| After saying last week the RBA was “smashing the economy” with high interest rates, and the worst quarterly GDP result in 30 years outside of the pandemic, the Coalition had Treasurer Jim Chalmers firmly in their sights this week in Canberra. The opposition, which has always targeted PM Anthony Albanese in question time over the government’s economic policies, put the Treasurer under pressure to prove his budget strategy was not having an adverse effect on the economy. In other important news, the Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide handed down its final report, sparking calls to urgently implement overdue reforms to address shockingly suicide rates among serving and former members of the ADF. And the government is busily progressing their legislative agenda, with a number of key Bills tabled this week. Catch up on all the week’s major stories in our Parliament Wrap. |
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| Government and Coalition finally agree on aged care reform After many months of negotiations, and a false start last sitting period, the government and opposition have struck a deal on aged care reforms, designed to put the system on a more sustainable footing as Australia’s population ages. Well into the third year of the Albanese Government’s term, Aged Care Minister Anika Wells yesterday introduced a bill for a new Aged Care Act, one of Labor’s signature election commitments. A reform package worth $5.6bn will see a new system of supports for people to age at home, new laws to protect older Australians in residential aged care and structural funding reform to increase the viability of the sector. Those funding reforms will see wealthier Australians pay more for aged care services, adversely affecting self-funded retirees who traditionally vote for the Coalition. In supporting the reforms and risking a potential backlash from one of their core constituencies, the Coalition has taken a gamble they hope will pay off in the long run, with the reforms representing a $12.6 billion budget save over the next 11 years. It’s a policy that would have been much harder for a Coalition government to implement, but opposition leader Peter Dutton is hoping it pays off should they win back government in the next term or two. Government acts on social media age restrictions On Monday, after enormous pressure from both Labor and Coalition MPs, Prime Minister Albanese committed to introduce legislation to increase the age restriction for social media. This will significantly impact companies like Meta and TikTok. The development follows a meeting of National Cabinet where South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas provided the government with a comprehensive 276-page report from a review conducted by former High Court justice Robert French. This report outlined the legislative model for banning children under 14 from accessing social media and emphasised the need for social media companies to take systemic responsibility for enforcing these restrictions. While the Prime Minister didn’t announce the details of the policy, it is believed the legislation will effectively ban children under 14 years of age from accessing social media and require companies to gain parental consent for 14 and 15-year-olds to use their platforms. The opposition has already committed to increase the age to 16 years old and has made it an election commitment if they are successful at the next federal election. As such, with bipartisan support, the Prime Minister should be able to meet his timeline of passing the enabling legislation before the end of the year. More Bills before the House In a surprising move that caught many stakeholders off-guard, on Thursday the government introduced the Privacy and Other Legislation Amendment Act which seeks to enhance Australia’s privacy laws to ensure they are appropriate for today’s digital age. The Bill is the result of a four-year review into Australia’s privacy laws which was started under the Morrison Government following a series of high-profile data breaches including Optus and Medicare. The government said this is the first tranche of privacy reform and it will implement 23 of the 25 legislative proposals from the review that were agreed by the government. Some argue the Bill hasn’t gone far enough and is more of a light-touch approach than expected. Critics suggest the Bill focuses on rules for relatively narrow situations or groups, without changing the most important principles that tell government and businesses how to treat our personal information. And in another surprising move the Communications Minister reintroduced the Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill. This Bill gives the regulator extensive powers to police social media posts and communications deemed to be containing mis or dis information, and issue extensive fines to social media companies for hosting the content. As if Minister Rowland wasn’t busy enough with social media reform, gambling advertising and the media bargaining code, she has decided to make a second attempt to implement the controversial Bill that many stakeholders believed had been shelved by the government. The Minister first introduced the Bill earlier this year but after extensive backlash she was forced to reopen consultation. The revised Bill now before parliament is said to address many of the concerns raised, including updated definitions of misinformation and disinformation, new exemptions for religious content and provisions to ensure content produced by governments is captured by the legislation. Unlike the privacy reform, this Bill is yet to receive bipartisan support and given the Coalition’s opposition to the previous iteration of the legislation, I wouldn’t bet on this Bill passing in this term of parliament. Mining industry puts Albo on notice Representatives from Australia’s mining industry converged on Canberra this week for the annual Minerals Week, and it was hardly a friendly affair. Speaking at an event on Monday night, the Prime Minister enraged industry leaders by dismissing their concerns about his industrial relations policies and urging them to cooperate with the government or risk ‘falling behind’ other countries. As Albanese dug in, so too did mining industry leaders. Minerals Council chief executive Tania Constable told the PM the industry was doing the heavy lifting in an economy struggling with low productivity growth and that he should “undermine it at your peril”. The industry argues the government’s IR policies will “drag us back to the failed ways of the past”, while also criticising a stream of restrictive policy interventions. Labor has indeed poked the mining industry at its peril before, with former PM Kevin Rudd’s failed super profits tax playing a major role in his downfall in 2010. And with majority government riding on Albanese retaining a swag of seats he won in Western Australia in 2022, it could be an ill-fated choice this late in the parliamentary term. Queensland Parliament has risen for the final time before Queenslander’s head to the polls next month, with the official election campaign kicking off in just two weeks’ time. The LNP used question time this week to highlight the government’s failures on child safety, the DNA lab debacle, youth crime, health and housing. The government continued its attacks on opposition leader David Crisafulli, seeking to undermine and discredit the LNP leader as the election gets underway. The Premier told Parliament this week “the invisible man hopes to sneak into office”, calling out Crisafulli for his small-target election strategy. As is customary during the last sitting week, retiring MPs delivered their valedictory speeches, with four LNP MPs and five Labor MPs calling time on their parliamentary careers. Those include current Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath, Speaker and former Treasurer Curtis Pitt and former minister Stirling Hinchliffe on the government benches, as well as new LNP MP Darren Zanow, who is not recontesting the seat he won at a by-election just six months ago due to illness. A special shout out to outgoing Burleigh MP Michael Hart, a good friend of ours. Michael is a true statesman who has served his community with great passion and respect over the past 12 years. We wish him and all retiring MPs the very best in their post-political lives. And in news outside the bubble… The debate everyone is talking about Of course we watched the US Presidential debate because we are political tragics, however I am blown away by the number of normal Australians who also tuned in to see Trump and Harris battle it out. Sitting at Sydney airport on Thursday morning, I was surprised to hear several conversations about the debate and people expressing their thoughts and opinions. I even had several friends message me expressing their views – which I absolutely love! If only everyone was this engaged in domestic politics. In our weekly wrap-up we try to simply outline the stories of the week and usually keep our opinions and critiques to ourselves, however this week I am going to deviate from that path and give you my personal views on the debate. After Trump essentially wiped the floor with Biden in the last debate, which ultimately led to Biden “stepping aside”, I didn’t know what to expect going into this debate. Furthermore, Harris has been essentially MIA in the media with her only recent interview being the most sanitised and prompted interview I’ve seen from a presidential candidate. However, within the first five minutes Harris appeared the stronger candidate with the more presidential demeanour. Trump made outrageous statements like migrants ‘eating pets’ in Springfield, Ohio, rather than focusing on the declining state of the economy and Harris’ record on immigration, fracking and gun control. Trump did make some valuable points during the debate, but these were all overshadowed by his controversial or unhinged comments. It was clear from the outset that both were really talking to their base and strengthening their own voter base. Trump reinforced policies that the Right support, while Harris chased votes from the Left. Although Trump failed to land a blow on Harris, he certainly wasn’t helped by the moderators. During the debate they pressed Trump and fact checked his answers but didn’t give Harris the same treatment. In fact, the one tough question they asked Harris about her backflips, she failed to answer, and the moderators didn’t even bother to pull her up. The real test for Harris comes now, post-debate. She needs to capitalise on the momentum and capture the middle to win. My unsolicited advice to Trump: If you want to win, stop talking about yourself and living in the past. Focus on what you will do for the people and how you are going to unite America. |
