Month: September 2023

The Greens cannot support the Government’s proposed changes to the Murray Darling Basin Plan in their current form.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is Greens Spokesperson on the Environment, Manager of Business in Senate, Senator for South Australia:

“After more than a decade the Murray Darling Basin Plan has failed to deliver the water our environment needs. In order to get Greens support for delaying the Plan, we need a guarantee that water, real water, is delivered for South Australia, the environment and the health of the river.

“We will refer the legislation to a Senate inquiry for interrogation. We are willing to work with the Government to improve this Bill, but in its current state it does not deliver the assurances that South Australia or our River needs. 

“Without a guarantee that the 450GL of water that was promised will be delivered, this bill will just kick the can down the road. 

“After over a decade of inaction we must see water flowing for the environment before the next election. The river dies from the mouth up which is why the guaranteed delivery of 450GL to the Southern Basin will help ensure health of the entire river system, ecosystems and economies that rely on it.

“The Greens will continue conversations with the Government in good faith as the Bill goes to inquiry.” 

The Greens today successfully passed a motion in the Senate requiring the Albanese Government to produce documents on multi-million dollar VIP flights. 

The order for the production of documents on the cost, dates and locations of special purpose flights as well as previous and current guidelines was passed in the Senate today with only Labor opposing. These documents must be provided no later than 13 September. 

The Albanese Government, in a last-ditch attempt to hide information from the public, tried to prevent key information from being disclosed and hide behind questionable security concerns. Despite this, the motion passed with the support of every Senator in the chamber except Labor. 

Senator David Shoebridge, Greens Defence spokesperson, said:

“There is a growing cult of secrecy in Canberra and especially in the Defence Department and this was a moment to push back against it. 

“Senior Ministers are taking these VIP flights at an eye-watering cost at a time when everyone else is cutting back, Defence Minister Marles has cost $3.6 million alone.

“Transparency is a vital check on excess and essential for good government.

“The official line is that Defence won’t reveal where MPs flew on VIP flights in 2021 and 2022 because it’s a security risk that might reveal “pattern of life” information. 

“These are not meant to be multi-million dollar taxis, they are meant to be special purpose flights, flights only taken for a special purpose. If there is a repeated pattern being shown then that’s a warning bell about potential misuse.

“You have to wonder if the real threat to security is in fact a threat to the job security of anyone who took advantage of the lack of transparency.

“We look forward to the public seeing the amended guidelines and details on their multi-million dollar flights next week.”

Under pressure from the Greens, Labor has today backflipped again to support an important inquiry into the mammoth Middle Arm gas and petrochemical expansion, subsidised by taxpayers at a cost of $1.5b. The gas field is so large it will increase Australia’s emissions by 25% and blow the shrinking chance of the Albanese government meeting its climate targets.

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is Spokesperson for the Environment & Manager of Greens Business in the Senate: 

“In the middle of the climate crisis, Anthony Albanese is continuing Scott Morrison’s gas fired recovery with $1.5 billion of taxpayer money to subsidise gas export and petrochemicals 3km away from the suburbs of Darwin. 

“As doctors have warned, the top end does not need another “Cancer Alley” like has happened with gas feedstock and petrochemical production in Louisiana.

“Gas fuels the climate crisis and taxpayers should not be subsidising its dangerous expansion.

“Greenwashing gas and ‘petrochemicals’ as renewables means this entire project requires closer scrutiny.”

The Middle Arm gas and petrochemical project is a $1.5b  the ‘gas fired recovery’ brainchild of former Dow Chemicals and Saudi Aramco chief and Donald Trump’s confidant, Andrew Liveris. 

U.S gas frackers Tamboran have rights over a site at the Middle Arm project to build a gas export hub to export gas overseas from the Beetaloo region.

Elizabeth Watson-Brown, MP for Ryan and Greens spokesperson for Transport, Infrastructure and Sustainable Cities said:

“Alan Joyce has made Qantas’s name synonymous with price gouging, mismanagement, attacking workers’ pay and conditions, and scandal. I’m sure many Australians are happy to see him go.

“As CEO, Joyce has received bonuses of over $20 million, while workers and customers have lost out. Now that he’s being pushed out, the board should step in to ensure he receives no final bonus payout.

“But a change of CEO alone won’t fix Qantas’s problems. As long as Qantas remains a private, for-profit monopoly, we’re going to see more price gouging, more undermining of workers rights, more scandals.

“It’s time for a rethink. Instead of propping up Qantas’s profits, the government should take this moment to seriously look into bringing Qantas back into public ownership. 

“Bringing Qantas back into public hands would ensure no gouging or breaching of consumer rights, decent pay and conditions for workers, and fair prices for everyday travellers.”

“With 60% share of Australia’s aviation market, it makes no sense for Qantas to remain in private hands. Rather than protect Qantas’s monopoly status as ‘too big to fail’, the government should investigate bringing it back into public ownership.”

I welcome the decision today by the UK Government to proscribe the Wagner Group as a terrorist organisation. This will make it illegal within the UK to be a member of the group or support its activities, and allows the UK government to seize its assets.

The UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman put it succinctly when she said the Wagner Group “are terrorists, plain and simple – and this proscription order makes that clear in UK law.” It follows a Biden Administration decision to designate Wagner a significant transnational criminal organisation in January.

I again call on the Albanese Government to act immediately in taking the steps necessary for Australia to join our allies and formally list the Wagner Group as a terrorist organisation. The Coalition stands ready to assist with any legislative changes required to take this action without further delay.

On 22 May I wrote to the Minister for Home Affairs and the Attorney-General asking them to investigate the listing of the Wagner Group as a terrorist organisation in light of its complicity in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its extensive track record of abhorrent human rights abuses and offering the full support of the Coalition in doing so.

Australia could have led the world and acted early to rightly recognise the Wagner Group as a terrorist organisation and send a clear message that we will not tolerate violent acts of terrorism no matter where in the world they are occurring. Labor’s complacency has instead seen Australia lag behind our allies with no explanation for the government’s inaction.

The Albanese Government needs to explain when and how it plans to list Wagner a terrorist organisation to ensure Australia stands shoulder to shoulder with its allies in taking action against the abhorrent conduct of the Wagner Group.

The eSafety Commissioner has faced questions about the Albanese Government’s refusal to support an age assurance trial aimed at protecting children from online harm.

Age assurance technology is designed to stop children from accessing inappropriate material online.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland has been criticised by child protection advocates after rejecting a recommendation from her own online safety agency for the trial.

The eSafety Commissioner’s Roadmap for age verification had recommended that the Government:

“Trial a pilot before seeking to prescribe and mandate age assurance technology.”

Appearing on ABC 24 this afternoon, the eSafety Commissioner, Julie Inman Grant was asked what she made of the Government’s refusal to support the trial she’d recommended. She told the ABC:

“That was a question for Government. The Government made its decision and I need to get on with using the tools that I have.”

The comments come after the National Children’s Commissioner expressed disappointment at the Government’s failure to support the trial. Commissioner Anne Hollonds told ABC Television on the weekend that the trial was needed:

“So that we can safeguard children for whom this material, this content is really inappropriate, and actually can be quite dangerous.”

In contrast, the Eros Foundation General Manager Graeme Dunne welcomed the Government’s decision, in an interview with the ABC on 1 September.

Shadow Communications Minister David Coleman said the trial on age assurance technology should go ahead, as the eSafety Commissioner has recommended.

“Child online safety is a defining issue of our time and we must do everything we sensibly can to keep kids safe. It is impossible to understand why the Government is refusing to act on this recommendation.”

The Senate has today made clear it’s expectations of greater transparency from the Albanese Labor Government on the use of Special Purpose Aircraft (SPA) flights.

As a result of motions moved by the Coalition and The Greens the Albanese Labor Government has been ordered:

• to table information relating to SPA flights to the extent such information can be provided consistent with advice from security agencies;
• to table all current and previous versions of the SPA Guidelines provided to officials around the use of SPA flights; and
• to provide in confidence to the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security (PJCIS) any related advice that informed the changes to the SPA Guidelines.

The Coalition’s motion means that there will be careful assessment, without breaching or risking security considerations, of the security advice that led to the changes to the SPA Guidelines.

This can then determine whether or not this Labor Government has applied it in a fair way or whether there has been gross overreach to use that security advice to avoid transparency.

The Coalition understands and respects the role our law enforcement and national security agencies play in providing advice to Government.

The PJCIS is well trusted to hold information in confidence, but it will enable scrutiny by the Opposition and indeed by Government backbenchers.

For a Prime Minister that lauded promises of a more accountable and transparent government, this chain of events only continues to demonstrate this Labor Government’s rank hypocrisy.

Labor yet again is resisting scrutiny of its draconian IR Bill.

Today in the House of Representatives Labor refused to support the Opposition’s proposal that the 278 page industrial relations Bill should be referred to a parliamentary committee.

A parliamentary committee inquiry would be an appropriate and wholly orthodox next step as the Parliament considers this long and complex Bill with profound economy wide implications.

But Labor’s refusal to allow this scrutiny of the Bill follows a regrettable pattern.

Yesterday Labor refused to support an Opposition proposal to adopt an orthodox timetable for this Bill, resuming debate in the next but one sitting week, to allow MPs to study the details of a 278 page Bill which was only made public yesterday.

Even before the Bill was introduced, Labor took extraordinary steps to avoid scrutiny, forcing the handful of people who were consulted to sign legally binding non-disclosure agreements, preventing them from disclosing publicly what they had been told about the Bill’s contents.

When a government goes to such efforts to avoid its legislation receiving scrutiny and examination, there is only one conclusion: it knows how bad the Bill is and is trying to hide the details as much as it can.

The Opposition is calling on the Albanese Government to urgently deliver equitable funding to high-risk Indigenous students under its Alice Springs community safety package.

On 30 July 2023, I wrote to Education Minister Jason Clare requesting that he deliver $40.4 million to Central Australian schools to increase school engagement and combat youth crime, as he promised to do.

More than a month on, it is disappointing that I have not received a reply to my letter.

Mr Clare’s decision to plug the Northern Territory government’s education budget black hole, rather than prioritise Indigenous students most at risk such as those who attend Yipirinya School in Alice Springs, constitutes a blatant broken promise.

As Yipirinya principal Gavin Morris told the Daily Telegraph today, “… what we are seeing is you can have a Voice in Parliament but if you are not being heard, you are voiceless.”

The Opposition recently called out the Albanese Government for axeing the construction of two Indigenous boarding schools in East Arnhem Land and the Pilbara. Now, plans to build a satellite school in Burt Creek, 60 kilometres north of Alice Springs, are in ruins.

This is such gross hypocrisy from Labor which is failing to listen to the voices of some of the most disadvantaged Indigenous children in the country.

My letter to the Minister is reproduced below.

Dear Minister

Request to provide equitable funding to high-risk indigenous students in Alice Springs

On behalf of Senator Nampijinpa Price and myself, I write to raise deep concerns about the Albanese Government’s inequitable distribution of funding to 46 Central Australian schools, as part of a package of measures to combat youth crime in Alice Springs.

As you announced on 9 May 2023, $40.4 million was to be shared between these schools for ‘On-Country Learning’ to improve school attendance and engagement. The schools were asked to “develop tailored solutions to better engage children and young people in school and provide them with the wrap-around support they need to succeed” to “…improve community safety, tackle alcohol-related harm, and provide more opportunities for young people.”[1]

In short, this funding was delivered to keep young people at school, off the streets and out of jail.

Astonishingly, you have determined not to provide some of the most at-risk indigenous students with their fair share of funding.

Indigenous independent school, Yipirinya School in Alice Springs, which is home to many vulnerable and disengaged aboriginal children suffering acute disadvantage, has been advised it will receive only $329,000 and not the nearly $1 million it was expecting.

It is understood that 10 independent and catholic schools, including Yipirinya School, will receive only $2 million of the $40.5 million with the lion’s share going to government schools, calculated in accordance with the ‘Gonski’ School Resource Standard (SRS) and not for the purpose for which the funding was intended which was to combat the Alice Springs crime wave.

In distributing this funding to prop up the Northern Territory Labor government which is providing only 59 per cent of the 75 per cent funding required under the SRS, we believe you have profoundly misled local principals and their school communities.

This is the latest example of the Albanese Government listening to selective indigenous voices, and not the voices of local indigenous people most in need.

Consistent with your request that Central Australian schools develop On-Country Learning initiatives, Yipirinya School was planning to build a satellite school at Burt Creek, 60 kilometres north of Alice Springs, which would have allowed students to attend school in their community rather than drive three hours to and from Alice Springs each day. These plans are now in ruins.

We also note that despite repeated requests and funding submissions for more than a year, your government including the Minister for Indigenous Australians, Linda Burney, continues to stall on the delivery of funding to build boarding facilities at Yipirinya School which are vital to keep children safe at school.

We urge the Albanese Government to deliver on its commitment to ‘support a better, safer future for Central Australia’ by distributing the $40.5 million On-Country Learning measure consistent with its purpose. Distribution of funding should be equitable, taking into account schools which have the highest rates of student disengagement and youth offending, and the lowest attendance rates.

Given the lack of transparency about these funding arrangements, we also seek information as to the indicative amount allocated to each of the 46 schools as soon as possible this week, noting it is open to us to request this information by way of an Order for the Production of Documents in the Senate.

Yours sincerely

Sarah Henderson