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Morrison says Coalition will 'implement resettlement policies' after medevac repeal – question time live
Morrison says Coalition will 'implement resettlement policies' after medevac repeal – question time live
(32 minutes later)
‘Cruel, heartless’ move provokes outrage from refugees, Greens and Labor as deal described as ‘dark day’ for Australia. Plus Nationals under pressure over Murray-Darling basin plan. Follow all the day’s political news live
‘Cruel, heartless’ move provokes outrage from refugees, Greens and Labor as deal described as ‘dark day’ for Australia. Plus Nationals under pressure over Murray-Darling basin plan. Follow all the day’s political news live
Taylor again. Mark Butler points out that publicly-available internet archives show the annual report on the council’s website contained accurate figures on four dates in March, April, June, and October. How does that square with Taylor’s claim that his office downloaded a version of the report with inaccurate figures from the council’s website? Butler asks:
The question prompts some wry smiles from the Labor benches. It does all seem, er, rather improbable.
There’s some scuttlebutt about whether the question would interfere with an active police investigation.
Eventually, Taylor says:
Another question to Taylor. Mark Butler asks if he has provided metadata and download logs to police.
Taylor reveals he has established a point of contact with NSW police.
Labor shifts to Angus Taylor. They ask why he hasn’t complied with a Senate order to produce evidence to back his claims that he downloaded a false document from the City of Sydney council’s website, which he then used to attack the lord mayor, Clover Moore.
The Speaker, Tony Smith, makes his position on the matter fairly clear. Oy Senate, bugger off. I’m paraphrasing slightly, but you get the drift.
Taylor gets up:
That’s fine and all, but he still hasn’t provided any evidence that he downloaded the dodgy document from the council’s website.
Senator Cory Bernardi – who is due to give his valedictory speech this afternoon – got what is likely to be his final question in Senate question time.
Bernardi asked the finance minister, Mathias Cormann, to explain the evils of socialism and why the government has not implemented such policies. It was all very Auspol101, and a bit of a nostalgia lap for the Australian Conservatives senator who started his career as a Liberal.
Kim Carr interjected “they have” (implemented socialism) – asking “what’s the big stick all about”. Green Peter Whish-Wilson also got in on the action suggesting “the question should have been directed to Matt Canavan, the minister for nationalising coal-fired power stations”.
Cormann then expounded on the different growth rates in East and West Germany – which Tim Ayres suggested hardly proved his point because West Germany was a social democracy.
The first supplementary question was about Marxism, which Cormann described as “socialism on steroids”.
In his final supplementary, Bernardi asked if Cormann was aware of a certain senator standing 6 foot 5 inches who had consistently railed against socialism (himself).Cormann responded:
Scott Morrison is asked how the government can claim it has done no deal with Jacqui Lambie, when she herself claimed such a deal was brokered.
Scott Morrison is asked how the government can claim it has done no deal with Jacqui Lambie, when she herself claimed such a deal was brokered.
Morrison says Lambie simply confirmed her support for government policies, including its policy on medevac.
Morrison says Lambie simply confirmed her support for government policies, including its policy on medevac.
He then prompts an uproar when he accuses Labor of sending women and children to Manus, which he says was a new low.
He then prompts an uproar when he accuses Labor of sending women and children to Manus, which he says was a new low.
This mob on this side Mr Speaker, this Labor party, were the party that sent children to Manus Island.
On the topic of border protection, the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at the University of New South Wales said the repeal of medevac and the Independent Health Advice Panel “in no way extinguishes Australia’s duty of care” to those held in offshore processing.
On the topic of border protection, the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law at UNSW, said the repeal of medevac and the Independent Health Advice Panel “in no way extinguishes Australia’s duty of care” to those held in offshore processing.
It said medevac saved lives and de-politicised the health care of refugees and asylum seekers.
It said medevac saved lives and de-politicised the health care of refugees and asylum seekers.
The Kaldor Centre told a senate inquiry in August that medevac was a “necessary, reasonable and appropriate” measure.
The Kaldor Centre told a Senate inquiry in August that medevac was a “necessary, reasonable and appropriate” measure.
Dutton gets an energetic dixer from backbencher Vince Connelly. Hands were flurrinyg. Dramatic pauses. Gesticulation, emphasis abound. The dixer is on border protection, which leads Dutton down a well-worn path.
Peter Dutton gets an energetic dixer from the backbencher Vince Connelly. Hands were flurrying. Dramatic pauses. Gesticulation, emphasis abound. The dixer is on border protection, which leads Dutton down a well-worn path.
Labor leader Anthony Albanese quotes Scott Morrison’s words back to him on the economy. At the end of the last quarter, Morrison said “you’d expect that things would improve in the next quarter”. Albanese says:
The Labor leader, Anthony Albanese, quotes Scott Morrison’s words back to him on the economy. At the end of the last quarter, Morrison said “you’d expect that things would improve in the next quarter”. Albanese says:
Morrison responds:
Morrison responds:
Albanese protests on relevance.
Albanese protests on relevance.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg gets a dixer on the economy. He says despite the drought and other economic headwinds, the Australian economy has shown great “resilience” and continues to grow.
The treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, gets a dixer on the economy. He says despite the drought and other economic headwinds, the Australian economy has shown great “resilience” and continues to grow.
In Senate question time, Richard Di Natale has asked a more targeted question than Deal or No Deal - was there an exchange of letters with senator Jacqui Lambie.
Government leader in the Senate, Mathias Cormann refused to rule it out:
The supplementaries are all the same question - and now all the Greens are interjecting “any letters?”
A nice moment in the house, for a change. Australian man Timothy Weeks, who was held hostage by the Taliban for three years, is in the chamber.
His presence is noted by the speaker Tony Smith and the lower house rises united in standing applause. Weeks was freed after a prisoner swap deal earlier this year.
Weeks was teaching English at a Kabul university when he and an American colleague were abducted at gunpoint in 2016.
Fireworks again in the lower house between Michael McCormack and Joel Fitzgibbon. The pair have got some odd competition going on this week about who knows more about farmers. McCormack said:
Over in the Senate, it looks like Cormann is explaining his “no secret deal” comment by claiming nothing in government policy has changed as a result of its negotiations with Jacqui Lambie. Righto.
We get a dixer to the PM on the economy. Then Labor asks education minister Dan Tehan about the PISA results. Tanya Plibersek asks when the government’s education reforms are going to start to work. Tehan says:
He then objects to criticism. You’re in the wrong business, mate.
Morrison continues:
Labor kicks off question time with a question on the PISA results, which show Australian school students are falling behind the rest of the world. Morrison responds:
The shadow climate change minister, Mark Butler, has told Guardian Australia that the resources minister, Matt Canavan, “doesn’t even pretend to care about our international commitments” on climate change after the minister gave two interviews to the climate science denier Alan Jones on Monday.
Jones asked the Queensland senator if he would be going to the UN climate talks that are under way in Madrid, but Canavan joked he had “got some better things to do” and that he had “not committed enough sins” to have been sent there.
The Greens climate spokesman, Adam Bandt, accused Canavan of engaging in “smug mockery”.
Canavan claimed terms like “climate emergency” were being forced upon members of the public, which he said was “Orwellian” and an attempt to shut down “alternative viewpoints”.
When asked on radio by Jones why he was not in Spain, a laughing Canavan said: “I’m sure it’s lovely this time of year but I’ve got some better things to do. I haven’t committed enough sins in my life to be sent there yet, Alan.”
Later on Sky, Jones again asked Canavan why he wasn’t in Madrid.
“Ha!,” said Canavan. “Well, Alan, it would not exactly be how I would like to spend my Christmas let’s just say that, but good luck to all those beautiful people who aggregate there.
“Obviously we need to have international meetings to discuss these things, but then there are all these hangers on who seem to use this as a PR exercise to preen their moral vanity.”
In each interview Jones, who has described human-caused climate change as a hoax, promoted a climate science denial group known as Clintel, before then introducing the minister.
Clintel is promoting a declaration that “there is no climate emergency” and that “CO2 is plant food”.
Canavan did not comment on the Clintel group, which has signed support from more than 100 Australians, including Hugh Morgan, a former president of the Business Council of Australia, and Ian Plimer, a director on Gina Rinehart’s Roy Hill Holdings iron ore project.
The Queensland state MP Colin Boyce, of the LNP, is the only Australian elected official to have his name appear on the Clintel declaration.
Later in the Sky interview, Canavan said: “What’s wrong with this agenda that’s being pushed by some people going to these conferences is that they want to regulate what we say and do.” He added there was an attempt to “shut down debate”.
He said: “They are worried about alternative viewpoints. As you said in your intro we now have to call it a climate emergency.
“It is not enough to call it climate change or global warming or greenhouse gases of the ozone layer – it’s now a climate emergency. This is true Orwellian stuff that we have to use these kinds of terms.”
Canavan also used the interviews to heavily promote coal-fired power and coal generally, claiming coal generation was growing in other parts of Asia.
“We are as a government backing coal-fired power,” he told Jones on 4BC, adding the government was “progressing an option” for a new coal-fired power station at Collinsville in north Queensland.
Canavan said the renewable energy target had “destroyed our energy systems” and had been a “massive mistake”.
Butler told Guardian Australia Canavan’s comments on the climate talks “tells us everything we need to know about the government’s attitude to action on climate change.
“Matt Canavan doesn’t even pretend to care about our international commitments under the Paris agreement. The hard-right of the Coalition dictates Australia’s climate policy, as a result emissions are continuing to go up and our children will pay the price.”
Bandt said anyone attending the Madrid talks should be applauded, adding: “This smug mockery from the minister for coal is part of a broader assault on climate action by a government in the pocket of the polluters.”
The Labor senator Malarndirri McCarthy has revealed she has suffered “threats of violence, graphic threats of being gang-raped and beaten, being killed for doing [her] job” which she described as “reprehensible”.
These included “threats of executing me in the federal parliament” that were taken seriously by the Senate president, the speaker of the House, and the Australian federal police – which served a personal protection order against the person making the threats.
She told the Senate:
She said the threats are “designed to maximise fear, render them incapable of doing their job” and to put the target in “a prison of impending danger”.
McCarthy also revealed that Pat Dodson was “also now a focus for similar threats” and thanked police in the NT and the AFP for taking the threats seriously.
