Key events
The Conservative Political Action Network have announced former UK prime minister Liz Truss will be appearing at their October Cpac conference in Brisbane.
Truss was prime minister for 50 days and was famously outlasted by a live streamed lettuce.
Cpac wants to know “was Prime Minister Liz Truss the last chance the UK had to save itself from economic and social dystopia?”
It will be her only Australian appearance we are told. At a recent appearance on the conservative talking circuit, activists unfurled a lettuce sign above Truss – she left the stage.
A lovely reader just asked – why do we have senate only weeks?
It’s because the senate needs to catch up on the legislative agenda after losing sitting days to estimate hearings.
When estimates is on, the house sits, but the senate doesn’t. So there can be a backlog of legislation that the senate needs to get through, and the senate only weeks even those sitting days out.
There have been times when the legislative agenda has been so thin the senate has run out of bills to pass. When that happens, you tend to get a lot more filibustering from the government. (A filibuster is when member of parliament make very long speeches in order to push out time in a debate). That’s not the situation here – in this parliament the issue is the government is having trouble gaining support for some key bills (housing for instance) with negotiations remaining stalled.
Good morning
A very happy good morning to you and a very big thank you to Martin for starting the blog off this morning and updating us on the morning news.
You have Amy Remeikis for most of the sitting day now. It’s the last joint sitting day until October, so it will be a bit of a busy one.
It’s a five-coffee day. Ready? Let’s get into it.
Anti-war protesters vow third day of demonstrations outside Melbourne weapons convention
Fiery and violent scenes have “not deterred” anti-war protesters, who are vowing to be back outside a major weapons convention in Melbourne as police warn they are well prepared to hold troublemakers to account, AAP reports.
Pro-Palestine and anti-war protesters were planning a third straight day of demonstrations for Thursday, outside the entrance of the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre which is hosting the Land Forces weapons convention.
Police were out in force again early on Thursday, maintaining no-go lines near the convention centre ahead of visitors to the expo arriving.
Chaotic scenes between protesters and police broke out on Wednesday.
Read more:
Teenage gambling shows link to adult problem, survey shows
As mentioned at the top, we have a report on a survey about the gambling habits of more than 1,000 people aged 16-35. It shows how they are more likely to develop a gambling problem in adulthood if they start gambling before reaching the age of 18.
One such person was Jason. Not a day goes by when he doesn’t wonder how his life might have turned out if a fake ID had not fallen into his hands, setting off a gambling addiction he has been unable to escape. Now 44, he says:
I would have spent in excess of $1m on poker machines. Until the last 10 years, I used to spend every penny I had.
I’m much better with money now … but I think every day how much more I could have become if I never got that ID and never started gambling at such a young age. It’s hooked me for life. There is no escape for me, I just know I have to limit it.
Read our full report and Jason’s story here:
Karen Middleton
Consultation open on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander family safety plan
The federal government has opened a public consultation process on the design of a national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander family safety plan aimed at eliminating family, domestic and sexual violence against First Nations women and children.
The social services minister, Amanda Rishworth, said the public submission process would give victim-survivors of violence, and others, the opportunity to engage on priorities, challenges and solutions.
“Providing everyone the opportunity to contribute is an important part of the consultation and design process,” she said.
The minister for Indigenous Australians, Malaarndirri McCarthy, said the disproportionately high levels of family and domestic violence in Indigenous communities was unacceptable.
“This opportunity for First Nations people with lived experience of family violence, experts, the community-controlled sector and community members to inform the development of the … plan is key to ensuring practical outcomes and driving meaningful change,” McCarthy said. “It is essential these perspectives are heard.”
The Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care, known as SNAICC, is managing the consultation process, which will close at 11.5pm on Friday 25 October.
Written and audio submissions are being accepted via the SNAICC website, snaicc.org.au, where a discussion paper on the proposed plan is being published on Thursday.
Karen Middleton
Stand-alone fund to be established to cover childcare pay rise
The federal government is establishing a stand-alone fund to cover the cost of its planned 15% pay rise for early childhood education and care workers in a move it says is designed to make it harder for future governments to unwind.
Legislation will be introduced to federal parliament today to establish the Fair Pay Fund, to deliver an increase which will be tied to a commitment from childcare providers to cap their fee increases. The 15% rise will be phased in over two years, with a 10% rise from December this year and a further 5% from December 2025.
The government is citing Treasury modelling that it says shows that by 2050, Australia’s care economy could grow by more than 50% as a proportion of GDP.
The education minister, Jason Clare, said the pay rise would benefit the workforce, families and the economy.
“The childcare debate is over,” Clare said. “It’s not babysitting. It’s early education and it’s critical to preparing children for school.”
The opposition is yet to declare a position on the proposed payrise, although the shadow treasurer, Angus Taylor, and the shadow early childhood education minister, Angie Bell, said in a statement last month that they favoured higher wages for early childhood educators.
Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our rolling coverage from Canberra, where it promises to be another lively sitting day. In the meantime I’m Martin Farrer and I’ll be bring you the top overnight news before Amy Remeikis comes along to guide you through the day.
Anthony Albanese’s government will introduce a new bill today to outlaw online doxing – the malicious use or exposure of personal data – with the offence punishable by up to seven years’ jail. But Labor has backed down on its proposal to outlaw hate speech and vilification against minority groups. As Labor broadens its crackdown on big tech, including a proposal to ban children from social media apps, the communications minister, Michelle Rowland, will introduce its bill on mis and dis-information, which has been debated in exposure draft form for more than a year. More details coming up.
It’s a busy day for government initiatives with the federal government establishing a standalone fund to cover the cost of its planned 15% pay rise for early childhood education and care workers in a move it says is designed to make it harder for future governments to unwind. More coming up.
About a third of young adults who gambled in the last year started punting before the age of 18, a new survey shows, and those who start young experienced greater harms from gambling as an adult. The study by the Australian Gambling Research Centre, based at the government’s Australian Institute of Family Studies, also shows almost half of 16- to 35-year-olds had a bet in the past year and builds on a growing body of evidence of gambling as a public health problem. More on that also coming up.
