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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Stephanie Convery, Amy Remeikis and Martin Farrer (earlier)

Greens signal motion for recognition of Palestinian statehood – as it happened

Australia PNG
Greens leader Adam Bandt with senator Steph Hodgins-May at Parliament House in Canberra on Tuesday.
Greens leader Adam Bandt with senator Steph Hodgins-May at Parliament House in Canberra on Tuesday. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

University of Sydney to review defence and security investments

The University of Sydney will set up a working group to review its investment portfolio related to defence and security in the greatest concession yet to demands of pro-Palestine protestors.

On Tuesday, the vice chancellor, professor Mark Scott, wrote to the university community following a second meeting with representatives of the protest encampment alongside the provost, professor Annamarie Jagose.

Scott said management was “committed to genuinely responding to the deeply held concerns of the encampment”. The University of Melbourne and Curtin University have agreed to disclosed their research ties, but not divest.

We will undertake a review of our investment portfolio ... prior to a Senate divestment discussion ... this is the same process that led to our institutional decision to divest from modern slavery, cluster munitions, fossil fuels and tobacco.

The university will also double its expenditure over three years to support academics and PhD students under the Scholars at Risk program, and expand its truth-telling processes with “reference to current events and their historical relevance”.

The offer, “more comprehensive than offers accepted by other encampments around the country”, will be conditional on an agreed timeline to clear the camp from campus.

Students will have until 3pm on Thursday to respond.

What we learned today, Tuesday 28 May

And that’s where we’ll leave you this evening, folks. Here’s a snippet of what happened today:

Thanks so much for your company this evening. Politics Live will be back bright and early again tomorrow. See you then.

Updated

Peter Dutton tells colleagues Labor’s hate speech crackdown is a ‘trap’

Labor’s hopes of passing two key bills with opposition support have taken a hit with a breakdown in negotiations on religious discrimination and Peter Dutton labelling its hate speech proposal a “trap”.

The opposition leader addressed the Coalition party room on Tuesday for the first time since the government revealed it intends to create a new criminal offence to protect all attributes – including sex, sexuality, gender, race and religion – from vilification.

According to three accounts of the meeting, Dutton described the proposal as a “trap”, promised not to be distracted by a Labor “wedge” and vowed to stand for Liberal values including free speech.

Although the Coalition is yet to see legislation for the hate speech proposal, expected to be introduced in August, Liberal MPs Keith Wolahan and Garth Hamilton made remarks also calling for the opposition to proceed with caution to avoid unintended consequences.

Contributions cited the experience of hate speech laws in the United Kingdom and Canada, and argued they resulted in community conflict through courts and tribunals. One MP labelled it a potential “backdoor” to blasphemy laws.

Read more on this from me and political editor Karen Middleton here:

The process of getting married has been slightly modernised, according to attorney-general Mark Dreyfus, after legislation passed today making the paperwork slightly less annoying.

Thanks to amendments made to the Marriage Act, one of the key documents required for a wedding to occur, a Notice of Intended Marriage (NOIM) – which couples need to get sorted at least a month before their intended marriage – can now be witnessed via videoconferencing, which means you don’t have to sit down with a celebrant twice if you want to tie the knot.

A statement from Dreyfus’ office this afternoon said remote witnessing was an option put in place as a temporary Covid-19 social-distancing solution, but this amendment makes it permanent.

You can still choose to sign and witness the NOIM in person, on paper, if you want to.

The statement continues:

Authorised celebrants will still be required to meet independently and in person with each party before they solemnise a marriage, to ensure both genuinely consent to the union.

And while the paperwork has now entered the digital age there’s no change on the day itself, with the happy couple, the authorised celebrant and two official witnesses all required to be there, in person, on the day of the marriage.

Greens to move motion tomorrow for recognition of Palestinian statehood

It may well be one of the shortest motions the Greens have ever proposed, but Adam Bandt has given notice of this plan to put Palestinian statehood to a vote in the House of Representatives tomorrow.

He will move that “This House recognise the State of Palestine”.

The Greens argue that these seven words would acknowledge the House of Representatives’ stance on the matter. The party said in a statement:

No further or more complicated process is required for Australia to join 143 other nations in recognition.

Bandt, the leader of the Greens, urged Labor to make good on “an election promise to support Palestinian statehood”.

(Quick analysis: The party platform certainly called on Labor in government “to recognise Palestine as a state” and said this should be “an important priority” – but it did give cabinet ministers a level of flexibility because it did not set an actual deadline for that step to be taken.)

Bandt said the Labor government should go beyond “hand-wringing statements” and take meaningful steps:

Recognition alone won’t stop the invasion or end the occupation, but it will be a big step towards ensuring that Palestinians have the same rights as Israelis to live in peace and security with full rights under international law.

A government spokesperson said earlier today that Bandt’s attempt amounted to “a procedural motion” that would result in “not dealing with the parliament’s agenda”.

Updated

WA police commissioner asked whether force has strong enough powers to prevent domestic and family violence

Blanch has been asked a number of questions about the interactions Ariel Bombara says her family had with the police relating to her father and her father’s guns. Blanch hasn’t answered many of these questions, referring instead back to the investigation that they are conducting into what happened.

Asked whether the force has adequate powers to effectively and proactively police domestic and family violence, Blanch said:

I want to talk specifically about firearms in this instance. I have been talking to governments, certainly talking to the minister of police, about how we may be able to tighten up the seizure of firearms where, at the moment, there seems to be a larger part of discretion or instructions from the state administrative tribunal about when or when it is not appropriate to seize firearms. We have taken many cases to the state administrative tribunal that we have lost and have had to hand back those firearms.

Updated

Blanch continues:

I know what Ariel has said in her statement. [And I have asked the] investigation to determine exactly what was said and what was asked for. I think that’s appropriate. Again, I don’t want to add to her grief but I think it’s appropriate that we actually get the correct details that we have recorded and that we have probably recorded on body-worn video.

Updated

WA police to investigate reports made about Mark Bombara before fatal shootings

We’re hearing now from the Western Australian police commissioner, Col Blanch, now about the shootings in Perth on Friday.

Ariel Bombara, daughter of gunman Mark James Bombara, spoke earlier today, saying she had warned police about her father’s guns on three separate occasions, in an attempt to protect her mother, before the shootings last Friday.

Ariel Bombara said she raised concerns of a real threat to the family’s lives with the police, and that the family were “ignored by five male officers on three different occasions” that they reported her father’s guns.

Blanch says he has asked that the police conduct an investigation into the three interactions with police:

Officers in that investigation will determine what was done what was said.

Updated

DPS secretary grilled on declaration of conflict of interest with former deputy

The head of the Department of Parliamentary Services, Rob Stefanic, was peppered with questions today in Senate estimates about a conflict of interest he declared with his former deputy secretary, Cate Saunders.

Earlier today, senators raised a report by the Australian in early May alleging Stefanic and Saunders had been in a romantic relationship while they worked together.

While he initially declined to answer whether he was in a romantic relationship with Saunders while he was her boss when asked by One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts, he eventually said “no” when pressed again.

But the simple response didn’t quite clarify the situation, given Stefanic later admitted to formally declaring a conflict of interest in regards to Saunders with the then APS commissioner, Peter Woolcott, in August 2022.

Stefanic said he did so because of “rumours” and “gossip” swirling within the building about his relationship with his deputy. Saunders was later seconded to Services Australia in April 2023, and took an incentive payment to retire in October 2023.

In the afternoon, the Liberal senator Jane Hume returned to the subject to get further clarity on what prompted Stefanic to declare the conflict if there was no romantic relationship to declare.

Stefanic responded:

I thought it was necessary given that I anticipated that that gossip and rumour would at some point come out in this forum. And I felt it was important procedurally that – it was probably time for me to seek some advice.

Stefanic added there were “perceptions of a close relationship” and that rumour “morphs into fact in people’s eyes”.

Hume asked:

So you were declaring that others thought that there was a relationship, but there wasn’t one?

Stefanic responded:

What there was is a close friendship.

Updated

Penny Wong to Israel: ‘This cannot continue’

The foreign minister, Penny Wong, has condemned the “death and destruction” in Rafah as “horrific” and says her message to the Israeli government is: “This cannot continue.”

Wong is representing the government at a Senate estimates hearing this afternoon focused on the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet.

In an opening statement, Wong alludes to the incident in which an Israeli airstrike caused a huge blaze at a tented area for displaced Palestinians in Rafah, southern Gaza, with medics putting the death toll at 45 people.

Wong said:

You may recall that the prime minister and I have both said, in relation to Rafah, that our message to the Netanyahu government [is]: do not go down this path.

The international community has been as one on this.

What we have seen in the past 24 hours reinforces why we and the international community issued this warning.

The death and destruction in Rafah is horrific. This human suffering is unacceptable.

We reiterate to the government of Israel: this cannot continue.

We must see an immediate humanitarian ceasefire so civilians can be protected and Australia continues to support the work of the United States, Qatar and Egypt to that end.

We continue to call for the release of all hostages by Hamas and for Israel to allow aid to flow at scale, as directed by the international court of justice.

Updated

Thank you very much to everyone who followed along with me today – I will hand you over to Stephanie Convery who will take you through the evening.

Politics Live will be back early tomorrow morning – until then, take care of you.

Updated

Rights advocates urge ANU vice-chancellor not to have police intervene in pro-Palestine protest camp

The Australian Democracy Network has contacted ANU’s vice-chancellor urging her not to pursue police intervention in the ongoing pro-Palestine encampment and calling for her to work with students to allow the protest to continue.

The letter, penned by protest rights campaigner Anastasia Radievska, warned Genevieve Bell to only use police as a “last resort” where “criminal offences” were involved.

The protection of the right of peaceful assembly, under international human rights law and standards, extends to assemblies even on private property and therefore applies to protests on university campuses.

On Tuesday, students relocated their encampment after warnings from management that their location posed health and safety risks to the university community, including the risk of AFP intervention.

It comes as the Coalition government has vowed to use provisions of the Migration Act to cancel the visas of any student protesters found to be involved in “spreading antisemitism or supporting terrorism” if it comes into office.

In a joint statement, the Coalition said the ministers for home affairs and immigration had “significant powers” to cancel visas of any person who “show contempt or disregard for the law or human rights, including terrorist activities and political extremism, and for vilifying a segment of the Australian community or inciting discord”.

Updated

Labor MP Josh Wilson says ‘proper processes’ should be used to decide whether something is genocide

Asked if he believes it is a genocide, Josh Wilson says:

Those are judgments that ought to be made through proper processes and I’m not sure that having people jump to certain kinds of terminology really assess or deal with the substance of the issue, which is unconscionable suffering and violence that is being experienced by civilians in Gaza [that] must stop, and Australia is and should be advocating for that at every turn.

There is an issue I think in how we respond to a community. We don’t want to see the conversation itself – which is an important part of our democratic process, but – we don’t want to see the terms of the conversation become a point of conflict where people are being pushed or judged or criticised because they are prepared to use a certain word or not prepared to use a certain word. In my view, that doesn’t add to the effort.

Updated

Josh Wilson says:

… When you are approaching 40,000 civilian deaths, many of whom are women and children, it goes to that question about the legitimacy of violence that is being inflicted in that way and the Australian government has been principled, consistent, persistent and resolute in calling for a ceasefire, in saying about military action in Rafah that it would be unjustifiable, precisely because it is likely to have these kinds of consequences.

When you think that we have seen the wholesale destruction of Gaza, a relatively small area of land, and civilians forced and encouraged to go into a place that they understood was a place of refuge and they are on the receiving end of an additional bombardment, it [has] predictable results.

The Australian government and the minister for foreign affairs will continue to take that position that Australia should take, which is the call to an end of the violence, advocate and vote for a ceasefire at the UN, when we have the opportunity to do that.

Updated

Israel’s actions in Rafah ‘cannot be described as self-defence’: Labor MP

Labor Fremantle MP, Josh Wilson, is speaking to the ABC and was asked about the Israel prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s claim that the assault on the Rafah refugee tent camp which killed at least 45 civilians, mostly women and children, was a “tragic mistake”.

Wilson says:

It is not for me to necessarily judge what the Israeli prime minister has said, but it is a terrible, awful, horrific outcome and it proves, really, what lots of people have been saying and what the Australian government has been saying about military action in Rafah.

The minister for foreign affairs said some time ago that that kind of action was unjustifiable and would have potentially catastrophic consequences. We made similar statements in partnership with like-minded countries, New Zealand and Canada and the terrible events of the night before last proves that. As I said before, we need this violence to stop, what is being inflicted on Gaza is unconscionable. It has been indiscriminate and disproportionate. It cannot be described as self-defence. It has to stop.

Updated

Spokesperson for Dreyfus denies Cash’s claims of ‘aggressive or demeaning’ behaviour in meeting

A spokesperson for the attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, has responded to Michaelia Cash’s claims over their meeting on the religious discrimination legislation.

Cash said:

I was appalled by Mr Dreyfus’s behaviour. Mr Dreyfus needs to stop playing games with his religious discrimination legislation. As I told Mr Dreyfus he needs to take on board the feedback he has received from the faith communities and release his legislation publicly.

As we reported earlier, accounts of the meeting are highly disputed, with both sides accusing the other of aggressive behaviour including raised voices – which both deny.

Dreyfus’s spokesperson said:

Senator Cash’s claims are not correct.

The Attorney-General did not raise his voice and at no point was aggressive or demeaning.

Senator Cash interrupted the Attorney-General, described his request for the Opposition’s position on religious discrimination as unreasonable and walked out of the meeting.

Updated

For a recap on religious discrimination/freedom (depending on how you are looking at it), Sarah Basford Canales prepared this a little earlier this year, with the wonderful video team:

Updated

The Greens senator David Shoebridge is making the same point:

Ending discrimination against students and teachers is too important for it to stall in a shouting match between the Coalition and Labor. It is incredibly frustrating this is the path the Albanese government appears to have chosen.

Updated

Greens emphasise that crossbench could put religious freedom bill over the line

The Greens are still making the point to the government that they do not need to work with the Coalition to pass the religious freedom legislation – they can work with the Greens.

The government says it wants bipartisan support for the legislation, which is why it is focused on the Coalition, but there are some pretty big sticking points.

Brisbane Greens MP Stephen Bates has posted to X to say there is another option the government is ignoring:

The gov could work with the Greens and the xbench to pass reforms that provide countless school students and educators the freedom to be themselves. Yet they seem unwilling to take this path. The fight to end discrimination cannot stop because the LNP wants it to.

Updated

Husic’s company tax comments ‘out of touch’, Greens say

The Greens economics spokesman, Nick McKim, is not a fan of Ed Husic’s comments to the AFR’s AI summit about the need to talk about lowering company tax.

McKim says the comments are “out of touch”.

Instead of reducing corporate taxes, we should be introducing a super profits tax to make sure that the corporations who have driven inflation contribute to a fairer society.

Lowering corporate taxes would also sabotage our climate efforts, rewarding industries that pollute our environment.

Fossil fuel corporations already enjoy substantial subsidies. Our priority should be holding them accountable for their environmental impact.

Updated

Hume asks for update on Jenkins recommendations including a doctor at Parliament House

The Department of Parliamentary Services is still fronting senators in estimates despite being scheduled to finish at midday.

The Liberal senator Jane Hume is asking for an update about the outcomes of recommendations from a landmark review into Parliament House culture by the former sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins.

One of the recommendations is to have a doctor on site within Parliament House during sitting weeks. In a feasibility study for the DPS, the annual cost of having a doctor on site sit at around $361,000.

Hume asks: “Do you know how much the department has spent on designer furniture in the last decade? $3.698m in the last decade, so around $360,000 a year on designer furniture, rather than a doctor on site in this building, which was not just recommended by Kate Jenkins but is being demanded by our staff.”

The Senate president, Sue Lines, later responds “the vast bulk of staff don’t work in this building – they work in electorate offices … a GP here [in Parliament House] does not assist a staff member working in Darwin or in Perth or wherever they work across this country in any shape”.

Updated

Australian Christian Lobby decries government ‘transparency crisis’

In an odd turn of events, the Australian Christian Lobby – best known for its fierce opposition to marriage equality – has declared there’s a “transparency crisis” across Australian governments.

Citing recent Freedom of Information (FoI) knockbacks (we feel you) and recent reporting over the Department of Parliamentary Services’ exemption from FoI laws, the ACL’s national director for politics, Wendy Francis, has had enough with the broken regime.

She wants an FoI overhaul and a promise to “reduce the use of exemptions, exceptions, and redactions while introducing real penalties for non-compliance”.

Francis says:

It’s time to end the secrecy and lack of accountability in government at every level … Democracy depends on transparency. No more excuses, no more delays, no more denials. Access to public information should be non-negotiable.

You won’t get any complaints from me here on greater transparency.

However, the kicker is the ACL is trying to get data as part of its campaign against gender-affirming surgery and those requests have been largely knocked back.

Updated

And after one last dixer, question time ends.

Don’t get too excited – there is another one tomorrow.

Taylor asks treasurer if company tax rate should be cut

Angus Taylor has a question for Jim Chalmers.

What. A. Day.

Taylor:

Does the treasurer agree with the minister for industry that there should be a reduction in the company tax rate?

Chalmers:

It’s a very welcome opportunity, a very rare opportunity indeed, to get a question from the shadow treasurer, even though a budget was handed down from this dispatch box a couple of weeks ago.

Mr Speaker, I saw the comments that the industry minister made at the Fin Review gathering earlier today, and they are entirely consistent with the sorts of things that we have been saying for some time.

And what he said was, was that the corporate tax system has a role to play in incentivising manufacturing capital, and it might just have dawned on those opposite, but that was a central feature of the budget two weeks ago to use the tax system to incentivise the kind of investment and production that we want to see to power the good, secure, well-paid jobs of the future in industries like manufacturing.

I say in addition to that, Mr Speaker, that the industry minister and I, indeed the energy minister, the resources minister, the prime minister, the infrastructure minister and others, have worked very, very closely to put together a tax package in this budget that we’re very proud of and we’re very proud of it, because it recognises that we can use the tax system and tax breaks for corporate Australia to incentivise a future made in Australia, Mr Speaker. And so a large proportion, indeed most of the $23bn of the Future Made in Australia package that I announced from this dispatch box almost exactly two weeks ago was about company tax reform in the form of production tax credits.

Updated

Victorian government to review admin burden on teachers

The Victorian education minister, Ben Carroll, has just announced he has commissioned an independent review into the burden of administration tasks on teachers and principals in government schools.

Led by the researcher Katie Roberts-Hull, Carroll said the review would provide recommendations to the government by December on how to help schools and principals manage and reduce this workload.

He said it was a repeated complaint from teachers and school leaders that they were tied up with administrative and compliance activities rather than focusing on teaching and learning.

Carroll said:

School leaders, teachers and staff play a vital role in supporting young Victorians – while administration is a necessary part of their roles, we need to make sure they have as much time as possible to teach and support students.

Updated

Andrew Giles is asked another version of the same question he has been asked by the Coalition since the beginning of QT and gives the same answer.

As I’ve said in relation to similar questions, this is a visa that was cancelled and remained cancelled by my department in line with ministerial direction 99. I believe these visas should remain cancelled and I prioritise the number of cases for urgent cancellation in consideration to that effect.

Updated

Tink asks treasurer about decision not to raise jobseeker in the budget

The North Sydney independent MP, Kylea Tink, wants to know from Jim Chalmers what analysis the government undertook before it decided not to raise the rate of jobseeker, as recommended by the economic inclusion advisement committee, in the most recent budget.

Chalmers goes through what the government has done (raise rent assistance, which not everyone is able to receive and works out, at the maximum rate, to about an extra $9 a week, the previous $40 a fortnight rise to jobseeker and indexation) but does not answer Tink’s question.

Chalmers:

We will continue to do what we can to help people who are doing it tough. We have made some progress, but we acknowledge in the member’s question and in all of the engagement that the minister and I do with the sector, that there is an appetite to go further. And what we have shown, I think, in the course of our three budgets, is a willingness to do that where we can.

Updated

There is another question to Andrew Giles, which prompts the same answer we have heard since the beginning of question time.

Updated

Adelaide University officially registered as a new higher education provider

In big news for the university sector, Adelaide University has been officially registered as a new higher education provider by the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA).

The institution is being created as a merger of the University of Adelaide and the University of South Australia, with registration marking the next major step forward in opening the campus, slated for January 2026.

In 2022, the state government held a review into the viability of merging the two campuses, backed by the state opposition but contentious among existing academics. This decision means Adelaide University is registered for a period of seven years.

The Adelaide University co-vice chancellors, Prof David Lloyd and Prof Peter Høj, said it was a “significant milestone” in the creation of a new university.

This is an important step forward in the formal regulatory process and provides absolute confidence in our stated ambition as we prepare to launch the nation’s new for-purpose university.

Adelaide University has a compelling reason to exist – to enable educational excellence, equitable access, and excellent research become a driving force for good with impact that transcends borders – and we look forward to taking the new institution to the world.

Updated

Bandt asks PM to reaffirm Australia’s full commitment to ICC

The Greens leader, Adam Bandt, asks Anthony Albanese:

Will you condemn the calls from the leader of the opposition that Australia should consider cutting ties with the international criminal court if it issues warrants for the arrest of members of Israel’s war cabinet, and will you reaffirm Australia’s full commitment to the court, including that Australia will seek to arrest any person for whom the court issues a warrant, such as the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu?

Albanese doesn’t answer the question directly:

This government and indeed this parliament has been very clear from the beginning. We joined together, most of us, to condemn the terrorist attacks of October 7. We regard Hamas as a terrorist group. We have called upon Hamas to immediately release all hostages, and there is no equivalence between Hamas and Israel. We said in a motion, carried last October, that we recognise Israel’s right to defend itself, but we also reiterated this parliament’s stance, that Australia’s consistent position in all contexts is to call for the protection of civilian lives and the observance of international law. We have been consistent.

I note as well the impact that has occurred recently in Rafah. We consistently have opposed the ground offensive in Rafah. We expressed our concern that the impact that that would have, given that more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people were sheltering in Rafah, and were told to go to Rafah, where they would be safe.

We must have a humanitarian ceasefire so that civilian life can be protected. We must have increased humanitarian assistance delivered to Gaza. Every innocent life matters, whether it is Israeli or Palestinian, and my government consistently and will consistently support a two-state solution, which recognises the right of both Israelis and Palestinians to live in peace and security with prosperity.

Updated

Giles gets another opposition question

Andrew Giles gets the next opposition question and it is again about someone who had a visa cancelled because of an alleged crime, which was reinstated by an independent tribunal. Ministerial direction 99 was again raised.

Giles gives the same answer:

I say again that the department cancelled the visas of all these people. I say also that there are five primary considerations, all of which are given equal weighting in ministerial direction 99 that need to be taken into consideration. These are protection of the Australian community from criminal conduct, family violence, strength, nature and duration of ties to Australia, best interests of minor children and the expectations of the Australian community. Direction 99 did not decrease the importance placed on considerations such as the expectations of the Australian community on community safety. That remains unchanged under this government.

Updated

Fossil fuel holdings have increased in many super funds, Market Forces says

Market Forces has released a report today detailing how superannuation funds are – so far – not walking the talk about decarbonising their holdings.

Its headline findings are that 30 of the nation’s biggest super funds have 9% of their members’ investments in what they call “Climate Wreckers Index companies”.

In the two years from December 2021 to the end of 2023, funds’ holdings of firms with big coal and gas exposure doubled from $19bn to $39bn.

Meanwhile, at the other end of the carbon spectrum, holdings of clean energy companies (drawn from the Bloomberg Goldman Sachs Global Clean Energy Index) actually fell by $500m over those two years to $7.7bn. That’s about 2% of funds’ holdings.

There are a couple of caveats to the report. One is that Market Forces counts BHP as a “wrecker” because of its coking coal assets.

BHP is a behemoth and many funds would find it hard to avoid having some of the miner’s stock in their holdings. (The company might say: we dig copper, cobalt and other metals that the renewables transition needs.)

The other caveat is that some of those movements have to do with shifts in stock prices. About one-third of the increase in fossil fuel stocks came from increased purchases of those shares by funds. These included Australian Super buying “tens of millions of Woodside shares”, according to the report lead, Brett Morgan.

As for the clean energy side of the ledger, the market capital value of such firms fell 15% over that time, Market Forces says. That explains the shrinking share of funds’ holdings.

Still, the group notes super funds talk up their net zero credentials. Based on comparison for these two years at least, we’re not seeing a decarbonisation trend matching that rhetoric.

Updated

Another opposition question to Giles

There is another opposition question to Andrew Giles about direction 99 and the answer is pretty much the same:

As I have already said, my thoughts, and the thoughts of all members, I’m sure, are with the family of the victim here. This was a visa that was cancelled, and remained cancelled by my department, under direction 99. Direction 99 did not and does not decrease the importance placed on expectation such as the expectation of the Australian community and the protection of the community from crime. This remains unchanged under this government. Community safety remains the highest priority of this government and, I say again, these were decisions made by an independent tribunal.

Updated

‘In the darkest hour, Australia will be there’: Marles speaks about PNG landslide and Noumea unrest

Richard Marles took a dixer on what Australia has been doing in PNG and Noumea.

On PNG, Marles says:

In addition to the disaster response experts who are on their way to PNG now, the emphasis is on helping those who are displaced, and so we are working on transporting 750 family-sized shelters to the site. There is more that we are seeking to do.

But, to be frank, part of the issue here is about not overwhelming a system which is currently under a lot of stress.

But what every Australian should know, and more importantly what every Papua New Guinean should know, is that we will do everything within our power in this moment to help Papua New Guinea through this most difficult time.

And on Noumea, Marles says:

If I can just briefly mention New Caledonia – over the last couple of weeks we have seen unrest, and the origins of this obviously go back decades. The answer to this has been and continues to be ongoing dialogue. We very much welcome the visit of President Macron to Noumea, and we’re working with our French neighbours about how we can provide assistance in this context as well.

What we have done is provide eight flights over the course of the last week or so in which we’ve transported about 500 people to Australia, most of whom are Australian citizens.

These two very different incidents remind us of one central fact. We are members of the Pacific family. And every person in the Pacific should know that, in the darkest hour, Australia will be there.

Updated

Back to QT and Peter Dutton asks another question about the ministerial direction 99 and how it was used by an administrative appeals tribunal to reinstate a visa (the case is before the courts).

Andrew Giles says:

Direction 99 did not decrease the importance placed on considerations such as the expectations of the Australian community and the protection of the community from crime. That is a very important point here, as well as the fact that the visa in question was cancelled and remained cancelled by my department in accordance with ministerial direction 99. A number of cases were not raised with me by my department, and I’ve asked my department … for an explanation why.

(The gap there is because of interjections from the opposition.)

My department is now looking at all these cases as a priority, and they are all under cancellation consideration.

Updated

Husic calls for conversation on corporate tax rate

While we are going through some dixers, let’s take a look at what else is going on.

At the AFR summit, Ed Husic said there needs to be a conversation about corporate tax rates – which he says are too high (and therefore, the argument goes, a barrier to investment).

It isn’t the first time that conversation has been raised, but Husic wouldn’t have brought it up unless there was something coming down the pipeline, so watch this space.

It has made the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry VERY happy though:

The ACCI chief executive officer, Andrew McKellar, said:

Australian businesses will embrace the need to reconsider corporate taxes. Lowering the corporate tax rate or introducing investment allowances are critical measures that can drive business investment, spur economic growth and ultimately benefit all Australians.

Businesses need the ability to free up capital and invest, especially given the sluggish productivity growth over much of the past decade.

… ACCI looks forward to engaging constructively with the government on this crucial issue and we thank the government for raising it. An approach that enhances productivity and ensures sustainable economic growth would be a win-win for all Australians.

(At least someone is happy today.)

Updated

UQ admits to almost $8m in staff underpayments

The University of Queensland (UQ) has admitted to owing almost $8m in staff underpayments, becoming the latest of a string of high-profile universities to incorrectly pay casual workers.

Late on Monday evening, UQ revealed it was correcting pay owed to 9,743 casual academic and professional staff, after identifying the mistakes during a review of its pay processes and systems.

The review found the university’s enterprise agreement was incorrectly applied between 2017 and 2023 related to minimum hours and the use of a different pay rate for casual academic staff with a relevant PhD.

The UQ vice-chancellor, Prof Deborah Terry, unreservedly apologised to impacted staff.

Our intention is to rectify these matters as soon as possible, and I would like to assure them they will receive all entitlements including superannuation and interest. We will be writing individually to all staff affected … the university is working through a comprehensive program of work to upgrade our systems and processes to further ensure ongoing pay accuracy.

The impacted staff will receive an average payment of about $250 each, excluding super and interest.

Updated

Le asks PM about western Sydney funding

The independent MP Dai Le has the first crossbench question. Le asks:

Prime minister, in 2022 you announced $15bn in National Reconstruction Fund supposedly to support manufacturing. This budget, you announced $22.7bn for your Future Made in Australia. Manufacturing is the largest employer in Fowler – 40% – and the engine room powering western Sydney.

How much of the $15bn announced in 2022 has been allocated to support small- and medium-sized manufacturing companies in western Sydney?

Anthony Albanese:

I’d hope that she’s an enthusiastic supporter of our plan for manufacturing. Because it compares with those opposite [the Coalition] who, of course, voted against the National Reconstruction Fund. Who voted against it and stopped it going through for a period of time through this parliament. And delayed it. But we’re getting on with, now, the National Reconstruction Fund, have its structure set up. It isn’t something that has a colour-coded spreadsheet.

It’s something that will get proper economic analysis for projects. But I hope as well that the member for Fowler was pleased to see three new projects in the budget benefiting Fowler – $5m for Hume Highway corridor assessment; $47.5m for western Sydney roads; $100m for western Sydney rapid bus infrastructure upgrades; $22.5m for Roads to Recovery funding for councils in Fowler over five years following our increases.

Ley raises a point of order, but it’s not a point of order.

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Ley asks another visa question to Giles

Sussan Ley asks another visa question to Andrew Giles about a matter which is before the courts (but the vibe is the same as Dutton’s).

Giles says:

This was a visa that was cancelled and remained cancelled under ministerial direction 99. Now it was a decision of the AAT, an independent tribunal, to overturn the cancellation of the visa and I remind the House that the direction places a serious emphasis on family violence. These need to be considered in all matters by the tribunal. I also want to inform the House that I have cancelled the individual’s visa, and as this matter is before the courts I will say nothing about this matter.

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‘We need to all be upstanders’: Victoria’s first parliamentary secretary for men’s behavioural change speaks

Back in Victoria for a moment, the Labor MP Tim Richardson, who has been appointed by the premier as the first parliamentary secretary for men’s behavioural change, has spoken briefly to the media.

He says he is honoured to take on the role – a brainchild of Jacinta Allan.

Richardson says:

The premier is really passionate about women’s safety, but also the accountability and importance of boys and men to really lead that change. So I hope I can bring along with all my colleagues, but also all of our community, that change over time. We know that cultural change in attitudes towards women and respect for women is so very critical. So I feel really honoured to be in that space. And I know how passionate the premier is about leading in this space.

He says his priority will be being a positive role model for young men:

I think we need a role model for positive masculinity and positive relationships. And we see that in our schools with respectful relationships – a program that’s run across Victoria. We see that in our community organisations and sporting clubs. We need to all be upstanders. But it can’t be left to women to manage women’s safety. It’s boys and men and those attitudes and those norms and stereotypes that we need to break away from.

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Giles targeted over visa cancellations as question time begins

As expected, Peter Dutton opens up with a question for Andrew Giles:

An immigration detainee referred to as CHCY had his visa cancelled after he was convicted of raping his 14-year-old stepdaughter while his wife was in hospital giving birth. The Albanese government’s watering down of the law has allowed this criminal to stay in Australia, making our country less safe. When will the Albanese Labor government apologise for this catastrophic mistake and reverse direction 99?

For some context, here is what Paul Karp has previously reported on this case:

In one case, a New Zealand-born man – referred to as CHCY – was given his visa back in March despite being found guilty of nine counts of indecent treatment of a child under 16 and two counts of rape in relation to his stepdaughter.

The AAT “found that CHCY’s strength, nature and duration of ties to Australia as a primary consideration, weighs in favour of revocation of his visa cancellation as he has lived here for 21 years”.

The tribunal said CHCY had “violated the expectation that he be a law-abiding citizen” and would ordinarily lose his visa, but restored it due to his “particular circumstances and those of the victim”. The government believes this indicates the fact the victim had moved to New Zealand was the decisive factor, not the new rules.

Andrew Giles says:

Our thoughts are, of course, with the victims in this case. In saying that, of course, community safety remains our highest priority as a government. I remind the leader of the opposition and all members that this was a visa that was cancelled and remains cancelled by my department, in line with the ministerial direction 99.

Now, I believe it is a decision that should still be cancelled and I advise the House also that I have prioritised a number of cases for urgent cancellation consideration.

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Peter Dutton joins with Anthony Albanese and says the Coalition supports any form of support Australia can offer Papua New Guinea:

It is rugged country and very difficult to access, but the scenes of seeing people try to dig for loved ones who are buried, by hand, trying to move rocks, and some reports of people being under 10 metres of landfill, it is unimaginable, and I wrote, as the prime minister acknowledged earlier, to him this morning to offer the Coalition’s support on any decision the government would make, to provide additional effort to PNG.

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‘We hold them in our hearts’: Albanese says Australians grieve for people killed in PNG landslide

The MPs are all in the House of Representatives chamber for question time.

But first, there are statements on the devastating landslide in Papua New Guinea, which may have killed 2,000 people in a remote part of the country’s north.

Anthony Albanese:

Earlier today and over the weekend, I have had contact with Prime Minister James Marape. You heard him address this parliament just a short time ago. I informed him that all Australians were grieving for those killed in the landslide in Papua New Guinea. We hold out hope for Papua New Guinea. We held out hope for the missing and strength to those who are now so desperately searching in what is an unimaginable tragedy.

We can’t envisage what it was like for those in its path, the suddenness of it, the scale of it, the macro terror of it. Locals have described it as an exploding bomb and rushing towards homes like a sea wave. We do not know the full extent of it. Tragically there are reports it could be up to 2,000 people buried beneath the mud and the rubble. All Papua New Guineans are suffering in the wake of this terrible disaster, and we hold them in our hearts.

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Dreyfus and Cash share conflicting accounts of heated meeting over religious discrimination bill

The attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, met with his shadow counterpart, Michaelia Cash, to discuss the religious discrimination bill today. Labor has said that it wants bipartisan support for the bill, while the Coalition wants it released publicly.

Accounts of the meeting are highly disputed, with both sides accusing the other of aggressive behaviour including raised voices – which both deny.

Cash said:

I was appalled by Mr Dreyfus’s behaviour. Mr Dreyfus needs to stop playing games with his religious discrimination legislation. As I told Mr Dreyfus he needs to take on board the feedback he has received from the faith communities and release his legislation publicly.

Labor is considering whether and how to respond but, from its perspective, Cash was spoiling for a fight to blame the government for a breakdown in negotiations.

We can’t say with certainty what happened in the room, but we can definitively say no progress was made with the opposition to pass the bill.

Updated

Stefanic says he declared conflict over personal relationship with deputy due to ‘gossip’

Still in Senate estimates hearings, the Department of Parliamentary Services boss, Rob Stefanic, has defended his actions during an eight-month period between 2022 and 2023 after he declared a conflict of interest with his former subordinate as “purely administrative” and “transactional”.

Stefanic is being questioned by senators in the hearing about a formal conflict of declaration he made in regards to a personal relationship he developed with the former deputy secretary, Cate Saunders.

Stefanic and Saunders worked together between 2017 when she was employed as the chief operations officer, and later as the deputy secretary in 2020, until she left the DPS – and didn’t return – for a temporary secondment at Services Australia in April 2023.

In August 2022, Stefanic told the estimates hearing he made a formal conflict of interest declaration to the then APS commissioner, Peter Woolcott, regarding the relationship, which he said there was no documentation of.

Stefanic said he did so because of “gossip” and “rumours” that began to emerge about his relationship with Saunders.

The Greens senator Barbara Pocock asked why Stefanic and Saunders continued to work together for a period of eight months after the declaration was made.

Stefanic said “it’s not a matter of simply moving someone on day two, it can take time” in regards to organising other arrangements, such as Saunders moving to another agency.

Pocock asked: “So for the eight months where you were the manager in this relationship, how did you manage the conflict of interest within that eight-month period?”

Stefanic responded that the working relationship between the secretary and deputy secretary is “transactional” and that his dealings with Saunders as her boss during that period were “purely administrative in nature”.

Earlier, Stefanic revealed those administrative matters were mostly to do with the approval of personal leave.

• This post was updated on 28 May 2024 to include Stefanic’s stated reason for declaring the relationship.

Updated

The first question time of the House of Reps sitting week will begin in just under 15 minutes. Grab something and get comfortable – it is the first QT since budget week, so I think we know it is going to go places.

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Asked about Penny Wong’s latest statement on Rafah, Jennifer Tierney says:

I am happy to hear the language coming out of Minister Wong’s office. I think those words matter. It matters that the Australian government leads but I would encourage us to also look at action as well.

When there are security council resolutions from UN, what are the actions the government of Australia has taken? When there is a UN security resolution regarding Israel and the conflict in Gaza, what are the actions they are taking? I think it is a really good story for someone to write about how and what the response of the government is. We want to see them take the most thorough response possible within the UN community.

Dr Christos Christou adds:

I think everybody is horrified. And I have seen that, everyone is shifting their language on to this, but where is the action? There must be action. As I said before … there must be this political solution and I think every single party from different sides of this world, even in Australia, Europe, the US, Canada, there is a level that things can start with the very basics of having a ceasefire, having the humanitarian aid [allowed] in, and then we will find out steps.

Updated

Asked about how MSF cares for its health workers and protects them, given that health workers have become targets in conflicts (the question is broad), Dr Christos Christou says:

It’s getting worse and worse. Not only what I had discussed in Gaza, we have more attacks in Ukraine. We have experienced in 2015 a bombing of one of our trauma centres by the United States Air Force.

We have lost colleagues and patients that were sedated inside the ICU. You saw them getting buried. This is the reality.

Many responses from progressive governments, like Australia, like Japan, and we ended up the resolution in the United Nations to protect. We came with campaigns. But after what we see in the last few days, I do not know, we may need to change course. We may need to look differently at the situation, with this impunity, many of our colleagues say the hospitals in Gaza have become graveyards.

Jennifer Tierney adds:

We used to have conversations with supporters and we would explain, we negotiate with those outside the conflict, educate the community about who we are and they care about having medical care and that really protects us, and now I feel like Pollyanna having said that. We are now seeing that is a much less a guarantee of safety and I think that Gaza is the extreme context of that.

Updated

Dr Christos Christou answers that same question and says he has posed that question to colleagues and other journalists and that money and resources was one of the responses.

The other is there was no presence on the ground, no boots, as we say, on the ground. Even the UN agencies, when I invited them to an event, the heads of the UN, they acknowledge that they have been quite concerned about the [issues] in responding or even being present on the ground. When you don’t have these eyes, you cannot get alerted of what is happening.

The third factor was the lack of political willingness by anyone at this moment to get involved in this situation to try to resolve the situation.

The combination of these things creating amazing humanitarian crisis that there was no one else to see that early enough.

That’s when MSF came with this survey and said one kid every few hours dying, and immediately afterwards there was a response by journalists. They arrived. Was that enough? No. Because the agencies did not come … and still they have serious problems with funds.

Updated

The pair are asked about what has changed in terms of how conflicts are covered.

Jennifer Tierney says:

Journalism I think has changed. We work very closely with journalists and I think that the international [desks] have changed. There is less funding, less people on the ground, less capability to report. We hear it is not for lack of wanting to and not for lack of desire to be reporting on those things.

Social media obviously is another thing. You have different humanitarian focuses splitting eyes, populism, all these things are really contributing to our ability to break through the stories.

And if you don’t know, MSF was started by doctors and journalists and we really have been an organisation that has its basis in reporting. And our team does an amazing job of getting the stories out there but we would love to see news agencies reinvesting back in the international developing world so that we can talk about this more from a first-person account.

Updated

The Australian head of Médecins Sans Frontières, Jennifer Tierney, is also answering questions at this National Press Club address and says (in answer to that same previous question covered in the last post):

If you think about what the Israelis are going through and Palestinians are going through, if you take it back to the humanitarianism of it, these are traumatised, hurting people on both sides of this conflict.

From a human level you can understand the rage and the hurt and the pain, but the civilian casualties that we are seeing are so outside the bounds of acceptability of any law of war that there is no way to contextualise it, to excuse it away or to even be able to frame it even from that human understanding.

The pain and suffering that we are seeing in this tiny little area when no one can run, no one can be evacuated, where the primary people suffering are mothers and children, make it very hard to take that rationale all the way to its conclusion of what happened this week.

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Dr Christos Christou is asked about Israel’s claims Gaza’s hospitals were being used by Hamas and says:

What we ask is for everyone to respect the laws of war. Respect hospitals. Many times I have been asked and I really never heard anything from any of my colleagues about anything happening inside the hospital other than being full of patients, that sometimes we have been asked to activate even within a couple of hours, which is impossible. So when you asked me what is happening inside the hospital, I can tell you that is just a desperate situation for the patients, and that is what we see.

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Medical workers in Gaza are ‘exhausted’ and their message is not getting through, MSF chief says

Dr Christos Christou says he and MSF staff are exhausted and the message – that medical aid and the ability to transfer patients outside of Gaza for treatment is desperately needed – is not getting through:

Nothing changes, that is why sometimes we feel like it is not for us any more. That is why we address these [forums].

Our people are exhausted. I have crossed the line. You can imagine eight months, working days and nights, witnessing all this, members of their families. Not being safe anywhere. I think we still try to find the words, we cannot find them. We tried to collect the evidence. It is not for us any more.

Updated

Daniel Hurst asks: What is the latest information you have about the types of injuries, the extent of the damage in the injuries?

Dr Christos Christou:

The latest tragic incident, we happen to have our stabilisation and treatment point. It is a small clinical facility, very close to the place that was bombarded, close to that informal camp with the tents.

We received more than 128 patients there. The situation, as you can imagine, it depends, some are very severely injured and others could not even make it after a couple of hours.

The numbers are everywhere now shared. If I remember we have more than 30 or 40 people confirmed killed and there are many more they are still trying to assess where they are. But what is important in this question, as I describe the situation, is to understand these little facilities are there to stabilise the patient, where they can get more advanced surgical treatment but these places do not exist any more. There is no trauma centre any more, there is no hospital, they are barely functioning, they are overworked.

Updated

Dr Christos Christou says MSF has a meeting with Penny Wong tomorrow and will present a petition with 85,000 signatures from Australians to do more.

Christou says:

Everywhere we are and wherever we have a presence, be that operational or institutional, we try to engage with everybody and especially with authorities.

It was after I have returned back from a visit to Palestine that we drafted an open letter and my colleagues in the [United] States and members of the States to explain the seriousness of the situation and that was also escalated up to the United Nations Security Council and also the United States were holding regular meetings, to bear and advocate. What we try to do is to let them be fully aware of what we witness on the ground.

We are one of the very few that we have all this evidence that is based on a neutral assessment of the needs.

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Doctors ‘the voices of the people that we are there to support’, MSF chief says

Dr Christos Christou, the Médecins Sans Frontières International president, is taking questions at the National Press Club.

He is asked about the MSF charter and neutrality and the organisation’s call for sanctions against Israel and the responsibility of other nations to uphold international law. He says:

The first thing in our charter is the medical action. This is our basic act of solidarity. Medical action [and] wherever possible combine bearing witness and advocating about what we see – becoming, in other words, the voices of the people that we are there to support.

And then, of course, we have to do that as doctors, which means we always impartially assess the needs and which used to go there where most of the needs exist.

And we do that also thanks to our work financially independent and also within the spirit of neutrality.

If we follow the order and are in extremely challenging situations, exceptional crisis, like the ones I described before, what matters is again to stand by the people no matter what this means.

Sometimes we may feel that we cross lines, but we never crossed the line of defending humanity, we will always do that.

Updated

Retail sales eke out 0.1% increase as households skimp where they can

The latest retail sales figures for April underscore what most of us know already: inflation and higher mortgage repayments are forcing households to skimp where we can.

Last month, retail turnover eked out a 0.1% increase but not enough to erase the 0.4% decline in March, the Australian Bureau of Statistics says. According to Moody’s Analytics, retail sales have been stagnant since December.

From a year earlier, turnover was 1.3% higher. However, inflation was running at an annual pace of about 3.5%, so it’s firmly negative in real terms. (We’ll get April CPI figures tomorrow, and expectations are that the figure will land close to March’s 3.5% pace.)

Discretionary spending is wilting, particularly for clothing and footwear (though presumably some of that would be non-discretionary).

If you’re a retailer in Victoria you might be doing it particularly tough just now. (NSW bounced back from worst to first on a monthly basis.)

Since consumption is the largest part of the economy, such a weak retailing result will bolster the “economic doves” who want to see an RBA rate cut soon. (Today’s figures would tend to undermine the view of those wanting to see the central bank lift the cash rate from 4.35% to stymie inflation.)

The stage-three tax cuts and energy rebates will start to ease households’ squeeze from 1 July. Retailers will be hoping for some extra spending to head their way (but presumably not too much, too soon to disturb the RBA board room).

Updated

The Department of Parliamentary Services secretary, Rob Stefanic, is still facing questions about a perceived conflict of interest with a former colleague.

Stefanic is facing scrutiny over an alleged relationship with his subordinate, the former deputy secretary Cate Saunders, but Stefanic earlier said they were not in a relationship while he was her boss.

Saunders left her role as deputy secretary and chief operating officer of the DPS for a temporary secondment at Services Australia in April 2023 after first joining Parliament House in 2017, according to the latest DPS annual report.

The senators were told Saunders left the public service with an incentive to retire months after beginning her secondment.

Stefanic said he declared a formal conflict of interest declaration to the former APS commissioner Peter Woolcott in August 2022 and had “ongoing dialogue” to seek advice on “various matters”.

But the secretary, who has been in the role since 2015, said there was no documentation produced on these meetings or in relation to the management of the conflict to his knowledge.

In response to questioning by the Liberal senator Jane Hume, Stefanic said he continued to deal with personal leave approvals, which he deemed “not controversial”.

Stefanic said he made a formal declaration with the current presiding officers, Senate president Sue Lines and speaker Milton Dick, on 20 June 2023. He said it was for a “perceived” conflict of interest.

The questioning continues.

Updated

Department of Parliamentary Services boss grilled over relationship with former deputy

The Department of Parliamentary Services secretary, Rob Stefanic, has complained of a “repeated violation” of his personal privacy in relation to scrutiny over a relationship with his former deputy secretary Cate Saunders.

In a Senate estimates hearing this morning, in response to questions from One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts, Stefanic was critical of media coverage of the situation.

Stefanic initially said he was “not prepared to entertain any questions that speak to my personal privacy”, when Roberts asked if he was in a relationship with Saunders when she was given a redundancy package on her exit from the public service.

Stefanic told the Senate he had “unsuccessfully tried to communicate to members of the media, that I’ve taken all reasonable steps to declare all conflicts of interest as appropriate”.

I have acted appropriately at all times.

Stefanic said the situation was “actually not new” and said his privacy had been “considerably violated in this process”.

However, upon repeated questioning from Roberts, Stefanic said he was not in a relationship with Saunders when he was her boss.

Roberts said Stefanic should “put an end to it” by answering questions on the issue, adding “taxpayers have a right to know what’s going on in the Department of Parliamentary Services”.

Stefanic responded: “To that end senator, I’ll give you a simple answer, which is no.”

The committee went on a short break after this, to return shortly.

Updated

The National Press Club address is being delivered by Dr Christos Christou, Médecins Sans Frontières International president today.

Christou has begun speaking and Daniel Hurst is covering the speech. As always, we will bring you elements of what is being said, as well as cover parts of the question and answer session.

Updated

Paterson asks home affairs chief about guidance from PM’s office on answering Senate estimates questions

The shadow home affairs minister, James Paterson, is asking officials about guidance he says was distributed by the prime minister’s office entitled “Approaches to Senate estimates questions on notice asked of multiple agencies”. Essentially, the Coalition is pursuing the line that this is a handbook teaching officials how to obfuscate at Senate estimates.

The home affairs department’s secretary, Stephanie Foster, says that she has seen guidance from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Foster says that it is guidance only, and it’s clear that it is up to officials how to answer questions and that they must do so in line with the Senate’s instructions to witnesses.

Labor’s Murray Watt says that questions on notice have doubled since the Coalition was in opposition, some pursuing matters of public interest and some not. He gives the example of questions asking what temperature the office thermostat is set at. The guidance is to try to avoid diverting resources to “trivialities”.

Foster insists that she and her senior officers all understand it is guidance only, and that she has departed from it on occasion when she thought it appropriate to do so.

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Transport department boss quizzed over Taylor Swift T-shirt

It’s been a relatively uneventful start to transport and infrastructure Senate estimates on Tuesday.

With public servants so far answering questions related to corporate matters of infrastructure, transport and regional development administration, the topic of the department secretary Jim Betts’ preference for statement T-shirts over corporate attire has again come to the fore.

The Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie, who like her fellow Coalition senators has become known for pushing Betts with pointed questions and criticism of a reliance on answering questions on notice during previous estimates hearings, took a lighter tone on Tuesday.

McKenzie asked: “I hope you didn’t think because I hadn’t mentioned this in the first hour that I haven’t been watching your T-shirt efforts over time. Have you changed your mind since last estimates, are you now a fan of Taylor Swift,” she said, referencing her line of questioning from the previous estimates hearing inquiring if departmental staff had scheduled work travel that coincided with the pop star’s concerts dates.

I feel like I’m living rent-free in your head, but at the supply and logistics conference last week I was told when I got there in the afternoon that you indeed had taken the time to.

Betts interrupted: “Yep, exactly, so I was wearing a Taylor Swift T-shirt last week at a freight and logistics conference, thank you for asking.”

McKenzie queried: “Why did you choose Taytay?”

Betts responded: “It was a gift from one of my staff and I also thought you might enjoy it because I knew you were speaking later on in the agenda and it might come up at Senate estimates.”

McKenzie: “Well I did, I did, so I thought that was very sweet of you.”

Betts: “It’s the least I could do if you’re living rent-free in my head.”

Updated

Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS) estimates has moved on to the Parliamentary Budget Office and the parliamentary budget officer Dr Stein Helgeby has told the Senate president, Sue Lines, and speaker, Milton Dick (the presiding officers), he will not seek reappointment when his term expires in November of this year.

A merit-based recruitment process to find his replacement will begin soon.

Updated

Cabinet is ‘crafting the offer for a second term’, Albanese tells MPs

Anthony Albanese has told Labor MPs that cabinet’s work is now concentrating on “crafting the offer for a second term”, as ministers get out and sell the budget’s key measures to voters.

“Crafting the offer” is political campaign jargon, which means cabinet is focused on its plan to win the next election.

Albanese reminded his colleagues that the government was now in the final 12 months of its first term and repeated his post-budget message he cost-of-living measures in the budget included “a tax cut for every taxpayer, an energy rebate for every Australian, benefits for students and a future made in Australia”.

He described Peter Dutton’s budget reply speech as having “no costings, no media release – just chaos and confusion”.

Updated

Here is what the House program looks like today.

The House will sit, so bills will be introduced, debated and passed, but the Senate won’t sit until Senate estimates is completed, so no legislation will pass the parliament this sitting fortnight.

Updated

Paterson grills home affairs secretary at Senate estimates

The home affairs secretary, Stephanie Foster, has delivered her opening address at Senate estimates.

Foster rattled off achievements in the portfolio, only touching lightly on the biggest controversies about boat arrivals and handling of releases from immigration detention.

Foster praised the “on water and on land deterrence and response to illegal fishing and people smuggling” and the department’s handling of the “complex litigation caseload arising from the NZYQ high court case and developing legislation to facilitate removing people who have no right to remain in Australia”.

She said:

In among scrutiny and controversy that will always accompany this portfolio it is too easy to forget home affairs officers have achieved amazing things.

The Liberal senator James Paterson has started by asking why Foster hasn’t tabled answers to written questions he supplied ahead of the hearing.

She said:

I have not prepared a document to table in response [because] I always prioritise bringing myself on the day ready to answer questions from the whole committee.

Paterson is now suggesting that Foster has breached a commitment to him to follow the same process she did when she came to estimates prepared to table a document revealing seven murderers were among those released after the high court decision.

Foster said the commitment was to consider whether it was an appropriate use of resources, not a guarantee of the same outcome. Paterson notes reports that Foster was reprimanded by the home affairs minister over the tabling. He suggests transparency has been harmed.

The committee’s chair, Labor senator Nita Green, said Foster was available to answer questions now.

Updated

Allan accuses Greens of ‘politicising’ Middle East conflict

Jacinta Allan has hit back at suggestions by the Greens that the Labor government should cut any ties it had with Israel following the attack on Rafah. She says the Victorian government is not responsible for foreign affairs and cannot resolve the conflict:

We are not responsible for defence relationships with other countries, that is the responsibility of the Australian government and the Australian parliament. That is their responsibility. What we do here in Victoria is provide support to communities who are grieving – and there will be many in our community today who are grieving following the attack in the Middle East overnight. Too many people are continuing to lose their lives while this conflict continues. Now the resolution of this conflict rests with those international agencies and bodies and foreign nations who have … the powers to bring this conflict to an end. That is not a power that the Victorian parliament has. That is not a power that the Victorian Greens political party has.

She accused the Greens of “politicising a tragedy” and driving division in the community:

They’re politicising grief, they will choose to bring division to the streets of Melbourne off the back of people losing their lives in the Middle East. That is the choice that the Greens political party are making. So it’s incumbent upon them to explain to the Victorian community how that shows any sign of leadership. It is unacceptable behaviour. We’ve seen disruption on the floor of the parliament. We have seen the parliament become an unsafe workplace for staff and members of parliament because of the actions of the Green political party. We saw it our recent party conference – atrocious behaviour … that’s not leadership.

Updated

‘It shouldn’t just be left to women and girls’: Allan on new parliamentary secretary for men’s behavioural change

Jacinta Allan is being asked about the new parliamentary secretary for men’s behavioural change. She says she appointed the MP Tim Richardson as she wants to foster conversations between men:

Having Tim in that role, both as a younger person, and also he’s a dad with two girls as well. He knows some of those parenting challenges firsthand. He’s having conversations with other families. But also too … having these conversations with men and boys is recognising that we are all part of this conversation. We are all part of this cultural change. It shouldn’t just be left to women and girls to talk about how women and girls should be kept safe and the actions they need to take. There is a responsibility on all of us.

Updated

Allan reveals more about proposed anti-corruption commissioners

Here’s a bit more information about the commissioners, via the Victorian premier:

There will be one full-time commissioner and two part-time commissioners and will reflect … the different skill sets that are needed to fulfil the roles and the different complaints that may come the commissioners’ way. The appointment process will be led by the Department of Premier and Cabinet, in consultation with the parliament … However, before the appointment can be made, the independent oversight committee needs to consider and endorse the appointment of the commissioner.

She says the terms will be five years and recently retired MPs can’t be commissioners.

Allan says:

There needs to be relevant skill sets whether it’s some experience in workplace relations, industrial relations, human rights, financial skills as well. For example, there’s a range of skills that are required – the bill does spell out though who’s not eligible. For example, someone who served as a member of parliament within the last five years, state or federal, is not able to be considered for the role of the commissioner.

Updated

Australia to deploy disaster expert team to PNG landslide

At Senate estimates, National Emergency Management Authority officials are giving an update on the situation in Papua New Guinea’s Enga province, where more than 2,000 people have been buried by a landslide.

Joe Buffone, the deputy coordinator general for emergency management response, said it was a “sad moment for our neighbours in PNG”. A landslip had occurred, 8 metres deep in places, leading Buffone to conclude there were “unlikely to be survivors”. “Condolences and thoughts remain with them.”

Australia was deploying an expert team of disaster assistance response, alternating one from NSW and one from Queensland. Buffone said the main focus was to support the PNG government dealing with the landslip and helping to recover bodies. About 5,000 people would be displaced as a result of the landslip.

Brendan Moon, the coordinator general, acknowledged the “significant human impacts” of the disaster and said our “hearts go out to the Enga community”.

Moon said there would also be long-term impacts, as food gardens for subsistence agriculture had been affected.

Updated

Victoria moves to set up commission to investigate corruption and misconduct allegations against MPs

The Victorian government is introducing long-awaited legislation to parliament it says is the “most significant overhaul of parliamentary oversight in the country”.

The premier, Jacinta Allan, has announced the government will introduce the Parliamentary Workplace Standards and Integrity Bill 2024 today, which if passed will establish a commission to investigate allegations of corruption and misconduct – including bullying, harassment, sexual harassment and victimisation by state MPs.

The bill will also allow for a new Parliamentary Ethics Committee to “promote ethical practices by MPs”.

She says the reforms will ensure Victoria’s parliamentary system operates with the “highest standards of accountability, conduct and integrity” in the country:

This is a big step forward in providing a safe and respectful workplace, whether it’s here on the parliamentary precinct, in elected offices, or in any other area where members of parliament go about their work … This is something that we know we need to bring to the parliament because parliament should be no different to any other workplace.

Updated

AI proving ‘useful tool’ for submissions to parliamentary inquiries, Senate clerk says

Artificial intelligence is proving a “useful tool” for submissions to parliamentary inquiries, says Senate clerk Richard Pye, saying his department has been using the tech to analyse some submissions to inquiries to identify themes emerging from those contributing.

Pye said the Senate doesn’t use diagnostic tools to check whether submissions are AI-generated - after Liberal senator Richard Colbeck raised concerns about AI submissions potentially containing false information.

In a Senate estimates hearing this morning, Pye said there needed to be a “broader awareness” about people using AI to contribute to the Senate, but also cautioned against dismissing out of hand any submissions that had been generated using AI - saying the technology could help more people contribute to the parliamentary process who otherwise may not be able to make submissions.

Colbeck raised concerns about false information making its way into the Senate submission process, saying there should be tools to address that.

Senate president Sue Lines said it was a good point to make about AI, but asked genuinely whether other submissions were also screened for false information - with Colbeck conceding this wasn’t the case. Lines said AI-generated submissions should be “identified”, but said the same standards about accuracy should apply to all submissions, regardless of how they were generated.

Elsewhere in the Senate’s finance and public administration committee, Liberal senators Jane Hume and Simon Birmingham spent a large chunk of time asking about the Senate’s transition from a monthly pay cycle to a fortnightly pay cycle for senators.

Updated

ABC denies claim of board meeting over Laura Tingle

The ABC has dismissed claims by News Corp that the ABC Board held “emergency talks over Laura Tingle outburst”.

The chief political correspondent for nightly current affairs program 7.30 and the staff-elected director on the ABC Board, Tingle made some comments at the Sydney Writers’ Festival on the weekend which have been seized upon by The Australian.

The ABC denial comes after a front page story in the Australian claimed the board had emergency discussions over “Tingle’s claims that Australia is racist and Peter Dutton is encouraging the abuse of migrants”.

A spokesperson for the ABC told Guardian Australia.

Reports of an emergency ABC Board meeting are incorrect and baseless.

Updated

Jacinta Allan’s changes to outer ministry include first ‘men’s behaviour change’ role

The Victorian premier, Jacinta Allan, has just announced some changes to her outer ministry, including the introduction of a parliamentary secretary for “men’s behaviour change”.

Allan says Mordialloc MP Tim Richardson will take on the role - the “first position of its kind in Australia”.

He will “focus largely on the influence the internet and social media have on boys’ and men’s attitudes towards women and building respectful relationships”, she says.

Allan has also replaced Darren Cheeseman - who was booted from the parliamentary Labor party last month over “allegations of persistent inappropriate behaviour” as secretary for education with Albert Park MP Nina Taylor.

Josh Bull, the MP for Sunbury, will become parliamentary secretary for infrastructure delivery – supporting both transport and health infrastructure ministers, while upper house MP Sheena Watt will become parliamentary secretary for emergency services.

Updated

Save the Children welcomes Australian government’s additional $10m aid for Syria

Yesterday, the Australian government announced it would provide an additional $10m in humanitarian aid for Syria, which has been welcomed by Save the Children CEO Mat Tinkler:

Syria was already experiencing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world before the earthquakes hit and the situation has continued to deteriorate, with almost 17 million Syrians now requiring lifesaving humanitarian assistance.

This commitment from Australia sends the message that even as donors are forced to respond to an increasing number of crises, Australia won’t forget about Syria or stop supporting people in need around the world.

We hope Australia will make further humanitarian commitments to Syria in the near future.

Updated

Victorian Greens leader wears watermelon earrings as symbol of Palestine solidarity

Victorian Greens leader Ellen Sandell is attempting get around the state parliament’s ban on the keffiyeh by wearing watermelon earrings, a symbol of Palestine solidarity, and the colours of the flag.

She says events in Rafah should be a “line in the sand” for the Allan Labor government. Sandell says:

In light of what happened in Rafah two nights ago where we saw over 40 Palestinians killed by an Israeli air strike as they were sheltering for their lives, the Greens are reiterating our call for the Victorian Labor government to rip up their MoU with the Israeli Ministry of Defense and to stop providing support for Israeli weapons manufacturers. We are seeing just incredible devastation and atrocity happening in Palestine. And if this latest attack, doesn’t draw a line in the sand, and isn’t the line where Labor says they will no longer support the Israeli Ministry of Defence, then what is?

The Victorian government has previously said signed it the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in late 2022, prior to the Israel-Hamas war. Its contents have not been made public but according to the Australian government’s register under the foreign arrangements scheme it is a “declaration of cooperation on fostering trade relations”.

Updated

Almost two thirds of young Australians dissatisfied with body image from being on social media, report finds

A new report on the effect of social media on the body image and mental health of young people has been handed to the government.

Independent MP Zoe Daniel convened a working group which included:

  • Jim Hungerford, Butterfly Foundation.

  • Varsha Yajman, mental health youth advocate.

  • Susan Rossell, Swinburne University.

  • Marilyn Bromberg, University of WA.

  • Hannah Jarman, Deakin University.

The report found:

Almost two thirds (61.7%) of young Australians aged 12-18 said social media made them feel dissatisfied with their body – up by 12% since 2022.

8 in 10 young Australians aged 12-18 thought that social media platforms need to do more to help young people have a more positive body image.

6 in 10 (59 %) Australians say diet and fitness content on social media impacts their body image – yet two thirds (68%) aren’t adjusting their social media behaviour.

Since 2012 the prevalence of eating disorders in youth aged 10-19 has risen by 8%, with the Butterfly Foundation seeing a staggering 275% surge in enquiries to its national helpline from individuals aged up to 25 (since 2019).

Updated

Emergency services chief stresses need to prepare for next high-risk weather season

The coordinator general of the National Emergency Management Agency, Brendan Moon, has stressed the need to prepare for the next high-risk weather season.

He told Senate estimates:

The 23-24 high risk weather season again tested the resilience of many Australian communities. Tropical cyclones, record-breaking rainfall, heatwaves, bushfires as well as rapid onset severe storms, yet again, again, challenged the capabilities and capacities of our systems and also our people ...

With a warmer than normal winter forecast and with a La Niña watch, we shall continue to prepare for the next high risk weather season.

Updated

New coalition to combat early learning crisis in rural, regional and remote areas

Rural and regional groups have come together to form the Access for Every Child Coalition, which has been formed with the aim of fixing the early learning crisis in rural, regional and remote Australia.

Advocacy group, The Parenthood are leading the group, which includes more than fifty organisations.

The main message – access to childcare shouldn’t depend on where you live and the exisiting system is failing rural, remote and regional communities.

​The new coalition want government to step in and do more to solve the crisis. Greens senator Steph Hodgins May agrees:

We need the Government to step in to do more. The Government needs to support families by making early childhood education and care free for all parents across Australia, and to pay our educators what they deserve for doing the most important work imaginable - educating and caring for our kids.

Updated

Watt: 44 high-risk weather events ‘impacted over 190 local government areas’ in 2023-24 period

Addressing Senate estimates, the minister for emergency management, Murray Watt, has recapped the 2023-24 high-risk weather season:

In the last higher-risk weather season which has just recently come to an end, we’ve experienced 44 events of national significance, which have impacted over 190 local government areas; 60 of the local government areas have been impacted more than once.

Disaster recovery can’t be a short-sighted exercise. Helping a community getting back to where it was physically and mentally can take years.

Watt said the federal government was working with the states and territories. He said the government had allocated $11.4bn in its latest 2024-25 budget to continue supporting ongoing recovery efforts across Australia. He said this was primarily in New South Wales and Queensland, given the location of recent disasters, but in other states and territories as well.

Watt said that figure represented an increase of about $3.9bn since the estimates laid out in the previous mid-year economic and fiscal outlook at the end of last year, reflecting increasing costs in repairing roads, other infrastructure, community facilities and homes.

Updated

Murray Watt thanks emergency staff working ‘tirelessly’ to help Australians ‘in their darkest days’

The Senate legal and constitutional affairs committee hearing is scrutinising the government’s emergency response efforts this morning.

The minister for emergency management, Murray Watt, began the hearing by saying it’s “nice to see you all at the beginning of the two-week estimates blockbuster”.

Watt expressed appreciation to the staff of the National Emergency Management Agency, and all responsible organisations, who had worked “tirelessly” to help Australians “in their darkest days” when responding to disasters.

He said Australia was also “helping our neighbours in their time of need”, including PNG:

I think all Australians are thinking of our friends in Papua New Guinea at the moment.

Watt thanked personnel who were “being deployed at quite short notice” to assist the PNG response.

Updated

ANU student protestors relocate pro-Palestine camp

Student protestors at the Australian National University have relocated their pro-Palestine camp, after a request from the university.

Students have been protesting for four weeks at the Kambri lawns but have moved to the end of University Avenue, after voting “overwhelmingly” for the decision last night.

A statement from organisers said:

Let us be clear: our goal has never been to occupy Kambri Lawns. Our goal has always been to, and continues to be, to ensure our ANU degrees are no longer contributing to genocide. Our goal is for the ANU to disclose and divest. No location change, no intimidation tactic, and no threat, will change that.

The university had given students a midday deadline to move their camp or risk disciplinary action and arrest, stating that the camp was in a fire evacuation zone creating an “unacceptable risk” to staff and students.

Video below is from yesterday’s demonstrations:

Updated

The house of reps won’t be sitting until noon, which is usual for Tuesdays. Even with Senate estimates, there will be party room meetings happening (senators assigned to estimates get a leave pass) which delays the starting time on Tuesdays.

Updated

Sydney’s Lord Mayor Clover Moore seeking re-election for record sixth term

Clover Moore will seek re-election for a record sixth term as Sydney’s Lord Mayor later this year.

She said she was still “energised about our work transforming the city”.

Announcing her campaign on Facebook, she said:

There are reminders everywhere: award-winning parks and community facilities, busy bike lanes, thriving villages with greener and transformed high streets, light rail and pedestrianised George Street.

But the work to ensure the City is a great place to live, work and visit – with environmental, social and economic sustainability at its heart – is far from over.

Updated

‘Ministerial decision 99’ making ‘Australian community a less safe place’, Dan Tehan says

Coalition immigration spokesperson Dan Tehan has demanded the government rescind the controversial “ministerial decision 99”, which the opposition has blamed for foreign-born criminals being allowed to stay in Australia and avoid deportation.

Tehan said of the immigration minister:

Andrew Giles has run out of excuses.

He must now front up and own the ministerial direction he put in place that is leading to serious hardened criminals walking our streets.

Tehan was speaking after further coverage in the News Corp papers this morning which reported “direction 99” had been behind decisions to allow three child rapists to escape deportation. Paul Karp had this report yesterday, which explains the Albanese government’s rule change that people with significant ties to Australia should not be deported to countries where they lacked community links.

Tehan told a Parliament House doorstop this morning that the direction was “flawed, it’s not working, and is making the Australian community a less safe place”.

He said direction 99 should be rescinded, and called on Giles to make a public appearance to answer questions about the scheme.

Updated

‘No barrier, except weakness’ of government, Paterson says on ministerial direction 99

Liberal senator and shadow home affairs senator James Paterson appeared on Network Seven’s breakfast show a little earlier with some things to say about immigration minister Andrew Giles and direction 99.

(If you need an update on direction 99, Paul Karp has you covered).

Paterson is continuing the Coalition campaign to have Giles sacked from the ministry. Paterson blamed the government:

The High Court made a decision, but then the Parliament made another decision. We passed a law which allowed people who pose a risk to the community to be preventively detained.

Now, I think if you’re committing an offence, with a recidivism rate of 20%, then you are a serious risk to the community and the government should apply to the court to get this people off the streets.

But on the other issue are people who should be deported from our country. There is no barrier, except the weakness of the Albanese government, to getting rid of these people.

Under the previous Liberal government, we got rid of people like this. Under the next Liberal government, whenever its elected, we will get rid of people like this. But under this weak government they are letting these people stay.

As Paul tells me, Giles said last week that some preventive detention applications have progressed to stage two of getting expert reports into likelihood they’ll reoffend; and the idea they wouldn’t have been released but for direction 99 is contested. In some cases with serious offending it was a factor that weighed in favour of them getting their visa back, not necessarily the reason.

Updated

ANU gives students noon deadline to disband pro-Palestine encampment

Caitlin Cassidy and Luca Ittimani have an update on the ANU encampment:

Student protesters in Canberra have been given a noon deadline to disband a pro-Palestine encampment but say they will defy the order and risk disciplinary action and arrest.

On Monday the Australian National University dramatically escalated its response to the occupation. An ANU spokesperson said the university was working with Australian Capital Territory police to ensure the “safe removal of people”.

They said, providing a deadline of midday on Tuesday:

The university expects encampment participants to follow directions from police.

Police directions are enforceable under law. Failure to comply with a reasonable direction from ANU, or police, could lead to potential disciplinary action under the university’s code of conduct.

Updated

With estimates about to get underway for the first day of hearings, you might want to take a read of Sarah Basford Canales’ latest story:

Penny Wong: ‘Israel must not proceed with its operation in Rafah’

Foreign minister Penny Wong has released an official statement on Rafah.

Wong’s official X account posted that the events of the last 24 hours “underscore that we must see a humanitarian ceasefire now so that civilians can be protected”.

Israel’s strikes have had horrific and unacceptable consequences. Australia has been been very clear that Israel must not proceed with its operation in Rafah – where more than half of Gaza’s 2.3 million people are sheltering.

Hamas must release all hostages, stop using Palestinian civilians as human shields and lay down its arms.

Updated

‘We want actions in Rafah to stop’, Watt says

Q: Four strikes did hit in an area designated for displaced people, Benjamin Netanyahu called it a “tragic mishap”. Is that good enough?

Murray Watt:

Well, again, I find that the casualties that have [been] experienced, incredibly distressing and unknown many Australians do as well. And this is exactly why we have been calling for humanitarian ceasefire, so the civilians can be project protected, and at the same time, we need to see hostages released and at increased.

Of course, that’s before we get to a discussion about a longer term two-state solution.

So I think Australia has exercised our moral position very effectively from the prime minister and the foreign minister down and we want to see the actions in Rafah stop, and we want to see a humanitarian ceasefire. That the only solution here.

Updated

Rafah casualties ‘deeply distressing’; government has been pressuring Israel for ceasefire ‘for very long time’, Watt says

Murray Watt is also asked about Rafah, particularly since his senate colleague, Fatima Payman called for Australia to “demand an end to this genocide, stop all trade, divest and recognise a Palestinian state”.

(The official Australian government position is that it does not support the BDS movement, and does not believe the right conditions are in place to recognise a Palestinian state).

Watt:

I would argue that Australia has been putting pressure on Israel for some time in conjunction with partners across the world. We have obviously been calling for a humanitarian ceasefire for a very long time, again, in alignment with a range of other like minded countries across the world.

Equally, we have been putting pressure and calling for Hamas to release hostages from the very first day of that apparent incident in October 7. So I think that our government has played a leading role internationally for a middle power and will continue to do so.

I mean, we as I say, we have been on the record for some time now saying that Israel mustn’t proceed with its operation in Rafah. We’re now at a point where more than half of Gaza’s people are sheltering in Rafah. And these latest reports of casualties are deeply distressing. So I can understand people being extremely upset about that.

Updated

Banning live sheep trade helps transition WA industry like ‘every other state’, Watt says

Murray Watt is also the minister for agriculture, and he is asked about the anger from some farming groups after the decision to end the live sheep export trade from 2028.

Watt says he isn’t surprised by the anger, given those same groups had been against the policy since the election when Labor announced it as policy. But he says it makes sense on multiple fronts to end the industry:

I’ve probably met with sheep producers and their representatives at least a dozen times in the two years that I’ve been in the role. And I’ve listened to them, but I’ve always made clear that it’s our intention to implement that election commitment.

And the reason we want to do that is partly around animal welfare but it’s also partly about seizing the value adding opportunity that Australia has.

The live export industry has been in decline for 20 years, it’s now shrunk to only operating in Western Australia. It’s only generating $77m a year for Western Australia which is less than 1% of its agriculture industry.

But at the same time we’ve seen an explosion in exports of sheep meat in Australia. They’ve quadrupled over the same time that live exports have shrunk by 90%.

So what we want to do is help transition the industry in Western Australia, just like we’ve seen in every other state. Other states used to do live exports of sheep as well, but they’ve moved towards onshore processing, and that generates more jobs for Australians.

Updated

Bill for natural disasters ‘rising exponentially’, Watt says

What is the bill for natural disasters, both in Australia and in the Pacific?

Murray Watt says it is “rising exponentially”.

I think all Australians have witnessed the explosion in natural disasters that we’ve seen over the last few years.

And unfortunately, due to climate change, we are going to be experiencing more intense and more frequent natural disasters in the future.

And that’s why the Albanese government has been investing so heavily since we came to office two years ago to make sure that we are much better prepared for these disasters.

But while we are investing more in resilience, obviously we also need to make sure that we’re responding to communities when those disasters occur.

The most recent budget allocated $11.4bn for disaster recovery over the next four years, but that doesn’t take into account emergency payments for those caught up in one.

Watt says the way infrastructure is built will need to change, to be able to withstand more natural disasters, and the federal government has been in discussions with the states to ensure that when rebuilding, they are doing it “to a higher standard”.

Updated

Technical experts to fly to PNG hopefully by Tuesday afternoon, minister for emergency management says

Murray Watt, the minister for emergency management, has told ABC radio that a team of technical experts will be flying to Papua New Guinea to help after the landslide, hopefully as early as this afternoon.

Their role will be particularly helping perform geotechnical surveillance to establish the level of the landslip, the instability of the land, they’re obviously doing some work around identifying where bodies are, that kind of thing.

It’s pretty grim and grisly work, but work that has to be done.

Updated

Conroy calls for ‘full respect for international law’ after Israeli airstrike on Rafah

Pat Conroy was asked:“I understand the word ‘concerned’ that you’re using and your colleagues have been using. The French President Emmanuel Macron said he was ‘outraged’ by the blast and said that there had to be full respect for international law. Does this action fall under international law?”

He replied:

Well, we’ve also been calling for full respect for international law and the protection of civilians on both sides. And I’ll leave it to others to comment more fully on it. But it was obviously incredibly concerning scenes that we’ve all witnessed over the last 24 hours.

Updated

‘Last 24 hours only reinforces need’ for immediate humanitarian ceasefire, return of hostages and aid access, Conroy says

Pat Conroy was also asked about Israel’s assault on a refugee camp for displaced Palestinians in Rafah.

At least 45 people were killed, many of them women and children, with the strikes coming two days after the international court of justice in The Hague, which arbitrates between states, ordered Israel to stop its operation in Rafah immediately.

Conroy said:

Well, we’re incredibly concerned by what we saw in Rafah. And that’s why we’ve been continuing to call for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. We’ve also called for an immediate return of all hostages that Hamas have taken. And the immediate opening of access so we can get massive amounts of humanitarian support into the Gaza. So immediate humanitarian ceasefire, release of hostages and immediate flow of aid is critical. That’s the Australian government’s position and you’re absolutely right, what we’ve seen overnight or over the last 24 hours only reinforces the need for those three things.

Updated

Does anyone have a true sense of the scale of the disaster just yet?

Pat Conroy:

No, to be quite frank, we don’t. The Papua New Guinean government has asked the UN agencies to coordinate partner countries and those assessments are going on right now. But this is an incredibly inaccessible part of Papua New Guinea. And it’s a really challenging process for everyone.

Updated

PNG landslide search and recovery ‘very, very challenging’ with only helicopter access, Pat Conroy says

The minister for international development and the Pacific, Pat Conroy, has spoken to ABC News Breakfast about what Australia is doing to help Papua New Guinea after a landslide hit at least six villages in the Enga province, with authorities warning the number of deaths could reach 2,000 people.

Conroy said access can only be reached through helicopters making the search and recovery efforts “very, very challenging”.

We’ve immediately made offers of assistance, which the Papua New Guinea government have accepted, but it’s a long road and we won’t know the true death toll for a long time, unfortunately.

So what has Australia done so far?

… We provided immediate logistical help. The Australian defence force transported officials to the site to commence assessment. We announced an initial - and this is only an initial package of $2.5m of assistance. That will include a disaster assistance response team that will arrive in Papua New Guinea this afternoon, that’s made up of teams from Queensland Fire & Rescue, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and the national emergency management authority, that will have the ability to do incident control, geohazard assessment and also drones for mapping the site.

We’re also providing humanitarian assistance, such as shelters and sanitation kits for displaced villagers, particularly women and children. And we’re providing more logistical support through the Australian defence force.

That’s the initial assistance. Obviously, more will flow based on requests from the Papua New Guinean government.

Updated

New acting chair of Net Zero Economy Agency to start from June

Dr Iain Ross will take up the acting chair position of the Net Zero Economy Agency from 1 June, replacing outgoing chair Greg Combet.

Once legislation is in place, Dr Ross will be appointed as the inaugural chair of the Net Zero Economy Authority.

Ross is a former federal court and supreme court of Victoria judge, president of the fair work commission and has served as the vice -president of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission, and assistant secretary of the ACTU.

Once the authority is established, a board will be appointed (with an open recruitment process for a CEO to begin in June) and once up and running, the authority’s job will be to support “Australia’s economy-wide net zero transformation by acting as a catalyst for private and public investment, major project development, employment transition, skills and community development”.

The short version – the authority will be helping to lead the mission to reduce emissions by 43% from 2005 levels by 2030 and net zero by 2050.

Anthony Albanese said:

The Net Zero Economy Authority will play an important role in one of the most significant economic events in Australian history and help position us as a renewable energy superpower.

Combet has been thanked for his work in establishing the agency, ahead of the new authority’s set up.

Updated

The estimates hearings will kick off from 9am (and are scheduled to go until 11pm).

Up this morning is:

  • Environment and communications (climate change, energy, the environment and water);

  • finance and public administration (prime minister and cabinet);

  • legal and constitutional affairs (home affairs);

  • regional affairs and transport (infrastructure, transport, regional development).

Updated

Good morning

Thank you very much to Martin for starting us off so early and bringing us all up to date.

You’ve got Amy Remeikis with you for most of day now and I’ll take you through all the news of the House of Representatives sitting day, as well as estimates.

That’s right – it’s budget estimates time in the senate, which means a lot of eyebrow raising, statements posed as questions, questions posed as answers and hopefully, a bit of transparency where it is needed.

We’ll also continue to follow everything which is happening across politics in general.

So grab your coffee (number two over here) and get comfortable – ready?

Let’s jump in.

Updated

Government panel to investigate violence against women

The federal government is convening an expert panel into violence against women, which will recommend new approaches to preventing gender-based violence.

Journalist Jess Hill and author Anne Summers have been named on the panel, alongside academics, advocates and other experts. The Panel will be co-convened by Australia’s domestic family and sexual violence commissioner, Micaela Cronin, the executive director of the commonwealth office for women, Padma Raman, and the secretary of the Department of Social Services, Ray Griggs.

Prime minister Anthony Albanese said governments “need to act, but we also recognise that this is an issue for the whole of society”. He said in a statement:

Women should not be responsible for ending violence against women. This rapid review will bring together experts and provide practical advice to Government to help us end the scourge of domestic violence.

Minister for women Katy Gallagher said the review, which is to provide a report by year’s end, would give advice to the federal government and national cabinet.

The review, meeting for the first time today, will consider new approaches to violence prevention across different groups of society, as well as risk factors and pathways toward violence.

It will also consider stronger accountability and consequences for perpetrators.

Social services minister Amanda Rishworth said “we must have a considered focus on perpetrator intervention and prevention activities”.

As mentioned at the top, today’s Full Story podcast is by Nour Haydar from inside the newly opened Parramatta Women’s Shelter.

With shelters struggling to keep up with the demand for crisis housing, she speaks to chief executive of Women’s Community Shelters Annabelle Daniel about the crisis.

You can listen here:

And she has also written a feature about what she found at the shelter and how it is helping women and often their children to rebuild their lives.

Read her full piece here:

Australia to give $2.5m to help with PNG landslide response

The Australian government will give $2.5m in humanitarian assistance to help Papua New Guinea respond to the Enga province landslide, which has claimed the lives of at least 670.

In an announcement last night, the Albanese government said emergency relief supplies, such as shelter, hygiene kits and specific support for women and children would be provided.

Australia would also send technical experts to offer incident management assistance, support geohazard assessments and to help with early recovery efforts.

Yesterday, Papua New Guinea’s national disaster centre asked the United Nations for international assistance, reportedly saying the landslide in the country’s remote north could have buried more than 2,000 people.

The deputy prime minister, Richard Marles, said Australians will be thinking of PNG at this very difficult time. He said:

As a close neighbour and friend, we will be doing all we can to provide support. Australia’s defence force is working closely with the PNG Defence Force to assist with the response. This work is yet another demonstration of the close partnership between our nations and militaries.

Here’s our latest report on the disaster:

Welcome

Good morning and welcome to the live blog. My name is Martin Farrer and I’ll be bringing you the best of the overnight stories before Amy Remeikis takes over in a bit.

The Albanese government is assembling an expert panel to examine the rise in violence against women and will recommend new approaches to try to curb the problem. There have been a spate of high-profile incidents this year, most recently last week’s double murder in Perth of Jennifer Petelczyc and her daughter Gretl. We have more details coming up, plus a feature and podcast by Full Story presenter Nour Haydar on a new women’s shelter in Parramatta in western Sydney.

As the federal parliament returns for two weeks, our environment editor Adam Morton bemoans the lack of clear policies to tackle the climate crisis and issues an impassioned plea for a change. On the one hand the government appears confused and wedged by the gas industry – especially in Western Australia where Labor is in power and can’t turn against such a powerful lobby. And on the other hand, Coalition hasn’t even got a policy.

Australia will send technical experts and $2.5m in initial aid to Papua New Guinea as the death toll continues to rise after a catastrophic landslide that destroyed a village. PNG’s disaster centre said more than 2,000 people had been buried alive by Friday’s landslide in remote Enga province. Under the Australian aid package experts will provide incident management assistance, support geo-hazard assessments and help early recovery efforts, with the Australian defence force also assisting. More coming up.

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