On that note, we will also adjourn until Monday.
This first week back went for eternities. Whole civilisations rose and fell while we were locked in this building. I never thought I would be so happy to return to talking energy policy deadlocks.
I’m sure that will pass by next week, when we are still talking about energy policy deadlocks. There’s another party room meeting next Tuesday, which only means more time for he said, he said (with the occasional she said), about whether or not the Neg is the worst idea this country has had since the importation of cane toads.
And while the reserve-the-right-to-cross-the-floor dance card is getting pretty full, there are so many conversations in enclaves in this place right now, don’t be surprised if that roster grows.
The states will also be looking at releasing the draft exposure legislation they need to enact in the next week, which means more time for Victoria to demand things the government doesn’t want to give them.
There’s also more time for the government to not answer the question on whether or not it will take the company tax cut legislation to the election.
To paraphrase someone else in this place, there has never been a better time to talk in circles.
But even that’s better than a lot of the stuff we have heard come out of here in recent times. And at least it’s on policy.
So, thank you to the Guardian brains trust for dragging me across the line this week. It was a tougher job than usual. And of course, to my partner in crime, Mike Bowers, for being my much better eyes and ears in the hallways, and also for propping me up.
And to you, for reading and commenting and engaging in your democracy with the hope that we can always make it better. It’s been a pretty extraordinary couple of days in here, but we must never forget that while our parliamentarians can move on from the debate, and what was said, millions of Australians don’t have that luxury, because its their daily fight.
Take care of them, and take care of you.
We’ll see you Monday.
Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Management Plan disallowance fails
From Tony Burke’s office:
The Australian Parliament has just locked in the largest removal of area under conservation in history.
The Senators considered each of the Marine Park Management Plans and the disallowance motions moved by Labor Senator Louise Pratt have each been defeated.
This is a shocking day for conservation.
No Government anywhere in the world has ever removed an area this large from conservation on land or sea. The process, which was commenced by Tony Abbott in 2013 has now been completed by Malcolm Turnbull and locked in by the Senate.
At a time when the health of our oceans has never been worse the rest of the world has been adding marine protected areas at the exact same time as Australia has been removing them.
Labor acknowledges the support of the Senators from the Green Party during this process.
The fight to protect our oceans will continue. It must.
Labor will have more to say on this in the near future.
Updated
The House stands adjourned. Members will return on Monday for the second half of the sitting fortnight. pic.twitter.com/qhLqt64HkR
— Australian House of Representatives (@AboutTheHouse) August 16, 2018
Michealia Cash’s office has issued a transcript of that press conference. For the record this was what was asked, and answered, about the AFP investigation:
QUESTION: Minister, the subpoenas that were issued ordering you to give evidence, you said months ago that you would be instructing your lawyers to have those subpoenas set aside. They are still on the books. Are you delaying this or have you indeed decided you won’t indeed fight them?
MINISTER CASH: Again, I’m not a party to these proceedings …
QUESTION: But this is a subpoena relating directly to you.
MINISTER CASH: … however I will not be providing a running commentary on what is occurring.
QUESTION: So have you changed your legal advice?
MINSITER CASH: Again, I am not going to be providing a running commentary.
QUESTION: But Minister, you said your office isn’t under investigation: that’s not what the AFP have said. They were in front of Senate Estimates a week ago and they said that your office is under investigation.
MINISTER CASH: Well Alice you and I …
QUESTION: So why won’t you answer: have you been interviewed by the AFP?
MINISTER CASH: Alice, you and I are going to have to agree to disagree. As I said, not a party to the proceedings, not under investigation but I would like to know why the AWU does not want to show the Australian people, but in particular the members of the AWU, that the money they were spending on their behalf was properly authorised.
QUESTION: You won’t comment on the AFP and whether or not they’ve spoken to you, but has the Commonwealth DPP spoken to you or anyone in your office?
MINISTER CASH: Again, I’m not going to give a running commentary on the legal proceedings.
QUESTION: Surely you can understand how these issues would be in the public interest though, Senator?
MINISTER CASH: Well as I said, I’m not a party to the proceedings and I’m not under investigation. I can only say that so many times. The issue at the end of the day is it’s actually been 12 months since the issues in relation to properly authorised donations were actually made. I would have thought you might like to ask – were they or weren’t they properly authorised?
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Updated
Revenge porn legislation is almost a reality. From Michelle Rowland’s office:
Three years after Labor first introduced a Private Members’ Bill to criminalise image-based abuse, the Enhancing Online Safety (Non-consensual Sharing of Intimate Images) Bill 2017, introducing both civil and criminal offences, has finally passed the House of Representatives.
Labor welcomes the government coming to the party on the need for a specific criminal offence that sends a strong and clear message to the community that the non-consensual sharing of private sexual material is not acceptable.
Labor’s commitment to tackling this pernicious form of abuse has been unwavering and we are pleased the government has finally accepted the evidence and followed Labor’s lead on this issue.
For years, Labor and community stakeholders have called for a specific criminal offence yet, until now, the Turnbull government has maintained that existing criminal law is enough.
In October 2015, Labor first introduced a Private Members’ Bill into parliament to criminalise the sharing of private sexual material without consent.
Labor took a policy to criminalise image-based abuse to the 2016 federal election, undertaking to do so within the first 100 days of being elected.
In October 2016, Labor reintroduced its Private Members’ Bill into the current parliament but it lapsed in 2017 because the government refused to call it on for debate.
In June 2017, Labor moved a second reading amendment calling on the Turnbull government to criminalise the sharing of intimate images without consent.
A number of Labor MPs have prosecuted this issue over the years, in particular: Terri Butler MP, Tim Watts MP, Clare O’Neil MP and Mark Dreyfus QC MP.
The constructive and bipartisan approach of the attorney general, Christian Porter MP and the shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus MP QC also deserves acknowledgement.
Labor pays tribute to the efforts of a range of stakeholders in the community. We hope today’s progress brings the victims of image-based abuse some comfort as they see the results of their advocacy, and know they have helped protect their fellow Australians from this serious form of abuse.
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On policy – Pauline Hanson is still very against the company tax cuts.
Updated
Pauline Hanson on Fraser Anning’s election chances:
Fraser Anning, he has no chance, I don’t think he has any chance - which has been proven, Bob Katter has never come near a Senate [quota].
Hanson wants a five-year ban on Muslim immigration and she wants a plebiscite on it.
Updated
Pauline Hanson is now on Sky News, talking about where Fraser Anning’s speech went too far for her – the return of the white Australia policy and the use of “final solution” is the short answer. (That may be worth mentioning to Andrew Bolt who continues to argue that Anning wasn’t asking for a return to the white Australia policy)
As for why she didn’t give the [purported] speech writer Richard Howard a job:
Richard was very right wing, extreme right wing and that didn’t suit me, it is not what I wanted, what I was looking for, and I had all my staff [positions] covered.
Hanson still supports banning Muslim immigration though.
Updated
Question time ends.
Peter Dutton has digressed from his usual “you are very safe, your borders are very safe” monologue, to talk about Shayne Neumann:
He has been the shadow minister for immigration for 120 question times. Now, Mr Speaker, he has not asked any questions on boats or immigration. Mr Speaker, I have got a soft spot for the member for Blair and, Mr Speaker, I have got to say I have just been advised that after all of this period of time, the member for Blair has asked for his first briefing from my department on operation sovereign borders. I feel almost, Mr Speaker, like a proud father, you know when your child takes a first step or milestone. Is not yet speaking, he is a little slow at speaking but he has taken one baby step.
Also, you are very safe and your borders are very safe.
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Tony Burke to Malcolm Turnbull:
Can the prime minister confirm that even under its own figures for private fundraising, it took the Great Barrier Reef Foundation more than 18 years to raise $58m and just 18 minutes with the prime minister to get almost $500m?
Turnbull repeats the answer we have heard all week – that it went through the normal processes, Labor had previously worked with the foundation and it was known to the department, and it’s all about saving the reef.
Labor tries again, with Bill Shorten asking why “weren’t the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, the Australian Institute of Marine Sciences, or the CSIRO even invited to tender”.
Josh Frydenberg takes it and starts the same answer we have heard again and again, until Tony Burke asks him to address the tender issue, which Tony Smith agrees with and we get:
Mr Speaker, the best partner for the Commonwealth government was the foundation because of its proven track record and its ability to leverage off the tropical sector, the fact that the matter is the foundation works closely with the CSIRO, with the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, so much so that when Labor was in office, Labor decided to provide money to the foundation. Again, Labor abandoned the reef and the Coalition is saving it.
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Scott Morrison gets a dixer on this:
(from the ACCC statement)
Criminal charges have been laid against the Construction, Forestry, Maritime, Mining and Energy Union (CFMMEU) and its ACT Divisional Branch Secretary, Jason O’Mara, in relation to alleged cartel conduct.
“The CFMMEU and Mr O’Mara are each charged with attempting to induce suppliers of steel fixing services and scaffolding services to reach cartel contracts, arrangements or understandings containing cartel provisions in relation to services provided to builders in the ACT in 2012 to 2013,” ACCC Chair Rod Sims said.
“These charges follow a joint investigation between the ACCC and the Australian federal police as part of the AFP’s role in coordinating and contributing to the Joint Police Task Force following the royal commission into trade union governance and corruption,” Mr Sims said.
The charges are being prosecuted by the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (CDPP).
The first mention of the charges before the ACT magistrates court is scheduled for 27 September 2018.
The Competition and Consumer Act requires any trial of such offences to proceed by way of indictment in the federal court of Australia or a state or territory supreme court.
The ACCC is unable to comment further as this is a criminal matter now before the court.
Updated
A moment of bipartisanship, when Nola Marino asks Greg Hunt for an update on what the government is doing for those suffering from endometriosis (more than 700,000 women)
Hunt:
I want to thank the member, who along with the member for Canberra, the member for Boothby, and many others, has been a powerful advocate for action on endometriosis. She brought to this parliament the story of her daughter, Kylie, and how Kylie’s condition destroyed so much of her life and how as a consequence she became a passionate advocate. But I acknowledge, as I have earlier, the member for Canberra and Boothby and many others. This is an example of this parliament working at its very best. Through their collective work of others the Parliamentary Friends of Endometriosis was created. At that meeting the government gave a long overdue national policy for the silence that had confronted so many women and they had been forced to adopt in relation to this condition. It is a menstrual condition, you can have a debilitating impact not just on Kylie, but we know about 700,000 women.
They can also be ... exposed to mental health conditions. As a result of that joint parliamentary friends group, the government agreed to put forward and to develop with the community and the sector a national action plan for endometriosis. People from all sides of parliament, the community, the women’s movement, the medical profession came together to develop it. There are four key elements – they are education for women and girls to acknowledge the science and to seek help, but also for the medical condition and medical workers, their approaches to treatment and diagnosis, and the search for a cure through research.
In response to that plan the government has committed about $4.7m to treatment of endometriosis and to pursuing those four goals. That includes $2.5 m for clinical trials, for seeking new treatments and working with women who are afflicted with endometriosis. So this is a really profound and important step forward. It is accompanied by the funding for GPs of $1m to work with the medical profession to assist them in better understanding and diagnosis. All these things come together. It has been a tough week in some ways in the sense that the parliament has been at its most conflictual. When we look at this topic we see parliament working, democracy working, and outcomes for women around Australia.
Catherine King adds her support for Hunt’s statement:
I seek to associate the Opposition with the remarks of the minister. I do think it is an example of the parliament at its best, when you have the parliamentary friends being established to highlight such an important disease for women. And I do, as the government has said and the Opposition has said, on many occasions, particularly the members for Canberra and Boothby, we commend the government for its actions on recognising endometriosis and we want to continue that fight as well.
Updated
Over in the Senate, Gavin Marshall has also asked about Keith Pitt:
Marshall: In an article in this morning’s Australian entitled Neg rebels try to force walkouts, it’s revealed assistant minister to the deputy PM, Nationals MP Mr Keith Pitt is considering stepping down from his front bench position so he could oppose the Neg. Has the minister attempted to persuade minister Pitt — assistant minister Pitt?
Matt Canavan: Of course, I have tried to persuade all I’ve spoken to about the common-sense of adopting the National Energy Guarantee. It is the right approach to help bring down power bills for the Australian people. So if you’d like to have a briefing on why the National Energy Guarantee is the right approach, I’d love to have that discussion with you because we still to this day, Mr President, we still to this day don’t know what the Labor party’s is on the National Energy Guarantee. When I hear Mr Butler get up and speak, all I hear him talk about is emission reductions. That’s all he talks about. He doesn’t talk about lowering power bills for the Australian people.
Doug Cameron: This was a very specific question. Has the minister attempted to persuade assistant minister Pitt to support the government’s position? The minister’s attention should be drawn to the specific question.
Senate president: You have very kindly done so, Senator Cameron. I note the minister has 14 seconds remaining to answer.
Canavan: As I said, I try to convince everybody of common sense and good policy in this nation and this policy is commonsense. It does provide the potential to lower power bills and that’s what this government is focused on.
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Chris Bowen asks Scott Morrison about the $444m grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, given that government debt continues to grow.
Morrison:
Why did the government give money to dead people and pets and all these things, Mr Speaker? I want to know, want to know – what has the Labor party got against Nemo?
They have invested money in saving the reef. The minister brought forward a proposal to save the reef, not only to save the reef, but to work in partnership with others outside of this building, outside of government, to say that the reef, Mr Speaker. Maybe the Labor party thinks the Australian people are like Dory. They forget everything.
When he was minister for immigration, the shadow treasurer racked up millions in deficits because he could not control the borders. They will forget grocery watch or fuel watch or the economic record of the member for Lilley, but they won’t. What we have done on the Great Barrier Reef is create jobs in the reef up there. That is all about that. The member for Capricornia knows that. The member for Herbert is hiding under the desk when we talk about the Great Barrier Reef, Mr Speaker, because they know that this government has gone out there and invested in the future of the reef. And we think it is the right thing to do that in partnership with others out there in the community.
The Labor party think all the answers, all the answers reside only sitting around public service desks sitting in government buildings, Mr Speaker. Maybe that is why [the member] want to put up taxes so he can have more and more and more public servants. His great idea is to increase efficiency by abolishing the efficiency dividend. That is the genius of him. And we know, Mr Speaker, that is they want to increase taxes for one simple reason. They want more desks in Canberra not more desks in schools. They want a bigger public service. It will go back to the ballooning of public service that we have seen in Victoria and Queensland. They cannot control the spending. This is a government that has invested $500 million. They want to deny them the extra $11 million that comes from them at being able to invest that money into more success on the reef, Mr Speaker.
This government makes no apologies for investing in the reef and for doing it in partnership. That was the proposal, that was the deal. That is what we put in the budget. That is what the member for Sydney welcomed on the night, but maybe she has a memory like Dory as well.
Updated
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull:
Wages growth has never been lower than under any other prime minister. Australians are struggling with cost of living, with their out-of-pocket health costs going up and up, out-of-pocket child-care cost is increasing for at least one in four Australian families, and of course power bills are going up and up. Under this prime minister is everything go up except people’s wages?
Turnbull:
On a matter of recent financial information from the Treasury, the average weekly ordinary times earnings four adults increased, to the six months of May 2018, to be 2.7% higher through the year. This is the highest 3-year growth rate since 20 November 14. There is more work to do. More to be done, but we are seeing the results of a stronger economy and more jobs, more demand for labour, creating skill shortages as the Reserve Bank governor observed the other day and we are starting to see wage increases and they are reflected in the numbers.
I note the leader of the Opposition has talked about the take-home pay of Australian workers. We want Australians to keep more of the money they earn. In that case, why is he opposing, why is the opposing, why is the opposing us bringing down electricity prices? Why does he want Australians to pay more for electricity? Why did he oppose lower income taxes for every working Australian? Why is he opposing pay rises for workers by opposing tax relief for Australian businesses? Why did he oppose our new child-care subsidy that gives a typical family $1,300 more support for each child each year? And, why, when he was a union leader did he spend his time trading away penalty rates in order to put workers at a disadvantage in return for support for their employers? Why did he turn a blind eye to the big unions that bankroll the Labor party while slashing the pay of Australia’s lowest paid workers?
Why did he deny 7,400 workers a pay rise last year when he chose to play political games and block a government bill that would have ensured those workers received a pay rise? Why, Mr Speaker, did he oppose our multinational tax legislation which cracks down on tax avoidance? Why, Mr Speaker, when he is so concerned about hard-working Australian families, why does he oppose our ... benefits legislation that cracks down on secret deals, the kind [he] used to be very good at between unions and big business? And why is he opposing or seeking to oppose over $200 billion of taxes on Australian families, targeted at a low income families, including, and perhaps most shamefully of all, self-funded retirees who would be stripped of up to 30% of their income by this shameless high taxing Labor leader were he ever to be the prime minister?
Updated
Another question time – another dixer where Christopher Pyne has to talk about government policy and not how terrible unions are. Sad.
Updated
Tanya Plibersek to Malcolm Turnbull:
The prime minister claims the National Energy Guarantee will reduce energy prices by 20% by 2030 by reducing uncertainty, but the government’s cut will cost pensioners $360 a year. Isn’t the only certainty for pensioners that they will always be worse off under this prime minister?
Turnbull:
The Australian government, my government, provides pensioners with the support that they deserve. We’re not, as Labor is proposing to do, stealing their savings. Let’s not forget, the Labor Party, the honourable member’s party, wants to go after the savings that pensioners and self-funded retirees [have]. Well, they do, they do. There used to be apart as an agreement that people on low incomes were entitled to get the cash benefit of those franking credits, and that was Labor’s policy. Labor took it to an election, in fact, and it was passed through this parliament by Peter Costello with bipartisan support, and now the Labor Party wants to go after it and who is going to pay? It is going to be the people that will pay, it will be self-funded retirees, $5 million the year they think they will be getting, and pensioners, yes.
Pensioners will be getting it as well, yes. Yes, you are misleading the house.You are misleading the house. Labor is going after the savings of other Australians in the shameful cash grab and they should be appalled at the injustice of this assault on older Australians’ savings.
Updated
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull:
Can the prime minister confirm that the Energy Security Board modelling reveals that under the National Energy Guarantee, residential electricity bills increase by $210 between the years of 2024 and 2030? And that wholesale electricity prices actually rise from 2024?
Josh Frydenberg is back up:
What is absolutely clear from the Energy Security Board’s modelling is that power prices, with the National Energy Guarantee, will come down by $550, Mr Speaker. That is why the member for Port Adelaide described it as a very good design. That is why he described it as being a Rolls-Royce, that is why the international energy agency said this could be a model for other countries around the world. That is why every large miner, manufacturer, farmer from around the country, industry group, has got behind the National Energy Guarantee.
And he talks a big game, he writes to the prime minister last year and says I want to reach across the political divide, I want to end the climate wars, I want to lower power prices. But when it comes to walking the talk, he goes missing, Mr Speaker, he goes missing, and it may be because they do not even know what their policy is.
They went to the last election promising an emissions intensity scheme, that will drive power bills up by $300, Mr Speaker, compared to the National Energy Guarantee. They went to the last election with a 45% emissions reduction target, which the Business Council of Australia, representing 1 million workers plus across the country, described as economy wrecking. Economy wrecking, Mr Speaker. They went to the last election with a 50% energy renewal target, but they do not know what their own policy is because you would think that the shadow treasurer, and member for McMahon, would know about their own energy target. He went on Sky with David Speers, David Speers said ‘Bill Shorten was unable to say what cost this morning. Are you able to say what it would cost?’
The member for McMahon, ‘well, well, well, what we have is the renewable energy targets, then there is the goal of getting to 50% renewable energy’. Hang on, says David Speers, there’s a difference between a goal and the renewable target.
‘Well, there is a renewable energy target, and then we have the 50% aspiration, which is separate to our renewable energy target.’ Hang on, says David Speers, that sounds like important new [information]. The Member for McMahon, ‘well, there is nothing new here, David, nothing new. You ask me about the renewable energy target and I do not want to mislead you’. Again, David Speers - ‘your colleague Mark Butler does refer to it as a 50% energy renewal target’.
‘Well, then, I am being precise with you intentionally.’
Mr Speaker, the Leader of the Opposition, the member for McMahon, the member for Port Adelaide do not even know what their own policy is, but what the Australian people know is one thing, under the Australian Labor party, you’ll always pay more for your power.
Updated
Julie Bishop is given the next dixer on energy, but as she sits down, Speaker Tony Smith says he heard an unparliamentary remark and asks if it was Mike Kelly who said it.
“Well, if it was, Mr Speaker, I withdraw.”
Which is not exactly an answer, but is a fairly common way of withdrawing used by both sides.
Christopher Pyne: One of the hallmarks of this house is a robust debate but it does not degenerate into that sort of gutter language in the chamber, and the member should do more than withdraw, you should apologise and withdraw.
Smith: The Leader of the House makes a fair point. The practice makes it clear that a withdrawal is regarded as an apology, but I think given the circumstances it would assist the house if the member in error did both.
Kelly: I apologise, Mr Speaker, and withdraw.
I’m pretty sure the unparliamentary “gutter” language was: “crap”.
Updated
Labor’s Doug Cameron has asked the jobs and innovation minister Michaelia Cash to clarify her remarks at an earlier press conference when she said “I am not being interviewed” as part of the police investigation of the media tipoff about the raid on the Australian Workers’ Union headquarters.
Labor clearly thinks there is some ambiguity around the remark and wants her to repeat it in the Senate – but she won’t.
Cash: “I have confirmed this is not an investigation into me or my office ... I have also stated the AFP has requested public interest immunity in relation to this.”
Penny Wong points out this doesn’t answer HAVE YOU BEEN INTERVIEWED. Mathias Cormann says the answer is relevant to the question, and Senate president Scott Ryan agrees.
Cameron then asks if the government is still paying her legal bills and the total cost. Cash replies it’s common for ministers to receive legal assistance. “So the answer is yes, I’m following the normal procedure,” she said and took on notice the cost.
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Mark Butler to Malcolm Turnbull:
This morning the former deputy prime minister, the member for New England, said about the prime minister’s energy policy, ‘I’ve heard the stories in the past, how it was going to drive down prices, and it didn’t.’ Why should Australians believe promises from this Liberal-National government when even the former deputy prime minister has confirmed the government lied on power bills before?
Barnaby Joyce makes all of the faces. All of them. There are now none left for anyone else.
Butler is cautioned on the use of language “lied” but we move on and Josh Frydenberg takes the question:
“The parliament knows that when the carbon tax was abolished, the Australian Bureau of Statistics confirmed it was the single biggest drop in electricity prices ever recorded.
“That is the fact of the matter. And yesterday into Hansard, in the MPI debate, I read from an ACC press release which said that the $550 reduction that was coming from the abolition of the carbon tax and estimated by Treasury was absolutely reasonable. What the member for Port Adelaide fails to tell this House is that when Labor was last in office electricity prices doubled. They went up each and every year. And the member for Port Adelaide comes from a state where a Labor government completely wrecked the energy system.
“And South Australia was left with the highest prices in the country. And in the member of Port Adelaide’s own electorate, companies have lost their power and lost jobs and lost millions of dollars as a result. And what did the member for Port Adelaide call it? He called it a hiccup. But as the prime minister has made it clear, everything’s been revealed by LEAN. LEAN Australia who said that high prices are not a market failure, they are proof of the market working well.
“So what do you think the shadow Minister for Energy thinks? He says, ‘In my nearly 30 years in the party, I have not seen an organising effort on a policy issue like LEAN has delivered. It was phenomenal. It gave Bill and I and the rest of the Shadow cabinet the assurance that the party was behind us as we stepped out to lead on climate change.’
“LEAN speaks for the Labor Party. LEAN directs ... LEAN directs the shadow minister. And just to finish – just to finish – today there was a very revealing front page in the Australian Financial Review which made it very clear that higher emissions reduction targets will mean higher prices for Australian consumers, and the Gratton Institute said about Labor’s claims that prices would go down as a result of higher emissions reduction targets, that, “This is unlikely to be sustainable, it would accelerate plant closures, require higher consumer prices, and that it would be inherently uncertain.” This is what the Labor Party is promising the Australian people – higher power prices, lower stability, reckless Renewable Energy Targets, recklessly high emission reduction targets, which the business community rejects, and the people of Australia reject.”
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Rebekha Sharkie has the crossbench question:
“In continuation of that spirit [from yesterday], the spirit of reconciliation and recognition of the history and cultures of Australia’s First Peoples, will the government support flying the Aboriginal and Torres Straight Islander flags in this chamber?
Malcolm Turnbull:
I imagine the honourable member will seek to move a motion to amend the standing orders for that purpose ... assuming that is necessary. It is within the Speaker’s responsibility, as we understand, but it’s ... we take the honourable member’s suggestion on board. I have to say, and remind the honourable member, while we pay great respect to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags, the flag hanging in each corner of this room is the flag of Australia.
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The deputy prime minister might still be finding his feet on how to deal with question time, and what level of passion and theatre he should bring to the floor, but let us all be thankful he quickly abandoned the ‘yelling-and-loud-noises-as-a-personality-quirk’ because Scott Morrison has that space more than covered.
Michael McCormack is still on the hunt for that personality.
Moving on
Nick Champion to Malcolm Turnbull:
Is the prime minister aware of media reports that during a briefing on his energy policy the prime minister said to the member for Warringah, “please do me the courtesy of allowing me to finish my sentence”. The member for Warringah replied, “I would have, if you allowed me the courtesy of finishing my term.”
Was the prime minister again speaking merchant banker gobbledygook?
The chamber has a big laugh and the question is ruled out of order.
Updated
Catherine King to Greg Hunt:
(The PM mentioned the PBS in his dixer answer)
I refer to the prime minister’s previous answer on PBS listings. How can the prime minister boast about the government’s record when, in fact, this government has delayed recent listings of cancer, epilepsy and other drugs by an average of eight months? After they have been recommended by the independent experts?
Hunt doesn’t address the question, but lists the drugs the government has put on the PBS.
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Just on Keith Pitt and his views on what we should be doing on electricity, it might be timely to revisit his 2015 speech in relation to the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Amendment Bill.
He was against it. He outlines his reasons why, and it is very, very similar to what we are hearing today:
I will not be supporting the Renewable Energy (Electricity) Amendment Bill 2015 that is currently before the Australian parliament. In my view, the renewable energy target –the RET, the deal the coalition has been forced into with Labor – will achieve only three things. It will increase the cost of electricity for those who can least afford it, Australian taxpayers will have spent billions of dollars subsidising private enterprise and, come 2020, environmentalists will have little more to show for it than a warm and fuzzy feeling.
Let me explain. When I entered parliament in 2013 I was still a registered professional electrical engineer in the state of Queensland, and I promised to be a commonsense voice for the people of Hinkler and regional Australia. Over the past 18 months the issue raised most often with my office has been the spiralling cost of electricity – and for good reason. The median personal income in Hinkler is just $411 a week – just $411. A substantial number of pensioners call Hinkler home, and we have one of the highest unemployment rates in the country. Unfortunately, many of Hinkler’s major employers are making workforce decisions based on the cost of energy – local foundries, farmers and manufacturers all say their overheads are rising at an unsustainable rate. Any relief businesses and households might have felt with the repeal of Labor’s carbon tax quickly turned to dismay when Queensland electricity retailers substantially increased their tariffs. The end result was a net price increase of about 5%. It is no coincidence that in 2013-14 the number of households in regional Queensland disconnected for debt or non-payment rose 87% to 12,454. The Fraser Coast Chronicle last week reported that the local Meals on Wheels electricity bill jumped from $5,700 to $12,200 in just one year. The not-for-profit organisation says it has only two choices if it is to remain viable: to either increase the price of the meals or find $85,000 to buy solar panels.
What is the solution? I have heard politicians on both sides tell people to shop around for the best rate. That might be possible in the capital cities, but there is generally only one retailer in most regional communities. The lack of market competition will only worsen if the Queensland Labor government proceeds with its plan to merge state-owned corporations Ergon, Energex and Powerlink. The merger, combined with already high electricity prices, falling energy consumption and the renewable energy target, will result in substantial job losses in the energy sector. We heard a lot from the Electrical Trades Union during the January 2015 state election, but why aren’t they out there actively fighting for their members’ jobs right now?
In his second reading speech to this bill, the Minister for the Environment, Greg Hunt, said the renewable energy target introduced by the Rudd government resulted in:
… new subsidised capacity … being forced into an oversupplied electricity market …
I appreciate the government is trying to put the RET on a sustainable footing, but, in my view, this current legislation will still result in an increase in power prices, paid for by the people who can least afford it. Australians are using less electricity now than they were 10 years ago. The AEMO Electricity statement of opportunities report in August 2014 stated:
More than 7,500 MW would need to be removed from the market to affect supply-adequacy in 2014-15.
There is potentially between 7,650 MW and 8,950 MW of surplus capacity across the NEM in 2014-15.
Under any risk scenario, no additional capacity is required for at least 10 years. It also states that approximately 90% of this excess is in New South Wales, Queensland and Victoria. Furthermore:
As operational consumption grows, the level of surplus capacity decreases. However, even with 10 years of consumption growth, by 2023-24 between 1,100 MW and 3,100 MW of capacity could still be withdrawn from each of NSW, Queensland, and Victoria without breaching the reliability standard.
The problem is that forecast consumption is expected to fall by 1.1 per cent per year at a minimum.
Current renewable technologies like wind and solar do not reliably generate power on a constant basis, and so the baseload coal or gas-fired power stations still have to maintain capacity for peak use times when the sun is not shining and the wind is not blowing. Most of that peak occurs in the evening, after dark and, in many locations, when it is calm. Without some type of affordable storage system, there is no option but to maintain baseload power, and that will continue to force up the price of electricity. Put simply, if your running costs remain the same and you are selling less product, the next logical step is to increase the price of the product to be able to maintain your operations.
However, the Australian Energy Regulator, the AER, has advised of its plans to restrict Ergon Energy’s proposed revenue by 27 per cent over the next five years, well below the $8.24bn that Ergon requested. The measure is expected to save Ergon customers between $16 and $44 in network charges on their bills each year. The savings would have been substantially higher if not for the exorbitant feed-in tariff offered to solar users by the former Queensland Labor government. In very simple terms, the AER makes its decisions based on how much the businesses need to spend delivering electricity prudently through the distribution network, putting an end to the so-called “gold-plating” that occurred in the Beattie years. The AER says any costs above efficient levels are to be funded by the network owners and not the customers. On the one hand, federally we are trying to keep power prices down for consumers by reducing the operating expenses and revenue of electricity companies; but, on the other hand, our current environmental policies are inflating the price of electricity because, without baseload power, you have to start turning the lights off.
The public expects coal-fired energy companies to maintain the same availability and readiness, but the renewable energy target encourages people to use more renewables in an already oversupplied market. To give you a simple example, I spoke with a pensioner in my electorate last week. He gets up in the middle of the night, each and every night, to turn off his refrigerator so he does not use as much electricity. He relies on his rooftop solar to power the fridge during the day, and he would rather risk food poisoning than run up an electricity bill that he cannot afford to pay.
I would support the move towards renewable energy if wind, solar and battery technology actually worked – meaning if it were capable of reliably supplying electricity during peak periods to replace traditional baseload power generators. Plus, the cost at this point in time is astronomical.
Under this bill, $15bn will be spent over the next five years on infrastructure that will run concurrently with coal-fired generators, supplying into a market that is excessively supplied. Broad estimates by the department indicate that renewable energy certificates from 2015 to 2030, at an average of $47 per certificate, will cost $24bn. If the RECs are allowed to reach penalty at $93, the cost to users will be $43bn. Can you imagine the response if we went to the Australian people and said they needed to contribute an additional $43bn through their electricity pricing as a surcharge? To meet the target, Australia will need to build as many renewable generators in five years as we have built over the past 15 – all of which will need to be replaced in the short to medium term, when the technology outdates and the equipment deteriorates. Putting aside the cost of building the infrastructure, renewable energy is extremely expensive to generate. Coal-fired power costs about $36 per megawatt hour to produce, compared to $190 per megawatt hour for solar and up to $120 for wind. If renewable energy were a sound investment, governments would not need to subsidise private businesses with renewable energy certificates.
I find it absurd that we on the conservative side of politics have abandoned the stated belief in the free market to reach a deal with Labor. Labor’s recalcitrance will only hurt the very people they always purport to represent, and that is the poor. The Coalition’s Direct Action Plan costs around $14.50 per tonne of carbon abated at its first auction. That is compared to $25 under Labor’s carbon tax and a whopping $95 to $175 per tonne of carbon abated through the renewable energy target for the small systems scheme. Rather than subsidising jobs in private renewable energy businesses to the tune of almost $200,000 each over the period 2015 to 2030, we should be spending taxpayers’ funds on research to advance renewable technologies that have real promise– growing our fuel, finding cheap and effective storage sources and ensuring ongoing jobs in Australian manufacturing through competitive energy pricing. The enormous buckets of money thrown at renewable research by Labor was haphazard and predominantly unsuccessful in large-scale trials.
I have personally worked in hydro power stations that have been operational for more than 50 years and they will continue to work into the future. These plants provide a multiplying effect into the local economy, providing water storage, generating capacity and long-term infrastructure with real benefits. They are a true renewable, with their energy source replenished every time it rains. The greatest of these installations is, of course, the Snowy hydro scheme. Hydros can be used as peakers. They are flexible and can be run up quickly, and at night, when there is no wind or sun, they still work.
If you really want to do something about emissions, we need to be having a proper debate about zero-emission next-generation nuclear technology. If you want renewables, we should consider growing the fuel source. Spend money on research for natural fuel sources such as biomass, where every year 100 per cent of the fuel supply can be regrown, providing long-term jobs. There is a proposal floating around for loans for irrigators to install solar pumps. Unfortunately, they will only be able to irrigate when the sun is shining – and it is back to the bad old days of watering in the middle of the day, when evaporation is at its highest. All of those years of water-use efficiency and capital installation down the drain. Typically, irrigation only occurs during times of low rainfall and drought, when water is scarce, but it is either be killed by electricity bills or invest in capital.
The public perception is that we have not done enough with respect to renewable energy. In fact, there was a large amount of capacity before the target was even set. The price of installing rooftop PV solar has fallen substantially. In terms of installed capacity, that is, gigawatts, rather than generation, that is, gigawatt hours, coal is currently only providing around 50 per cent of the energy mix. To even come close to meeting the target set in this bill, around 1,500 to 2,000 wind turbines would need to be built. Wind turbines are intrusive, ineffectual and always best placed in your neighbour’s property, and out of view of your own. The remaining sites capable of having any chance of even 30 per cent utilisation for wind turbines are very limited, because you need a location where the wind blows consistently, of which there are not that many. And it should be close to where the energy is used.
Do I honestly think they can install the capacity needed to meet the reduced target? My answer is no. We will be back having this debate again in two or three years’ time, when it becomes apparent that even huge subsidies will not be enough to get sufficient facilities built. If you want to subsidise businesses, subsidise exporters that create long-term jobs. Do not subsidise businesses that devalue and destroy assets already predominantly owned by the taxpayer.
Every business owner in my electorate would like to have the upper hand against their competitors. They would love to receive a guaranteed price for the products they produce, regardless of need, subsidised by someone else. If – and I say if – Australia meets its 2020 renewable energy target, it will not be because we have created an economically self-sustaining, reliable source of renewable energy. People will be using less coal-fired electricity for one reason only: they simply cannot afford it.
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Question time begins
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull:
Is the prime minister aware that the assistant minister to the deputy prime minister, the member for Hinkler, has refused to deny reports that he’s considering resigning to protest against the prime minister’s energy policy? Can the prime minister assure the House that no other members of his executive are considering resigning to protest against the prime minister and his energy policy?
The rumour Keith Pitt is preparing to step down over the Neg hit the News Corp papers today. Pitt won’t say if it’s true – or untrue.
Turnbull takes the use of energy to repeat his attacks on Labor for what he says is their failure to have an energy policy to cut prices down. It’s the same thing we have heard all week – but he does not acknowledge whether or not Pitt is about to pull the pin.
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Over on ‘Who’s that MP?’
It’s ...
Luke Howarth
The member’s 90-second statements already sound so much like dixer answers, we really should just save time and combine the two.
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We are sliding towards question time.
Which strangely, always feels the same as my slow descent into madness.
What creative non-answers will our ears be graced with today?
Don’t think that everyone has just moved on from yesterday:
There’s been a lot of self-congratulation in this building today.
— Tim Watts MP (@TimWattsMP) August 16, 2018
But yesterday’s debate shouldn’t absolve us from asking why we ended up here and where we should go from here.
Instead, focus on the leadership challenge ahead. pic.twitter.com/oYgkJSWEHx
Michealia Cash refuses to say if she has been interviewed by the AFP
Michealia Cash on whether she has been interviewed by the AFP:
“Oh Alice [Workman] ... you would know, that I am not a party to the proceedings, you would also know that I am not being interviewed, I have not been under investigation, nor my office – what this is all about is the AWU are currently challenging proceedings in the court because they don’t want to produce the relevant documentation to show, donations made by Bill Shorten when he was leader of the AWU, members’ money, to GetUP $100,000 to his own campaign, of $25,000 were properly authorised.
“I am not a party to these proceedings.”
Workman: Minister, you have said your office is not under investigation – that is not what the AFP have said, they said in front of Senate estimates, a week ago, and they said your office is under investigation ... So why won’t you say whether you have been interviewed by the AFP?
Cash: Alice, you and I are going to have to agree to disagree. As I’ve said, not a party to the proceedings, not under investigation, but I would like to know why the AWU does not want to show the Australian people, in particular the members of the AWU, that the money they were spending on their behalf was properly authorised.
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I do have to say that the loudest voices in our ‘freedom of speech’ debate (usually the same ones who’d overlap in a venn diagram of people who enjoy lobbing the term “snowflake”) sure seem to get upset at any efforts for inclusive speech.
Because HOW DARE anyone consider using the term “chair” instead of “chairman”, especially in situations when you don’t know the gender of the person you are addressing.
Fun fact – when the LNP was in government in Queensland, they changed legislation so all references to chairperson, became chairman.
Updated
Janet Rice overheard Barry O’Sullivan’s motion. The Greens senator had this to say:
Expanding the use of some simple words, or making efforts to improve inclusive practices in the public and private sectors do not pose a threat to Senator O’Sullivan, or anyone for that matter.
Inclusive gender pronouns and gender neutral language demonstrate our commitment to equality and respect for all Australians regardless of sex or gender.”
Sadly, Barry O’Sullivan ran out of time to move another Queensland LNP state conference motion:
That the Senate —
(a) notes that:
(i) the concepts of abortion and euthanasia specifically contradict the Hippocratic Oath – written nearly 2500 years ago – which is arguably the most famous text in Western medicine: “I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest any such counsel; and in like manner I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion”, and
(ii) the Queensland Labor Government’s proposed abortion laws will permit life termination at 22 weeks, which is a common age for expecting parents to be sharing images of ultrasounds due to the human form of the baby, and is a time in human development where babies have already formed lips and eyebrows and whose infused eyelids can discern the difference between light and dark; and
(b) condemns:
(i) the Queensland Government for its repeated attempts to excessively overhaul state legislation on abortion, and
(ii) any law that would permit abortions based on gender - selection.
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It’s unemployment figure time ... (it is down 0.1% to 5.3%)
Which means it is also Michaelia Cash time.
Standing by for Michaelia Cash pic.twitter.com/hEzGCQ96Ec
— Alice Workman (@workmanalice) August 16, 2018
Updated
And here is the statement the Australian Defence Force issued just 10 days ago on that same topic: (tl;dr - there is no gender neutral language directive)
Reports regarding Defence requiring the use of gender-neutral language are wrong.
ADFA Cadets are not being told that they should not use terms like him or her.
As was explained to the journalist prior to publishing, the Department has not, and is not intending, to issue a directive on the use of gender-neutral language.
For example, every day ADFA cadets address their seniors as Sir and Ma’am. This has not, and is not, changing.
There are around 80,000 personnel in the Australian Defence Force. Supervisors and commanders are required to lead teams from all walks of life, who often work, eat and sleep in close proximity for extended periods.
Commanders must be skilled in harnessing these diverse backgrounds and experiences in their teams to deliver what is required.
Effective teamwork is at the centre of ADF capability and it is built on respect and cohesion.
Members of the Australian Defence Force are required to work with each other, and address each other, in a respectful manner. This includes members addressing each other by rank and using the customary military compliments.
Here is what Barry O’Sullivan wants the Senate to agree to:
That the Senate —
(a) notes:
(i) that the Australian Defence Force has recently drawn headlines following an indication it could end the use of gender-specific pronouns, and enforce a new language regime on our defence personnel,
(ii) that the Victorian public service, with support from the Victorian Government, has commenced a campaign to enforce the belief that masculine and feminine pronouns are somehow restricting,
(iii) that in 2016, the Queensland Government ended its inclusion of male or female in drivers’ licence information, following complaints from the gender-diverse community,
(iv) the bully and intimidation from some within the gender-diverse community towards iconic Australian comedian Mr Barry Humphries – a man who has been a public trailblazer in challenging community expectations surrounding gender stereotypes – when he questioned the legitimacy of expanding bathrooms, and indoctrinating children in certain social outlooks relating to gender,
(v) that Qantas made international headlines earlier this year when it was revealed it would focus on directing staff language and behaviour, as part of a so-called ‘Spirit of Inclusion’ month that would “recognise reality” by forcing staff to follow a strict language regime by replacing language such as husband, wife, mum and dad to avoid any potential offence potentially felt by same-gender couples, and
(vi) that the Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Mr Parkinson, has repeatedly stated his belief in the highly contentious concept of “unconscious bias”, and has spent millions of taxpayer dollars attempting to find evidence to support his personal beliefs and alter the personal actions of staff under his control;
(b) reaffirms its support for free and fearless speech, and open and honest discourse as foundations of western civilisation;
(c) rejects any attempt to enforce an overhaul of longstanding language usage for innocuous and benevolent terms that are spoken with no intended malice; and
(d) condemns any form of crusading, bullying, intimidation and use of authority by government, activists and corporate leaders that attempts to stifle free speech by enforcing a specific world viewpoint on linguistics and social policy.
Updated
Annnnnnd down in the Senate, Barry O’Sullivan has moved a motion against gender neutral-language (which was a LNP conference motion put forward and passed by the room in June), which the government is officially against, but that broad church means not everyone agrees.
Eric Abetz, Amanda Stoker, Jim Molan, Ian Macdonald, Lucy Gichuhi and Wacka Williams are all for it.
Honestly, the Usual Suspects remake is looking a little tired.
Because this week just hasn’t been enough, Malcolm Roberts is about to appear on Sky.
While the sun is still up.
Updated
Fraser Anning 'told' to 'hold your nerve' and not apologise
Sky played a piece audio they believed to be Jim Savage, talking to an unidentified person, as saying:
“We told Fraser months ago, we had a meeting with him ... when you make your maiden speech, Fraser ... you have to get up there and you have to say something really controversial, really hit that nerve, otherwise you will be forgotten.
“We told him to do that and that is exactly what he did.”
Savage goes on to say that he also told him not to apologise:
“Don’t start apologising, don’t start saying, oh, I shouldn’t have said that, ‘hold your fucking nerve’.”
Jim Savage says he met with the Senator months ago and it was during this meeting that he encouraged @fraser_anning to 'hit a nerve'.
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) August 16, 2018
Listen to the leaked audio: https://t.co/eWqJvSasYx
Updated
Sky News is playing audio of someone they believe to be Jim Savage, the former state secretary of One Nation, who was talking about Fraser Anning’s speech, saying he had told him to make it controversial on purpose, to make sure it was remembered.
Fraser Anning is not heard on the audio - just a man they say is Savage.
Updated
Chris Bowen was on Alan Jones (or Chris. Bowen) as Ray Hadley calls him, this morning and was asked why so many people don’t want Malcolm Turnbull or Bill Shorten:
Alan I think around the world, including in Australia there has been as you said, as you put it in a fraying of the system of major parties and people are attracted to more minor parties. That’s happening in Australia and as we know that’s happening around the world and I think it’s largely because people are hurting. You know in Australia we had the 26 years of uninterrupted economic growth but it has not been equally shared. It has not been equally shared between Sydney and Melbourne and the rest of Australia for example. I spent a lot of time in regional Australia, you’ve spent a lot of time thinking and talking to regional Australia. People are hurting out there and people want answers.”
This sort of came up yesterday, with the news the US is increasing its defence spend (it’s now hovering somewhere close to 3% of GDP).
Then there is also Australia’s very keen interest in the soft diplomacy China has been using in the Pacific, which has become especially relevant since Australia reduced its foreign aid spend.
The good folks at Development Policy Centre at ANU have taken a look at Australia’s defence spending as compared to our aid spending.
You can find that here.
Updated
This fight is also coming up today:
After a day of platitudes... tomorrow Senators have the chance to actually *do* something about racist and sexist behaviour in our parliament. I understand Labor has told the Greens it won’t be supporting a Code of Conduct. #auspol @SBSNews pic.twitter.com/Pud03JXDwR
— Brett Mason (@BrettMasonNews) August 15, 2018
Nick McKim has released this statement on the Ashmore Reef decision:
Labor and Liberal MPs voting together to retrospectively validate the unlawful detention of up to 1600 people seeking asylum confirms that business as usual has resumed, Greens Immigration spokesperson Nick McKim says.
“This is the Labor and Liberal parties trying to rewrite history because their detention of up to 1600 people seeking asylum was based on a legal fiction,” Senator McKim said.
“Bipartisan support for the Migration (Validation of Port Appointment) Bill 2018 resumes the cosy arrangement of arbitrary cruelty towards refugees and people seeking asylum.”
“All of yesterday’s speeches about rejecting racism ring hollow while the Labor and Liberal parties continue to detain and deliberately harm men, women and children on Manus Island and Nauru.”
Where insisting on a debate which is all about where people come from is fine, but asking about your own family heritage is “the height of bad manners” because – Bob Katter
Katter has to share his vote with One Nation, the Nationals part of the LNP, as well as Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives, where Lyle Shelton is working on carving out his niche.
And the LNP is also making a stronger move up north, with Susan McDonald, the incoming senator who will replace Barry O’Sullivan, heading to north Queensland.
Part of McDonald’s job is to improve the LNP’s standing in the north – and she has the runs on the board to do it – her family is very, very big in the cattle industry and her father is a former National party president.
That is worrying to the Katter, who came close to losing his seat in 2013, after the LNP threw a lot of money into unseating him, following the Gillard years.
.@tomwconnell: Would your grandfather be allowed in under Anning’s Australia?@RealBobKatter: I think asking people where their forebears come from is the height of bad manners.
— Sky News Australia (@SkyNewsAust) August 16, 2018
MORE: https://t.co/ykweMevBOK #SkyLiveNow pic.twitter.com/5jF1HQbiOc
Updated
And an update on that legislation I pointed you to a few posts down:
BREAKING: Whiplash as cruelty returns to Parl. Day after parl applauds opposing discriminatory migration policy, Lab joins Libs to overturn court decision & RETROSPECTIVELY justify locking people up, stopping up to 1600 ppl seeking asylum. https://t.co/u4gTN9uFL9
— Adam Bandt (@AdamBandt) August 16, 2018
Update on the Greens Manus motion:
Update: we are postponing this debate until Monday to work on shoring up the numbers. It is crucial that this inquiry happens.
— Nick McKim (@NickMcKim) August 15, 2018
Bob Katter is on Sky News, calling Katter’s Australia Party “the party of the Jews” and saying he doesn’t think Fraser Anning should apologise.
He repeats a lot of what he said yesterday.
But on the use of the term “final solution”, he had this to say:
“I mean, if he was to say that, apologise, he is just using two words in the English language, he could have said ultimate solution, or he could have used some other phrase.”
Just a reminder that this is also the same man who stood up in parliament and had a meltdown during the marriage equality debate, because the LGBTI community had “taken the word gay” from him.
In the same interview, he again accuses anyone pointing out his grandfather was born in Lebanon (Syria at the time) of being “racist”, because he is “Australian” and suggests host Tom Connell deserves “a hiding” for even talking about someone’s ancestry, having completely forgotten that he himself was only moments ago explaining why someone’s ancestry or birthplace should determine whether or not they are allowed to come here.
He is still not in Canberra.
Updated
Peter Dutton attempts legislative fix to Ashmore Reef court decision
Australian customs ships intercepted asylum seeker boats and sailed those on board for days, not to Australia but to remote Ashmore Reef, so the asylum seekers could then be sent for offshore processing.
By sailing asylum seekers in Australian government vessels through Ashmore Reef – far closer to the coast of Indonesia than Australia – those asylum seekers were judged to be “offshore entries” to Australia, and therefore eligible to be sent to immigration centres on Nauru or Papua New Guinea.
Some of those taken through the reef remain in immigration detention still, more than five years later.
But that “offshore entry” connivance has been found to be unlawful.
A court judgment this month found that Australia’s attempted excision of the Ashmore and Cartier islands (of which the reef is a part) was invalid, and up to 1,600 asylum cases may need to be revisited because of careless legislative drafting.
The excision was believed to have existed for 11 years – between 2002 and 2013 – but the court found it was never valid because the lagoon at Ashmore Reef, declared a “proclaimed port” by the then immigration minister, Philip Ruddock, was never a port at all.
“The area was an area of water within a reef. It was, it seems, navigable, but it was not disputed that the area was not, and could not be, used for the transfer of goods or passengers from vessels,” judge Justin Smith said in the federal circuit court.
1. The purpose of the migration (validation of port appointment) bill 2018 (the bill) is to confirm the validity of the appointment of a proclaimed port in the territory of Ashmore and Cartier Islands contained in the commonwealth of Australia gazette No. GN 3, 23 January 2002 (the appointment).
2. By confirming the validity of the appointment, the bill will ensure that there was a properly proclaimed port at Ashmore and Cartier Islands at all relevant times and ensure that things done under the Migration Act 1958 (the act), such as actions taken or decisions made, which relied directly or indirectly on the terms of the appointment are also valid and effective.
Updated
Joe Hockey update – our man in Washington to continues to absolutely nail it on social media.
The death toll in the Kerala floods has risen to 75.
— Alice Workman (@workmanalice) August 15, 2018
And Australia's ambassador to the US tweets this: pic.twitter.com/65d6cYVLFc
Updated
Peter Dutton: I want energy prices to be reduced, I have said that before, I am a member of the cabinet and I was loyal to Tony Abbott, I am loyal to prime minister, I’ve been …
Hadley: Are you blindly loyal?
Dutton: I am not blindly loyal
Hadley: At 38 two-party preferred in a row, a narrowing gap between that thing you cling to like a lifeboat, the better PM stakes, you got lapped as probably as everyone thought you would. Mate, 30% of the primary vote. Now, they say polls are saying you’ll hang on to your seat, but many of your mates, they’ll go down with the sinking ship come the federal election and you’ll be in opposition. And I won’t be talking to you. I won’t be talking to Shayne Neumann, because that’ll be a waste of time, or I’ll be doing is blowing that bloody horn every day, as the boats come over the horizon (horn sound effect plays) because you all listen to the prime minister at your peril (horn continues). I just don’t understand it. And for you, as a conservative politician, to tell me that you can’t see the folly of this, when the AWU and MARK BUTLER congratulating the prime minister for this stroke of genius. [They are not.]
Dutton: Mate, if you had a blue with something that Alan Jones, Jonesy said on air, you’re not going to battle it out over the airwaves, you’d have a chat with him off air. It’s no different in my game, mate.
Hadley: Let me, let me, let me clarify that for you – if you think that what Alan Jones says on his program is replicated here every day of the week …
Dutton: I am not suggesting that.
Hadley: Well, let me just tell you, that over the years Alan and I have a courtesy for each other, that I respect what he says and I say sometimes exactly the opposite.
Dutton: But you don’t bag him out on air.
Hadley: Mate, I don’t bag anyone on air that I work with, but I am looking to you to actually not just simply say – I don’t say that everything that Alan says is right, given that you have drawn that comparison, I don’t come on air and say Alan said “x, y, z and you know, Alan is 100% right”. What you are doing here today, is telling me everything the prime minister has done with the national energy guarantee is right and that’s, there is no similarity to what I do in relation to my other colleagues, including Alan Jones, no similarity, to what you are doing as a party in relation to the prime minister.
Dutton: And it is the same if you are the part of the Brisbane Broncos, you don’t go out bagging your coach, or your captain on Channel Nine, you have …
Hadley: Mate, with all due respect to you, this is a bit more important than winning the NRL premiership or winning ratings. This is about our country. THIS IS ABOUT OUR COUNTRY, mate, this is about where we are headed and we headed, as sure as night follows day, for Bill Shorten prime minister, Tanya Plibersek deputy prime minister, Neumann the immigration minister, boats over horizon annnnnnd Chris Bowen the treasurer. Chris. Bowen.
Dutton: So Ray, the most effective I can be, mate, is providing advice which I do and I give frank advice, I can promise you that, to the prime minister, to my other colleagues, if I don’t agree with what we are doing, or with a policy, or I argue vehemently that something should be changed or dropped. I get my way sometimes, sometimes I don’t. I work as a team player, I am not going to be a part of the cabinet and then bag the prime minister out, as was the case with Tony Abbott – some stuff, I didn’t agree with when Tony was prime minister, I made my case, as I have with Malcolm, where you can have a general conversation, you can have a raised voice conversation, I express my view and I give as a member of the cabinet when I can do that, but I am not bagging my colleagues or my prime minister, publicly. I have my utmost respect for my colleagues and if I have something to say to them, I say it in private and that is my responsibility as a cabinet minister.
Now, if my position changes, that is, it gets to a point where I can’t accept what thegovernment is proposing or I don’t agree, then the Westminster system is very clear – you resign your position, you don’t serve in that cabinet, and you make that very clear in a respectful way.
Hadley: Well, if someone actually did that and I am not suggesting that you be the one to do it, it may demonstrate to the prime minister, as Dennis Shanahan has written so expertly today, that he is in a very tenuous situation. If someone, in cabinet, said “I can’t countenance any longer” … 38 Newspolls, two-party preferred, you’ve lost the battle mate. If we are to have any hope against the Labor party in the forth coming federal election, we need to change the order.
Dutton: Mate …
Hadley: And if someone were to do that, maybe, just maybe, Peter, you might win that election. Just maybe.
Dutton: Well Ray, I can promise you, mate, I have no intention, and I never have, of giving up. I will fight til election day and beyond that, because Bill Shorten as prime minister of this country would be a disaster, there is no question of that, for the reasons and many others, that you’ve outlined this morning. Now, I am going to do the best I can to turn these polls around, I will do the best that I can in my portfolio, I think we kick some pretty good goals in this portfolio, we don’t get everything right, but I think that we do a good job and I want to make sure that I can be a part of restoring our fortunes, making sure that we are in a winning position by the time of the next election and I am not going to deviate from that path.
They both move on to condemning Fraser Anning and Bob Katter.
Updated
Ray Hadley has Peter Dutton on, where he hits him with the ultimate burn (“not that I agree with it”) that people are saying “you are getting closer to Scott Morrison than you have ever been before, in blindly following the words of your leader”.
It’s over the Neg. Hadley wants Dutton to say the national energy guarantee is garbage. Dutton won’t do it. Hadley is splenetic. Dutton is giving a masterclass in the passive aggressive use of “mate”.
It’s great radio.
Updated
Malcolm Turnbull was door stopped (which, for those unfamiliar with the term, is an unscheduled, quick press conference, where you basically grab someone as they walk in or out of an entry) on his way out of the new cyber security centre at the Canberra airport.
He had this to say about the Neg:
The test today – and every day – is for Bill Shorten. Does he want to stand up for lower electricity prices and back the national energy guarantee? You can see today – his old union, the AWU, is urging him to do so, joining every leading industry group in the country, the Queensland government appears to be moving to support it, to join other states. It’s about time Bill Shorten put his hand up and said he was going to back the national energy guarantee and back lower energy prices for all Australians. That’s what it’s all about.
Updated
Never let it be said that Anthony Albanese doesn’t walk the walk – after the ABC turned down the broadcast rights for Descent into the Maelstrom – The Radio Birdman Story, Albanese fired off a pretty strongly worded letter to Aunty telling them they should.
He’ll follow up that letter with a speech in the Federation Chamber at 10.20am on exactly why.
Which may be the first time Radio Birdman ever gets entered into the Hansard. I haven’t checked, so I can’t say for sure, but I can’t see too many reasons why Australian 70s punk rock would get mentioned in parliament.
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Peter Whish-Wilson will move to suspend standing orders to give precedence to the marine park management plan disallowance motion, so the Senate can have a longer debate.
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Mike Bowers headed to the ABC Parliament House showcase last night.
As usual, B1 and B2 were the biggest stars and perhaps the answer to complete bipartisanship. Maybe Mathias Cormann should engage those two to do his Senate negotiations.
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After getting up a Senate inquiry into JobActive yesterday – which Labor and the government both opposed so should have been defeated on the numbers but no one actually asked for a division so it passed on the voices – the Greens are now attempting to hold an inquiry into the “avoidable deaths” and other issues on Manus Island and Nauru.
Here is how Nick McKim explains it:
Tomorrow the Greens will move to set up a Senate inquiry into the avoidable deaths, serious health problems, abuse and neglect of people seeking asylum and refugees who are detained on Manus Island and Nauru. I urge all my Senate colleagues to support it. pic.twitter.com/hTutVgaSYr
— Nick McKim (@NickMcKim) August 15, 2018
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The divide in the Coalition party room has caused much mirth within Labor circles. This was sent out from Bill Shorten’s office this morning on Twitter:
Interesting little tidbit from Coalition partyroom in today’s @australian 🔥🔥🔥 #auspol pic.twitter.com/wZaqwbeFmo
— Shorten_Suite 👊 (@Shorten_Suite) August 15, 2018
Mark Butler had a chat to Fran Kelly on ABC radio this morning about what Labor plans on doing in regards to the Neg.
Short version: it still hasn’t made up its mind.
We are going to take this as it comes and we are going to argue very strongly for our emissions reduction target. Let’s be clear Fran, a 26% target is actually, because it comes off of a 2005 baseline, is actually a 2% target over the course of an entire decade.
What Malcolm Turnbull announced this week is a plan that will ensure there is not a single large-scale renewable energy project built for 10 years; it will halve the rate of installation of rooftop solar on people’s houses. And it will bizarrely channel billions of dollars into new coal-fired power plants that the industry says is “uninvestable” and that Snowy Hydro says would make Snowy 2.0 completely unviable.
This was not some sort of victory over Tony Abbott for Malcolm Turnbull; this was an abject surrender by Malcolm Turnbull to the hard-right agenda in climate and energy policy.
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The Australian reports Emma Husar has made a formal complaint to NSW Labor and asked for an investigation into who was leaking against her during the investigation into allegations of her work practices.
Husar announced she would not contest the next election ahead of John Whelan returning his report. The party has kept it confidential, but said it found the most serious allegations levelled against Husar could not be supported, and recommended training into running an office, as well as further investigation into the use of travel funds, which Husar had already requested.
It found no reason Husar could not remain in parliament.
The Lindsay MP is set to return to parliament next week.
So far, the Senate list looks like this: no company tax, but Mathias Cormann can bring that on when he wants. But without the numbers, the government would only do it, if a) it suddenly got the four votes it needed, or b) it just wanted to shuttle it off for defeat and recalibrate for the next election.
1. Counter-terrorism legislation amendment bill (no 1) 2018
2. Telecommunications legislation amendment (competition and consumer) bill 2018
Telecommunications (regional broadband scheme) charge bill 2018
3. Social services legislation amendment (cashless debit card trial expansion) bill 2018
4. Treasury laws amendment (black economy taskforce measures no 1) bill 2018
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One of Fraser Anning’s advisor’s announced he quit the Queensland senator’s office following the maiden speech.
His Linkedin announcement has been sent around the hallways this morning.
BREAKING Fraser Anning adviser resigns. Richard Mcgilvray says “I do not condone reference to ‘The Final Solution’” #auspol @SkyNewsAust pic.twitter.com/MsW0ZUnxUa
— Kieran Gilbert (@Kieran_Gilbert) August 15, 2018
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The treasurer, Scott Morrison, has spoken to Radio National about the national energy guarantee, including a bit of a clap-back at Tony Abbott for calling it “seriously bad policy”. Morrison said the policy had clear support in the party room and Abbott is “entitled to his view and he’s also entitled to be not correct”.
Morrison gives a number of strong hints about the government’s direction to “ensure the energy companies don’t play the system to force prices up” and backed an ACCC recommendation to introduce a standard default price for electricity offers so that users are not ripped off after introductory offers.
Morrison claims the threat of up to eight MPs and senators crossing the floor is “being overly dramatised” and says the government is “working through the issues colleagues have raised”.
On Barnaby Joyce’s calls for a price guarantee, the treasurer says he is sympathetic:
“Price-targeting is not necessarily price control of the sort of 1970s type economic policies we’ve spent the last 30 years getting rid of … What the ACCC has recommended are very strong measures to ensure the big energy companies behave to exactly the ends Barnaby’s talking about and I have a lot of sympathy with that view.”
But he also warns power prices can still go up in price regulated markets, so it’s more a matter of getting competition settings right.
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This is floating around Twitter this morning:
It's good that @PeterDutton_MP agrees with me that he & the Prime Minister have been race baiting. On his other point, we'll have to agree to disagree. #auspol #springst pic.twitter.com/yOaTFinRbT
— Philip Dalidakis MP (@philipdalidakis) August 15, 2018
Good morning
Welcome to the last day of this sitting week, where the government is attempting to retake the agenda with its energy and company tax policies.
But there is still a lot of convincing it has to do on its own side.
Overnight David Leyonhjelm’s bill to reinstate the ACT’s and NT’s rights to legislate for euthanasia fell at the second reading stage, after Peter Georgiou and Brian Burston switched their votes from yes to no.
That saves Malcolm Turnbull from another party room battle, after Leyonhjelm said he had struck a deal with the prime minister to have the bill, if it passed the Senate, taken to the House, where the Coalition would be given a free vote.
Turnbull later said the deal never existed, which upset Leyonhjelm, as well as Tony Abbott, who was annoyed “crossbenchers had more negotiating power than the backbench”.
But the bill’s fall means the Senate is free to deal with the government’s agenda again, which has Labor re-activating its attacks against company tax cuts. So far Pauline Hanson hasn’t shown much interested in doing any more position switching on the issue, and Centre Alliance have only said they would come back to the negotiating table, if PHON is back on board.
That hasn’t happened. Which has put pressure on the government over whether it will take the policy to the next election. There are a growing number of backbenchers who want the issue put to bed one way or another.
But first the party room has to come to terms with its energy policy. Malcolm Turnbull and Josh Frydenberg are still meeting with the dissenters, with up to a dozen MPs reserving their right to cross the floor.
That would leave the government without the numbers its needs to pass the federal legislation the Neg needs – making Labor’s decision a make or break one for the Neg.
We’ll bring you all those updates as they come up, along with everything else. Mike Bowers is with you, as always, capturing those moments – follow him at @mpbowers and @mikebowers. You’ll find me in the comments or @amyremeikis.
I haven’t had my coffee this morning, so this should be fun!
Ready?
Let’s get into it.
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