Clive Palmer on his private plane after a campaign stop in Melbourne in June last year. Photo: Photo: Jason South
Clive Palmer has lost a bid to get a suppression order
concealing the already widely known fact that he owns a private airplane
after a judge rejected claims the knowledge could put his life in
danger.
Mr Palmer, who has repeatedly been photographed next to the
estimated $70 million aircraft during the 2013 federal election
campaign, now believes fresh media coverage about its existence poses
"safety issues".
The application for the confidentiality order was made as
part of Mr Palmer's fight against the public release of flight records
for his jet that was ordered by the Office of the Australian Information
Commissioner.
Clive Palmer with wife Anna on his private plane while on the campaign trail in Queensland in September last year. Photo: Photo: Hamish Cairns
The departure and arrival records for all aircraft that use
Australia's airspace are held by commonwealth regulatory
agency Airservices Australia, which has traditionally ruled that release
of this type of information is in line with public policy about
transparency and does not violate privacy laws.
Fairfax Media was supposed to be granted access to the flight
plans under freedom-of-information laws, a decision that is now being
challenged by Mr Palmer's company, Palmer Aviation, in the
Administrative Appeals Tribunal.
Mr Palmer's legal counsel argued the existence of the legal
proceeding should be suppressed from the public and a pseudonym used in
all documentation that refers to the politician and mining magnate and
his company.
"Our submission is that the basis of the business of Palmer
Aviation is to provide confidential business travel to Mr Palmer and his
invited guests. At the crux of that business is the confidential nature
of the transportation and Mr Palmer and his invited guests' whereabouts…," Tracey Miley said.
"The only issue I can point to is safety issues if the
registration of the plane is ... registration number of the plane is
made known publicly."
But AAT deputy president Philip Hack found the submission was "at too high a level of abstraction".
"As I understand it, Mr Palmer is a figure of some notoriety.
He is a member of the House of Representatives. He is frequently in the
media," he said.
Deputy president Hack noted that aircraft registration
numbers were already a matter of public record and refused to grant the
confidentiality order.
The application was made despite Mr Palmer routinely using
the intercontinental Bombardier Global Express - which has been
emblazoned with a logo of the Palmer United Party - as a backdrop for
photo opportunities and press conferences. The plane is registered in
the Isle of Man, an off-shore tax haven.
PUP is under increasing pressure from factional splits, with
Mr Palmer recently blasting fellow member Jacqui Lambie as a "drama
queen".
Mr Palmer, whose legal counsel is now seeking to suppress all
administrative documents relating to the FOI application, is also
hoping to make a personal submission to the tribunal over concerns about
whether his "personal information and safety" have been adequately
considered.
Palmer’s once potent PUP is now polling badly — and following the same trajectory as other minor parties.
Clive Palmer’s Palmer United Party is facing electoral
oblivion, mere months from its key election test in Queensland, where
the party was established as a vehicle for Palmer’s personal vendetta
against the party he helped found and bankroll, the Liberal National
Party.
State-based polling taken over four weeks in October by Essential Research showed
that PUP had continued its freefall in public support in its home
state, down to 5% in October after consistently losing 1-2 points every
month for much of the year, having peaked at 12% in May. Nationally, PUP
has been hovering at a dire 3-4% for two months, although as recently
as August, it had managed 6%. In contrast to its performance in the 2013
election, PUP is no longer performing noticeably better in Queensland
than elsewhere.
Other polling backs up the decline of PUP. Today’s Fairfax
Ipsos poll has PUP on just 3% nationally, whereas Nielsen polls from
earlier in the year had it regularly managing 5-6%. Newspoll doesn’t
separately track PUP, but “Others” reach 16% and 17% after the budget
and are currently on 14%. As “others” tend to average around 7% in polls
with PUP, that suggests Newspoll is also picking up the fall in PUP’s
vote nationally. Similarly, in Newspoll’s Queensland state polling,
“Others” fell from 24% back to a more typical 18% between June and
September.
At that level, Palmer will barely trouble the scorers in
next year’s Queensland state election, even assuming his now-standard
late-campaign advertising blitz lifts the party a couple of points.
Indeed, Palmer has been distancing himself from PUP’s Queensland campaign, even though revenge on Campbell Newman was the principal reason for the establishment of the PUP.
What’s happened to Clive? For starters, the Palmer model has
some problems built into it. Palmer’s approach to politics has been
shark-like, not so much in terms of its ferocity as in the need to keep
moving. Clive is always in search of the next headline, making
announcements and prognostications but never sticking to one issue so
that there’s a risk of someone spotting his inconsistency or
incoherence. But this sort of approach is ultimately self-limiting — you
can only ramp up the hype for so long, you can only flit from subject
to subject for a limited period, before voters start to wonder about the
detail and the substance, even in our ADD-based polity.
“PUP’s fate
threatens to be that of other minor parties that have made an initial
splash politically but then failed to follow through …”
And the PUP has also suffered from the inevitable problems
of small but initially successful political parties: ego, cliques and
division. Palmer has lost not one but, carelessly, two state leaders in
Queensland, with Alexander Douglas and Carl Judge both walking out on
him. Then, of course, there’s Jacqui Lambie, who has been busily
differentiating her own product as a latter-day Pauline Hanson, an
impressive feat for a party that was founded on the principle of
welcoming asylum seekers. Lambie’s status as the political equivalent of
the flatulent, ranting old relative at Christmas dinner might improve
her voter recognition when she has to seek reelection in Tasmania in a
few years’ time, but hasn’t done the party any particular good among
mainstream voters.
Meanwhile, the Coalition, which initially struggled with all
this confusing “negotiation” stuff in the Senate, has worked Palmer
out, realising that the mining magnate’s vociferous and colourful
objections to its policies count for little when it comes to securing
his support — indeed, the more abusive and graphic Palmer is about
government policies on asylum seekers, financial planning regulation or
climate inaction, the more likely it seems that he will fall into line
with some token concessions. The fall in Palmer’s support appears to
have increased as he has made more deals with the government, suggesting
that dealing with the government has contradicted the essential selling
point of PUP as a disruptive force of populist political outsiders
refusing to engage in business-as-usual politics and holding the line
against unpopular policies.
Who has benefited from PUP’s decline? Like other non-maj0r
party voters, PUP voters appear to be economically Leftish — supportive
of traditional economic interventionism and opposed to
privatisation — but socially conservative. The numbers are too small to
make a sound assessment, but Essential’s Queensland polling shows the
“Other” vote declining as PUP grew, then rising again as PUP has
declined. The interventionist/conservative segment of the electorate is
still looking for a politician that can carry its standard, with Pauline
Hanson, Bob Katter and now, seemingly, Clive Palmer failing to retain
its hopes for the restoration of a golden age of 1950s economic and
social certainty.
In short, PUP’s fate threatens to be that of other minor
parties that have made an initial splash politically but then failed to
follow through on their initial success, partly because of the
impossibility of permanently playing the role of outsider, partly
because the process of actually operating effectively as a party is
difficult for small groups without formal mechanisms. And that’s even
more so when ultimately the party is centred on one individual and his
own agenda.
Once
again backing away from a commitment, the PUP leader has announced
support for direct action. His deal with Greg Hunt serves a personal
interest but puts the Australian economy at risk, writes Ben Eltham
The Abbott government has secured the likely passage of its Direct Action carbon policy through the Senate.
The news comes as a result of an agreement reached yesterday between
Environment Minister Greg Hunt and Palmer United Party leader Clive
Palmer, for the PUP to support the bill with minor amendments.
Once again, after tough talk and media stunts, Palmer has rolled over
in the back rooms and done a deal in his own best interests. As the
owner of several large coal and iron ore mines, Palmer has an obvious
vested interest in ensuring a taxpayer-funded compensation plan for big
polluters.
As we've arguedmany times,
Direct Action is a fraudulent policy that can’t possibly reduce
Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions to our target of a 5 per cent
reduction by 2020.
What it will do is pay the biggest polluters in the country a total
of $2.55 billion over the next six years. All for doing what everyone
(except the most ardent climate denialists) agrees they must, if the
world is to escape devastating warming: lower their fossil fuel
pollution.
The government claims the policy will spend $2.55 billion in reverse
auctions to those firms that can promise the biggest reductions. This
will be great for the bank balances of big polluters, but won’t do much
to reduce Australia’s overall emissions.
You can get an idea of just how little the government cares by
reference to Hunt’s plans for those polluters who take advantage of the
scheme to rapidly ramp up their emissions. He has no plans to punish
rogue polluters.
Hunt just expects everyone to play by the rules. After all, fining
polluters for releasing greenhouse gases would look awfully like … a
carbon tax. “Our intention is no, our budgeting is no, and that's
because we think the firms will operate within it," Mr Hunt told Sky News on Thursday.
The passing of Direct Action in this manner is Australian politics at its barrel-bottom worst.
Everyone is lying. Hunt is lying when he says Direct Action will
reduce emissions by enough to meet Australia’s 5 per cent target. So
obviously will the policy fall short, the government has understandably
decided not to bother commissioning any fresh modeling.
No credible analyst believes Direct Action can achieve anything like
the 5 per cent emissions reduction target we have signed up to.
According to respected analysts RepuTex, Direct Action may be able to
reduce emissions by 80 to 130 million tonnes at best. “This is
equivalent to a shortfall of over 300 million tonnes for Australia to
meet its 5 per cent emissions reduction target of 421 million tonnes by
2020,” RepuTex’s Hugh Grossman told The Australian.
But even if Direct Action magically achieves the 5 per cent mark, the
next round of international talks will see many countries push
Australia for a bigger reduction by 2030 – perhaps 15 per cent, perhaps
more. There is simply no way Direct Action can do this.
In the manner of chancers everywhere, Hunt has doubled down on his
rhetoric in recent weeks, ramping up the chutzpah to superlative levels.
“Well, this is a scheme which is designed to last for 20 years, for 30
years,” Mr Hunt said in a press conference yesterday. “It is absolutely
capable of providing for the long term.”
Voters might be more confident in such predictions if the government
itself had budgeted for the policy “for the long term.” Direct Action
isn’t even fully budgeted for the medium term: while the headline budget
is $2.55 billion, the forward estimates in Joe Hockey’s May budget provide only $1.15 billion to 2017.
Clive Palmer is lying too. He put out a press release yesterday that
read “Palmer Saves Emissions Trading Scheme”. Even in the
reality-challenged worldview of Palmerama, this is a pretty impressive
confection. Australia doesn’t actually have an emissions trading scheme
to save: Palmer voted with the government to abolish it.
Palmer is probably talking about his pet scheme for a “zero dollar”
emissions trading scheme that would have a carbon price of zero until
Australia’s major trading partners introduce their own schemes
(presumably Europe is not a major trading partner). He secured a token
concession from Hunt on this point, allowing the Climate Change
Authority to research the zero-price ETS and report back.
But Hunt is frank about the government’s attitude to such a proposal.
“We have agreed to a review but our policy is crystal clear, we
abolished the [carbon] tax and we're not bringing it back," Mr Hunt told the ABC this morning.
Palmer is also trumpeting his success in saving certain climate
agencies and initiatives like the Climate Change Authority and the
Australian Renewable Energy Authority, both of which the government
wants to abolish.
It’s not much of a success. The last federal policy that is achieving
any emissions reductions of note, the Renewable Energy Target, is hanging in the balance. Palmer has pledged to vote to keep the RET.
On the other hand, he also pledged to vote against Direct Action,
which he is now voting for. On recent form, anything Clive Palmer rules
out one week is a good chance to receive his support the next. Perhaps
Al Gore can explain.
The real tragedy here – apart from the environmental one – is for
Australia’s future economy. Australia once had a world-leading scheme to
prepare it for a carbon-constrained future. That architecture has been
comprehensively dismantled, to be replaced with government hand-outs to
the worst culprits.
Greens leader Christine Milne made the obvious point. “What we have
here is no contribution to bringing down emissions, no modelling to
backup the claims, by a government and Clive Palmer which tore down an
emissions trading scheme which was bringing down emissions,” she said in
response.
Meanwhile, the world keeps warming, and the world’s economic powers
are rapidly moving towards far more serious efforts to transform their
polluting industries.
If you want proof, look to China’s latest five year plan.
It ploughed billions into renewable energy, established a pilot ETS in
some of the its largest regions, including Beijing, and moved to
radically lower coal consumption in an attempt to curb China’s crippling
air pollution. China has introduced a coal tariff, and Australia’s
biggest trading partner is reportedly preparing to introduce a national ETS in 2016.
In contrast, Australia is going backwards.
Under Direct Action, Australia is storing up huge risks for our
future economic wellbeing. Instead of a gradual transition that allows
the market to adjust in the least costly manner, we are instead headed
for a disruptive future in which rapid decarbonisation may well be
forced on us by international sanction. The result could be precisely
the sort of rust-belt doomsday that Tony Abbott prophesied in his
campaign against the carbon tax.
Anti-politicians are everywhere. Clive Palmer is the left’s
current favourite anti-establishment politician because he is blocking
some of Abbott’s nastier budget policies. Palmer has broken progressive
hearts before, such as when he stood next to Al Gore and promised to
help repeal the Carbon Tax only if it was changed into an ETS; he
followed through on the repeal bit but failed to save the ETS. This time
we’re all really hoping he sticks to his guns on higher education
policy after disappointingly letting Abbott’s do-nothing Direct Action
policy through today. It’s easy to forget, while appreciating Palmer’s
Abbott-blocking ability, that this was the man who fought tirelessly to
destroy two of the previous Labor government’s most important
progressive policies – the mining tax and the Carbon Price. So Palmer’s
not a progressive politician, even if he does have some really
interesting ideas about asylum seeker policy. Just ask the people who
voted for him – those people he’s ultimately beholden. Or look at how he
makes his money.
I am torn in thinking about keep-the-bastards-honest,
a-pox-on-both-their-houses anti-politicians and minor parties because
there’s no doubt that sometimes some of them can be useful – like when
they’re blocking Tony Abbott. Actually, it’s not fair to just say
useful. Sometimes they’re entirely heroic and progressive policies
wouldn’t be implemented or saved from repeal without them. But just as
often, they’re unpredictable, flimsy, self-centred, untrustworthy, and
politically motivated to differentiate themselves from major parties for
their own vested interests and ideological purity. Yet they claim to be
above all this when painting themselves as ‘not like the baddies in the
majors’. But most are just as grubby as the spin doctors in the major
parties when it comes to election tactics. Otherwise they’d never get
elected in the first place. Don’t forget that independents and minor
parties rely on convoluted preference deals to get into power, deals
which are by their very nature political. Once in parliament they have
to do deals – otherwise they’d be both invisible and irrelevant.
A great example of these mixed feelings is my current love-hate
relationship with Russell Brand. I guess it’s not really fair to say
hate, because I don’t feel the same way about Brand as I do about
Abbott. Let’s just say love and frustration. I really respect Brand’s
moral stance on the danger of growing wealth inequality. His possible
bid to become London’s Lord Mayor is probably inspired by his campaign
to reduce unaffordability of housing in London, where he grew up on a
council estate. Helen Razor
suggests that if Brand wants to be a politician, he should learn a
thing or two about economics. But to be fair, when he says he can’t get
his head around economics, he may be joking, or he may be making the
very fair assessment that current orthodoxies about supply and demand
economics are a function of a capitalist system that favours the very
few over the rest of us. In that, Brand definitely has a point. Brand is
not just any celebrity who decides to talk about politics – he is
eloquent, intelligent, passionate, knows his stuff, and is incredibly
charismatic – all great qualities of a leader (or politician if you want
to call a spade a spade). And his values align very closely with mine.
On top of this, he promoted Australia’s March in March to his 8 million twitter followers. Also, his YouTube show The Trews is truly hilarious.
So I’ve covered the things I love, but now what about the
frustration? Really it all boils down to Brand’s anti-politician
strategy of differentiating himself from mainstream politicians by calling for a revolution and encouraging people who value his opinions not to vote.
When I first heard this, I was intrigued. The conspiracy theorist in me
wondered for a moment if he was being paid by the Conservative Party to
get young progressive voters off the electoral role. And even though
I’ve since become a huge fan of Brand, I still can’t see how he can’t
see that it’s an incredibly counterproductive action to urge support for
progressive policies by telling progressive voters not to vote. I’m
sure the Conservative Party are happy that they didn’t have to
pay Brand to mount this campaign. Perhaps a year on, Brand is shifting
away from this statement by considering running himself for Mayor – it’s
hard to get people to vote for you when you’ve told them that voting at
all makes you part of the problem. However, the trait that Brand shares
with many anti-politicians and minor parties is that he wants
everything to happen now, through revolution, and ignores the reality
that progressive policy reforms are never an overnight change inspired
by a single person or a small group.
Brand’s impatience makes him in the UK context just as anti-Labour as
he is anti-Conservative – he heaps them together into the ‘they’re all
the same’ type statements, which ends up benefiting the Conservatives.
Why does this statement benefit the Conservatives? Because if they’re
just as bad as each other, people may as well vote for Cameron, or in
our case, Abbott. If there’s no difference in the result. Reality is,
progressive reforms come about through long, hard-fought series of
carefully negotiated and compromised battles to inch forward away from
the right-wing ideal of letting the market rip (unregulated
neoliberalism) and keeping women barefoot in the kitchen (social
conservatism). I’ve quoted Judt before on this blog and I’ll quote him
again: ‘incremental improvements upon unsatisfactory circumstances are
the best we can hope for’.
The ideal of a revolution – a complete replacement of the status quo –
as compared to steady and incremental gains in the right direction
aren’t two options that you have to choose between. One is a fantasy,
the other is achievable. The real option is a choice between the two
major parties – one progressive and one conservative. I support the
party which aligns most closely with my progressive values, and has the
best chance of forming progressive government. As a Port Adelaide
supporter, I’ll remind you of the famous Port Adelaide line – we exist
to win premierships. The Labor Party doesn’t exist to be activists, or
to be ideologically fundamental or to promise a complete overhaul of the
status quo. Nor do they expect every progressive voter will agree with
everything they do. The Labor Party exists to form government that can
improve the lives of Australians through progressive reforms. And they
need progressive Australians help them to do this.
Many left wing independents or minor parties spend most of their time
bemoaning that the incremental improvements of the major progressive
party aren’t fast enough, large enough, or anywhere near revolutionary.
And they often spend most of their time fixated on one or two causes
which they feel effectively differentiate them from the progressive
major party. However, a pragmatist would say that in a country where an
extreme right wing conservative such as Abbott can be elected as Prime
Minister by a healthy majority and go about undoing Labor’s policy
reforms (such as mining tax, Carbon Price, Medicare, ABC funding, health
and educational funding, a social safety net just to name a few), it’s
unrealistic to believe you’ll achieve any progress by throwing your
weight (and lack of vote) behind an ideologically pure revolution, or a
single policy ideal, that has no hope of success, and no hope of
changing anything. And it’s unhelpful to spend all your time, energy,
campaign dollars, talent and voice in the community bagging the
progressive option when it’s the option you really want if you really do
value progress.
You might not like everything a major party like Labor does, and the
flash and colour of an independent or a minor party who promises you the
world without any hope of delivering might seem like a tempting option.
There’s no reason why these colourful and passionate people can’t
contribute to the debate and provide fresh ideas – and sometimes some
great blocking skills. But ultimately we need the workhorse – the
progressive major party – to be in power if we don’t want the country
run by conservative neoliberals. So who are you supporting in the 2016
election? I hope Australian progressives are realistically ready for the
fight.
The
Palmer United Party has joined forces with Immigration Minister Scott
Morrison to re-introduce the infamous 'Temporary Protection Visas'. Max
Chalmers reports.
A
new deal struck by the Palmer United Party and Scott Morrison will
prevent asylum seekers currently held in detention centres in Australia
from ever being granted permanent protection visas, even after they are
found to be genuine refugees.
On Thursday morning PUP leader Clive Palmer announced his party had
reached an agreement with the Coalition to back the reintroduction of
Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs) which will allow refugees to settle in
Australia for just three years before they have their claims to asylum
reassessed.
Those placed on TPVs will have work rights, and will be offered access to social security.
As part of the deal, Palmer announced a new class of visa called the
Safe Haven Enterprise Visa, which will enable regional businesses and
communities to make a request to have TPV holders come and fill jobs in
their area.
The changes have been touted by Palmer and Minister Scott Morrison as
a way to deal with the so-called ‘legacy caseload’ of around 30,000
asylum seekers who are currently in Australia and waiting to have their
claims processed.
Palmer said those being held on Christmas Island will be eligible for
the new visas but Morrison confirmed asylum seekers already moved to
Manus and Nauru would not. Any new arrivals will be sent to offshore
processing and will not be eligible for settlement in Australia.
Morrison said people currently being held on Christmas Island would
not be moved to Nauru while the legislation is examined and debated by
the Parliament.
In response, Morrison has attacked the Greens and Labor for refusing
to allow the previous attempts to reintroduce TPVs through the
Parliament.
“The introduction of TPVs is a key element of the Government‘s border
protection strategy to combat people smuggling and to discourage people
from making dangerous voyages to Australia,” the Bill’s explanatory
memorandum states.
TPVs have long been opposed by asylum seeker advocacy groups, who
claim they place legitimate refugees in limbo and reinforce the
psychological harm inflicted by indefinite detention.
The visa changes are part of a broader package introduced to the
parliament today, which includes amendments altering the way children
born in detention are classified and the relationship between
Australia’s international obligations and domestic law.
The Human Rights Law Centre has been quick to raise concerns about
the Bill, which looks likely to pass the Senate once it gets out of a
committee review.
HRLC’s Daniel Webbs said Morrison was trying to escape Australia’s obligations under international law.
“The Minister has trumpeted the TPV issue but that’s just the tip of
the iceberg. Lurking beneath the surface, today’s Bill contains a suite
of appalling reforms which impact on the way asylum seekers will be
treated both here and at sea,” Webb said.
“If these changes go ahead, some babies born in this country will be
subject to mandatory detention and mandatory removal to Nauru as soon as
possible.”
Yes…
that would be the section of the Constitution that explains how you can
ban an MP from parliament. Oh the irony. Max Chalmers explains.
A
senior Palmer United Party adviser is standing by a series of alarming
predictions he made about the threat Sharia law poses to Australia,
despite facing criticism from an expert in both Australian and Islamic
law that he does not understand either.
Rob Messenger, Chief of Staff to PUP Senator Jacqui Lambie, told New
Matilda he believed anyone in Australia practicing sharia was in breach
of the Australian Constitution, and that he had not changed his mind
since authoring a series of posts defending Dutch anti-Muslim politician
Geert Wilders and calling on leaders to speak out against “extremist
Islamic religious ideology”.
“I’m concerned about any law that’s not Australian operating in
Australia. Any law other than Australian law indicates a divided
loyalty, is a breach of section 44 of our constitution and possibly
treasonous,” he said in an email.
The Palmer United Party remains tangled in a public feud after
Messenger’s boss called for supporters of Sharia law to leave Australia,
but then failed spectacularly to define the term ‘Sharia’ when probed on ABC program Insiders.
Despite signs of division in the PUP camp, Messenger was not backing away from the issue when quizzed on Monday evening.
In his correspondence, Messenger posited his own definition of Sharia.
“It’s a law that’s not Australian and being promoted by terrorists, extremists and murderers,” he said.
But Dr Ghena Krayem, a lecturer in law at the University of Sydney,
ridiculed Messenger’s understanding of both Sharia and Australian law,
saying the former had nothing to do with terrorism or extremism.
“That’s an incredibly ignorant definition,” Dr Krayem said.
“Sharia is not just the legal code that we associate it with, so it’s not just about law.
“Sharia is the whole framework that Muslims live by, their day-to-day
things like how they pray, their interaction with people, the food that
they eat, all of the things that we don’t normally associate with any
legal system.
“It’s kind of like our moral code.”
Dr Krayem said that banning Sharia would in effect mean banning
Islam, an act that, ironically, would not be supported by the Australian
Constitution, which prevents the Commonwealth making laws prohibiting the free exercise of religion.
“Perhaps Mr Messenger hasn’t heard of Section 116 of the Australian Constitution,” Dr Krayem said.
She also noted that Section 44 of the Constitution, cited by
Messenger, outlines the conditions under which someone may be banned
from sitting as an MP in the House of Representatives.
“I’m not sure what he’s talking about there,” she said.
A former member of the LNP and of the Queensland Parliament,
Messenger has previously compared the danger Islam presents to modern
Australia to that faced by the people of Germany in the 1930s.
“There was a time when the German people could have emphatically said
‘No’ to the Nazis’ special message of hate and crazy,” Messenger wrote in a May 2013 letter to the Brisbane Times.
“We are living in similar times and face a similar evil. And the
world will suffer a similar fate as the generation of 1930s and 40s, if
we do not loudly condemn the leaders and followers of the extremist
Islamic religious ideology driving this current world madness.”
Asked if he had gone too far in the comparison, Messenger upped the
ante: “Given the recent level of barbarity displayed by the sharia
extremists - the comparison didn't go far enough.”
Pushed to expand on the number of “extremists” he thought were active
in Australia, Messenger replied: “We're in a new world. It only took 19
sharia extremists to bring America to its knees at 9/11.
“There are hundreds of Australian extremists fighting overseas. It’s
not a case of numbers it is a case of capacity and motivation to inflict
harm. The extremists have both.”
Dr Krayem said that in her experiences researching Sharia in
Australia, no-one she met had advocated establishing a parallel legal
system.
“My research indicates that certainly the overwhelming majority of
Muslims in Australia would find that it’s their legal and moral code
that makes them feel comfortable to be Australian and to abide by
Australian law,” she said.
“I mean I’ve heard repeatedly from the Imams that have been
interviewed that your first obligation here in Australia is to abide by
the law of the land.”
A screenshot from Messenger's blog
While still an MP, Messenger also introduced a bill calling for the “pre-emptive banning of Islamic Sharia Law” in Queensland.
“Not one media outlet reported on my speech,” he lamented in a blog
post. “Not one member of the LNP or Labor Party spoke to support a
debate on this matter.”
On Monday, Lambie hit back at her critics in Parliament, defending her Sharia stance.
“I’ve been criticised by some because I couldn’t properly define what
Sharia law is. It’s not going to come as a shock when I tell you that
I’m not an Islamic scholar,” she said.
“However, I will tell you what I do know about the supporters of
Sharia. Every major terrorist attack on Western world citizens and
Australian citizens — 9/11, the Bali bombings, the Boston marathon
bombings, recent beheadings and massacres — have all been carried out by
supporters of Sharia law. If people want more detail on this law, my
advice is to google ‘Sharia’.”
Days earlier, the Senator was called out for sharing an image from
her Facebook page showing a Muslim woman dressed in a burqa and holding a
pistol, with text superimposed calling for the burqa to be banned.
Lambie was apparently unaware the image was of Afghani policewoman
Malalai Kakar, who had formed a women’s crimes unit and been
assassinated by the Taliban as a result of her work.
Messenger denied being responsible for the Kakar post but said that,
with Lambie’s permission, he took a role on advising in all areas,
including policy matters relating to Muslim communities.
“Senator Lambie and I have been working together as a political team since before the last federal election for about 18 months.
“We’ve done so because like most politicians and their [Chiefs of Staff] we share similar political views,” he said.
Dr Krayem said she intended to offer her assistance to Lambie in
understanding Sharia and its Australian context, but that Messenger’s
assumptions appeared to be on shaky legal ground.
“I think maybe he should come to some of our Constitutional law
classes 101, because he’s got to get some basic facts straight,” she
said.
“Before Mr Messenger or Jacqui Lambie talk about banning anything, they need to get their facts right first.”
In his letter to the Brisbane Times, Messenger said “Islamic
terrorists… cleverly hide amongst us” and made alarming predictions
about the kind of weapons they would use to do harm to Australians.
“One of the greatest risks our children face is that meat cleavers,
knives, home-made bombs and guns will be replaced with sophisticated
modern weapons of mass destruction - poisonous chemicals, nuclear bombs
and deadly viruses,” he wrote.
New Matilda asked Messenger why he had singled out “meat cleavers” at
two points in his letter to the Brisbane Times, and whether he saw any
need to restrict the sale of the implement.
“The use of "meat clever" [sic] was a direct reference to one of the
weapons that the killers of Trooper Lee Rigby used. The letter was a
direct response to that horrifying event,” he replied.
“Your simplistic, leading question disturbs me because it indicates a
complete lack of knowledge about that extraordinary terrorist attack
and a predetermined editorial position.”
For the record, New Matilda has no editorial position on the sale of
meat cleavers. We do, however, have pretty strong views on ignorance.
Clive Palmer outside Parliament House in Canberra. Photograph: LUKAS COCH/AAPIMAGE
Tony Abbott was jubilant after his government persuaded the party of
a mining magnate to repeal a mining tax. The deal – while “imperfect” –
proved Labor was irrelevant and the Coalition was getting on with the
job, he said.
It also proved, once again, that Palmer is an easy touch in
behind-closed-doors negotiations, and that neither Palmer, nor the
government, are all that keen on Australia’s world-leading system of
retirement savings through compulsory superannuation.
Which is strange since the Coalition is so keen on reducing
government spending. Compulsory superannuation means more people can
finance their own retirement and fewer will need the aged pension.
The millionaire Palmer United party leader had presented himself as
the protector of the little man – determined to keep three of the
programs that had been “paid for” from the mining tax and that the
government had promised to axe along with it.
He said he would never agree to the axing of the low income
superannuation contribution – $500 a year paid by the government into
the super accounts of people earning less than $37,000 a year – or the
schoolkids bonus – a means-tested payment of $420 for every primary
school child and $840 for high school students – or the income support
bonus – a $200-a-year supplement to help pensioners get by.
But in fact he did agree to their abolition, just delayed by three
years. And the trade-off was that he also agreed to freeze for seven
years the superannuation contribution paid by all employers to all
employees.
That was also another big broken promise for a government that had
pledged “no further adverse changes” to superannuation – although the
prime minister (who takes a black is white approach to these questions)
insisted it wasn’t a broken promise at all because he had promised a
two-year freeze and a seven-year freeze was pretty much the same thing.
Not really, according to examples provided by Labor. A seven-year
freeze would mean a 25 year old earning $55,000 will have $9,215 less in
retirement savings by 2025 and a 35 year old earning $75,000 will have
$12,977 less.
And as for that hero of the little guy, Palmer, he saved the
$500-a-year low-income super payment for someone on $37,000 a year for
the next three years, but cost them so much in superannuation payments
that in the long term that they’ll be $10,000 worse off by 2025. Great
deal, Clive.
Perhaps it’s because, like some in the government, Palmer is not so keen on compulsory superannuation in the first place.
Abbott once described compulsory super as “one of the biggest con jobs ever foisted by government on the Australian people”.
Palmer said on Tuesday it was “just the way to allow merchant banks
to make large fees out of the Australian population, or many union
movements that manage their own super to have a good time.”
And they both made the point that superannuation increases come at
the expense of wage rises – meaning families have less disposable income
now in order to have more money for their retirement later. Abbott said
this proved superannuation was not a “nirvana” – whatever that might
mean. Palmer suggested it showed super was in fact a bad thing because
lots of people would be dead before they ever received it.
At the end of the last chaotic session of parliament I wrote that a “Palmer pattern” was emerging
– cause maximum disruption and then support the government after
extracting cobbled-together concessions during chaotic backroom meetings
from which all stakeholders are excluded.
This time it is worse – far-reaching changes to a crucial economic
policy in a last-minute deal without any scrutiny. Yes, the government
has abolished the flawed mining tax, as it promised, and just in time to
tick the box for its first year anniversary. And yes, it had no choice
but to deal with Palmer. But it came at a very high price for public
policy.
Tony Abbott had a favored technique which he applied to the five boxing matches he had at Oxford.
As soon as the bell sounded, Abbott would rush his opponent
before they had a chance to get out of their corner and commence to rain
a flurry of blows.
Perhaps it was a good thing for Tony that he confined himself to only
a few bouts, as the technique won’t work against a more experienced
opponent who will simply cover up, side step and wait for an opening.
In an interview conducted circa 2006, with ABC’s Melbourne’s Jon
Faine, Abbott in typical hubris told Faine that his technique was;
“basically no big deal. You’ve got to remember Jon, that they were only
weedy Poms.”
Both Abbott’s boxing technique and the remark offered a good insight to the character of the man.
Rush in, try to overwhelm your opponent through sheer aggression and then denigrate them as weak and unworthy.
Aggressive and conceited, Abbott has applied the same characteristics and approach to his political career.
On winning the election, Abbott was determined to come into government like a lion.
The adults were in charge. There would be neither compromise nor quarter with his opponents.
Sweeping reform was to be the order of the day.
The opposition was there to be pummeled and denigrated, ridiculed and reviled.
Truth and facts, always shadowy figures in politics, were to be
trampled underfoot along with a sense of humanity as Abbott trod the
paths of Right wing righteousness to a Shangri-la where Australia was
“open for business.”
How could he lose? Tony not only had God in his corner but Rupert Murdoch as well.
Why; – the difference was scarce adjusted in the tomb!
Then came Clive Palmer.
If Abbott saw himself as an elected crusader seeking the holy grail
of an unfettered ‘free market’ economy, Palmer portrayed himself as
Robin Goodfellow, a role which he has clearly relished over the past few
weeks.
No stranger to politics, Palmer won his votes through unabashed populism.
While Abbott played to the Dress Circle of the true believers of the free market, Palmer played to the stalls.
There are interesting parallels between Palmer and his approach to
politics and those of Senator Huey P. Long former Governor of Louisiana.
Long was a member of the Democrats and helped get Roosevelt elected
in 1932, but split with the party in 1933 to conduct his own bid for the
Presidency.
Palmer was a member of the National Party and bank rolled the ‘Joh
for Canberra’ campaign in 1987 but split with the Nationals after
failing to get pre-selection to contest the Division of Lilley in 2013.
Similarly to Long, Palmer announced that he would run as an
independent for the seat of Fairfax at the 2013 and hinted that a run
for PM “wouldn’t be out of the question.”
Long’s success so frightened the party leaders that even the
conservatives flocked to Roosevelt, and readily embraced FDR at his
worst in preference to dealing with ‘the Kingfish.’
While Palmer has not espoused any campaign similar to Long’s ‘Share
the Wealth’ policy, he was quick to refute the Abbott government’s
claims of a budget emergency as “sinister and ideologically driven.”
Palmer added that News Ltd had been complicit in peddling the LNP’s
“lies and broken promises, and that Rupert Murdoch should get the Joseph
Goebbels award for propaganda.”
Both Palmer and Long had axes to grind with the parties that had spawned them.
Long with FDR as a political rival and for his remarks that Long had
flouted and caricatured the process of parliamentary democracy, Palmer
with the Nationals and their refusal to select him as a candidate for
the Division of Lilley coupled with his ongoing feud with Queensland
premier Campbell Newman.
Palmer has waited patiently over the last ten months to even the
score with the LNP while maintaining a steady media profile, and stole
the spotlight from Tony Abbott by appearing with Al Gore a week before
the senate was due to vote on Abbott’s center piece policy of Carbon Tax
Repeal.
Palmer announced that he would support the repeal – but with conditions.
When the bill was presented to the Senate, what followed could only be described as a farce worthy of Moliere.
Abbott, whose polls as preferred prime minister had plummeted, was
desperate to ram the bill through in an attempt to salvage the
government’s credibility, suddenly found himself cast in the role of
Pantaloon, as Palmer and his party insisted on further amendments to the
repeal, and then amendments to the amendments.
Treading warily, Abbott shifted the blame to the ALP while at remaining at pains not to antagonize Palmer.
Six days later, the bill is still under debate in the Senate and no vote has been cast.
A similar if not more muted situation occurred when the government
presented its Future of financial advice reform (Fofa) bill on Tuesday,
with Palmer clearly calling for the government to jump, while the LNP
responded by asking; ‘how high?’
Whilst a large number of voters may feel a strong sense of Schadenfreude at Abbott’s fate at the hands of PUP and the independents, as The Guardian’s Leonore Taylor observed of Palmer’s antics;
Abbott, who came in like a lion and who was sure that his ‘rush ‘em,
knock ‘em down, and then kick ‘em in the head’ style would overcome any
political or parliamentary obstacles, has been reduced to a lamb by
Palmer, and now the roles are reversed.
While Palmer could hardly be described as a lamb, he’s proved to
Abbott and the LNP that he can certainly be the lion when it comes to
calling the shots in the Senate.
Palmer may enjoy playing Puck to Abbott’s Bottom, but for the sake of governance the situation cannot continue indefinitely.
At some stage, the lamb is going to have to lie down with the lion.
At present however, Abbott and the LNP are learning that while the
lion may lie down with the lamb, the lamb’s not going to get much sleep.
It's
an odd sounding question but not without foundation. Clive Palmer’s
bombshell press conference with Al Gore where he announced his party's
voting intentions in the Senate on Wednesday June 25th gave a pretty
clear indication that he was calling the shots on the repeal, or
otherwise, of the carbon tax. And, one must say…
While
Googling Tony Abbott - now there's something I wouldn't have imagined
myself doing twenty five years ago - I came across an interesting quote
that I thought was refreshingly honest: “It’s my job between now and
polling day to remind the Australian people just what a hopeless,
unreliable, untrustworthy, dishonest, deceptive Government this has…
If
anything was patently obvious from the events in Canberra last week, it
is that Clive Palmer thinks he is running the country and the media
seem to think so too. They are all over him, relegating Tony Abbott to
the role of a bit-player. It is also patently obvious that the
government's negotiating skills…
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While still an MP, Messenger also introduced a bill calling for the “pre-emptive banning of Islamic Sharia Law” in Queensland.
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