Sticking with Malcolm Turnbull’s impromptu press conference at Parliament House in Canberra this morning, the former prime minister was asked if the Liberal Party could still be saved, and responded by saying: “I’m a Christian, and nothing’s beyond salvation, but I think it could be a long haul”.
As One Nation rises in the polls to the detriment of the Coalition’s primary vote, Turnbull accused the Liberals of having parroted too much of the right-wing party’s rhetoric, which is leading to their own electoral demise.
“Pauline Hanson has run on a couple of issues, immigration being the main one, others related to that. If you follow her down that rabbit hole, as [the Coalition] have done, and if you try to outdo Pauline Hanson, or compete with her … what you are doing is increasing the salience of that issue,” Turnbull told journalists.
“They’re taking the megaphone that the opposition has and using it to broadcast and promote the issues that One Nation is interested in. And surprise, surprise, the salience of those issues rises and One Nation’s vote does.”
Turnbull said the party had become too interested in appealing to sections of the media, saying: “Sky News is the best thing that has ever happened to the Labor Party. It has drawn the Libs off into this la la land.”
“If you hear a sort of … soft, purring, rubbing noise in the parliament, it’s all of the Labor members just rubbing their hands and hugging themselves with glee as they watch the catastrophe on the other side.”
Former Liberal prime minister Malcolm Turnbull has just given an impromptu press conference in the Senate courtyard at Australian Parliament House, and called on Liberal leadership rival Angus Taylor to declare his hand.
“I think it is important to stand up and be counted,” he said. “If Angus wants to be leader of the Liberal Party, he should stand up and say so and say why.”
Describing the party he once led as in “existential crisis”, he went on to say Taylor now has “rather unenlightened views on energy” but claims as a young economist, Taylor had argued for a carbon price.
He concluded by saying the Labor Party needed more competition for voters in the centre.
“Given that the centre is the political battleground of Australian politics, there really should be some competition there. But I think, regrettably, the Liberal Party and the national party at the moment, are no longer, by their own choice, competing in the centre.”
Asked if he would support a new, centre right party, he said “we’ll see what happens. I’m not about to start one today or announce one today”.
Our national correspondent Rob Harris wrote about the possibility of a new party here.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has thanked the Labor caucus for maintaining “discipline and dignity”, something he says is a clear contrast to the Coalition, following a week dominated by the opposition reuniting and ongoing speculation over a challenge to Opposition Leader Sussan Ley’s leadership.
During the weekly caucus briefing Albanese told his MPs that the government would be focused on strengthening their fiscal position as they look towards the May budget.
MPs are understood to have thanked Albanese for calling out an article in The Nightly titled “Why I wouldn’t marry Sussan Ley”, and for his defence of MPs who had received threats of violence.
The nation’s air traffic control organisation has pushed back on claims that it alone was responsible for a spate of delayed and cancelled flights in Sydney in mid-January, pointing to the effect of the weather on the day.
Airservices Australia deputy chief executive Officer Peter Curran, while fronting Senate estimates last night, said the organisation was responsible for just over one-third of the delays and cancellations that occurred on January 15 at Sydney Airport.
“Certainly it appeared that we were held accountable for all the delays that day,” said Curran. “In fact, there was already significant weather that was forecast in Sydney that day; there was low cloud and poor visibility in the morning and thunderstorms in the afternoon.”
“And we were actually attributable for about 36 per cent of the delay only.”
“That doesn’t mean that we didn’t cause impact to passengers and our customers; we did. But we were not the reason for all of the delays and cancellations in Sydney that day,” Curran told the Senate Rural, Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee.
On January 15, at least 38 flights were cancelled in and out of Sydney airport while dozens more were delayed as air traffic controllers implemented “spacing intervals” to ensure safety with reduced staffing levels. At the time, Airservices Australia said it was triggered after “a number of staff” took short-notice sick and carer’s leave.
Airservices Australia has contended with staffing issues related to the disruption and aftermath by the COVID lockdowns, which ground the nation’s aviation services to a halt, before restarting in 2022. The disruption of flying prompted resignations and staff reductions which – given the skilled nature of the work – have been hard to replace.
Independent MP Zali Steggall has slammed the government’s decision to invite Israeli president Isaac Herzog to Australia following violent clashes between police and protesters at a Sydney demonstration last night.
Speaking to Sky News this morning, Steggall said she did not agree with chants such as “globalise the intifada” but that the clashes were “entirely foreseeable”.
“I don’t agree with what is being chanted … But I think the prime minister bears the blame of this situation. This was entirely foreseeable, and that’s why I wrote to him, asking him to reconsider and to really clarify. It was entirely foreseeable, considering the last two years and the issues and the damage this has seen to social cohesion, that events like last night were going to happen.
“Why are we having the leader of a foreign state here causing social disruption and impacting our social cohesion, if we are Australians first and foremost? Inviting the head of another state that has highly foreseeable consequences on our social cohesion is something the prime minister should have taken much greater care in considering,” Steggall said.
Independent MP Allegra Spender has called for a “clear investigation” into allegations of police brutality against protesters in Sydney last night, saying while she was not present at any protests she was disturbed by the images she saw.
“I think everyone has been distressed by the images overnight, and I think that this is really, in the next few days … a question [of] how can we make sure that as much as possible, you know, we just take the temperature down,” Spender told journalists at Parliament House in Canberra.
“Nobody wants to see that sort of violence that we saw last night … that sort of violence which we saw, I think, needs a clear investigation,” she said.
Footage of police and protesters clashing on the streets of Sydney have gone viral, with both sides facing condemnation from politicians. Spender urged “everyone” to “take a breath” and work to retain social cohesion while expressing strongly held views.
“That is kind of that balance that I think we need to strike, as in all Australians, at the moment, right now. And it is, it is a hard time, but I think people feel very strongly. But I think that is really important,” she said.
The MP whose electorate takes in Bondi Beach – the site of December 14’s shooting that prompted Israeli President Isaac Herzog’s visit – said: “it’s very hard for me to make a proper assessment, but I’m distressed by the images, and I think that we do need to investigate what actually happened to make sure that we can get to the bottom of how it was managed”.
Liberal leadership rival Angus Taylor’s key moderate backer, Jane Hume, has gone toe-to-toe with Sussan Ley in a closed-door party room meeting, demanding to know how the opposition leader would reverse disastrous polling as MPs brace for a leadership challenge in days.
Hume, whom Ley dumped from the frontbench last year, is in the mix to run as Taylor’s deputy running mate and raised expectations of a spill on Monday when she warned about an election wipeout. Ley rebuked Hume yesterday, urging her to keep her criticisms for Tuesday’s confidential party room meeting.
Hume appeared to take the advice, asking Ley this morning what Ley would do to avoid “electoral oblivion” at the polls.
Ley responded, according to three MPs in the room unwilling to speak publicly, by saying: “It’s simple. Stop talking about ourselves. Disunity is death.”
One MP said it was disappointing that Ley did not give a more fulsome response on policy direction, given she asked Ley to keep the conversations for the party room meeting.
Liberals are preparing for a spill on Thursday or Friday. This masthead reported yesterday that Taylor was preparing to quit the frontbench as early as Wednesday, after Question Time, to precipitate a challenge.
The Reserve Bank’s decision to lift interest rates has driven consumer confidence to its lowest level in two years.
The ANZ-Roy Morgan weekly measure of consumer sentiment dropped 3.6 per cent. The measure fell to its lowest level since December 2023 when the official cash rate was 4.35 per cent.
ANZ economist Sophia Angala said those with a home or buying one were particularly hard hit by the Reserve’s decision.
“The sharpest falls in the week occurred for household confidence in economic conditions, as five-year economic confidence plunged to its lowest level in 25 years of data history,” she said.
“Confidence slipped across all housing cohorts, led by a sharp 5 point drop in confidence among outright homeowners. Those paying off their homes are now the least confident cohort.”
The Reserve Bank’s decision to lift interest rates has driven consumer confidence to its lowest level in two years.
The ANZ-Roy Morgan weekly measure of consumer sentiment dropped 3.6 per cent. The measure fell to its lowest level since December 2023 when the official cash rate was 4.35 per cent.
Savannah Guthrie’s family is “at an hour of desperation” in the search for her missing mother, the US Today show host said in a video, just hours before a purported ransom deadline apparently set by Nancy Guthrie’s abductors.
Savannah Guthrie didn’t mention the deadline in the video, saying her family in Arizona believed their 84-year-old mother was still out there and had heard everyone’s prayers.
“She was taken and we don’t know where, and we need your help,” Guthrie said in the video posted on Instagram.
“No matter where you are, even if you’re far from Tucson, if you see anything, if you hear anything.”
The mysterious disappearance and search has riveted the country – from President Donald Trump, who spoke with Savannah Guthrie last week, to the online sleuths who’ve flooded social media with tips, theories and rumours.
Multiple news outlets have received alleged ransom letters during the past week. At least one letter made monetary demands and set deadlines for receiving the money.
Law enforcement officials declined to affirm that the letters were credible but said all tips were being investigated seriously.
Authorities believe Nancy Guthrie was taken against her will from her home just outside Tucson and have growing concerns about her health, because she needs daily medication.
AP
Greens senator David Shoebridge has accused Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of inviting clashes between police and protesters in the streets of Sydney, saying his rhetoric had “delivered violence on the street” and encouraged police into altercations with protesters.
“The prime minister can say he supports the right to protest, but he’s part of a political movement that has been demonising protesters, seeking to conflate, falsely conflate, hundreds of thousands, millions of Australians who have been demonstrating against the genocide with the hateful, hateful violence from two violent men whose ideology has no connection with the free Palestine movement,” Shoebridge said in reference to the Bondi shooters.
“We’ve seen Prime Minister Albanese repeatedly attack protesters using words, and now those words have actually delivered violence on the street in the form of police brutality,” Shoebridge claimed.
He said the prime minister needed “to be held account for his words and his demonising of protesters, his appalling political demonising of protesters because his words matter, and his words are part of the reason the police felt able to deliver that level of violence on the streets of Sydney.”
Shoebridge told journalists at Parliament House that Albanese “should apologise to the people of Australia for inviting that conflict onto the streets. He should make it clear in his words and his actions that he condemns the violence being delivered by another Labor leader, [Premier] Chris Minns in Sydney.”
Shoebridge said staff from his office were present at the protest and were “appalled” by what they saw.
“There are images of packs of police charging through the city looking for people to pull to the ground, to tackle to the ground and to violently arrest. Who created that violence on the streets of Sydney last night? Prime Minister Albanese and Premier Chris Minns.”
Asked this morning how he felt to see the images of police and protesters clashing, Albanese said: “Oh, look, I’m devastated by it.
“These are really scenes that I think shouldn’t be taking place. People should be able to express their views peacefully, but the police were very clear about the routes that were required if people wanted to march to go a particular route and to ensure that this was done peacefully”.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: www.smh.com.au
