What we learned: Monday, 12 January
With that, we will wrap the blog for the evening. We’ll be back first thing tomorrow, take care of yourselves.
Until then, these were today’s biggest news headlines:
Federal parliament will return next Monday and Tuesday, to deal with hate speech laws promised after the Bondi terror attack. Anthony Albanese says there will be a condolence motion for the 15 people who were killed on Bondi beach in December.
The Coalition says it is “deeply sceptical” of the government’s decision to tie hate speech reforms with a gun buy-back scheme under one piece of legislation.
Former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has become the latest international headline act to pull out of the 2026 Adelaide Writers’ Week, in protest of the Adelaide festival board’s decision to rescind its invitation to Palestinian Australian academic Randa Abdel-Fattah.
The Victorian premier has announced further support for bushfire-affected residents. It includes emergency assistance payments of up to $52,250 available to eligible uninsured households so they can re-establish their principal place of residence. There have been at least 350 structural losses in the state.
And the Minns government will give councils new powers to crack down on illegal hate preaching venues, including allowing utilities to be cut off if operators ignore planning laws and cease-use notices.
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Coalition ‘will not stand in the way of getting things done’
The shadow home affairs minister, Senator Jonno Duniam, says the Coalition’s “first port of call is to cooperate” on hate speech and gun laws.
Anthony Albanese will push the Coalition and the Greens to support urgent legislation establishing reform, bringing MPs back to Canberra next Monday to debate laws proposed in the wake of the Bondi terror attack.
At a doorstop on Monday afternoon, Duniam said Australians “want the parliament to work together to get the right outcome” and the Coalition “would have loved to have worked with the government before today in the lead up to the introduction of these bills”.
We’ve wanted these laws passed and action taken urgently. We will not stand in the way of getting things done, but we want to get it right. Again, as I said, this is not a take or leave proposition.
Asked if he had any concern that his Nationals colleagues would be resistant to gun reform, he said the Coalition would “work through the detail” and “make sure our position is a united one, a unified one”.
We are speculating on laws we haven’t seen yet. I do also note that a lot of state and territory governments have taken issue with the federal government’s approach to the gun buy-back. So there’s no guarantee that this thing will get off the ground no matter what laws are passed here. So, let’s see the detail, number one.
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