Night time politics
That is your lot for the evening. As we sign off, the prime minister is launching a book for the Menzies Research Centre.
- Today, the Coalition dumped a large omnibus, which contains old zombie savings measures reaching back to the Abbott 2014 budget, and newer measures, rolled up into the childcare package which puts a range of childcare subsidies into one single means-tested payment.
- Labor has managed to get a senate committee up to look into the establishment of a national integrity commission a.k.a. a federal corruption commission.
- Cory Bernardi continued to come under attack for from his old party. Late today, Craig Laundy suggested that by taking the Liberal senate spot and then defecting, Bernardi would be able to build his party on the taxpayer. His salary and staff (including extra staff for being a crossbencher) would cost the taxpayer more than $5m, Laundy estimated.
- Greens senator Nick McKim said the parliament should have the power to decide visas for visiting foreign leaders - the Trump Clause.
- The senate referred Centrelink’s controversial debt recovery system to an inquiry, which the Greens promised would be “uncomfortable” for the government. The Community and Public Sector Union said that Centrelink staff would be using the inquiry to show the dysfunction of the debt recovery system and their department more broadly.
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In a torrid question time, Malcolm Turnbull’s MPs rallied around him after he gave a withering speech calling Bill Shorten the biggest social climbing sycophant of all time. It nearly brought Barnaby Joyce undone, such was his delight. He riffed off his old line, the politics of envy after Shorten called him Mr Harbourside mansion. Turnbull generally painted a picture of Shorten dissing wealthy people while “sucking up” to them. Labor’s Jenny Macklin described it as an angry rant. Defending the speech, Liberal MP Craig Laundy described Bill Shorten as a “private school boy from Melbourne” and said he should be called out (for pretending to be otherwise). Labor’s Joel Fitzgibbon said it was unnecessarily personal. Tell us what you think below.
Thanks to the brains trust for the assistance through the day and thanks to Mike Bowers who has captured the doings.
Whatever you think of Turnbull’s speech, there is no doubting who won the day in the mind of Malcolm.
From the magic lens of Bowers.
Goodnight.
Updated
Senate committee to consider a federal corruption commission
There has been years of discussion and a previous half-completed inquiry but Labor has succeeded in establishing a select committee to inquire into the possibility of a national integrity commission.
At the end of the day, it only means that the senate will canvass the pros and cons and make recommendations. But at least the conversation is open again.
.@JacquiLambie's office says Senator is likely to oppose welfare changes - including 4-week dole waiting period and Newstart age increase
— Shalailah Medhora (@shalailah) February 8, 2017
Our Shalailah reports:
David Leyonhjelm is the only crossbencher to so far unreservedly throw his support behind the youth-specific welfare measures.
— Shalailah Medhora (@shalailah) February 8, 2017
Jacqui Lambie is now moving her motion in the Senate for a criminal code amendment to ban full face coverings in public places.
Updated
PM Malcolm Turnbull & LOTO Bill Shorten pass each other at the end of #QT @gabriellechan @GuardianAus @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/hRsTW0TqHl
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) February 8, 2017
The chamber has just voted down the Shorten motion and question time is over.
That was quite some speech by Turnbull who found his inner mongrel. As he continued speaking, the backbench woke up, slapped their knees and roared.
Barnaby Joyce enjoyed the speech so much he nearly burst a valve. Speaker Smith had to warn him as Jenny Macklin followed. Macklin reminded the house that this motion was about cuts to families and household budget.
Updated
Malcolm Turnbull is on a roll. He is contrasting Shorten’s previous statements in support of cuts to company tax rates and the benefits it would have for the economy.
I reckon Dick [Pratt] probably broke out an extra bottle of Cristal for that. They would have been pleased to hear that. They would say, “He is not like some of those other Labor people. He is really one of us”. He is really on side. Really on side. But now, of course, now, of course, he is a wholly owned subsidiary of left wing unions. He has shifted and he will say whatever suits his purpose from day to day. No consistency, no integrity. This sycophant, blowing hard in the house of representatives, sucking hard in the living rooms of Melbourne. What a hypocrite.
In answer to the Shorten motion, Malcolm Turnbull fires up.
He calls Shorten the greatest sycophant of all times.
When he was a regular dinner guest at Raheen, with Dick Pratt, did he knock back the crystal? I don’t think so, there was never a union leader in Melbourne that tucked his knees under more billionaires’ tables than the leader of the opposition. He lapped it up, yes, he lapped it up. He was such a sycophant, a social-climbing sycophant, if ever there was one.
There has never been a more sycophantic leader of the Labor party than this one and he comes here and poses as a tribute of the people. He likes harbourside mansions. He is yearning for one, he is yearning to get into Kirribilli House. Because somebody else pays for it.
Updated
That moment when Malcolm Turnbull congratulates the Queen.
Updated
Shorten’s motion contrasts the cuts to pensions and welfares with corporate tax cuts and protection of banks.
Mr Harbourside Mansion is attacking the standard of living of Australian families. The story of the cuts today is that the prime minister is taking $2.7bn from Australian families and yet he proposes giving several billion to big banks in tax give aways. This prime minister is seriously the most out-of-touch personality to ever hold this great office of prime minister. Tough on pensioners and soft on banks, tax cuts for millionaires and payment cuts for Australian families. This is another version of the Liberal-National version of robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Updated
Shorten to Turnbull: How can anyone have confidence in a government which is hopelessly divided, which punishes pensioners, which punishes families, and is only interested in talking about itself and giving a $50bn tax cut to large business?
Turnbull begins, is interrupted and then Shorten moves to suspend proceedings to discuss the general shortcomings of the Turnbull government.
Updated
Josh Frydenberg gets a government question on energy affordability. He says Shorten’s old union opposes Labor’s rush away from coal.
Jim Chalmers to Malcolm Turnbull: He says a father, veteran and a full time carer to his son who lost his legs to meningococcal was sent a bill by Centrelink and was paying $15 a fortnight out of his carer payment while the case was being reviewed. He will lose hundreds of dollars from the cuts. Why is the prime minister hurting vulnerable Australians like Athol but sticking up for big business and the banks?
Turnbull asks him to pass on the details of the case to the human services minister and underlines that in other cases, it has been a case of human error. The government, he says, is simply trying to make the system fair.
Updated
Christopher Pyne informs the house that the ship build is on time. Which gives him a chance to inform the house the ship build requires a standalone power supply because “we cannot rely on the power supply in South Australia not to go out”. Renewables target is to blame, he says.
Updated
Linda Burney to human services minister Alan Tudge: during question time, both the prime minister and the minister promised that that the minister would investigate the case of Ann Foley, a 67-year-old pensioner who had her pension cut off after receiving a Centrelink notice for $76 when she owed nothing. Now he has had a chance to investigate, will he acknowledge any fault in causing Ann such stress and anxiety.
Tudge says her case was taken up manually (as opposed to by the Robocop) and the Centrelink officer made two mistakes when entering details while on the phone to Ms Foley.
Unfortunately, human errors do occur from time to time … it has nothing to do with the computer system.
Updated
A dixer to Barnaby Joyce, which purports to be about agriculture policy but it morphs into power prices.
Jenny Macklin to Christian Porter: Kelly Manning is a mum with four children living in Melbourne and has just completed six months of chemotherapy. She will be more than $1,000 a year worse off because of the prime minister’s cuts into family tax benefits which were introduced in the the parliament today. Is the prime minister so out of touch he is congratulating himself on a policy which will help vulnerable families like Kelly’s?
Porter says:
The government has made no secrets of the fact that we consider the end-of-year supplements in family tax benefits should be saved and repurposed and reinvested in a plan to ensure better utilisation of childcare.
One thing that can be said is that members opposite have made a secret of that fact.
Their memories are so unbelievably short that they don’t recall that not that long ago in the first omnibus savings bill they agreed with the government to close down the end-of-year savings and tax benefits for 374 families.
Before the election, they told those families they would not do that. But they agreed with the government that that end-of-year supplement should be closed down for those families so that it would be repurposed.
Updated
Katharine Murphy reports from the stalls: Kevin Andrews has not looked up from that book at any stage of question time. Not for the PM. Not for Christian Porter. He has a highlighter out. It’s serious business.
Indi indie Cathy McGowan asks Barnaby Joyce about Centrelink and the access for dairy farmers. “I asked about delays for them in accessing household support. You delegated Minister McKenzie. My question today, when will you release the report by Senator McKenzie about the meeting and what action will the government take about extra resources to Centrelink in terms of clearing the backlog. In asking this question, I understand the government plans to introduce legislation to the house tomorrow about access and water access, which we acknowledge is great.”
Joyce says he doesn’t know when the report will be released but has no reason to withhold it.
He says the government will introduce legislation tomorrow to further streamline the farm household allowance so people can get access to the program.
There are 495 Victorian dairy farmers on farm household allowance as of 3 February 2017.
Updated
Kevin Andrews is trolling you.
Kevin Andrews gets some quality Trump time during #QT @gabriellechan @murpharoo @GuardianAus #politicslive pic.twitter.com/uCmPI5RIHR
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) February 8, 2017
Shorten to Turnbull: How can the prime minister justify ripping family payments out of the pockets of over 1 million Australian families and at the same time propose $50bn in a tax giveaway to big business?
Turnbull says the government has a duty to target welfare to those who need it most.
You would think, given that these reforms will benefit lower and lower middle and income families the most. You would think that given the way they are targeted, so equitably, so fairly that the opposition would support it. But of course, Mr Speaker, they do not.
Updated
Duelling cameos. Social services minister Christian Porter has his own cameo for the childcare changes.
A single parent family with an income of $50,000, with two children in long daycare for two days, which costs $100 a day, will be $1400 better off under the reforms that we announced. That same family, if they were using family day care three days will be $2500 better off.
So the government will be pushing the childcare package and Labor will be pushing the cuts to family tax benefits.
Shorten to Turnbull: When will the prime minister admit that over one million Australian families will have their family payments cut because of the legislation the government introduced today. How can the Prime Minister stand there and pat himself on the back for attacking the living standards of over a million Australian families?
Turnbull goes through the childcare changes but does not speak to the cuts to family tax benefits.
Labor’s analysis says 1.1m families will lose FTB-A supplements of $726 per child which means with the government’s compromise of a $20 a fortnight increase, they will still be $200 worse off. Labor claims half are sole parents and 500,000 of those families are on the maximum rate, which means their family income is below $52,000.
A dixer to Turnbull allows him to talk about childcare reform and affordable energy.
All of the governments’ messages are around household budgets at the mo.
Bill Shorten to Turnbull: Exactly how many Australian families will be worse off because of the prime minister’s cuts to family payments introduced into the parliament today?
Turnbull relates a comment from a mother to him at the childcare centre he visited this morning.
As the mother said to me at the creche this morning, it will enable us to stay in full-time work. One mother said, “This will enable me to work another day. She said to me as I walked out of the childcare centre, “when is it going to start?”
I said, “That will depend on the Senate and the Labor party” and she said, “I hope they support it”.
Updated
Tony Abbott is pretty happy with Malcolm’s tribute to the Queen. Chuckles a plenty. One Labor wag shouts: “Did you write this Tony.”
The prime minister is not amused.
Malcolm Turnbull is congratulating the Queen on her sapphire jubilee, 65 years on the throne.
The vast majority of Australians have known no other head of state. She is so revered and respected here that few of us can say that we are not Elizabethans.
General tittering at the republican declaring his love.
Shorten follows but adds,
As colonies become countries and as the commonwealth of nations have evolved and matured, the Queen has greeted each change with grace. I have every confidence that she will show the same respect and the same generosity when Australia becomes a republic.
Christopher Pyne lectures Labor on their lack of decorum (laughing at Turnbull while he was talking about the Queen).
They yell about being republicans. Pyne says he is too but you need to be respectful.
Updated
Meanwhile in Perth, Nationals leader Brendon Grylls has learned something interesting following a debate with Reg Howard-Smith of the Chamber of Minerals and Energy of Western Australia, the peak resources sector representative body in Western Australia.
.@CMEWA tells @abcperth they've spent about $2 million on all those anti-mining tax ads. Brendon Grylls argues his mining tax is fair
— Julie-anne Sprague (@JASprague) February 8, 2017
Grylls is trying to reform out-of-date State Agreements by “increasing the 25 cent per tonne Special Lease Rental to $5 per tonne to reflect the modern economy we live and work in.”
He is facing strong resistance from the mining industry in the resources state in the state election campaign.
@gabriellechan 🍦Good afternoon🍦 Having reviewed the govt's Omnizombie efforts, the urge to Omnicuss is overwhelming. 👺 pic.twitter.com/jahqcJUQN9
— The Matt Hatter (@MattGlassDarkly) February 8, 2017
Question time coming up people. Grab a hot beverage.
Lunchtime politics
- Politicians of all shades are combing through the government’s omnibus bill, which combines childcare subsidy changes with budget cuts to various welfare measures. Some of these cuts are left over from the 2014 Abbott budget.
- The Nationals MP David Gillespie is facing questions about his eligibility to sit over his ownership of a shopping centre that has a tenant who is an Australia Post licensee. Gillespie has told Fairfax he has no leases or deals with Australia Post, as a government owned corporation.
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Labor will today push for a Senate inquiry into the establishment of a federal integrity commission or Icac.
Updated
The Greens and Labor are piling pressure on to Nick Xenophon not to support the omnibus bill, because of the cuts to various programs. Greens senator Rachel Siewert:
If Nick Xenophon has negotiated this bill I have to ask if he is aware of the full impacts and hidden nasties in the complex legislation? Is he trying to keep young people off income support? Is he supporting cuts to family tax benefits particularly for low-income families?
On top of all this, the government is claiming those on FTB A will get an increase to their payment – that is not true. If you would have received the full FTB A supplement, you lose out on $8 a fortnight.
Updated
Down the hall, Adam Gartrell at Fairfax is reporting:
In circumstances that echo the Bob Day case currently before the high court, experts believe assistant health minister David Gillespie could have an indirect financial interest in the commonwealth – grounds for removal from federal office under section 44(v) of the constitution.
Gillespie owns a small suburban shopping complex at Lighthouse Beach in Port Macquarie, on the NSW north coast. One of the shops is an outlet of Australia Post – a government-owned corporation.
The Nationals MP says he and his wife, through their company Goldenboot, lease the space to a local woman who is an Australia Post licensee – meaning he has no direct financial link to the postal service.
“I have no leases or deals with Australia Post,” Gillespie told Fairfax Media.
Given Day’s case is currently running, a lot hinges on how the high court judgement falls. Constitutional experts George Williams and Anne Twomey say the outcome will be critical.
Paul Karp, who covered the Day case, tells me the judgment is expected in between four and eight weeks.
Updated
I see from the thread that more than a few of you have taken issue with Paul Kelly’s column discussed earlier. Andrew Bolt is also taking issue with it, throwing it back at Kelly.
But let’s start with one corrective and one inconvenient historical fact.
The grandest hoax of our time is in fact the claim – pumped out by the likes of Paul Kelly – that manmade global warming is a catastrophic threat that demands painful sacrifices from voters, by hook or by crook.
The hectoring and lecturing and lying and hypocrisy that the political class then indulge in to spread this catastrophism – and promote their totally useless job-killing sacrifices – are in fact one of the many reasons that so many voters no longer trust them.
Bolt takes issue with Kelly on defining Bernardi, Hanson and Trump as populist.
For a start, “populist” is a curse-word used far too readily by Kelly and his like. Too often they say “populist” when they actually mean “popular” – as in something demanded by or approved of by many people. But isn’t doing what the public wants the very essence of democracy?
And it is not conservatives destroying the Liberal party, but the Left.
But in this case the truth is obvious: conservatives are not destroying the Liberals. The Liberals are instead being destroyed by the Left, into whose hands the party has fallen.
Updated
If Donald Trump was a rapper, who would he be?
The Greens want to give parliament the power to cancel visas for foreign leaders.
Let’s call it the Trump clause. Greens senator Nick McKim said if Trump were a rapper promoting sexism and racism, he would not be allowed in the country.
“Parliament is sovereign in this country,” McKim told the Australian.
Consistent with our position that parliament should have the final say on Australia going to war, we believe that parliament should have the right to refuse entry to, or deport, foreign leaders on the basis of their character.
Liberal senator Zed Seslja says McKim is indulging in a juvenile politics.
He said Trump would be welcome.
Updated
Labor’s Jenny Macklin has been combing through the omnibus and has characterised it thus:
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Cuts to family tax benefits – cuts that will leave a typical family on $75,000 around $1,000 a year worse off. More than one million Australian families will be worse off.
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Cuts to paid parental leave –70,000 new mums will still be worse off.
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Scrapping the energy supplement – a $1bn cut to pensioners, people with disability, carers and Newstart recipients.
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Cuts to young people between the ages of 22 and 24 by pushing them onto the lower Youth Allowance – a cut of around $48 a week or almost $2,500 a year.
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Scrapping the pensioner education supplement and education entry payment.
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Cutting the pension to migrant pensioners who spend more than six weeks overseas.
Updated
The revised childcare package – the OMNICUSS – is sending parliamentarians to their bunkers to try and determine who wins and who loses. Various figures are floating around the parliament at the present time, because the obvious question cross benchers ask when being presented with a big complicated package is who wins, and who loses.
They consider the net effect of the changes before saying yes or no.
I’m on the hunt for net effects, and will share whatever I can find courtesy of a quick corridor prowl.
Right now I can share this material on the paid parental leave part of the package.
In essence the government is extending the taxpayer funded PPL scheme from 18 to 20 weeks, but it is restricting access to the payment for some families.
What this looks like in practice is the revised payment will reach 97,000 (or 57% of families) on a median income of $42,000. The average gain for this group is $1,300.
- 1,000 families (with median incomes of $50,000) will not be impacted.
Now, the losers.
- 68,000 families will still get a partial PPL payment from the government – this group, with a median income of $62,000, will suffer an average loss of $5,600.
- 4,000 families (with median incomes of $67,000) won’t get government PPL at all – and their average loss is $12,106.80.
As they say in our business, more to come.
Updated
The Greens’ Rachel Siewart is speaking on the omnibus bill. She made the point that the zombie cuts are still contained in the bill, including the wait for the dole for young people and the cuts to pensions once people travel more than six weeks overseas.
The Greens do not appear likely to support the bill. While Labor has yet to telegraph its approach, if I was a betting woman I would bet no. Which takes the government back to the crossbench, the Xenophones and Hanson.
Updated
Point Piper: A sinkhole has opened up near the Prime Minister's personal home on Wentworth Street. #PointPiper #7News pic.twitter.com/j60JWfjXpJ
— 7 News Sydney (@7NewsSydney) February 7, 2017
I, as a mother, had to look after my kids.
At her doorstop, Pauline Hanson said the $700 a year per child supplement “needs to be reined back”.
“It is a lot of money to be handing out … When I was rearing my children we got $8 a week,” she said. “There was no childcare – I, as mother, had to look after my kids.”
“I know circumstances have changed, but … I believe in giving them a helping hand when you need a helping hand.”
The One Nation leader said Australia was about to hit $500bn in debt and had to rein in welfare payments, which would hit $191bn by 2019-20, or the system would not be sustainable.
So while Hanson seems supportive of supplement cut, her position remains unclear on the childcare reforms as a whole.
Updated
Stella has been wading through the Omnicuss bill.
@gabriellechan Well I've waded through most of it. Mostly minor alterations. Still worrying three step activity test for access to payments.
— Stella Orbit (@stellaorbit) February 8, 2017
Updated
It is only Wednesday but things are getting a little loose around here.
Updated
Back to Australia Post and its pay office.
Overnight we discovered the chief executive, Ahmed Fahour, was paid $4.4m and bonus of $1.2m in 2016. Five more executives earned between $1.8m and $1.3m.
The Liberal senator James Paterson was the chair of the committee that got this information out of Australia Post.
The organisation originally objected to releasing the numbers to the committee on the grounds that it could damage the commercial prospects of Australia Post.
Paterson said the committee was not convinced by that argument given it used to publish salaries in the annual report but stopped.
Malcolm Turnbull, who was communications minister with responsibility for Australia Post in a previous life, has called Fahour to tell him his salary is too high.
But Paterson has said the government cannot do much, because the salary is set by the board. The government does appoint board members but it would take a while for that view to filter through.
Updated
Labor to push for a federal Icac Senate committee while Jacqui Lambie calls for ban on full face coverings in public
While we all scramble over the Omnicuss bill, in the Senate later today Labor will move to establish a Senate select committee into a national integrity commission (federal Icac).
This policy was announced in Bill Shorten’s speech at the National Press Club last week.
Penny’s Wong will also calling for Australia to support a non-discriminatory immigration policy.
Also in the Senate, Jacqui Lambie will move to introduce a criminal code amendment to ban full face coverings in public places.
Updated
A summary of the proposed childcare changes
According to the government explainer, a single Childcare subsidy, starting July 2018, will:
- replace the childcare benefit (CCB) and childcare rebate (CCR)
- be paid directly to service providers to be passed on to families.
Families earning $65,710 or less will receive a subsidy of 85% of the actual fee charged (up to 85% of an hourly fee cap).
For family incomes above $65,710, the subsidy tapers down to 20% when family income reaches $340,000.
Updated
The Senate by numbers: a ready reckoner
With the Cory defection, the numbers are:
- Government – 29
- Labor – 26
- Greens – 9
- Others – 10
- Vacant (due to Bob Day, Rod Culleton) – 2
For a majority as of today, the government requires 38, or nine extra Senate votes.
If Day and Culleton are replaced by their own parties, the government would then require 39 or 10 extra Senate votes.
Updated
The old zombie measures such as the four-week wait for the dole and cutting out the pension supplement after six weeks overseas, have been opposed by Nick Xenophon in the past.
Because of the numbers, the government needs NXT and Hanson for anything to pass the parliament.
So it would be odd if the government rushed in this bill without at least some idea that it would pass.
That is a current conundrum.
Updated
The omnibus bill explanatory memo has now landed on the parliamentary website and I need your help. I am putting them out there for everyone to read and assess at the same time. We shall try to make some sense.
It is HUGE.
All of these measures combine to form the bill. So some of these measures are old zombie measures (like the four-week waiting period for the dole) and some are new measures (like the lesser cuts to family tax benefits) and some relate to the childcare package.
These are the list of new schedules, copied straight from the documents. Let’s crowd-comprehend.
- Payment rates
The family tax benefit part A standard fortnightly rate will be increased by $20.02 for each FTB child in the family aged up to 19. An equivalent rate increase, of around $19.37 per fortnight, will apply to youth allowance and disability support pension recipients aged under 18 and living at home. These increases will apply from 1 July 2018.
- Family tax benefits part B rate
From 1 July 2017, the bill will introduce a reform to family tax benefit part B that removes entitlement to FTB part B for single parent families who are not single parents aged 60 or more or grandparents or great-grandparents, from 1 January of the calendar year their youngest child turns 17.
- Family tax benefit supplements
This schedule will phase out the family tax benefit part A supplement for families with an adjusted taxable income of $80,000 a year or less by reducing it to $602.25 a year from 1 July 2016, and to $302.95 a year from 1 July 2017. It will then be withdrawn from 1 July 2018. The family tax benefit part A supplement has already been withdrawn for families with an adjusted taxable income over $80,000 a year under the Budget Savings (Omnibus) Act 2016.
The family tax benefit part B supplement will also be phased out. It will be reduced to $302.95 a year from 1 July 2016, and to $153.30 a year from 1 July 2017. It will then be withdrawn from 1 July 2018.
- Jobs for Families childcare package
The purpose of schedule 4 is to introduce key aspects of the Jobs for Families childcare package, as announced in the 2015-16 and 2016-17 budget. The schedule will, through the introduction of a new childcare subsidy and other enhancements, deliver a simpler, more affordable, more flexible and more accessible child care system for families.
- Proportional payments of pensions outside Australia
This schedule reduces from 26 weeks to six weeks the period during which age pension, and a small number of other payments with unlimited portability, can be paid outside Australia at the basic means-tested rate.
After six weeks, payment will be adjusted according to the length of the pensioner’s Australian working life residence.
- Pensioner education supplement
This schedule ceases pensioner education supplement from the first out of 1 January or 1 July after the day the act receives royal assent.
- Education entry payment
This measure ceases the education entry payment from the first out of 1 January or 1 July after the Act receives Royal Assent.
- Indexation
This schedule implements the following changes to Australian government payments:
- maintain at level for three years from 1 July of the first financial year beginning on or after the day this act receives royal assent the income-free areas for all working age allowances (other than student payments) and for parenting payment single; and
- maintain at level for three years from 1 January of the first calendar year beginning on or after the day this act receives royal assent the income-free areas and other means test thresholds for student payments, including the student income bank limits.
- Close the energy supplement to new welfare recipients
This schedule ceases, from 20 September 2017, payment of the energy supplement to recipients who were not receiving a welfare payment on 19 September 2016 and closes the energy supplement to new welfare recipients from 20 September 2017.
- Stopping the payment of pension supplement after six weeks overseas
This schedule will stop the payment of pension supplement after six weeks temporary absence overseas and immediately for permanent departures.
- Automation of income stream review processes
This schedule will allow for the automation of the regular income stream review process by enabling the secretary to require income stream providers to transfer a dataset to the Department of Human Services (DHS) on a regular basis.
- Seasonal horticultural work income exemption
- Schedule 12 to the bill provides a social security income test incentive aimed at increasing the number of job seekers who undertake specified seasonal horticultural work, such as fruit-picking.
- Ordinary waiting periods
This schedule makes amendments to extend and simplify the ordinary waiting period for working age payments.
- Age requirements for various commonwealth payments
This schedule provides that young unemployed people aged 22 to 24 would no longer be eligible for Newstart allowance or sickness allowance until they turn 25 years of age and would, instead, be able to claim and qualify for youth allowance. To enable this, youth allowance for all types of people who can satisfy the activity test, will be available to people who have not yet reached 25.
- Income support waiting periods
This schedule introduces a four-week waiting period for job-ready young people who are looking for work, to receive income support payments. During this four-week period, job seekers under 25 years of age who have been classified as job-ready (stream A) by the job seeker classification instrument will also be required to complete assigned activities, through a new program, RapidConnect Plus, that will help them prepare for and find work.
- Other waiting period amendments (rapid activation of young job seekers)
This schedule implements the rapid activation of young job seekers 2015-16 budget measure.
- Adjustments for primary carer pay
This and the following schedule introduce the revised arrangements for the paid parental leave scheme announced in the 2015-16 mid-year economic and fiscal outlook and previously introduced in the fairer paid parental leave bill 2016, which will now be withdrawn. The measure is changed in that the maximum PPL period for which a person may be paid parental leave pay is increased from the current 18 weeks to 20 weeks. The measure will commence on the first out of 1 January, 1 April, 1 July or 1 October that is nine months after the date the act receives royal assent, with an earliest commencement date of 1 January 2018.
- Employer opt-in (PPL)
Schedule 18 removes the employer paymaster role in administering the paid parental leave scheme.
Updated
Social services minister Christian Porter is presenting the new omnibus childcare/family tax savings bill to the house. The bill text has yet to be posted on the parliamentary website, which would suggest the finer details are still be finalised and this may or may not involve ongoing negotiations with the senate cross bench.
Part of the problem is the childcare part of the bill falls into the education minister’s lap and the family tax benefits cuts fall into the social services minister’s lap. So there is no single explanatory memo as yet.
It is what you might call a moveable feast.
Which causes a live blogger to OMNICUSS.
Pauline Hanson is giving a lecture in the corridors to Sky. She doesn’t want the childcare package because there were no childcare payments available to her when her children were little. She said the debt is too high and she acknowledges that, while she may appear tough, middle class welfare has to stop. Although:
I believe in giving a helping hand when you need a helping hand, by all means.
Updated
OK parliament begins. Government business this morning:
- Building and construction industry (improving productivity) amendment (the Hinch amendment.)
- Social services legislation amendment (omnibus savings and child care reform)
- Resumption of debate:
- Corporations amendment (crowd-sourced funding)
- Interactive gambling amendment
- Migration amendment (visa revalidation and other measures)
- Treasury laws amendment (enterprise tax plan).
Updated
Paul Kelly has an interesting contention in his column in the Oz.
The conservative side of Australian politics is now devouring itself, consumed by personal aggrandisement, ideological delusion and populist fervour in an upheaval likely to destroy the Turnbull government, deliver power to the Labor party and generate a structural split among conservatives that will weaken their cause for years to come.
The grandest hoax of our time, pumped out daily by conservative media outlets, is that the present Donald Trump-inspired turbulence will make conservatism in Australia ever stronger. In truth, conservatism in this country is being trashed. Every principle and value of genuine conservatism is being ripped up in an orgy of indulgent self-interest that exposes the intellectual and moral weakness of conservatism in Australia and its abject corruption by Trumpism.
The convulsive sea change rocking our politics points towards a historic outcome – a comprehensive victory of the progressive forces, the big winners being ALP leader Bill Shorten, the Labor party, the Greens, the trade unions and the progressive interest groups.
This is not because of superior policy performance by Labor. It is not because of Shorten’s genius or popularity. It is not because people are enthralled by progressive ideas or ideology. Indeed, progressive flaws are graphic and on display. Shorten is under pressure from the rising hostility towards the major parties but he wins because this upheaval is concentrated heavily on the Coalition side.
It is quite a long column but worth a read. Kelly’s contention is that in the age of of Trump and other populist leaders, Turnbull is in danger because he is a pragmatist. At the same time, parties like One Nation are taking votes from the conservative side of politics and not returning them in preferences, leading to a fracturing.
FWIW, I think there is also a difficulty on the progressive side with the rise of populism. The times suit opposition so maybe the fractures are papered over for now, as they were under the Abbott opposition. But progressive parties still have to juggle their own tribes. Working class voters looking for a safety net will have different interests to metropolitan progressives looking for cultural changes.
Murph and I discussed a this in the podcast this week, if you are so inclined. I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this theme.
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There but for the grace of the gods go all of us but it was a superb recovery by the new health minister Greg Hunt.
Health Minister @GregHuntMP takes a tumble (he was speaking at an Ovarian Cancer breakfast) @TheTodayShow pic.twitter.com/xuLTkFzzL1
— Lauren Gianoli (@LaurenGianoli) February 7, 2017
Now the other news that dawned on this Wednesday is this.
Senator Derryn Hinch has changed his mind on the building code laws which were contained in the Australian Building and Construction Commission bill (ABCC).
Paul Kelly at the Oz reports that the two-year transition code insisted on by Hinch will be wound back to nine months.
The second change bans companies whose enterprise agreements do not comply with the new code from being awarded commonwealth contracts.
The amendments will go to a Senate committee to report next week.
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Parliament sits at 9.30am in both chambers this morning.
I am still awaiting the full details of the great big childcare package.
At this stage, I can only tell you what the social services minister, Christian Porter, has told Sabra Lane on AM.
- He is not prepared to predict whether it will pass the Senate until the vote is held.
- Any savings from paid parental leave will not pay for childcare. Childcare will be paid for from other savings measures.
- The government will still axe the end-of-year supplements for people who get family tax benefit part B.
- But they are increasing payments for people who get family tax benefit part A.
- This bill follows on from the other omnibus savings bill (remember the one agreed to by Labor). In that first bill, Labor agreed with the government to end the supplement for families with incomes over $80,000.
- So the savings from the family tax benefit part B will be used to fund the childcare changes.
Wait. There’s more in a minute. I am delivering it in chunks because too many things are happening right now.
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Both China and the US will lose in a conflict, says Chinese foreign affairs minister.
The other big story around this morning relates to a visit by the Chinese foreign affairs minister, Wang Yi, who met with the prime minister and the foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop.
Gareth Hutchens reported Wang had a swipe at Steve Bannon, Donald Trump’s chief strategist, who told a radio show hosted on the far-right website Breitbart in March 2016 that the US would go to war in the South China Sea “in five to 10 years”.
Wang essentially told everyone to take a chill pill, reminding everyone that there had been a whole lot of irrational statements about the China and the US for the past 40 years.
But such statements aside, the China-US relationship has defied all kinds of difficulties and has been moving forward continuously. Any sober-minded politician, they clearly recognise that there cannot be conflict between China and the United States because both will lose, and both sides cannot afford that.
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Asked about Cory Bernardi, Malcolm Turnbull again said the former Liberal senator should do the honourable thing and resign.
Cory Bernardi should resign from the Senate. He’s talked about the importance of keeping faith with the electorate. The Liberal party of South Australia and the people of South Australia only seven months ago elected him to the Senate for a six-year term as a Liberal senator. So the honourable thing for Cory to do is to resign from the Senate and then run again at the next election as an independent or under his new party. Now, he’s chosen not to do that. That’s his decision. He has to explain it and obviously we will work with him as we will with every other senator to secure the passage of the government’s legislation.
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I will bring you more details on the omnibus bill because it is getting a bit scrappy at the press conference.
Malcolm Turnbull is also asked about the Australia Post salaries which were revealed in a senate committee.
Committee chairman Senator James Paterson said documents published on Tuesday showed managing director Ahmed Fahour received a $4.4 million salary and a $1.2 million bonus last financial year, taking his total package to $5.6 million.
That salary is more than 10 times more than the $507,338 Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is paid.
Turnbull said, as someone who had spent a lot of time in the business world, he believed the salary was too high for that job.
Birmingham says the changes will mean lowest-income families will be able to access childcare at about $15 a day.
He says for those families, their rate of subsidy will go up from about 76% to 85% support of the cost of accessing high-quality early learning.
The government will abolish the $7,500 cap which he says many families face.
It’s a cap that means around March or April each year, for many families, at present, they run out of support in relation to childcare payments. That’s a horror for budgeting.
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Simon Birmingham on childcare:
We are abolishing the existing childcare rebate, childcare benefit, complicated mix of different payments and replacing them with one new childcare subsidy that is better targeted to provide the greatest assistance to the most hard-working, lowest-income families in Australia, to make sure that it is a support payment that supports people to participate in the workforce as it suits them and their families.
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Malcolm Turnbull and education minister Simon Birmingham are at a childcare centre in Crace in Canberra.
What we’re proposing – and we’re seeking the support of the Senate – is reforms that will make childcare more affordable and more available, especially for families on lower incomes. It will remove the $7,500 cap. You can see how well-received that news is from the mothers in the early learning room where we were a moment ago.
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Good morning zombies,
Welcome to day 2 of the 2017 parliamentary sitting. The days are stretching out like dog years but after yesterday, we are hoping for a more orderly day. But then ...
Top line this morning is a great big new omnibus bill coming to parliament. (Cory is so yesterday.)
The new bill reportedly has some zombie savings measures from previous budgets which have stalled in the Senate, together with the government’s childcare package.
In other words, if you want the childcare package, take the cuts. The government has compromised on previous measures, to the tune of $688m over the forwards but we have yet to see the bill so I can’t swear that on my beagle’s life.
Of the details we can glean, Katharine Murphy has a story here.
We know that the government got the tick from the party room on the compromise measures, just to get the thing through the parliament. From Katharine’s report:
The government is expected to announce the end-of-year supplement for family tax benefits will be abolished, in line with the previous savings measure, but people eligible for family tax benefit A will get a boost to their fortnightly benefit of $20.
It is also expected to announce that family tax benefit B would be scaled out once a dependent child reached the age of 17. Previously, the savings measure was to scale out the payment progressively after dependent children turned 13.
There are other numbers which fell off the back of a truck overnight. The Australian reports on childcare:
Under the revised arrangement, someone with an employer scheme covering less than the government’s new 20-week allowance will be able to get a top-up covering the difference at the minimum wage.
Under the changes, which are expected to have sufficient support in the Senate to pass into law, 96,000 families will receive an average $1,300 more as a result of the two weeks’ extra leave than under the government’s stalled paid parental leave changes, which kept the existing 18-week limit.
And that:
The government’s revised proposal to set a 20-week limit for those on employer schemes seeking a top-up will leave about 68,000 people worse off, with an average loss of $5,600.
However, this is a $700 improvement compared with the previous scheme.
The day is getting on so lets away. Talk to me in the thread, on the Twits @gabriellechan and @mpbowers or on Facebook.
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