The Two Weeks That Were – May 19 to June 1

Well that was certainly not the result the country expected!

The election result was a bit of a shock, with government being returned with a slightly more solid majority than 2016. There was an epic swing toward the Coalition in Queensland, where it seems Labor’s lack of a concrete position on the Adani mine was their downfall. There has been calls from those south of the Queensland border that have suggested that the Sunshine State should secede, but I think they’re (mostly) joking. Regardless, Morrison appears to have pulled off a massive victory, and this gives him great authority.

Tony Abbott did lose his seat of Warringah this election, much to the joy of many both in the electorate and out of it. This will likely make the government more stable this time around, as both of Morrison’s predecessors, Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull, are no longer in Parliament. However, Kerryn Phelps has lost her seat of Wentworth to Dave Sharma, whom she defeated in last October’s by-election.

The Prime Minister then spent some time forming his new cabinet – which can now be fully his own. In order to keep stability when he took the reins last August, Morrison left most ministers and assistant ministers where they were, but now he can rearrange the ministry however he pleases. Frydenberg, Payne and Dutton were thought to keep their positions, and they have.

The cabinet now has seven women, including Melissa Price, who spent most of her time as Environment Minister in hiding (or so it seemed). Price will no longer be Environment Minister though, as she is moving to the Defence Industry portfolio. This is essentially a demotion to the outer ministry, while Sussan Ley has been reappointed to the inner ministry in the Environment portfolio. We will also see two Senators leave in the next six months, with Arthur Sinodinos heading to Washington DC to become the next Ambassador to the United States, once Joe Hockey’s term ends, and Mitch Fifield will head to New York to become the next Ambassador to the United Nations.

The government has also appointed Ken Wyatt as Minister for Indigenous Australians, the first Indigenous person to be appointed to the role. Many people in the indigenous community are happy to have one of their own responsible for the policies that affect them. However there seems to be confusion regarding how constitutional recognition and the “voice to parliament” that the indigenous community. The Prime Minister has announced a new agency within the Indigenous Affairs portfolio, and while information is sparse, there is concern that its purpose is to trump the plans for the “voice to parliament” – which is touted as an elected advisory body to Parliament, but some conservatives seem to see it as a third house of Parliament, which is not the case.

The government also plans to introduce their promised tax cuts as soon as possible, however they’ve kind of reneged on one of their promises already, which was to try get the legislation through before the start of the new financial year on July 1. This is because there is still at least one seat to be declared, as the seat of Macquarie is now so marginal they’re counting all of the preferences – earlier in the count there were less than 100 votes separating the Labor and Liberal candidates, but as of writing, Labor has pulled ahead by 282 votes.

Speaking of Labor, after their shock loss, Bill Shorten stepped down as leader, but has decided to remain in Parliament as an MP. The leadership race began, with Anthony Albanese (aka Albo) throwing his hat in ring. Tanya Plibersek considered running, as did Jim Chalmers and Chris Bowen, however all three decided not to, and Albanese was nominated unopposed, leading to the least bloody leadership battle the Labor Party has seen in a decade. As Albanese is from NSW and is from the left faction of the party, his deputy must be from another state and from the right faction – Richard Marles and Clare O’Neill both considered running, however O’Neill decided to step aside in the end, leaving Marles as the only contender.

All of this bloodless change was somewhat tainted when factional drama arose over who would be in Shadow Cabinet. Albanese had made clear publicly that he wished to have Senator Kristina Keneally in his cabinet, however it took a bit of drama to get there – and this is going to require a bit of explanation. In the Labor Party, in order to keep things equal and even between the left and right factions each side hands over a list of people to be in Shadow Cabinet and the leader chooses the positions each gets. However, the right faction’s list did not have Kristina Keneally’s name on it, let alone the name of any woman. So Ed Husic decided to give his spot to Keneally, allowing the former NSW Premier to be in the cabinet, and she will now be Deputy Leader in the Senate and will likely get a high ranking ministry.

Finally this week, Papua New Guinea has a new Prime Minister, which may have implications for the resettlement of refugees on Manus Island; and the Adani Coal Mine has passed another hurdle on the path to being approved. The Queensland Government has approved Adani’s conservation and protection plan for the Black Throated Finch.

Tweet of the Fortnight

https://twitter.com/shauncrowe/status/1133627072025260032

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

So, how do we pronounce Albo’s name then? – ABC Online

What challenges does Ken Wyatt face as Indigenous Affairs Minister? – ABC Online

 

The Promise of Australia, Voting for Change and Vale Bob Hawke

The last week of the campaign began with the Liberal Party’s official campaign launch, where Scott Morrison’s mother, wife and two daughters introduced him to the stage. It was mostly the “ScoMo Show”, although we did get a glimpse of the front bench in the audience, including the Environment Minister Melissa Price, who seems to have been let out of wherever she was being hidden for the bulk of the campaign. The policies announced at the launch included money for post-natal healthcare, and a subsidy for first homebuyers to help them make up the 20% deposit required to buy a home.

Morrison used the oft-used campaign slogan of “The Bill you can’t afford”, and then it got a tad weird because he has (or the spin doctors have) created a new slogan. Scott Morrison said he was going to “keep the promise of Australia for all Australians” – which left most of my household asking “what the f*** does that even mean?”. Labor on the other hand had a mostly low-key day, trying not to distract from the Liberal launch too much, although they did decide that the Liberal plan to subsidise deposits for first home buyers was a cool idea and adopted it.

Much of the week was dedicated to reiterating and explaining policies that have already been announced – basically ensuring that everyone knows what policies are on offer – although there was a push from Labor on wages and how they were going to try and increase them if they got into power.

A lot of the focus switched to the key battleground seats across the country. In NSW (where I am from) all eyes were some seats in Sydney: Reid, Lindsay, Bennelong and Warringah. We saw this week just how worried Tony Abbott is for his political life, as he had John Howard join him when he went campaigning around the local shopping centre saying he might just win, and the citizens of Warringah (including my grandmother) have been bombarded with robo-calls, texts and various political pamphlets from the Liberals.

It seems that many voters in Warringah want change. Abbott has been in the seat for 25 years and for the first time there is a suitable alternative in the form of Zali Steggall. She is a moderate conservative, but on some social issues is more progressive, especially on climate change and same sex marriage and this position more accurately represents the electorate.

Meanwhile, former PM Paul Keating (and his unique way with words) made another venture into campaign waters, encouraging the voters of Peter Dutton’s seat of Dickson to “drive a political stake through his dark political heart”. Dutton, somewhat rightfully, was offended by the remarks, and responded by saying that part of the reason he had joined the Liberal party was because Keating’s economic reforms and “mismanagement” nearly ruined his dad’s business.

Also this week, it was revealed that there has been a record number of pre-poll votes cast this election. Somewhere in the region of four million people voted early, which means that it could be a while before we know the results in some key marginal seats, as the ballot boxes can’t be opened until 6pm on election day. This high number of pre-poll votes is a concern, as it does delay the results in some seats, however the AEC has said that there is a parliamentary review slated once the election is over that will look into the pre-poll process.

Finally this week, former Prime Minister Bob Hawke has passed away at the age of 89. The former Labor PM, famous for introducing Medicare and introducing economic reforms (with his Treasurer Paul Keating) that has helped Australia avoid a recession for over 25 years. Hawke’s death distracted from the final day in the campaign, especially for Labor, as Bill Shorten changed his plans and went to visit Hawke’s widow Blanche D’Alpuget.

Then it was election day.

Tweet of the Week

Antony Green!

https://twitter.com/leighsales/status/1129202586660220930

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

The rise of the “religious left” – ABC Online

Politicians need a better understanding of Chinese-Australian voters – ABC Online

 

The Week That Was – January 13 to January 19

This week, politicians started to come back from holidays, and given it is an election year, the pre-election rev-up has begun. Both Bill Shorten and Scott Morrison headed to the Northern Territory where they both announced nearly $220 million worth of investment into Kakadu National Park and the township of Jabiru. Labor’s plan includes money to seal a number of unsealed roads in the park, while the Government’s plan is not totally clear.

Meanwhile in the lead-up to the election, Minister for Women, Jobs and Industrial Relations and MP for Higgins, Kelly O’Dwyer has announced she won’t contest her seat at the next election, as she’s made the decision to spend more time with her family. She’s also revealed that she and her husband would like to have another child, and that they needed to be realistic about whether could happen if she’s still in Parliament, and O’Dwyer and her husband have decided the answer to that is “no”. O’Dwyer has insisted that a woman would be the Liberal candidate in Higgins, but we don’t know who that is yet.

Also, Cathy McGowan, the Independent MP for the seat of Indi, has announced that she won’t contest the seat at the next election. She’s decided it’s time to move on and let a new person take her place, with McGowan’s supporters choosing a nurse and health researcher Helen Haines – it’s not exactly a party thing per se, but (from what I can gather) a community group that helps McGowan at elections and with her community meet-ups in the seat of Indi.

This week also saw a the continued anger over a fish kill in the Murray-Darling River Basin at Menindee in early January. After heat wave conditions, the temperature dropped rapidly and algal blooms in the Darling River de-oxygenated, suffocating the fish. There are concerns that given the heat in the last couple of days, there could be more fish kills on the river where the algae is blooming if the temperature drops suddenly again. Many locals believe the algal bloom and the fish kill could have been better prevented by government policy, and again blame is being placed on the poor management of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan in NSW.

Meanwhile, on the topic on environmental management, the National Audit Office has released their report into the contentious $443 million grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation for protecting the Great Barrier Reef. The Audit Office found that the minister at the time, Josh Frydenberg, made decisions based on information the department gave him, but that the Environment Department should have placed the foundation under greater scrutiny and taken into account the high administration costs of the foundation and their subcontractors. Current Environment Minister, Melissa Price, says that the government is proud of the grant they gave the organisation and that they won’t be asking for the money back.

This week also saw the start of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety, with The Honourable Richard Tracey AM RFD QC and Lynelle Briggs AO in charge. They’re facing a bit of an issue in that only 80-ish aged care providers have provided the commission with documents, out of the 2,000 or so providers in Australia. They’re going to spend most of their time in South Australia, but will soon travel around the country to hear submissions.

Scott Morrison headed to Vanuatu this week to meet with leaders and promises to invest more money in Vanuatu and the Pacific in general. This is mostly due to the fact that China has been getting involved in the Pacific with infrastructure investment – evidenced by the fact that the tarmac that the Prime Minister’s plane landed on was built by a Chinese company, as was the building Morrison met the Prime Minister of Vanuatu in. However, Pacific nations are not getting one of the big things they want out of Australia, which is for the government to take more action on climate change.

Scott Morrison is under fire because he’s trying to force local councils to hold citizenship ceremonies on Australia Day, because while most councils do hold them, there are a small number of councils that do not. It appears to be some sort of way to counter councils not wanting to hold ceremonies out of respect to indigenous people, however most of these councils don’t hold citizenship ceremonies on Australia Day because the cost-to-benefit ratio is low. Only two Melbourne councils have ever publicly said they don’t hold ceremonies on the 26th of January out of respect to Indigenous people – and they’ve had their right to hold citizenship ceremonies stripped from them by the government already.

Also this week, the NSW Government has announced their new Governor will be Justice Margaret Beazley, taking over from David Hurley in May, when he becomes Governor-General.

Finally this week, Saudi Arabian refugee Rahaf Alqunun spoke with the ABC, saying that all she wanted was a safe country to live in and that the UNHCR chose Canada over Australia because the Canadian government approved her case faster than Australia did.

Tweet of the Week

Annabel Crabb on the Gillette masculinity ad

It's quite interesting seeing how outraged some blokes are getting about receiving preachy life lessons from a company that sells cosmetic products.
Come on in, fellas! The water's fine! #gillette

— Annabel Crabb (@annabelcrabb) January 17, 2019

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

ABC political journalist Laura Tingle on the possibility of an early election – ABC Online

Tomic and Kyrios are distracting from our Aussie women players – ABC Online

The Gillette “toxic masculinity” advertisement:

 

The Year That Was – 2018

Leadership Spills: 2

Back at the end of August there were two spills in the same week, with the right-wing of the Liberal Party attempting to roll Turnbull. They were, the second time around, successful-ish. You see, the party knew that had Peter Dutton won the leadership (which was what the right wanted), the party would have been doomed, so Scott Morrison was the safer, more reasonable option.

Cabinet Reshuffles: 1

Just after the spill in August, the new Prime Minister Scott Morrison had to reshuffle the Cabinet.

Women in Cabinet: 6 (assessed by whether or not the role is bolded in the PMO’s Ministry List here.)

Julie Bishop is no longer in the Ministry, leaving:

• Marise Payne – now Foreign Minister
• Kelly O’Dwyer – Minister for Jobs and Industrial Relations and Minister for Women
• Melissa Price – Environment Minister
• Bridget McKenzie – Minister for Regional Services, Sport, Local Government and Decentralisation
• Michaelia Cash – Minister for Small and Family Business, Skills and Vocational Education
• Karen Andrews – Minister for Industry, Science and Technology

State and Federal Elections: 9 (by-elections included)

• South Australia – where after 16 years, the Labor party lost to the Liberals.
• Tasmania – where the incumbent Liberal Premier Will Hodgman maintained a majority. It’s also the first state election where more female than male members were elected – 13 women and 12 men.
• Victoria – where the incumbent Labor party earned another term with a massive majority.
• Wentworth – after Malcolm Turnbull was rolled from the Prime Ministership, he left Parliament. The by-election saw independent Kerryn Phelps win the election, with a swing of 19% and leaving the Liberals in minority government.
• Super Saturday – the five, yes five, by-elections held on one day in July, in order to solve four section 44 issues and replace one Perth MP retiring from politics.

Politician’s Kids getting involved in public debate: 1

Alex Turnbull, Malcolm Turnbull’s son – who lives and works in Singapore – got involved in the Wentworth by-election, telling people not to vote Liberal.

Scandals: 3

• We learned the reason why Barnaby Joyce’s marriage ended back in 2017…he’d taken up with a staffer of his, and she was expecting a baby.
• Barnaby Joyce was also accused of inappropriately touching a Nationals member at an event (which would not have been made public if someone wasn’t trying to smear the victim)
• Andrew Broad, just before Christmas, was discovered to have engaged the services of a “sugar baby” while in Hong Kong on a trip. He will no longer be a Minister and will no longer contest the next election.

The ABC’s Year in Review

 

The Week That Was – October 14 to October 20

This was the final week of campaigning for the Wentworth by-election, which got a bit nasty towards the end (but more on that in a moment). The Liberals kept going on about how if the Liberal candidate Dave Sharma didn’t win the election there would be instability because there would be a hung parliament. Meanwhile, Kerryn Phelps has been talking about keeping parliament stable should she win. Sharma and Phelps are the two frontrunners and between them the polling has been neck and neck. The candidates had an event for the public earlier in the week where they spoke to people from the electorate about issues important to them. Sharma has made clear that he was just as shocked and upset by the rolling of Malcolm Turnbull as most of the electorate was.

However, Malcolm’s son Alex Turnbull has been telling people to vote for anyone but the Liberal Party. Kerryn Phelps became the victim of a vicious email that suggested she was pulling out of the race because she’d been diagnosed with HIV and that people should vote for Sharma. Phelps has forwarded the email to the AEC to be investigated, and Sharma has condemned the email.

Meanwhile the Liberals appeared to get a tad desperate this week, by announcing something that was apparently meant to get some of the Jewish vote for Sharma. Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced that he was considering moving the Australian Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv – like Trump did with the American Embassy. According to Morrison, the suggestion came from Sharma himself, but the timing for the idea is a little odd. As Peter van Onselen pointed out on Insiders, most devout and potentially Orthodox Jews in Wentworth who support that policy are also strict observers of the Sabbath on Saturdays, and generally pre-poll vote, meaning they would have already voted without that policy on the table influencing their vote. Furthermore, ASIO documents have been leaked to the media, suggesting that if Australia were to follow the American’s example and move the Embassy to Jerusalem, Australia there would be some serious implications (mostly violent protests according to the documents).

Anyway, election day came and both Sharma and Phelps were unable to vote for themselves because they don’t live in the electorate (Sharma lives on the North Shore of Sydney and Phelps lives near Wentworth, as she was a Sydney City Councillor before running for Federal Parliament, but not exactly in the electorate). Sharma instead spent his day touring the polling booths and at one point was followed by a bunch of anti-coal protesters, while Phelps also toured around talking to people. By 7:20pm on Saturday night, with 9.4% of the vote counted, the ABC’s Election Analyst (or psephologist if you want to get technical) Antony Green called the election for Phelps, with a then swing of 23.6% against the government.

As morning came on Sunday, the gap between Sharma and Phelps was narrowing slightly, as postal votes and pre-poll votes were also counted, and the swing has narrowed to 18.4% as of the last update on the ABC website on Sunday morning – which I think may be the biggest swing ever in a by-election.

And then, Antony Green had to update on Twitter as I hit publish on this post 🙂

#wentworthvotes Check count corrects increase Phelps lead from 884 votes to 1186 votes. Two-candidate preferred percentages Phelps (IND) 50.8%, Sharma (LIB) 49.2% – results at https://t.co/ngXDINz7j5

— Antony Green – elections (@AntonyGreenElec) October 21, 2018

This by-election result has topped off a pretty bad week for the government. First, they suggested they might let people leave Nauru and settle in New Zealand – although they want some way to stop these refugees from coming to Australia, even as tourists. This has Labor, the Greens and the New Zealand government concerned, as Labor thinks it’s economically stupid to ban tourists from New Zealand, and New Zealand doesn’t want to have a group of people in their country who would essentially have second-class citizenship.

The government was also humiliated by their Senators somehow “accidentally” voting in favour of a Pauline Hanson motion that said it was “ok to be white” – which has its roots in right-wing white supremacist movements in the USA. The government’s Senators demanded a re-vote in which the summarily condemned the motion. But still, from the perspective of an outsider like me, it looks really bad.

Environment Minister Melissa Price is in hot water this week, after approaching the former President of Kiribati (pronounced Ki-ri-bas), Anote Tong, at a restaurant in Canberra. Pat Dodson, a Labor Party senator, was dining with Tong when Price approached, as were several other including the Director of the Edmund Rice Centre (a climate justice organisation that brought Tong to Australia). They allege and confirm that the Environment Minister said to Tong at the table:

I know why you’re here. It is for the cash. For the Pacific, it is always about the cash. I have my cheque book here. How much do you want?

Price denies that she said anything of the sort, but with Tong, Dodson and several other diners confirming she said something to the effect of the above quote, she’s not very convincing. Labor and the Greens have been appalled by the Environment Minister’s behaviour, saying she is the “worst Environment Minister ever”.

The other thing that’s been big this week (but not necessarily political) has been the royal tour to Sydney by the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prince Harry and his wife Meghan. The tour is mainly focused on the Invictus Games in Sydney, which Harry started to help his fellow servicemen who were returning from military service in the Middle East, but will also visit Fiji and Tonga while down in this part of the world. They flew in on a Qantas flight on Monday morning, and spent the day recovering from their long trip at Admiralty House where they’ll stay while in Sydney. Kensington Palace then announced on Monday night that the Duchess of Sussex is pregnant with the couple’s first child, due in the first half of next year.

Highlight of their trip so far have included Prince Harry spotting Daphne Dunne, a lady in her 90s who has met him multiple times. He chatted to her again, before introducing her to Meghan. The Sussexes went to Dubbo where they met school children (and got a hug from a 5-year-old boy who got to stroke Harry’s beard) before meeting with a drought affected farmer and talking about mental health at a picnic. They also went to Melbourne, where the Duchess of Sussex had a go at some AFL skills, and the couple went to a restaurant where they learned about indigenous ingredients. Another highlight was the Duke of Sussex climbing the Harbour Bridge with Invictus representatives and the Prime Minister Scott Morrison to plant the Invictus Games’ flag atop the Bridge.

Youth mental health network Headspace, will get an extra $51.8 million, to hire more staff and increase online services for those in regional areas in order to reduce wait times for young people reaching out for help.

Concerns have been raised about “alt-right” (those on the extreme right of the political spectrum) and their infiltration into the Liberal and National parties. One group in particular, the Young Nationals, seem to have been joined by some of these alt-right people. There was apparently some sort of plan to change the views of the mainstream parties, which has been somewhat unsuccessful, given the Young Nationals have cottoned onto the issue (potentially through the ABC telling them when they went to ask the party about it) and has asked one Young Nats member to leave, while two others have been suspended and two more have been asked to explain. The federal Nationals President has said that extremism is not welcome in the Nationals Party.

Finally this week, the former Managing Director of the ABC Michelle Guthrie is suing the ABC at the Fair Work Commission, claiming the board had no reason to trigger the termination clause in her contract, and the terror charge against the Sri Lankan student accused of planning a terror plot to kill Malcolm Turnbull because the police have admitted the handwriting in the notebook that has his name on it (and is their only evidence) is not his. Also, the Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Glenn Davies, has defended Anglican schools, saying that they never asked to have the ability to expel LGBTIQ+ students in their submission to the Ruddock religious freedom review.

Tweets of the Week

Elections means Antony Green – made even better by the fact that parts of Wentworth are on Green’s morning cycling route.

The set-up at the Watson’s Bay polling place on my Tour de Wentworth ride this morning #wentworthvotes pic.twitter.com/8AyOzqpses

— Antony Green – elections (@AntonyGreenElec) October 19, 2018

Kerryn Phelps an easy winner. The swing constant across all the different parts of the electorate
Full results at https://t.co/ngXDINz7j5 #auspol

— Antony Green – elections (@AntonyGreenElec) October 20, 2018

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

Jessica Martin on the fall of women’s magazines – ABC Online

Tony Walker on moving the Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem – ABC Online

The Week That Was – August 26 to September 1

This week was Scott Morrison’s first week as Prime Minister and he rather quickly announced his cabinet. Mathias Cormann and Peter Dutton, have kept their roles – although Immigration is now no longer part of the Home Affairs portfolio.  A number of cabinet members have also stayed in cabinet or kept their roles, regardless of who they supported during the drama of last week. However, there has been a bit of a reshuffle and two backbenchers have been pulled out of relative obscurity into the ministry, with Melissa Price becoming Environment Minister and Karen Andrews becoming Minister for Industry and Science. Michaelia Cash has been moved sideways to become the Minister for Small Business and Skills, and Kelly O’Dwyer is now Minister for Jobs and Industrial Relations. Steve Ciobo seems to have lost his Trade portfolio to Simon Birmingham, and Dan Tehan is now Education Minister.

Julie Bishop has left the front bench, and will be replaced by Marise Payne as Foreign Minister, so Christopher Pyne is now Defence Minister. The big thing here though is that Bishop has left the ministry and the deputy leadership of the Liberal party after eleven years. One of the most senior and experienced women in the Liberal party is no longer in the ministry, and that’s a heck of a lot of expertise no longer on the front bench. Part of this seems to be because of a group text conversation on WhatsApp between some moderate Liberal MPs and Senators calling themselves “Friends of Stability”. It appears one of them uncovered an alleged plan from the Dutton camp to stick some WA votes behind Bishop in the first round of voting during the spill, in order to knock out Morrison so Dutton would win. Poor Christopher Pyne was left to very respectfully warn Julie Bishop of this plan to use her to get Dutton as PM.

Julie Bishop has said that she will contest her seat of Curtin at the next election, and there are whispers that she could be the next Governor-General as she is respected on both sides of the political divide.

This is not the only issue involving women in the Liberal Party and the spill of last week. Julia Banks, the Member for Chisholm, has announced she will not contest the next election in her marginal Melbourne seat. She cites bullying and sexist behaviour from parliamentary Liberal Party, especially during the week of the spill, where she alleges three MPs and Senators (who are thought to be some of Dutton’s numbers men) engaged in intimidation tactics to try to get her to vote their way.

https://twitter.com/juliabanksmp/status/1034597677017718784

Two other members of parliament, Sarah Henderson MP and Senator Linda Reynolds have also alleged poor behaviour on the part of these “numbers men”, with Henderson apparently being promised a ministry or some other worldly goods, and Reynolds feeling intimidated by the actions of her party – something she spoke about in the Senate to get it into Hansard.

Prime Minister Morrison spent a lot of his first full week as PM not in Canberra. He toured drought affected Queensland at the start of the week and learned more about the effects the drought is having on families. At the end of the week he travelled to Jakarta and met with Indonesian President Joko Widodo. Originally the trip was for Malcolm Turnbull, and many expected it to be postponed after the spill, however, Morrison went over and spent time with Widodo, and they seemed to get on well, and Morrison did represent us well on his first international trip as Prime Minister. Australia is about to sign a Free Trade Agreement with Indonesia, eight years in the making, so the relationship is now more important than ever.

Meanwhile, Peter Dutton is facing criticism over what is being dubbed the “Au Pair Affair”. It’s understood that a couple of years ago, Peter Dutton allowed a 27-year-old French national into the country on a tourist visa, despite the fact that she had admitted to Border Force officials that she would engage in work as an au pair for the McLachlan family. The McLachlan family are well-known South Australian pastoralists and are related to AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan – who knows Dutton from when he was Sports Minister. It appears Gillon McLachlan linked his relatives to Dutton’s office so they could plead the young woman’s case. It’s also understood that he has helped a former cop colleague in the same situation whose potential au pair was detained at Brisbane airport, along with one other au pair – but that last one hasn’t been talked about much.

The Catholic Church has responded to the recommendations from the Child Abuse Royal Commission, saying it will take all but a few of the recommendations on board. They have stated that they won’t be breaking the seal of confession to report child abuse, but they will apply to the Vatican to consider making celibacy a voluntary aspect of being a member of the clergy. Meanwhile, South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory are continuing in their push to make it illegal to not report child abuse revealed to priests in the confessional, against the wishes of the Catholic Church.

Finally this week, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Barnaby Joyce will be a Special Envoy for the Drought, and Tony Abbott will be Special Envoy for Indigenous Affairs (which is going down really well amongst the Indigenous community); Chelsea Manning, the US Army intelligence officer who leaked thousands of documents to WikiLeaks, was banned from entering Australia, but she will be allowed to enter New Zealand; the NAPLAN results came out and while Primary school results are improving,  the high school results aren’t as positive; and Australia probably won’t get visited by US President Donald Trump, instead we’ll get a visit from Vice-President Mike Pence.

Tweets of the Week

https://twitter.com/BevanShields/status/1034259584221736960

Christopher Pyne has just been sworn in as Minister for Defence.
I repeat: @cpyne now has weapons.

— Annabel Crabb (@annabelcrabb) August 28, 2018

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

Annabel Crabb on Julie Bishop’s savage one-liners – ABC Online

Mark Latham’s defamation defence dismissed (it’s awesome) – Federal Court of Australia