Let us fold this magic tent
That’s enough I think, enough of this Politics Live great goodness. Lets all have an evening before regrouping in tight battle formation at 8am tomorrow.
But first, let’s recap Monday.
- Newspoll showed the major parties in a dead heat, but one poll does not a trend make. Or more elegant words to that effect.
- The government decided today was the day when Senate voting reform would burst out of the cupboard into public consciousness. The Greens say yes, Nick Xenophon says yes, Labor says more than likely no, and various cross benchers say this will spell the end of the micro-parties, which is, from their perspective, Not On.
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Malcolm Turnbull pretty much ruled out doing anything much on capital gains tax (with some footnotes) and waggled a disapproving finger at Labor for being stupid about business and investment strategies and inherently opposed to luring kids back from Silicon Valley.
- The prime minister also appeared to walk back half a centimetre on double dissolutions but only half a centimetre. I still wouldn’t book a holiday in July, myself.
- Sydney broadcaster Ray Hadley sulked because the treasurer Scott Morrison declined to make himself available on his program, in accordance with their settled Monday tradition. Hadley told his listeners he had intended to rebuke the treasurer for having nothing to say. You know it makes sense.
- Immigration minister Peter Dutton suggested during question time asylum seekers (unnamed) were self harming as some kind of method of getting Australian citizenship via a short hospital stay. Green Adam Bandt and independent Andrew Wilkie were unhappy with this sledge and attempted to censure the minister for his remarks.
There was more, but there’s your main points.
Thanks for your company. See you in the morning.
Senator Jacqui Lambie, on the ABC just now, on the intrinsic merits of the Senate cross bench.
We’ve done a lot of great goodness up here.
Catching up with a little Mikearoo magic.
My colleagues Lenore Taylor and Daniel Hurst report the prime minister has invited all the senate crossbenchers round for a bite of tea on Thursday night. Peace, love and harmony. And Awks.
Here’s a picture of the visitors today at the Parliamentary Friendship Group for LGBTI Australians – referenced in Shalailah’s post.
Continuing to take stock of other matters, both the Coalition and Labor have signalled today that they are examining options for changing the laws around cross hormone therapy for transgender children.
At the moment, transgender minors and their parents must get permission from the Family Court before doctors can administer oestrogen or testosterone. Australia is the only country in the world to mandate judicial oversight in this area.
But both major parties have indicated that they will look at options to change that, a move welcomed by advocates. “We’ve been through the courts three times, and it’s a horrible, horrible process and we need to make sure that this doesn’t happen to any other family,” transgender teen, Georgie Stone, told Guardian Australia during a visit to parliament today. “There were changes happening to my body that I didn’t want and we had to apply to these people who didn’t even know us to make decisions about my body, which is just wrong. And I think it’s discriminatory and it has to change.”
Parents and their transgender children attended an event in Parliament House aimed at pressuring the government to change what they say is an “increasingly large barrier” to transitioning - the requirement that the Family Court must sign off on cross hormone therapy.
Turning to the other key matter of the day, Senate voting reform, Labor is still sounding less than convinced on this proposal.
A spokesman for Bill Shorten says the proposal will go through the usual shadow cabinet and caucus process, but (you felt that but coming, didn’t you) ..
Labor is concerned this looks very much like Malcolm Turnbull’s Greens party preference deal. It is not in the nation’s interest or our economic future to give the Greens party the balance of power in the Senate.
Reading each statement in context, this is what I think. I think Andrew Wilkie was perfectly entitled to call Dutton out on his self-harm/blackmail remark, which was quite something (as I noted covering it in real time.)
Dutton has a habit of making general declarations about such things without feeling much obligation to peg himself to facts: actual examples, actual cases, that would support such a serious allegation. It’s always inference, political word painting with a clear object of presenting behaviour as undesirable, and being called periodically on your sledge is an essential part of a healthy democracy. If he gets called more often, perhaps the minister will be more careful in his characterisations.
But in terms of the Marles rationale – the analysis that said Wilkie hasn’t represented precisely what Dutton said, therefore we can’t support this censure motion – it is actually possible to read Dutton’s comment this afternoon as one of his many general statements that I’ll categorise as “what these (dreadful) people” do – rather than a specific reflection on this particular case involving the baby in Brisbane.
There’s a small fig leaf there. I don’t regard the fig leaf as particularly compelling, but it is there. Convenient for Marles that the tiny fig leaf is there, because here is the actual truth: Labor really doesn’t want the current debate about the treatment of this child and other children in immigration detention. It would really like this debate to go the hell away.
Labor is caught, as the party always is, between “traditional” Labor voters who absolutely support policies like Operation Sovereign Borders and progressive Labor voters who are completely disgusted by the policy. This asylum debate for Labor is like a scab that won’t heal. Which is, of course, a fact not lost on the Greens, who want progressive voters to defect and stay.
One more thing should be noted about the circumstances of the baby. Because the government tells us nothing about its own behaviour concerning asylum seekers, and about their practical circumstances far out of sight and out of mind, we don’t know specifics about this case. We really don’t know key facts that would be useful to know in order to make a judgment about this specific case. And rather than pursuing a policy of disclosure and transparency, the government simply blames reporters for getting detail wrong, and characterises advocates for the asylum seekers as pursuing a strategy of boosting their own media profiles (as if this is something a person of conscience would actually contemplate doing).
Those immutable facts, and the inevitable overlay of politics, tend render these discussions incredibly suboptimal. We journalists can’t keep the public properly informed because the government won’t allow us to do that, and the government then blames us for failing to be accurate. It’s a disgrace, and the absurdity of fictions, the absurdity of the policy contortions, the deeply irritating false binaries and false equivalences in this debate, are obviously unsustainable to anyone who looks at this area for more than five minutes.
Thus ends my analysis.
Rightio, several readers have been in touch wondering how it is that Richard Marles can say Labor doesn’t support the Wilkie motion (censuring Peter Dutton) on the basis the wording was over egged. The only way to get to the bottom of this is backtrack to the motion, which I missed, because it was brought on on the fly.
Thanks to Andrew Wilkie’s office, here is the motion put this afternoon.
That the minister for immigration and border protection be censured for implying that the baby Asha was deliberately harmed as a means of facilitating asylum seeker access to Australia.
So let’s work through this carefully.
In question time, Dutton said the following.
I’m not going to conduct a situation, not going to preside over a situation where we have people self harming to come to hospitals in this country because they believe that is the route out into the Australian community for Australian citizenship.
This remark was in response to a question from Adam Bandt. Here was his question, which went to Turnbull before it was redirected to Dutton.
Adam Bandt:
Q: Doctors have said that returning baby Asha to detention would harm her. Your immigration minister has decided not to send her to Nauru for the time being but said it will happen later. Prime minister, do you agree with the doctors that detention harms children or are you waiting until after the election to deport babies and children to Nauru?
This was Dutton’s full answer. To make a fair judgment I think we need the full answer.
Peter Dutton:
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. I thank the member for his question. Last year when the shadow immigration minister addressed the Labor party conference and he said that Labor regretted the decisions they made which resulted in children drowning at sea, I thought his words were profound and I thought they were genuine, I thought they were sincere and it’s why the Labor party decided to move away from the policy which had seen 50,000 people arrive on 800 boats and 1,200 people drowned at sea.
Since Operation Sovereign Borders has been implemented we have been able to stare down the threat from people smugglers. Not one death at sea has been reported over that period. We have the ability to turn back boats where it’s safe to do so and it’s the policy of both government and opposition in this country to continue regional processing because we know that it works in stopping the boats. Now we are working with third countries to try and provide alternative arrangements but we have been very clear and I repeat this today, because the people smugglers listen to every word spoken in this place, spoken by premiers and other leaders around the country, let me be very clear to these people.
We will not be held to ransom, we will not be blackmailed into changing this policy because this policy has resulted in lives being saved. And we are not going to retreat on what has been a successful policy because I’m not going to preside over an arrangement which the Greens presided over when they were in coalition with the Rudd and Gillard governments which saw children drown at sea. I’m not going to allow that to return.
We have said we will look at each case compassionately, on its merit, and we will decide in relation to those cases what is in the best interests of those children or of those families.
I’m not going to conduct a situation, not going to preside over a situation where we have people self harming to come to hospitals in this country because they believe that is the route out into the Australian community for Australian citizenship.
Now we know that we will provide medical assistance, including to this baby, and including to other people we have brought to this country and when the medical assistance has been provided, Mr Speaker, to that family or to that individual, the policy of this government, the policy of the opposition is that that person will return to Nauru. We will provide support and assistance to return people back to their country of origin if they have found to be not under protection and that is the policy we will continue because we are not going to allow the people smugglers to get back into business.
I’ll let you think on that, before I come back in the next post and share my thoughts.
I’ll try and track down the precise wording of that Wilkie motion.
In the meantime, here was that vote.
The Gov & Oppos vote against @WilkieMP @Indigocathy and @AdamBandt as they attempt to censure Min Dutton @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/BvvywMsGJD
— Mikearoo (@mpbowers) February 22, 2016
Labor’s immigration spokesman Richard Marles says he won’t support the censure motion because it over eggs what Dutton said in the parliament during question time today. Marles says in this debate, it is very important to sift facts from spin. Marles says this debate has to be conducted on the basis of accurately representing what people say, not distorting what they say.
The government is driving this through now.
Peter Dutton is back in the house. Dutton says in relation to baby Asha, I pass no judgment and make no comment in relation to (the circumstances of the baby’s injuries). He says he wants children out of detention and he’s not going to cop sanctimonious lectures from the Greens who presided over people drowning at sea.
Peter Dutton:
This cooked up situation in parliament today needs to be seen for what it is. We are not going to tolerate these lectures from the Greens. That’s why the censure motion should be rejected.
The Wilkie motion is being seconded by Green Adam Bandt. He says there’s a certain inevitability in Australian politics, when the polls go down, the ugly goes up. Dutton’s remark he characterises as a disgusting and vile statement.
No time to take stock. The Tasmanian independent Andrew Wilkie is attempting to censure the immigration minister Peter Dutton, for his remarks in question time about blackmail and self harm.
Wilkie says the suggestion from Dutton today that self harm was being deployed as a route to citizenship was one of the ugliest things I have heard in this place in my time serving here.
The government clearly isn’t expecting this, and no initial effort is made to shut Wilkie down. Ah yes, they’ve cottoned on now. The gag has been moved.
Further questions have been placed on the notice paper. Give me a minute or two to take stock and I’ll be back with your political afternoon.
New leadership.
Bowen is back now with a question to Scott Morrison. He wants to know if he agrees with the former treasurer, Joe Hockey, who said housing tax concessions should be directed towards new stock. Does Morrison agree with that, or did the former treasurer have a better understanding of the economy and housing market?
Morrison wonders what Chris Bowen has against teachers and nurses. Whither teachers and nurses without their negative gearing concessions.
Scott Morrison:
Those opposite have no empathy for Australians who are working to pay tax in this country, Mr Speaker. They have no empathy for those who are trying to back themselves in, in this transitioning economy. What you get from them is a race for higher taxes!
Updated
Labor is back to capital gains tax.
Q: I refer to the prime minister’s answer a few moments ago in which he claimed reducing the capital gains discount would punish investors: “It will drive jobs away and drive investment away”. Is the prime minister aware that foreign investors in Australia don’t receive the capital gains discount?
The prime minister thinks the shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, is very silly. Very very silly. Doesn’t he know we are trying to get those bright kids back from Silicon Valley?
The prime minister also has a little thought for Bowen. There are nearly twice as many people in his electorate that are negatively geared as votes needed to change hands for him to lose his seat.
He should think about that.
I’ll float a couple of observations while Barnaby Joyce answers his first question as deputy prime minister.
The prime minister in attack mode is playing against his natural strength, which is charm. First point.
Second point, Turnbull is busy styling himself as the defender of capital in question time today, which I suspect at the crass intra-day political level, Labor won’t be entirely unhappy about.
Moving forward.
Bill Shorten, to the prime minister.
Q: Does the prime minister think it’s fair under his government’s policy an investor buying their 7th home will receive more taxpayer subsidies from his government be a first home buyer?
Oh Bill, you are very silly about business, the prime minister thinks.
Malcolm Turnbull:
Mr Speaker, every investor is entitled to deduct the interest expense of the borrowings they incur in order to buy an income-producing asset and that is true whether it is a farm or a shop or shares in a public company or whether it is rental property. So there is nothing remarkable, unusual or unorthodox about buying property and borrowing money to buy it – and if the interest loss is greater than the rent, being able to deduct that loss.
Labor can’t add up, the prime minister says.
Oh, sorry, I get it. Blackmailed by people who have a legal right to seek Australia’s protection under the refugee convention.
Those blackmailers.
Peter Dutton:
I’m not going to conduct a situation, not going to preside over a situation where we have people self harming to come to hospitals in this country because they believe that is the route out into the Australian community for Australian citizenship.
Green Adam Bandt asks the prime minister about baby Asha.
Q: Do you agree with the doctors that detention harms children or are you waiting until after the election to deport babies and children to Nauru?
Turnbull waves that to the immigration minister Peter Dutton.
We have been very clear and I repeat this today, because the people smugglers listen to every word spoken in this place, spoken by premiers and other leaders around the country, let me be very clear to these people.
We will not be held to ransom, we will not be blackmailed into changing this policy because this policy has resulted in lives being saved. And we are not going to retreat on what has been a successful policy.
(Blackmailed by whom? Anyone know?)
Shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, to Turnbull.
Q: Will the prime minister rule out making any retrospective changes to negative gearing, yes or no?
Turnbull says tax policies will be considered and rolled out in the usual way.
He’s now onto the fantasy land of the Labor party where there is a hankering for a centrally planned economy and manifest threats to the economy.
The prime minister tracks back to negative gearing, and Labor’s policy. Whither house values.
Malcolm Turnbull:
Mr Speaker, every single Australian recognises that the bulk of most family’s assets are in their homes. It’s well over 65% across the board. So you knock that price down, you knock that value down, that’s what Labor’s proposing to do, cut out over a third of the demand, knock that price down. What does that do for consumer confidence? Are people going to go out and buy a new appliance, borrow money to start a small business, are they going to hire somebody if they see their greatest asset shrinking before their eyes at the hands of the Labor party?
Mr Speaker, every measure they propose is calculated to drive our economy into the ground!
Updated
The prime minister has turned now to alternative proposals.
Now Mr Speaker, let me turn now to the question of alternative approaches. I mentioned that the Labor party is proposing to increase the capital gains tax so that on a top marginal rate it would go to 37%. That is higher than the United States, dramatically higher than the United States, higher than the UK, much higher than New Zealand which doesn’t have the capital gains tax.
It will be the highest capital gains tax in any comparable country.
(There’s a lot of laughter from across the dispatch box. Someone screams out Cayman Islands.)
The shadow treasurer Chris Bowen turns this back on Turnbull. Will he rule out any changes to CGT?
Turnbull takes a while to find his level with this one. Then, this.
I can say to the Honourable Member opposite, that increasing capital gains tax is no part of our thinking whatsoever.
Today’s first Dorothy Dixer is about pulling the levers of government.
Bill Shorten opens on the theme of six months of lost opportunities.
Q: When will the prime minister finally deliver an economic plan for Australia?
The prime minister is clutching the levers of government, and pulling them.
Malcolm Turnbull:
So every single lever of my government is pulling in the direction of jobs, growth, fairness.
(Fairness is the newcomer in this pack).
The prime minister is advising of new ministerial arrangements. There have been a few changes since last the parliament met.
Friendly, approachable, a straight shooter.
This is the current speaker of the House of Representatives, Tony Smith, paying tribute to Bob (Halvo) Halverson (who once represented Smith’s electorate of Casey.)
Question time
Golly Gee Wilickers, it’s 2pm. We are kicking off today with a motion of condolence for Bob Halverson, who is a former speaker of the House of Representatives, who died of cancer recently.
This deal will wipe out micro-parties in the Senate: Leyonhjelm
Xenophon is followed by the LDP senator, David Leyonhjelm, who isn’t very happy. The government, he says, is transacting a dirty little deal with the Greens and Nick Xenophon.
Can I point out when I say the Greens and Nick Xenophon, I repeat myself, Nick Xenophon is a Green for all intents and purposes, he votes with the Greens more than Labor.
So, for the government to do a dirty little deal with the Greens and Nick Xenophon was a surprise and very disappointing.
The end result, the bottom line of this proposal is that it will be extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible, for the minor parties to ever win seats again in the Senate.
(I think if we looked at Leyonjhelm’s voting record we’d see some lining up with the Greens on issues like intelligence and security, but perhaps I digress?)
Nick Xenophon is explaining to reporters why he’s a supporter of the Senate voting reform package.
In my case, in my home state of SA, I received close to 25% of the vote: 1.75 quotas but didn’t get in because of a series of bizarre preference deals. We have Family First in the Senate.
At the moment as a result of the Labor party preferencing (we get) someone who is to the right of the Liberal party. It’s not a criticism of Bob Day, making a solid contribution, and not a criticism of all my colleagues, my cross-bench colleagues in the Senate who really add to the value of the Senate.
But I want a Senate voting system that is fair, a Senate voting system that reflects the will of the people, a Senate voting system that takes away from the back room deals and the preference whisperers and gives the power back to the people – and I believe substantially this is what these reforms will do.
Greens leader Richard Di Natale is on the ABC talking Senate voting reform.
Q: Did you discuss at any point in your negotiations with the government, preferencing at the next election?
Richard Di Natale:
No.
Q: Not in any seat? Lower or upper house?
I know this might be a huge surprise to people. People assume in these negotiations that some of these things that don’t relate to the legislation are put on the table.
We made it really clear, this is a long-held position, a position of principle, fundamental to any democracy, that an outcome reflects the voters’ intentions.
Politics this lunchtime, the very short version
I apologise, this isn’t going to be much of a summary, wedged as I am between significant events. But it’s important to take stock, particularly if you are just tuning in with a sandwich at your desk, and wonder how it is you’ve fallen into roiling white water.
So, today, Monday:
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The latest Newspoll shows the major parties deadlocked on 50% of the two party preferred measure, leading to much musing about whether Malcolm Turnbull’s honeymoon is over. There’s only one honest answer to that ‘is the honeymoon over’ question, and ‘it’s I don’t know yet because there’s no clear trend.’ We’ll just have to do that thing we are no longer much good at: wait, watch, and suspend overly-emphatic interpretation in advance of the facts.
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Today is also Senate voting reform day. The government has broken cover with a proposal it has worked up with the Greens and Nick Xenophon which is designed to prevent people assuming a place in the Senate on less than 1% of the vote. Malcolm Turnbull says this is all about the voters. Labor fears it is about shoring up the Coalition’s position in the Senate. The Greens say Labor is saying this because the party prefers back room deals to a system which allows a better expression of voting intentions. The ABC’s election analyst Antony Green says reform has to happen because the current system is too complex and is open to gaming by wily preference whisperers – but this proposal will likely boost the Coalition’s position in the Senate because unlike Labor, the government is not in frontal competition with the Greens for votes.
There’s more, but that’s the main thrust.
Onwards and upwards, towards 2pm.
Back to Stan Grant, who is asked how he’ll manage expectations if he chooses to leave the media and run for politics.
Stan Grant:
Would you disappoint people? Inevitably. I might disappoint people with what I write now.
Some people, our own people, Brooke, who might not like the fact that I can stand here and acknowledge the greatness of Australia because they are still dealing with the depth of the wound that Australia has inflicted – but that’s how I feel, that is what I have seen.
To say otherwise would repudiate the experiences of my life.
Poor Ray, thwarted
Now I mentioned a bit earlier (through a sledge Chris Bowen hurled at Scott Morrison across the dispatch box a little while ago) that the treasurer did not enjoy his usual chat this morning with the Sydney talkback host, Ray Hadley.
It should be noted for the record that Ray was not amused. Here he is.
Ray Hadley:
Now to another matter – every Monday since coming to power, firstly as immigration minister then social services minister more recently as treasurer, Scott Morrison’s appeared on my program.
Even when he travelled overseas he’d make arrangements to be available to talk to me at about 20 past 9, 20 past 8 in Queensland. But today we’ve been told the treasurer is too busy with a meeting to appear. We offered a change in time, we said what about the second or third hour trying to maintain the continuity. No, not available today. What about tomorrow? Don’t know, don’t know.
Now I’m not one for conspiracy theories, however there are government MPs talking to The Australian newspaper who say they’ve been astonished by the performance of the treasurer, including a poorly received speech at the NPC last week and a series of talkback radio interviews in which he was blasted for lacking vision, including his regular chat with me, as was the case last Tuesday, last Monday, I’m sorry.
Labor will be buoyed by support to its negative gearing plan announced by Shorten and Bowen last week to restrict from July next year all future tax breaks for new housing but not change existing arrangements. And so it goes on.
So I don’t know whether this is just a coincidence and I was going to put it to Scott Morrison that I thought his performance last week after he appeared on my program before the NPC was inglorious. That it was a whole lot of gobbly-di-gook, and I mean it appears to me that just perhaps these two blokes wished for the job they’ve now got, prime minister and treasurer, and wishing for it and getting it are two different things.
It’s a lot harder, a lot harder when you get it, than it appears when you’re looking from the outside.
Notwithstanding the feeling that I really need eyes in the back of my head today, here’s one excerpt from Stan Grant’s speech.
Stan Grant:
As a reporter I was drawn to those stories that mirrored my own. Always I sought to answer this question: how do we live lives of dignity and meaning when all certainty has been removed? What makes a man who has lost a son to war and natural disaster get up in the morning and find a job to put food on the table for his remaining children? How does a mother mourn and yet love and nurture at the same time?
What does the future mean when the now is so bleak? And when I reported these stories, I met myself in the eyes of Afghan refugees, I saw my family in the eyes of a peasant Chinese farmer looking for a foothold in the China dream, I saw my sawmiller father. Here were lives shaped by the great forces of our time, as surely as my own, and that of my people.
I spent half my adult life away from Australia. I felt liberated from the chains of this history, no longer did I meet people across this chasm of race.
I was free to be seen as a human being in my own right and delight in meeting people with my guard down, freed from the suspicion and mistrust that can still tear at us here.
But always I felt the pull of home, the smell of wattle and wheat that would burn my nose on a hot summer day, the feel of molten tar under my feet and the crack of frost on a winter’s morning, the cool waters of the Murrimbidgee.
Eventually I came back to a country fighting old battles.
My Guardian Australia colleague Stan Grant is currently giving an address to the National Press Club. I’ll try and look in on that once I get a small break from Senate reform.
Updated
Two crossbench senators, David Leyonhjelm and Bob Day (Family First) have been spotted in the corridor adjacent to the prime minister’s office. Not clear whether they have popped in to have a cup of spicy chai and a chat about Senate reform, or whether this is a lunchtime constitutional.
Is there a seconder for this motion (having a gratuitous crack at the treasurer)?
Labor’s Chris Bowen:
The government has a problem when Scott Morrison can’t even go on Ray Hadley!
(It’s true. The treasurer did miss his regular chat with Hadley this morning. We assume he was detained by the special party room meeting on Senate voting reform.)
Pyne is moving that Bowen be no longer heard.
For all the good folks sweating on the Senate reform bill, here’s a link. It’s just lobbed online.
The procedural skirmishes continue. Morrison has succeeded in tabling that legislation. Now Labor is attempting to suspend the standing orders to require the treasurer to make a speech outlining policies to improve the economy.
Tony Burke:
Maybe he’ll want to talk about unicorns for 46 minutes.
That’s enough for Pyne. He’s moving that Tony Burke be no longer heard.
Sorry, we really can’t help ourselves.
Come. We ride.
Scott Morrison wanders to the dispatch box. I’m representing the special minister of state, he notes. The former special minister of state, Mal Brough, is sitting directly behind him.
(That rather tart Burke reference about Morrison is a reference to the recent leadership challenge.)
Manager of opposition business Tony Burke says it is ironic the treasurer is the one introducing this legislation. Scott Morrison goes to the National Press Club last week and has zero to say on jobs, Burke contends. Waffle is all he has. But chasing votes? Well, Morrison is an expert at that. A vote harvester from way back.
Manager of government business Christopher Pyne is in the house now suspending the standing orders in order to allow the Senate reform legislation to be brought on now.
Pyne says the government cannot possibly be accused of lobbing this proposal without warning. There has been a wealth of debate and a parliamentary inquiry by the joint committee on electoral matters. He is clearly filibustering here.
Ah yes I get it, he’s waiting for the treasurer to arrive. Scott Morrison will be introducing the legislation (presumably representing Cormann).
Quick Mathias, bung the Senate on.
Meanwhile, what was I saying about the barricade in the red room?
Thanks for singling me out in your power grab speech @malcolmturnbull, I will return the favour in the chamber #auspol
— Senator Ricky Muir (@Ricky_Muir) February 22, 2016
Q: Does this change advantage the Coalition?
Richard Di Natale:
Look, there are claims and counter-claims about what it will do.
If you’re a small party, the advice I give you is: do what the Greens have done. Become a grass roots movement, get people elected at local government, at state government, into the national parliament, and you will find that you have success in this place.
That’s how you build a political movement.
Di Natale, continuing, in response to ‘what’s in this for you’?
Ultimately, we think what we are doing is good for democracy.
I don’t think it will make a big difference to the Greens’ prospects.
Greens leader Richard Di Natale is speaking to reporters outside. This is all about strengthening the democracy, he says.
I understand that the Labor party – people like Gary Gray, Alan Griffin and many others I’ve spoken to privately want to see reform. They believe that we need to ensure that we have a functioning democracy.
But there are people inside the Labor party who wield their power and influence through these back-room deals. The factional power - the factional operators inside the Labor party who wield their influence as a result of these backroom deals don’t want to see reform. Well, again, we say to them: we live in a democracy. Let’s make sure that people’s vote’s reflected in the ballot box.
Di Natale cites the ABC election analyst Antony Green (who I quoted in the last post).
Antony Green’s made it very clear he doesn’t believe there’s a high likelihood of the Coalition getting control of the Senate.
(What Di Natale doesn’t say is Green has said quite clearly this proposed change will benefit the Coalition’s position, for the reasons he outlined at the tail end of my last post.)
Quick translation of all that
Hmm, the voters, yes. Hmm. Moving forward. Here’s the broad outline.
Here are the main points of the Senate voting reform package the government is proposing, in detail.
- The introduction of optional preferential above the line voting, with advice to the voter on the ballot paper to vote above the line by numbering at least 6 of the boxes in the order of the voter’s choice (with the number 1 as the voter’s first choice);
- The introduction of a related savings provision to ensure that a ballot is still formal where the voter has numbered 1 or fewer than 6 boxes above the line;
- In relation to voting below the line, a proposal to reduce the number of informal votes by increasing the number of allowable ‘mistakes’ from 3 to 5, as long as 90% of the ballot paper below the line is filled in correctly;
- The abolition of group and individual voting tickets;
- The introduction of a restriction to prevent individuals holding relevant official positions in multiple parties;
- A proposal to allow political parties (at their discretion) to have their logo included on the ballot paper.
Here’s what the Greens leader, Richard Di Natale, is saying about this.
It is vital that Senate voting reform is in place before the next election. The Greens had proposed a series of changes to how the Senate is elected including allowing voters to determine their own preferences when they vote above the line. We understand that the proposed new voting system would instruct voters to number at least six boxes. We are pleased that the bill will end the era of back room party preference deals with the removal of group voting tickets.
Here’s one very quick translation from the ABC’s election analyst, Antony Green, on this issue that Labor is concerned about: that the proposed change will boost the prospect of the Coalition winning control of the Senate. Readers with me since the opening of today’s play will know already that Bill Shorten is reserving his position on this package.
Antony Green:
As long as the Greens are there, Labor will poll fewer votes than the Coalition. At a half Senate election, the Coalition will find it easier to win three seats than Labor because Labor’s vote is lower, and Labor will often find itself competing with the Greens for the same seat, the same final seat. So that’s what the Labor party’s concerned about, the way the voting works they’re more reliant, they will be forced to be more reliant on the Greens in the Senate, where the coalition may end up being able to govern with someone like Nick Xenophon or other crossbenchers.
The prime minister has wrapped up now. Given that all got a bit choppy with the protest, I’ll come back shortly with a stocktake on Senate reform.
Turnbull is asked who are the beneficiaries of this change. He’s back to the voters.
It needs to be done now so that it is in place before the election, whenever that election is held, in the second part of this year. So the time has come to do this, but as to who may be better off, the truth is that the only person, people that will be better off are the voters because their wish will be clearly translated into a parliamentary outcome and surely that’s what this whole mechanism, this great edifice here is designed to translate the will of the Australian people into senators and members of the house – and that’s what this will do – make that translation more transparent and more effective.
The prime minister and Cormann have said the Australian Electoral Commission will explain these changes to voters in the lead up to the election. The changes will also be referred for inquiry to the joint standing committee on electoral matters, with a reporting date of 2 March. The government is proposing to debate the changes in the Senate from 2 March onwards, for “as long as it takes.”
As to election timings?
Malcolm Turnbull:
Well, nothing has changed. I’m working on the assumption that the election will be held at the normal time, which is August/September/October, in that period.
I know there has been speculation about a double dissolution election.
Our aim is to ... persuade the senators to pass the registered organisations bill and indeed to pass the Australian Building Construction Commission legislation, the legislation that would reinstate them.
That’s why we’d urge them to do that.
It's the voter, stupid
Malcolm Turnbull, in case we missed it.
I will just make this observation: this is critically important – these changes will advantage only the voter. The only person that will benefit from these changes is the voter.
Because the voter will determine where their preferences go. So it’s up to the voter.
Entirely coincidentally, a rendition of Somewhere, over the Rainbow, down the front.
Sit-in ends with a rendition of "Somewhere over the rainbow". @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/rv79iTKife
— Shalailah Medhora (@shalailah) February 22, 2016
Back to the prime minister, who thinks the crossbenchers need to vote on this issue on the merits, not out of self interest.
Malcolm Turnbull:
We would hope that Senate crossbenchers will vote on legislation on its merits and without regard to whatever they may perceive to be their personal electoral agenda.
They are, after all, elected to serve the people of the state or territory from which they’re chosen, and they should act accordingly.
(They would of course counter that lowering the number of micro parties in the Senate is entirely in the government’s interest. Everyone is pursuing their interest, here.)
While the prime minister is talking, a protest is underway at the other end of the parliament about children in detention.
"All children matter", protesters say, referring to children in detention. "Enough is enough." @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/fYNExnDsbn
— Shalailah Medhora (@shalailah) February 22, 2016
A dig at Labor, which as I’ve mentioned, is divided on this question. Gary Gray (shadow special minister of state) is all for it, the Labor Senate leadership is dead against it.
Malcolm Turnbull:
There’s been no more forceful advocate of this change than Gary Gray himself. Labor’s spokesman in this area.
So this is an important change, it’s an important reform, it’s an important electoral reform. It’s be a important economic reform because it goes to the governance of Australia, our strong economy.
Our destiny depends on the strength of our democracy. This strengthens it because it gives the power, the choice, back into the hands of voters. Clearly and accountably.
(I’m glad the government recognises this as a principle. But I can think of several things which also need urgent attention, which won’t get a run today.)
"The system has been taken advantage of .. "
The current system has been gamed, Turnbull says.
The system has been taken advantage of. There is no doubt about that. The last Senate election was widely criticised. Australians were astonished to see people elected to the Senate whose primary votes were a fraction – in the case of one senator from Victoria – about half of 1% of the vote.
(Here’s looking at you, Ricky).
Malcolm Turnbull addresses journalists on Senate reform
The prime minister has arrived in his courtyard downstairs with the finance minister and special minister of state, Mathias Cormann.
Malcolm Turnbull says legislation giving effect to Senate reform will go into the parliament today.
It’s all about empowering the voters, the prime minister says.
What these changes will do, what they seek to do, is to ensure that Australians, Australian voters, determine where their Senate votes go.
We have a prime ministerial press conference coming up in three minutes on Senate reform.
Hang onto your hats – and watch for that spontaneous barricade in the red chamber.
Questions on multinational tax, and on the Newspoll again. (No distractions, people, please.)
Q: Peter Dutton has today said that baby Asha will be sent to Nauru at some point or other, eventually. Do you think that’s appropriate?
Bill Shorten:
What guides Labor are the following principles: when it comes to this little child, we want to make sure that the medical staff and the people who’ve been treating this child, their view should be paramount. The safety of the child has to be paramount.
Shorten goes on to say Labor supports regional processing but the government has to deal with the unacceptable indefinite detention which is occurring to some of the people on Nauru and Manus.
They must take up Labor’s policies of proper oversight. I respect that Papua New Guinea and Nauru are sovereign nations but these people are indirectly in Australia’s care with so we need to make sure they get the highest standard of care. I’m very supportive on a bipartisan basis of this government, if it’s having negotiations with New Zealand or Canada or Philippines or Indonesia, or importantly, Malaysia, if the government can do more to help the regional processing, we will support them 100%. I just wish that the Liberals when they were in opposition had supported Labor’s Malaysia solution, because I’ve got no doubt if they had done that then, there’d be more people alive today.
So we can translate that one too, just as we did Dutton’s formulation earlier on today.
So Shorten is saying put these people in offshore detention, but do it nicely. And hurry on with the resettlement. Slightly more elegant than Dutton, but similarly implausible, given well, lived experience.
Updated
Some questions about Labor’s policy on negative gearing. Shorten has been trying to work up this counterpoint for the last few days – at least since the prime minister went the kerbside beat down on Labor’s negative gearing policy last Friday afternoon.
Bill Shorten:
We want to make sure that Australian home ownership is affordable. I know the Australian dream is for parents to be able to see their children buy their first home. Mr Turnbull thinks it’s for very wealthy investors to acquire taxpayer support to get their fifth, sixth and seventh houses.
Q: Is there modelling of your negative gearing policy. If so, can we see it?
Bill Shorten:
ANU has already released work or they announced work that they’d done over the weekend. Again, I will back up our approach about housing affordability, budget repair, than a government who don’t know what they’re doing.
Shorten says his job is not to be distracted by opinion polls. (In case you were wondering.)
To questions now at ANU. First question to Shorten is about Senate reform, will Labor support it?
Bill Shorten:
We will consider the matter when we see the final legislation.
The Labor leader Bill Shorten is at the ANU, with a couple of frontbench friends – actually several frontbench friends, including the shadow higher education minister Kim Carr, who is talking social justice: not slogans.
With Senate reform now hurtling down the pipe, I’m just keeping half an eye on the red room to make sure the crossbenchers (the folks outside the government’s sharing circle) don’t suddenly construct a barricade and lock themselves in. Thus far, LDP senator David Leyonhjelm has been droning calmly about plucking a foreign investment goose. Or perhaps it was a tax goose. Poultry before a storm.
People are still very excitable about that Newspoll, despite my entreaties to be cautious. Here’s another ‘be cautious’ view from Peter Brent, published this morning in the always excellent Inside Story.
It can be summarised as ‘do those preference allocations look right to you?’
Here’s Peter:
One unknown with all these polls, which won’t be revealed until the election, is the reliability of preference allocations based on flows at the last one, in 2013. That’s how the pollsters estimate their two-party-preferred numbers. The 2013 poll was characterised by three unusual things: the Palmer United Party, which seemed to come out of nowhere; a low vote for independents; and an overall independent preference flow that favoured Labor. The latter was primarily due to the results in Denison (from Andrew Wilkie) and Indi (from Cathy McGowan). And PUP has all but disappeared.
Pollsters allocate preferences party by party, and presumably independent preferences are distributed as a block. We don’t know the level of independent support in these polls, as they are lumped with “others,” but it’s fair to assume it is larger than at the last election, and it is highly questionable that most of the people who are telling pollsters they’ll vote independent would really preference Labor ahead of the Coalition.
Yes, it’s possible that the Labor Party could get 50% of the two-party-preferred vote from primary support of only 35 per cent (as Newspoll shows) – but if the Coalition receives 43 and the Greens only 12 (as in Newspoll) it’s very unlikely.
Updated
Both chambers have just been gonged into life. Hello Reps. Hello Senate.
PM&C officials have been asked by Labor’s senate leader Penny Wong whether advice has been given to the prime minister on the proposed marriage equality plebiscite. The official at the table says advice was given shortly after the prime minister assumed the party leadership. No advice has been given since that time.
There’s a spillover estimates hearing this morning in the finance committee. David Gruen from the department of prime minister and cabinet on the federation white paper process:
We are working on the reforms. There is no question that involves working up documents. As to what comes of the documents that’s up to government.
Remember that particular white paper/green paper? This was the whole business of reforming the federation to make it work better.
Cost of this process to date? $5m plus.
Meanwhile, in the House of Representatives, Labor’s Andrew Giles will later this morning move a motion calling on the government apologise to Save the Children workers, following an independent report saying the workers should be compensated for being removed from Nauru in 2014.
The report, released in January, found that the staff members had been taken off the island in 2014 due to political pressure from Canberra. Giles’ motion calls for the government to apologise and acknowledge that there were no basis for claims that the workers had fabricated stories of abuse and mistreatment of asylum seeker children.
The immigration minister, Peter Dutton, has brushed aside calls for an apology, saying the incident happened before he took on the portfolio.
I’m stoked I’ve actually managed to plunge below the line this morning. Down in the thread Matt Harris is sounding sanguine about a two year election cycle (pegged off Michelle Grattan’s piece in The Conversation, which I linked to earlier.) Two years? Good grief, I need the smelling salts.
Meanwhile, in the entirely plausible parallel universe that is our #BrickParliament, Captain Cronulla, also known as the treasurer, Scott Morrison, has been sighted hunting for mythical creatures.
Ah, here is one .. the manager of government business, Christopher Pyne, who is #BrickParliament’s Unicorn in Chief.
Morrison is still yet to sight the fabled pixie horse.
Updated
My colleague Lenore Taylor has been writing about Senate reform intensively over the past few weeks. She broke the story that the government had come to terms with the Greens and with Nick Xenophon on the specific method of reforming the Senate voting system. Labor is divided on this issue. In Camp Labor, there are concerns the model the government proposes could entrench Coalition control of the Senate.
I’ll let Lenore explain the nuts and bolts, and give you the quick version of what they mean. She wrote a column about this issue which was published Friday night, which you can find here.
In the Reader’s Digest version, the system abolishes the “group voting tickets” which allowed parties to do backroom preference deals and enabled the sophisticated “preference harvesting” that saw micro-party senators such as Ricky Muir elected with just 0.5% of the first preference vote, on the back of preferences from voters who probably had never heard of him.
Voters will be asked to vote for six parties above the line, after which no more preferences are allocated.
Most experts agree the scheme will advantage the parties that are preparing to vote for it.
The extent of the advantage depends on the assumptions you make about how voters and political parties will respond to the change, and how far into the future you are looking. In other words, no one can be certain.
Back to Senate reform now, and the spectre of double dissolutions.
Things are now moving slightly more quickly than I anticipated.
Coalition joint partyroom at 0930 this morning (normally Tuesday) - to consider electoral reform
— Kieran Gilbert (@Kieran_Gilbert) February 21, 2016
Setting aside Senate reform for just a moment, Michelle Grattan from The Conversation has a very good piece this morning drilling into the complexities associated with double dissolutions.
Going down this route would take, as she notes, a certain chutzpah. Facts follow. Have a read.
Michelle Grattan:
Given the government is committed to bringing down a budget on May 10, the double dissolution would have to be called on May 11, for July 2, 9 or 16 (the last possible date). The July date is needed to avoid cutting the next parliamentary term very short.
This means Turnbull would be taking a big gamble on his and Scott Morrison’s budget. This will contain income tax cuts, but with the GST off the table these can no longer be mega. Some other taxes will have to be adjusted to pay for them.
Presumably the government would avoid the nasties being a surprise via early leaks or announcements.
Still, launching an election before the reaction to the budget plays out – and the opposition leader has even had a chance to give his parliamentary reply – would take a certain chutzpah.
And there are some practical issues. Once the end of the financial year ticks over the government needs a fresh appropriation of money. It’s not that all the cash instantly runs out but it would be impossible to get by because it would be weeks before the new parliament convened.
Passing some appropriation would need Senate co-operation. ABC election analyst Antony Green says: “If they need to pass supply and Labor says ‘not on your nelly, Bill Shorten hasn’t given his speech’, it’s all over”.
If Turnbull wanted to call an election on May 11, he might have to seek supply funds earlier, during the current parliamentary session which ends in mid-March.
All the big iss-shoes.
Shalialah Medhora and Mike Bowers®
Updated
What double dissolution?
The employment minister, Michaelia Cash, has also been hitting the airwaves early making the case for industrial relations reform.
She says current laws “are not acting as a deterrent” for bad behaviour in the building industry, and has urged the Senate crossbench to pass legislation that re-establishes the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC).
“My goal is to get the ABCC legislation through,” Cash told Radio National. She denied that the government would prefer it if the Senate did not pass the bill, making it a double dissolution trigger. “As the prime minister said, this is a government that will be going full term.”
Two other issues to bookmark quickly.
Senate reform is well and truly on Monday’s political agenda. Cabinet is apparently looking at some options on this front today. I’ll come back to this chunky topic in a minute.
Issue number two to bookmark is defence: there are some reports about suggesting the defence white paper isn’t too far away.
Let’s get across the other major developments in the news cycle.
Over this past weekend Brisbane folks rallied to the cause of baby Asha after there were signs the child may be about to be removed from hospital and returned to immigration detention on Nauru.
While folks were rallying for Asha, the president of the Australian Medical Association, Brian Owler, was making a significant public intervention against Australia’s policies on immigration detention. I’d encourage you to read that speech in full when time permits.
Until that happy time, here’s a short sample of Owler:
Australia, to me, represents democracy, freedom, openness, and accountability. A fair go and honesty are sources of national pride. The reality is that children, and adults, are being subjected to physical and emotional harm. People are being moved in the middle of the night without notice; under a cloak of secrecy and intimidation. Denying people access to the legal representatives. Threatening to forcibly remove a baby from hospital against medical advice. Our colleagues are being intimidated. It is being done by the Australian government, and it is being done in our name.
With the hubbub about Australia’s extreme acts of state sanctioned cruelty reaching eleven on the Spinal Tap amplifier scale, the immigration minister Peter Dutton confirmed over the weekend that the child would go to community detention in Brisbane, not to Nauru.
At least not yet.
Queensland Health has confirmed Asha is now out of hospital.
We can confirm that baby Asha has been discharged from #LadyCilento hospital. Maybe if she visits again it will be as a doctor or nurse.
— Queensland Health (@qldhealthnews) February 21, 2016
Dutton has done a couple of radio interviews this morning. This formulation gives you something of the difficulty associated with the government’s contorted formulations on this subject.
Peter Dutton, on Radio National:
She has gone into community detention, as you point out. That has been the case for 83 other people including women and children – families – and when I have been on the show before, Fran, I said I wanted to be the minister to get children out of detention.
I want to make sure that we can stop the boats and for 83 people already who have come from Nauru to Australia – they are in community detention already.
This family has been treated no differently to the families that we have treated before them.
So let’s translate that PDuddy segment. I’m very tough and I certainly haven’t done anything special for this child, but I’m also a softie because we allow people to be detained in the community and I want the kiddies out but I’m not at all soft because I’m hard because ... #StopTheBoats.
Yes, it makes no sense. It’s not just you.
If you want my thoughts on this subject: I don’t think that baby was going to be sent back to Nauru despite the rumours that sparked the protests outside the Lady Cilento Hospital on Saturday. I think the politics of sending that baby back would be untenable for the government, notwithstanding the fact that most Australians want the boats stopped, apparently at any price. I don’t see the weekend developments as a great and specific victory for people power – but I also absolutely agree with Brian Owler, this policy is a disgrace and the only way it will change is if enough people raise their voices in opposition.
I’ve been saying this policy completely stinks for years. No one listens. But the folks in this building do listen to you people.
Updated
Good morning good people
Hello everyone and hold onto your unicorns. Welcome to another parliamentary session where way too much of everything will be nowhere near enough. I do hope you’ve had a moment this morning to consume your morning muesli, extra fruit.
Hyper connected political tragics will know the results of the latest Newspoll have been thundering through the digisphere since late last night. Consequently, a number of broadcast types have informed us in sonorous tones at thirty minute intervals from the sparrow’s wind explusion that the Turnbull government’s honeymoon may be over.
Over. Over. Over.
This morning’s poll published in The Australian shows the major parties in a dead heat in two party preferred terms, because of changes (within the margin of error) in each party’s primary vote since the last survey. The Coalition’s primary vote is down three points since the last poll, and Labor’s up one point.
As Phillip Hudson notes, the Newspoll sample is also pursing its lips slightly at the prime minister. “Satisfaction with Mr Turnbull’s performance as prime minster fell five points, to 48 per cent, and is down 12 points since peaking in mid-November. Dissatisfaction with Mr Turnbull jumped seven points to 38 per cent, the highest level since he became prime minister.”
There’s also reasonable news for Labor in this poll about its proposed changes to negative gearing. 47% of the Newspoll sample were positive about Labor’s negative-gearing plan (which would restrict the concessions to future investments in new housing stock) – with 31% opposed and 22% undecided. That affirmation is higher than I would have predicted.
What I’ll say next is probably obvious.
This is just one poll, and we really shouldn’t make sweeping analytical declarations on the back of it. Some of the recent evidence from polls suggests a tightening between the combatants, but you would expect that given the government is flat out telling us to brace for an election .. well .. any minute now. You’d also expect the government’s recent, less than convincing performance, to raise eyebrows among the voters of Australia: the whole controversy concerning Stuart Robert (really bad), the clear ‘we’ve got absolutely no idea what we are doing here’ on tax reform (somewhat perplexing), and Labor’s decision to fill the mildly chaotic void with actual policy (enough to make a seasoned political reporter dare to hope.)
The bottom line of this survey? Interesting, but a distance short of definitive.
Loads more on the go already, so let’s get into it. The Politics Live comments thread is wide open for your business, and Mikearoo and I are up and at ‘em on the Twits. He’s @mpbowers and I’m @murpharoo
Fill up your water bottles, and jog lightly on the spot, here comes Monday.
