Coalition working ‘in good faith’ with Labor on hate speech laws, Duniam says
Shadow home affairs minister, Jonathon Duniam, has crossed over to the ABC studio, where he’s asked whether he can get even the most outspoken colleagues, like Andrew Hastie, to support a potential deal made with the government on its hate speech bill.
Hastie came out last week before Sussan Ley to say he would not support the bill.
It’s understood the shadow cabinet met last night, and agreed to work with Labor. Ordinarily, if a deal is done between the two major parties, the leader would take that deal to the shadow party room for approval. Duniam tells the ABC that the Coalition is working with the government “in good faith”:
One thing that most colleagues would accept including Andrew is that there is a need for us to get this right. There are concerns identified in the legislation, and I won’t speak on behalf of colleague they will have the opportunity to have their say to our internal processes, dealing with risks and concerns in the laws is something we’re working through now and if we can do that to an extent that colleagues are comfortable, we will proceed.
Pushed on his comments to Sky News earlier about whether the government could bring back the anti-vilification provisions at a later time, Duniam won’t say whether he thinks the government should do that.
I’m not sure the provisions they tabled that have been entitled ‘racial vilification provisions’ are necessary. Others say they were. We need to work together, which didn’t happen … If [Labor] want to revisit those laws and tell us these will work and how we can protect freedom of speech, let’s have a conversation.
Updated at 22.10 EST
Key events
Show key events only
Please turn on JavaScript to use this feature
Former Labor strategist Tim Picton dies after alleged assault
Former Labor strategist turned mining executive Tim Picton has died after spending several weeks in hospital following an alleged assault in Perth, AAP reports.
Picton was rushed to hospital after suffering a serious head injury outside a licensed premises in the Western Australia capital early on 27 December.
The 36-year-old was found unconscious at the scene after striking his head on the pavement. He was subsequently placed in an induced coma.
Picton’s family said the Mineral Resources executive died on Monday, saying they are “devastated by the loss of our beloved Tim”. In a statement they said:
Tim was a deeply devoted father and loving husband, son, grandson, brother and uncle. His kindness, generosity and humour brought joy to our lives.
We will be forever proud of Tim’s many extraordinary achievements and capacity for love, while knowing that he still had so much to give.
Above all, Tim was an adoring father to four-year-old Charlotte, the love of his life. It breaks our hearts to know that Charlotte will grow up without her father by her side.
Picton played a key role WA Labor’s landslide 2021 election victory, which left the Liberal opposition with just two seats.
Updated at 22.19 EST
Tom McIlroy
Opposition says Australia should consider Trump ‘board of peace’ invitation as Greens decry ‘profiteering off genocide’
The shadow foreign affairs minister, Michaelia Cash, says the federal government should carefully consider Donald Trump’s proposal for Australia to join a new US-led “board of peace”.
The leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Hungary, Canada, the European Commission and Middle East powers have been invited to join the new organisation, which Trump expects to be a “more nimble and effective international peace-building body”.
A draft charter shows Trump will serve as chair, with national leaders expected to make up its top tier of members. Countries are expected to serve three-year terms, with those paying US$1bn to the US expected to be given permanent status. Cash said:
The Coalition looks forward to understanding more about the objectives, structure, membership and implications of this proposal before Australia commits to any engagement.
It is important for all nations to work together to rebuild Gaza and ensure that it is no longer under the control of the Hamas terrorists.
But the Greens defence spokesperson, David Shoebridge, was scathing of the plan, writing on social media:
Trump is trying to sell Palestinian sovereignty for $1 billion per seat while Palestinians are still being bombed and starved under the so-called ‘ceasefire’.
This isn’t diplomacy, it’s profiteering off genocide. Australia better not touch this with a 10-foot pole.
Updated at 22.16 EST
Coalition working ‘in good faith’ with Labor on hate speech laws, Duniam says
Shadow home affairs minister, Jonathon Duniam, has crossed over to the ABC studio, where he’s asked whether he can get even the most outspoken colleagues, like Andrew Hastie, to support a potential deal made with the government on its hate speech bill.
Hastie came out last week before Sussan Ley to say he would not support the bill.
It’s understood the shadow cabinet met last night, and agreed to work with Labor. Ordinarily, if a deal is done between the two major parties, the leader would take that deal to the shadow party room for approval. Duniam tells the ABC that the Coalition is working with the government “in good faith”:
One thing that most colleagues would accept including Andrew is that there is a need for us to get this right. There are concerns identified in the legislation, and I won’t speak on behalf of colleague they will have the opportunity to have their say to our internal processes, dealing with risks and concerns in the laws is something we’re working through now and if we can do that to an extent that colleagues are comfortable, we will proceed.
Pushed on his comments to Sky News earlier about whether the government could bring back the anti-vilification provisions at a later time, Duniam won’t say whether he thinks the government should do that.
I’m not sure the provisions they tabled that have been entitled ‘racial vilification provisions’ are necessary. Others say they were. We need to work together, which didn’t happen … If [Labor] want to revisit those laws and tell us these will work and how we can protect freedom of speech, let’s have a conversation.
Updated at 22.10 EST
Randa Abdel-Fattah serves second defamation legal notice to SA premier
Kelly Burke
The South Australia premier, Peter Malinauskas, has been served a second concerns notice for defamation by lawyers acting for the Palestinian Australian academic whose cancellation from this year’s Adelaide Writers Festival line-up caused the 2026 event to fold and its director to resign.
Randa Abdel-Fattah said she had been left with no other choice after the premier “doubled down” on his previous comments during a 14 January radio interview on Adelaide’s FIVEAA.
That interview took place the same day Michael Bradley from legal firm Marque served an initial concerns notice on Malinauskas, after he had asked journalists at a press conference the previous day to imagine if a “far-right Zionist walked into a Sydney mosque and murdered 15 people”. Here’s what he said:
Can you imagine that as premier of this state I would actively support a far-right Zionist going to Writers’ Week and speaking hateful rhetoric towards Islamic people?
Of course I wouldn’t, but the reverse has happened in this instance.
Bradley is alleging the premier’s remarks are defamatory by implication, linking her political commentary to the actions of the two Bondi mass murderers.
“Rather than reflect on the harm he has caused me, he has doubled down leaving me no choice but to see this through until justice is served,” Abdel-Fattah posted on Instagram.
A fundraiser set up by Readers and Writers Against the Genocide last week to pay for Abdel-Fattah’s legal costs has so far raised almost $87,000.
The Guardian has sought comment from Malinauskas.
Updated at 22.05 EST
Coalition says ‘hope’ of progress on hate speech laws
The government is in conversation with the Coalition to negotiate on its hate speech laws that would (in their current form) give a home affairs minister more grounds to deny or cancel a visa if the person has engaged in hate, vilification or extremist conduct, and create a new “hate groups” listing.
Speaking on Sky News, the shadow home affairs minister, Jonathon Duniam, hints that those conversations might be getting somewhere (after Sussan Ley last week called the laws “pretty unsalvageable”).
Duniam says it’s good that the government abandoned racial vilification provisions in the legislation. Kieran Gilbert asks: will we see progress? Duniam:
Well, that’s the hope. I mean, the process has been shambolic from day one. What we’re doing now should have happened right at the beginning. This is a national response requiring unity, requiring everyone to be on the same page in order to in a uniform, united way …
It is excellent that the racial vilification provisions were kicked out … We are working through, and the government and opposition are working together to try and get the best outcome possible.
Gilbert pushes Duniam on why the Coalition pushed back against the anti-vilification provisions when it was something the antisemitism envoy called for in her report. Duniam says:
The government brought it in, they should consider bringing it back and indeed go through a proper process. These are something that can’t be dealt within a week and amended on the fly within a seven-day period.
Updated at 21.40 EST
Joe Hinchliffe
Crime scene set up after Canadian woman found dead on K’gari in Queensland
A crime scene has been established on a popular tourist island off the Queensland coast after a 19-year-old woman was found dead Monday morning.
The national broadcaster reports that the young woman found dead on the beach north of the Maheno shipwreck on K’gari (Fraser Island) was a Canadian citizen.
A Queensland Police Service spokesperson said officers were called to the beach at about 6.35am but that “initial information indicate that the woman may have gone for a swim around 5am”.
A crime scene has been established, with investigations ongoing into the circumstance.
Police are appealing for witnesses.
K’gari, the largest sand island on Earth, is a World Heritage Area whose name means “paradise” in the Butchulla language of its traditional owners, and is an important refuge for dingoes (wongari).
Updated at 21.37 EST
Spender supports anti-vilification laws and says social cohesion must be protected
Allegra Spender says the government should move ahead with anti-vilification laws – that she has been supporting for more than 18 months – as Labor moves closer towards passing its hate speech and gun control bills.
The independent MP had moved an anti-vilification amendment in late 2024 when the government passed its previous hate crimes legislation, but it wasn’t supported by Labor or the opposition.
Spender wants to see anti-vilification laws protect the Jewish community, but also other protected groups including the LGBTQI+ community. Speaking to Sky News a little earlier, Spender said the parliament must do more to protect Jewish Australians. She also said Australia’s social cohesion must be protected:
That has to be our north star, that the Jewish community are not behind bars. They are not behind security fences. It is going to be hard to do that, but we absolutely need to have that as our north star, because then we know that we’re protecting the Jewish community and to protect the Jewish community, then we are protecting the whole Australian community.
We need to call out the violent Islamic extremism that led to Bondi, and we need to call out violent extremism of neo-Nazis and others that we have seen in this country, but we must also make sure that we protect the broader social cohesion.
Updated at 21.10 EST
Parents of youngest Bondi shooting victim say they would like footbridge painted yellow in her honour
Penry Buckley
The parents of 10-year-old Matilda, the youngest person killed in the Bondi massacre, have said they would like the footbridge used by the alleged gunmen to be saved and painted yellow in honour of the sundress their daughter wore on her final day.
In a sit-down interview with the ABC, their first since the terror attack, Matilda’s parents, Valentyna Poltavchenko and Michael Britvan, have warned against rushing new legislation through parliament in response to the attack, and thanked the woman who saved their younger daughter.
The future of the heritage-listed pedestrian footbridge has been placed on hold after a Waverley council meeting heard it was “really upsetting” that the matter had ignited such fierce public debate. The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, has called for it to be torn down to prevent it from becoming a “ghoulish reminder” of the attack.
Matilda’s parents have suggested painting the bridge yellow and installing a plaque to commemorate the 15 victims of the attack, the ABC reported. Matilda’s mother said she did not want to see the bridge demolished.
Read the full story here:
Updated at 20.56 EST
Chalmers thanks Bondi survivors who came to Canberra to share their stories
The condolence motions are continuing in the House and the Senate today. In the House, the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, spoke a little earlier.
He said Australian Jews are part of the Australian story and thanked the survivors of Bondi who have come to parliament today for sharing their stories with him.
The victims at Bondi came from all walks of life: rabbis, devoted volunteers, sports lovers and IT analysts, a retired police detective, a Holocaust survivor, all bound by the simple act of enjoying life and observing faith under a summer sky and their lives were cut short.
We say to everyone affected by this horror, and to every Jewish Australian, you have the right to walk the beach, the promenade, in the park in safety, to be proud of your origins and your heritage, to celebrate your faith in public.
Updated at 20.52 EST
Where are the government’s hate speech laws at?
Over the weekend, the prime minister announced he would split the omnibus hate speech bill, and abandon anti-vilification measures within it – because it did not have the support of the Coalition or the Greens.
Since that point, the Greens have said that they would support one of the bills that deals with gun laws. That bill will set up a new gun buyback scheme, and tighten the importation of a range of firearms including guns with belt-fed ammunition and magazines of more than 30 rounds, and it ends the use of open-ended import permits.
It will also increase background checks for current and prospective gun owners, and will allow for more information sharing between states, territories, the commonwealth and security agencies.
Prime minister Anthony Albanese speaks during today’s parliament sitting after the Bondi terror attack. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP
So what about the other bill?
The government is now negotiating with the Coalition to try to pass the other legislation, which will deal with visa restrictions and a new hate group listing.
That one will increase the grounds that the home affairs minister can use to cancel or reject a visa if they believe an individual has engaged in hate, vilification or extremist conduct. These grounds would sit within the already existing character test.
The new “hate group” listing would criminalise an individual for being a member, recruiting, training or providing any support to the hate group.
You can listen to my excellent colleagues Tom McIlroy and Reged Ahmad talking about how the negotiations are taking place here:
Updated at 20.43 EST