Albanese defends stage-three tax changes in rowdy question time
Anthony Albanese:
We have just introduced very significant legislation before this parliament to give every Australian a tax cut.
Every Australian taxpayer, whether they own their home or not, all 13.6 million of them …
They’ve [the opposition] had two weeks to think about their first question … and it has nothing to do with what we’re doing. And something to do … with something that no one will ever do. They’ve had a fortnight to think of it, Mr Speaker. Because they’ve been all over the shop, Mr Speaker. When it became clear that we were going to have a position of supporting every taxpayer getting a tax cut, the deputy leader of the opposition – because the leader went missing for a while – the deputy leader charged out there. And she said, ‘We will fight this legislation in the parliament’.
She went on, Mr Speaker. She said, ‘We don’t even know what it will look like.’ She actually said that.
There are a bunch of interjections, a shot of Sussan Ley looking dejected, and a warning to Labor MP Josh Burns on his birthday.
Peter Dutton makes a point of order that is not a point of order.
It’s like we never left.
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For that reason, what we’ve seen is a very rapid rise in interest rates over the last 18-24 months, and it’s been rapid because, first of all, we had to remove all of that stimulus that we had from the pandemic, and then we had to obviously address inflation, which means we had to get interest rates into restrictive territory.
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That said, the inflation rate still has a “4” in front of it. It’s fair to say the board does understand that people are doing it tough. And a big reason for that is inflation. That’s why it’s really important we get inflation down. We have made good progress. Absolutely, we’ve made good progress.
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But there is more work to do. The job’s not done.
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And the best thing that we can do with our tool is help households deal with the cost of living by getting inflation down. That’s our aim. We want it back in the background again, when people aren’t worrying about it.
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So, looking ahead, we’re forecasting inflation – we’re expecting, our central forecast is that inflation will return to the target range of 2% to 3% in 2025, and will reach the midpoint of the target range in 2026.
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In what is not a surprise, the RBA has decided to hold rates at 4.35%
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What everyone is going to be looking at now is the commentary the RBA board will give around its decision – what it is looking at, what it is looking towards and what is worrying it.
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A reminder though that inflation for December came in lower than the RBA’s own forecasts (which is uses to make these decisions).
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Job numbers have been weaker than expected, retail sales are down and the economy is slowing down, so now the RBA has to work out whether it has overshot with the rate rises. The RBA would say no, it is still above the RBA’s target band (2-3%) at 4.1%, so the RBA would say there is work to do.
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More detail here from Guardian Australia’s Peter Hannam:
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Anthony Albanese:
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We have just introduced very significant legislation before this parliament to give every Australian a tax cut.
\n
Every Australian taxpayer, whether they own their home or not, all 13.6 million of them …
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They’ve [the opposition] had two weeks to think about their first question … and it has nothing to do with what we’re doing. And something to do … with something that no one will ever do. They’ve had a fortnight to think of it, Mr Speaker. Because they’ve been all over the shop, Mr Speaker. When it became clear that we were going to have a position of supporting every taxpayer getting a tax cut, the deputy leader of the opposition – because the leader went missing for a while – the deputy leader charged out there. And she said, ‘We will fight this legislation in the parliament’.
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She went on, Mr Speaker. She said, ‘We don’t even know what it will look like.’ She actually said that.
\n
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There are a bunch of interjections, a shot of Sussan Ley looking dejected, and a warning to Labor MP Josh Burns on his birthday.
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Peter Dutton makes a point of order that is not a point of order.
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It’s like we never left.
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prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the minister for home affairs, Clare O’Neil, arrive for question time in the House of Representatives today.”,”caption”:”The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the minister for home affairs, Clare O’Neil, arrive for question time in the House of Representatives today.”,”credit”:”Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian”}}],”attributes”:{“pinned”:true,”keyEvent”:true,”summary”:false},”blockCreatedOn”:1707189940000,”blockCreatedOnDisplay”:”22.25 EST”,”blockLastUpdated”:1707191901000,”blockLastUpdatedDisplay”:”22.58 EST”,”blockFirstPublished”:1707190086000,”blockFirstPublishedDisplay”:”22.28 EST”,”blockFirstPublishedDisplayNoTimezone”:”22.28″,”title”:”Albanese defends stage-three tax changes in rowdy question time”,”contributors”:[],”primaryDateLine”:”Mon 5 Feb 2024 23.50 EST”,”secondaryDateLine”:”First published on Mon 5 Feb 2024 14.31 EST”},{“id”:”65c1a6118f08001288228d6b”,”elements”:[{“_type”:”model.dotcomrendering.pageElements.TextBlockElement”,”html”:”
Peter Dutton:
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Will the prime minister rule out changing the current tax treatment of the family home?
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The house gets rowdy right off the bat, before the prime minister says a single word, because it is that sort of day.
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The Coalition is trying to create a scare campaign around what taxes *could* be changed – like changing capital gains etc around the ‘family’ home, which is something no one is suggesting.
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But then again, the 2019 election was fought, in some areas, on a death tax that no one was talking about or planning – so who knows?
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The Coalition will seek to push Labor’s stage-three tax changes to a committee inquiry, despite agreeing to back the reforms in what was described as an “extremely united” party room meeting.
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Former PM Scott Morrison, whose government legislated the original stage-three plan, spoke in favour of the Coalition backing the tax plan.
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The tax changes were the big topic as the opposition met for their caucus meeting today. Opposition leader Peter Dutton claimed prime minister Anthony Albanese was “at his core… dishonest” over the stage-three reform.
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A party room spokesperson said the meeting debated whether they could move specific amendments of their own or back only certain parts of Labor’s changes (for instance, one colleague asked whether they could support the increase in the tax-free threshold but oppose other sections). But the Coalition deemed that the structure of Labor’s amendments meant they had to vote for the whole thing, and couldn’t choose individual parts to support or oppose.
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Still no word on what the Coalition’s proposed amendments might be, but the party room spokesperson said they may be “both” substantive and symbolic. We reported earlier that the Coalition’s amendments may be more symbolic in nature, restating their commitment to the principles of the original stage-three plan.
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The spokesperson said the Coalition’s amendments would reflect “the principles we stand for”.
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Peter Dutton then moves on to the stage-three tax cuts and the Coalition’s newest favourite line, “the liar in the Lodge”.
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As you know, this morning the Coalition party room met and we dealt with what has been an egregious lie by the prime minister.
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I think again Australians have been shocked to know they have a liar in the Lodge, and a prime minister who looks the Australian public in the eye and is prepared to lie to them.
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He promised on 97 occasions that power prices would come down*. He has never mentioned that figure since the election.
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He promised on the voice he would give the detail to the Australian public**. The [referendum] vote was last October. The detail has still not been provided***.
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The prime minister deliberately deceived the Australian public on the voice, deceived the public in relation to bring down energy costs and deceived the public in relation to the tax cuts which are promised on more than 100 occasions.
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He has taken the money away from the proposed stage-three tax cuts which have been legislated, robbed that money and put it into the proposal he has on the table at the moment****.
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*by 2025
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**The detail was there
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***Why would there be legislation on a referendum that failed?
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****This makes no sense.
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And after all of that, Dutton says – but we will vote for the changes.
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The Coalition will seek to amend but ultimately not oppose Labor’s changes to stage three tax cuts that redistribute benefits to low and middle income earners.
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The Coalition party room met on Tuesday, endorsing a decision of the shadow cabinet not to vote against the Labor tax plan despite weeks of arguing Anthony Albanese had lied and reneged on his commitment to stage three tax cuts before the 2022 election.
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We’ve confirmed this decision with several Coalition sources, but we’re not yet clear on what the amendments to Labor’s bill will be.
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This clears the way for the $359bn 10 year tax cut package to pass parliament in February ahead of the changes taking effect in July. The Labor plan delivers bigger savings to all taxpayers earning less than $146,486 and doubles tax relief for those on the average income.
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Senior Coalition shadow ministers have been repositioning on Labor’s tax plan since last week, insisting that it is the party of lower tax and promising not to seek to repeal the changes.
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The decision not to oppose Labor’s plan creates a wider dilemma over whether to recommit to remove the 37% tax bracket, the centrepiece of stage three tax cuts, or propose an alternative to redistribute the $28bn more tax raised by Labor’s plan over 10 years.
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The Coalition’s decision also sidelines the Greens, who had attempted to use their Senate voting bloc to lobby for an increase to jobseeker payments and raising the tax free threshold from $18,200.
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On the suspended death sentence Australian academic Yang Hengjun received in China, Anthony Albanese said:
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Well, we have conveyed, firstly, to China our dismay, our despair, our frustration – but to put it really simply, our outrage – at this verdict. This is a very harsh sentence on Dr Yang, who is a man who’s not in good health.
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We will continue to make the strongest representations. We of course called in the ambassador yesterday – but we will make representations at all levels …
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We have said very clearly that we’ll cooperate with China where we can, but we’ll disagree where we must. We must disagree with this harsh action by China. We have done so. We will continue to do so.
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(Calling in the ambassador is the diplomatic version of “explain yourself” and is an official lever used between countries to express dissatisfaction with something that has occurred.)
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The shadow cabinet met last night to discuss Labor’s proposed revamp of stage-three tax cuts.
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We understand from several Coalition sources that the majority view in the opposition leadership is not to block Labor’s tax cuts, which deliver bigger cuts to low- and middle-income earners. This is consistent with the holding line that the Coalition are the parties of lower tax and would not be taking money off anyone.
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Given all the Coalition rhetoric attacking Anthony Albanese for abandoning stage three, we thought it might try to promise to abolish the 37% tax rate in addition to Labor’s changes. Apparently not.
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The Australian reports that the Coalition will look for a new policy to improve the budget bottom line and hand back bracket creep. This is consistent with what one source told us – that it is not feasible for the Coalition to come up with a new policy in two weeks.
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The opposition may avoid getting wedged on tax by Labor’s plan but it will need to do a lot more work to create its own. Labor’s plan is budget-neutral over four years but gives back $28bn less tax over 10 – so there is some money to play with, but not for several years.
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It’s also unclear how Peter Dutton will maintain the rage about stage three if the Coalition is no longer proposing to deliver it. Perhaps it was spooked by Jim Chalmers’ sums that doing Labor’s plan and stage three together would cost $40bn.
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The tax plan will be discussed in the Coalition party room today.
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Welcome to the first sitting day for 2024.
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We arrive in the middle of Australia’s latest tax battle for voters hearts and minds – the Coalition, after a big song and dance about broken promises (which was completely ridiculous) will now not stand in the way or delay the Albanese government changes to the stage-three tax cuts.
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Instead the Coalition is going to try to shape the battle around what it would do and how Labor is still failing on the tax front.
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So consider this week a forerunner for your immediate future.
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We’ll have all the rest of the parliament shenanigans – we are now officially back in the re-election zone, so it can only get more unhinged from here.
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You have Paul Karp, Josh Butler, Daniel Hurst and Sarah Basford Canales to guide you through the week, with Mike Bowers already in the building and sniffing out what’s what. And you have me, Amy Remeikis, back with you for another parliamentary year.
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I’ve already had three coffees. Ready?
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Let’s get into it.
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Good morning and welcome to our live politics blog. My name’s Martin Farrer and I’m here to bring you the overnight headlines before Amy Remeikis returns to the chair for 2024’s first sitting week.
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Peter Dutton is poised to accept Labor’s changes to the Coalition’s stage-three tax cuts after party room meetings today. Reports suggest Dutton, who at first vowed to repeal the changes in full, will agree to the tweaks that will put more money back into the pockets of low- and middle-income earners by making planned tax cuts for the wealthy smaller. Legislation backing the Labor changes will be brought forward to the House of Representatives today, as federal parliament meets for the first sitting day for the year. More coming up.
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Community groups and politicians opposing offshore windfarms and “reckless renewables” will converge on the lawns of Parliament House this morning as their campaign gathers momentum. It is expected that about 1,000 people opposed to the federal government’s rollout of renewable energy, which includes wind and solar farms, batteries and the transmission lines needed to connect power to homes and businesses, will join the protest backed by some notable Coalition figures such as Barnaby Joyce and Jacinta Nampijinpa Price.
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Talking of the Coalition, it was a rollicking second episode of the ABC documentary Nemesis last night with Malcolm Turnbull unloading on his enemies. Focusing on his term as prime minister between 2016 and 2018, the exposé of Coalition infighting heard Turnbull describe his then-treasurer Scott Morrison as “duplicitous”, recall that Tony Abbott promised to be “very fucking difficult” as revenge for being ousted in a coup in 2016, and dismiss Dutton as a “thug”. All that and a tetchy phone call with Donald Trump, plus handling Joyce’s infidelity.
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Key events
What about Taylor Swift inflation? (This is the inflation that has been attributed to Swift, and the money which has been injected into economies where she has held concerts. It is also being used to describe children asking their parents for more money to cover Swift tickets, accomodation or transport –all of which have increased around the time of her events)
Michele Bullock:
I know all about Taylor Swift inflation as well, myself. I think the bottom line on services – we’re talking to colleagues about what services inflation is, because I think people don’t quite really get what it is.
One of my colleagues said services inflation is anything that you can’t drop on your foot, right? So all of these sorts of things you’re talking about.
Monetary policy, it’s true, works on the demand side. And to the extent that some of these things you’re talking about – like insurance and electricity and these sorts of things that have been driven by other things – monetary policy doesn’t directly impact that. But it can indirectly impact, because these sorts of costs go into business costs, obviously – non-labour costs – and to the extent that demand is tempered, it tempers the ability of them to pass on costs.
This is the way that you can end up with an indirect impact of monetary policy on these sorts of services. On Taylor Swift tickets – I’d say that, from my own experience that my kids put money away to do it. They forewent other things in order to be able to afford Taylor Swift.
So I think there’s also issues – people are deciding what’s really important to them and what’s not as important to them. Clearly, for a lot of people, Taylor Swift is very important.
So what would Michele Bullock say to mortgage holders who are counting on rate cuts?
If you look at the forecasts – the point I’d make about the forecast is that there is a cash rate assumption in the forecasts and, there has to be. We need some sort of assumption to work with there.
But I emphasise the word “assumption”. It isn’t a commitment, a forecast, or even an expectation. It’s something to work with.
As we move out with our forecast, it gets more uncertain. It might be we’ve already emphasised that there could be risks on the upside – there could be risks on the downside.
If the risks on the downside present themselves, then we have the options of cutting interest rates. If the risks on the upside eventuate, then we might have to look at whether or not we need to increase again.
But I think the point is that we need to make sure that we don’t have to backtrack on inflation.
That inflation doesn’t get away. We do need to make sure we’re making progress and we need to convince that that progress is going to continue.
That’s what’s going to help, ultimately, mortgage-holders and everyone.
Is Michele Bullock saying rate cuts are ruled out for this year?
Bullock:
As I said earlier, we haven’t ruled anything out and we haven’t ruled anything in. So I would say we have maintained the option that it might be that there has to be more rate rises, but the option’s in.
The option here is we need to be maintained because we need to be driven by the data.
I come back to the point that I made earlier – I really understand that the mortgage-holders are sweating on this. I do understand that.
But the big issue that’s confronting not just mortgage-holders, but everyone, is inflation. And the fact that inflation so high in so many parts of their lives at the moment is what’s really hurting them.
What’s really important here is that we address that issue for people. That will help mortgage-holders. I know that they’re doing it tough. But it will also help renters, for example, who don’t have mortgages, and also are experiencing these inflationary pulses. So, in the end, I think that’s why we need to stay the
Was it a mistake for the RBA to raise rates in November?
Has the RBA overdone the rate rises?
Michele Bullock:
The short answer is that we didn’t make a mistake. That was based on – all of this is based on risk and risk management framework, in some sense.
What we’re doing here is we’re trying to balance bringing inflation down versus keeping the employment gains of the pandemic that we made, which has been great.
At the same time, we don’t want inflationary expectations to rise, which would make the job harder and ultimately be more costly. On that basis, the raise in November – the risks had shifted to the upside. And in order to mitigate some of those, to give a bit more assurance, that was the appropriate move at the time.
I don’t need to remind you, probably – you’d know this – that we haven’t gone up as far as other countries have gone up.
Because we are trying very hard to make sure that we bring this balance in in terms of the employment and the inflation objectives.
Will the government’s changes to the stage-three tax legislation add to the inflation challenge?
Michele Bullock:
I don’t think it’s a material issue. If you look at Treasury’s analysis, which was published on the website, they actually did a little bit of analysis to look at what might happen depending on different marginal propensities to consume.
The bottom line really is that the fiscal envelope is the same. It’s the same amount of money being handed out to households, but distributed slightly differently. We don’t think it has any implications for our forecasts.
Asked about productivity, Michele Bullock says:
… Concentrating on quarterly movements in productivity, I don’t think, is particularly helpful.
So I think we need to take a step back.
We have assumptions in our forecasts that productivity will return to some sort of long-run trend which will be positive, because that’s really important for the economy to continue growing.
And I’m confident that that will occur, but I think concentrating on quarterly ups and downs is sort of distracting.
It’s a bit noisy. So I think we just need to take a step back. Ultimately, I think productivity is going to return to the Australian economy. Technology will help. There is business investment going on. And I think these things are all positive for productivity looking out further – not looking at the quarterly ups and downs.
Michele Bullock:
So, in short, by introduction, high inflation is bad for everyone. It’s still high. We still have got a little way to get it down. And that’s what our job and our focus is for the next little while.
RBA predicts inflation to drop by 2025
Michele Bullock:
For that reason, what we’ve seen is a very rapid rise in interest rates over the last 18-24 months, and it’s been rapid because, first of all, we had to remove all of that stimulus that we had from the pandemic, and then we had to obviously address inflation, which means we had to get interest rates into restrictive territory.
That said, the inflation rate still has a “4” in front of it. It’s fair to say the board does understand that people are doing it tough. And a big reason for that is inflation. That’s why it’s really important we get inflation down. We have made good progress. Absolutely, we’ve made good progress.
But there is more work to do. The job’s not done.
And the best thing that we can do with our tool is help households deal with the cost of living by getting inflation down. That’s our aim. We want it back in the background again, when people aren’t worrying about it.
So, looking ahead, we’re forecasting inflation – we’re expecting, our central forecast is that inflation will return to the target range of 2% to 3% in 2025, and will reach the midpoint of the target range in 2026.
The RBA governor, Michele Bullock is holding her first post-board meeting press conference.
The RBA hired Sally Cray, who was Malcolm Turnbull’s right hand fixer-in-chief late least year – it is not a coincidence. Cray’s expertise in honing messages is one of the reasons she was brought on board, and for someone like Bullock, who has spent most of her career at the RBA, not facing press conferences – especially not of this nature (press conferences after speeches with mostly financial types isn’t exactly the same) – it is absolutely needed.
Bullock (who is speaking in a much more relaxed way than I have previously seen) opens with:
First thing I wanted to do was reflect a little bit on where we’ve come from over the last three-to-four years. Because I think we tend to forget it. We had a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic. And this was something that was entirely out of anyone’s experience.
And in that context, what we did was we took the cash rate – among other things, but the tool we had, that cash rate – to practically 0%. That was emergency settings. It was never going to stay there forever. I don’t know watt you’d describe as normal, but possibly the situation we’re in now is back to more normal than it was certainly during those pandemic periods, and certainly during the dark days of 2020 and 2021 when we were in lockdown.
Now, the situation obviously is that we’re fighting inflation, and the point about this is that inflation hurts all Australians.
I think, for many Australians, the last two decades prior to the pandemic, inflation was about 2%. It was in the background. People weren’t focused on it. Some prices were sort of increasing a bit more slowly. Others a bit more fast. But basically, it was in the background. People weren’t worrying about it. That’s not the case anymore. Everyone is focusing on inflation.
In among all of that, question time ended.
Anthony Albanese continued:
What we have been trying to address is the cost-of-living pressures, including on the people that the member for Indi raises.
They were particularly beneficiaries of our rent assistance increase, the largest increase in some 30 years.
They benefited from the increase in jobseeker and other payments that we introduced as part of our last Budget.
They benefited certainly from the cheaper medicines policy where Australians are benefited to the tune of $250m last year and that of course was disproportionately towards lower income earners and particularly older Australians who were on those regular pharmaceuticals, whether it be for heart treatment or diabetes or other treatments as well.
In addition to that, the government will continue to consider, as we have said, in the lead up to the May budget, what further measures we can put in place.
The parenting payment made a difference to 67,000 single mums as a result of the changes we have put in place, we will continue to examine what we can do, but these tax cuts are particularly aimed at middle Australia. We make no apologies for that, they are aimed at middle Australia to provide them [relief].
Independent MP Helen Haines asked about people earning under the tax free threshold and what they can expect in terms of cost of living relief:
There are 25,000 people who have incomes below the tax-free threshold and these tax as well not for money back in their pocket. There are also 20,000 people on the age pension, a thousand more on other payments like jobseeker who are struggling with strict fixed income. What new action will you take now to address cost of living pressures for these people?
Anthony Albanese said:
We had a meeting earlier today and talked about the tax cuts that were introduced by the treasurer at 12 o’clock and indeed, the people of regional Australia will in particular benefit from the Labor tax cuts that we have to deal with cost of living and in Indi, some 80% of taxpayers will get even more, but 100% of taxpayers will get a tax cut.
One of the things that the Treasury analysis that we released spoke about bracket creep, and particularly those on low incomes … cutting the tax rate from 19% to 15%, according to the Treasury, they said this in the documentation that we released.
By releasing the first tax rate from 19% to 16%, the redesign reproduces a smaller increase in average tax rate for the first seven income deciles over the next 10 years.
In other words, reduces bracket creep even for these groups compared to stage three and a no change scenario.
(This is where Angus Taylor got booted)
Angus Taylor got booted under 94A for interjecting during an answer from Anthony Albanese on the tax changes:
Paul Karp heard him saying “you don’t even understand bracket creep. Asks your economists – the real ones, not that one over there”.
He was pointing either at Andrew Charlton or the advisers box, saying to ask them rather than Chalmers.
Michael Sukkar had also been booted a little earlier for his interjections.
David Littleproud asked Chris Bowen:
Multinational developers unable to ride roughshod over communities on the government’s reckless race to 80% renewables by 2030. The government’s Dyer review found that 90% of people affected are [unhappy with their treatment]. Will the minister finally listen to the concerns of communities and establish a proper community consultation assessment process that protects regional communities against renewable projects?
Woo-ee – if he thinks renewables are bad, just wait until he hears how fossil fuel companies treat Indigenous communities!
Bowen says he ordered the review to ensure better community consultation and then goes through the organisations who are happy with the changes to consultation the government is making. He then says:
What we will not be doing, Mr Speaker, is pausing or having a moratorium as the deputy leader of the proposition [suggested this morningl, because the last decade was because enough. The last decade was pause enough. We saw another example of that last night on the television, Mr Speaker.
I am not normally one for horror movies, but last night’s viewing was pretty compelling. We saw last night the national energy guarantee, remember that? The same people that killed that are still here, still here sitting on the opposition. We agree, Mr Speaker, on this side of the house, recognise that renewable energy [is the future]
Here is that moment Daniel Hurst reported on a little earlier, when Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi asked Penny Wong about Australia’s suspended UNRWA funding:
Peter Hannam
Markets react to RBA decision
Bets shifted slightly after the RBA’s verdict and accompanying forecasts, while stocks dipped briefly. That slight frisson probably relates more to the likelihood that rate cuts might be a bit later and more drawn-out than thought before today.
But the difference is modest.
Basically, the central bank thinks the risks to the domestic outlook are “broadly balanced”, which means it’s happy with its current settings.
The bank’s statement on monetary policy – which journalists have been poring over in a lock-up – noted market expectations the cash rate would “remain around its current level of 4.35% until mid-2024 before declining to around 3.25% by the middle of 2026”.
That’s not necessarily where things will land, black swans and all that.
The RBA notably barely changed its forecasts for how soon it expects inflation to drop back to its preferred 2-3% target range. It did, though, trim its forecast near-term price changes.
It now expects both consumer price inflation and its trimmed mean measure – which strips out more volatile movements – to ease to 2.8% by the end of 2025. Its November forecast had those rates at 2.9% by then.
The range midpoint – of 2.5% – would be approached by mid-2026. Way into the next federal election cycle by then.
“Recent high inflation is consistent with excess demand in the economy and strong domestic cost pressures,” the statement said. “Services inflation remains high despite having passed its peak, while goods inflation has recorded substantial declines.”
The good news is that wage increases should exceed inflation from here on for a while – clawing back some of the drop in real wages over the past two years.
Daniel Hurst
Senator presses Albanese government over ICJ ruling
In Senate question time, the Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi also pressed the government over its response to the international court of justice’s ruling last month in relation to South Africa’s case against Israel under the genocide convention.
Faruqi said:
We’re coming up to week two of complete silence from the Labor government on the international court of justice ruling which found that Israel is plausibly committing genocide* and gave a clear signal to Australia to stop aiding, abetting and shielding Israel. Minister, when will the Labor government break its cowardly silence on the ICJ ruling?
Before we go on, a quick reminder: the ICJ has not yet ruled substantively on South Africa’s allegations that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza (that process could take years). However, in a provisional ruling on 26 January, the ICJ found “a real and imminent risk that irreparable prejudice” will be caused to the rights of Palestinians:
In the court’s view, the facts and circumstances mentioned above are sufficient to conclude that at least some of the rights claimed by South Africa and for which it is seeking protection are plausible. This is the case with respect to the right of the Palestinians in Gaza to be protected from acts of genocide and related prohibited acts identified in Article III, and the right of South Africa to seek Israel’s compliance with the latter’s obligations under the convention.
The ICJ ordered Israel to “take all measures within its power to prevent the commission of all acts” within the scope of the genocide convention and also to “prevent and punish the direct and public incitement to commit genocide”.
In response to the question, the foreign minister, Penny Wong, said Faruqi “again” had “not looked at what we have done and said”.
Wong pointed to a joint statement issued by the Australian and New Zealand governments after meetings of defence and foreign ministers in Melbourne last week.
Paragraph 18 said:
Ministers noted the international court of justice’s (ICJ) ruling on provisional measures in South Africa’s case against Israel. Ministers expressed their respect for the independence of the ICJ and the critical role it plays in upholding international law and the rules-based order, and noted that decisions of the ICJ are binding on the parties to the case. Ministers expect Israel to act in accordance with the ICJ’s ruling, including to enable the provision of basic services and humanitarian assistance.
Wong told the Senate the statement specifically expressed “our shared expectation … that Israel will act in accordance with the ICJ’s ruling”.
Wong added:
Now you might not think that’s of significance where two Five Eyes countries say that. I beg to differ.
Anyway, here is how Sussan Ley is dealing with it
#Breaking: The Treasurer just refused to rule out changing negative gearing.
— Sussan Ley (@sussanley) February 6, 2024
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#Breaking: The Prime Minister just refused to rule out taxing the family home.
— Sussan Ley (@sussanley) February 6, 2024
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Politicians co-opting the overused #BREAKING needs to stop, by the way. It hurts the eyes.
So it is back to Jim Chalmers:
It beggars belief that the guy who is not asked me a question in more than six months is chirping about relevance.
What would you know about relevance. What would the member for Hume know about relevance to make I say once again for those opposite I have dealt with this question publicly in the recent past and the point I make once again, Mr Speaker, is it is almost three o’clock on the day that we introduced legislation to give a bigger tax cut for more workers to help with the cost of living.
They still have not asked us a question at 10 to 3 about the legislation I introduced at noon today and we all know what is going on here, Mr Speaker. They want to ask us a question about all of the things we have not said we are doing because they cannot defend their position on the thing that we have said we are doing.
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