Huseyin, had just moved to Sydney, staying at the Villawood Migrant Hostel as it was known then. A heavily pregnant Muzeyyen woke up on the morning of June 11, and just knew today was the day. The woman looking after her as her contractions intensified was like, relax, you’ve got plenty of time. Hearing this, Huseyin started dutifully dressing for work, to which Muzeyyen basically said, have you gone completely bonkers?! “I’m having a baby and you go to work!” she hollered at him. (Men, am I right?) So the pair bundled into a taxi and told the driver, Bob, to take them straight to Fairfield Hospital.
But Muzeyyan couldn’t wait a second longer and out sprang little Ish in the back seat, screaming to the high heavens. Bob, no doubt completely freaked out by the commotion and driving as quickly as possible, ran a red light. A cop noticed, pulling them over before promptly jumping back into his cop car and escorting the taxi straight to the hospital. Once his wife and new son were safely inside, Huseyin tried to pay the cabbie for the ride and for the cleaning, but Bob wouldn’t accept it. He revealed that he too had been born in a cab 26 years ago, and he was just glad mum and bub were doing well this time, because Bob’s mum hadn’t made it. Muzeyyen tears up, even now, thinking of the story. Bob was a “beautiful man”, she says, adding she’d love to thank him personally. It would be wonderful, Ish said, even if they found Bob’s family, to share the story of his generosity in that tough moment.
Hoping you believe in the good in the world today.
SAY WHAT?
You know what I say to you? You know what I say to you? Small penis, small penis.
Lidia Thorpe
The independent senator returned serve to a group of men who confronted her about her views on Indigenous rights outside a strip club in Melbourne, with one calling her a “racist dog” while another asked how Thorpe was elected to Parliament.
CRIKEY RECAP
Forget Dutton, Alice Springs locals say Jacinta Nampijinpa Price is the real problem
“Flanked by Country Liberal Party Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton put boots on the ground in Alice Springs this week to declare the town crime-ridden, unsafe and ripe for an immediate federal law-and-order response.
“His comments stirred angry backlash, but Arrernte traditional owner and CEO of Lhere Artepe Graeme Smith points to Price, not Dutton, as the real problem for the town. Price, a former Alice Springs councillor and deputy mayor, is a Warlpiri/Celtic woman from Yuendumu country, about 290km north-west of Alice Springs. Smith says this gives her no right to be talking for or about talking for or about the Arrernte people of Mparntwe, Alice Springs.”
Pentagon leak mentions Australian information, as US scrambles to assess damage
“A leak of top-secret US documents could have the potential to do serious damage to intelligence-sharing relationships with Australia and other allies, an expert tells Crikey. The alleged culprit behind the Pentagon leak was arrested overnight in Massachusetts by an armed group of federal agents.
“Footage from the arrest shows the man, identified in US media as 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard Jack Teixeira, being apprehended wearing shorts and a T-shirt. Teixeira allegedly shared pictures of printed-out documents in a private chatroom on the gaming platform Discord over the past few months.”
Christian Lives Matter goes dark as group members defend attack on LGBTQIA+ protesters
“The Christian Lives Matter group has disappeared from the public, as the group’s members continue to privately support men arrested for attacking LGBTQIA+ protesters. Following three men being arrested for charges relating to an attack on Community Action for Rainbow Rights activists protesting a Mark Latham event, the leaders of Christian Lives Matters have retreated from public view.
“The group’s Instagram account has been deactivated and its Facebook page has deleted all of its posts from this year. The accounts, run by leader Charlie Bakhos, had tens of thousands of followers and frequently amplified attacks on LGBTQIA+ people and groups. Other than participating in the Day of the Unborn Child mass prayer and protest, Christian Lives Matter has been publicly dormant. But behind the scenes …”
READ ALL ABOUT IT
‘An Easter exchange’: 130 Ukrainian prisoners of war freed (Al Jazeera)
Former Indian lawmaker slain live on TV while in police custody (Reuters)
Spanish PM apologises for loophole in new sexual consent law (The Guardian)
[Japan’s Prime Minister] Fumio Kishida vows G7 security boost after smoke bomb (BBC)
Poland and Hungary ban Ukrainian grain amid glut from neighbour (CNN)
Climate activists in Germany rejoice at wind-down of the last nuclear plants (EuroNews)
THE COMMENTARIAT
‘Activist’ Bureau of Meteorology fuels climate politics — Maurice Newman (The Australian) ($): “Today the bureau has become an activist, simultaneously publishing reports and giving media interviews claiming a temperature increase of 1.5C would devastate the planet. Meanwhile, the bureau’s chief executive, Andrew Johnson, maintains the ‘integrity of its records is at its core’, a claim that has as much credibility as ‘there is no bias at the ABC’. But why the secrecy? The bureau claims it has more important things to do than to provide data. But surely its methodology is not commercial-in-confidence? Indeed taxpayers, who pay more than a million a day for this agency, have a right to know.
“The integrity of historical temperature data has a direct bearing on government policy and people’s budgets … The bureau is in denial. But analysis of the released data shows that across the three-year period, probes returned temperatures higher than the mercury thermometers placed alongside them 41% of the time. Once again, the bureau’s credibility and, indeed, its integrity are in tatters. Any claims it now makes about unprecedented climate events must be treated with utmost suspicion.”
Why DeSantis has to run — Ross Douthat (The New York Times) ($): “A great many successful political careers never have that path open at all. A minority have it open in the narrowest way, where you can imagine threading needles and rolling lucky sixes all the way to the White House. Only a tiny number are confronted with a situation where they seem to have a strong chance, not just a long-shot possibility, before they even announce their candidacy. That’s where DeSantis sits right now. The political betting site PredictIt places his odds of being president in 2024, expressed as a share price, at 23 cents, slightly below Trump and well below Biden, but far above everybody else.
“Those odds, representing a roughly 20% chance at the White House, sound about right to me. If you look at national polls since Trump’s indictment, DeSantis’ support has dipped only slightly; if you look at polls of early primary states he’s clearly within striking distance, Trump has a floor of support but also a lot of voters who aren’t eager to rally to him (his indictment may have solidified support, but it didn’t make his numbers soar) and DeSantis has not yet even begun to campaign. He’s in a much better position than any of Trump’s rivals ever were in 2016, and you could argue that he starts out closer to the nomination than any Republican candidate did in 2008 or 2012.”
HOLD THE FRONT PAGE
WHAT’S ON TODAY
Yuggera and Turrbal Country (also known as Brisbane)
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i2i Global’s Darren Godwell, as well as UQ’s Matt McDonald and Marianne Hanson, will speak about the Albanese government’s foreign policy, in an event at the uni.
Ngunnawal Country (also known as Canberra)
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Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong will speak to the National Press Club.
