Australia politics live: Pauline Hanson to face censure motion over Muslim comments; Marles ‘concerned but confident’ about troops in Middle East | Australia news
Pauline Hanson to face censure motion over Muslim comments
Josh Butler
Later this morning, Pauline Hanson will face a censure motion in the Senate today, with Labor drafting a motion seeking to censure the One Nation leader for her recent comments about Australian Muslims.
Hanson told Sky News in February: “You say, ‘Well, there’s good Muslims out there.’ How can you tell me there are good Muslims?” The Queensland senator refused to apologise for the comments, standing by them in subsequent interviews, but later issued a partial apology if she “offended anyone out there that doesn’t believe in sharia law, or multiple marriages, or wants to bring Isis brides in, or people from Gaza that believe in a caliphate”.
Hanson is expected to face a censure motion today, drafted by Labor. The government motion states that Australia has been “built by the hard work, sacrifice and aspiration of people of every race and faith”, “assures all Australians they are valued, welcome members of our society”, and “rejects any attempt to vilify people on the basis of their religion”.
The motion states that the Senate “reiterates its solidarity with those who have been vilified because of their faith” and that “if parliament is to be a safe place for all who work and visit here, there can be no tolerance for hate speech in the course of parliamentarians’ public debate”. The motion calls on all senators to “refrain from inflammatory and divisive comments, both inside and outside the chamber”.
It goes on to call on the Senate to censure Hanson over “her inflammatory and divisive comments seeking to vilify Muslim Australians, which do not reflect the opinions of the Australian Senate or the Australian people”.
The motion is subject to change, debate and potential amendment. We will bring you more as this goes on.
We have approached One Nation for comment.
Key events
Wong says 115,000 Australians her priority, not Cash’s motion
Wong, responding to Cash, returns serve against the criticisms levelled against her and says the 115,000 Australians “are my priority”, not senator Cash’s motion.
She says the opposition only told the government that it would move its motion five minutes before the chamber began sitting, and if they were “serious” about debating the issue, they would have spoken to Labor about it some time between Saturday night and this morning.
She says “Australia stands with the people of Iran”, and takes another swipe at the Greens for supporting the Coalition’s suspension of standing orders.
We’re not focused on the politics of this issue, we’re focused on the 115,000 Australians who are in the region.
Wong puts forward an amendment to the Coalition’s motion that removes parts that “congratulates” Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu over the strikes and welcomes the death of the Ayatollah.
Instead, Wong says those should be replaced to say the Senate supports efforts by the US and Israel to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, stands in solidarity with the Iranian Australian community, condemns the Iranian regime for its “decades of attacks and destabilisation of its neighbours”, and calls for dialogue and “the pursuit of diplomatic pathways to restore peace and security”.
Liberals and Greens pass motion, begin debate on US Israeli strikes
With the support of the Greens and members of the crossbench, the suspension of standing orders has been passed, which means the Senate can now debate the Liberals’ motion on the US and Israeli strikes on Iran.
Cash, who moved the motion, begins, and takes a strong swipe at the government for not supporting the motion.
You can see the full wording of the motion in the post below.
Cash says:
This is one of the most historic moments history will ever record, one of the most historic moments, and we come in here this morning and not only is there silence from the government but more than that, they do everything they can to shut the Senate down from properly debating this motion.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is dead. For decades he was the supreme authority of a regime that imprisoned dissenters, crushed protests slaughtered Iranians at home, empowered by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Liberals and Greens vote to suspend standing orders
Back to the Senate, the Liberals and Greens have just voted to suspend standing orders – giving them a majority. One Nation and independents including David Pocock and Lidia Thorpe also voted in favour of the suspension.
It’s all very procedure-y but essentially what this means is that the current order of the day (which is planned by the government in advance) has been paused, so the Liberals can now bring forward their motion supporting the strikes on Iran.
The full motion states that the Senate:
(a) congratulates the United States of America and the State of Israel for their sustained efforts to prevent the Islamic Republic of Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, acknowledging the long-standing threat posed by Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs to regional and global peace and security;
(b) welcomes the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a brutal dictator who has oppressed the Iranian people for decades, as a result of the American and Israeli attacks;
(c) reaffirms Australia’s rejection of any future Iranian acquisition of nuclear weapons capability, recognising such an outcome would severely destabilise the Middle East and pose unacceptable risks to international peace and security;
(d) condemns in the strongest terms the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) for its sponsorship of terrorism globally, including its role in orchestrating antisemitic attacks targeting Jewish Australians on Australian soil, acts which represent a direct attack on our social cohesion and national security;
(e) condemns the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran for its use of state-directed violence and its support for proxy militant groups engaged in terrorist activities in multiple regions, undermining peace, stability and the rule of law;
(f) deplores the recent attacks by Iran on civilian infrastructure in Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, including the suspension of operations at Dubai’s major airports due to regional hostilities, and condemns the IRGC for targeting civilian populations and civilian facilities; and
(g) expresses strong support for the Iranian people in their ongoing struggle against the IRGC.
Pauline Hanson to face censure motion over Muslim comments
Josh Butler
Later this morning, Pauline Hanson will face a censure motion in the Senate today, with Labor drafting a motion seeking to censure the One Nation leader for her recent comments about Australian Muslims.
Hanson told Sky News in February: “You say, ‘Well, there’s good Muslims out there.’ How can you tell me there are good Muslims?” The Queensland senator refused to apologise for the comments, standing by them in subsequent interviews, but later issued a partial apology if she “offended anyone out there that doesn’t believe in sharia law, or multiple marriages, or wants to bring Isis brides in, or people from Gaza that believe in a caliphate”.
Hanson is expected to face a censure motion today, drafted by Labor. The government motion states that Australia has been “built by the hard work, sacrifice and aspiration of people of every race and faith”, “assures all Australians they are valued, welcome members of our society”, and “rejects any attempt to vilify people on the basis of their religion”.
The motion states that the Senate “reiterates its solidarity with those who have been vilified because of their faith” and that “if parliament is to be a safe place for all who work and visit here, there can be no tolerance for hate speech in the course of parliamentarians’ public debate”. The motion calls on all senators to “refrain from inflammatory and divisive comments, both inside and outside the chamber”.
It goes on to call on the Senate to censure Hanson over “her inflammatory and divisive comments seeking to vilify Muslim Australians, which do not reflect the opinions of the Australian Senate or the Australian people”.
The motion is subject to change, debate and potential amendment. We will bring you more as this goes on.
We have approached One Nation for comment.
Luca Ittimani
House prices rising despite February’s rate hike
Dipping out of the Senate for a moment, Australia’s median house price picked up $7,324 in February, even though the Reserve Bank hiked interest rates and making loans more expensive to repay.
That 0.8% national increase was driven by a huge monthly increase in Perth, up 2.3% or an effective $22,500, according to Cotality data today. Brisbane, Adelaide and Hobart each saw prices rise more than 1% in February.
Lower-priced markets are less responsive to interest rate rises, with the cheapest quarter of homes in Sydney matching the national increase of 0.8% in the month. The top-priced quarter of homes in Sydney fell 0.9%, leaving Sydney’s overall trend flat.
A similar dynamic played out in Melbourne – also steady, as we reported earlier. Cotality’s research director, Tim Lawless, said investors and first-home buyers were still competing for more affordable homes.
Lending has boomed 6% over the year to January for owner-occupied housing and nearly 8% for investor housing, according to data released by the Reserve Bank on Friday.
February’s interest rate hike would typically slow that pace, but loans have already been growing much faster than the RBA expected, with research suggesting a recent downward trend in banks’ typical mortgage rates is to blame.
Wong accuses Liberals of ‘political stunt’ in Senate
This debate is getting quickly heated, as foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, responds to Cash’s move to suspend standing orders (which would then allow her to move her motion on the strikes).
Wong accuses the Liberals of a “political stunt” by working with the Greens and Greens senator David Shoebridge to get the numbers to move the suspension.
Senate president Sue Lines starts screaming at Shoebridge, Greens deputy leader Mehreen Faruqi and members of the Coalition for shouting out and attacking Labor while Wong speaks. Unlike the House, where the Speaker is allowed to kick out members for being disorderly, the Senate president does not have the same powers.
Wong says:
This suspension is not about national interest, it’s about political interest and you know how you most know that? Because you have this unholy alliance between Senator Cash and Senator Shoebridge.
Senator Cash and Senator Shoebridge together, what an extraordinary demonstration of the fact that they will do anything to engage in a political stunt while there is a war going on.
Wong says the motion will remove time from debate on Closing the Gap targets which were scheduled this morning.
Lines says the behaviour in the chamber is “outrageous”.
Cash moves motion welcoming strikes on Iran
The Liberal leader in the Senate, Michaelia Cash, as Tom brought you earlier, is moving a motion to suspend standing orders to move a motion on the US and Israeli strikes on Iran.
Cash says the Senate must not be a “procedural spectator” and that it should send a “clear signal” to the Australian public and global allies.
She says this is a historic moment that Australians are watching in real time. The motion “or their sustained efforts to prevent the Islamic Republic of Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon” and condemns the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
In moments like this when history is literally being made before our eyes the Senate cannot be a procedural spectator, this chamber must be able to respond immediately to put Australia’s position clearly on the record, and to send a clear signal to our allies and adversaries and to give certainty to Australians both here at home, including those that fled the Islamic regime and those abroad
The reason we must suspend standing orders is simple, this is urgent, Australians, the world globally are currently watching these events, some of the most historic events of our time, unfold in real time on our TVs.
Liberals would support Australia assisting the US in Iran if in ‘national interest’: Paterson
New shadow defence minister, James Paterson, who moved to the role after the latest Liberal reshuffle under Angus Taylor, says he won’t speculate on whether Australia will assist the US militarily in Iran, but that the Coalition would support the government doing so if it is in the national interest.
Speaking to Sky News this morning, Paterson says the opposition welcomes the government supporting the strikes by the US and Israel on Iran.
He says the UK, Germany and France have already signalled a “willingness” to use their assets in the Middle East, but notes those nations have a more significant presence in the region than Australia does.
In the past, we have deployed Australian personnel to some of those joint facilities in the Middle East and assisted with targeting missions. And at different times, we’ve provided some military assets to the region, including naval assets and air assets, for example, for surveillance and targeting.
I don’t want to publicly speculate about whether or not we will be asked, or if we are asked whether or not we should do that, except that the Australian government should always be guided by Australia’s national interest, and if it’s determined that it is in Australia’s national interest to assist, and that we have the assets available to assist, and the government chose to do so, they would obviously have our bipartisan support.
Tom McIlroy
Liberals push Senate motion on Iran bombings
As international reaction grows to the weekend bombings in Iran and the death of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the federal opposition is set to push a motion in the Senate congratulating the US and Israel for their actions.
Coalition Senate leader Michaelia Cash has circulated a motion on Monday morning which seeks to congratulate Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu for “sustained efforts to prevent the Islamic Republic of Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, acknowledging the long-standing threat posed by Iran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs to regional and global peace and security”.
The draft motion welcomes the Ayatollah’s death, calling him a “brutal dictator” and condemns the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps for its terrorism and involvement in attacks on Australia’s Jewish community.
As well as expressing strong support for the Iranian people, the motion also criticises Iranian retaliatory attacks on Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
Anthony Albanese has marked 30 years in parliament today, after he was first elected as the member for Grayndler on 2 March 1996.
You can have a look at his career over the years here:
Ican condemns strikes on Iran and calls on Australia to encourage diplomatic negotiations in the region
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (Ican) Australia has condemned the US and Israeli strikes on Iran and called on Australia to encourage the parties to return to negotiations.
It says the strikes have “provoked a dangerous escalation in an already volatile region”.
In a statement, Ican Australia co-chairs Tara Gutman and Marianne Hanson said “nuclear-armed states launching unlawful attacks is no way to reduce nuclear threats” :
Australia is being too quick to support force, and too slow to grow peace. Australia was among the first nations to announce it backed the US and Israeli strikes. In doing so, it has aligned itself with high-risk military action before diplomatic avenues were exhausted and is knowingly condoning clear violations of international law.
A conflict being waged by not one but two nuclear powers further heightens the risk of miscalculation, misunderstanding and mistake. The best way to manage nuclear risks is through diplomacy and respect for international law.
How many Australians are in the Middle East?
There’s been a lot of information coming through this morning so let’s break down a few of the numbers again.
The government has told us there are about 115,000 Australians in the Middle East right now. Given the huge number, they would not commit to repatriation flights but said once flights do resume, people should aim to get on a commercial flight because that would be faster.
To give you a scale of how many people are travelling through the region, Penny Wong told us earlier that on a normal day, there are 11,000 Australians flying in and out of the country through the Middle East on Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways.
The air space is now closed which means there have been significant flight disruptions and delays, not only for those who are meant to be flying through the area.
‘We wouldn’t anticipate participating in the future’: Wong
The government has been pushed this morning on whether Australia would send troops over to the Middle East if conflict escalates.
So far we have heard from Richard Marles that Australia had no involvement in the strikes and we were not warned beforehand. He said there are more than 100 Australian defence personnel in bases in the Middle East.
Foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, said this morning that Australia is not a “central” player on issues in the Middle East.
She told the Today Show:
We all want peace in the region. And what I would say is obviously Australia’s not central to the issues in the Middle East. We didn’t participate in these strikes and we wouldn’t anticipate participating in the future.
Tom McIlroy
Independents pushback on ‘mates over merit’ culture
Independent MP Sophie Scamps will seek to channel anger over the government’s response to the jobs for mates review in parliament today, reintroducing legislation which would stop former politicians being given high profile official jobs.
Scamps, the MP for Mackellar, has updated her transparent and quality public appointments bill after Labor’s release of a major report by Lynelle Briggs in December.
It found the major parties have abused appointments to government boards so routinely that the public fears being lumped with “overpaid political hacks” who cannot do important jobs properly, a scathing report to the Albanese government has found.
With support from independent Andrew Gee, the bill would establish an independent, transparent process for all major commonwealth appointments to ensure selections are based on expertise, not political connections.
It would also requires a six-month cooling-off period for former politicians and senior political staff, and 18 months for former ministers or parliamentary secretaries, before they can be appointed to major public roles.
Scamps is mad as hell about the culture of appointments in Canberra. She said without enforceable rules, patronage and favouritism creep into the system.
It’s bad for democracy and bad for Australians when governments choose who suits them best, not who is best for the job. I am taking this action because the government has not … Australians deserve a system where these high-paid and powerful appointments are based on merit, not mateship. This bill puts an end to the quiet deals and back‑room pathways that have damaged confidence in government for far too long.
A look at the corridor this morning
There has been a few politicians out and about in the corridor this morning.
And while Penny Wong and Barnaby Joyce might be from complete opposite sides of the political spectrum, it doesn’t mean the two can’t share a smile and a handshake together!
Marles says ‘concerned but confident’ about the wellbeing of Australian defence personnel
Richard Marles says there are more than 100 Australian defence personnel in the region, including at the Al Minhad airbase outside of Dubai.
He tells Sky News the defence personnel have been accounted for, and the government has been working to increase the safety for diplomatic personnel in the region, after three US soldiers were killed in a strike on an army base in Kuwait.
We’ve taken measures in respect of the safety of all of those Australian personnel, and all of them are accounted for and and so we are very much concerned but confident about their wellbeing, and we’re very attentive to that.
Our diplomatic presence in the region is obviously very important, and we are very mindful of their safety. We have taken steps in the days leading up to this, because, you know, we could see what was brewing in respect of their dependence.
Marles would not say whether Australia would eventually join in on any military action:
I’m not in the habit of speculating. This is action that’s being undertaken by the US and Israel and [I’ll] leave it at that.
Australia imports crude oil from around the world: Marles
Moving over to Sky News, Richard Marles is asked about Barnaby Joyce’s earlier comments on Australia’s low reserves of crude oil and our limited refining capacity and whether Australia will be left exposed by this conflict.
Marles says Australia takes crude oil from all over the world – including the Middle East – but says the government will be “watching that very closely”.
He won’t say whether the reserves (where there are supposed to be 90 days’ worth of fuel reserves) should be increased by the government.
Look, we take crude oil from around the world, but that would include from the Middle East, but it’s not the only place where we take crude oil from. But I guess what that highlights is that, I mean, this is an important region. It has an impact on the global economy. We’ll all be watching that very closely, exactly what impact it has as a function of how long this continues.
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