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Kelly Burke
Adelaide University cancels event with UN special rapporteur Francesca Albanese
Adelaide University has abruptly cancelled a high-profile public event featuring UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, prompting organisers to accuse the institution of turning Adelaide into “Moscow on the Torrens”.
The event is part of Constellations: Not Writers’ Week, the popup literary festival that emerged in the wake of the cancelled Adelaide Writers Week.
It was scheduled to take place at the university’s Elder Hall tomorrow night, but organisers say the university has informed them certain booking requirements were not adhered to. The Guardian has sought comment from Adelaide University.
A new venue to accommodate 650 in-person ticket holders and 350 livestream ticket holders has been secured at Norwood Concert Hall.
Albanese is appearing via video link alongside historian Prof Henry Reynolds and academic Dr. Lana Tatour.
Louise Adler, the former director of Adelaide Writers’ Week, lashed out at the decision.
“Welcome once again to Moscow on the Torrens,” she said.
double quotation markUniversities, the arts, and the media were once respected as sites where controversial ideas could be tested. That is no longer a given. We are witnessing relentless campaigning by sectional groups and their influence over politicians … the public square is being seriously impoverished.
Organisers of the event claim the university has bowed to pressure from the Australian, which reported last week that Albanese’s scheduled appearance was in defiance of a recent US sanction against her issued by the US president, Donald Trump.
Updated at 23.37 EST
Question time ends
And after a final dixer to Tony Burke, question time is over for the day.
Updated at 23.27 EST
Nationals’ Michelle Landry continues Coalition questioning line on living standards
And we’re back to regularly scheduled programming, and this time Nationals MP Michelle Landry is holding the baton, putting the same question to Anthony Albanese about Australians’ living standards going backwards.
Albanese says again that the question flies in the face of the accounts data released today that shows the economy is growing.
Dan Tehan gets up on a point of order, which Albanese says is because he “hasn’t been on TV for a minute”.
The personal jabs are really up there today folks.
Milton Dick says the questions are so broad the opposition can’t compel the government to be tight with their answers. “I will keep saying it and hopefully it will get through,” he adds.
Updated at 23.27 EST
Allegra Spender asks treasurer how budget will address AI
A bit of a flavour change here, independent MP Allegra Spender says the government is moving too slowly on artificial intelligence and asks Jim Chalmers how the government is considering the impact of AI on the economy, and how the budget will urgently address “both capturing the upside and managing the downside risks?”
Chalmers says he reckons the government isn’t moving too slowly and that some “substantial progress” has been made.
He says the government’s national AI plan has three goals: capturing the opportunities of AI “including attracting more investment”, spreading the benefits of AI and keeping Australians safe.
On the upcoming budget, he says:
double quotation markWe’ve made it really clear, a big focus will be this productivity challenge that the honourable member knows has been hanging around in our economy now for some decades. AI can be part of the solution to our productivity challenge if we manage it right and maximise the opportunities along the lines of the AI plan.
Updated at 23.19 EST
PM says opposition ‘completely ignoring’ national growth figures
Angus Taylor gets another go at the dispatch box, and says Australians have “endured the longest household recession on record”, and asks the PM the same question about the buck stopping with him.
Now so far, these fairly long questions have been exploited by Labor because broad questions allow very broad answers, and there’s not a whole lot the Speaker can do about it.
Albanese again takes advantage, saying “another tight question from the opposition there, Mr Speaker!” He says the question ignores today’s national accounts data.
double quotation markThey come in here with Monday’s pack [of questions] that they forgot to ask, ignoring today’s figures on the national accounts that are out today, completely ignoring the growth that is there, and they come in here and just continue to just talk Australia down.
Updated at 23.11 EST
Will the treasurer bring forward measures to stop excessive grocery pricing?
Back to the crossbench, Rebekha Sharkie asks the treasurer if he will bring forward the ban on excessive pricing of groceries that is due to come into effect on 1 July.
Jim Chalmers, without committing to accelerating the deadline, says price gouging is a “big focus” of the government, and they are working to “strengthen the arrangements as soon as we can”.
double quotation markWe go as quickly as we can, but also consulting where we need to, making sure that we get it right.
Updated at 23.00 EST
‘This is beyond a joke’: Speaker gets fired up
Milton Dick is not having it today.
Liberal frontbencher Angie Bell gets to the dispatch box next and asks the same question again (living standards going backwards, the buck stopping with the PM, you get the gist).
Anthony Albanese takes the call this time, and soon after the opposition jumps up to make a point of order on relevance.
But the speaker’s fuse is short, and burning quickly, as the chamber gets loud with the two major parties shouting at each other. Dick then intervened:
double quotation markThis is beyond a joke, the way the childish, snide remarks are being added in. It’s not dignified. So, I don’t know how else to explain it, I can only imagine what the gallery thinks.
Albanese has another go at the opposition which gets them riled up again
double quotation markThey’re not interested in the economy, they’re not interested in jobs, they’re not interested in living standards. All they’re interested in is over who is next to jump into various [party] positions.
Anthony Albanese in question time. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAPShare
Updated at 22.58 EST
Chalmers references Guardian report on Tim Wilson’s shares that bet against Australian market
Variation on a theme is the vibe of the questions today – Tim Wilson is back up and says Australia’s is the only advanced economy to go backwards – and asks whether the PM if he’ll accept the buck stops with him. This time Wilson actually lists the countries that have a lower inflation rate than Australia.
Jim Chalmers says that Australia’s economic growth is stronger than every other advanced economy. He says he knows that makes the shadow treasurer “unhappy”.
double quotation markThe living standards in today’s national accounts went up, it went up through the year.
Why does that make the shadow treasurer unhappy? Chalmers has a printout of a Guardian article by my colleague Jonathan Barrett which shows Wilson holds shares that bet against the Australian share market.
Chalmers says Wilson should stop talking the economy down:
double quotation markHe has invested in shares which ensure the worse the Australian market and economy performs, the more money he makes out of it, Mr Speaker.
Jim Chalmers holds a printout of a Guardian Australia article in parliament. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAPShare
Updated at 22.57 EST
‘Listen up!’ Chalmers tells opposition
The deputy Nationals leader, Kevin Hogan, is next to the dispatch box and says Australia is the only advanced economy where living standards have gone backwards. The question, of course, is when the prime minister will accept that the buck stops with him.
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, takes the question and again takes a jab at the opposition for taking until the third question time to ask about the economy.
double quotation markGiven it’s Wednesday, and that appears to be Economy Day – and they’re asking us about the economy at last, Mr Speaker – you would think that having taken three days, a three-day run-up to ask a question about the economy, that they would have some understanding of what’s happening with living standards, Mr Speaker. Now, I refer those opposite – listen up.
Oh boy. That “listen up” gets the opposition fired up, with shouts of “ooh, Jimmy!” heard from the benches.
Chalmers runs through the national accounts numbers and says living standards, including real disposable incomes per capita, rose in the quarter.
Updated at 22.38 EST
Independent MP asks about review into government board appointments
Over to the crossbench, Sophie Scamps is asking about government board appointments. She says a review found the current appointments process “is not fit for purpose and often looks like patronage and nepotism”.
So why, she asks, did the government not accept the review’s recommendation to legislate an independent appointment process.
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, says the government’s response has actually gone further than the review, and makes appointments “more about merit and the national interest”.
He says that while ministers will continue to have responsibility for board appointments, all decisions will be “underpinned by mandatory transparency reporting requirements”.
double quotation markWe’re extending it beyond government boards to cover departmental secretaries, agency heads, statutory office holders across the commonwealth.
We think that the best model is to have ministers responsible and accountable in this way to the Australian people for the appointments that we make.
Updated at 22.28 EST