DEBT OF GRATITUDE
We’ll be covering the legal costs for former prime minister Scott Morrison to appear before the robodebt royal commission, the SMH reports. Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus agreed taxpayer funds would cover the expenses of several Coalition figures who may front the commission, including former ministers Alan Tudge, Michael Keenan, Stuart Robert, Christian Porter and Marise Payne. Dreyfus says he had no choice — Morrison’s appearance related to his former duties as social services minister where he oversaw the creation of robodebt. The 2015 scheme, which took annual income data and averaged it over 26 fortnights, required the welfare recipients to prove their debts were wrong. Robodebt was later found to be illegal. A compensation payout was given to some victims, though a small number had already taken their lives, according to families, in despair over their alleged debts, as the BBC reports.
Meanwhile, Stuart Robert was “secretly” giving advice to a lobbying and consulting firm that helps large companies win government contracts, according to the SMH, that is. Leaked emails from 2017-18 reportedly show he helped Synergy 360 get clients by promising he’d help them meet Coalition ministers, though the paper says it’s not saying Robert was paid for this advice. So who are these companies? Indian multinational Infosys, which won Centrelink contracts in 2019-20 worth more than $100 million while Robert was the minister for government services, though again the paper stresses it’s not saying he was involved with it getting the contract. Robert told the paper its report was a “load of rubbish”.
THAT SINKING FEELING
It’s official. The NSW flood crisis is the most expensive natural disaster in our history, with insurers estimating $5.5 billion in damage. Dismally, some victims have received letters from their insurers saying their policy will not be renewed, according to the Forbes mayor, while others can’t even get insurance, The New Daily reports. The Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) boss said it can’t help it — the industry needs the state and federal governments to pitch in because it’s getting too expensive to cover swathes of disaster-prone areas. Also, build flood levees, the ICA added — the towns have been asking for them for years.
Condobolin locals built their own levee last week from sandbags and dirt, dubbed the “great wall of Condo”, Guardian Australia reports — fortunately it held, though some homes were flooded. The flood in the town peaked at 7.6 metres, the SES says, and is receding. It isn’t over for another western town, Euabalong, which received an evacuation order yesterday. One farmer told the paper floods could also be mitigated if the government allowed them to harvest 30% of the rain, instead of the 10% level. We could make our farms drought-proof in extreme heat too, he added. Speaking of — air-conditioning will finally be expanded to every cell at a remote West Australian prison where temperatures have exceeded 50C, The New Daily reports. It comes after Crikey reported the local pound had air-conditioning while inmates at Roebourne prison — 90% of whom are Indigenous — suffered through heatwaves without it.
HELD IN LOWE REGARD
A teal independent candidate in Hawthorn sent Premier Daniel Andrews a tweet wishing him a speedy recovery from an injury, The Australian ($) reports this morning. Melissa Lowe, who was a manager of student equity at Swinburne University before this campaign, posted tweets in 2020 and 2021 calling Andrews “#dantheman” and telling him to get well soon, saying: “We need decent humans in power.” It seems the paper is implying it’s hypocritical, considering teals are popping up in seats where voters don’t like their major party options. Lowe told the Oz the tweets sounded like her. “I do care about people,” she said, and contended she probably thought Andrews was a decent guy at the time. Does it undermine Lowe’s campaign? Hardly, not in this editor’s view, anyway. Does the paper expect emerging independents to have never in their life supported either major party?
Meanwhile, Labor MP Kat Theophanous has won a Supreme Court bid to stop Darebin City Council from tearing down her billboards in Northcote, The Age reports. Eight of them at four locations were removed; two were found destroyed at the tip. Theophanous won the seat by just 800 votes in 2018 — incidentally from now federal Greens Senator Lidia Thorpe. And Theophanous is suspicious that Darebin council is represented by three Greens councillors, as well as three Labor councillors, and three independents — but Victorian Greens leader Samantha Ratnam waved away any suggestion the Greens had a hand in the billboards as some sort of retaliation. “When Labor gets desperate, they get dirty,” she said.
ON A LIGHTER NOTE
Picture this: you’re strutting around the house, tail aloof, looking for a warm place to curl up. You see your cat bed, a plush little thing bought for more than $100, and you think, nah. You see the dog’s bed, and you just know you’re not supposed to go in there, plus it would upset the dog, a favourite pastime… Eh, you think. Then you see an open suitcase backed with freshly laundered holiday clothes all folded up neatly. Parfait! your little feline brain says, and you climb in and drift off. But then you hear a zip, and suddenly you’re on the move. This is what happened to a New York orange tabby, who was rather humorously captured on the X-ray scanners at JFK Airport looking distinctly, well, alive. The bag was about to be loaded on to the plane when baggage handlers had noticed orange fur sticking out of it.
When they approached the bag’s owner in the terminal, they were flabbergasted. “I didn’t know it was in there,” the passenger told the Transport Security Administration (TSA) agents. A spokesperson said the cat — who is named Smells — didn’t belong to the owner, CNN reports, but rather someone else in the same home (a roomie maybe?). The feline stowaway was perfectly fine and returned into the arms of its actual owner quite unbothered. But the TSA went with it, posing a pun-laden Instagram post reminding people about the rules when it comes to travelling with pets. “We’re letting the cat out of the bag on a hiss-toric find,” the TSA wrote. “Once at our screening area REMOVE GARFIELD FROM THE BAG before sending the CARRIER through the X-ray.” And double-check your luggage before you leave the house, one would think. Who knows who’s napping in there.
Wishing you the confident nonchalance of a snoozy cat today, folks.
SAY WHAT?
At a time when Australian families are being hit by Labor’s price hikes in electricity and gas, why on earth did this government sign up to a new United Nations fund which will channel Australian taxpayers’ money to other countries, including China?
Alex Hawke
After another botched Coalition gotcha! attempt, Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen patiently explained to the Liberal MP that China is not a recipient of the fund and that it was set up to help poor nations dealing with climate change crises caused largely by us and other industrialised nations. Hawke declared it his first question in a decade — Crikey notes he might want to take another decade before his next to get up to speed.
CRIKEY RECAP
Friendlyjordies’ house ‘firebombed’, says lawyers as police investigate
“Friendlyjordies’ lawyers have claimed that the Australian YouTuber’s house was ‘firebombed’ last night, after NSW Police confirmed it was investigating a fire at his address. Law firm Xenophon Davis confirmed that Friendlyjordies — whose real name is Jordan Shanks-Markovina — was safe after the fire in a tweet on Wednesday morning …
“Shanks-Markovina is a popular political YouTuber and comedian who was the subject of a high-profile defamation claim by former NSW deputy premier John Barilaro last year.”
‘Wake-up call for cops’: pleas to address ‘over-policing’ as Sydney protester Danny Lim hospitalised in arrest
“In a statement provided to Crikey, NSW Police said it planned to conduct an independent review into the actions of police during Lim’s arrest, which was halted when Lim sustained an injury ‘after he struggled with police’ …
“Lim is renowned and much-loved in Sydney for wearing ‘provocative and cheeky’ but ‘not offensive’ signs that encourage passers-by to smile, advocate for peace and equality, and dig into politicians. This includes a special edition for former prime minister Tony Abbott …”
Coalition’s China blunder — or how to get caught out on fair-weather xenophobia
“The Coalition’s switch to xenophobia on foreign aid is a particularly sharp correction on climate funding. Back in 2019, Morrison promised $500 million in additional climate aid to Pacific countries to head off criticism by them of his climate denialism. The package ‘highlights our commitment to not just meeting our emissions reduction obligations at home but supporting our neighbours and friends’.
“In December 2020, that $500 million was expanded to $1.5 billion, and the Coalition government told the UN that Australia ‘recognises developing countries’ calls for a stronger focus on financing for adaptation and resilience, and for an increased share of finance flowing to small island developing states (SIDS) and least developed countries (LDC)’.”
READ ALL ABOUT IT
Turkey’s Erdogan: new ground offensive in Syria ‘when convenient’ (Al Jazeera)
2 bomb attacks in Jerusalem kill 1 and wound at least 18 (The New York Times)
Angry protests at world’s biggest iPhone factory (BBC)
Namibia pulls down German colonial officer’s statue in Windhoek (BBC)
Walmart Chesapeake shooting: employee kills 6 and himself in Virginia (Reuters)
German footballers cover mouths in apparent protest at FIFA over [LGBTIQA+] ‘OneLove’ armbands [ban] (EuroNews)
Finland PM Sanna Marin set for Auckland meeting with Jacinda Ardern (Stuff)
THE COMMENTARIAT
The ‘Dan’ factor makes this Victorian election unique. But the pandemic poll is much more than a referendum on Andrews — David Speers (ABC): ” ‘Teal’ independents federally have had more success in Sydney (where they hold four seats) than Melbourne (where they hold two). They’re unlikely to make a big splash in this state election, but if independent Sophie Torney picks up the seat of Kew (within the federal seat of Kooyong now held by independent Monique Ryan) that will give the movement some added momentum. The Greens are likely to make the bigger show, potentially doubling their presence in the Victorian Parliament from three seats to six.
“This would build on the party’s federal election success in grabbing three Brisbane-based seats, and further rattle the nerves of all Labor MPs, federal and state, trying to defend inner-urban electorates. The Liberals will almost certainly win back some of the seats in Melbourne’s south-east lost in the 2018 “Dan-slide”. A net gain of 18 will be needed to give Matthew Guy a majority in his own right. This seems well out of reach, but if the Liberals can pick up more than a handful, Labor could be forced into a minority government. That could be spun as a satisfactory, if not successful, result for the Liberals. Another poor performance, however, would only deepen the soul-searching under way since voters turned on the Morrison government.”
I’m a doctor who’ll trust pharmacists to diagnose — Nick Coatsworth (The Age) ($): “I’ve lost count of how many times a pharmacist has saved my bacon (and my patient’s health) during my career. Those experiences have led me to deeply respect the professional skills of pharmacy colleagues. They have made me open to the idea that community pharmacists are capable of diagnosing straightforward illness and prescribing medication. The NSW government last week approved a prescribing trial for community pharmacists. Under the plan, patients will be able to access an expanded range of vaccinations, antibiotics for urinary tract infections, and oral contraceptives prescribed by their pharmacist instead of their GP.
“And I note the pledge on Wednesday by the Andrews government in Victoria that, if reelected, it too will enable pharmacists to treat minor conditions and to reissue prescriptions for contraceptives. It is a marked variation from what we have termed the ‘scope of practice’ of pharmacists in NSW. Scope of practice refers to the bandwidth in which a health professional can deliver safe and effective healthcare to a patient. Expanding scope of practice always has significant safety implications and is never something to be taken lightly. But it would be wrong to characterise this trial as an attempt by the pharmacy profession to gain ground in a professional turf war.”
HOLD THE FRONT PAGE
WHAT’S ON TODAY
Yuggera Country (also known as Brisbane)
-
Comedian Wil Anderson will talk about his new book, I Am NOT Fine, Thanks, at the Judith Wright Arts Centre.
Kulin Nation Country (also known as Melbourne)
-
Writer Jock Serong will discuss his new book, The Settlement, at Montalto.
Kaurna Country (also known as Adelaide)
-
SA Treasurer Stephen Mullighan and The Honeycomb Effect’s Carolyn Miller will speak about the future of digital in a talk held at the Adelaide Business Hub.
Eora Nation Country (also known as Sydney)
-
Author Alice Godwin will talk about her new book, Slipstream, at Glee Books.
-
Public Sector Reform’s Gordon de Brouwer, Australian National University’s Renée Fry-McKibbin, Bank of England’s Carolyn A Wilkins, and CEDA’s Melinda Cilento will discuss the RBA review at an event held by CEDA.
