Fare thee well
Angry Birds? Facebook status. The treasurer enjoys a quiet moment. Now I’m going to go away and enjoy a quiet moment until we resume in the morning.
Let’s review Wednesday.
- The government announced it would proceed with inserting an effects test in the competition law – a HYOGE win for the Nationals (as Bernie Sanders might say.) Big business said bad call, small business said good call, the prime minister faced a bunch of questions about why he’d been distinctly cool on the effects test before he became Liberal party leader and implemented it nonetheless. Turnbull said he’d always had an open mind on the question.
- Conservatives went to war over the Safe Schools program, again. LNP backbencher George Christensen circulated a letter calling for the program to be defunded which he said had been signed by the majority of the government backbench. A motion backing that idea in looms in the senate.
- Labor went on the attack about the government’s lack of a tax policy, lack of a settled budget date and a lack of over-arching strategy in plain evidence. The government countered by saying Labor’s negative gearing policy was the end of capitalism, or words to that effect.
- The Senate went on with the business of debating voting reform without the fireworks of yesterday, but with continuing small proxy wars over same sex marriage between Labor and the Greens.
You’ve been legends as always. Magic Mike and I salute you. Have a lovely evening. See you in the morning.
That’s the news points. We are into the weeds of the thank you’s now. I think it’s time for us to fold the tent. I’ll be back with a summary shortly.
It’s kind of curious, Paterson’s ‘schools should reflect parents world views’ point. Why? Drawing from his own life story, as he’s just told it, he grew up in a Labor family and went to public schools. Despite that conditioning, here he is, a proud member of the Liberal party. Doesn’t that indicate that kids form their own world views, that they are not just products of their environment? That they are more than their immediate cultural conditioning?
Anyhow, we are missing Israel. Tel Aviv, bah humbug.
I am a strong supporter of the state of Israel. I admire greatly what they have built in just a few short years. Today, Israel stands not just as a beacon of liberal democracy in a sea of despotism in its own region, but a shining example to the world of how to build a prosperous, tolerant, harmonious and creative country in the toughest of circumstances.
I am proud of the generally bipartisan support Israel has enjoyed from successive Australian governments. But I think we can do more to demonstrate our solidarity. Like many nations, Australia has chosen to locate our embassy to Israel in Tel Aviv. But Tel Aviv is not Israel’s capital city. Jerusalem is. Every nation deserves the right to choose its own capital city. Since 1950 Israel has asserted it is Jerusalem. Since 1967 it has administered the entire city. The Israeli government have demonstrated time and time again that they are the best custodians for the religious and historical sites that are of significance to people of many faiths. I don’t believe that the international community can continue to refuse to recognise their capital city of choice and the clear reality on the ground.
It would be a symbolic, but important step for Australia to formally recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital city and to move our embassy there.
I should have mentioned Paterson is from the Institute of Public Affairs.
Education now, enough of this national curriculum ..
Schools should reflect parents world views.
James Paterson:
If we want to maintain our unique way of life, we must pass these values on to the next generation. As much as possible, the education system should facilitate this. Sadly, it is becoming increasingly difficult for parents to choose a school which reflects their worldview and will teach it to their children.
One of the reasons for this is the national curriculum. I must confess I am not a fan of the national curriculum on many grounds. I don’t like centralising policy in Canberra. I don’t think that removing our ability to compare competing state curriculums is a good thing. I don’t think the best educational outcomes will arise from a one-size fits all product.
But I also believe that our current national curriculum is unbalanced and skewed towards a left of centre world view, although I do acknowledge the government’s efforts to improve it. I’m particularly concerned that the cross curriculum priorities, which are to be taught in all subjects, are more aligned with progressive values than liberal or conservative ones.
Those cross curriculum priorities are: sustainability, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Histories and Cultures, Asia and Australia’s Engagement with Asia. These are all worthy areas of study.
But here are some alternative cross curriculum priorities which I believe are equally worthy, and may have been included if the original authors of the curriculum came from the other side of the political fence. For example: the importance of the free enterprise system to a prosperous country, how to secure paid employment and why the dignity of work leads to a happy life, the British heritage of our political institutions and our unique democratic freedoms
I don’t outline these ideas to suggest that the curriculum should be rewritten to reflect my personal views ..
We must make it as easy and cheap as possible to employ people ..
Paterson is clever enough not to mention the Racial Discrimination Act in the freedom section.
Now we are on to work.
I believe it is our duty to remove every obstacle we can to work. Every intervention we make in the labour market which makes it more difficult to get and keep a job should be avoided at all costs. We must make it as easy and cheap as possible to employ people, so that anyone who wants to work is able to. The most important reason why we must reform our welfare and industrial relations systems is not that it is good for the budget bottom line or the economy. We must do it because it is good for people.
Human flourishing ..
James Paterson is underway in the senate now.
Like many in the Liberal party, I don’t fit the caricature of a Liberal that our political opponents and some in the media like to imagine. I come from a traditionally Labor-voting family of long term union members and I went to public schools. But after many years of debating my parents over the dinner table and stirring my teachers in the classroom, I joined the Liberal party at age 17 because I passionately believe in Liberal values. I am a Liberal because I believe that we are most likely to achieve human flourishing if we give people freedom.
I am proud to call myself a classical liberal, because I recognise that we are the custodians of a set of ideas that go back centuries. We have inherited an incredibly proud intellectual tradition. Throughout history, liberals have fought for human progress. It was people who called themselves liberals who helped emancipate slaves, enacted religious freedom, and established the principle that all should be equal before the law.
I have come to this place to fight for the things liberals have long fought for.
For freedom of speech, personal responsibility, federalism and free markets. Of those, freedom of speech is particularly close to my heart.
Labor will tonight release a discussion paper on inequality. We’ve been flagging this eventuality in our coverage over the past few days. My colleague Lenore Taylor has filed some news ahead of the launch this evening.
A sweeping stocktake of Australia’s social policy and how it meets national need suggests future Labor governments will consider increasing unemployment benefits and help for the long-term unemployed, spend more on education, simplify family payments, revamp labour market programs and protect employees’ rights and conditions despite drastic changes in the workplace.
Coming up shortly, the senate will welcome its newest Liberal recruit, James Paterson.
Sorry I’m not ignoring you – people keep visiting my office. Shocking business.
Haven’t caught up with it all yet but a good day for Hillary Clinton by the looks.
Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Illinois, Missouri: We did it. And together, we're going to win this nomination. pic.twitter.com/6uPW4X3RUJ
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) March 16, 2016
Earlier today in the 90 second statements Christensen used the cover of parliamentary privilege to link the Safe Schools program to a pedophilia advocate. He repeated much of what he said in parliament on Sky News just a few moments ago. No privilege there.
Given I know none of the context, nor have I seen documentary material Christensen used to make his allegation – I think I’ll leave it at that.
Rightio, let’s crack on. The LNP backbencher George Christensen is on Sky News now. As we reported earlier today, Christensen is in the centre of the new controversy over the Safe Schools program. He’s told host David Speers that the letter he’s circulating calling for the program to be defunded has already be signed by the majority of the Coalition backbench in the House of Representatives. The letter will head shortly to the Senate.
While Murph is getting in touch with her inner Taylor Swift, there’s more to this morning’s Ian Macfarlane saga...
This morning, the former resources minister’s office said he had been offered the role of Queensland’s resources investment commissioner. But the position now is he’ll be rejecting it.
No reason was given.
This about face comes just hours after the Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, told reporters that Macfarlane had not been offered the role as the selection process was ongoing.
Further questions have been placed on the notice paper. Give me a moment to shake it off, and I’ll be back with the afternoon.
Burke asks rhetorically, if fear is all you have, if that’s all you’ve got, why didn’t you leave the job to Tony Abbott? He’s much better at scare campaigns than you.
And I’ve got to say, if fear is all you’ve got going for you, why did you bother replacing him?
He was better at it! Much better at it!
Labor’s Tony Burke, rather unkindly.
Some of the longest ten minutes the parliament has ever been through! Ten minutes and the backbench is still there! I haven’t heard them for so long – that speech cleared the public gallery, tranquillised the backbench.
Who would have thought we would get to the point in question time when the toughest question you could have asked a prime minister is what is your government’s tax policy!
Burke works up a doomed theme with backbench interventions.
To be warned anytime you hear someone from other side say they are passionate about an issue, the issue is doomed. The issue is doomed.
He was passionate about the republic. Doomed!
He was passionate about marriage equality. Doomed!
This guy over here was passionate about dealing with bracket creep. Doomed! Gone!
Passion about climate change. Doomed!
As long as they say they believe in something, guaranteed they will fly the kite and then cut the cord (and) watch it blow away.
Every chance they get where people think maybe they’re going to stand for something – this prime minister then comes in and shows the only leadership he’s capable of: to stand for nothing.
What we have is something who created so much hope among a lot of people, that the nation’s debate at least, whether you agree with him or disagreed with him, the debate of the nation would improve when he became PM.
And since then you can find debate – but it’s him disagreeing with himself on a daily basis.
He gets up in question time, he asks himself questions. He does an interview, he argues with what Malcolm said the day before. And I have to say you are doing really well in the debate. It’s riveting television!
That’s a fair lug of provocation, but Turnbull is responding in low key fashion. He says key economic indicators have improved during the past six months of his prime ministership. He says he’s pushing ahead with tough reforms, like media ownership and the effects test in competition law, the defence white paper, the innovation statement.
Malcolm Turnbull:
We have taken the hard problems out of the too hard basket. We have consulted carefully, considered it carefully and we have announced our decision. That is governing. That is making decisions, making hard decisions.
Shorten is talking about the shrinking prime minister. The shrinking treasurer.
Of course this poor old treasurer must hate going to cabinet these days. Has this treasurer won a single economic argument with Barnaby Joyce since he got there? I understand it must be very embarrassing to lose arguments to Barnaby Joyce!
Shorten wonders whether the treasurer has been to see the foreign minister about a diplomatic posting. Perhaps Washington? No, that’s gone. Perhaps something more low profile. New Zealand?
Shorten says Turnbull has become the ultimate hollow man, nothing more than a paid advocate for the Liberal party.
The reason why we’re not getting tax reform in this country is Mr Turnbull believes in nothing else other than himself. That is a very confident set of beliefs, I understand.
Everything he said that he believed in before he came PM: tax reform, climate change, the CSIRO, even marriage equality – all of it’s been dropped.
The only thing agile about this program are not his tax reforms, it’s his convictions.
This man puts the vain into weather vane.
Here’s the Shorten suspension motion.
That the House:
- One, notes that when the deposed the member for Warringah he promised new economic leadership for Australia. The prime minister promised significant tax reform agenda and the Turnbull government has said that the entire reason for its tax reform agenda was to deliver personal income tax cuts for Australians; and
- Two, notes that in the chaotic six months since the PM deposed the member for Warringah, the Turnbull government has floated and shelved plans for an increased GST, floated and then shelved plans for dealing with what the government has described as the excesses in negative gearing, backflipped on superannuation tax concessions, attacked Labor’s responsible plan for tobacco excise but now plans to adopt some or all of it and floated then shelved personal income tax cuts for Australians; and
- Three, notes that the only policies that the government has kept on the table are extreme cuts including from the 2014 budget, including plans for 100,000 dollar university degrees, cuts to family payments, cuts to pensions, cuts to Medicare and cuts to schools and hospitals; and
- Four, condemns the government and the PM for failing to meet their own tests, including failing to provide new economic leadership, failing to respect the intelligence of the Australian people, failing to deliver any tax reform, and failing to deliver a stable and competent government but instead leading a government wracked by chaos and dysfunction.
The suspension gives me a moment to share this happy snap of happy Bruce.
While Bill Shorten is talking the former prime minister Tony Abbott is paying studious attention to his papers.
Shorten is now on his feet seeking to suspend the standing orders.
Malcolm Turnbull, continuing:
What the honourable member is asking, he wants to know the contents of the budget on the 16th of March. He wants to know the budget on the 16th of March! They want us to present the budget in March!
Well, Mr Speaker, the contents of the budget and tax changes contained therein will be delivered on budget night, in the normal way.
And, look, Mr Speaker, the honourable members opposite, they were reckless and unwise enough to publish their own tax plans.
Oh, yes.
This is their special formula ...
Bill Shorten to Turnbull.
Q: My question is to the prime minister. What is the government’s tax policy?
Malcolm Turnbull:
The leader of the opposition knows full well that any changes to tax in any government’s life are not announced almost invariably in the budget!
Bill Shorten:
I didn’t ask what the PM’s future tax policy is. I just wanted to find out what the government’s current tax policy is.
Malcolm Turnbull:
Mr Speaker, at a high level, philosophical level, our commitment is to taxes that are lower, fairer, simpler. We want to ensure that the tax system works as effectively as possible and applies the least dead weight loss to if economy.
Malcolm Turnbull:
Lower house prices, higher rents, less investment, that can mean only one thing – fewer jobs, fewer businesses, less enterprise. That is Labor’s recipe: It’s a recipe for economic failure.
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull.
Q: My question is to the prime minister. Last year the prime minister said: “Bracket creep is seeing Australians earnings on average head into the second top tax bracket.” PM isn’t breaking your word on tax cuts more proof that every idea this prime minister has ends up going right down the drain?
Now, Bill, about your negative gearing policy.
All the Dorothy’s today have been on the effects test thus far.
All business will be able to back themselves, will be able to take risks, will be able to engage in that entrepreneurial activity, which means that we can grow jobs in our economy.
(This is small business minister Kelly O’Dwyer. I really have been here too long. I can’t quite wrap my mind around her supporting an effects test. Too much cognitive dissonance.)
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull.
Q: My question is to the prime minister. The prime minister promised new economic leadership. The government promised tax cuts. Isn’t it true that all things that the government promised have gone down the drain and all that are left are the extreme cuts of the Abbott government’s 2014 budget?
The prime minister thinks things are going well. Thanks for asking. The government is providing real economic leadership.
Green MP Adam Bandt to Malcolm Turnbull.
Q: My question is to the PM. NASA has just said that February was the hottest month on record ever. Smashing a century of global temperature records by a stunning margin, results that scientists have described as a climate emergency. Prime minister, do you agree with your own chief scientist that under current policies we are losing the battle against climate change?
Turnbull says emotion and passion is all very well but evidence matters more.
What we need in the response to global warming - and I don’t doubt the temperature figures that the honourable member referred to, but what we need is a clear commitment of all governments, all major economies, to emissions reduction strategies.
We have made those commitments. We have the policies in place. They are working. And that is the object of the exercise. This is not a question - emotion and passion all have their place. But in terms of reducing our emissions, what we need is policies that work.
The policies that are in place are working, they are able to meet the targets that we committed to in Paris and if they do so and if other nations continue to do so we will be well on the way to ensuring that we meet the global objective.
(Other questions also matter with respect. Policies working – well, that’s still moot right now – at what cost? That used to be a foundation question in climate policy, emissions reduction at least cost. You can’t say that about direct action.)
Bowen, persisting with Morrison and passion.
Q: My question is to the treasurer. The treasurer said the government wanted to deliver: “large personal income tax cuts, significant personal income tax cuts, big income tax cuts, very big income tax cuts and bigger income tax cuts”. Treasurer, what happened? What killed off the treasurer’s passion and what exactly does the treasurer stand for?
Morrison says it helps to have a surplus when you think about cutting taxes. Labor didn’t leave the government a surplus. He says the government looked at a tax mix switch but the numbers didn’t add up. Now we are at Labor’s wickedness on the negative gearing policy.
Scott Morrison:
Under the policy of housing affordability, apparently the way you address housing affordability is stopping people investing in shops and shares and factories and partnerships and vehicles and all these things.
Mr Speaker, this government doesn’t rush out with ill-considered policies.
We leave that to those opposite.
A Dorothy Dixer for Morrison on the effects tests being a consumer nirvana.
Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen.
Q: My question is to the treasurer. In January, the treasurer said that fixing bracket creep was one of his highest priorities saying: ‘I’m quite passionate about it because I think it’s one of the things that is holding the Australian economy back.’ But now, less than two months later the government has walked away from income tax cuts. What is the point of this government? What has happened to the treasurer’s passion? And when will the government start governing?
Scott Morrison says the government will do what it can to help people out there earning in the economy.
This is the government on this side of the House that got rid of the carbon tax, this is the government on this side of the House that got rid of the mining tax, got rid of the member’s opposite bank deposits tax. This is the government that has reduced taxes, not increased taxes in net terms. What we have done is delivered on our commitments to reduce the tax burden on Australians and that is what we are about.
Moving on now to lost passions.
I mean, seriously.
Bruce Billson is given the Dorothy Dixer to ask about the effects test. He’s delighted.
Malcolm Turnbull:
I’m equally delighted to be asked that question by the member who as a small business minister was such a champion for small business, radiating enthusiasm.
(Someone who has been in this building for more than five minutes might be then prompted to inquire, well, why did you dump him as small business minister then?)
Question time
The Labor leader Bill Shorten begins on uncertainty.
Q: Prime minister, will there be a tax statement? When is the budget? And will the government start issuing use by dates on every answer it gives on these matters?
Malcolm Turnbull thinks he’ll have a word about Labor’s negative gearing policy. It’s terribly wicked.
Rents will go up, home values will also go down, that is what a Labor budget would look like!
Just quickly before daggers are drawn. I did love this picture of Mike’s from earlier today. Best share it, really.
Question time in a moment. Just enough time for a hot buttered crumpet.
A quick wrap of Mitch Fifield at the press club. Could this be the end of Senate brick lego? (NEVER!) The communications minister and government Senate leader, Mitch Fifield, threw his support behind changing rules so that camos can take video and still images in the chamber.
“I want the change because I’m sick and tired of the House of Reps getting front page pics of members of the House at historic moments doing interesting things, and there’s just not that opportunity for us. So I think purely in the self-interest of senators, that should change,” Fifield told journalists at the National Press Club.
During the address, the minister also rejected suggestions that SBS and the ABC should amalgamate, saying the two have distinct roles. He also praised the contribution of media barons like Rupert Murdoch.
“When it comes to a particular families who have been engaged in the media industry, whether they be the Murdochs or the Packers in times gone by or the Stokes, I think there’ve been forces for good,” Fifield said. “When it comes to the particular configurations of media organisations in the country, I’m fairly agnostic.”
The former small business minister, Bruce Billson, is standing up in the chamber now. Billson was the small business minister when Tony Abbott was prime minister. Billson was a one man campaign for the effects test when he was the small business minister. He was completely rolled by the anti-effects test faction. Turnbull chose not to keep him in on the small business portfolio when he took the Liberal party leadership.
Billson, now a backbencher, is quite pleased with the day’s events.
A very important and welcome move.
We'll gag if you do: Greens
The skirmish over who is more progressive on same-sex marriage is continuing after a messy day in the Senate over the issue yesterday. The Greens have now written to Labor asking them to bring the debate on same-sex marriage to a vote on Thursday. Labor conceded its private members time to debate the Greens bill, after the Greens voted with the Coalition to gag debate on the bill on Tuesday. The debate will go for just one hour, meaning it would need to be gagged in order to move to a vote. “A number if senators from all sides of this debate have already made contributions to this bill,” the letter from Greens leader Richard Di Natale and senator Robert Simms, said. “We look forward to the Labor party moving for a vote during your Private Senator’s time, and assure you of the support of the Australian Greens for this vote.”
Updated
Down in one of the courtyards, the National leader Barnaby Joyce, is stoked. How did you get past the lawyers, he’s asked? How did you get past the Liberals? Everyone agreed this was the best course, Joyce says, diplomatic in victory.
Let the angels sing.
There was a final question about unions right of veto about tenders in the ACT, which is a story from The Australian this morning, which I’ve ignored, because it’s not a national story. The Dorothy Dixer to the prime minister from Dennis Shanahan, political editor of The Australian, gives the prime minister a helpful opening to change the subject. Labor needs to pass the ABCC bill, he says. Like now. (Except not this week, because the government yesterday declined the opportunity to debate the ABCC legislation this week.)
Q: I know you are saying we should suppress our curiosity – good luck with that – but I think Australian voters might be confused at the moment. They are hearing there is going to be a double dissolution, there is not going to be, there is going to be an early budget, there won’t be tax cuts, there will be tax cuts. What’s going on?
Malcolm Turnbull:
The first thing, as you know, there is always speculation about what will be in the budget. It is an annual fever. The budget speculation starts this time of year and comes to an end when the budget is delivered. That’s an annual event.
There is a triennial event which is speculation about the election date. That follows a familiar pattern. All I can say to you is this is election speculation, budget speculation, these are traditional parts of our political process and they will all be resolved, in one case, when the budget is delivered, in the other case, when the election is called.
Will the legislation be presented before the election? The prime minister says the legislation will find its way into the House in the normal manner.
Morrison is asked about the key concern about an effects test: that companies in a competitive market don’t know in advance the effects of their action, hence the provision might chill normal commercial activity. The treasurer says companies can seek authorisation if they are worried via the ACCC.
Q: Are you saying your position hasn’t evolved or changed on these matters since the discussion in the Abbott Cabinet because it was widely understood at that time you were at least sceptical about the Harper review?
Malcolm Turnbull:
I have always been open-minded about this.
Q: Last time it was discussed in Cabinet, it was put by some of the lawyers in Cabinet it would produce a lawyer’s picnic. Have the same arguments been presented this time around? What’s convinced you that still isn’t the case?
Malcolm Turnbull:
My Cabinet is – you may speculate about what is said in our Cabinet but you won’t get the same degree of transparency if you like as to Cabinet discussions; they are confidential.
We do have lots of lawyers in the Cabinet. All I can tell you without breaching Cabinet secrecy is the discussion was extreme erudite and I was proud to be the leader of such a fine and thoughtful and well-schooled group of men and women.
Excuse me suppressing a chuckle. I think I described it earlier today as a guffaw.
"I've always had an open mind .."
First question it to Turnbull. Why have you backflipped?
No, no nooooo, says the prime minister.
I have always taken a thoroughly open mind to this issue. I have had quite a lot of experience with competition in a practical sense, particularly with emerging businesses competing with larger businesses so I’m not a theorist in this area – but I’ve approached this issue of law reform in a very open-minded way.
The assistant treasurer Kelly O’Dwyer, who worked in the office of the former treasurer Peter Costello, when he was hell bent on making sure the Nationals didn’t get an effects test, now thinks this is terrific for small business.
This is a government that backs small business. This is a government that backs competition. This is a change that is unashamedly pro-competition.
The treasurer, Scott Morrison.
It’s about competition. It’s not about whether one is taking the view of larger businesses or smaller businesses or medium-sized businesses.
It’s about taking the view that competition benefits the consumer. That’s what is at the heart of changes we have announced today.
Malcolm Turnbull:
This is yet again a case of my government taking long overdue reforms out of the too-hard basket and getting on with the job.
This is reform, a long overdue reform, one that has been canvassed for many years, one that has been in the long grass for many years ...
(It was certainly in the long grass during the Abbott years, because of a cabinet revolt. Yes, it was.)
There has never been a more exciting time .. to have hot breath
The prime minister has bounded into his courtyard announcing the government will accept the recommendations of the Harper review on the effects test. I’ve shared those with you in a post earlier.
Innovative businesses are competitive businesses, Turnbull says.
They are more innovative if the hot breath of competition is coming down their neck.
Back to the effects test and small business clapping hands. Peter Strong, chief executive officer of the Council of Small Business Australia (Cosboa) has long campaigned for an effects test and has congratulated the Turnbull government for its “gumption” and following due process.
“Congratulations to the cabinet for showing gumption,” Strong said. “They resisted BCA (Business Council of Australia) and Wesfarmers and the like.”
“We think it is not strong enough but they have gone with the recommendations of an independent panel and it is really pleasing that the government can make the decision.”
Strong said Cosboa had been openly consulted in two roundtables and then he heard nothing. “Yet the CEO of Wesfarmers was saying last week he didn’t know any cabinet minister that supported it. He was obviously wrong.”
Ah yes, he gets to it. Fifield explains that the new environment has hit the revenue streams of what he politely terms longstanding media companies. Ad revenues are down, particularly in print.
Mitch Fifield:
This is the environment the more long established platforms are operating in. It is a market defined by unparalleled choice across multiple platforms. The current media regulations that I’m seeking to remove are a pair of cast iron shackles. They’re a pair of cast iron shackles on competition and I think they’re to the detriment of media of longstanding.
(So the rationale is if you let Rupert Murdoch own both the Ten Network, pay television interests and the newspapers, and Nine merge with Fairfax, all will be well. A bright new future looms.)
Speaking of bright new futures, the prime minister and the effects test will be with us in a moment. I will need to look there.
Over at the National Press Club, the communications minister Mitch Fifield is talking about disruption. It troubles the communications minister that disruption is seen as a negative word, that it implies that change is somehow bad.
Whereas, I think technology and the way it’s changing lives is one of the most overwhelming forces for good in human history. Our lives are easier, we are more productive, people are more connected and that’s all good.
(Except in a media context, where technological disruption is leading to the destruction of the business model for commercial journalism, leading to circumstances where quality journalism is under significant threat. I wonder if that will get a look in at any point today?)
Here is the specific recommendation on the effects test from the Harper review. The Harper review was established under the Abbott government to consider the whole sweep of the competition law, and make recommendations about how it could be improved.
The effects test sits at section 46.
- The panel finds that section 46 [of the competition law], dealing with the misuse of market power, is deficient in its current form.
- It does not usefully distinguish pro-competitive from anti-competitive conduct. Its sole focus on ‘purpose’ is misdirected as a matter of policy and out of step with international approaches.
-
Section 46 should instead prohibit conduct by firms with substantial market power that has the purpose, effect or likely effect of substantially lessening competition, consistent with other prohibitions in the competition law.
- It should direct the court to weigh the pro-competitive and anti-competitive impact of the conduct.
- The panel recommends a number of changes to simplify and clarify the operation of the law, to bring to the forefront the competition policy objectives of the law and to reduce business compliance costs.
- The cartel provisions should be simplified. The price signalling provisions should be removed and replaced, by extending section 45 governing contracts, arrangements and understandings that affect competition to also cover concerted practices that have the purpose, effect or likely effect of substantially lessening competition.
Assuming it’s a full bottle effects test, small business will love it.
The cabinet decision on the effects test is being put now to a special meeting of the Coalition party room. The prime minister and the treasurer will address reporters afterwards.
Big business won’t like it. As long as the Nationals have campaigned for an effects test, big business has campaigned against one.
The short version of the politics of an effects test. The Nationals want it. They’ve campaigned for it for years, and when I say years, I mean as long as I’ve been in this building. The economic rationalists of the Liberal party have resisted this notion for years. Including Turnbull, when he wasn’t the leader.
If you don’t speak competition law – an effects test is designed to stop big firms misusing their market power. Critics of effects tests say they drive up consumer prices.
Stand by for an effects test
Coming up shortly: the communications minister at the National Press Club.
And the prime minister will shortly confirm a decision by Cabinet to implement an effects test in the competition law. This is a fairly amazing development, given Turnbull argued pretty vigorously against an effects test before he took the Liberal leadership from Tony Abbott.
Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk says it is no secret that Macfarlane has applied for the job of Queensland resources commissioner, which will be decided according to a merit based selection. She says the government would like whomever the successful applicant is to start in the new gig soon.
The Queensland premier is speaking to reporters in Brisbane now. She is asked whether Ian Macfarlane has a job or not.
He has applied for the job. I can confirm he has applied.
Because today wasn’t quite unhinged enough. Apparently the Queensland government is now disputing the fact that Ian Macfarlane has been offered a job in the state. I’ll keep you posted as (disputed) particulars come to hand. Usually you can rely on someone being able to report accurately whether they have a job offer or not. Politics does move the goal posts on reliability, though.
Prem Palaszczuk S/man says selection process is ongoing. Insists No offer has been made. https://t.co/XvducMDAkN
— Patrick Condren (@PatrickCondren) March 16, 2016
In Florida, Marco Rubio has just suspended his campaign after failing to win his home state of Florida in the Republican primaries.
Summary this almost lunchtime
I know we are early but a small cluster of things is going to happen between about noon and 2pm, so I’m getting in early with our stocktake.
Let’s recap Wednesday morning in Canberra.
- The communications minister Mitch Fifield thinks the budget is on May 10, but who knows.
- The Senate has resumed debate on the government’s voting reform legislation. When will this debate come to a conclusion? Who knows.
- Conservative MPs opposed to the Safe Schools program remain opposed to the Safe Schools program after an independent review, and may show their displeasure by bringing forward a motion blasting the program or by having a fresh committee inquiry into the program. Will the prime minister Malcolm Turnbull sue for peace with said conservatives or will he declare that enough is enough? Who knows.
- Will the senate vote on the Greens marriage equality bill on Thursday or just have a short debate before returning to the voting legislation bill? Who knows.
- Will Liberal Ian Macfarlane remain in parliament until the election or will he accept a new job offer from the Queensland government? Who knows.
Yes, that is Wednesday. Delightful.
Cue restorative drumming solo.
We could use a blast of grannies right about now.
Don’t you reckon?
My colleague Shalailah Medhora has been told by Macfarlane’s office the new job is resources investment commissioner for the Queensland government. The official word is he intends to stay in parliament until the election, unless he announces otherwise. Which is a fairly significant unless in the circumstances.
Political editor for Sky News, David Speers, is reporting that Queensland Liberal Ian Macfarlane has been offered a job by the Queensland government. The implications of this are obvious. Will he leave the parliament and trigger a by-election?
Some pictures from earlier of Bill Shorten with the poorly treated workers.
Back to Chris Bowen for a moment. The shadow treasurer was asked about his own negative gearing policy. Was Labor really prepared to implement this policy, particularly if it discovered significant implementation issues along the way? Paul Keating tried to fiddle with negative gearing in the 1980s and ditched it after-all. Might he do the same thing?
Bowen says he’s not for turning.
Our policy is clear. It will be implemented by an incoming Labor government.
While I’ve been trying not to smack my head on the desk, Magic Mike has been shaking his tail feather bringing me visuals of the day. He visited grandmas for refugees earlier today, bless them.
There is a lot about today that is making me laugh out loud. There’s quite a large laugh coming up a bit later on as well, but we’ll get to that in due course. The big guffaw.
Down in the courtyard, the shadow treasurer Chris Bowen is laying into the treasurer Scott Morrison. It’s quite clear Scott Morrison should hand back the keys to the treasury portfolio, Bowen says.
We don’t even know when the budget will be.
Over in the Mural Hall, the prime minister Malcolm Turnbull is making sure we are all pulling in the same direction. Worthy aspiration. This is a speech about regional development.
Bob Day, continuing.
A petard is French for bomb.
Over in the senate, debate has begun on the voting reform legislation. Family First senator Bob Day is speaking presently, saying he can’t believe the government has moved to stifle independent voices in the senate. This is an odd line of argument from this particular parliamentarian given he has voted with the government more often than any other cross bencher. But why sweat the small incomprehensible things when the big things are equally incomprehensible. Day says this proposal will see the government introduce first past the post voting by stealth. Foul deeds will rise.
Politics tragics who still watch the telly will be aware that there is a lot of taxpayer funded advertising on TV at the moment, some of it quite general in nature.
Labor isn’t worried about the lack of verbs, it’s worried that at least one current campaign – welcome to the ideas boom – breaches official guidelines on taxpayer funded advertising.
Pat Conroy has written to the Commonwealth auditor-general asking whether the $28m innovation policy campaign uses a political slogan. The guidelines prohibit the use of political slogans.
The campaign says: “There has never been a more exciting time to be an Australian.” If that formulation sounds familiar, it is. We know who says this because he says it very often. Most days. Sometimes several times a day. He’s a politician, and a senior one.
Conroy has asked the auditor-general to rule on the matter, and also rule on whether or not the campaign is factual and verifiable.
Sometimes you’ve just got to dive in.
Persisting on Safe Schools, Shorten says Turnbull is going to have to decide whether to back his education minister, or side with the “tin foil hate brigade” in the Liberal party’s right wing. Shorten says the prime minister can’t do both.
Bill Shorten:
The idea behind Safe Schools is that children who are grappling with their sexuality, who are dealing with the toughest issues teenagers can in terms of bullying, that Safe Schools would provide resources for schools to be able to help students. It’s a voluntary scheme. Schools opt in to the Safe Schools program.
Who is Mr Turnbull or indeed the sort of the tin foil hat brigade in the Liberal right wing in the senate to start second guessing school councils, school principals and the administrators?
Shorten rounded out his opening remarks by calling on the prime minister to stand up to the “hard right” on the Safe Schools program, and while he’s at it, share the date of the budget.
If Mr Turnbull is in the mood to stop the chaos and start governing, stop playing games with the date of the budget, just say that the budget is on May 10 and if Mr Turnbull is feeling really bold and excited about governing, he might even tell us the date of the election so we can all get on with the business of governing Australia in the interests of all Australians.
Updated
Down in the courtyard, the Labor leader Bill Shorten is holding an event with a couple of workers who have been poorly treated by their employers. Later today the ALP will release a paper about inequality.
Bill Shorten:
Listening to those two workers tell their stories reveals a picture of Australia, an under belly which Mr Turnbull likes to pretend doesn’t exist. It is not an exciting time, if you work in hospitality, or at 7-Eleven, if you’re casualised and you’re getting ripped off.
Another unknown of the political week is how long Labor will push out the parliamentary debate on Senate voting reform. Readers with me yesterday will know the senate roiled for several hours, with procedural skirmishes and forceful protestations of dishonour and treachery. The legislative debate is back on the agenda for today.
Labor’s senate leader Penny Wong didn’t answer specifically when asked this morning how long Labor intended to filibuster on senate voting reform. She said the opposition would continue to press its case. By that we can read they will talk it out.
One other moving part associated with events yesterday. The Greens yesterday voted against an opportunity to bring forward their own marriage equality bill for a vote. (Yes, that happened.) It happened because the government and the Greens had agreed that this week in the senate would be dedicated to the senate voting reform issue.
To paper over the political embarrassment associated with being seen to gag your own proposal, the Greens proposed to have the marriage equality bill considered in private member’s business on Thursday. The Greens are saying the issue can come to a vote on Thursday if Labor agrees. Wong was asked about this on radio this morning, would she support it being put to a vote?
Penny Wong to host Fran Kelly from Radio National Breakfast.
Are you saying that’s a smart way to deal with marriage equality? Three speakers and a gag?
Kelly thought this might be a case of a bird in the hand. Why sweat the procedure if you get the outcome?
Wong didn’t sound convinced, but she said Labor’s door was open. If the Greens were flexible, then Labor would consider being flexible.
Defend! Defend!
A bit more on that parliamentary inquiry into Safe Schools that Murph flagged before. The LNP backbencher George Christensen will today write to fellow Coalition MPs to ask them to seek change to the program.
Christensen wants a parliamentary inquiry into the program or for it to be radically overhauled in order to remove its “political agenda”.
“I am confident that something has to happen on this,” Christensen told Guardian Australia, adding that the “majority” of the backbench has concerns with Safe Schools.
More vigorous clean family fun on the sporting field. Endorphins. A marvel. I only run in emergencies but I don’t seek to prohibit anyone else from running.
Some other major moving parts of the morning.
Let’s open with the budget.
Budget cycles are funny things. I see in today’s early news cycle that we are pretending that it’s new that the treasurer Scott Morrison is hosing down the notion he’ll be delivering personal income tax cuts in the coming budget.
It isn’t new. Morrison has been hosing that prospect down at least since his famous press club speech several weeks back when he apparently forgot he was the treasurer and thought he was just some guy at a lectern having a conversation about backing “in” the Australians he approved of (whatever that means).
But anyway, let’s pretend it’s new. Morrison is sending ever stronger signals that there won’t be generous tax cuts in the budget because the government can’t afford generous tax cuts without a switch in the tax mix, which is a polite way of characterising a GST increase. All that raving from Morrison about how bracket creep was the end of humanity and enterprise and personal fulfilment has come to two fifths of bugger all.
So noted.
Now let’s consider the budget date.
The government is leaving its options open on budget timing while trotting out various formulations pretending the budget will be on May 10.
It was the communications minister Mitch Fifield’s turn this morning.
The budget is scheduled for May 10.
Which of course is a distance from being definitive. Fifield added on the ABC May 10 was the timetable he was working towards as communications minister.
Labor and the Greens are making it clear they will not support bringing the Senate back early to accommodate the prime minister’s timetable for a double dissolution election.
The government could bring the House back early to deliver the budget on May 3 rather than May 10, and pass a supply bill to keep the apparatus of government ticking over despite the onset of an early election.
There are a number of balls in the air currently. It will remain pretty much unfathomable until the government starts making concrete decisions.
Updated
Before we return to the sporting field, some further and betters now on Safe Schools. In terms of the motion I flagged in the opening post, I gather the story is this.
LNP senator Barry O’Sullivan several weeks ago flagged internally a fighting words motion on Safe Schools. He was persuaded not to proceed with the motion by the education minister Simon Birmingham. But this motion is highly likely to re-appear today. The Liberal senator Cory Bernardi is also expected to put his name to it.
Unless I’m forgetting procedure, the senators would have to give notice of the motion today, and proceed to debate tomorrow. There is also talk around the government of a House of Representatives committee inquiry into the program.
MPs opposed to the program say the review of the program had ridiculously narrow terms of reference. It didn’t look at supplementary materials associated with the program, and it looked at a handful of schools that had not yet implemented the program in classrooms. The word whitewash is being used.
Far too early for this I fear but I’ll share regardless. Mike Bowers has been hanging out with parliamentarians as they indulge various sporting activities this morning. National Darren Chester is looking pretty happy with the aquatics.
Lots more photographic marvels, I’ll share more shortly.
Well hello there
Greetings earthians and welcome to Wednesday in Canberra, and what a lovely Wednesday it is. At least before the hollering starts.
There are a number of issues bubbling away early. The Safe Schools program is back on the political agenda after a meeting last night of Coalition backbenchers. The backbenchers were briefed on the outcome of a review into the program by the University of Western Australia emeritus professor Bill Louden.
Regular readers will remember that particular review happened after a spot of foot stamping in the Coalition party room about the program – an anti-bullying initiative. Conservatives feel the program is pushing a rainbow agenda, which sounds harmless, peaceful even, remunerative too, in the event one can find a pot of gold at the base of the colourful arc, but apparently isn’t. Apparently it is the end of civilisation.
The ABC reports this morning that one MP, post Louden briefing, declared: “The minister needs to fix this [the Safe Schools program] or resign.” The voluble declaration was sadly detached from a name, so it’s not clear who is talking so tough safely under the cover of anonymity. In any case, it doesn’t much matter – bottom line is this story was always going to travel in a predictable arc. The government MPs who want this program gone would only be happy with one review outcome: the cancelation of the program. There’s some talk this morning of a parliamentary motion calling for the program to be defunded. I’m not sure whether it’s serious or not. I’m sure we’ll find out.
The education minister Simon Birmingham, a supporter of the program, has a difficult path to walk. The prime minister will also have to make a decision about whether he draws a hard line and asserts a principle (something he’s not readily inclined to do during head ons with conservatives in his own ranks) or whether there’s some other means of putting critics back in their boxes.
Many more things on the go in Canberra but let’s get your conversation cracking. The thread is open for your business. Magic Mike and I are up and about on the twits. He’s @mpbowers and I’m @murpharoo You can also make a contribution to today’s conversation at my new Facebook forum, which you can find here.
Shun all moonbeams and rainbows. Here comes Wednesday.
