www.theguardian.com
Dutton rules out offering cabinet post to Pauline Hanson in minority government
Pauline Hanson won’t get a seat at Dutton’s cabinet table, despite One Nation doing a preference deal with the Liberal party.
Dutton says he “wouldn’t be mucking around” with independents and minor parties.
I wouldn’t be mucking around with independents and third parties at this election. I really wouldn’t. We don’t want to see a European situation where you’ve got a handful of Greens and left-leaning teal candidates holding the government to ransom.
He’s asked a follow up on whether the Liberal party shares values with One Nation, but Dutton skips over the reporter.
Like yesterday, Dutton’s choosing to avoid or ignore a lot of the follow-up questions during the presser today.
Key events
Petra Stock
Election pledge to keep the ‘BoM of fire management’ online
Labor has been called to match a Coalition pledge to extend the life of a satellite fire mapping tool described as the “BoM of fire management”.
The North Australia and Rangelands Fire Information (Nafi) service, used by land managers across remote and regional Australia – where 99% of bushfires happen – expects to run out of funds by June.
The Coalition has committed $2.5m to keep the service running for three years. The Nationals leader, David Littleproud, said the ability to track fire activity saved “not just lives but livelihoods”.
Rohan Fisher, senior research fellow at Charles Darwin University, described the NAFI as like the “BoM of fire management” with more than 250,000 users.
John Connor, Carbon Market Institute chief executive, said the tool was a “crucial foundation” for the $80m Indigenous-led carbon abatement industry stretching from the Kimberley to Cape York, and should have stable funding.
It’s a clear public good, not just for the Indigenous carbon industry, but the whole resilience of northern Australia.
Emily Wind
Continuing from our last post …
Lethal humidity is a growing concern among scientists, as intolerable bouts of extreme humidity and heat are on the rise across the world. Humidity is more dangerous than dry heat because it impairs sweating – the body’s life-saving natural cooling system.
The number of potentially fatal humidity and heat events doubled between 1979 and 2017, and are increasing in both frequency and intensity, according to a 2020 study published in Science Advances.
During 2023 – which was the hottest year on record, more than 47,000 people in Europe are estimated to have died from heat, according to a study published in Nature.
A coroner found Keith Titmuss died of heatstroke after a Manly Sea Eagles pre-season training session in November 2020. You can read Scamps’ apology earlier in the blog here.
Emily Wind
Sophie Scamps’ full comments on lethal humidity in February
As we flagged earlier, independent MP Dr Sophie Scamps has apologised to the family of Keith Titmuss after linking his death to climate change, and the growing concern about lethal humidity.
At a doctors for the environment event in February, she was asked – as a medical practitioner – to “describe a patient or an event from your practice that started you making a connection between climate and health”.
Scamps responded that it was “hard to pinpoint a patient” but pointed to the bushfires because “we were all inhaling the smoke” and mothers were worried about the impacts on their unborn children. She then continued:
One of the things that really struck me, we’ve got this thing called lethal humidity now. With every rise in one degree of temperature, you have seven degrees increased percent in humidity. So the death of that young man, and I’m not saying – the death of that young man, the rugby league player, when it was 33 degrees, very humid day, died from heat stress after training session – that type of lethal humidity is something that the medical fraternity is getting more and more concerned about.
Apparently, the human body can survive – if it’s dry heat – up to 54 degrees Celsius, it’s pretty hot. But with high humidity, that level comes down to kind of 33C, 30C, even 31 degrees, so it’s something to consider.
She went on to note air pollution and plastic pollution, and “how that relates to dementia and our cognitive impairment”.
Underlying inflation fall puts interest rate cut on cards
Patrick Commins
A Reserve Bank rate cut on 20 May appears locked in, after new data showed the key measure of underlying inflation dropped below 3% for the first time in three years.
Headline inflation – which includes the impact of government cost-of-living policies such as rebates – held steady at 2.4% in the year to March, the Australian Bureau of Statistics figures show.
Crucially, the RBA’s preferred gauge – the trimmed mean rate of inflation – fell from 3.3% in the year to December, to 2.9% in March.
Dutton has ‘no knowledge’ of any Liberal volunteers’ links to Chinese Communist party
Yesterday the Australia Electoral Commission referred to its integrity taskforce footage of Monique Ryan volunteers saying they were directed to vote for her by groups accused of ties to Beijing’s foreign influence operations.
Dutton is asked if he’s confident there are no volunteers with the Liberal party who have links to the Chinese Communist party.
Dutton says he doesn’t have any knowledge of volunteers with links to the CCP.
I don’t have any knowledge in relation to that, and I mean without speaking out of school, generally if there was a concern, then the director general of Asio would raise a concern if there is somebody of concern to them. I’m not aware of any reports out of that or from the organisation.
This morning The Australian newspaper reported that the organisation in question, the Hubei association, was involved in recruiting volunteers for Labor cabinet minister Clare O’Neil.
O’Neil told Sunrise she did not make any requests for assistance from the organisation, and her office had “politely decline[d] that offer of support”.
Dutton says O’Neil, like Ryan, should refer her matter to the AEC.
I think the focus is clearly on Clare O’Neil and Monique Ryan … There are huge issues for Clare O’Neil to address and she should refer her matter to the AEC as well.
Dutton reiterates opposition to Indigenous voice
Asked whether the Coalition would oppose any attempt to legislate an Indigenous voice to parliament in the future, Dutton says he doesn’t support the voice.
I think the Prime Minister should have heard the voice of the Australian public when they voted no in the referendum. Clearly they haven’t. Now, it would be one of the first items of business for a Labor-Greens government to introduce legislation to put in place the Voice and treaty and truth-telling, etc.
The answer is in response to comments by Penny Wong on the Betoota Advocate podcast, who was reflecting on what people will think about the voice debate in the future.
She said that like the marriage equality debate, Australians will look back on the voice and say, “did we even have an argument about that?”
Dutton and the Coalition, during the referendum debate, supported legislation for a voice over a change to the constitution.
Dutton rules out offering cabinet post to Pauline Hanson in minority government
Pauline Hanson won’t get a seat at Dutton’s cabinet table, despite One Nation doing a preference deal with the Liberal party.
Dutton says he “wouldn’t be mucking around” with independents and minor parties.
I wouldn’t be mucking around with independents and third parties at this election. I really wouldn’t. We don’t want to see a European situation where you’ve got a handful of Greens and left-leaning teal candidates holding the government to ransom.
He’s asked a follow up on whether the Liberal party shares values with One Nation, but Dutton skips over the reporter.
Like yesterday, Dutton’s choosing to avoid or ignore a lot of the follow-up questions during the presser today.
Dutton defends members of Brethren group volunteering for Liberals
The Coalition has been questioned over involvement by the Exclusive Brethren, a secretive Christian sect that has been volunteering for the Liberal party in marginal seats, despite the fact that its members don’t vote.
Yesterday Dutton said that it allowed people of all religions to volunteer with the party.
He’s asked again whether the Brethren share the values of the Liberal party.
People of Christian faiths support both sides of politics and people of no faith support both sides of politics. People ultimately can make a decision about who they want to support in a democracy.
The reporter pushes on whether there are shared values between the sect and the Coalition, when the sect “treats women as second-class citizens and doesn’t tolerate homosexuality”?
Dutton won’t budge on the point, and says again that people of different faiths support the party.
He then attacks the Greens, calling them an “antisemitic, Jew-hating” party as he did yesterday, and says Jewish people have been “particularly aggrieved … by the antisemitism we’ve seen in our society”.
Coalition pledges $2bn Pacific funding rise
The Coalition has promised to increase funding to the Pacific region by $2bn by increasing funding through the Australian infrastructure financing facility for the Pacific (AIFFP) in loans and grants from $4bn to $6bn.
Dutton is asked whether that’s in an effort to distance himself from Donald Trump, who has frozen significant amounts of foreign aid.
Dutton says it’s not, and that the Coalition are “good partners and good friends” in the region.
No, it’s a continuation of the support we provided in the region. Over the course of Covid we provided support to our near neighbours in the Pacific. We are good partners and good friends … We’ve invested a lot into relationships in the Pacific and with near island nations.
Dutton swipes at Labor’s ‘big taxing’ ahead of new inflation figures
The ABS will release the latest monthly and quarterly inflation figures in about half an hour, and Dutton is asked if inflation falls, is that a vindication of Labor’s success?
Dutton says he hopes inflation does fall, but attacks Labor as a “big taxing” government.
Let’s hope that CPI comes down because interest rates have risen on 12 occasions under the government. They’ve only come back once. And a big-taxing Labor-Greens government will be a disaster for the economy.
The latest monthly CPI figure for February was 2.4%.
This morning Jim Chalmers said a headline figure with a two in front of it would be “a powerful demonstration of the progress that we’ve made together as Australians on inflation”.
Dutton won’t say if candidate should be disendorsed over Plibersek comments
Dutton is asked about comments by a candidate in Fowler who made disparaging comments about Tanya Plibersek amid reports her daughter had experienced domestic violence.
Yesterday Dutton said that the candidate, Vivek Singha, had apologised and that he (Dutton) didn’t endorse the comments, but he wouldn’t say whether Singha should be disendorsed.
Dutton is asked again whether he should be disendorsed, having just spoken about the need to support women and children facing family violence.
Dutton: I’ve made it clear that I don’t endorse or accept the comments.
Reporter: You do endorse the candidate.
Dutton: He’s apologised for it.
Reporter: Would you call the prime minister weak if he did the same thing?
Dutton: There’s a question at the back.
Dutton pressed on Coalition use of consultants amid planned public service cuts
Dutton won’t rule out spending more money on private consultants in the public service, following his promise to cut the sector by 41,000 staff.
What we’re going to do is spend taxpayers’ money wisely and that’s exactly the approach that the Howard Government had. We want to make sure that we respect people’s money.
The reporter pushes back, asking specifically about consultants.
Dutton just repeats the line that taxpayer dollars are spent “wisely”.
An audit found that the former Coalition government spent more than $20bn on consultants in its final year in office.
Dutton is asked for more details by two reporters, but won’t shed any further light on whether he’ll bring on more consultants.
He’s asked by the second whether he’ll guarantee that there will be no cuts to ASIO, ASIS or ASD. Dutton says:
Yes.
