Federal politics live: Coalition says plan for information access charges a ‘transparency tax’

Meeting with his colleagues this morning, the prime minister spoke about the rallies on Sunday and stressed that not everyone who attended was associated with neo-Nazis.

That said, he urged politicians to call out racist behaviour and said he was shocked to see people in the black uniform.

Anthony Albanese also raised concerns about how the Jewish and Indian communities appeared to be particularly targeted over the weekend and encouraged MPs and Senators to meet with different multicultural communities when they headed back to their electorates.

Albanese was asked about the active recruitment of people to the neo-Nazi cause.

He said people should be given space to move away from the group and not push them “further down that rabbit hole”.

He also noted that net overseas migration is going down, responding to some of the concerns raised during the rallies on Sunday.

The prime minister has told his colleagues that it was “quite horrific” to hear neo-Nazi leader Thomas Sewell had gatecrashed the Victorian premier’s press conference.

Jacinta Allan was forced to cut her press conference short when Sewell shouted insults and accusations at her in Melbourne.

Anthony Albanese made the comments to his colleagues this morning during the government’s usual Tuesday morning caucus meeting.

Labor’s bill to remove procedural fairness for a cohort of migrants set for deportation to Nauru will pass the parliament with Coalition support, but will go to a short Senate hearing first.

That’s the main bit of news to come from a media briefing held after the opposition party room met this morning.

We’re told by a party room spokesperson that it was a short meeting with no substantial discussion on the three big issues of the week: net zero, aged care and the weekend’s anti-immigration process.

But Sussan Ley did tell colleagues she was inclined not to support Labor’s plan to water down FOI laws, although she and colleagues are yet to be briefed on that plan, set for introduction to parliament tomorrow.

And Barnaby Joyce‘s private members bill to repeal net zero will also be introduced in the Senate by fellow National and net zero opponent Matt Canavan.

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young has written to the Speaker of the House and the parliamentary standards committee about Bob Katter’s outburst at a journalist last week.

Katter has not apologised for his behaviour, but instead doubled down, telling Nine Newspapers he should’ve been even more aggressive.

The Greens think Katter should face consequences and have questioned how the government would act if it was a different MP.

We’ll give you more details once we’ve got our hands on Hanson-Young’s letter.

Australia’s permanent migration intake will remain at 185,000 for this financial year.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke issued a short statement this morning announcing the government had set the rate to the same level as the 2024-25 financial year.

“It follows consultation with the states and territories, which recommended maintaining the size and composition of the Program, with a focus on skilled migration,” he said.

“The Department of Home Affairs has been processing visas based on last year’s level, so there has been no disruption to the delivery of the Program.”

It comes just days after anti-immigration protests took place across the country.

The permanent migration intake includes skilled, family and special eligibility visas. It doesn’t include the movements of Australian citizens, permanent and temporary visa holders, which is recorded by net overseas migration.

Greens and crossbench MPs and Senators have joined forces to speak out about a gas leak coming from a gas storage tank near Darwin.

Documents seen by the ABC suggest the scale of the leaking pollutants could be equivalent to 8,300 new cars on the road every year it is in use.

Independent MP Monique Ryan says the leak — which hasn’t been fixed — is a “regulatory failure”.

“It is a health risk not only for territorians but for all australians but it is actively contributing as we stand here to an increase in carbon emissions,” Ryan says.

Darwin-based paediatrician Louise Woodward says the leak has been going for years and the NT Environmental Protection Agency hasn’t acted.

She’s called on Santos to fix the leak, and wants the federal government to legislate industrial air pollution to safeguard communities.

“Research from around the world shows that children living near gas operations have higher rates of serious illness, like asthma and cancer,” Woodward says.

Greens Leader Larissa Waters has called for “science-based” climate targets and a toughening of rules against oil and gas companies.

“This company cannot comply with environmental regulations, has been leaking gas for almost 20 years, can’t be bothered to fix the leaks that might cost them a bit of money. They do not deserve fresh approvals,” Waters says.

Independent Senator David Pocock has urged the federal government to “grow a spine” and force Santos to fix the leak before the tank is filled again.

Members of the crossbench have joined a group of former senior defence and security leaders to call for a “climate first” foreign policy for Australia.

The Australian Security Leaders Climate Group, which is led by the former chief of the defence force Chris Barrie, has issued a new report that says the government is too fixated on building alliances with its traditional allies and isn’t focusing nearly enough on the existential risks posed by climate change.

The group calls Australia’s current foreign policy settings “dangerously out of date” and says the government needs to invest much more heavily in the “diplomatic, economic, and humanitarian tools needed to respond to escalating climate-driven crises”.

Several crossbench and Greens MPs and senators are also calling for a similar foreign policy overhaul, saying the Trump administration’s assault on America’s institutions and climate science should propel the government to reconsider the alliance — and focus instead on building regional cooperation to tackle climate threats.

The group says Australia also needs to urgently ratchet up its own actions to cut emissions, as well as building international alliances to bolster international action on climate change and phase out subsidies for fossil fuels.

A snap press conference was called by Shadow Attorney-General Julian Leeser this morning so he could give us a couple lines about the government’s proposed changes to Freedom of Information.

By his own admission, Leeser has yet to be briefed about the proposal. But he told reporters he’s concerned by what he’s read in the paper.

“This is a government that talked a big game on transparency before they came to office. But what they’ve done since is anything but transparency,” he says, referring to stakeholders signing NDA agreements and a cut in staff for the opposition.

He’s gone as far as labelling the move to charge for access to documents as a “transparency tax”.

When asked, Leeser acknowledged the FOI system could be reformed but he’s not keen on the way the government is going around it.

After a couple of quesitons he had to dash off to the Coalition’s joint party room meeting.

A planned change to the Freedom of Information system will soon see the government charge for access to documents.

The government argues the changes, to be introduced to parliament on Wednesday, are designed to stop departments from “being inundated by anonymous requests”.

Under new legislation, there’ll be exemptions for people seeking information related to themselves, but media companies and journalists will be among those to be charged.

Health Minister Mark Butler defended the changes when asked in the parliamentary corridors this morning.

“We’re frankly being inundated by anonymous requests as a government for Freedom of Information and we don’t know where those requests come from,” he said. 

“Many of them, we’re sure, are AI or bot generated requests. They may be linked to foreign actors, foreign powers.”

Health Minister Mark Butler says he’s open to establishing a national body to regulate the IVF industry after numerous cases of mix ups.

They include stories of incorrect embryo transfer and, as revealed by ABC Investigations yesterday, a white couple giving birth to a biracial baby.

Butler says he’ll meet with his state and territory counterparts next week to discuss regulation because for too long the industry has been self-regulated.

“I think self-regulation isn’t working and I don’t think that it is inspiring the confidence that parents need,” he said.

He said there was a particular eye to taking over sperm donor regulation as part of a potential crackdown.

Labor is facing its first Senate showdown of the new term, with an unlikely political alliance pushing to expedite the delivery of home supports for older Australians languishing on a waitlist.

The Coalition, Greens and independent senator David Pocock have teamed up to pressure the government to bring forward 20,000 home support packages, after the government’s promised release of 83,000 was pushed back from July to November.

More than 121,000 older Australians are waiting to be assessed for assistance to help them live at home, the federal health department revealed on Friday, on top of at least 87,000 who have been approved but are waiting for a package or a higher level of support.

The government needs to pass its bill to tweak existing legislation to bring it in line with the aged care reforms before they are rolled out later this year, but the alliance has seized on it to bring amendments that would require additional packages to be released immediately.

Read the full story by Maani Truu and Olivia Caisley at the link below.

We’re still no closer to learning how Donald Trump’s hefty pharmaceutical tariffs will impact Australia’s exports.

The US president flagged a possible 200 per cent tariff on pharmaceuticals — one of Australia’s biggest exports to the US — earlier this year.

Health Minister Mark Butler told ABC Radio National Breakfast he’s not received any clarity on the matter.

“The honest answer to that is no,” Butler told ABC Radio National Breakfast. 

“What we do know is that the Trump administration, perhaps unsurprisingly, is focused on trying to get … their medicine prices down.

“What the impact for the rest of the world would be, is something we’re still, as every other country is trying to do, trying to understand a little bit better.”

Butler says he’s meeting with industry chief executives tomorrow to discuss the matter.

Health Minister Mark Butler also stopped by the ABC’s Radio National Breakfast studio, where he was asked if it was acceptable 200,000 Australians are waiting for home care packages.

“Well, we want to get those waiting lists down as much as we possibly can,” he says.

The government needs to pass a bill this week to tweak existing legislation to bring it in line with the aged care reforms before they are rolled out this year.

But an alliance of Coalition, Greens and independent David Pocock are threatening to make life in the Senate more difficult for Labor as they pressure the government to bring forward the rollout of home support packages.

Butler says the delay from the July 1 start date to November was “relatively short” and was welcomed by the sector.

“This is a new system. This is not just about the release of new packages,” he said.

Dan Tehan is asked if Barnaby Joyce’s push to repeal net zero emissions targets has been disruptive to the Coalition’s review of energy policy.

The shadow energy and emissions reduction minister says as a backbencher Joyce has a right to pursue any policy he wants to.

“What I’ve always tried to do in my parliamentary career is make sure we’re bringing everyone together and to make sure that we’ve got a unified approach,” he tells ABC Radio National Breakfast. 

But he says it’s not always possible to “get everyone on a unity ticket”.

So can the Coalition find common ground?

“That’s what we’ve got to work through over the next nine to 12 months,” he says.

A review of the Coalition’s energy policy will take at least nine months to complete and “get right”, Dan Tehan says.

The shadow energy and emissions reduction minister has told ABC Radio National Breakfast is leading the party’s process.

He says he wants to take a “methodical” approach to the review despite internal calls for the matter to be settled as soon as possible.

“I’ve always said we’ve got to take our time to get it right and that’s what I intend to do,” Tehan says.

Tehan adds he’ll be travelling to the United States at the end of the week to look at developments on nuclear, stressing that lifting the ban on nuclear power was “common sense”.

“We’re seeing all the big tech companies look to nuclear and look to energy abundance as an absolute key for economies going forward. And yet, here in Australia, we seem to be constraining our energy at every opportunity,” he says.

Asked if the Coalition would come to a policy conclusion that makes it unelectable, Tehan says the opposition will adopt an approach that’s in the “best interests” of Australians.

Independent MPs are meeting with children’s advocates and the eSafety commissioner in Canberra this morning to call for more action to protect children from the harms of artificial intelligence.

The roundtable will focus on the idea of a nationwide prevention and awareness program for AI-related harms, as well as a review of facial recognition and additional training for police.

National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds says AI is already posing a real risk to children’s safety.

“Rather than waiting for tragedies to happen, we need to get on the front foot with training, with regulation, with community education about the risks so that we prevent harm to children,” she said.

Access to apps that use artificial intelligence to create nude images and undetectable online stalking tools will be restricted under the government’s latest cyber crackdown.

The government will work with industry to ban the apps in a bid to close the gaps in laws to proactively preventing abuse facilitated by new technology.

Communications Minister Anika Wells says there was “no place” for apps that are “used solely to abuse, humiliate and harm people, especially our children”.

“This is too important for us not to act. Abusive technologies are widely and easily accessible and are causing real and irreparable damage now,” she said in a statement.

“While this move won’t eliminate the problem of abusive technology in one fell swoop, alongside existing laws and our world-leading online safety reforms, it will make a real difference in protecting Australians.”

Much like the social media ban for under 16s, the onus will be on tech companies to prevent the availability of the apps.

The government passed laws last year banning the sharing of deepfake pornography and imposing a six-year prison term.

Labor frontbencher Amanda Rishworth received the call-up for the morning show rounds, where she was asked about migration in the wake of the weekend’s anti-immigration rallies.

The employment minister says there’s “no excuse” for some of the behaviour seen at the protests as she defended the government’s actions to make migration more sustainable.

“I think we all need to stand up and say that there is no place to be calling for people, particularly groups of people, if they don’t look like you, to be excluded from this country,” she told Nine.

“When it comes to migration policy, we’ve been doing a lot of work … and for example, we have seen a reduction in the net overseas migration from the peak of COVID levels, down 37 per cent, particularly as a result of a number of things but including sustainability around student visas.”

Rishworth said the permanent migration target would be released soon.

“I think as Minister [Tony] Burke said, I think it is very soon. We are working with states and territories on that.

“That target will be released shortly”.

Liberal frontbencher Tim Wilson agreed there was “no place” for intimidation of Australians because of their bloodline.

He said he wants “sustainable migration” with investment in public resources and housing matched to the number of people arriving.

Health Minister Mark Butler is out and about this morning, promoting the passage of the government’s cheaper medicines bill.

The legislation passed the Senate last night and reduces the cost of a script to $25 from January 1.

“This will make a huge difference,” Butler told Sunrise, adding he’s heard stories of people asking their pharmacists for advice on which scripts they could get away with not filling.

“It’s good for the hip pocket and that’s important. But it’s also good for your health. It maximises the chance that people can afford the medicines that are important for their health.”