Australian Politics

Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong has slammed reports that Australia still sells ‘weapons parts’ to Darth Vader, clarifying that any parts Australia makes for the construction of the Death Star are ‘non-lethal’.

“It is gross misinformation to say that we are in any way part of the Death Star trade just because we sell parts for it,” said Wong.

“The death laser is the lethal part. We don’t sell the laser energy. We only provide parts that help them shoot the laser beam.” [...]

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says claims from his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu and diplomatic officials that there's no starvation in the war-torn territory were "beyond comprehension".

Opposition Leader Sussan Ley said she was "incredibly distressed" by the images she had seen from Gaza.

But she did not directly respond to questions about whether she believed people were starving in the territory or if Israel's policies had contributed to the deteriorating humanitarian situation for the region's 2.2 million residents.

"We all want to see aid flow into Gaza and we all want the war to end and we all want the suffering to cease," Ms Ley said.

"It's very complex on the ground. It's not something that we can make judgments about every move that is made.

"If we want the war to end, and we all do, we know the simplest, quickest way is for Hamas to surrender and release the hostages."

Video of Sussan Ley refusing to answer the question (timestamp 23:50 if link doesn't take you there)

The UK wants to allow 16 and 17-year-olds to vote in the next general election in 2029. 5 experts give their verdicts on if Australia should do the same.

cross-posted from: https://aussie.zone/post/22987236

I'm wondering whether I'll have to wait a long time after royal accent for the new penalty rates bill [1] to enjoy not having to work 40 hours a week (and finally be able to work a standard 38).

From what I can tell, the bill only requires the Fair Work Commission to make/update awards such that you must be paid overtime, meaning the professional employees award won't be valid anymore (where they don't have to unless you earn less than 1.25x of minimum wage).

I'm wondering what your opinion/guess is (not legal advice) on whether we'll need to wait for the award to be updated, or can just go to our employers and say: hey, I'm working 38 hours unless you want to pay me overtime.

I was part of my union, but since engineers are barely in the union, being part of a Professionals Australia (the union for my industry) was kind of a waste of time, and I tried many times to get in touch with their organiser team to push membership in my company to not avail.

Since then I let it lapse because I thought they were doing a pretty bad job, since you can't have solidarity by yourself. In any case, that's why I can't ask them

[1] Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Penalty and Overtime Rates) Bill 2025:

https://parlinfo.aph.gov.au/parlInfo/search/display/display.w3p;db=LEGISLATION;id=legislation%2Fbills%2Fr7335_first-reps%2F0001;query=Id%3A%22legislation%2Fbills%2Fr7335_first-reps%2F0000%22;rec=0

This is not yet law.

Ammends this act: [2] Fair Work Act 2009: https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2009A00028/latest/text

Hmm was it science or was it diplomatic negotiation?

Anger is rising among Labor’s base over the war in Gaza, with nearly 80 local branches passing motions over recent weeks calling for Australia to impose sanctions on the Netanyahu government and sever military ties with Israel.

...

Seventy-eight Labor branches have passed motions calling for far-reaching sanctions against Israeli entities and individuals involved in the war and a two-way arms embargo on Israel, including the supply of military parts and components.

The branches include one in Foreign Minister Penny Wong’s home city of Adelaide and three in Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Sydney electorate of Grayndler.

“Strong words are not enough,” the conveners of the Labor Friends of Palestine group said in a letter sent to Wong on Wednesday and seen by this masthead.

“Expressions of concern and repeated calls for restraint have achieved little in the last 21 months; indeed Israel’s violence and clear disdain for international humanitarian law have only intensified.”

archive.org

The Greens are also pretty incensed about some of the changes – particularly the rule that would allow Hansard not to record the names of MPs voting in favour of legislation if there are six or fewer members on one side of the chamber for the vote.

Greens MP Elizabeth Watson-Brown has called it a “stitch up” that undermines transparency.

It gives Labor and Liberal MPs cover to hide how their MP’s are voting on important issues. Voters deserve to know how their representatives are voting.

Labor needs to explain why they want to hide their MPs voting positions from the public. Transparency should be a bare minimum in a democracy.

Among the changes are rules allowing members to be booted from parliamentary proceedings for a maximum of three hours, up from the previous rule of 60 minutes.

Another change would allow Hansard, the record of proceedings, not to record the names of MPs voting in favour of legislation if there are six or fewer members on one side of the chamber (ie, clearly in the minority) at the time of a vote. The new rule states:

If, after the doors are locked, there are six or fewer Members on one side in a division, the Speaker shall declare the decision of the House immediately, without completing the count. The names of the Members who are in the minority shall be recorded in the Votes and Proceedings.

The US geopolitical objective is to destroy China’s power. This is being pursued variously. China’s economy depends on Asian sea traffic. The US military strategy is to sever those sea lanes. Thereby China’s economy is imperilled.

However, as the US itself has claimed (from Obama on) it lacks the resources to achieve its objective. It says it must rely on allies’ support.

Unsaid by US planners is that those same sea lanes upon which China depends are critical also for Japan and Australia. Any pedant can see that the natural allies here are China, Japan and Australia.

smh.com.au

Bob Katter, the long-serving MP for the northern Queensland seat of Kennedy, has refused to swear allegiance to King Charles, his heirs and successors during the opening of parliament.

When asked if he would swear allegiance, Katter responded: “No, I swear allegiance to the Australian people.”

The small protest did not disrupt proceedings, as it did when Victorian senator Lidia Thorpe gave the oath in 2022.

Members are asked to swear faith and allegiance to King Charles III. They are expected to respond “I do”.

Liberal candidate Gisele Kapterian has appealed her narrow loss to Nicolette Boele in Bradfield to the court of disputed returns. According to Professor Anne Twomey, no questions of law are raised in Kapterian’s challenge. Rather, the court is being asked to determine more mundane questions. Is that 1 actually a 7; is that 6 an 8? and so on.

...

The last time the courts considered questions about ballot formality was in 2007 from the seat of McEwen. The resulting federal court case produced one of the more unusual judgments one will find in Australian law reports. Mitchell v Bailey (No 2) ****contains a lengthy tabular schedule, listing the disposition of 643 reserved ballots and – in 153 instances – reasons for Justice Richard Tracey’s assessments about ballot formality differing from those of the AEC. Examples include comments such as “Notations reasonably resemble numbers. In particular, three of them can be recognised as figures 7, 6, 5.” Why? How? Presumably, they just did to Tracey, just as they did not to AEC officials. No criticism of the late justice is intended; the point is to highlight just how subjective and hence seemingly unfair these assessments – and election outcomes – can appear.

...

Here’s a modest proposal. For decades we’ve been training computers to recognise handwritten digits, principally for making mail processing and delivery more efficient. Massive datasets of real, handwritten digits have become one of the touchstones of machine learning, test beds for refining algorithms and global competition among researchers. The best algorithms have 99.82% accuracy in recognising digits. And the AEC itself uses digital scanning to process Senate ballot papers.

Australia has done what it does best today, which is to throw its weight behind a flawed but familiar larrikin simply because he’s being sued by a bigger and worse cunt from overseas.

News broke this morning that US President Donald Trump has launched a $15 billion lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch over a Wall Street Journal article reporting on his alleged involvement in a bizarre birthday tribute to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

While Murdoch has long been accused of corrupting global democracies, manufacturing moral panics and platforming people who would’ve been fed to bears for entertainment in the Middle Ages, the fact that Trump is now suing him has flipped the public’s view of “our Rupert.” [...]

Ms Ryan said that she planned to introduce another private member's bill during the upcoming term of federal parliament, after an initial bill in 2018 failed to pass.

It is hard to see how this helps a Jewish community that feels threatened, attacked and misunderstood. Could it be that the Segal report’s only contribution to the necessary battle against antisemitism will be to fuel the growth of the antisemitism it is meant to combat?

If the ironies are endless, the dangers are profound.

It is not simply that these things are absurd, it is that they are a threat to us as a democratic people. That the prime minister has unwisely put himself in a position where he now must disavow something he previously seemed to support is unfortunate. But disavow and abandon it he must.

Antisemitism is real and, as is all racism, despicable. The federal government is right to do all it can within existing laws to act against the perpetrators of recent antisemitic outrages. Earlier this month, the Federal Court found Wissam Haddad guilty of breaching the Racial Discrimination Act with online posts that were “fundamentally racist and antisemitic” but ruled that criticism of Israel, Zionism and the Israel Defence Forces was not antisemitic. It is wrong to go beyond our laws in new ways that would damage Australian democracy and seem to only serve the interests of another nation that finds its actions the subject of global opprobrium.

archive.org

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