Transport department boss quizzed over Taylor Swift T-shirt
Elias Visontay
It’s been a relatively uneventful start to transport and infrastructure Senate estimates on Tuesday.
With public servants so far answering questions related to corporate matters of infrastructure, transport and regional development administration, the topic of the department secretary Jim Betts’ preference for statement T-shirts over corporate attire has again come to the fore.
The Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie, who like her fellow Coalition senators has become known for pushing Betts with pointed questions and criticism of a reliance on answering questions on notice during previous estimates hearings, took a lighter tone on Tuesday.
McKenzie asked: “I hope you didn’t think because I hadn’t mentioned this in the first hour that I haven’t been watching your T-shirt efforts over time. Have you changed your mind since last estimates, are you now a fan of Taylor Swift,” she said, referencing her line of questioning from the previous estimates hearing inquiring if departmental staff had scheduled work travel that coincided with the pop star’s concerts dates.
I feel like I’m living rent-free in your head, but at the supply and logistics conference last week I was told when I got there in the afternoon that you indeed had taken the time to.
Betts interrupted: “Yep, exactly, so I was wearing a Taylor Swift T-shirt last week at a freight and logistics conference, thank you for asking.”
McKenzie queried: “Why did you choose Taytay?”
Betts responded: “It was a gift from one of my staff and I also thought you might enjoy it because I knew you were speaking later on in the agenda and it might come up at Senate estimates.”
McKenzie: “Well I did, I did, so I thought that was very sweet of you.”
Betts: “It’s the least I could do if you’re living rent-free in my head.”
Key events
Dr Christos Christou, Médecins Sans Frontières International President is taking questions at the national press club.
He is asked about the MSF charter and neutrality and the organisation’s call for sanctions against Israel and the responsibility of other nations to uphold international law and says:
The first thing in our charter is the medical action. This is our basic act of solidarity. Medical action [and] wherever possible combine, bearing witness and advocating about what we see – becoming in other words the voices of the people that we are there to support.
And then of course we have to do that as doctors, which means we always impartially assess the needs and which used to go there where most of the needs exist.
And we do that also thanks to our work financially independent and also within the spirit of neutrality.
If we follow the order and are in extremely challenging situations, exceptional crisis like the ones I described before, what matters is again to stand by the people no matter what this means.
Sometimes we may feel that we cross lines but we never crossed the line of defending humanity, we will always do that.
Peter Hannam
The latest retail sales figures for April underscore what most of us know already: inflation and higher mortgage repayments are forcing households to skimp where we can.
Last month, retail turnover eked out a 0.1% increase but not enough to erase the 0.4% decline in March, the Australian Bureau of Statistics says. According to Moody’s Analytics, retail sales have been stagnant since December.
Another weak month for retail sales up just 0.1% in April, and 1.3% from a year earlier. (That’s a real decrease of more than 2% even before the population increase is taken into account.) @ABSStats pic.twitter.com/YMoG6dZ375
— @[email protected] (@p_hannam) May 28, 2024
From a year earlier, turnover was 1.3% higher. However, inflation was running at an annual pace of about 3.5%, so it’s firmly negative in real terms. (We’ll get April CPI figures tomorrow, and expectations are that the figure will land close to March’s 3.5% pace.)
Discretionary spending is wilting, particularly for clothing and footwear (though presumably some of that would be non-discretionary).
If you’re a retailer in Victoria you might be doing it particularly tough just now. (NSW bounced back from worst to first on a monthly basis.)
Since consumption is the largest part of the economy, such a weak retailing result will bolster the “economic doves” who want to see an RBA rate cut soon. (Today’s figures would tend to undermine the view of those wanting to see the central bank lift the cash rate from 4.35% to stymie inflation.)
The stage-three tax cuts and energy rebates will start to ease households’ squeeze from 1 July. Retailers will be hoping for some of extra spending to head their way (but presumably not too much, too soon to disturb the cultivated wa in the RBA board room).
Sarah Basford Canales
The Department of Parliamentary Services secretary, Rob Stefanic, is still facing questions about a perceived conflict of interest with a former colleague.
Stefanic is facing scrutiny over an alleged relationship with his subordinate, the former deputy secretary Cate Saunders, but Stefanic earlier said they were not in a relationship while he was her boss.
Saunders left her role as deputy secretary and chief operating officer of the DPS for a temporary secondment at Services Australia in April 2023 after first joining Parliament House in 2017, according to the latest DPS annual report.
The senators were told Saunders left the public service with an incentive to retire months after beginning her secondment.
Stefanic said he declared a formal conflict of interest declaration to the former APS commissioner Peter Woolcott in August 2022 and had “ongoing dialogue” to seek advice on “various matters”.
But the secretary, who has been in the role since 2015, said there was no documentation produced on these meetings or in relation to the management of the conflict to his knowledge.
In response to questioning by the Liberal senator Jane Hume, Stefanic said he continued to deal with personal leave approvals, which he deemed “not controversial”.
Stefanic said he made a formal declaration with the current presiding officers, Senate president Sue Lines and speaker Milton Dick, on 20 June 2023. He said it was for a “perceived” conflict of interest.
The questioning continues.
Josh Butler
Department of Parliamentary Services boss grilled over relationship with former deputy
The Department of Parliamentary Services secretary, Rob Stefanic, has complained of a “repeated violation” of his personal privacy in relation to scrutiny over a relationship with his former deputy secretary Cate Saunders.
In a Senate estimates hearing this morning, in response to questions from One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts, Stefanic was critical of media coverage of the situation.
Stefanic initially said he was “not prepared to entertain any questions that speak to my personal privacy”, when Roberts asked if he was in a relationship with Saunders when she was given a redundancy package on her exit from the public service.
Stefanic told the Senate he had “unsuccessfully tried to communicate to members of the media, that I’ve taken all reasonable steps to declare all conflicts of interest as appropriate”.
I have acted appropriately at all times.
Stefanic said the situation was “actually not new” and said his privacy had been “considerably violated in this process”.
However, upon repeated questioning from Roberts, Stefanic said he was not in a relationship with Saunders when he was her boss.
Roberts said Stefanic should “put an end to it” by answering questions on the issue, adding “taxpayers have a right to know what’s going on in the Department of Parliamentary Services”.
Stefanic responded: “To that end senator, I’ll give you a simple answer, which is no.”
The committee went on a short break after this, to return shortly.
The National Press Club address is being delivered by Dr Christos Christou, Médecins Sans Frontières International president today.
Christou has begun speaking and Daniel Hurst is covering the speech. As always, we will bring you elements of what is being said, as well as cover parts of the question and answer session.
Paul Karp
Paterson asks home affairs chief about guidance from PM’s office on answering Senate estimates questions
The shadow home affairs minister, James Paterson, is asking officials about guidance he says was distributed by the prime minister’s office entitled “Approaches to Senate estimates questions on notice asked of multiple agencies”. Essentially, the Coalition is pursuing the line that this is a handbook teaching officials how to obfuscate at Senate estimates.
The home affairs department’s secretary, Stephanie Foster, says that she has seen guidance from the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Foster says that it is guidance only, and it’s clear that it is up to officials how to answer questions and that they must do so in line with the Senate’s instructions to witnesses.
Labor’s Murray Watt says that questions on notice have doubled since the Coalition was in opposition, some pursuing matters of public interest and some not. He gives the example of questions asking what temperature the office thermostat is set at. The guidance is to try to avoid diverting resources to “trivialities”.
Foster insists that she and her senior officers all understand it is guidance only, and that she has departed from it on occasion when she thought it appropriate to do so.
Transport department boss quizzed over Taylor Swift T-shirt
Elias Visontay
It’s been a relatively uneventful start to transport and infrastructure Senate estimates on Tuesday.
With public servants so far answering questions related to corporate matters of infrastructure, transport and regional development administration, the topic of the department secretary Jim Betts’ preference for statement T-shirts over corporate attire has again come to the fore.
The Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie, who like her fellow Coalition senators has become known for pushing Betts with pointed questions and criticism of a reliance on answering questions on notice during previous estimates hearings, took a lighter tone on Tuesday.
McKenzie asked: “I hope you didn’t think because I hadn’t mentioned this in the first hour that I haven’t been watching your T-shirt efforts over time. Have you changed your mind since last estimates, are you now a fan of Taylor Swift,” she said, referencing her line of questioning from the previous estimates hearing inquiring if departmental staff had scheduled work travel that coincided with the pop star’s concerts dates.
I feel like I’m living rent-free in your head, but at the supply and logistics conference last week I was told when I got there in the afternoon that you indeed had taken the time to.
Betts interrupted: “Yep, exactly, so I was wearing a Taylor Swift T-shirt last week at a freight and logistics conference, thank you for asking.”
McKenzie queried: “Why did you choose Taytay?”
Betts responded: “It was a gift from one of my staff and I also thought you might enjoy it because I knew you were speaking later on in the agenda and it might come up at Senate estimates.”
McKenzie: “Well I did, I did, so I thought that was very sweet of you.”
Betts: “It’s the least I could do if you’re living rent-free in my head.”
Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS) estimates has moved on to the Parliamentary Budget Office and the parliamentary budget officer Dr Stein Helgeby has told the Senate president, Sue Lines, and speaker, Milton Dick (the presiding officers), he will not seek reappointment when his term expires in November of this year.
A merit-based recruitment process to find his replacement will begin soon.
Cabinet is ‘crafting the offer for a second term’, Albanese tells MPs
Karen Middleton
Anthony Albanese has told Labor MPs that cabinet’s work is now concentrating on “crafting the offer for a second term”, as ministers get out and sell the budget’s key measures to voters.
“Crafting the offer” is political campaign jargon, which means cabinet is focused on its plan to win the next election.
Albanese reminded his colleagues that the government was now in the final 12 months of its first term and repeated his post-budget message he cost-of-living measures in the budget included “a tax cut for every taxpayer, an energy rebate for every Australian, benefits for students and a future made in Australia”.
He described Peter Dutton’s budget reply speech as having “no costings, no media release – just chaos and confusion”.
Here is what the House program looks like today.
The House will sit, so bills will be introduced, debated and passed, but the Senate won’t sit until Senate estimates is completed, so no legislation will pass the parliament this sitting fortnight.
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