Watch live: question time
Question time is about to begin in the House of Representatives.
Watch live below.
Senator Tammy Tyrrell takes new seat in the upper house after joining the Labor Party
In other political news outside of today’s dramatic question time, Senator Tammy Tyrrell has taken her new seat in the upper house after joining the Labor Party earlier this afternoon.
Tyrrell and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese held a press conference this morning in which the independent senator announced she was joining the government.
Her admission to the party took place shortly after midday.
Our photographer Alex Ellinghausen pictured Tyrrell fist-bumping Senator Dorinda Cox, who last year defected from the Greens to join Labor.
Due to the makeup of the Senate, Tyrrell’s change of heart does not alter the government’s fortunes in passing legislation.
Labor will still be reliant on the Greens or the Coalition to see their bills pass parliament.
‘Withdraw it!’: dramatic scenes in QT as Liberal ejected
Twenty out of 23 Labor frontbenchers own more than two properties they can continue to negatively gear, Liberal MP Simon Kennedy has told the Federal Parliament during question time.
However, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was quick to question why opposition leader Angus Taylor had not asked that question himself.
“I wonder why, Mr Speaker, why a question about properties or wealth or inheritance or trusts wasn’t asked by this bloke [Taylor], but they get the new kid, the member for Cook, to ask the question,” Albanese said.
The jibe at Kennedy elicited some interjections from the Coalition and Albanese appeared to call a Liberal backbencher a “moron.”
Coalition pursues PM over broken promises in heated question time exchange
Liberal frontbencher Ted O’Brien has sledged the prime minister, saying his nose has grown, as the opposition pursues the federal government over broken promises while creatively trying to avoid the word “lies”, as per the house speaker’s latest edict.
Anthony Albanese is apparently channelling the insults into energy as he’s just banged the lectern.
“We want more family homes. We want more family homes,” Albanese said, slamming his fist down in tempo. “They want to lock young people out of home ownership.”
‘Untruthed’: Liberal pulled up for using the L-word
Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson got just four words into his first question before the speaker had to interrupt.
“Labor lied to Australians –,” Tim Wilson began.
After a heated debate during yesterday’s question time about the Coalition’s proclivity for accusing Labor of lying, Speaker Milton Dick said he didn’t want the word used any more.
Backbenchers were encouraged to shout it out at their political opponents when they heard it being used in the questions, he said.
Manager of opposition business Dan Tehan made the case for using the word and said was okay in this instance because it was true.
But he needn’t have worried – Wilson found a solution.
“Labor mislead, deceived, untruthed, about their tax plan,” he said.
Taylor demands guarantee on family home tax from PM
Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has kicked off question time by demanding Prime Minister Anthony Albanese promise not to tax the family home after his about-face on negative gearing.
In response, Albanese went on the attack reminding the Coalition of their opposition to Labor’s surprise tax cut at the last federal election.
“I thank the member for his question about tax policy,” he said.
“Truth is that if the Coalition had won the last election and the leader of the opposition had been the one delivering the budget on Tuesday night, we know that it would have contained a tax increase for every single Australian taxpayer, all 14 million of them.”
Watch live: question time
Question time is about to begin in the House of Representatives.
Watch live below.
Presidents Trump and Xi start their bilateral talks
In global news, presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have started their talks inside the Great Hall of the People, China’s grand national legislature.
On the US side, Trump is accompanied by senior cabinet members including Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
On the Chinese side, Xi is accompanied by Foreign Minister Wang Yi; Cai Qi, his chief of staff and right-hand man; and other officials.
Xi has opened the meeting with some introductory remarks welcoming Trump, which reporters are invited to see before being asked to leave the room.
Trump, in his characteristic style, was more effusive than Xi about the future of US-China relations in his opening remarks, and described the welcome to Beijing as “an honour like few have ever seen before”.
You can follow our live blog of the proceedings here.
Cuba has run out of diesel and fuel oil amid US oil blockade, minister says
Cuba has completely run out of diesel and fuel oil, the country’s energy and mines minister said, as the capital, Havana, faced its worst rolling blackouts in decades amid a US blockade that has strangled the island of fuel.
“We have absolutely no fuel [oil], and absolutely no diesel,” Energy Minister Vicente de la O Levy said on state-run media on Wednesday (Cuba time), adding the national grid was in a critical state. “We have no reserves.”
Blackouts have increased dramatically this week and last across Havana, and many neighbourhoods hav been without light for 20 to 22 hours a day, the minister said, heightening tensions in a city already exhausted by food, fuel and medicine shortages.
The national grid, he said, was operating entirely on domestic crude oil, natural gas and renewable energy.
Cuba has installed 1300 megawatts of solar power over the past two years, but much of that capacity is lost to grid instability amid the fuel shortages, de la O Levy said.
Taylor’s approach to migration ‘divisive’: Mulino
Assistant Treasurer Daniel Mulino has expressed concern over the migration policies expected to be announced by Opposition Leader Angus Taylor during his budget reply speech tonight.
The Coalition have slated the idea of stripping welfare benefits for migrants until they become citizens, a policy Mulino labelled “divisive” and “really bad for the country”.
Speaking to Sky News this afternoon, he said: “What’s Angus Taylor trying to achieve by demonising this huge part of our population that contributes so much?
“I really worry about policies that start to demonise permanent residents in the way that it looks like tonight’s speech might. I think it’s really bad for our country.”
Coalition’s fossil fuel plan ‘out of touch’: Climate Council
The Climate Council has labelled the Coalition’s plan for fossil fuels “out of touch”, ahead of Angus Taylor’s budget reply speech tonight.
In a statement released this morning, chief executive Amanda McKenzie said:
The Coalition’s Budget Reply is a fossil fuel fantasy—it’s so out of touch, they’re still trying to drill for oil in a well that’s nearly dry. The dregs can’t fuel Australia, the Coalition would have us tied to foreign oil indefinitely.
If we want fewer price spikes, fewer supply shocks, and less climate pollution, we must expand homegrown clean energy solutions that put us back in control. Electrifying homes and transport puts Australians back in the driver’s seat, which is exactly why millions of households are already turning to rooftop solar, batteries and electric vehicles to protect themselves.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: www.smh.com.au
