THINGS GET AUKUS
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is in the United States to meet with his US and UK counterparts on Tuesday ahead of an announcement concerning the future of the AUKUS treaty.
The Nine papers ($) report that Albanese’s first formal meeting while he’s in San Diego will be with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. Then he meets US President Joe Biden, before the three leaders reveal the choice of new submarines.
The Australian ($) is reporting that part of this announcement will be a “warning” to taxpayers that the plan, to be overseen by a multi-agency body, will cost more than $200 billion over 30 years. Further, the plan is to create 20,000 direct Australian jobs — Indeed, per Nine, the Australian Navy will launch a recruitment drive next week, hoping to find “hundreds of personnel to support the shift to nuclear-powered submarines and make more staff available to train with the US and Britain”.
The next stage in the AUKUS pact is to build these vessels in Adelaide, based on a new British design, with the capacity to fire cruise missiles.
BANKING ON THE KIDS
Still on politicians promising to spend big, NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has announced that a reelected Coalition government would create a dedicated savings fund for each child in NSW, to be used towards the cost of education or a home deposit. It would cost $850 million over four years.
As The Sydney Morning Herald ($) reports, Perrottet was speaking at his party’s launch ahead of the state poll on March 25, telling the party faithful: “This investment will change the lives of millions of children across our state … This is a down payment to secure the future dreams of our children.”
The plan is for the government to pay parents an initial $400 for children under 10, and then match any future contributions up to $400 every year until the child turns 18.
Labor questioned the value of the policy, with its Treasury spokesman, Daniel Mookhey, telling The Guardian: “At a time where interest rates are skyrocketing mortgages, families don’t have to spare money. It seems as though the families that need the help the most will benefit the least from this policy because they don’t have the money to put into this account.”
HILLSONG AND DANCE
Hillsong Church will launch an independent review of its financial structure and systems following allegations of fraud and extravagant spending. Last week, as reported in Crikey, independent Tasmanian MP Andrew Wilkie tabled 17 binders of financial information which he alleged reveal the church breaking “numerous laws” in Australia and around the world, relating to “fraud, money laundering and tax evasion”. Wilkie said in Parliament that the documents had been provided to him by a whistleblower and revealed “the kind of shopping that would embarrass a Kardashian”.
Details allegedly contained in the documents included members of the Houston family spending $150,000 of church money on a luxury retreat in Cancun, Mexico, during Australia’s strict COVID-19 lockdown, and Hillsong founder and former leader Brian Houston treating private jets “like Ubers”. You can read all of Crikey’s coverage here.
Addressing the congregation on Sunday morning, global senior pastor Phil Dooley and church board member Stephen Crouch both apologised to the faithful, announced a “forensic audit” and said the church had implemented a new policy on gifts and honorariums, and changed its structures.
“I am also announcing today that on top of the forensic audit that has been conducted by [accounting firm] Grant Thornton regarding the allegations, we will be beginning this week a complete reevaluation, via an outside third party, of our financial structure and systems to ensure they line up with the mission going forward,” Dooley said.
Dooley also said that Wilkie’s use of parliamentary privilege “kind of feels like being king hit from behind. But Jesus loves you Mr Wilkie … Mr Wilkie, you’re still welcome to attend any of our services”.
SAY WHAT?
Everybody knows what Match of the Day means to me, but I’ve told the BBC I won’t be doing it tomorrow. Solidarity.
Ian Wright
In a case of “strikers on strike” Wright joined fellow premier league legend Alan Shearer in opting out of the BBC’s flagship premier league highlights program in solidarity with co-presenter Gary Lineker, after Lineker was suspended from the show for tweeting his disgust at recent developments in UK refugee policy (which, to an Australian audience, may look eerily familiar … ). The scandal is threatening to end the career of BBC chairman Richard Sharp.
CRIKEY RECAP
The art of turning faith into profit: inside Hillsong’s financial machine
“The Hillsong papers spell out for the first time that the church operates with a form of franchise model whereby other churches in the Hillsong orbit pay an annual fee to Hillsong HQ.
“There are two kinds of Hillsong churches: the fully fledged churches owned and operated by Hillsong, and a second category known as Hillsong family churches. Hillsong family churches have a degree of autonomy from the Hillsong mothership but pay a fee to use Hillsong branding and other Hillsong products.”
Anti-trans disinformation is rife in Australia — and it’s being spread by a small group of organisations
“Commentators had the privilege of asking whether her beliefs were truly ‘anti-trans’ or if she was just misunderstood; meanwhile, trans people were denied a similar platform to explain the impact of her words on our lives.
“The thing that the media missed during this time was that the issue for trans people was not just that [Katherine] Deves’ tweets were offensive, it was also her promotion of dangerous anti-trans disinformation groups like Genspect and Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine (SEGM).
“You have probably never heard of them before now, but these groups are some of the leading voices against trans healthcare globally.”
Network 10 faces threats, protest after Christian Lives Matter campaign against The Project
“Multiple Ten staff members who were not authorised to speak publicly told Crikey of the fallout of the joke. The Project had received threats against its staff and had increased security around its Sydney office ahead of the protests.
“Former Project host Dave ‘Hughesy’ Hughes spoke publicly about being approached by two men on the beach asking if he was still part of the show earlier this week.
” ‘You on The Project? You against Jesus? If you are, I’m going to bash you,’ the man allegedly said, according to the comedian on 2DayFM earlier this week.”
READ ALL ABOUT IT
Pence says ‘history will hold Donald Trump accountable’ for Jan 6th (The Washington Post)
Watchdog ‘clears’ South Africa’s Ramaphosa in cover-up scandal (Al Jazeera)
How a Catholic group doxed gay priests (Wired)
Israel sees one of its biggest protests (BBC)
Indigenous call to ban cop neck restraint that led to man’s death (The Australian)
Mark McGowan’s approval rating sinks to lowest level since start of COVID-19 pandemic (The West Australian)
Melbourne University one step closer to strikes as industrial action vote green-lighted (The Age)
Big Pineapple owners vow to return icon to former glory (The Courier-Mail)
THE COMMENTARIAT
Robodebt final week: ‘It served them right, did it?’ — Rick Morton (The Saturday Paper ($): “The royal commission has heard of at least two cases where a robodebt victim has killed themselves after receiving a letter or debt collection notice. There are more. Beyond the loss of life, significant in itself, it is impossible to quantify the harm perpetuated against ordinary Australians on a massive scale …
“At no stage was it apparent that the people designing the scheme cared enough to imagine what its consequences might be. When, at the direction of either Alan Tudge or Kathryn Campbell, PricewaterhouseCoopers was brought in on a $1 million contract to figure out what was going wrong, the focus was on some $8 billion in budget savings that needed to be achieved.”
Subs deal will strengthen our historic alliances — Greg Sheridan (The Australian) ($): “The AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines will hugely enhance our national power and sovereignty. Nothing could be more ridiculous than the idea that if there are some Americans on an Australian boat this compromises our sovereignty.
“The deal is we buy three to five Virginia-class nuclear submarines from the US, boats that are probably already in use. As part of the purchase price we contribute financially to expanding US industrial capacity to build more nuclear subs.”
HOLD THE FRONT PAGE
WHAT’S ON TODAY
San Diego
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Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to meet his US and UK counterparts ahead of an announcement concerning the way forward for Australia to receive nuclear-powered submarines.
Los Angeles
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The Oscars (Academy awards) presentation ceremony.
Yuggera Country (also known as Brisbane)
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Appeal decision for human rights campaigner Drew Pavlou who is suing Chinese diplomat Xu Jie.
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Public hearing on Queensland’s path to treaty bill.
