Keating: government ‘flogging a dead seahorse’ with Aukus deal
Daniel Hurst
The former prime minister Paul Keating has accused the government of “flogging a dead seahorse” with its nuclear-powered submarine plan and has argued the Labor party’s rank-and-file membership “abhors Aukus”.
Keating has never been a fan of the Aukus security partnership with the US and the UK, and has said so repeatedly. The former Labor PM has argued that it will constrain Australia’s room to make independent military deployment decisions for decades to come.
His latest statement follows the meeting of the Aukus defence ministers and secretaries in London last night.
At the joint press conference, a journalist asked the ministers and secretaries about Keating’s views. The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said the submarine plan would “provide a generational capability to Australia that will provide benefits for many, many years to come” and was “well worth the investment”.
Austin added:
We are committed to making sure that, you know, Australia has what it needs to have … and it will make its own sovereign decisions about what it will do in the future. We fully expect that.
In a statement issued on Friday afternoon, Keating said the Australian defence minister, Richard Marles, “has his US friend propping him up in London to throw a 10,000-mile punch at me – and as usual, failing to materially respond to legitimate and particular criticisms made of the Aukus arrangement”.
Keating said Austin’s claim about Australian sovereign control “would only be true until the prime minister and Marles got their phone call from the President, seeking to mobilise Australian military assets – wherein, both would click their heels in alacrity and agreement”. Keating said:
The rest of us would read about it in some self-serving media statement afterwards.
(Continued in next blog post)
Key events
The Greens have renewed calls on the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek to call in Tamboran Resources’ fracking project in the Beetaloo Basin under the water trigger, following the Environment Centre NT filing an urgent application to stop the gas company from drilling without an environmental water assessment.
Greens spokesperson for the environment and water, Senator Sarah Hanson-Young, said it was “shocking that gas fracking cowboys have started drilling with zero environmental water assessments”.
It is disgraceful that the minister is leaving it to communities on the frontline of environmental destruction to do the government’s job and make sure all assessments are completed before any work starts.
The minister’s request for scientific advice from IESC isn’t good enough. A recent presentation to IESC made it clear aquifers in the Beetaloo are ‘highly susceptible to contamination or drawdown from activities that support shale gas extraction’.
I urge the minister to do the right thing, right now – call this dangerous fracking project in, look at the science, and listen to the communities and Traditional Owners who have been pleading with you to protect their water – the lifeblood of the NT.
Pedestrian reportedly hit by a car in Penrith dies
A pedestrian has died after he was hit by a vehicle in Penrith, in Sydney’s west on Friday.
About 12.45pm, emergency services were called after reports that a man on a mobility scooter was struck by a car, which failed to stop after the crash.
The pedestrian – believed to be a man aged in his 80s – was treated by NSW Ambulance paramedics; however, he died at the scene. He is yet to be identified.
Officers attached to Nepean Police Area command established a crime scene, which will be examined by specialist police from the Crash Investigation Unit.
Following inquiries, police arrested a man at a shopping centre on Jane Street, Penrith, about 1.45pm. He has been taken to Nepean hospital for mandatory testing.
Daniel Hurst
Marles says Keating’s Aukus criticism ‘nothing new’
The former prime minister Paul Keating also took aim at the defence minister, Richard Marles, for his comments in London last night.
Marles had played down the latest Aukus-related criticism from Keating, saying it wasn’t a new line of attack.
Mr Keating, to give him credit, has been consistent in his position over a long period of time. What Mr Keating is saying now is what Mr Keating was saying in March of last year. So there’s really nothing new in his comments. And obviously he is perfectly entitled to the view that he holds.
But what’s also not new is the strategic imperative for Australia to walk down the path of acquiring a nuclear-powered submarine capability.
Marles also said Aukus was “utterly essential for Australia’s future and the strategic imperative of that remains unchanged, irrespective of what Mr Keating says”. Marles noted Aukus had bipartisan support from the major Australian political parties, and from the Labor party’s national conference in Brisbane in August last year.
Keating countered with this comment:
This may be true at some factionally, highly managed national conference – like the last one – but it is utterly untrue of the Labor party’s membership at large – which he knows.
The membership abhors Aukus and everything that smacks of national sublimation. It does not expect these policies from a Labor government.
Keating: government ‘flogging a dead seahorse’ with Aukus deal
Daniel Hurst
The former prime minister Paul Keating has accused the government of “flogging a dead seahorse” with its nuclear-powered submarine plan and has argued the Labor party’s rank-and-file membership “abhors Aukus”.
Keating has never been a fan of the Aukus security partnership with the US and the UK, and has said so repeatedly. The former Labor PM has argued that it will constrain Australia’s room to make independent military deployment decisions for decades to come.
His latest statement follows the meeting of the Aukus defence ministers and secretaries in London last night.
At the joint press conference, a journalist asked the ministers and secretaries about Keating’s views. The US defence secretary, Lloyd Austin, said the submarine plan would “provide a generational capability to Australia that will provide benefits for many, many years to come” and was “well worth the investment”.
Austin added:
We are committed to making sure that, you know, Australia has what it needs to have … and it will make its own sovereign decisions about what it will do in the future. We fully expect that.
In a statement issued on Friday afternoon, Keating said the Australian defence minister, Richard Marles, “has his US friend propping him up in London to throw a 10,000-mile punch at me – and as usual, failing to materially respond to legitimate and particular criticisms made of the Aukus arrangement”.
Keating said Austin’s claim about Australian sovereign control “would only be true until the prime minister and Marles got their phone call from the President, seeking to mobilise Australian military assets – wherein, both would click their heels in alacrity and agreement”. Keating said:
The rest of us would read about it in some self-serving media statement afterwards.
(Continued in next blog post)
Thanks so much to Kate Lyons and Rafqa Touma for steering the blog ship today. It’s Caitlin Cassidy, I’ll be with you until stumps.
Kelly Burke
Mona’s Ladies Lounge wins appeal in bid to continue barring men from entry
Tasmania’s Museum of Old and New Art (Mona) has won an appeal in the state’s supreme court in a bid to continue barring men from entering an installation known as the Ladies Lounge.
The exhibit was closed in April after Tasmania’s civil and administrative tribunal ordered the museum to admit men to the female-only space, upholding a Sydney man’s complaint that the museum had discriminated against him on the basis of gender.
But on Friday, the supreme court found the Ladies Lounge qualified for an exemption from the state’s anti-discrimination act under a section that allows discrimination if the intention behind the action is to promote equal opportunity for a group of people who are disadvantaged or have a special need.
“The Ladies Lounge can be seen as an arrangement to promote equal opportunity by highlighting the lack of equal opportunity, which generally prevails in society, by providing women with a rare glimpse of what it is like to be advantaged rather than disadvantaged by the refusal of entry to the Ladies Lounge by men,” justice Shane Marshall said in Friday’s decision.
Full story here
Self confessed human encyclopedia Bill Shorten serves up all you need to know about praying mantises
If you need a little bit of fun to get you through the end of Friday, our political reporter Josh Butler has you covered.
He’s spotted this interesting nugget from Bill Shorten’s interview this morning on the Today Show in which the former Labor leader reveals his extensive knowledge of praying mantises.
didn’t expect Bill Shorten to have such immediate encyclopaedic knowledge about insects, but you learn something new every day
(via Today Show this morn) pic.twitter.com/fNfer45LGs
— Josh Butler (@JoshButler) September 26, 2024
Andrew Messenger
Queensland ALP, unions rally in support of women’s reproductive rights
Queensland Labor and the state’s union movement have rallied in the Brisbane CBD, claiming a conservative government would roll back abortion access in the state.
The LNP have repeatedly denied the allegation.
But Queensland Council of Unions head Jacqueline King said “it’s an absolute concern for the union movement, and it should be a concern for all Queenslanders”.
“Queensland will go backwards. Queensland women’s rights will go backwards. We have a whole range of initiatives that the LNP has opposed progressively, even in this last term of government, up until the last sitting, when they opposed respect at work, reforms which were about preventing further sexual harassment, sex based harassment against women in the workplace, but also requiring people to take some positive actions to try to prevent those things,” she said.
“We have the most arch conservative LNP, opposition and members of parliament in Queensland, out of any state in Australia. They are opposed, you know, to any progressive reform.”
Opposition leader David Crisafulli committed this week to implement the government’s Women and Girls’ Health Strategy, although the party voted against legislation earlier this year to permit part of the plan.
Senior Labor minister Grace Grace and several Greens figures attended the rally – plus not-for-profit Children by Choice. It was held before the international safe abortion day, on Saturday.
Rafqa Touma
That’s all from me on the blog today. Handing over to Kate Lyons who will take you through the afternoon’s updates.
DFAT tells tourists to PNG to exercise ‘high degree of caution’; Kokoda Track still closed
SmartTraveller advises travellers to Papua New Guinea to “exercise a high degree of caution”. The Kokoda Track is closed because of “blockades” on the track, according to the government site. It says:
We continue to advise exercise a high degree of caution in Papua New Guinea due to high levels of crime, tribal violence and civil unrest. Higher levels apply in some areas.
The Kokoda Track is closed while local authorities negotiate with landowners to remove blockades on the Kokoda Track. The blockades and closure are disrupting current and planned treks. Check with your trekking company for the latest information (see ‘Travel’).
The travel advice for PNG was updated on 19 September 2024 to advise that blockades and closure would disrupt current and planned treks.
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is not aware of any tour groups remaining on the Kokoda Track.
A DFAT spokesperson says reopening of the track “is a matter for the PNG government”.
“The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is encouraging an early resolution.”
CEO of drinks retailer Endeavour to step down from underperforming group
Australia’s biggest alcohol retailer is on the hunt for a new CEO as 30-year veteran Steve Donohue said it’s “the right time” to leave the underperforming Dan Murphy’s and parent company BWS.
Endeavour Group is facing a dwindling stock value and its 2023/24 financial year results showed that although sales has increased, profits had been slashed to service its $1.9bn debt.
Donohue, who will remain in the role until a replacement is found, said:
It has been an immense privilege to lead this company and to have been a part of this business for three decades.
Six years after we created Endeavour Group and with the strategy and culture well established as an independent company, now is the right time for me to pass the baton on to the next leader.
– Australian Associated Press
Bronze statue of ex-Victorian premier Daniel Andrews in works
A statue of former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews is in the works one year after he resigned from the state’s top job.
Bronze statues of state premiers who spent more than 3,000 days in office are immortalised outside government offices near Treasury Gardens in central Melbourne, under a rule introduced by former Liberal premier Jeff Kennett to honour premiers for their longevity.
The process of installing one of Andrews is under way. It is unclear how much it will cost or its possible location.
A government spokesperson confirmed the Department of Premier and Cabinet has provided a brief to government over the statue but did not reveal further information.
Opposition finance spokesperson Jess Wilson hit back at the decision to immortalise Andrews in a statue.
“As Victoria buckles under a cost-of-living crisis, a failing health system and surging crime, Premier Allan’s priority is to erect a statue for Daniel Andrews instead of delivering relief for Victorian taxpayers,” she said.
– Australian Associated Press
