Gambling amendments coming today
Josh Butler
Further to what Krishani has already told you on the gambling bill, we will be expecting more news later today on the specifics but it’s understood another tweak will be moving the start time of the television ad restrictions from 6am to 5am.
That provision of the laws was originally going to limit TV ads to three per hour between 6am and 8.30pm. It may now be moved back to 5am, we understand, but we’ll wait for the final tick-off once it goes through the Labor and Liberal party rooms today.
We reported last week that this small shift in TV ad times, which will not be nearly enough to win over critics of the changes, was part of the negotiations.
We’re told there will be more than a dozen amendments. We already know a few of them, with Labor proposing to create a single opt-out register for gambling ads and taking action on inducements, but we’re still awaiting specific details about how those would work.
Unsurprisingly, key advocates for more action on gambling ads have branded the government and Liberal amendments as inadequate. Independent MP Sophie Scamps, responding to discussion about the deal, slammed the changes as “weak, piecemeal, pathetic.”
Australians are the biggest losers to gambling in the world and over 400 die by suicide each year linked to gambling addiction. Yet the major parties will crow about doing a deal that will be ineffective and which prioritises the profits of Gambling corporations over the wellbeing of Australians.
Key events
Josh Butler
Albanese declares “launch edition” wine from News 24
Sky News recently changed its name to News 24 with a flashy rebrand, and it seems the TV channel was in the mood for celebrating, if Anthony Albanese’s latest update to the parliamentary register of interests is anything to go by.
The prime minister, in a new disclosure, has declared receiving a “Bottle of News24 Launch Edition McLaren Vale Shiraz – Vintage 2020”. No doubt going straight to the wine cellar.
Despite the protestations of Pauline Hanson last week, Albanese hasn’t declared the crown melons from the Japanese prime minister on his register – perhaps as they may fall below the disclosure threshold of $750 from official sources – but he has noted a number of other gifts from world leaders and well-wishers.
Alongside the News 24 plonk, Albanese has disclosed receiving an “ironwood carving”, woven mats from the PM of Fiji, a wood carving from the Solomon Islands, and “framed traditional double pig tusks, coffee and independence book” from the PM of Papua New Guinea, among other gifts – most listed as having been “surrendered” or “donated” to his department or national collections.
Albanese also declared hospitality from the Canberra Raiders NRL team at a recent football match against his South Sydney Rabbitohs.
Hanson doing what ‘big tobacco have been lobbying her to do’, Greens leader says
Larissa Waters says Pauline Hanson’s call to cut the tobacco excise by 75% is at the behest of the tobacco lobby who she says are “haunting the halls of parliament”.
Speaking to the Today show earlier this morning, the Greens leader said by all means fight organised crime behind illicit tobacco but don’t do it to line the coffers of big tobacco:
Pauline Hanson is doing precisely what big tobacco have been lobbying her to do. We see them haunting the halls of parliament here … if you want to, fight crime, but don’t dress up fighting crime as just a premise to boost the profits of big tobacco.
Anything that Philip Morris wants to do primarily revolves around them boosting their own profits off the pain of humans and the cancer and the devastation that they will wreak. So I don’t have a lot of sympathy for big tobacco and I don’t think they should be influencing our politics.
The government has said it doesn’t want to change the tax settings, while some in the opposition have left the door open to an excise cut.
‘I’m up for that discussion’: Chalmers open to speeding up widow tax reforms
Jim Chalmers says he’s open to talking to the Coalition about speeding up legislation that would close the so-called widow tax loophole on Labor’s negative gearing and capital gains tax changes.
Speaking to reporters in the press gallery corridor this morning, the treasurer said the government had made it “abundantly clear” that it is addressing the issue, and has released draft legislation that’s currently still open for consultation.
Chalmers said:
Now, if the opposition’s main ask is that we pass the government’s legislation quicker, then obviously I’m up for that discussion.
For a recap on what the widow tax is: the government is grandfathering changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax meaning existing owners of a property using the tax incentives can still access them, but as soon as that property is sold or changes hands they’re no longer available. For anyone buying a property that isn’t a new-build, those concessions will no longer be available.
But it means that in the event of a divorce or death where a property goes from joint ownership to the single ownership of one spouse, the current rules say they no longer get the benefit. So the government is promising to change that.
Labor pledges $14.8bn to boost fuel security and increase domestic reserves
Labor has pledged to established a government-owned strategic reserve of one billion litres of diesel and jet fuel, and will consult on low carbon fuels.
The government has released two consultation papers and is pledging $14.8bn to boost fuel security following major international shocks from the war in Iran.
As part of this package, Labor has also committed to “increasing mandatory industry fuel stockholding requirements by an additional 10 days for diesel, petrol and jet fuel by 2030.”
The energy and climate change minister, Chris Bowen and the infrastructure minister, Catherine King, are holding a press conference on the announcement.
Bowen says:
We’ve been pleased with the updates I’ve been able to give the Australian people every week about how many days we have, but strengthening it, not for this crisis, but for future geopolitical crises, which are inevitable at various points in coming decades, is very important for our fuel security.
Wilson leaves door open to tobacco excise cut
Tim Wilson says the Coalition wants to cut out the tobacco black market in Australia and that Anthony Albanese’s “pride” has led him to ruling out measures to do that.
The shadow treasurer is talking about the calls to cut the tobacco excise.
One Nation has said it would do so, as the illegal cigarette market has soared and the budget take from the excise has tanked in recent years.
Wilson, speaking to journalists this morning is asked about whether the Coalition would support One Nation’s plan to cut the excise by 75%. He says the party will “review this policy”:
In principle, we want to cut out the black market and the organised crime that the Albanese government has let fester. What we know is, through pride, the Albanese government is ruling out any measure that would stomp down on organised crime, which is literally handing over the trade to criminals that’s then going on to do things like finance terrorism and hurt the Australian community.
It’s time the Albanese government got past its pride, acknowledged, just like in their budget, that adding more taxes doesn’t always deliver, or definitely doesn’t deliver, better outcomes for the Australian people.
Others in his party, including MP Mary Aldred who is part of a parliamentary committee reviewing the excise, has argued for the levy to be cut.
Gambling amendments coming today
Josh Butler
Further to what Krishani has already told you on the gambling bill, we will be expecting more news later today on the specifics but it’s understood another tweak will be moving the start time of the television ad restrictions from 6am to 5am.
That provision of the laws was originally going to limit TV ads to three per hour between 6am and 8.30pm. It may now be moved back to 5am, we understand, but we’ll wait for the final tick-off once it goes through the Labor and Liberal party rooms today.
We reported last week that this small shift in TV ad times, which will not be nearly enough to win over critics of the changes, was part of the negotiations.
We’re told there will be more than a dozen amendments. We already know a few of them, with Labor proposing to create a single opt-out register for gambling ads and taking action on inducements, but we’re still awaiting specific details about how those would work.
Unsurprisingly, key advocates for more action on gambling ads have branded the government and Liberal amendments as inadequate. Independent MP Sophie Scamps, responding to discussion about the deal, slammed the changes as “weak, piecemeal, pathetic.”
Australians are the biggest losers to gambling in the world and over 400 die by suicide each year linked to gambling addiction. Yet the major parties will crow about doing a deal that will be ineffective and which prioritises the profits of Gambling corporations over the wellbeing of Australians.
Rent increase reports ‘don’t seem realistic’ says Charlton
The assistant minister for science, Andrew Charlton, has dismissed media reports of NAB warning that rents in Sydney and Melbourne could rise by up to 30% due to budget changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax.
Speaking to RN Breakfast earlier, Charlton says 99% of properties that people are in at the moment are grandfathered. Under the budget changes, anyone who currently negatively gears their property will still be able to do so, but only someone who buys newly built property from now will be able to negatively gear it.
Charlton says:
I’ve seen those reports on rental increases today, and they just don’t seem realistic to me … So the idea that you would have big changes to the properties that people are currently renting, when the overwhelming majority of them are in grandfathered arrangements, just doesn’t seem to make sense.
In the budget, the Treasury department modelled the impact of the changes and said rents would increase about $2 per week.
Charlton says he reckons that Treasury modelling is right and “that there’ll be negligible impacts of our changes on rents”.
Chalmers resists call for excise cut with focus on police crack down on tobacco black market
Jumping back to Jim Chalmers’ interview on ABC News Breakfast, the treasurer hosed down proposals to drop the tobacco excise, and said the government is focused on the law and order side of cracking down on illegal cigarettes.
The government has been under some pressure to reconsider the excise, as NSW premier Chris Minns has called for a review of the policy while others in the state Labor party have argued for a cut.
Chalmers says:
Our primary focus has been on providing hundreds of millions of dollars in extra resources for the police and other authorities to crack down on this big problem in our society and in local communities as well. Now, we’ve had some recent successes when it comes to that crackdown. We’ve seen some raids and some busts when it comes to some of this illegal supply. That’s a good thing. We want to see more of that.
Tobacco excise increases lead to ‘more mafia’, Joyce says in call for cut
Barnaby Joyce says increasing the tobacco excise, which makes legal cigarettes more expensive is just leading to “more mafia” around the country, as he argues that the excise should be cut.
Speaking to RN Breakfast this morning, the One Nation MP points to the surge of Australians buying illegal cigarettes which has led to the government revenue from the excise tanking.
Annual excise revenue has more than halved over the past five years to $7.8bn.
Joyce says:
This is just absurd economics: that if you keep on putting up the price of cigarettes, you’re going to get more excise. Now, if you keep on putting up the price of cigarettes, you’re going to get more mafia. That’s what you’re getting, more mafia. And that’s precisely what’s happening. And the only way we can deal with the criminality, the mafia that also underwrites some of the other drugs, is to bring back the price of legal cigarettes into the same realm as where the illegal ones are.
But, and there’s a big but here for you, some research by the e61 institute released late last year showed slashing the tobacco excise might not actually be enough to lure smokers back to legal cigarettes and could even widen the multibillion-dollar hole blown in the budget.
Federal police to investigate leaked melon-gate memo
The Australian federal police has told Liberal shadow defence minister, James Paterson that it will review the leak of a memo sent by Japanese diplomats to the Australian government over melon-gate.
Just when you thought that story was all over …
Last week it was reported that a memo from Japan had downplayed the PM’s appearance on the Bush Deep podcast, and said they didn’t believe Anthony Albanese’s comments or hand gestures were done with “ill will”.
Paterson and shadow foreign minister, Ted O’Brien, then referred that leak to the AFP.
The AFP has responded in a letter, seen by Guardian Australia, which says it takes allegations of unauthorised disclosures of correspondence seriously. It has been referred to the Special Investigations Command.
You can read more about the incident here from Malcolm Farr:
Coalition offers ultimatum on widow tax and NDIS
Angus Taylor has said the opposition will only support the government’s NDIS bill if it first removes the so-called widow tax in the government’s budget changes.
This morning, Jim Chalmers told ABC News Breakfast that the government is working through those changes, and has released draft legislation (which we knew).
Last week, the opposition tried to suspend standing orders in the parliament to get Labor to bring the bill on immediately.
Chalmers says he’ll engage in good faith:
On the NDIS – this is all about saving the NDIS from itself, making it sustainable so it can continue to deliver a decent standard of care for Australians who need and deserve that. That’s our motivation here. And it should be supported, our changes should be supported in the Senate in that light and on its merits.
The government made it clear we were addressing [the widow tax]. We already released draft legislation. We have consulted on that. We made it abundantly clear that this is a change that we’ll be making. Now, if the opposition wants to do that quicker, of course we’ll engage with them in good faith.
