‘Most severe test for social cohesion’ since federation, shadow defence minister says
Shadow minister for defence Andrew Hastie says Australia is facing its “most severe test for social cohesion” in 123 years, since federation.
Responding to the two stabbing attacks across Sydney in recent days on ABC RN, Hastie argued that the prime minister, Anthony Albanese’s, leadership is “so important” amid this “test” for social cohesion.
We are under immense pressure. People are scared, and particularly in Sydney where I grew up … We have many different people from all parts of the world and it’s very diverse too. There’s Christians, Muslims, Jews and other religions in between, and we need to be able to live together.
And so this is why Anthony Albanese’s leadership is so important and I think he can be stronger in articulating the values that we all share, and insisting that we all adhere to them, and that there is no place for religious extremism in this country.
Host Patricia Karvelas asked how much stronger Albanese can be, because “didn’t he just say that yesterday”?
Hastie said Albanese needs to “send a few signals that he’s serious about national security” and called on him to restore the director generals of Asis and Asio to his national security committee of cabinet:
I think that the current threat levels that they are, with the strategic disorder that we’re seeing in the Middle East – and also in this region – it’s really, really important that those two individuals have a seat at the table and are advising the national security committee of cabinet regularly.
Key events
Tanya Plibersek encourages people to switch off social media during this time
Environment minister Tanya Plibersek has reflected on the “shocking” events in Sydney throughout the past few days and says locals are reeling, with many personally impacted.
Speaking on ABC News Breakfast earlier, she said:
Many of us know one of the victims or [know someone who was] there at the [Bondi Junction] shopping centre… This is really reverberating throughout our community. Our focus is on the victims, their families, their friends, those who have been impacted.
And when it comes to the attack in the church, I mean, obviously [it’s] a place of worship, you think that people would be safe. There’s a lot of concern. It’s an important time for community leaders I think to provide as much reassurance as we can and to remind people that we have a strong and cohesive community.
Plibersek also called on the community to switch off from social media if they are able:
I really don’t think that the social media companies are doing as much as they ought to be, to support the police in their efforts to keep calm in the community. We know there are people deliberately trying to stoke division on social media, deliberately lying to create that social division. Switch it off, if you can. Switch it off.
‘No point pretending everything is as normal’, says NSW premier
The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, says Australia’s largest city is in a combustible and abnormal situation and there’s no point pretending otherwise.
Speaking to Sunrise after the two stabbing attacks in Sydney, he said:
I can understand people’s concern and anxiety in what has been an incredibly difficult week in Sydney. It is a combustible situation, there’s no point in pretending that everything is as normal.
Minns said police now had enhanced patrols, “particularly in western Sydney, particularly around religious institutions, for the rest of the week and the weekend”.
The public has been urged to come together and act reasonably. Minns said:
Take the heed from the civic and religious leaders of this state who are calling for calm and an absolute repudiation of all kinds of violence.
– from AAP
Hastie wants ‘clear’ national defence strategy from government
As we flagged earlier, defence minister Richard Marles is due to speak at the National Press Club today and unveil the national defence strategy.
Shadow defence minister Andrew Hastie said he wants a “clear strategy” after last year’s defence strategic review, which he labelled a “deferral of decision making”.
There was no strategy in it and there are also cuts and cannibalisation to capability. So today, in clear plain English – which is not Richard’s strengths when it comes to strategy – he needs to articulate the threats we’re facing, he needs to articulate how we’re going to defeat them and how we’re going to build a defence force that will keep Australia safe over the next decade and beyond.
Asked how much more the government should be committing to defence, Hastie said clear strategy comes first and would dictate spending. He also said he is “concerned” about potential defence cuts.
We know inflation is eating into families, budgets around the kitchen table. It’s also eating into defence’s budget too. And what we’ve seen over the last two years is Aukus – which was supported on a bipartisan basis – and so we’re seeing increased defence expenditure required and this government has yet to commit to it.
‘Most severe test for social cohesion’ since federation, shadow defence minister says
Shadow minister for defence Andrew Hastie says Australia is facing its “most severe test for social cohesion” in 123 years, since federation.
Responding to the two stabbing attacks across Sydney in recent days on ABC RN, Hastie argued that the prime minister, Anthony Albanese’s, leadership is “so important” amid this “test” for social cohesion.
We are under immense pressure. People are scared, and particularly in Sydney where I grew up … We have many different people from all parts of the world and it’s very diverse too. There’s Christians, Muslims, Jews and other religions in between, and we need to be able to live together.
And so this is why Anthony Albanese’s leadership is so important and I think he can be stronger in articulating the values that we all share, and insisting that we all adhere to them, and that there is no place for religious extremism in this country.
Host Patricia Karvelas asked how much stronger Albanese can be, because “didn’t he just say that yesterday”?
Hastie said Albanese needs to “send a few signals that he’s serious about national security” and called on him to restore the director generals of Asis and Asio to his national security committee of cabinet:
I think that the current threat levels that they are, with the strategic disorder that we’re seeing in the Middle East – and also in this region – it’s really, really important that those two individuals have a seat at the table and are advising the national security committee of cabinet regularly.
Chalmers accuses Greens of ‘confected outrage’ during supermarkets inquiry
The treasurer was also asked about the ongoing supermarkets inquiry, which yesterday threatened to hold Woolworths CEO Brad Banducci in contempt during a fiery hearing.
Being found in contempt carries a penalty of up to six months’ imprisonment. Nick McKim, who chairs the Senate committee, said Banducci was engaging in spin, “cherrypicking” facts and “bullshitting the committee”.
You can read all the background on this below:
Responding to this on ABC RN, Jim Chalmers said Banducci would be providing some information on notice and said “the Senate hasn’t jailed anyone before and I don’t think they’re about to”.
He accused McKim and the Greens of displaying “confected outrage”.
There is a real issue here about people’s concerns about the prices they pay at the checkout. We share those concerns. The difference between the way that the Greens go about this and the way that the Labor government goes about this is [McKim] does what he does for the cameras, and we do what we do for the consumers …
We think the best way to get at these real issues, which are genuinely felt as people are under pressure around the country, is to do it in a methodical and considered way and to get real change and take real action. And I think that’s a contrast with the kind of confected outrage we saw from senator McKim.
Unemployment ‘might take up a little bit’ when new numbers released later this week
Q: Given the economic conditions we’re seeing, what should households with mortgages expect?
Treasurer Jim Chalmers did not answer directly regarding any potential rate rises, but said inflation has “come off pretty substantially”, unemployment was down in the most recent data, and real wages are growing.
[Inflation] won’t necessarily continue to come off in a perfectly straight line, but [it] is a fraction of what it was a couple of years ago when we came to office. That’s a good thing.
He flagged unemployment “might take up a little bit on Thursday when we get new numbers on the jobs market”.
So we’ve got a whole bunch of things going for us in Australia, but enough to concern us as well about the global conditions about the way that people are still under considerable cost of living pressure.
Treasurer flags ‘real premium on responsibility’ in upcoming budget
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, is on his way to the United States for G20 talks, and has been speaking with ABC RN about the state of the global economy – and what this means for the government’s third budget.
He said there was a “tricky balance of risks” in the global economy currently, and in Australia’s, with inflation still causing impacts and growth slowing.
The way that I would describe it to your listeners is we’ve got inflation lingering in parts of the world, we’ve got growth slowing in China and elsewhere, we’ve got tensions rising in the Middle East and the war in Europe. We’ve got supply chains which are straining and we’ve got a global economy which is fragmenting and transforming and so all of these factors are really important to us as we finalise the government’s third budget.
These are going to be these global conditions are going to be a really big influence on our budget, so the trip to DC which will be a pretty quick and make the most of it but it’s a good opportunity to take the temperature of the global economy.
Because in the budget, what you’ll see is a real premium on responsibility and these conditions, but also a real emphasis on economic security.
Motorcyclist seriously injured in crash in Sydney CBD
An intersection in Sydney’s CBD is expected to remain a crime scene for some time today after a serious crash took place early this morning.
Around 4am, emergency services responded to reports of a crash between a utility and a motorcycle at the intersection of King Street and York Street.
Paramedics treated the motorcycle rider at the scene who was taken to St Vincent’s hospital in a critical condition. The driver of the utility, a 36-year-old man, was uninjured and taken to the same hospital for mandatory testing.
Officers have established a crime scene and the intersection is expected to remain a crime scene for a “considerable amount of time”. Motorists are urged to avoid the area.
According to Live Traffic the road was closed in an eastbound direction, however it seems to have returned to normal just after 7am.
Marles to address National Press Club and unveil national defence strategy
Defence minister Richard Marles is expected today to unveil cuts to programs in a bid to fund crucial areas under a shake-up of the Australian military, AAP reports.
In an address to the National Press Club in Canberra today, Marles will release a new national defence strategy.
The government released the defence strategic review in April last year, which found the Australian Defence Force was no longer fit for purpose.
It’s expected new missiles and drones will be prioritised under the recalibration.
Opposition defence spokesman Andrew Hastie said for the defence minister to pass the test of leadership, the new plans “must be more than just vague language, vague promises and vague time frames”.
Writing ahead of the announcement, Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, said the government should prioritise the “rapid deployment” of an integrated air and missile defence system for the ADF to protect critical northern base infrastructure.
Paul Karp
Human Rights Law Centre to argue a person’s reason for refusing to consent to removal must be considered in whether detention is lawful
Continued from last post:
ASF17’s case before the high court is that there is no “general exception” to the rule that where deportation is not possible immigration detention is unlawful simply because of the “noncooperation” by an alien.
ASF17’s lawyers submitted:
It would only emphasise the punitive—and thus constitutionally invalid—nature of the executive detention if parliament were to purport to extend it in respect of a ‘non-cooperative’ person for the purpose of detaining them until and unless they cooperated with their removal, in circumstances where the constitutional limitation would otherwise be reached (with the result that cooperation may be forthcoming only under the threat of further, and possibly indefinite, deprivation of liberty).
ASF17’s case is supported by an intervention from AZC20, another Iranian asylum seeker, who is represented by the Human Rights Law Centre (HRLC) and barrister Craig Lenehan SC, who won the original NZYQ case in November.
The HRLC will argue:
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Indefinite detention is unlawful under any circumstances
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A person’s reasons for refusing to consent to their removal must be considered in determining whether their detention is lawful
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Detention is not lawful when the primary barrier to the removal of people is another country’s refusal to accept the forced return of its citizens.
Sanmati Verma, legal director at HRLC, said:
Other countries around the world have recognised there must be limits on detention in all circumstances. Yet our government is still trying to use indefinite detention to coerce people into returning to danger. Instead of trying to find legal workarounds to keep people locked up, the Australian government should support people to rebuild their lives in freedom and safety.
High court to hear appeal on uncooperative immigration detainees
Paul Karp
The high court is today hearing the case of ASF17, an appeal that could extend the NZYQ ruling that indefinite detention is unlawful. At stake is whether people in immigration detention must be released if their refusal to cooperate has prevented them being deported.
ASF17 is an Iranian man who has said he “fears for his life if he is removed to Iran” because he is bisexual, Christian, a Faili Kurd and because he had opposed “the mistreatment of women by the government in Iran”.
In January Justice Craig Colvin ruled ASF17’s detention was lawful. He said:
Where ongoing detention is to arrange removal from Australia as soon as practicable, that lawful purpose is served for so long as there is a practicable way that the person may be removed, even if it requires cooperation from the detainee for it to be achieved.
When ASF17 appealed, the Albanese government applied to send the case to the high court to settle the legal uncertainty. It will argue for the right to continue detaining those who refuse to cooperate.
In March Guardian Australia revealed a leaked internal estimate that more than 170 could be freed if the commonwealth loses the case, although the government is confident it will win the case.
In its submissions the commonwealth highlighted the primary judge’s findings that “the appellant’s refusal to undertake voluntary actions to assist in his return to Iran was not because of a genuine subjective fear of harm if returned there”.
It said:
The primary judge was correct to conclude that it is necessary to take into account the ability or capacity of a non-citizen to cooperate in achieving their removal, irrespective of any demonstrated unwillingness to cooperate, and irrespective of any subjective reasons for refusing to cooperate …
The fact that it is within the power of such a non-citizen actually to bring their detention to an end by cooperating with their removal answers the [question] … A non-citizen in that position is in ‘three-walled detention’ only.
Albanese to announce $400m loans for industry projects
Josh Butler
The federal government will offer $400m in loans to an alumina facility in Queensland and fast-track support to a graphite project in South Australia, as part of its Future Made In Australia industry program.
Prime minister Anthony Albanese will make the announcement in Gladstone in Queensland today. Alpha HPA will deliver “Australia’s first high-purity alumina processing facility”, the PM’s office said, a mineral which is needed for LED lighting, batteries and semiconductors.
The Gladstone project will support around 200 jobs on an ongoing basis, and nearly 500 in construction.
The money will go out under the government’s $4 billion Critical Minerals Facility, one of the programs which will be rolled under the Future Made In Australia push.
The government is also announcing plans to help “fast track” a graphite project from Renascour Resources on the Eyre Peninsula. A $185 million loan for stage one of that development has been “conditionally approved” by the Labor government – it follows a restructuring of the company’s plans to develop that site, which were originally approved in February 2022 under the former Coalition government.
That project will support 150 construction jobs and 125 positions ongoing. Albanese said:
The global race for new jobs and new opportunities is on. Our Government wants Australia to be in it to win it.
These two critical minerals projects will help secure good and secure jobs in manufacturing, and clean, reliable energy.
However the assurances were immediately challenged by Assange’s team.
Assange’s wife Stella, whom he married while in prison in London, said the guarantees did not satisfy their concerns, describing them as “blatant weasel words”:
The United States has issued a non-assurance in relation to the First Amendment, and a standard assurance in relation to the death penalty. It makes no undertaking to withdraw the prosecution’s previous assertion that Julian has no First Amendment rights because he is not a U.S citizen. Instead, the US has limited itself to blatant weasel words claiming that Julian can “seek to raise” the First Amendment if extradited.
The diplomatic note does nothing to relieve our family’s extreme distress about his future – his grim expectation of spending the rest of his life in isolation in US prison for publishing award-winning journalism. The Biden Administration must drop this dangerous prosecution before it is too late.
– AAP
Assange ‘would not face death penalty’ in US
The United States government has provided assurances requested by the high court in London which could finally pave the way for WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange to be extradited from the United Kingdom, AAP reports.
Last month, the High Court ruled that, without certain US guarantees, Assange, 52, would be allowed to launch a new appeal against being extradited to face 18 charges, all bar one under the Espionage Act, over WikiLeaks’ release of confidential US military records and diplomatic cables.
Those assurances – that in a US trial he could rely on the first amendment right to free speech, that he is not “prejudiced at trial” due to his Australian citizenship and that there was no prospect of new charges which could result in the death penalty being imposed – have now been submitted by a deadline which fell overnight.
The document, seen by Reuters, stated that Assange would be able to rely on US first amendment protections and says “a sentence of death will neither be sought nor imposed”.
These assurances are binding on any and all present or subsequent individuals to whom authority has been delegated to decide the matters.
Judges in the UK are expected to consider the submission from the US authorities as well as any response from Assange’s lawyers.
Welcome
Martin Farrer
Good morning. Thanks for joining us again for our rolling news coverage of the day. I’m Martin Farrer and I’ll be highlighting some of the main overnight news lines before my colleague Emily Wind picks up the news baton.
After five tumultuous days, NSW premier Chris Minns is considering tightening the laws surrounding the possession of knifes in the wake of the Bondi and Wakeley attacks, and also a fatal stabbing in Doonside on Friday. Minns and other political leaders, along with religious leaders, pleaded for calm amid what the premier called a “combustible situation” set off by the stabbing of Orthodox bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel on Monday night and subsequent street unrest. More coming up.
The nine-month-old baby who was seriously injured in the Bondi Junction knife rampage has been moved out of intensive care at Sydney Children’s hospital in Randwick, according to overnight reports citing an NSW health official. Harriet Good, whose mother Ashlee was killed in the attack by Joel Cauchi on Saturday, had surgery after suffering chest and arm injuries. Her condition had been critical but has now improved to serious but stable.
Anthony Albanese is to announce his government will loan $400m to an alumina facility in Queensland and fast-track support to a graphite project in South Australia, as part of its Future Made in Australia industry program.
Three of Sydney’s wealthiest private schools received double the federal funding they were entitled to last year under the official resource standard, new data shows, despite the introduction of reforms to tackle overfunding. Northern Beaches Christian school, St Augustine’s College and MLC school, all in Sydney, were funded at 171%, 160% and 158% of the SRS respectively, about double the 80% they should have received from the commonwealth.
And coming up: the US has continued its push to extradite Julian Assange from the UK, providing “assurances” requested by London’s high court about his legal rights – which Assange’s wife Stella Assange immediately criticised as “weasel words”. More on that too, soon.