Night-time politics
- Malcolm Turnbull has defended his immigration minister, Peter Dutton, over his comments questioning Malcolm Fraser’s decision to bring in Lebanese Muslims. Turnbull said Dutton was a good minister. He would not enter into any correspondence on the comments themselves. But the Lebanese Muslim Association’s president, Samier Dandan, said the comments were racist.
- The Queensland attorney general, Yvette D’Ath, has referred the One Nation senator Rod Culleton to that state’s police commissioner over a letter that could amount to an attempt to pervert the course of justice.
- Question time was dominated by a Labor attack on division within the government after the Nationals abstained or voted against an import ban on the Adler shotgun. Turnbull said not all the Nats needed to be in the Senate for the vote – which lost with the support of Labor and the Liberals.
- Superannuation fund types laughed at the financial services minister, Kelly O’Dwyer, when she suggested super funds were not governed to the same standard as the banks.
- The registered organisations bill passed in the wee small hours of the morning, giving the government reason to celebrate its passage for the day. Nick Xenophon and Derryn Hinch successfully amended it to include whistleblower protections. They are hoping the Australian Building Construction Commission will be next. It was debated today in the Senate but there is still no vote.
That’s it for me. Thanks to Gareth Hutchens, Paul Karp and Katharine Murphy. To Mike Bowers, to sleep perchance to dream. You need it.
Tomorrow we have superannuation in the Senate, the PM is doing a national security statement at noon and presumably more ABCC.
Until then, goodnight.
@gabriellechan "Oh Duttie, this is another fine mess you've gotten me in to." #auspol pic.twitter.com/xLIq4nMc6f
— The Matt Hatter (@MattGlassDarkly) November 22, 2016
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We are not very, very mediocre, says Queensland LNP president Gary Spence.
On the weekend, Senator Brandis made some comments ...
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Things are whipping along here. On a brief walk around the corridors, MPs began running for a division. The lower house is voting on the counter-terrorism legislation. It passes the lower house.
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Queensland attorney general refers Rod Culleton letter to police commissioner
This is a statement from the attorney general and justice minister, Yvette D’Ath.
I have referred a matter to the Queensland Police Commissioner for his consideration.
The Chief Magistrate of Queensland informed me that Senator Rodney Culleton, One Nation Senator for Western Australia, had written a letter to the Magistrate at Cairns Magistrates Court.
The Chief Magistrate expressed concern that the contents of the correspondence from Senator Culleton could amount to an attempt to pervert the course of justice, and threatening a judicial officer.
Paul Karp rang the senator but Rod Culleton can’t talk right now. I cannot tell you anymore than that.
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The Department of Immigration and Border Protection has rejected criticisms of its policies by the UN special rapporteur François Crépeau.
Last week Crépeau wrapped up an 18-day official visit to Australia with a highly critical assessment of some of the federal government’s immigration policies.
In a statement released today, the department welcomed Crépeau’s “cooperative engagement” but said it did not accept some of his preliminary observations “on Australia’s compliance with international obligations and human rights principles”.
In particular, we reject the special rapporteur’s characterisation of the human rights situation for all migrants in Australia.
The human rights expert had said Australia’s immigration policies had eroded human rights and tarnished the country’s reputation and, while some other policies were laudable, he singled out prolonged and indefinite detention, temporary protection visas, lack of access to health and justice services and punitive action against asylum seekers as “regressive and [falling] way behind international standards”.
The department said Australia had a longstanding history of promoting and protecting human rights, and was a “world leader” in investing in refugees with responsive settlement services:
Public confidence in migration and refugee intakes is strongest when the department provides safe pathways for those most in need, rather than unsafe pathways offered by people smugglers to those who can pay.
Australia’s humanitarian dividend has been possible due to the success of Operation Sovereign Borders. It is Australia’s view that strong border security measures, including mandatory detention, ensures the integrity of Australia’s migration programmes.
The department accused Crépeau of factual inaccuracies which it suggested he did not give it an opportunity to respond to.
For example, Australia guarantees that all asylum claims are thoroughly examined through an individual assessment conducted by trained and highly experienced protection decision makers, with reference to Australia’s domestic laws, international non-refoulement obligations and contemporary and comprehensive country information.”
Crépeau had also said the temporary nature of some visas also let migrants open to exploitation, and called for better oversight, but the immigration department said Australia had rigorous legal protection regimes and employers were subject to monitoring.
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The justice minister, Michael Keenan, has introduced the counter-terrorism legislation amendment bill (No 1) 2016 to the house.
This is the bill that lowers the age at which control orders can be applied to terrorism suspects from 16 to 14. It also imposes an obligation on a person subject to a requirement to wear a tracking device to maintain the tracking device in good operational order and create offences for interfering with the operation of a tracking device.
It is the fifth tranche of security legislation introduced by the government. The shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, says Labor generally supports matters of national security.
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Katharine Murphy has written a comment piece on Peter Dutton and how Malcolm Turnbull used to try to calm the debate on national security to allow trust between government and the community.
Turnbull realised just how dangerous that road was and insisted on calming the conversation, which was one of his most comprehensive early achievements when he took the Liberal leadership last September.
So let me honour this legacy by saying today what Turnbull, our leashed prime minister, couldn’t bring himself to say.
Peter Dutton’s comments are ridiculous.
The immigration minister (of all people) is suggesting Australia should have a discriminatory immigration policy, a policy that discriminates against migrants of particular ethnic or religious origin on the basis that people connected with them in the future might be involved in criminal activity.
Only five seconds thought delivers the manifest absurdity of this statement. Not so much stopping the boats as stopping the grandkids.
Dutton’s comments are also inflammatory. The immigration minister is prosecuting a low-grade culture war against a community which is dealing with a radicalisation problem. A real problem, not an abstract one.
Radicalisation is a problem that requires trust, cooperation and clear lines of communication to be able to manage.
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The lower house is voting on the superannuation reforms.
The Coalition’s superannuation reforms have passed the house. They are on the list for debate in the Senate tomorrow.
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What Peter Dutton said was racist, dog-whistle politics, Lebanese Muslim Association president says
A very strong statement follows. The frustration of the community is palpable.
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Bowers reports there was a little bit of awks during the divisions between Dutton and Turnbull, perhaps stemming from Dutton’s comments.
Their colleagues on the outside were so much more interesting.
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Strangers in the night.
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It’s tough at the top.
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The Labor senator Glenn Sterle has asked the minister for resources and northern Australia, Matt Canavan, whether he supports the prime minister’s position that the import of Adler shotguns should be banned, given he had not voted on it last night.
Canavan replied: “I support the government’s position on the national firearms agreement,” which is not the same thing as supporting the ban on the Adler.
He rattled off a bunch of things he was proud of: gun ownership laws, responsible gun use and its benefits. Everything but the Adler ban.
Canavan also recognised the “rights of individual senators to express their views, to have independent thoughts” and added he was “very proud to stand with my colleagues on all those issues”.
Given no Nationals voted for continuation of the Adler ban, it was not a ringing endorsement of Malcolm Turnbull’s position.
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The deputy PM, Barnaby Joyce, gets a government question on water.
Labor to Turnbull: Australian seafarers aboard the CSLBrisbane including Andrew Halliday from my electorate were made redundant by their foreign-owned employer, Canada Steam Ship Lines. There are 457 visa holders working for the same company on a similar vessel off WA. Is it the case the prime minister is so focused on his own job he has forgotten about the jobs of Australian seafarers like Andrew who is in the public gallery today?
Turnbull says 457 visas were never so high than when Bill Shorten was a minister. (Labor did tighten the laws in 2013.)
Then Turnbull flicks to the immigration minister, Peter Dutton. He says they have started to consolidate the occupations allowed to come in under 457 visas, removing boarding kennel and cattery operators as well as goat farmers.
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In the lower house, Labor loses the final suspension vote.
Sarah Hanson-Young calls Dutton a 'racist bigot', then forced to withdraw
In Senate question time, the Greens leader, Richard Di Natale, has asked the attorney general, George Brandis, about the immigration minister Peter Dutton’s comments that allowing generations of hardworking Lebanese immigrants to Australia was “a mistake”.
Brandis backed Dutton in:
A more thoughtful or compassionate minister you will not find.
The evidence? There are no children in detention, because of Peter Dutton. There are no drownings at sea, because of Peter Dutton.
Di Natale raises several points of order that Brandis hadn’t addressed the part of his question about Dutton singling the Lebanese community out. The answer is relevant, the president rules.
Brandis then begins riffing on John Howard’s “we decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come” and Malcolm Turnbull’s claim the success of the migration program depends on control of the borders.
Sarah Hanson-Young interjects, calling Dutton a “racist bigot”. Asked to withdraw, she at first refuses, then withdraws “for the sake of the chamber” but adds “honestly – I believe it”.
Updated
The government wins the second gag motion. Now they are voting to get on with the suspension vote.
Government wins the gag, as expected.
Labor’s Tony Burke jumps up to second the motion.
He can’t manage the parliament, the cabinet or the country.
Christopher Pyne moves to gag.
There is another vote on the gag motion.
Shorten to Turnbull on Dutton. Dutton checks phone.
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This is the Labor suspension motion.
That the house:
- Notes:
- Clause 23 of the prime minister’s own cabinet handbook states: “Members of the cabinet must publicly support all government decisions made in the cabinet, even if they do not agree with them. Cabinet ministers cannot dissociate themselves from, or repudiate the decisions of their cabinet colleagues unless they resign from the cabinet. It is the prime minister’s role as chair of the cabinet, where necessary, to enforce cabinet solidarity”;
- For the first time in the history of the Liberal-National Coalition, three National party ministers in the cabinet failed to vote for the cabinet’s position, contrary to the prime minister’s cabinet handbook and cabinet solidarity;
- The dysfunction and division in the government means the prime minister and his ministers are spending every minute fighting for their own jobs and not the jobs of Australians; and
- Therefore, condemns the prime minister for being so weak and leading a government that is so divided that the prime minister is powerless to act.
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The government moves to gag Bill Shorten. The house divides on the vote.
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Bill Shorten moves a suspension of standing orders on cabinet division, following the National party’s defection on the Adler gun ban.
The energy and environment minister, Josh Frydenberg, is asked about energy infrastructure and segues into ... ABCC.
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Shorten to Turnbull: Clause 23 of the prime minister’s cabinet handbook states: “Cabinet ministers cannot disassociate themselves from or repudiate the decisions of their cabinet colleagues unless they resign from the cabinet.” It is the prime minister’s role to enforce cabinet solidarity. Given it is up to the prime minister to enforce cabinet solidarity, why hasn’t he sacked these three disloyal ministers? Is it that he genuinely believes their absence was a coincidence or is he just too weak to run his cabinet?
Turnbull quotes from Paul Kelly’s book regarding the Labor leadership fights of the past.
The distrust between Rudd and Shorten was enduring. It was weak and duplicitous, neither side trusted him and neither side revised his view. The Australian people won’t revise their view of him either.
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Sussan Ley, the health minister, is asked about why the ABCC is needed to build hospitals, such as the
Adelaide hospital, which is the third most expensive building in the history of the world.
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Christopher Pyne gets an ABCC question.
Shorten to Turnbull: Given last night no member of the National party Senate team, no member of the National party Senate team voted to keep the government’s ban on the Adler shotgun and given that the prime minister has just confirmed that the deputy prime minister and leader of the National party backed the ban in the cabinet, does the prime minister’s deputy still support the ban on the importation of the Adler shotgun and, if so, why did none of his team in the Senate back up the cabinet decision?
The Speaker rules the question is out of order because it relates to another party of which he is not a member.
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Shorten to Turnbull: I refer to the prime minister’s previous answer about his missing National cabinet ministers. How can the prime minister claim the absence of all three National party cabinet ministers in the Senate was insignificant when Senator Leyonhjelm has confirmed to Sky News that these cabinet ministers deliberately refused to back the cabinet position because they didn’t agree with it?
Turnbull repeats that the Adler ban is cabinet policy and has been extended until the states agree on a classification.
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Treasurer Scott Morrison gets a government question on ... registered orgs.
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Andrew Wilkie to Christopher Pyne, the defence industry minister: The government is quick to say increased defence spending will provide an economic stimulus for states and regions in need of a boost. What tangible commitment can you now give that Tasmania will get its fair share of the work? Will Hobart’s Prince of Wales bay defence manufacturing precinct benefit from the as yet to be decided subcontract work on the C-11 offshore patrol vessel and the C 5,000 future frigates projects. Will you commit to vast Prince of Wales bay and meet the companies based there? Tasmania and Hobart need a boost too and there are many firms with the skills and advantages to help build and sustain Australia’s future defence needs.
Pyne says the work will be spread around the country but in Tassie:
Taylor Brothers, which is near the Prince of Wales precinct you talked about, has provided material for the air warfare destroy program. Things like refrigeration spaces and prefabricated doors. A business in Hobart has provided things to do with fire equipment and fire blankets for the Air Warfare Destroyer program.
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Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull: Clause 23 of the prime minister’s cabinet handbook states: “Members of the cabinet must publicly support all government decisions made in the cabinet even if they do not agree with them”. Has the prime minister disciplined the three cabinet ministers who took the unprecedented disloyal step of failing to vote for the cabinet position? Isn’t it clear this prime minister is so weak his government is so divided he can’t even keep his cabinet in line?
Turnbull gives his previous answer on the Mickey vote (named after Mickey Mouse because it is not serious). He says a number of Labor shadow cabinet members did not attend.
Updated
Just on those questions about Nationals not voting for the gun ban, the following Liberal ministers did see fit to attend a “Mickey” vote.
- Brandis
- Fierravanti-Wells
- Fifield
- McGrath
- Ryan
- Sinodinos
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There have been two government questions on registered orgs and unions.
Labor to Turnbull: I refer to reports in the Herald Sun of a panicked two-hour-long extraordinary meeting of the National party last night. Following this meeting, for the first time in the history of Liberal national Coalitions, three Nationals ministers in the cabinet failed to vote for the cabinet position. What are the consequences in the prime minister’s government for cabinet ministers who fail to vote for the cabinet position?
I’m not a member of the Nats party room, says Turnbull.
My government, my cabinet, of which I am the prime minister and my colleague is the deputy prime minister, the leader of the Nationals resolve to extend indefinitely the ban on the Adler shotgun that had been previously subject to a sunset clause. That was a cabinet decision.
Except the National cabinet ministers did not publicly show support for that position. #justsaying
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Labor opens with Peter Dutton’s comments.
Bill Shorten to Malcolm Turnbull: The prime minister has had the opportunity to be fully briefed on the minister for immigration’s statement in the House yesterday in which the minister expressed the view that the behaviour of children and grandchildren of immigrants meant Malcolm Fraser made a mistake by allowing their parents and grandparents to migrate to Australia in the late 1970s. Is this the prime minister’s position – yes or no?
Turnbull opens with a shouting defence of Peter Dutton. Which is a bad sign.
I can well understand how members opposite seek to tear down the minister for immigration. They can’t stand the fact that he succeeded where they have failed.
Tony Burke takes a point of order.
Turnbull says he has finished his answer.
Updated
Question time coming up.
Di Natale on Dutton: "Does the Minister think my Italian relatives shouldn’t have come here because of the Mafia?”
— Mark Di Stefano (@MarkDiStef) November 22, 2016
Don't call me a banker. Super funds laugh at Kelly O'Dwyers's comparison to banks.
Kelly O’Dwyer has just delivered a speech that riled an audience of superannuation representatives at a conference in Parliament House.
She told them – or trolled them? – that superannuation funds were not governed at the same standard as major banks and life insurance companies.
The crowd laughed at her.
“Are you serious?” said one audience member nearby. “She’s gotta be joking,” said another.
The minister was trying to make the case that the boards of industry super funds, which are not-for-profit organisations, ought to have independent directors and an independent chair.
At the moment, they typically have equal numbers of representatives from employer groups and unions. But the Financial Services Council, which represents the interests of major banks, has been lobbying hard for years to have that model broken up. Its members require a minimum of 50% independent directors.
O’Dwyer says the Turnbull government will now reintroduce a bill requiring trustee boards to have a minimum of one third independent directors, including an independent chair.
Peter Collins, the chairman of Industry Super Australia (and former NSW Liberal party leader), said O’Dwyer’s comments were laughable.
The minister for superannuation is saying that she would like super fund governance to be the same as governance for the banks,’ he told Guardian Australia.
‘If super funds had been responsible for systemic failures in financial advice, failure to pass on interest rate cuts, excessive executive remuneration and other forms of profit gouging by banks, there would have been a royal commission into super funds in a flash.
‘It is abhorrent and unacceptable in the minds of most Australians that the standards for super funds should be the same as those tolerated for the banks.’
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The Law Council president, Stuart Clark, has described the Xeno/Hinch whistleblower reforms as a major development that should push into the corporate sector.
These crossbench amendments now mean that vital whistleblower protection is moving well behond the public sphere and finding its way into the non-government and private sector. This is why this new legislation is so important.
Reprisals against whistleblowers in registered organisations will now carry civil or criminal penalties with damages.
The government has committed to a wider parliamentary inquiry into whistleblower protection and the establishment of an expert advisory panel.
We can only hope a few cattle dogs on the crossbench keep the government on course to extend whistleblower protections to the corporate sector.
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The ABCC debate has begun in the Senate and the house has started on superannuation.
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You madame, you with the question … let me make some witty aside lest I have to answer it (rhetorical flourish).
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(Live blogger picks herself up off floor.)
Penny Wong gave her best “give me a break” face at George Brandis’ suggestion last night that a mickey vote was the reason for the Nats absence.
Wong:
Where were the Nationals ministers? Where were the Nationals cabinet ministers? Were they here? I have to say –
Brandis:
It was a mick.
Wong:
It was a mick, he says. That was very, very mediocre, Senator Brandis. We will have a bit more to say about mediocrity, I am sure, in the days ahead, as will your colleagues, but that is a different point.
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PM takes the mickey on the Nats
The last point to mention from the PM’s press conference is about the Nationals abstaining or crossing the floor on the guns motion. He is asked about the “guiding principle” behind the Nats’ decision, given three National cabinet ministers abstained and two backbenchers crossed the floor.
In our parties, backbenchers are able to cross the floor and, indeed, you know, have done so and we respect their right – unlike the Labor party, we don’t expel people from the Coalition parties if they cross the floor.
Then he asked Michaelia Cash to explain the mickey vote. This is if both major parties support a vote, not everyone needs to turn up for the vote. It just so happens that the three senior Nats did not make the gun vote.
(Live blogger falls off chair.)
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Q: Last night, Peta Credlin said your chief of staff is paid double what an ordinary chief of staff is paid and that’s obviously taxpayer money. Is that correct? And, if so, why?
Turnbull said his “outstanding” chief of staff, Drew Clarke, was one of the most experienced public servants in the city and
that’s obviously been reflected in his ongoing remuneration.
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Malcolm Turnbull is asked about the Murray-Darling Basin plan. Following a review of the socioeconomic impact of the basin plan on local communities, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority announced a reduced target of 320 gigalitres, down from an initial level of 390GL.
A key element in the plan was to restore water to the environment. But to do so, by investing in infrastructure, both off-farm and on-farm, that enabled us to produce the same amount, if not more, food and fibre with less water ... That was the big idea in 2007 and, for whatever reasons, laziness, failure to understand it – you will have you to ask the Labor party – they abandoned that and spent a lot of money buying water back in a very, very non-strategic way that did disadvantage many irrigation communities.
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Dennis Atkins asks: Do you think that the return, electorally, of the One Nation party warrants a review of the 2008 deal between the Liberal party and National party in Queensland? Or should the LNP merger stand?
Turnbull says the Queensland LNP is working very effectively.
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David Speers follows up on Massola and Murph’s questions regarding Dutton: do you support your minister’s comments about Lebanese Muslim immigration in the 70s?
There is no question that there are lessons to be learned from previous immigration policies and the minister was reflecting on, you know, on policies many years ago. He’s entitled to do that.
But the critical thing is – I’m not making any comment on his remarks other than to say that it’s fair for all of us to reflect on past policies and how effective they were or not and seek to improve, in the light of that, to improve what we’re doing now.
(This is excruciating.)
The Labor party is constantly envious of Dutton’s record as an immigration minister, because every day, by his effectiveness, he demonstrates what failures they were when they were responsible for our nation’s borders.
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Katharine Murphy asks Turnbull: In the 1970s, should Malcolm Fraser have let Lebanese Muslims into Australia, on on the basis that a handful of their descendants might commit crimes?
Turnbull refuses to answer the direct question. He simply says Peter Dutton is doing a great job and Australia has a great migration program.
Asked about Lebanese Muslim migration, Turnbull backs Dutton's job as minister.
James Massola of Fairfax asks: on Lebanese Muslim immigration, Trent Zimmerman told the party room he had concerns about the mixed messaging we have heard in the last few days. Do you grow with Mr Zimmerman or do you agree with Michael Sukkar who told the party today that Peter Dutton’s commentary is spot on.
Malcolm Turnbull backs Peter Dutton.
Peter Dutton is doing a great job as minister ... Of course, Peter has been outstanding in his work, in our work together as a government, in reaching agreement for resettlement with third countries. So, he’s doing an outstanding job as immigration minister and if you want to look at a failure in immigration policy, you don’t have to look very far back.
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Michaelia Cash is asked if she is offended by Doug Cameron’s comments regarding her need for hand-holding by fellow minister.
Someone asked me if I was offended last night. The only thing that offended me last night is the fact that the Labor party consistently failed to stand up for the 2m members of registered organisations.
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Turnbull is asked how many jobs will be created by the legislation?
The PM won’t say how many jobs but it will be of economic benefit, he says.
It is perfectly clear that if you reduce the potential for corruption and abuse and malfeasance, that is a benefit to the economy.
Cash says the registered orgs bill was required because unions handle $1.5bn annually, they have net assets of $2.5bn and they have a special tax exempt status.
[Labor] continue to condone the using of members’ funds in registered organisations by some union officials for their own personal piggy bank.
Malcolm Turnbull crowing after the registered organisations bill win in the Senate last night.
He is doubling down on the ABCC bill.
The employment minister, Michaelia Cash, thanked the crossbench.
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Xenophon is happy if the Trans-Pacific Partnership dies but Hinch does not agree.
Xenophon and Hinch both support the government’s 19% backpacker tax . Xenophon says “someone” is floating 15% as a compromise with Labor’s 10% tax.
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Derryn Hinch says there was no horse trading for their votes on the registered organisations bill. In other words, they have not done any deals to pass registered orgs in return for other legislation.
Asked about the ABCC, Xenophon and Hinch again talks about the security of payments for subcontractors.
Asked whether they will horse trade on the Murray-Darling Basin plan bill given the stoush over South Australian water allocations, Hinch says no.
Xenophon will not answer the question (perhaps given Hinch has highlighted his refusal to horse trade).
Xenophon says he will talk about water later.
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Nick Xenophon also underlines the fact that, between them, they have four votes that can block any government legislation.
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The prime minister is back in the country. He will give a press conference in about 10 minutes.
Nick Xenophon is speaking now.
For first time whistleblowers will have real protections, the right to civil compensation and remedies that otherwise didn’t exist ... It applies at this stage to registered organisations, to unions and employer organisations, but there is a very firm commitment from the government to include this with a firm process within the next 18 months or earlier to our corporations and public sector.
He thanked everyone, including Prof A.J.Brown, the professor of law and governance at Griffith University, an expert on whistleblower protections and public expert exposures.
Derryn Hinch warns the government it must follow through and provide the same protection for corporate whistleblowers, noting he and Xenophon have four Senate votes between them.
People have been looking sceptically at us and saying we are trusting the government on a promise. If you don’t trust them, trust us. If they renegotiate on it we will come after them. There are four votes to come after them between us. That is something that should happen.
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Feedback from dear reader. It’s a fair cop.
@gabriellechan Please please don't call Trump "leader of the free world". Firstly its an outdated cold war term. Secondly its Merkel anyway.
— Jarrod Glover (@mrjarrodglover) November 22, 2016
Nick Xenophon and Derryn Hinch are holding a press conference in five minutes on the registered orgs bill et al.
Doug Cameron wouldn't withdraw comments last night claiming Michaelia Cash needed Mathias Cormann to "hold her hand" pic.twitter.com/FnRxxDnQ8U
— Henry Belot (@Henry_Belot) November 22, 2016
He’s only human.
This was last night at around 2am. The Liberal senator Linda Reynolds suggested that he might want to be aware that Bowers was in the room. He said he didn’t care because was looking at the sky.
Just so you know, there are skylights in both chambers. It was dark at the time.
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ABCC: deal or no deal? No deal. Yet.
After the government passed its registered organisations commission bill at 2am on Tuesday morning, attention swung to the Australian Building and Construction Commission bill.
Nick Xenophon told Guardian Australia there is “no deal” on it (yet, that can obviously change). In return for his votes, Xenophon wants security of payments laws improved so that subcontractors are not ripped off.
David Leyonhjelm said he is still in talks with the government over his vote. Leyonhjelm had asked for reform to section 18C of the Racial Discrimination Act in return for his vote but now says “realistically the government can’t deliver that” as Labor, the Greens and some in the Coalition oppose it.
He said the government had come up with “a couple” of reforms to improve freedom to help sway his vote.
Asked what they were, Leyonhjelm replied:
If I told you what they were I would have to kill you immediately after.
Yikes.
We’re endeavouring to find out what One Nation senator Rodney Culleton is thinking on the ABCC bill. He supported the registered orgs bill but has been much more critical of the ABCC.
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A reader, Captain Haymaker, has asked about the coercive powers of the ABCC.
One of the key controversies with the Australian Building and Construction Commission is that it has coercive powers to compel evidence and force witnesses to testify. There is no right to refuse to give evidence, but it can’t be used in proceedings against the witness.
The current building industry regulator has similar coercive powers but the shadow employment minister, Brendan O’Connor, has argued that they are subject to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal giving its approval, a check the ABCC bill removes.
Before the election the Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union ran a series of provocative ads claiming that because unionists and others in the building industry wouldn’t enjoy the right against self-incrimination, they would have fewer rights than criminals including ice dealers.
In an explainer about the controversy in April, the Australian Industry Group’s head of workplace relations policy, Stephen Smith, said the comparison between ice dealers and construction workers was “not valid” because industrial breaches are civil penalty provisions not crimes.
Smith argued other civil regulators including the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and the Australian Tax Office had the same powers.
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Bill Shorten: Nats get a conscience vote on guns but not marriage
Labor MPs have gathered for their weekly meeting when parliament sits. Leader Bill Shorten approached his task today like an excited patron at an all you can eat restaurant.
Where to start? Salad? No, perhaps straight to the pavlova.
Shorten began by telling colleagues the prime minister must have been tempted to turn his plane around from Peru after yesterday’s parliamentary highlights from colleagues, which included Nationals crossing the floor to vote against the government’s position on gun regulation, and Peter Dutton musing that Malcolm Fraser shouldn’t have allowed Lebanese Muslims into Australia in the 1970s because a handful of their descendants have gone on to be charged with terrorism offences.
There was also George Brandis (described by Shorten as a gift that keeps on giving) calling his Queensland LNP colleagues mediocre, which Shorten said was like Barnaby Joyce saying someone was hard to understand or Paul Fletcher saying someone was dull.
On the guns vote, Shorten observed Nationals could get a conscience vote on letting a lever action shot gun into the country and but not on same sex marriage. On Lebanese Muslims, he said Labor was not inclined to call people who had been in the country for thirty years migrants, Labor was inclined to call these people Australians.
On legislation and parliamentary business, Labor resolved to support various government proposals, including its revised superannuation package (although it will move amendments during the Senate debate.) There were also three questions from MPs on the backpackers tax. One Labor MP was concerned the fruit wasn’t getting picked. The shadow treasurer Chris Bowen told colleagues Labor had resolved on a position on the backpacker tax and didn’t intend to back off because the Coalition was huffing and puffing. Bowen said the legislation was not yet in the Senate, and if the government thought they could pressure the opposition into any particular position, Labor’s response was let them try.
Former Fairfax award-winning journalist and newly minted professor Michael West has an interesting column on One Nation senator Rod Culleton. It is worth a full read but here are some highlights. West writes:
When [Culleton] is likely declared bankrupt again next month, unless he somehow staves off the hearing or comes into some money, it won’t necessarily affect his eligibility for parliament. One is allowed to go bankrupt while in office. The question is, was Rodney Culleton insolvent when he last emerged from bankruptcy and was therefore able to enter parliament?
Just to reprise the omissions in his AEC declaration:
1. His claim personally for $450,000.00 from DEQMO Pty Ltd.
2. His director role in the company Elite Grains Pty Ltd.
3. His shareholding a in Elite Grains.
4. The two judgment debts against him from Dick Lester for $203,000 and the PCL (ANZ) judgment debt of $4.3 million.
5. Loans from Bruce Dixon.
Finally, it is worth noting that One Nation party leader Pauline Hanson had been made aware of Culleton’s form back in April but still supported his candidacy.
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I just digress for a minute for a message from the new leader of the free world, Donald Trump, in which he outlines his agenda for the first 100 days, including withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership.
Only because his characterisation of his transition to government process reminded me of Tony Abbott’s messaging in his 2013 transition.
I’m confident that we will return to strong and stable government that calmly, purposefully, methodically sets about implementing its commitments.
And here is the Donald.
Our transition team is working very smoothy, efficiently and effectively.
There must be a manual somewhere.
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Just so you know.
#BREAKING US President-elect Donald Trump says he will move to withdraw from #TPP trade deal "on day one"
— AFP news agency (@AFP) November 21, 2016
One down, one to go: the ABC of the ABCC
Later today the ABCC bill will be debated in the Senate, following hot on the heels of the registered organisations. We insiders who are on the outside are not expecting a vote today but hey, anything could happen in the final fortnight.
So let’s just brush up.
The ABCC bill:
- re-establishes the Australian Building and Construction commissioner (ABC commissioner) and the Australian Building and Construction Commission;
- enables the minister to issue a building code;
- provides for the appointment and functions of the federal safety commissioner;
- prohibits certain unlawful industrial action;
- prohibits coercion, discrimination and unenforceable agreements;
- provides the ABC commissioner with powers to obtain information;
- provides for orders for contraventions of civil remedy provisions and other enforcement powers;
- and makes miscellaneous amendments in relation to self-incrimination, protection of liability against officials, admissible records and documents, protection and disclosure of information, powers of the commissioner in certain proceedings, and jurisdiction of courts.
One Nation senators have said they will support the ABCC, with the exception of Rod Culleton, who has been a bit cagey. We don’t know where he stands as of this minute.
That leaves the government chasing four more votes. David Leyonhjelm wants other as yet unnamed libertarian amendments to unnamed legislation. So we will put him aside at this point.
Nick Xenophon with his three votes and Derryn Hinch want some sort of security of payment amendment. The problem they are hoping to solve is about subcontractors who getting stiffed on payments by larger or lead contractors on construction sites.
Given the government’s rhetoric revolves around jobs and growth and small business is supposed to be the engine room of growth, one would think security of payments should be a no brainer.
Les Williams of the Subcontractors Alliance says the issue is big contractors get the cheque for a job, employ small contractors who do the work, then big contractors either go broke or divert the money onto other jobs. Payments are either late or non-existent or renegotiated down due to assessment of “workmanship” after the fact. The small contractor has no money to employ lawyers to chase big builders who don’t pay.
Here is some of Williams submission he delivered to the crossbench:
The construction industry accounts for between 8 and 10% of GDP but 25% of all insolvencies.
Asic and the ATO advised a 2015 Senate committee inquiring into construction industry insolvency of an emerging business model involving company directors, their corporate advisors and liquidators.
This sanitised corporate description is better described as construction industry fraud that targets the revenue of and costs Australia’s 350,000 construction industry small business $3bn including employee entitlements and the ATO a further $700 million annually.
The number of construction company directors prosecuted for insolvent trading, fraud and breaches of duties is almost nil due to compromised ASIC reporting and protection by liquidators.
Williams said the problem with the ABCC is it just targets one side of the industry – unions (which is OK, he adds) – but there is a whole other side they are ignoring: big construction.
He said the big building companies are driving the ABCC bill targeting the unions but they don’t want to talk about the bad behaviour their members involved in.
I am sure if Australians knew what went on in this industry they would be appalled.
He said if One Nation was interested in working people they would not support the ABCC bill without amendments. He said in Pauline Hanson’s own state, there were 85,000 subcontractors employing 250,000 people.
Williams wants laws to be changed to ensure building payments are put into a trust fund, which is held at arm’s length from all companies to protect small contractors.
The difficulty is that state governments all have different versions of security of payments.
Earlier in the year, Xenophon met with stakeholders like Williams to look what could be done over security of payments. They all signed a joint statement that looked like this:
- The joint statement noted that states and territories have different laws for dealing with security of payments. The patchwork creates different obligations for progress payments for head contractors and how quickly they have to settle their bills.
- The statement called for the federal government to consider “enhanced national consistency between laws, including options such as model legislation”.
- It should also consider “whether related laws, such as those applying to corporations and consumers should also be improved”.
So that might give you an idea of where the ABCC amendments are heading.
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Culleton holding three thick sheafs of paper which he says is evidence of ANZ bank misconduct against farmers. pic.twitter.com/mII9L43mRc
— Lane Sainty (@lanesainty) November 21, 2016
Rod Culleton has the drivin’ in him. You either do or you don’t.
Culleton is showing the room a video with shots of tractors, trucks and horse-racing - "that's my lead truck" pic.twitter.com/IIRLPOQlZg
— Lane Sainty (@lanesainty) November 21, 2016
Tony Burke: Malcolm Fraser's mistake was he didn't stop the grandchildren?
That’s enough of last night. Because it is so last night.
The comments by immigration minister Peter Dutton regarding Lebanese Muslim Australians continue to ricochet around the nation.
Dutton said former Liberal party prime minister Malcolm Fraser should not have let Lebanese Muslims into Australia in the 1970s because a small cohort of people had been charged with terrorism-related offences.
The advice I have is that out of the last 33 people who have been charged with terrorist-related offences in this country, 22 of those people are from second- and third-generation Lebanese-Muslim background.
Labor’s Tony Burke, whose electorate of Watson takes in large Muslim Australian communities, was flabbergasted.
I was astonished. I expect the people angriest about this would be security agencies. Peter Dutton has attacked a group that last been cooperating so closely with our security agencies. His argument is Malcolm Fraser should not have allowed certain individuals into Australia based on their race and religion because of the grandchildren they would have?
Malcolm Fraser’s mistake was that he didn’t stop the grandchildren? This is a bizarre, weird argument of racial profiling. I’m sure this is not the sort of argument that the old Malcolm Turnbull would have wanted to lead as prime minister and now that Malcolm Turnbull is back in the country, it will be interesting to see whether or not he is of the same view as Peter Dutton. He’s declared a war on a community that has been so important in cooperation with local authorities.
Which gives you a pretty good idea of what Labor’s first question will be in question time.
My question is to the prime minister. Do you agree with the comments of your immigration minister …
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Penny Wong: Your side has never liked trade unions
Penny Wong spoke against the registered organisations bill, describing it as the last instalment in a long line of conservative actions against trade unions.
The fact is that those on the other side and their predecessors, the conservatives of Australian politics, have never accepted that trade unions play a legitimate and important role in our workplaces and in our society. From Stanley Bruce, who tried to scrap the federal arbitration system in the 1920s, to John Howard’s Work Choices legislation, which cut pay and conditions for Australian working people, it is the same ideological agenda over decades: Liberals and their predecessors always want to attack trade unions, deregulate the labour market, cut wages and conditions, and reduce the fundamental rights and protections for working people. That is who they are, that is what they believe, and this bill is simply another instalment in that story.
Derryn Hinch: extend whistleblower protections from unions to corporate sector
Now to the registered orgs debate.
Senator Derryn Hinch spoke to the bill and gave a sense of the sort of thing crossbenchers have experienced.
In recent weeks, I have spent a lot of time with ministers, shadow ministers, union officials, including from the CFMEU, and other senators. I will be voting for the amended bill, if the planned amendments pass. To get to this position, I have read many proposed amendments. I have supported some, and I have rejected others. The opposition encouraged crossbenchers to work on amendments. I suspect the big picture—as Paul Keating would say—was to get this bill and the ABCC legislation watered down as much as possible so that if, in the end, they did get passed, they would be closer to a gelding than a stallion.
But in the end, Hinch argued the registered organisations bill was needed.
This legislation has been a long time coming. It is time, I believe, for a full-time, independent regulator for this sector, which has been wracked with scandal, rather than the current body dealing with it part time. The union movement will only be strengthened if potential members can be confident that all of their leadership are working to benefit members, not to personally benefit themselves. I do not see this as an attack on unions. I see it as an effective way to improve the way that this sector is governed. No-one, including people within the union movement, wants to see a repeat of the Kathy Jackson or the Craig Thomson rorts. Kathy Jackson misappropriated $900,000 from the Health Services Union. Craig Thomson squandered $300,000 of union members’ money—much of it on prostitutes.
So Hinch and Nick Xenophon voted for the bill only after amendments were included for whistleblowers.
It would cover anonymity, compensation and protection. Even though it now deals specifically with unions, it must in the near future be extended with the same powers and the same protections to whistleblowers in the corporate sector. As my grandma used to say, ‘What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.’
Hinch said when he was railing against Kathy Jackson and Craig Thomson in his various media programs, he never thought he would be in a position to do something about the “selfish, self-serving thieves”. It became personal.
I will admit that in this case it is partly personal. When the stories started coming out about Craig Thomson spending $500 a time on hookers I was actually lying in a hospital bed, and watching members of his old union, the Health Services Union, doing menial tasks for about, I guess, $15 an hour. I remember that I watched a middle-aged European woman with a mop cleaning up after a burst colostomy bag. I thought at the time that her union fees for the year would probably be around the $500 that Thomson spent on one prostitute in one assignation. Maybe better auditing would have sprung people like Thomson, Kathy Jackson and Michael Williamson, and it may have sprung them hundreds of thousands of dollars earlier.
Now to the National party. Senators Bridget McKenzie and John Williams crossed the floor last night. Nigel Scullion, Matt Canavan and Fiona Nash abstained. As cabinet ministers, abstaining was the only option as they would have been sacked.
Katharine Murphy wrote up this story last night so it is worth a read.
Let’s just revisit the facts in this Adler debate.
As Murph reminds us, the ban prohibits the import of any lever-action shotgun with a magazine capacity of more than five rounds, and firearm magazines with a capacity of more than five rounds for lever-action shotguns, even if not attached to a shotgun.
The government wants the current import ban to remain in force until state governments decide which category to place the gun in under national firearms regulations.
The Howard gun reforms categorised weapons between A-D where A is the most accessible category and D is the least accessible.
The ban came about because the higher capacity Turkish-made Adler shotgun was in a lower category due to its lever action. But it was becoming very popular because of the higher capacity (number of rounds) versions. Right now, there are higher capacity Adlers already in the country being used by licensed owners. This ban only relates to new higher capacity Adlers coming in.
David Leyonjhelm negotiated a sunset clause on the ban to revisit the debate in order to get it lifted. That was what the vote was about last night.
So:
Bridget McKenzie is a keen shooter and is part of the parliamentary friends of shooters cross parliamentary group. John Williams did not speak on the motion but voted for lifting the ban.
This is McKenzie:
This debate is just full of so many mistruths as people conflate the tragedies of Port Arthur and Lindt Cafe. Increased gun crime – which is an absolute indictment on our law enforcement agencies at a state level and at a federal level – on the streets of our cities from illicit firearms conflates the threat of terrorism into a public conversation where law-abiding firearm owners in this nation are derided and belittled by political elites who think they know better. We need a debate that is informed by fact, not by fiction or emotional language.
This debate has also been focused on a false argument around categorisation that is not based on science or evidence. For example, the lever-action shotgun currently in category A under the National Firearms Agreement has five shots. To increase that to seven is not an exponential increase in risk. I would urge anybody to bring forward the science on that and also to please bring forward the evidence of a lever-action shotgun being used in crime since the late 1800s. It just is not based on fact; it is based on fear.
In my view, this is a categorisation issue. There are many guns out there that are far more powerful than the Adler – that would actually make your hair curl – but they are in higher categories. If you want a higher category weapon, you have to jump more hurdles, qualifying as a professional shooter or a primary producer.
Under the Howard gun laws, the categorisation issue can only be solved with states’ agreement. Right now, they don’t agree and they don’t look like agreeing for a long time.
The political issue is something else. While no one would argue that McKenzie and Williams were not voting on their values, the Adler vote has given the Nats a chance to distinguish themselves as a party. Set themselves apart from the Liberals. And in a post-Orange byelection world, that is very important for their survival. I note deputy (acting) PM Barnaby Joyce refused to state his view on the Adler ban this morning. That is no accident.
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Housekeeping: Parliament will sit at 12pm today.
There are party room meetings this morning.
The twin industrial bill to the registered organisations is the Australian Building and Construction Commission bill. That is up for debate in the Senate today.
The superannuation reforms will be debated in the lower house today.
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Nash smash.
That winning feeling.
The floor crossers unite.
Pass it on.
Winning friends and influencing people.
Sam Dastyari and his luxurious locks.
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Will we, won’t we?
Oh what a night.
Good morning wise monkeys,
Two very significant news items in the Senate.
- The registered organisations bill – one of the two bills that triggered the double dissolution election – passed with the support of Derryn Hinch and the Nick Xenophon Team and One Nation. Xenophon and Hinch insisted on whistleblower amendments, which they described as some of the best in the world.
- Two National party senators crossed the floor to vote with David Leyonhjelm to lift the temporary import ban on the Adler shotgun. Three more Nationals – all cabinet ministers – abstained from the vote. They were the deputy Nationals leader, Fiona Nash, the resources minister, Matt Canavan, and the Indigenous affairs minister, Nigel Scullion. It did no good because the majority of the government, Labor and the Greens combined to vote it down.
I have lots of thoughts about these two events which I will share in a minute. But first, Mike Bowers was up very late and has some wonderful images from these two votes.
Is this the moment when employment minister Michaelia Cash works out she has the numbers for the registered organisations bill?
Lots more pictures to come. I am @gabriellechan and he is @mpbowers if you speak in tweets. If Facebook is your thing, you can find me here. And of course, the thread is open for your business.
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