Tag Archives: Australian War Memorial

The Two Weeks That Were – October 28 to November 10

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The National Party is reeling after a recent ABC report that claimed that several Young Nationals members were actually part of an alt-right plan to infiltrate the party. At least nineteen members have either resigned or been expelled from the party. Meanwhile, senior National Party officials have made clear that there was no place for extremism in the party.

New South Welsh politics got interesting this fortnight, with the announcement that former federal Labor leader Mark Latham will join the One Nation party and run for the NSW Upper House in March. Antony Green says that due to the way preferences work, Latham has a pretty good chance of getting a seat and potentially holding the balance of power.

This fortnight also saw NSW Opposition Leader Luke Foley resign from his post and be replaced by Michael Daley. Luke Foley was forced to quit after sexual harassment allegations were levelled at him. He’s accused of drunkenly groping an ABC journalist back in 2016. She didn’t want to report it, and it was only when Liberal MP David Elliot, used parliamentary privilege to air the allegations that the public truly became aware of them. The journalist, Ashleigh Raper, has since released a statement recounting the events of that night, and criticising the use of her situation to score political points. Now, Michael Daley has a few months to fix Labor’s image and prepare for the election in March.

Speaking of elections next year, there is also a federal election coming up, and Labor has changed their candidate in the marginal seat of Bennelong. The original candidate for the seat, Lyndal Howison, has stepped aside to allow high-profile neurologist and former AMA president Brian Owler to run in the seat. Owler is best known in NSW for appearing in road safety advertising in his scrubs (he’s the first one to appear in the video below).

Scott Morrison has also begun what appears to be a practice campaign in Queensland using a bus – the “ScoMo Express”, which got a bit odd. This is partially due to the fact that Morrison’s three-word slogan wasn’t fully formed – he had his three points, he just kept changing up the order. He also didn’t actually spend a lot of time on the bus either, at least towards the end. When asked why, his explanation was that Queensland was a big state and he had to get to an event before the bus so would be getting a plane.

Several prestigious and well-known Anglican schools in New South Wales have written a letter to MPs asking them not to change the laws to prevent them from sacking LGBTIQ+ teachers, or expelling LGBTIQ+ students. Ostensibly this is because a change in the law would prevent them from refusing someone they felt didn’t fit the ethos or beliefs of the school. Several schools, including Barker College, Abbotsleigh, St Catherine’s and Sydney Church of England Grammar School (Shore), have faced backlash from their current and former students.

Meanwhile, the government has announced that the Australian War Memorial will be renovated to add a new exhibition hall, a place for peace and humanitarian missions to be commemorated and a place of reflection for visitors. It does have bi-partisan support, but there is some criticism that at a time when other cultural institutions are having funding cuts, the War Memorial is getting a huge injection of funds for the renovations.

The fortnight ended with what police have said is a terrorist attack in Melbourne, where a man set fire to a car and stabbed three people, killing one, before being shot by police. Police say that the perpetrator, Hassan Khalif Shire Ali, had his passport cancelled because he tried to travel to Syria a few years ago, but that he was not considered to be a threat so was not being watched too closely. Scott Morrison said during a press conference that he felt that Islamic community leaders should do more to prevent extremism in their communities – which some took a tiny bit of offence to, as it did sound a bit like he might have been pandering to those on the right of politics.

Finally this fortnight, the AEC has officially called the Wentworth by-election for Kerryn Phelps, and Malcolm Turnbull appeared on Q&A on the ABC, and was asked why he was no longer Prime Minister, to which his response was that we should be asking Tony Abbott, Greg Hunt, Peter Dutton and Mathias Cormann. Also, some more of the children on Nauru have now been transferred to Australia for treatment.

Tweet of the Fortnight

ABC News Breakfast turned 10, and I think Michael Rowland and Virginia Trioli had a bit of fun making a behind the scenes…

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

First Dog on the Moon on the Anglican Schools’ Letter – The Guardian

Annabel Crabb on the Foley saga – ABC Online

The Two Weeks That Were – September 3 to September 16

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After arguments were heard in the High Court at the start of the fortnight, the government won their case 7-0, and we will now have a postal plebiscite survey. The survey started being posted out on the 12th of September, and some people have already got them. Hopefully you all fixed your enrolment and will get your letters – if not, hopefully the people living in your old home will be kind enough to try to contact you (and if you find one in your letterbox for the previous resident, see if you can find them online – that’s what some people are trying to do). Send it before November 7 so it gets counted.

There have been “yes” rallies across the country, with some awesome banners and signs. One of my favourite messages was “I could have done this on SurveyMonkey for you for free”. The Liberals and Nationals for Yes group is starting with Turnbull, Christine Forster (Tony Abbott’s sister – who is gay), and several key Liberals from years gone by – mostly from NSW because the meeting I saw was in Sydney.

Section 44 – the bit of the constitution that is catching out unaware dual citizens – was brought up again at the start of the fortnight with Bill Shorten and former PM Tony Abbott being forced to prove they’d denounced their British citizenship prior to being in Parliament. The Liberals did try to focus the attention on Bill Shorten in question time about it, but it backfired on them when Bill Shorten waited until after Question Time to prove he wasn’t a British citizen – meaning that Barnaby Joyce, who is likely a dual Australian and New Zealand citizen and is refusing to step down as Deputy PM – got all the attention.

The government has decided that AGL’s Liddell coal plant in the Hunter Valley can’t shut down when AGL plans to in 2022. The government wold like it to stay open for another five years, closing in 2027 instead, which is when AGL plans on shutting a second plant down. It appears that people are blaming the East Coast’s power issues on the shutdowns of coal plants, such as the Hazelwood Plant in Victoria earlier this year. However, AGL is adamant the plant will shut when planned, and that by then they will have a non-coal alternative. At the moment, AGL’s whole thing is “getting out of coal” – as seen in their ads.

AGL’s people met with the government later in the fortnight, where AGL was told to either keep Liddell going, sell it to someone who would or replace with an alternate reliable source – and it appears AGL is set on the latter, which will most likely end up being gas. Oh, and um the Clean Energy Target is getting a new name so that the pro-coal Liberal backbenchers won’t roll Turnbull.

Media reforms passed the senate in the latter part of the fortnight, 31-27. With an NXT amendment to help support regional publishers, the “reach rule” and the “two-out-of-three rule” appear to have been abolished. The “reach rule” stopped  a TV broadcaster from reaching more than 75% of the population, and the “two-out-of-three rule” stopped someone from owning newspaper, radio and television networks in the one market. This change is not necessarily a bad thing, as long as people don’t go mad with power and do stupid things.

Also during this fortnight, the government is still trying to figure out where they will be placing the people who have been found to be refugees when Manus Island closes in October. It appears some were taken to Port Moresby recently, where they were interviewed by US officials. This does suggest that some of them may be going to the United States soon.

Finally this week, the WA Liberals passed a motion to look into the possibility of succession (WAxit?); the Nationals Conference narrowly defeated a motion introduced by George Christiansen to ban the burqa; Australia now has a memorial for peacekeepers at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra; and Clive Palmer has revealed that his nephew – who worked for the collapsed Queensland Nickel and has a warrant out for his arrest – is being paid $4000 a week, which Palmer says is his own money.

Tweets of the Fortnight

Jacqui Lambie smacks down those attacking the ABC

SUPER IMPORTANT TO NOTE – Don’t mess with the question on the survey, it’ll be considered invalid

https://twitter.com/lanesainty/status/907847393265295361

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

Ilhan Omar, the first Somali-American state legislator – TIME Magazine

The generation gap between China’s millennials and their parents – ABC Online

The Week That Was – April 20 to April 26

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So the week began on Easter Sunday, with the Royals going to St Andrews Anglican Cathedral in Sydney and later on, taking George to Taronga Zoo, where they opened a bilby enclosure. They took Easter Monday off, visited Uluru on Tuesday, Adelaide on Wednesday and were in Canberra on Thursday and Friday.

This week, as we get even closer to the Budget we’re starting to hear about what may or may not be cut from the budget and what we are going to have to sacrifice. This week seems to be focused on cuts to the health service. There have been suggestions that people on the disability pension will have to go to independent doctors and not their GPs to get the stamp of approval for the pension. There is also mention of cutting the amount of money people on the disability pension earn. One of the major issues here is that those with mental illnesses and disabilities could be disadvantaged as their mental state can vary. There could also be cuts to Medicare Locals, an after-hours GP service. This has major benefits for the chronically ill, who would otherwise have to go to Emergency, saving lots of money.

Another thing people are worried about cuts to is the Indigenous Health Service, in particular mental health and rehabilitation services, as well as the concern with raising the pension age, given the average life expectancy of Aboriginal males is less than 70 years old (ABS). Comments have been made about how cuts are going to make the PM look bad, given he has said he is focused on closing the gap and being there for the indigenous people.

If that doesn’t concern you, at least we’re spending about $12 billion on F-35 fighters from the USA. We originally ordered 14, and now we’re getting 58 more. They’re due in 2020, and have had some major issues, given the development of these planes are over budget and have had some safety issues – to the point where Canada and Denmark are reconsidering their ordering of the planes.

ANZAC Day was on Friday and the royals apparently surprised everyone by showing up to the Dawn Service at the Australian War Memorial – which really doesn’t shock me – and then came back later that day to lay a wreath at the ANZAC Day Ceremony. Then they left the country, with George giving us one of the best pictures of this entire tour – you can see it below in the Tweets of the Week.

And finally this week, a former NSW Premier Neville Wran died this week. He seemed to be liked by most in politics, and brought in a lot of changes for NSW including random breath testing, decriminalising homosexuality, developed modern lotto and started ICAC, only to resign because of it. He is getting a state funeral on May 1.

Tweets of the Week

In the mad rush to cover what was thought to be a hijack of an Australian plane but was just an allegedly drunk passenger, you can type too fast and have spelling issues

Oh, and this is why outsourcing sub-editing is a bad thing

Things I’ve Been Reading/Watching/Listening etc

A humourous take on why you should support same-sex marriage – College Humor

Behind the scenes of the ABC’s Coverage of Barry O’Farrell’s resignation – ABC Back Story

Hillary Clinton and the Fake Baby Conspiracy – SMH