Key posts
The wrap of this afternoon’s headlines
By Caitlin Fitzsimmons
Thank you for joining me on the blog this afternoon. I’m signing off for the evening.
Our websites will continue to be updated throughout the evening, and the blog with live news updates will return in the morning.
For those just joining us, here are the key headlines this afternoon:
- The Albanese government introduced its industrial relations reforms to parliament, which aim to close loopholes for the gig economy and labour hire firms.
- A group of 200 pharmacists disrupted question time with boos and jeers to protest the 60-day prescription reforms.
- John Farnham’s associates confirmed he gave the licence to use You’re the Voice to the Yes campaign for free.
- A class action blaming Monsanto’s popular weed killer RoundUp for causing cancer has started in the Federal Court.
- Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he was not lobbied by Qantas over the Qatar Airways decision.
- The defamation action by high-profile surgeon Dr Munjed Al Muderis against The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age has started.
- A woman fought off a man who was allegedly trying to drown his son at a Western Australian beach.
Energy and mining companies buoy sharemarket
By Millie Muroi and Caitlin Fitzsimmons
Turning to financial news, energy companies and miners powered the Australian sharemarket today.
Lithium miner Liontown Resources was up 8.8 per cent after it said it would accept an improved $6.6 billion takeover bid from US giant Albemarle if given a binding offer at that price.
Lithium extraction in Australia, which dominates mining of the metal.Credit: Bloomberg
Investors were also in an upbeat mood after the latest economic data from the US showed jobs growth was starting to moderate.
The S&P/ASX 200 was up 40.5 points, or 0.56 per cent, to 7318.8 at the close, with consumer staples and utilities underperforming in the session.
Read the full market update from Millie Muroi.
Farnham confirms he gave Yes campaign the rights to his rock anthem for free
By Caitlin Fitzsimmons
Financial details have emerged about the use of John Farnham’s You’re the Voice performance in a Yes campaign ad for the Indigenous Voice to parliament.
Farnham has licensed the use of the iconic song to the Uluru Dialogue, one of the groups pushing for the constitutionally enshrined First Nations consultative body. The financial aspects of the deal were initially undisclosed, but the singer’s associates have now confirmed it was given for free.
John Farnham gave the licence to use his classic rock anthem You’re the Voice in the Yes campaign for free.
The song is the soundtrack to a three-minute advertisement for the Yes campaign released yesterday, which pairs Farnham’s anthemic song with transformative moments in Australian history.
Gaynor Wheatley, the widow of Farnham’s former manager Glenn Wheatley, and the singer’s friend David Wilson said in a statement today: “We confirm that John Farnham has gifted his performance of You’re the Voice for its use in the Uluru Dialogue Yes Campaign advertisements.”
The ad, which includes defining moments from Australian history including the 1967 referendum and Cathy Freeman’s gold medal at the Sydney Olympics, will run on TV and social media ahead of the referendum to be held on October 14.
In 2022 Farnham had major surgery to remove a cancerous tumour from his mouth. He’s been given the all-clear, and a documentary about his life called Finding the Voice was released in July.
With AAP
Parliament pushed to set date to end live sheep exports
By Caitlin Fitzsimmons
To federal parliament, where Labor backbencher Josh Wilson has tabled an RSPCA petition signed by 43,000 people, to set a date to end live sheep exports.
Labor pledged at the 2022 federal election to end the trade, but the government has consistently said it won’t happen this term to allow the industry a smooth transition.
Sheep being loaded onto a boat in Fremantle in 2018.
Wilson, who holds the West Australian port seat of Fremantle, said setting a date was the logical next step to bring the “outdated, unnecessary, and cruel” trade to an end.
“Australians don’t accept the mistreatment of animals,” he told reporters in Canberra today.
“They don’t want to watch on their television screens or passing through their communities the kinds of terrible mistreatment of animals which has been intrinsic to this trade.”
An independent panel taking feedback on the issue is due to report to Agriculture Minister Murray Watt by the end of September.
“Our government does intend to keep its promises, including this one, that we will phase out the live sheep export trade,” Watt told parliament.
He said the government is waiting for the recommendations of the panel, which will include a suggested timeframe to phase out the trade in an “orderly manner”.
The proposed phase out does not apply to live cattle exports.
A WA delegation of sheep producers and industry groups will travel to Canberra tomorrow to discuss the ban with the government, which they say would be devastating.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton said the Coalition will support the live trade industry.
With AAP
Gig workers to receive $400m annual wage boost under IR reforms
By Angus Thompson
The wage bill for the federal government’s gig economy overhaul will be more than $400 million a year, while its labour-hire laws will cost employers half a billion dollars annual a year as industry groups gear up for a fight with Labor over its industrial relations reforms.
Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke introduced the Closing Loopholes Bill, designed to give gig economy workers minimum pay rates, criminalise wage theft, overhaul labour-hire laws, and make it easier for casual workers to convert to permanent positions.
Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke says the IR bill will close loopholes.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
“This bill will close the loopholes which undermine and weaken our workplace relations system, and it will make Australian workplaces safer and fairer,” Burke told parliament this afternoon.
The legislation’s tabling in parliament comes after several months of industry lobby groups campaigning against aspects of the changes, arguing it would increase business costs and add more complexity to the industrial relations system.
Burke told ABC radio’s AM program this morning most workers wouldn’t notice any difference because it was a minority of employers exploiting loopholes.
Regulatory impact statements attached to the bill state that workers on digital platforms like Uber will see an average increase in wages of $403 million over the next 10 years, while the labour-hire measures are expected to produce a wage bill of $510 million annually.
The government has granted various exemptions for small businesses, including excluding small operators that use labour hire from its “Same Job, Same Pay” measures within the bill, which aim to ensure employers aren’t undercutting enterprise agreements by bringing in auxilliary workforces on lower wages.
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry chief executive Andrew McKellar said the scope of the changes to the gig economy went well beyond what the legislation intended.
The predecessors to the Voice to parliament
By Caitlin Fitzsimmons
Staying briefly on that question of whether the Indigenous Voice to parliament needs to be in the Constitution or can be legislated, it is worth considering the predecessors to the Voice.
Earlier this year, I wrote a piece about how the Voice to parliament would be the fourth attempt at an Indigenous consultative body to advise parliament.
Each of the predecessors – Gough Whitlam’s National Aboriginal Consultative Committee (NACC), Malcolm Fraser’s National Aboriginal Conference (NAC) and Bob Hawke’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) – was set up by the government of the day and abolished by the subsequent one.
Here’s an interactive timeline:
Noel Pearson explains why the Voice needs to be in the Constitution
By Caitlin Fitzsimmons
Indigenous leader Noel Pearson has slammed Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s idea of a second referendum that would recognise First Nations in the Constitution but not enshrine a Voice to parliament.
Speaking to Raf Epstein on ABC Radio Melbourne, Pearson said this would silence First Nations people.
Indigenous leader and Yes campaigner Noel Pearson.Credit: Paul Harris
“The central idea is that yes, you will have recognition, but there’ll be kind of like masking tape over the mouths of the original peoples, so they won’t be able to be heard,” Pearson said.
“That’s not a good proposal and nobody’s going to support that.”
Pearson also rejected the idea of the progressive No case, as advocated by independent Indigenous senator Lidia Thorpe, saying the consequences of a No vote were the same regardless of the motivation.
“A progressive No is not a progressive No, it’s just a simple No,” Pearson said.
“Whether it’s from the left or the right, is the same. You’re basically voting with [One Nation] senator [Pauline] Hanson against an important opportunity for your people.”
When asked why the Voice needed to be in the Constitution, rather than legislated by parliament, Pearson said it was because it would be an important part of our democracy and therefore needed certainty.
“It takes all Australians voting in a referendum to change the Constitution, and that guarantee once it’s given by the Australian people, that is a guarantee that everybody must honour,” Pearson said.
“The words that we’re being asked to vote on October the 14th, say in clause number one ‘there shall be a body to be called the Voice’. That’s the guarantee that the Australian people will provide: that there will always be a body.
“Parliament can change the details from time to time – they can amend the legislation, they may replace the legislation, as is the right and power of parliament.
“But the Australian people through this constitutional change are mandating the existence of this body and that’s an important guarantee to provide to the first peoples of Australia.”
Turkish President to push Putin to resume Ukrainian grain export deal
Staying with international news, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan will try to convince Russian leader Vladimir Putin to return to a Ukraine grain export deal that helped ease a global food crisis.
The two leaders are meeting in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi today.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan will discuss Ukrainian grain exports when he meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin today.Credit: Reuters
Russia quit the deal in July – a year after it was brokered by the United Nations and Turkey – complaining that its own food and fertiliser exports faced obstacles and that not enough Ukrainian grain was going to countries in need.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the talks with Erdogan, who previously played a significant role in convincing Putin to stick with the deal, would take place in the middle of the day, Moscow time.
The deal was aimed at getting grain from Ukraine to world markets through the Black Sea and easing a global food crisis that the United Nations said had been worsened by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February last year.
Russia and Ukraine are two of the world’s key agricultural producers, and major players in the wheat, barley, maize, rapeseed, rapeseed oil, sunflower seed and sunflower oil markets.
Putin has repeatedly said the West was to blame for Russia leaving the deal because it had failed to implement a separate memorandum agreed with the United Nations.
Reuters
Corruption case dropped against Malaysian deputy PM
To Malaysia, where prosecutors today dropped corruption charges against Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi.
The decision allows the leader of a key partner in the ruling coalition to walk free, and raises questions over Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s promise to fight graft.
Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim has promised to fight graft.Credit: AP
Anwar needs the support of Ahmad Zahid’s United Malays National Organisation to maintain a parliamentary majority.
The prosecutors’ decision to drop the case will invite scrutiny over the government’s stance on corruption cases against other UMNO leaders, notably former prime minister Najib Razak, who is serving a 12-year prison sentence for graft and faces more bribery charges.
The Kuala Lumpur High Court allowed a prosecution request to grant Ahmad Zahid – who was facing 47 charges of criminal breach of trust, bribery and money laundering – a discharge not amounting to an acquittal, after the attorney-general’s chambers chose not to continue pursuing the case.
Reuters
Court to decide if popular weed killer Roundup causes cancer
To the courts, where hundreds of Australians diagnosed with cancer are fighting a class action to prove their disease stemmed from a component of a widely used weed killer.
The landmark class action, launched by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers on behalf of more than 800 non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients, alleges a component in the popular Roundup herbicide called glyphosate caused their disease.
A class action will test whether Roundup is a carcinogen.Credit: AP
Maurice Blackburn national head of class actions Andrew Watson said many of the participants in the class action had used Roundup in their work.
Federal Court proceedings that began today are slated to run for nine weeks and determine whether Roundup contains a carcinogen before other issues in the case are dealt with.
The civil action has been launched against Monsanto, which produced the weed killer. Bayer acquired Monsanto in 2018.
Watson said: “The upshot is, we are confident that Monsanto did everything it could to avoid confronting the reality that this chemical was a carcinogen and did everything it could to obscure the science and to hide the science.”
Roundup is still used in Australia, and the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority supports the company’s claim glyphosate-based herbicides are not carcinogenic.
The Federal Court case is expected to come down to the science behind glyphosate.
Barrister Steven Finch, SC, representing Monsanto, said Maurice Blackburn’s own experts disproved their claims.
The hearing continues.
AAP
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