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Labor calls for Angus Taylor to be sacked – question time live
Labor calls for Angus Taylor to be sacked – question time live
(32 minutes later)
The House has divided.
Also an insight into what my brain looks like after that:
There is no way Labor can win this.
Angus Taylor during Question Time today @AmyRemeikis @GuardianAus #politicslive https://t.co/KXw9wyIfsd pic.twitter.com/8VzM5eA3f9
Here is how we got to this point.
Peter Dutton moves to try and read an opinion piece on Kristina Keneally’s methods in taking on the shadow home affairs portfolio, but the lickspittle which was asked did not include my favourite and yours ‘do you know of any alternatives’ and because it doesn’t, Tony Smith tells him to stop.
Another question directed to Angus Taylor in #QT about Jam Land and the endangered grassland matter. Terri Butler asks Taylor "Can the minister confirm he has been representing himself on the grasslands all along?" pic.twitter.com/wyfyoPQ7Sq
Dutton challenges him, which is a brave move, because even I, who has what has been termed by several of my past teachers as ‘a slight issue with authority’, probably wouldn’t speak over the Speaker (one more reason I will never be in parliament).
Anthony Albanese moves to suspend standing orders, in order to move a censure motion against Angus Taylor.
Smith prevails, because he is the boss of all procedure, and Dutton moves on, but it is not the same.
Labor moves for a censure motion against Angus Taylor pic.twitter.com/Tcf10ezwxS
Expect ‘alternative approaches’ to be back with a vengeance tomorrow, as sure as potato follows meat and veg.
Anthony Albanese moves to put forward a motion, but it’s not his time. Stuart Robert fills in the time while we wait.
Nope.
Oof. Things just got nasty.
One more lickspittle so we can all hear how safe (and consistent) we are.
Anthony Albanese to Scott Morrison:
We finish with the divisions.
I refer to the energy and emissions reduction’s failure to put the interest interests ahead of his own interests, his family to declare his interests to the department, his failure to declare his interests to his house and his admission that he was representing his own private interests. Will the Prime Minister do what he should have done weeks ago and sack this minister?
And probably also question time.
Morrison:
Let’s see.
Well, Mr Speaker, that would have to be the lamest build up I have seen to that type of a question in this place before. But, Mr Speaker, not only is every assertion that he’s just put to this place totally and absolutely false, Mr Speaker, but the Liberal Party and the National Party will not be lectured by someone who used to work in the New South Wales branch of the Labor Party.
Meanwhile, from AAP:
He had a desk in the office, Mr Speaker, in the Sussex Street headquarters of a party that stinks with corruption, where they get money in plastic bags and count it out on the table.
Imogen Bunting is hoping for a “miracle” this week.
...Mr Speaker, he is a member of the branch of the New South Wales Labor Party where his colleague in the other place think it is only thing,
The Brisbane mum is in Canberra, along with other welfare recipients from interstate, to try to meet with federal MPs and senators to lobby for a raise to Newstart payments.
‘You don’t want me to talk about this? You don’t want this on the table?”
For Ms Bunting – homeless and on welfare – the miracle would be an immediate $160 per week raise to Newstart payments.
Anthony Albanese:
Her visit, a trip sponsored by activist group GetUp, comes as the government is negotiating with crossbenchers to expand the cashless welfare card program and trial drug testing of welfare recipients.
Yes, Mr Speaker. He was state director of a party that has 10 people resign.
“Do we care for human rights?” Ms Bunting said.
Tony Smith:Members on both sides. That was not a point of order, that was a statement. The Prime Minister has the call.
Australian Unemployed Workers Union campaigner Jeremy Poxon said they had tried to meet with Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Social Services Minister Anne Ruston, but both had declined.
Morrison:
He said unemployed people were “shafted” by the government and blamed for their own poverty.
Thank you, Mr Speaker. With the number of Labor Party members from the New South Wales division who used to serve in Senator Kristina Keneally’s former government, they’re in jail, you could establish a branch at the Silverwater prison of the Labor Party, and the member for Watson would know about it because one of the people who went to prison was Eddie Obeid who he used to visit when he bends the knee come winter.
“We’re here in Canberra, we’re not taking these attacks lying down,” Mr Poxon said.
...I will not cop lectures on integrity from the New South Wales Labor Party, Mr Speaker.
“For too long decisions have been made about our lives in Canberra ... we’re here to change all that.”
...That mob, Mr Speaker, stinks with corruption as we see it every single day in the independent commission against corruption, which has your state’s secretary right under their gaze.
Four years ago, Ms Bunting was moved off the Parenting Payment and onto Newstart, meaning she had to raise her then-teenage son on $530 per fortnight.
And this is one of the previous answers Angus Taylor gave when last asked about this in the last sitting week in July:
Her son, now 20, has moved out of home but Ms Bunting is still struggling, she says.
Terri Butler: My question is to the minister for energy and emissions reduction. Was a compliance officer from the department of environment present at the meeting, referred to in his previous answer, with departmental officials about the listing of critically endangered grasslands in the Monaro region affecting land he part owned?
She’s homeless, has her belongings stored in a shed and can only find work for two days a week.
Angus Taylor: Thank you for the question. This is a grubby smear from those opposite, one of many that have been made, and were made during the election campaign, and I have been very clear on this. This was not a discussion about compliance action. It was a briefing from departmental officials on technical aspects of a revised listing under the EPBC Act. And the secretary of the department has made very clear – and I quote: ‘I can be very clear that minister Taylor has never raised the issue.’ This is the point. I make no apology, though, Mr Speaker. I make no apology for acting in the interests of the farmers in my electorate, and it’s about time that those opposite stood up for the farmers in their electorates.
“I’m ashamed of a society that would put me in this position,” she said.
The transcript of the local ABC radio interview Labor is referring to, is this one, from 26 July.
She says the cashless welfare could be the last straw, stigmatising her and limiting her economic freedoms.
Presenter: You certainly were the target, pretty much the one and only target of the opposition this week in the parliament – what do you think that was about?
Side note – I’ve never seen an earless dragon in the wild.
Taylor: Well, I’ve been sticking up for farmers in my electorate, Melinda. We’ve had a change to a listing of the grasslands in the Southern Tablelands and that was a very substantial change, with potential to have a big impact on the ability of farmers in my electorate to improve their land, through pastoral improvement, which is a big deal across the Southern Tablelands and Southern Highlands. This listing had the potential to have a very big impact so I asked for a meeting to discuss this, and in particular discuss the technical aspects of the listing. There’s all sorts of issues here about whether clover is treated in a particular way, and we had the meeting. Now Labor has decided that because I live and farm in the electorate, and I am a farmer, that this is unacceptable.
From Mike Bowers to you.
Presenter: They do say – I mean, you said it has the potential to have a big impact on landholders, one of those landholders being a company that is –Taylor: One of the landholders is me. I’m a farmer, so are many, many people in my electorate and many people who’ll be listening to your broadcast right now. I mean, look –
Mark Butler:
Presenter: But a big impact on a company that is, one of the directors of which is your brother.
“This prime minister has chosen the witless minister over the earless dragon,” but he too is then shut down.
Taylor: Melinda, this discussion was about the technical aspects of a listing, which had the potential and still has the potential to have a very big impact on farming across the region. I make absolutely no apologies for standing up for farmers in my region. That includes me and other family members. I mean this is, you know, what my job is as a local member of parliament. It is my job to stand up for us. If I’m not standing up for my farmers in the federal parliament, then who is? You know I feel very strongly about this and all local members, I mean this is what local members should do.
Christian Porter, who has caught on to the make a really quick sledge before getting to the point, so Hansard records it game, says something about Aldi bags and moves Butler no longer be heard.
Angus Taylor:
Our video peeps, who are much more talented than I, have been working on doing these up for you, for a while, to bring you a bit more of what is happening in question time, for those of you not so enamoured with my comparisons to unseasoned chicken wings and white bread.
I was representing farmers in my electorate and – at a time of drought like this, you should show some respect ... for those representing farmers in their electorate.
Tony Burke is next with a question for Angus Taylor: "Why won’t the minister admit to the House what he told local radio that he’s actually been representing himself the entire time?" #qt pic.twitter.com/jrl3i8LNZT
... What I find most interesting, Mr Speaker, is those ...
Terri Butler makes mention of the “earless dragon” being a threatened species, as she tries to move forward Labor’s motion, but she is shut down, and we go back to the division.
.... Thank you, Mr Speaker. What I find most interesting is those opposite come into this place, lecturing us about good governance whilst the stench of corruption emanates from Sussex Street. What complete hypocrisy.
The government wins by five.
Tony Burke to Angus Taylor:
Tony Burke moves to try to continue Labor’s suspension, by seconding the original motion and referring to Angus Taylor as “the one threatened species in Parliament House today” but Christian Porter moves he no longer be heard.
Can the minister confirm that so far he’s told the House he was representing an unknown number of unnamed farmers inside and outside his electorate, who wrote a letter to someone else three years before the meeting, someone who wrote a letter to another someone else six months after the meeting and the mysterious bloke from Yass.
The bells ring again, but no one is changing their seats, meaning the government will win this one too.
Why won’t the minister admit to the House what he told local radio that, he’s actually been representing himself the entire time?
Christian Porter again makes a point of order, but Tony Smith allows it.
Please sign Melissa McIntosh up for the same microphone lessons Josh Frydenberg needs.
