Follow today’s news liveDutton defends ‘astute’ share purchases and late property disclosures as Labor demands detailsGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastABC pays tribute to Antony Green as he announces upcoming election will be his last on-airContinuing from our last post: the ABC’s director of news, Justin Stevens, has paid tribute to Antony Green as he announces the upcoming election would be his last on-air with the national broadcaster.For more than three decades he has performed one of the ABC’s most important roles with precision, impartiality, dedication and unprecedented expertise.He has the ABC’s immense gratitude and respect. I’m sure our audience joins me in thanking him and wishing him well as he prepares for his final federal election broadcast.It’s time to retire. I turn 65 this coming weekend. I work on a three-year election cycle with federal elections, I won’t be presenting elections in three years’ time when I’m 68, so this will be my last on-camera election for the ABC.I’ll stay on for a couple of years, handing over work and doing other things, but essentially I’m deciding to retire and work less.There are 80 or 90 of them, a book on every election since 1990, state and federal … I [also] redesigned computer system. When I first started this, you had to be in the tally room to get the numbers. It was the only way to get data from the Electoral Commission to the ABC computer, so you had to be there. It’s a completely different world now. Continue reading…Follow today’s news liveDutton defends ‘astute’ share purchases and late property disclosures as Labor demands detailsGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastABC pays tribute to Antony Green as he announces upcoming election will be his last on-airContinuing from our last post: the ABC’s director of news, Justin Stevens, has paid tribute to Antony Green as he announces the upcoming election would be his last on-air with the national broadcaster.For more than three decades he has performed one of the ABC’s most important roles with precision, impartiality, dedication and unprecedented expertise.He has the ABC’s immense gratitude and respect. I’m sure our audience joins me in thanking him and wishing him well as he prepares for his final federal election broadcast.It’s time to retire. I turn 65 this coming weekend. I work on a three-year election cycle with federal elections, I won’t be presenting elections in three years’ time when I’m 68, so this will be my last on-camera election for the ABC.I’ll stay on for a couple of years, handing over work and doing other things, but essentially I’m deciding to retire and work less.There are 80 or 90 of them, a book on every election since 1990, state and federal … I [also] redesigned computer system. When I first started this, you had to be in the tally room to get the numbers. It was the only way to get data from the Electoral Commission to the ABC computer, so you had to be there. It’s a completely different world now. Continue reading…
Bruce Lehrmann has been granted an extension of time to file his outline of submissions and the chronology of the relevant events for his appeal against his defamation loss to Network Ten and Lisa Wilkinson.
Justice Michael Lee found last year that Lehrmann was not defamed by Ten and Wilkinson when The Project broadcast an interview with Brittany Higgins on 15 February 2021 in which she alleged she was raped by a staffer.
Federal court justice Wendy Abraham has granted him until Monday 3 March to file the necessary paperwork and has also extended the time for the respondents to file any submissions in reply to 12 May.
Lehrmann has always denied the rape allegation and pleaded not guilty at his criminal trial in the Australian Capital Territory supreme court which was aborted.
Prosecutors did not seek a retrial due to concerns about Higgins’s mental health.
Australians with private health insurance to be hit with 3.37% premium increase
Australians with private health insurance will be hit with a premium rise of 3.73% on average from 1 April. The health minister, Mark Butler, has just announced the approved increase, after forcing private health insurers to resubmit their claims three times.
Just under 55% of Australians have some general health insurance cover, and Butler says he’s given them a “better deal”. Butler said:
In December, I wrote to every single one of the 29 insurers asking that they sharpen their pencils and provide us with an increase that was more in the interests of their members.
Based on the resubmissions, I was not prepared to tick and flick their asks and instead asked them to resubmit again. We’ve now ensured a better deal for the 15 million Australians with private health insurance.
Butler last year approved a rise of 3.03% in March.
Health inflation dropped slightly between the September and December quarters, but over the year to December 2024, medical and hospital services costs increased by 4.4% according to the ABS.
Australian students stagnant or falling behind on most key performance metrics
Australian students’ long-term trends are heading downwards or remaining stagnant on 11 of 14 key performance measures used to determine student outcomes, an annual report has found.
The 2023 national report on schooling, released by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (Acara) on Wednesday afternoon, found the student attendance rate, participation in Naplan and vocational education and training, and the proportion of students in education or work after their studies had all declined or remained the same over a long-term period – while over a short term period, each metric had remained largely stagnant.
The only metric which had improved was for attainment, which measures the proportion of 20 to 24-year-olds who have completed at least Year 12 or equivalent. It was sitting at 90.4%, an increase of 0.5% since 2004.
Acara is the independent statutory body that oversees these aspects of schooling.
Arts minister Tony Burke says everyone should ‘take a breath’ amid Creative Australia fallout
The arts minister, Tony Burke, has effectively told people to calm down over the fallout from the Venice Biennale fiasco.
Guardian Australia contacted Burke for a response to calls from the Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young for him to spill the board of Creative Australia and demand the resignation of its chief executive after last night’s Senate estimates hearing.
We also asked him to respond to new calls by the Zionist Federation of Australia to expand a forthcoming inquiry into the Venice controversy to include an investigation into whether taxpayer funds were being used to “promote hate, antisemitism, terrorism, or extremist ideologies”, as we reported earlier on this blog.
Burke said everyone just needed to “take a breath” and focus on the “incredible” work Creative Australia is doing connecting artists to audiences. He refused to be drawn on the role Creative Australia played in disconnecting one particular artist and his curator from a global audience at next year’s Venice Biennale.
In a statement to the Guardian, Burke said:
Can we consider the way [Creative Australia] helps artists develop their practices so they have a real chance at a creative career?
We cannot let conflicts around the world result in a neverending path of artists being cancelled from the right and the left.
Burke has consistently maintained the decision to cancel Khaled Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino was solely made by Creative Australia and he did not intervene.
Burke did not respond to the Guardian’s questions over whether the organisation’s board and its chief executive, Adrian Collette, should stand down over said cancellation.
Third review into mutual obligations system under way
Back to Senate estimates, where the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations (DEWR) has revealed it is undertaking a third review into the legality of the systems that perform mutual obligations for jobseekers.
In her opening statement, the department secretary, Natalie James, said internal and external lawyers were looking into the legality of the targeted compliance framework – a system that ranks and penalises jobseekers when they are not meeting mutual obligations requirements.
Deloitte is undertaking a review into whether the mutual obligations system is functioning properly and DEWR is conducting an internal review of the IT system and legislative framework. James said:
I have also instructed my department to undertake a legal review to examine whether decisions in this area are being properly made and whether decision-making processes are aligned with the relevant legislation.
The review commenced in November 2024 and is being undertaken by internal and external lawyers and is being assisted by advice from the Australian Government Solicitor
Decisions which have the most impact on people’s rights or which affect the most people are currently being prioritised for the legal review. At all times, my department’s highest priority is ensuring that participants’ payments are not affected except in accordance with the legislation.
The Australian Council of Social Services has repeatedly called for an independent review of the TCF.
Victoria police say they have charged seven men who allegedly performed the Nazi salute at a venue in Geelong on 8 February.
Police said they laid the charges after an investigation into an image that had been circulating online which depicted a group of men performing the prohibited gesture.
The seven men, who are aged between 19 and 25, have been charged on summons for public display or performance of Nazi symbols or gestures, police said.
They are due to appear at Geelong magistrates court on 6 May.
Police have said the maximum penalty for public display of Nazi symbols or gestures is a fine of up to $23,710, 12 months’ jail, or both. In a statement, Victoria police said:
There is absolutely no place in our society for antisemitic, racist or hate-based behaviour and such activity will not be tolerated.
They have asked anyone with relevant information to contact CrimeStoppers.
Gallagher: Dutton is just asking people to ‘take his word for it’ over stock activity
Peter Dutton refused to say much more about his stock activity at his own press conference earlier today, saying the questions were “ancient history” and declining to say any more about when exactly he bought the shares, how many he bought, or what profit he may have made.
When she addressed reporters after Dutton’s own press conference, Gallagher said the opposition leader was asking people to “just take his word for it”.
Gallagher said:
I think that he needs to … provide a bit more significant advice around that than just taking his word for it.
The questions we would ask of Mr Dutton is, ‘What was the value of those shares? Why were those shares purchased the day before a very substantial bank bailout?’
These are entirely reasonable questions to ask of someone who wants to be an alternate prime minister of this country.
Dutton has maintained that he declared everything he is required to declare.
The rules of the parliamentary register do not require MPs to say how many shares they bought or what value they came to – but Labor says Dutton should volunteer that information.
However, Gallagher declined to say, in response to multiple questions, whether Labor would agree to upgrade the requirements of the register to demand more information in future.
Several journalists (including this one) put to her that boosting the transparency around politicians’ interests, including requiring more information about property and stock investments, would help such inquiries and accountability in future – but Gallagher wouldn’t say whether Labor would make such changes in future.
Sticking with Gallagher’s press conference from earlier, the Labor frontbencher also said Peter Dutton still has “questions to answer” about his share holdings in 2009.
Labor is continuing to probe the now-opposition leader’s stock market dealings around the time of the GFC.
Dutton has strongly denied any wrongdoing, saying he has always acted with integrity and that he had no access to sensitive information before buying shares in the big banks shortly before the then Rudd government proposed a major bank bailout during the financial crisis.
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The minister for women, Katy Gallagher, has been asked about comments made about the Matildas by a Triple M host and criticised “derisory commentary” about women’s sport.
At a press conference earlier, Gallagher, who is also the finance minister, weighed in on the controversy about the much-criticised comments and how the public talks about women’s sport.
Gallagher said she thought the situation was “improving, but there are obvious examples where women get let down by social commentary, for sure”. She said:
And it’s not just in sport, it’s in a whole range of areas. I think a lot has changed in my time in public office to raise professionalism and commentary around women’s sport, and that being … the excellence and skill and professionalism of those women involved, they deserve respect.
I think that for the large part the Australian community does respect them and I think negative commentary or derisory commentary should be responded to in the harshest possible way.
Greens call for Creative Australia CEO’s resignation over Venice Biennale dismissal
At a press conference today, Hanson-Young said the impact of Creative Australia’s decision to withdraw the commission had ramifications throughout Australia’s arts community that would take many years to rectify.
She said:
The only way to break this crisis is for the CEO to hand his resignation and for the minister to spill the board.
It doesn’t matter which way you look at it, this has been managed poorly. It’s a shamozzle and it has trashed Australia’s reputation in the arts world, right across the globe.
The senator also called on Burke and Creative Australia to reveal the full costings to the taxpayer that have been incurred through the commissioning, and then decommissioning, of Sabsabi and Dagostino, including how much money had been lost through withdrawn philanthropy.
Within hours of Creative Australia’s decision to rescind the commission on 13 February, investment banker Simon Mordant, one of Australia’s most generous arts philanthropists, announced he was resigning as a biennale ambassador and withdrawing his pledge of a “significant sum”, on the grounds of “poor process by the government’s arts body”.
At Tuesday’s hearing Collette acknowledged additional costs to the taxpayer would be incurred due to the decision to withdraw the commission.
“We will discuss that with Khaled Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino and arrive at an agreement, but we absolutely acknowledge we have financial obligations to the artist and the curator,” he said.
Neither Collette or Morton responded to Wednesday’s calls for their resignation, having both testified the night before that they planned to remain in their positions.
A Creative Australia spokesperson said the chair and chief executive’s positions “remain as stated during last night’s hearing” and declined to comment on the ZFA’s call to broaden the impending inquiry into the biennale controversy.
The Guardian has sought comment from Burke’s office.
Zionist Federation calls for review into Creative Australia arts grants
A day after a bruising ordeal in Senate estimates over the dismissal of Australia’s artistic team for the 2026 Venice Biennale, Creative Australia is facing condemnation on both sides of the divide.
On Wednesday, the Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young – who accused Creative Australia’s chief executive, Adrian Collette, and board chair, Robert Morton, of a failure in due diligence, governance and fulfilling the agency’s role as a protecter of free artistic expression – called on the government to sack the Creative Australia board and demand Collette’s resignation.
At the same time, the Zionist Federation of Australia said it had asked the arts minister, Tony Burke, for a “broad and independent” review into the allocation of Creative Australia’s taxpayer-funded arts grants.
Creative Australia has already announced it will do an independent review into the selection process for the Venice Biennale.
During Tuesday’s hearing, Collette suggested that inquiry would also investigate artist Khaled Sabsabi and curator Michael Dagostino’s rescinded invitation.
But in a statement, the ZFA’s president, Jeremy Leibler, and its chief executive, Alon Cassuto, said the review should cover all grant programs and processes to ensure taxpayer funds were not being used to promote hate, antisemitism, terrorism, or extremist ideologies.
They said:
An independent review with a broad remit is necessary to restore confidence in Australia’s arts funding system, as well as ensure antisemitism and the promotion of extremism isn’t allowed to further fester within the arts community.
Department of Employment and Workplace Relations apologises over IT defencts
In Senate estimates, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has apologised for not having “full confidence” in the system that administers mutual obligations after it said it had to repay over $1,233,527 to 1,280 jobseekers after IT defects affected the system.
As first reported by The Saturday Paper, there were 10 deaths during the time the payments were cancelled.
Under questioning from Greens senator Penny Allman-Payne, the department secretary, Natalie James, said she apologised to the individuals affected. James said:
I absolutely and unreservedly apologise on behalf of the department that we cannot have full confidence in the system delivering what it’s intended to deliver.
It’s not acceptable, and it is my responsibility … legislatively and administratively for overseeing this process.
As you can see from the dates there are some issues that go back some way, and as I said in my statement, am very concerned and making it a top priority to ensure that we address these issues.
I do apologise for the impact that this has had on people.
Hi, I hope you’ve had a good day so far. I’ll be with you on the blog until this evening.
Many thanks for joining me on the blog today, I’ll hand the reins over to Catie McLeod to take you through the rest of today’s news. Take care.
All the details on Labor’s $7bn promise for Melbourne’s airport train
Well, that was a very busy afternoon! For all the details on the prime minister’s pledge for Melbourne’s long-awaited airport train, Benita Kolovos has you covered – you can read more below: