Contemporary politics,local and international current affairs, science, music and extracts from the Queensland Newspaper "THE WORKER" documenting the proud history of the Labour Movement.
MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
Any new coal and gas projects are incompatible with effective climate action. This egregious compromise has to stop now
‘The
fact that older Australians are bequeathing this deep ecological debt
to younger and future generations should trouble us all deeply.’
Rushing
my two-year-old son to hospital, I was overwhelmed with worry: there
was no escape from the toxic smoke, even where we lived in inner-city Sydney. It went on and on. As any parents would be, we were terrified about what the next few days would hold.
The
call came from his childcare centre. Our baby boy had been choking on
the air. For months we felt as though we had nowhere safe to go and no
way to adequately protect him.
Climate action is fighting back against big polluters. We don’t need to end Australia’s climate wars – we need to win them
Our
son was just one of more than 4,000 people who ended up in hospital due
to the smoke from bushfires that summer – almost 450 people died from
smoke inhalation and I’ll be forever grateful that he was not one of
them.
I was reminded of just how disempowered I
felt at that time when news of the latest state of the environment
report came last week.
The
report confirmed what we already knew from experience: climate change
is having a real impact on the environment and we are seeing the effects
now.
Extreme weather events including
bushfires are only getting more frequent and more intense – and the
health impacts of future bushfire smoke and heatwaves are among my
biggest concerns for my children.
The
environment we live in and that we are raising our children in is in
decline because we have neglected it for generations. That trend is set
to continue without substantial nature restoration and ambitious climate
action.
While my son was in the hospital it
was already clear that our youngest and most vulnerable were feeling the
impact of our negligence.
While
the natural world is in decline, the impact of extreme weather on all
of us will increase, and our food and water security are at risk.
So
I have again been thinking about what kind of environment we are trying
to raise happy, healthy and safe children in, as well as the world they
and their children will inherit. What does the future look like for
them?
Today’s world is already deteriorating before our eyes. But it’s not too late to turn this story around.
To
keep our children and wildlife safe into the future, we need a covenant
that acknowledges two key Australian values: that we love and value our
unique natural environment; and that older Australians hold a duty of
care for our young people.
Australians are so
proud of our environment. We take our international visitors to feed
kangaroos and see koalas, or we take our families on bucket-list trips
to the Great Barrier Reef and the red deserts of central Australia.
We are also united by our sense of fairness and a desire to protect children and our most vulnerable members of the community.
The federal court judge Justice Mordecai Bromberg described
the impacts of climate change as “the greatest intergenerational
injustice ever inflicted by one generation of humans upon the next”. He
said this during his (since-overturned) judgment in a class action
challenging the former environment minister Sussan Ley’s approval of a
coalmine expansion. The approval went ahead.
Will the new environment minister honour the duty of care one would expect of the role?
The
fact that older Australians are bequeathing this deep ecological debt
to younger and future generations should trouble us all deeply.
If
we truly hold those values close, we can have an impact. With better
education, attention, collaboration and advocacy from all sectors, we
can stop the endless destruction and hold our leaders to account.
We can introduce regulations that protect the air we breathe, the soil our farmers work, the water we drink.
But
most importantly we can call on our leaders to rule out approving any
new coal and gas projects – any new projects are incompatible with a
safe climate. This egregious compromise has to stop now.
Any
development project approvals must consider the comprehensive climate
impacts of all projects and activities that threaten our ecosystems, not
each project in isolation.
Australia is woefully unprepared for this climate reality of consecutive disasters
We
could follow the Welsh example of a law that ensures that listed
government bodies consider the quality of life of current and future
generations in their decisions. The Well-Being of Future Generations Act
acknowledges the duty of care that those in power have for young
people, and the stewardship we have for our environmental, social and
cultural heritage.
The solutions are available but we need bold and decisive action and support at all levels of government and across party lines.
The
story I tell my son, who is now four, about our natural environment is
simple: if we want to enjoy the beautiful nature that Australia has to
offer, we must be the ones to take care of it now.
If
our leaders in government and business share our Australian values of
fairness, pride in our natural environment and care for our children,
they will listen to that same story.
Nic Seton is the chief executive of Australian Parents for Climate Action
Heïdi was a teenager when she decided that she wanted to pursue a career as a glaciologist.(Supplied)
Being a glaciologist is like being an astronaut in a frozen world, Dr Heïdi Sevestre says.
The 34-year-old has been studying glaciers for about 10 years. In 2022, she was named the inaugural recipient of the Shackleton Medal for Protection of the Polar Regions for her work as a researcher, climate activist and expedition leader.
"There's something hypnotising, something absolutely mesmerising, about the icy environments," Dr Sevestre tells ABC RN's Late Night Live.
"This is probably one of the reasons why, as [a] scientist, [I] feel so strongly about protecting these environments."
'In love with these glaciers'
Dr Sevestre's unwavering passion for nature began when she was growing up in the French Alps.
"I
started hiking, climbing, mountaineering, and eventually I discovered
the high-altitude environments and I simply fell in love with these
glaciers," she says.
Dr Sevestre devotes her time to scientific research and science outreach.(Supplied: Silje Smith Johnsen)
At the age of 17, a mountain guidesuggested
she might be interested in pursuing a career in glaciology. Since then,
she studied physical geography, geology, and glaciology, and has been
on numerous expeditions in the polar regions.
Sometimes
she has carried out these expeditions in the harshest conditions,
trekking in 140 kilometres per hour winds and in temperatures dipping
below minus 15 degrees Celsius.
"Last
year, I got the chance to do probably one of the most challenging
expeditions of my life with some of my brightest and brilliant female
colleagues," she says.
In 2021, a small team
called the Climate Sentinels took part in a month-long expedition to
gain a better understanding of the drivers of Arctic change.
It
meant travelling 450 kilometres on skis across the Norwegian
archipelago of Svalbard, in the Arctic Ocean, to collect ice and snow
samples.
Collecting ice and snow samples in the Arctic.(Supplied)
The small archipelago of Svalbard sits between Northern Norway and the North Pole.
It holds a very dear place in Dr Sevestre's heart.
"[The
archipelago is] covered 60 per cent by glaciers, so it's truly paradise
for a glaciologist like me. But it's also a place where you feel the
true power of nature," she says.
Indeed, the team faced such bad weather on their 2021 expedition that they had to bury themselves in snow to protect themselvesand avoid losing their tents.
"We
got to experience some of the most terrifying conditions I've ever seen
on the archipelago. And bear in mind that I've been travelling to
Svalbard since 2008," she says.
"We got hit by a series of scary and dramatic storms, which are the expression of climate change."
Svalbard is also home to about 3,000 polar bears and on that trip, the team had to escape one.
But
while this work has its perils, it's a risk Dr Sevestre is willing to
take to raise awareness of the impact climate change is having on
glaciers and the implications this has on rising sea levels.
"What's
super important about the surging glaciers is that they are game
changers when it comes to predicting future sea level rise. This is a
big part of our work right now," she says.
'Surging glaciers are so erratic'
Dr Sevestre belongs to an organisation called Glaciers on the Move, which tracks the speed of surging glaciers.
She says results can sometimes be surprising.
"When
you look at glaciers around the world, you might think that they are
pretty static, that these glaciers don't do much apart from melting,"
she says.
However, the results for Svalbard have shown that these types of glaciers can change their behaviour.
Ahead of the expedition, Dr Sevestre and her team prepared themselves for avalanches.(Supplied)
"For most of their lives they are lazy, they don't do very much, they move extremely slowly," she says.
"And suddenly, for reasons that we still struggle to understand, they can move extremely rapidly."
According
to Dr Sevestre, the organisation has recorded glaciers moving over as
much as 10 to 50 meters per day, over several years.
"These
surging glaciers are so erratic, so chaotic, that they can suddenly,
over the space of a few months, bring huge amounts of ice into the
oceans and completely change our projections of future sea level," she
says.
"A moving glacier is pretty much like a bulldozer that is unstoppable. It will destroy anything that is in its way."
She
says that they now know that these ice masses are being greatly
affected by the increasing global temperatures linked to the burning of
fossil fuels.
Dogs often accompany Dr Sevestre and the other scientists on their expeditions. (Supplied: Nina Adjanin )
There's another significant effect too.
"Every
time we burn fossil fuels — whether it's wood, coal, gas, natural gas
or oil — we emit fine particles and among those fine particles, you get
this black carbon," she says.
These fine particles of black carbon can travel thousands of kilometres.
"For
example, every time there are wildfires in California, the soot [or]
the black carbon can travel as far as Greenland," she says.
"Today,
we see that the Arctic is melting faster, not only because global
temperatures are increasing, but also because we have more and more air
pollution, more and more of this black carbon being deposited on snow
and ice."
Glaciers are important water resources, she says. As temperatures rise, they are melting which affects sea levels.(Supplied: Frederic de La Mure)
She says about 40 per cent of the melting of the Arctic today can be attributed to deposits of black carbon.
There's still time to stop it from getting worse, she adds, but only if we start taking action immediately.
"I have to stay optimistic. This is my duty," she says.
"If
us the scientists, if the people who are so passionate about the polar
regions give up, why should people care about those regions? Why should
people act?"
An audit found $104 million more in grant funding went to projects in Nationals-held seats.(ABC News: Matt Roberts)
The
former federal government has been roundly criticised over its handling
of another billion-dollar taxpayer fund, with the auditor-general
finding it funnelled an extra $100 million to Nationals electorates
against the advice of the Infrastructure Department.
Key points:
Labor says the Coalition used the Building Better Regions Fund as a vehicle for pork barrelling
The ANAO said departmental advice on the worthiness of grant projects was ignored
Catherine King said the former government "dudded hardworking regional Australians"
The
Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has investigated the management
of the $1.38 billion Building Better Regions Fund (BBRF), which has, so
far, spent $1.15 billion on almost 1,300 projects across the country.
Labor
had accused the Coalition, and particularly the Nationals, of using the
fund as a vehicle for pork barrelling, citing a pattern of behaviour
with other funds, including the so-called "sports rorts" saga.
While
noting there were guidelines about how grants should be assessed and
funding awarded as part of the BBRF, the ANAO said departmental advice
on projects most worthy of support was routinely ignored by ministers.
"The
decisions about the award of grant funding across each of the five
funding rounds were not appropriately informed by departmental advice,"
the report said.
"As the program has
progressed through the first five rounds, there has been an increasing
disconnect between the assessment results against the published merit
criteria and the applications approved for funding under the
infrastructure projects stream (which comprised the majority of approved
projects and funding).
"This reflects the extent
to which the ministerial panel has increasingly relied upon the 'other
factors' outlined in the published program guidelines when making
funding decisions."
The ANAO found Nationals-held electorates were the big winners as a result.
"Specifically,
applications located in electorates held by The Nationals were awarded
$104 million (or 29 per cent) more grant funding than would have been
the case had funding been awarded to those applications assessed as the
most meritorious in each round," the report said.
"Applications
located in electorates held by all other political parties were awarded
less grant funding than would have been the case had funding been
awarded based on the results of the merit assessment process.
"The
most significant reductions were to electorates held by the Liberal
Party ($73.5 million less grant funding awarded) and the Australian
Labor Party ($26.1 million less grant funding awarded)."
Nationals
members chaired the ministerial panel through four of the five funding
rounds, with Fiona Nash, Michael McCormack and Barnaby Joyce holding the
position at various stages.
'Choose-your-own-adventure criteria'
The ANAO found that 179 funding decisions were also not properly documented.
There were 164 times where the ministerial panel decided not to approve applications recommended by the department.
Meanwhile, 65 per cent of infrastructure projects awarded cash were not considered most meritorious.
Catherine King says the former government dudded regional Australians. (ABC: Q&A)
"[ANAO's
report] confirms what we already suspected: that the former government
actively ignored grant guidelines and, in the process, dudded
hardworking regional Australians," new Infrastructure Minister Catherine
King said in a statement.
"Former
Coalition ministers made decisions on the basis of
'choose-your-own-adventure' criteria that weren't fully explained to
those applying for grants.
"They did not keep proper records of decisions."
The
ANAO has lashed the Coalition for its management of other grants
programs in the past, including the colour-coded spreadsheets used as
part of the "sports rorts" saga presided over by then-minister Bridget
McKenzie.
Former
minister Michael McCormack responded to the auditor-general's report on
the BBRF, telling the auditor-general "all grants were allocated within
the Ministerial and Programme guidelines at the time".
City-regional divide blamed for ANAO finding
His former Nationals colleague, Fiona Nash, provided a more-detailed response to the ANAO.
"While
the departmental processes for assessing and scoring applications are,
in my view, sound, it must be recognised that the departmental
decision-makers in that process are located in the cities," she said.
Fiona Nash says decision-makers in cities were disconnected from regional communities. (ABC Goulburn Murray: Laura Thomas)
"They
do not have the benefit of an on-the-ground understanding of the
regional communities, and their circumstances, where projects are
proposed to be located, and the potential impact and benefit of those
projects.
"One of the intentions of the Ministerial
Panel was to bring local community knowledge to the decision-making
process regarding the most appropriate and worthy projects and, on that
basis, strengthen the robustness of funding decisions."
The
ANAO was more critical of decisions made in later funding rounds for
the BBRF than when Ms Nash was chair of the ministerial panel.
What
is the difference between the house and the Senate? Who is the Speaker
of the House? What are backbenchers? Here’s our guide to the key terms
and processes.
The
Senate has red seats and carpet, with 76 senators that represent states
and territories. The House of Representatives has green seats and
carpet, with 151 members that each represent an electorate.
Thu 28 Jul 2022 03.30 AESTLast modified on Thu 28 Jul 2022 03.32 AESTAustralia’s
47th parliament has officially begun. As the nation’s politicians get
down to business, here are some key terms and processes explained.
What happens during a parliamentary sitting?
A
parliamentary sitting is when the whole parliament – the government,
opposition, minor parties and independents – come together to debate and
pass laws. Parliament sits for about 20 weeks a year.
Sitting days are bound by rules set out in what are known as “standing orders”.
The
day starts with government business, which is when planned issues or
proposed laws are presented and debated. Members then give statements to
parliament until 2pm, when question time starts. Question time is the
liveliest part of the day, when parliamentarians take questions from
their opposing members, but also from their own party (this is called a
“Dorothy Dixer”, see below).
After QT is the
presentation of documents. Then comes the matters of public importance: a
discussion on one issue, usually brought up by the opposition,
criticising how the government is doing something.
After that are prepared statements from any ministers who want to speak, and finally the day ends on more government business.
The black rod at Parliament House in Canberra. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian
What is the difference between the House and Senate?
The Australian parliament is split into two houses: the Senate and the House of Representatives.
The
Senate has red seats and carpet, with 76 senators that represent states
and territories. The House of Representatives has green seats and
carpet, with 151 members that each represent an electorate.
Bills
(AKA legislation) usually originate in the House of Representatives. To
become law, they have to pass a vote in both the house and the Senate.
What does it mean when standing orders are ‘suspended’?
It
is not unusual for the house or Senate to suspend a standing order – ie
to press pause on one of those rules governing how they operate. This
is so they can do something that would otherwise not be allowed: for
example, introduce a proposed law that has not been scheduled for
debate, or discuss new business after a sitting day has ended.
More than half (an absolute majority) of the house or Senate needs to vote in favour of a motion to suspend.
Is there a code of conduct for parliamentarians?
There
is, and it covers things like using “objectionable words” or
disregarding the authority of the speaker. A “disorderly” member can be
told to leave the debate for an hour by the Speaker.
This mostly happens during question time, which is the shoutiest part of the sitting day.
How long can an MP absent themselves from parliamentary sittings?
There is no limit to the amount of leave an MP can take.
There
has only ever been one federal MP booted from the parliament for taking
leave – John Ferguson, who wanted to separate central Queensland from
Brisbane, and was mostly against the White Australia policy (of 1901) as
well as bills which sought to deport Pacific labourers. He was also
very ill and only attended 128 days of the 222 days parliament sat and
then was on leave without absence for two months. And that is what got
him kicked out – he triggered a constitutional amendment. That was in
1903 and was the first and only time it has happened.
Why are prayers read before parliament, in a secular nation?
Good
question! Each sitting of the parliament has begun with a prayer in
both chambers since federation in 1901, and it is mostly because of
tradition – the UK and other common law parliaments, like Canada, also
begin parliamentary sittings with this tradition.
In
Australia, the prayers are part of the standing orders, so in order to
be changed, there would have to be an amendment to the standing orders.
Attempts to do this in the past (and replace prayers with a moment of
prayer or reflection) have failed. In 2010, the standing orders were
changed to add an acknowledgment of country before the reading of
prayers.
Who is the Speaker of the House?
The
speaker acts like a chairperson – running the House of Representatives
debate and making sure standing orders are obeyed. They don’t usually
contribute to debates, and they don’t vote unless there is a tie.
Over in the senate, that role is played by the president.
The
speaker is chosen in a secret vote after the official opening of
parliament. You may have seen the speaker “dragged” to the chair after
they are appointed to the position. Not in the “drag them” sense, but
the successful nominee does pretend to be quite reluctant about taking
up the role.
The
custom had its origin in the genuine reluctance with which early
Speakers accepted the office, for the role of spokesman for an emerging
body of legislators bent on opposing the royal will was a dangerous
occupation.
What are backbenchers?
Our
parliament has both frontbenchers and backbenchers. If you imagine the
layout of the House of Representatives, the front row of seats facing
the speaker are where the ministers (frontbenchers) sit, and the
backbenchers sit behind them.
Backbenchers are
members of parliament who are not ministers or shadow ministers. They
represent and advocate for their electorates and debate and vote on
proposed laws.
Without their votes, governments can’t pass legislation in the house. In the Liberal party,
where MPs can vote against legislation without ramifications, this
theoretically gives them a lot of power. For Labor, voting against a
caucus decision means expulsion from party, so it is a little more
tricky for them.
What are committees?
Parliament
can appoint a group of up to 10 members of parliament to investigate
specific issues or proposed laws. This is a select parliamentary
committee.
The committee invites submissions on
the issue from experts, interest groups and the community. They also
hold public hearings where they can hear directly from these groups.
Their findings are reported back to the house.
The parliament considers the committee’s findings, but it doesn’t mean it will adopt them.
What on earth does ‘I move that the member be no longer heard’ mean?
In
the House of Reps, a member of parliament can propose that the member
speaking “be no longer heard”. If the house votes in a majority to move
the proposed motion, the member speaking must immediately stop talking
and sit back down. There is no procedure like this in the Senate.
In
the previous parliament, the former government would “move the member
no longer be heard” almost every time there was a motion to suspend
standing orders, which Labor argued was shutting down debate. It will be
interesting to see how Labor handles these interruptions to the
schedule.
What is question time?
Each
parliamentary day includes a dedicated “question time”, when all the
members are present in the chamber and, usually, the most topical,
challenging and controversial conversations are had.
Question
time is usually held for an hour, but it is at the prime minister’s
pleasure, meaning it is the PM who calls time on it. That can be abused
when it suits the government. Malcolm Turnbull once allowed question
time to keep going and going as his government tried to run down the
clock on a medevac bill vote it didn’t want held. Scott Morrison would
cut QT short when there was an issue he didn’t like being prosecuted by
the Labor shadow ministers.
What does it mean when a question is ‘put on notice’?
Sometimes
a minister is asked a question that they cannot or do not want to
answer. The question is then “taken on notice”, and will be responded to
later in writing.
The answer, once prepared, is always available on the parliament’s public record.
Is that different from ‘questions on notice’?
Yes!
There is a difference between a question being “put on notice” and
“questions on notice”. Questions on notice are written questions to a
minister from a member of parliament, usually asking for detailed
information. The answers are also published.
Why is everyone talking about Dorothy Dixers?
A
Dorothy Dixer is a question planted by a government minister and asked
by a backbencher of their own political party during question time. The
dixer tactic has a few goals: to give free publicity to the government,
to help the minister speaking look good, to make the opposition look
bad, to raise the profile of the backbencher asking the question, or to
waste the available question time to avoid harder questions.
The term Dorothy Dixer has been used in Australian politics since the 1950s.
So … who is Dorothy Dix?
She
was an American advice columnist who was known to make up and submit
her own questions so she was able to publish more interesting answers in
her columns.
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What are green papers?
A
green paper is a government document that goes through details of
specific issues, and outlines potential policy and legislation changes
for those issues (for example, a green paper about the issue of an
ageing population and the potential for a new aged care system).
A
green paper doesn’t actually commit to any action or change. Instead,
it is to prompt discussion, and acts like a first step towards changing
the law.
What about the white ones?
After
a green paper is published, the government consults the public for
their thoughts and feedback. From those discussions, a white paper is
born.
White papers are documents with actual
legislative intention, proposing change to policy or law. They are
sometimes debated before a bill is produced.
What is a bill?
A bill is basically a proposal for a new law, or a change to an existing law.
A
bill is first introduced into either the House of Representatives or
Senate, and has to be passed by a majority vote in both chambers.
If
successful, it is signed by the governor general – this is the royal
assent, and is the last step before the bill becomes law. Then the bill
is known as an Act of Parliament, which will give a date that the new
law will begin.
Sounds simple enough, but it can take years for a bill to pass through parliament.
What is a maiden speech?
The first speech given by a newly elected member of parliament is sometimes referred to as a maiden speech.
There
is a tradition that a first speech is heard without interruption.
However, that tradition has been broken before. For example, Pauline
Hanson was interrupted when she said “I believe we are in danger of
being swamped by Asians” – among other things – in her 1996 maiden
speech.
Technically, Australia’s parliament
doesn’t really use the term “maiden speech” any more. (On the
parliamentary website they are just called “first” speeches.) But
colloquially, the term is still used.
What is a conscience vote?
A conscience vote allows members of parliament to vote according to their personal beliefs rather than along party lines.
These votes are usually used for social issues like abortion and euthanasia.
What is that ominous Black Rod?
You
might have seen a rod made of ebony with a silver crown that is carried
around in the Senate. It is a ceremonial object carried by the Usher of
the Black Rod while doing things like escorting the President of the
Senate into and out of the Senate and delivering messages or bills to
the House of Representatives.
The Usher of the
Black Rod is a tradition that dates back to the 1500s in Britain. They
served the British House of Lords, and were an officer of a British
order of Knighthood called the Most Noble Order of the Garter. If
someone offended the order, the Black Rod itself was used to discipline
them! (Thankfully, that tradition is long gone.)
Why is the Liberal party called the Liberal party?
The
word “liberal” is commonly understood to mean progressive, so it’s
confusing that Australia’s major conservative party uses the name.
The
word actually comes from the Latin word “liber”, which means free. In
Australia, our Liberal party is more aligned with economic liberalism,
or freedom for business.
The
Australian Liberal party developed out of conservative parties that
formed in the early 20th century to oppose the growing strength of trade
unions and the Labor party.
Here is what Robert Menzies, the father of the Liberal party, had to say about it:…
what we must look for, and it is a matter of desperate importance to
our society, is a true revival of liberal thought which will work for
social justice and security, for national power and national progress,
and for the full development of the individual citizen, though not
through the dull and deadening process of socialism.
And a fun fact about picfacs
Short for picture facility, picfacis an Australian phrase (at least according to the Oxford Dictionary)
for a photo opportunity and has been in use since the 1990s. Of course,
politicians have been pretending to hold conversations for the cameras
for much longer than tha
It
was standing room only for the hour of glower which witnessed outrage
from the new opposition and a solid start from the government.
Prime minister Anthony Albanese and opposition leader Peter Dutton go at it during their first question time.
He
collided early with the iron-clad law that politics is a numbers game.
Labor had resolved to change the standing orders to give more questions
to the crossbench and less to the opposition. That tweak reflected the
brutal representational mathematics of the May election, the conscious
uncoupling of the Liberal party and its progressive heartland.
Augmenting
Fletcher’s outrage at the shrinking number of questions was umbrage at
the evils of a new government truncating debate. “Indeed, [with] this
standing order, Mr Speaker, we will be right up there with the Russian
Duma as a toothless legislative body,” Fletcher said. It was a
rhetorical flourish which possibly sounded more plausible during
rehearsal than it sounded on the floor of the House of Representatives.
Fletcher’s
performative effrontery about the standing orders was the warmup to the
first question time of the 47th parliament. It was standing room only
for the hour of glower in the House of Representatives at 2pm.
Anthony
Albanese’s partner, Jodie, and son, Nathan, sat ringside. The
Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, hovered above the chamber in
the visitors gallery like visiting minor royalty.
On the day Australia recorded the fastest annual rate of growth in consumer prices
for more than 20 years, one might have expected the opposition to test
the prime minister’s mettle on inflation, that being the water cooler
issue.
But no. It was too soon.
Given
the Coalition was in power for the nine years leading up to 21 May,
Wednesday’s inflation was, more than plausibly, the Coalition’s
inflation. Peter Dutton,
it seemed, did not want to chance his arm on Albanese’s responsibility
for the soaring price of lettuce, given the tables would not only be
turned, they’d be loaded into a slingshot and propelled across the
chamber.
The new shadow treasurer, Angus
Taylor, however, is a confident soul and he did chance his arm with
energy prices. Would Albanese stand by the claims in his pre-election
modelling that power prices would come down as a consequence of the
government’s climate and energy policies?
Safer for Dutton was some base-pleasing obscurantism. Perhaps a gentle hat tip to the remaining members of the HR Nicholls Society.
Australia’s
alternative prime minister dived under the inconvenient tsunami of the
Coalition’s record by sharing dark prophesies of a construction union
that would now run rampant across the land because the new Labor regime
had gutted the Australian Building and Construction Commission.
Solid,
three-star Howard-era stuff. Albanese rewarded this predictability by
smiling benignly across the dispatch box and schooling the Liberal
leader about the trying vocation of opposition. “I wish him well,” the
prime minister said, pausing for a beat, “and I hope he stays there for a
very long time”.
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As
the various mini-reckonings and micro-dramas played out, the chamber
was quieter than usual. Perhaps the government held its collective
breath until Albanese demonstrated he’d done his homework, and therefore
wasn’t going to wing it. Early forays signalled he was across the
detail; even armed with pre-packaged zingers. New ministers experimented
with their scripts, finding their métier. The new elevations clutched
their question time brief folders like flotation devices.
The
new Speaker, Milton Dick, made it clear he was no Tony Smith – although
perhaps even Tony Smith wasn’t Tony Smith on day one. Perhaps Smith’s
audacity as an independent chamber arbiter grew in increments over time.
The
key moment of the first question time came when the home affairs
minister, Claire O’Neil, should have been shut down by the Speaker, but
wasn’t.
O’Neil accused Karen Andrews of an “act of cowardice” on election day when Australian Border Force was pressured to draft and issue a statement about an asylum seeker boat interception before the operation had even finished.
Cowardice
was a clear reflection on Andrews. The standing orders deem such
reflections disorderly. Fletcher doubled down on his performative high
dudgeon. Umbrage ensued. Smith would have required O’Neil to withdraw.
But the new Speaker was unperturbed.
O’Neil,
who lacks the chamber experience of some of her peers, could have lost
concentration in the melee. But she did what she’d been cast to do:
close the first question time of the new parliament with a forceful
j’accuse.
“We should not become immune to
these things in our democracy,” she thundered at Andrews, Dutton, and
the artists formerly known as the Morrison government. “This was a
disgraceful, unprecedented act that should never have happened, and
those opposite stand condemned doing it.”
Albanese would have considered Wednesday a solid start.
But this prime minister has been around long enough to know that what goes around eventually comes around.
Parliament
checks the overwhelming advantage of incumbency. It’s the only thing
that does. The institution and its rituals affords the combatants the
closest thing that exists to equal billing – a structural levelling that
Morrison never fully grasped, fixated as he was on the faux distancing that he imagined would keep him in power.
As
time passes, the price of lettuce will become Albanese’s
responsibility. Dutton knows that, and so does Australia’s 31st prime
minister.
