The Week That Was – June 30 to July 6

This week was the start of the 46th Parliament. So members were sworn in en masse and legislation being pushed through, but first, the new Governor-General, General David Hurley, was sworn in – Hurley’s first words as Governor-General were in the language of the Ngunnawal people, whose land encompasses Canberra.

Once all the politicians were sworn in, the government got to work on getting their legislation passed through the House of Representatives and the Senate. The government’s primary focus this week has been the tax cuts that it promised in both the Budget back in April and during the election campaign. With a majority in the lower house, the tax cuts passed easily. However once in the Senate, the government still had to negotiate with the crossbench, and it seems that the government has found a bloc of senators to make deals with that doesn’t involve Pauline Hanson and her One Nation Party. Instead, for this legislation, the government has Cory Bernardi, who thinks tax cuts are awesome, two Centre Alliance Senators – who have been promised changes to the pricing and exports of natural gas – and Jacqui Lambie (yep, she’s back) who has been promised that certain subsided housing debts will be waived.

Labor did, in the end, support the tax cuts too, but they really only support the first round of cuts for low and middle-income earners. They’re not too excited about the changes coming in 2022 which will decrease the tax rate for those on incomes between $46,000 and $200,000 to 30 cents in the dollar. However, there’s a suggestion that should they win the 2022 election they might repeal that second round of tax cuts.

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) cut interest rates to a record low of 1% this week, and economists expect there to be at least one more rate cut by the end of the year – not so great for those investing and saving, but pretty awesome for those who are borrowing. Part of the reason that the Reserve Bank continues to drop the interest rate is that they are concerned about the economy. The RBA wants to see unemployment rates drop to 4.5% (but actual higher-paying jobs, not minimum-wage service jobs), and more infrastructure investment. As it turns out, New South Wales is setting the example, with the government investing in public transport infrastructure, creating jobs and boosting the NSW economy.

The federal government seems reluctant to do this, and it seems to be because they desperately want to deliver a surplus this financial year. Economist Tim Harcourt, a Fellow at UNSW and an advisor to the South Australia Government, has suggested the economy could be negatively affected by the government’s “surplus fetish” – saying on ABC News that it is actually perfectly normal and okay for there to be a budget deficit when the economy is slowing down. This “surplus fetish” (which is now my new favourite phrase), is also the reason that the aforementioned second round of tax cuts isn’t happening until 2022.

This week also saw terror arrests in Western Sydney, which foiled a plot to attack “Sydney landmarks” – as they caught their suspects before they decided on a concrete target. This now makes 16 plots that the AFP and their state counterparts have foiled. The thing that surprised me this week about the whole thing is that the Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton decided to tell Australians “that the threat is not diminished” and not going away. Why not applaud the AFP and the other agencies that have worked hard to prevent these potential attacks?

Finally this week, Australian Alek Sigley, who was living in North Korea, was released from detention in the DPRK and reunited with his family, leading the government and the opposition to tell Australians going to North Korea is not necessarily a good idea; and the indigenous site of Budj Bim has been recognised as a World Heritage Site.

Tweet of the Week

Watching Sky after Dark inadvertently and Spectator editor Rowan Dean persistently is calling pro-Brexiteer Ann Widdecombe "Anna Widdecomb". Jeez you'd think he'd be across that.

— Annabel Crabb (@annabelcrabb) July 5, 2019

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

RBA Governor Philip Lowe wants the government to stimulate the economy – ABC Online

Hong Kong’s future generation was always going to rebel against China – ABC Online

Four Things That Happened During My Hiatus (March 3 to March 23)

I’m back! I took some time off work and then when I got back to work it was a bit hectic, so here are a few things that happened while I was away.

First, we saw yet another announcement from a Liberal MP that they would not contest the next election. This time it was Craig Laundy, MP for the marginal seat of Reid, in Sydney’s Inner West. Laundy was a minister in the Turnbull government, and he is considered to be a moderate Liberal, which many commentators attribute to his ability to hold onto the seat. There is currently a push for a woman or an equally moderate candidate to be placed in the seat in order to keep it in Liberal hands. The seat is likely to be one where the party will parachute a candidate into it given it is so close to the election (it’s expected to be called after the budget).

It’s also concerning that the party has already asked two people if they’d like to run, and they have both refused. These people were ABC Journalist Stan Grant, and former NSW Police Deputy Commissioner Nick Kaldas. This means that the candidate the Liberal party announces will be their third choice, and so far no women have been mentioned in rumours.

Second, New Zealand was rocked by a right-wing extremist terror attack on two mosques by an Australian citizen. It’s proved once again to the world and Australia that Jacinda Ardern is an awesome human being – just take her response on the day of the attack:

Once again there were calls for Jacinda Ardern to become Prime Minister of Australia, which isn’t possible because of Section 44, but whatever, we can dream.

The attack in NZ led right-wing senator Fraser Anning to try to blame Muslim immigration in Australia and New Zealand for the terror attack. Anning was widely criticised for his comments, mostly verbally. A teenage boy decided to smash an egg on Anning’s head while he was at an event – leading Anning to punch him in the face before Anning’s supporters tackled him to the ground.

The boy, Will Connolly, has since been interviewed by Channel 10. He admits that egging Anning was the wrong thing to do, and there is no denying it was, but he’s unapologetic because, well, he’s probably not the only one who has felt like smashing an egg on Anning’s head.

Scott Morrison also announced he was going to talk to social media companies about how they manage hateful content, and create legislation to make it illegal not to monitor and remove such content from these sites. This comes after the mosque attacker broadcast his attack live on Facebook, and while Facebook finally found it and deleted it, people kept reposting it.

Meanwhile, in New South Wales the state election took place, with it originally looking like the Liberal party would be in a minority government, mostly credited with the Labor leader Michael Daley’s comments about the Chinese community.

Finally, there was another round of school student strikes, with students campaigning to draw attention to climate change and their displeasure at the government’s action on climate policy, or lack thereof.

That’s it for now, back to regular posting this week.

The Week That Was – November 11 to November 17

This week saw the centenary of the armistice following the First World War, with commemorations across Australia. Scott Morrison spoke at the War Memorial in Canberra and the Governor-General, General Sir Peter Cosgrove, attended services in France. 

Melbourne is recovering from the apparent terror attack on Bourke Street, with Dan Andrews offering the family of the deceased victim, Sisto Malaspina, a state funeral – which they’ve accepted. Meanwhile the Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton have been speaking tough on extremism, saying the community, especially the Muslim community, needs to keep an eye on radicalisation and report it  – which has somewhat upset the Muslim community because they’re being tarred with the same brush. There are also questions now over whether the attacker, who died after being shot by police, was also mentally unwell, separate from his radicalisation – something that Scott Morrison did not like the idea of when asked about it in an interview on Channel 10. 

This week also saw Prime Minister Scott Morrison at his first regional summits. First, to Singapore, where he attended ASEAN meetings. He was received well, however both Indonesia and Malaysia have concerns about the Israel Embassy decision, which is yet to made. This has lead to the delay in signing the free trade agreement with Indonesia, which was supposed to happen this week. Morrison says the decision will be made in “a little while”, but won’t say exactly when – although the aim seems to be before Christmas.

Morrison also attended the APEC conference in Papua New Guinea this weekend, during which there has been a lot of announcements about joint projects. Most of these are designed, it seems, to counter Chinese influence in the Pacific region. The first is a joint infrastructure venture between America, Japan and Australia, which is meant to be an alternative to the “Belt and Road” infrastructure initiative offered by China.

The other of these is a Joint Naval base on Manus Island that will house Papuan, Australian and American naval forces. Again, the plan is to counter Chinese influence in the region by setting up a naval base close to Australia before China did. Australian Defence members have also bee brought in during APEC to help the Papua New Guinean security forces with security and protection for the conference, as Australia knows a thing or two about APEC security having hosted in 2007.

The closing date for opting out if the MyHealth Record system was November 15 – or at least it was until the website crashed in the days prior as people rushed to opt out or get more information. This has lead the Health Minister Greg Hunt to announce that there will be an extension to the opt-out timeframe. If you are yet to opt-out (if you so wish) you have until January 31.

Also this week, the ABC investigated itself on Four Corners over the sacking of Michelle Guthrie. Guthrie essentially accused the board of failing to act when she brought up instances of former Chairman Justin Milne interfering politically in the running of the public broadcaster. Guthrie also accused Milne of “inappropriate touching”, saying that he rubbed her back, which made her feel uncomfortable. She reported it to another board member but refused to make a formal complaint. Many people can understand why that’d make you uncomfortable, but it did feel a little bit like she was throwing that in at the eleventh hour to save her job. 

This has lead to calls for the ABC Board to be entirely replaced, but also lead to several former and current politicians to support the ABC and the work they do – with former Deputy PM Tim Fischer saying regional Australia would “be like Siberia” if not for regional ABC programming.

Finally this week, in an epic display of “policy gymnastics”, the government announced a cut to Foodbank, ostensibly to share the money with two other food rescue organisations, SecondBite and OzHarvest, before deciding instead to increase the food rescue industry budget after facing public backlash.

Tweet of the Week

Everything about this is wonderful… pic.twitter.com/ydiBa6Vzpt

— Andrew Stroehlein (@astroehlein) November 13, 2018

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

A year after the vote, the LGBT community are still recovering – ABC Online

Morrison’s government brings back memories of McMahon’s – ABC Online

The Two Weeks That Were – October 28 to November 10

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…

The alarm goes off at 2.30am…@mjrowland68 and @LaTrioli take you behind the scenes of their morning routines and how they get ready for the show each day.

Hint: ☕☕☕ pic.twitter.com/yM0D7U59WI

— News Breakfast (@BreakfastNews) October 30, 2018

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 Week That Was – August 20 to August 26

The week began with the government revealing their plans to protect people in crowded places, including more bollards and statues. They’re encouraging big businesses and small businesses to help contribute. There wasn’t much more they said publicly, but many feel they’re doing something.

The Australian Medical Association is concerned about certain levels of private health insurance and are pushing for the government to  more strictly regulate the industry. At the moment, there are 20,000 variations in policies and some are so poor that they simply help you avoid the Medicare levy. They’re suggesting a streamlined Gold, Silver & Bronze grading system for every policy so that people know exactly what they are getting.

The government is planning to start trials for drug testing welfare recipients in several areas, including the Western Sydney regions of Canterbury & Bankstown. It’s thought that they will test 1750 people on location at the Centrelink office, and if they test positive, they will not be reported to police. They will however, have their income managed, and may be asked to attend rehab. The legislation still has to get through parliament, and with Labor and the Greens against it, it will be interesting to see if it gets through the Senate.

The citizenship saga continues, with five of the seven cases in the High Court starting this week. Hearings will take place in October, even though people wanted them heard earlier. It was an interesting day, with Tony Windsor, who lost to Barnaby Joyce at the 2016 election, being allowed to join the case against Joyce, and One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts changing his story again. In an amusing aside, Barnaby Joyce has also been nominated for New Zealander of the year.

Nick Warner, the head of Australia’s CIA equivalent, ASIS (Australian Secret Intelligence Service), has been criticised for appearing in a photo with Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte doing the President’s famous fist-pump gesture. Some saw this as Australia’s acceptance of Duterte and his war on drugs, which has led to the extrajudicial killings of many people. In fact, Warner was meeting with Duterte to show Australia’s support of the Philippines military efforts to quash ISIS fighters in Marawi.

While the country awaits the court ruling on the same-sex marriage postal survey (actual name: “Australian Marriage Law Postal Survey”), the Yes and No sides are gearing up for campaigning. There are somewhat dubious claims coming from the NO campaign regarding the evils of the gays, while the YES campaign has been focusing on making sure that all of their potential voters are enrolled. It’s believed that the push for people to enrol to vote has led to hundreds of thousands of eligible young Aussies being added to the electoral roll, not just for this vote/survey, but for every election thereafter, which could change the direction of the country.

Finally this week, the worst was realised when the 7-year-old Australian boy missing after the Barcelona attack was identified as one of the 14 killed; the government has shut nearly 125 childcare centres in a crackdown; Tony Abbott confessed to being too drunk to show up to some divisions during the passing of Rudd-era financial crisis legislation (Wayne Swan is mad because people made him retract allegations he made at the time); and there are allegations that the big tobacco companies are in cahoots with customs and police to catch tobacco smugglers – which could be in violation of a World Health Organisation treaty.

Tweets of the Week

As an ex-resident of Hong Kong, typhoons are always interesting to follow…

Some wild vision from yesterday's #TyphoonHato #hongkong pic.twitter.com/xnXxSL9cz0

— Sarah Clarke (@sarahclarkeaus) August 24, 2017

And somewhat related to weather, ABC News Breakfast’s meteorologist Nate Byrne was getting into science week:

Fire, water, wind and ice in sloooooowww mooootion 🔥💧🌪❄️

Big thanks to @questacon for letting @SciNate play with the slow-mo cameras! pic.twitter.com/SmmxUHPxEq

— News Breakfast (@BreakfastNews) August 20, 2017

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

Leigh Sales on interviewing – ABC Online

Hillsong’s position on Same-Sex Marriage as covered by the New Matilda (N.B. – While critical of Hillsong, it does break down the church’s position)

Teachers on the joys of teaching – ABC Online

The Week That Was – May 15 to May 21

The second week of the election campaign began with Malcolm Turnbull promising money for new technology for kids with diabetes to allow their parents to monitor their sugar levels, and Bill Shorten wanting all primary school children to learn to swim. George Brandis suggested that Shorten should sack a candidate who campaigned against the strengthening national security laws a few years ago.

Meanwhile, there was talk of building things, penalty rates changes, taxes, cutting or giving more funding to the Haymarket Foundation Health Clinic as well as whether or not cutting funding to the Butterfly Foundation’s phone help line in order to streamline youth mental health is the right thing to do. There was also a backpacker tax backflip, and a screw up from a Richard Di Natale and David Feeney, both of whom forgot to declare some assets to parliament and could be in a lot of trouble.

Also this week, Peter Dutton caused controversy saying that refugees coming to Australia are illiterate and innumerate in both their own language and in English and are coming for our jobs. Malcolm Turnbull has backed him up and said that he won’t sack Dutton, leading some to think that Turnbull is keeping the right faction happy in order to keep his job, rather than fighting for what he believes in. Also this week, the Liberal Candidate for Fremantle has resigned.

However, the election campaign wouldn’t be complete without a warm fuzzy story about a politician comforting a woman and her child after a car accident. Bill Shorten’s campaign was held up during the week, after a car overtaking the campaign bus was involved in an accident. Once the campaign continued, Shorten was off talking about health, while Turnbull was off talking about company tax breaks.

The men arrested last week trying to take a small boat to Indonesia, allegedly to then go on to Syria, were extradited to Melbourne this week after being charged in Cairns. While in Sydney an 18-year-old man was arrested on terror charges. He was a member of the radical prayer group at a high school in Sydney’s northern suburbs.

Finally this week, a man died in mysterious circumstances at the Australian Embassy in Baghdad, with the only other person in the room at the time being sent home; the Federal Auditor-General is looking into the West-Connex at the behest of Anthony Albanese, leading some to think he might be trying to win votes in his seat, where he’s having a tough battle with the Greens; and the unions are hoping to get the government to guarantee Australian shipping jobs.

Tweet of the Week

https://twitter.com/Knightcartoons/status/733464938530803712

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

Mark di Stefano’s compliation of stories on “illiterate” immigrant families – Buzzfeed

First Dog on the Moon on ‘dog-whistling” – The Guardian

Di Natale’s failure to declare assets – The Age

The Week That Was – May 8 to May 14

Well, we’re officially in one of the longest election campaigns Australia has had in living memory.

In order to win the election, the Labor party will need to win 21 seats. It could be interesting to see the result, as an eight week-long campaign can lead to voter fatigue and if the 1984 Election is anything to go by, the opposition could get bigger in stature. Commentators suggest that if Turnbull lets that happen, he could lose the election. The ABC’s election analyst, Antony Green also suggests that this long campaign, paired with a double dissolution could see the Coalition with a hostile Senate, much like the one they’re trying to get rid of, if not more hostile. It also means that some of the “bellwether” seats across the country are getting media attention. Voters in the southern NSW seat of Eden-Monaro are not yet sure who they will vote for. Peter Hendy, the current MP, is getting criticised for not being in the seat enough, while the more recognised Labor candidate Mike Kelly is going around meeting people. It may not do Kelly much good though, given a minor redistribution of the seat has left it notionally more towards the Coalition.

The week began with both the PM and the Opposition Leader in Queensland, where Labor will need to win eight seats. Bill Shorten was in Far North Queensland talking up education policy, including scholarships for indigenous students to study education at university. However there have also been some first-week hiccups, with a few of the Labor candidates not toeing the party line on refugees coming by boat, as well as dumping a candidate for not disclosing criminal convictions.

It’s also been tough for Malcolm Turnbull and the Coalition with internal disagreements over negative gearing and questions to Liberal MPs over how they voted on spill night eight months ago. Turnbull was also mentioned in the Panama Papers, leading to calls from Labor accusing Turnbull for being out of touch and too wealthy. The whole wealth angle worked to Labor’s advantage at the end of the week at a mini debate in Windsor, in Western Sydney.

One week down, seven to go. Unlike 2007 and 2013, it’s not easy to figure out who is likely to win at this point. It’s anyone’s game.

In other news, five men have been arrested over one of the most peculiar attempts to get to Syria. The men towed a small boat from Melbourne to northern Queensland, it raised some suspicion with the authorities. They were stopped in Cairns and will face court some time next week if charged.

Also this week, a refugee on Nauru went into premature labour after having a seizure. It’s believed that the 22-year-old also had pre-eclampsia. Both mum and baby were on life support, but it’s understood that mum is now off that life support and her condition is improving. Peter Dutton is fending of criticism that the mother should have been evacuated off Nauru and taken to a hospital in Brisbane much earlier, especially given her pre-eclampsia diagnosis. Dutton says that the services on Nauru are fine and that people are well taken care of. Meanwhile the government is still deciding whether or not they will allow the baby’s father to be transported to Brisbane to be by his baby and his partner’s side.

Finally this week, arts groups are preparing to tighten their budgets as major cuts to the Australia Council come into effect. Many small and medium size arts groups could lose most of their government funding and grants, which could leave some with no choice but to close up shop. While there is the possibility of projects grants, some groups are saying that with fewer small arts groups, the fewer new talents there are for the bigger arts companies and groups to choose from.

Tweet of the Week

https://twitter.com/MarkDiStef/status/731272396699631616

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

First Dog on the Moon on the Election – The Guardian

First Dog on the Moon on Vote Compass – The Guardian

Aussie Cafés in NYC – ABC 7:30

The Week That Was – April 24 to April 30

It was the week before the Budget, which meant that there was a lot of Budget speculation. Combine that with the whole “the election will probably be called in a week or two” vibe, and you’ve got yourself a week where it seems like we’re already in the middle of an election campaign. This week also saw the commemoration of ANZAC Day across the country and at Gallipoli and Villers-Bretonneux. There were further commemorations at various Consulates and Embassies all over the world, and of course in the Middle East, where there are several different groups of troops deployed, mainly in training and advisory roles.

For once it seems that the Budget is being kept very tightly under wraps with very little fanfare over the whole thing. What we do know is that there will be no changes to negative gearing, while driving home the somewhat incorrect statement that negative gearing is helping mum and dad investors in the middle-income bracket. There is also a small tax cut for middle-income earners. The rest of the announced Budget measures seem to involve  the Coalition saying they’ll do the opposite to what Labor has announced and saying Labor is bad, which has Shadow Treasurer Chris Bowen suggesting the only plan the Liberals have is to attack Labor.

Meanwhile, Bill Shorten has continued being in his many months-long election campaign mode, with town hall-style meetings and other events. It seems to be doing him some good, in that he’s been able to get his messages across to the public, and keep the upper hand on announcing policies. One such example is negative gearing, which Labor announced and made a pretty convincing argument for several months ago. Their policy involves only allowing negative gearing on new housing stock, while grandfathering investment properties bought before the start date, which would allow for new housing to be built and people to find more affordable housing, especially young and first homebuyers. It’s an argument that has been considered and thought out, and for some people, including me, they are going to respond to that better than they might the personal attacks and bullying tactics that we see sometimes.

There was some drama thrown in towards the end of the week when the Papua New Guinea Supreme Court declared that detention centres were illegal as they violated a person’s right to personal liberty, which is written in their constitution. From there, the Prime Minister Peter O’Neill announced that the detention centre on Manus Island will close. There is an issue though, in that the Australian government believes PNG is responsible for the refugees in the centre, while the PNG government believes that Australia should be making the arrangements. Meanwhile, a refugee has died from self-inflicted burns in a Brisbane hospital after being transferred from PNG. It is understood that he set himself alight in front of his wife and UN officials.

We finally found out what submarines we’re getting in the next five to ten years, and who will build them. The government selected the French design, with construction to be done in Australia, mostly in South Australia, or at least that’s what is being said at the moment. However, there are also concerns over our relationship with Japan after they lost the bid, and also how they found out about it. A leak last week showed that the Japanese had lost the “competitive evaluation process”, seemingly before the government had a chance to tell them. There were also some suspicions over Defence Minister Marise Payne’s partner, Stuart Ayres, a NSW State MP, and his trip to France last week.

Finally this week, Nick Xenophon’s Nick Xenophon Team or NXT have announced some candidates which could shake up the Senate representation in South Australia; Scott Morrison essentially declined an application for a Chinese consortium to buy the Kidman farming empire, which takes up something like 1% of Australia’s land mass across three states and territories; the Port Arthur Massacre was commemorated twenty years on, as the gun control debate continues; and further arrests were made in relation to the ISIS-linked murder of Curtis Cheng.

Tweet of the Week

https://twitter.com/workmanalice/status/726628853301411841

Things I’ve been Looking at Online

The ABC is getting a new typeface soon – ABC Digital Network Blog

First Dog on the Moon on 60 Minutes – The Guardian

The Week That Was – November 22 to November 28

The week began with Anti-Islam and Anti-racism protests in most capital cities and while there was some fighting between the groups, most people were well behaved and the police kept each group as far away from each other as possible.

Meanwhile, Malcolm Turnbull completed his first World Tour with a trip to Malaysia for the ASEAN East Asia Conference. Turnbull met with the Malaysian PM, discussing the battle against Islamic State as well as trying to encourage China to play nice in the South China Sea. Upon his return to Australia, Turnbull was in Parliament, where the government and the opposition made speeches of condolence to the people of Paris as well as talking about keeping Australia safe.

Turnbull has also been questioned by the media over the wording in some of his speeches as well as whether or not he has a grip on the more conservative faction of his party. Furthermore, there has been calls from Labor that Mal Brough should either stand down or be sacked from his ministry due to a police investigation into Brough’s role in the Peter Slipper scandal back in 2011-2012. Then, at the end of the week, he flew to Malta for the CHOGM meetings, where he met Queen Elizabeth and apparently made her chuckle when he spoke of Prince Charles’ visit to Australia a few weeks back, and then he will travel to Paris for the Climate Conference.

Climate Change was a big thing this week in the lead up to the Paris conference, with concerns that Turnbull is heading to France with Tony Abbott’s old, and somewhat sub-par climate plan. Labor has come out with an alternative, suggesting a 45% reduction by 2030 and a carbon neutral economy by 2050. This is based off the exact same model that the Liberals are using for their climate plan too, so it should be interesting to see the reaction.

Domestic Violence came to the fore this week for Wednesday’s White Ribbon day, with Malcolm Turnbull telling the country that there must be change and it will have to be lead by men, while surveys are showing that young men are more likely to blame others for their problems and play down their aggressive behaviour, while young women are more likely to blame themselves as well as justify the aggressive behaviour of their partners.

The government has changed the terrorism warning system indicators from High, Low, Moderate etc, to a simpler system suggesting the likeliness of an attack.

The new terror attack warning system. (from: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-26/national-terrorism-threat-advisory-system-graphic./6976880)

 Under this simpler system the current warning is the second-lowest “probable”, so we’re pretty safe for now.

There are still national security concerns over foreign investment in Australia, with the US Ambassador meeting Australian officials to get more information on the Darwin Port deal, angry that they were not consulted. However, Defence Minister Marise Payne says that she was abroad with Julie Bishop when the decision was made and that as soon as it was, someone was dispatched to the Pentagon to tell US officials.

Finally this week, the coalition against Islamic State have completed more airstrikes on ISIS strongholds; the government wants the states to increase their trading hours to increase choice and the help the economy and Hillsong’s Brian Houston has been found to have had a conflict on interest over his father’s abuse of a young child at the Royal Commission into Child Abuse.

Also, if you live in the electorate of North Sydney, don’t forget you have a by-election on December 5!

Tweet of the Week

https://twitter.com/nthsydneyvotes/status/669365995148972032

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

First Dog on Bill Shorten’s dismal poll numbers – The Guardian

First Dog on White Ribbon Day – The Guardian

SBS2 The Feed’s retrospective for 2015

 

The Week That Was – November 15 to November 21

As the world recovered from the shock of the Paris attacks, people either tried to encourage calm and tolerance, while others encouraged negativity towards others. Thankfully, the Turnbull government appears to be in favour of the former.

While continuing his “World Tour”, Malcolm Turnbull travelled to Turkey for the G20 where they spoke a bit about a collective response to terrorism, and how there really needs to be a political solution in Syria, even if it means allowing Assad to remain in power while Islamic State is defeated, while also reminding Australia that we have good security measures in place and shouldn’t start freaking out. This year’s G20 was a huge improvement for Australia’s image, with Turnbull placed in a prime spot in the ‘Family Photo’ and during some discussions. The PM was also invited to visit President Obama at the White House at the start of next year. After the G20 was the APEC Meeting in Manila, in the Philippines, where Turnbull was bombarded with concerns about the Darwin Port lease – which is covered in more detail below – especially because the USA didn’t find out through official channels, but through the Wall Street Journal, to which Turnbull told them to get a subscription to the NT News. Turnbull returned to Australia, spending some time in Darwin before flying out to Malaysia for the ASEAN summit starting this coming week.

Terrorism has been infiltrating our news feeds this week, after the Paris Attacks, in which one of the attackers is believed to have gotten into France through the Eastern European refugee channels. This has lead to concerns around the world about just who they might be letting in, especially in the United States, where more than half of the States have decided to refuse to take in some the 10,000 refugees the US will allow into the country to help lessen the burden the European Migrant Crisis is having on the region. Meanwhile France began more airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq and France is believed to be talking with several nations including the US and Australia about increasing their involvement. Meanwhile the NSW government has announced that police will now have the power to act without question (presumably lethally) if they believe someone is being killed or attacked in front of them, while other States and the ADF are considering similar powers.

Foreign investment is starting to cause concern this week with three different situations arising. The first is the Darwin Port lease, in which the Northern Territory Government leased the port to a Chinese company, this has caused concerns given that people in the company have links to the Communist Party and the People’s Liberation Army. This seems to be surprising people even though it’s common for Chinese companies, especially the State Owned Enterprises (SOEs), to have these links. It is also concerning because the Darwin Port’s lease area also encompasses a naval base, which has become a security concern.

The second investment issue this week has been the Treasurer’s decision to deny an application for a company, believed to be a Chinese company, from buying all of the Kidman Family farmland, as part of the land in South Australia backs onto the ADF weapons testing site at Woomera – a national security issue. The third is the concern that the NSW government will sell off their electricity assets to a Chinese SOE – which is another national security issue.

All of this is also leading to cabinet disagreements, which is leading to the perception of disunity in the party. This could be problematic for Turnbull, who is trying to balance all of the views in his party and cabinet to keep people happy.

Finally this week, the Trade Union Royal Commission has recommended that the people who gave evidence into the NUW last week should be prosecuted for their actions; the “On water operational matters” curtain was raised when a boat was turned back from Christmas Island – whether it was refugees or some wayward fishermen is unclear;  the Arts Minister is moving some finding back to the Arts Council, which will benefit individual performers and artists, but will still disadvantage small companies;  the top-secret ASIO part of the Sydney Siege Inquest has begun and it’s believed that any recommendations from this section will never be known to the public and Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall finished their visit to Australia and New Zealand and headed home.

Tweet of the Week

Waleed Aly on how Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL, Daesh) is weak.

Waleed talks about how we can stop ISIL #TheProjectTV
Written by Waleed & @twhittyer https://t.co/tX6mRNXZK1

— The Project (@theprojecttv) November 16, 2015

Things I’ve Been Looking at Online

First Dog on the Moon on Paris – The Guardian

Durex wants a condom emoji – Junkee

Lee Lin Chin Interviews If You are the One host Meng Fei (subtitles)

Tea and Consent