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AEC: referendum messages must be authorised
The AEC commissioner Tom Rogers has a general message for anyone campaigning for either side of the referendum – if in doubt, authorise the message.
Politically active entities are familiar with the requirement to authorise their messages but others who will campaign in this referendum may not be.
If your communication is designed to encourage people to vote a certain way and you are expending money to create or distribute that communication, or if you’re likely to be a referendum entity, then you have to authorise that communication.
Authorisation laws are all about people knowing who is communicating with them about their vote – my advice to all campaigners is to make that as clear as possible and, if in doubt, authorise.
Public debate is important. The AEC isn’t here to stifle or prevent debate but we do want to make sure referendum communication is transparent and complies with the law.
Key events
Question time begins
After learning that Anthony Albanese went downstairs to watch the cricket so as not to disturb his partner, and Peter Dutton watched it on his phone with the volume down so as not to wake his wife, we move on to the questions.
Melissa Price kicks it off asking if Linda Burney misled parliament with some of her statements yesterday.
Burney does the verbal equivalent of an annoyed eye roll and says no and what she won’t do is engage in “tokenism” adding that this is “not about culture wars”.
Alas, even the Tveeder transcription service has given up today and I can’t say I blame it.
Caitlin Cassidy
Universities contributing to housing crisis ‘by charging huge prices’, Randwick councillor says
The Randwick Greens councillor Philipa Veitch has called for an immediate increase in public and affordable housing and a rent freeze, as students struggle under the weight of rising rents.
Speaking at the UNSW protest, she said:
Universities have … been contributing to the problem by charging huge prices for student accommodation, and selling off and leasing land to private accommodation operators.
A UNSW spokesperson said its Sydney campus was seeing higher demand for student accommodation compared to recent years, aligned to rental market demands and had established a new “concierge service” to help students find housing on and off campus.
This has been undertaken to support the needs of our students who have been increasingly experiencing difficulties in finding appropriate accommodation.
The University is aware that some students may be facing financial challenges at this time. UNSW endeavours to provide the support students need to succeed at university, ranging from financial assistance to academic skills support.
Caitlin Cassidy
UNSW students rally to call for rent caps on campus housing
UNSW students are holding a rally this afternoon calling for urgent affordable campus housing as the rental crisis continues to bite.
Students are demanding UNSW caps rents on student housing to one-third of youth allowance – equating to roughly $100 a week – and commit more finances to providing affordable campus housing.
Organiser Cherish Kuehlmann said the cheapest accommodation on campus was currently $653 per fortnight, $100 more than Youth Allowance.
Students would have to earn a full-time salary of over $56,000 a year to not experience rental stress. What student can afford that?
Every thing I have learnt about Bazball has been against my will.
This includes the four minutes of my life listening to both Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton talk about the Australian team underdog win in the first test.
There are four more tests to go. Calm down.
Meanwhile, QT will end with a Go the Blues, Up the Maroons moment ahead of origin.
And then we will continue to hear about how politics and sport should be seperate.
Tory Shepherd
President of Tibet’s government-in-exile compares China’s treatment of Tibetan children to Stolen Generations
“We are dying a slow death culturally, day by day,” the president of Tibet’s government-in-exile said today, as he called on Australia to do more to stop China’s human rights abuses in his country.
Penpa Tsering is the democratically elected head of the exiled government, living in India (the Dalai Lama is the spiritual leader of the east Asian nation).
Tsering has described China’s increasingly authoritarian rule in China to be “cultural genocide”, and in his National Press Club Speech he said if the federal government’s foreign policy was to impose sanctions on governments that commit crimes against humanity “just like China does in Tibet”, it should apply equally to everybody. He said:
We know for a fact Australia has sanctioned Iran, Burma, Russia, but when it comes to China, then everyone calms down a little bit.
He said he understood the sensitivities and the national interest that were involved, with China as Australia’s biggest trading partner, but that the bigger countries could “get away with everything”.
Tsering also likened the situation in Tibet to Australia’s Stolen Generations, saying Tibetan children were being taken from their families and put in boarding schools. China was also trialling schools with no Tibetan classes, he said.
China is trying to block Tibet and “make it like a huge prison where nobody can go in, nobody can go out” and then it tells the world it is a “socialist paradise”, he said. He also said the international community seemed to pay attention to violent conflicts and ignore the peaceful resistance of the Tibetan people, and that suited China.
“We are dying a slow death culturally, day by day,” he said. “[But] we have never lost hope.”
Greens accused of engineering rental crisis
The Greens are now being accused of engineering a rental crisis for their own ends in the house, as the airing of the grievances (90-second statements) comes to an end.
The last 90-second statement is usually the main message the government wants to get out because it is the time when everyone is switching over to pay attention before question time.
Anyway, here is another view:
Question time approaches
There is now less than half an hour until question time – the second last one of the sitting, which means it is also the second last one for almost six weeks.
We know that the Coalition will be asking more questions about what the voice can or can’t do and there will be more “when will the prime minister come clean about the damage his government is causing our country?”
Will the voice be able to save Fantales? Stay tuned.
Robodebt statement from Shorten still pending
We were waiting for Bill Shorten to deliver a ministerial statement (by leave) on robodebt which was down on the house notice paper for noon – but it doesn’t seem to have eventuated.
It is not surprising that Shorten would be delivering a statement – the final report is being handed down on 7 July and it’s the last parliament sitting before the Fadden byelection, which is happening because Stuart Robert, one of the Coalition ministers that had carriage of robodebt, has quit the parliament.
We’ll endeavour to find out what happened there.
‘We are not asking for independence’: Tibet’s Penpa Tsering
What is the difference between statehood (which Penpa Tsering wants) and independence?
Penpa Tsering
The middle way approach as proposed by his Holiness is a Buddhist concept avoiding extreme polarity.
So one polarity is the status of Tibet, historical status as an independent state and the other polarity is the present state of Tibet under the government of the PRC.
We are trying to seek a solution of an autonomous arrangement whereby Tibetans would have the freedom to practise its language, protect its environment, you know, and preserve its culture and religion and language.
So these are basic fundamental rights which are taken for granted in the free world that does not exist in Tibet. So this is what we are asking for. We are not asking for independence.
Even here at the Press Club, we know that Chinese government – the Ambassador here – ask the Press Club to disinvite me, and I always thank the Chinese government for being our best publicity agent.
President of the Tibetan government-in-exile delivers press club address
Penpa Tsering, president of the Tibetan government-in-exile, is giving his press club address. His government-in-exile is headquartered in northern India.
Freedom House, the international watchdog, has designated Tibet as one of the least free countries alongside South Sudan and Syria.
That itself explains it is not the Tibetans who are saying we are the least free country in the world, it is the international watchdog who is looking into all the parameters of freedom.
That it is what are the least free countries in the world where you have no access, no access to diplomats, no access to journalists, no access to even ordinary travellers.
That is what China tries to do, lock away Tibet, make it like a huge prison where nobody can go in, nobody can go out and then tell the international community that Tibet is a socialist paradise.
If Tibet is a socialist paradise, then why does Chinese government [not] allow [people] to see the paradise for themselves? Tibet does not have any political or civil rights.
If anyone of you have read George Orwell’s 1984, that has come into reality in China and more so in the Tibetan region, Mongolian region and in Hong Kong. Tibetans inside Tibet have no political space to express themselves.
Government sets up national registry to help combat workplace respiratory diseases
A national registry has been established to detect and combat deadly workplace respiratory diseases as the federal government seeks to tackle the prevalence of silicosis, AAP reports.
If passed, the law will require mandatory reporting of the disease which affects nearly one-in-four engineered stone workers in the industry prior to 2018.
But the peak union representing workers wants a ban on engineered stone to eradicate disease.
Products with high silica levels – commonly used in kitchen and bathroom benches – have been linked to the incurable lung disease silicosis and cancer.
Assistant health minister Ged Kearney said every case of silicosis was unacceptable.
Introducing the proposal to parliament, she told the story of Joanna, a 34-year-old mother of two who worked at a quarry run by a large multinational company.
During a fit-for-work test after returning from maternity leave, Joanna was diagnosed with silicosis.
Kearney said:
She’s not who many people would first picture when they think of a worker diagnosed with silicosis.
She’s a young woman and she worked largely in a reception role at the front office of the quarry.
(Joanna) should never have been diagnosed with this disease.”
The proposed national occupational respiratory disease registry will capture information on respiratory disease believed to have been caused by or exacerbated in the workplace.
Respiratory, sleep, occupational and environmental medicine specialists will be required to notify the registry of every diagnosis of occupationally caused silicosis.
They may also notify the registry of other occupational respiratory diseases, with the patient’s consent.
Protest mounted to save Kosciuszko brumbies
Ahhh – the mounted protest on the lawns of Parliament House is seeking to draw attention to the push to save the feral horses/brumbies in Kosciuszko national park.
The horses are being culled because their population is too large and they are causing damage to the ecosystem of the national park, including critically endangered frogs.
But the group is urging for other solutions to allow the horses to live.
Benita Kolovos
Victorian Coalition urged to drop vote on Paul Denyer parole bill
Victoria’s attorney general Jaclyn Symes is urging the Coalition not to put its bill to restrict any future parole applications by serial killer Paul Denyer to a vote in parliament today.
The bill, which proposes the serial killer should only be able to apply for parole if seriously incapacitated or at risk of death, is currently being debated in the upper house and will be put to a vote, but is doomed to fail without the support of Labor, the Greens and the two Legalise Cannabis MPs.
The government has ruled out creating a single law dealing specifically with Denyer’s case and is instead considering restricting serial killers from applying for parole for several years.
Symes said she had met with the family of one of Denyer’s victims and gave them a “personal commitment” that she would craft laws that “give them comfort that Paul Denyer is not getting out of prison”.
But she confirmed Labor would vote against the Coalition’s bill, which she says would lead to a legal challenge:
A one-man piece of legislation in relation to denying them parole forever will be challenged in the high court. We’ve had successes in the high court before but there’s no guarantee that we will have a success again, particularly when I’ve been able to articulate that there are other options on the table in relation to dealing with this matter.
Symes urged the Coalition to delay a vote on their bill and instead arrange a meeting with her and the family
I have expressed my preference to not debate this bill today. I know that family members are coming in today. We should use the opportunity to sit down and have further conversations with them. It’s a very unknown world – politics – for a lot of people. So taking the time to explain the process, explain the options, I think is a better use of today’s time than politicians standing up talking about these victims when you can actually talk to them.
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