Australian politics live: Lambie welcomes Labor backdown on allied health cap for veterans after emotional speech to parliament | Australia news

NSW parliament votes down bill targeting ‘sex-selective abortions’

A bill to criminalise “sex-selective” abortions has been defeated in the New South Wales upper house.

The legislation, introduced by Libertarian John Ruddick, was voted down 21–16 in the Legislative Council on Wednesday.

Defending the bill during its second reading, Ruddick cited 2025 Edith Cowan University research, frequently referenced by anti-abortion activists, which he said showed Indian and Chinese migrant families were more likely to have male children than the broader population.

Labor’s Cameron Murphy said he opposed the bill “in any form” in his second reading speech, referring to a 2020 NSW Health review that found 13 of 15,973 terminations between 2019 and 2020 were flagged for sex selection, 10 of which were likely “reporting errors”.

He also called anti-abortion activist Joanna Howe a “co–conspirator” of the bill, criticising her influence as a political lobbyist.

Greens NSW health spokesperson, Dr Amanda Cohn, welcomed the defeat in a statement, calling the bill a “thinly veiled attempt to incrementally re-criminalise abortion”.

The real impact of the bill would have been to create so much uncertainty and fear around severe criminal penalties that many health professionals would stop providing abortions.

On Wednesday, One Nation NSW leader Mike Newman walked back comments made alongside Howe at a Tuesday anti-abortion rally, clarifying his party did not support an outright ban, but would move to restrict late-term and sex-selective procedures.

Coalition’s no-confidence motion against veterans’ affairs minister fails

Unsurprisingly, the government has not voted with the Coalition to declare no confidence in the veterans’ affairs minister. And they have the majority in the house, meaning the vote fails.

Crossbenchers Rebekha Sharkie, Dai Le and One Nation MPs David Farley and Barnaby Joyce support the Coalition’s motion.

Jacqui Lambie has thanked the minister for “hearing us loud and clear” after the government scraps a proposed cap on allied health services for veterans.

The $5,000 cap was due to take effect on 1 July 2027.

Lambie, the Tasmanian crossbench senator and veteran, is debating her bill in the Senate which would permanently block any government from being able to impose caps on health services for veterans.

She says the bill is needed to protect veterans in the future.

If a veteran needs treatment because of their service, they should be able to get that treatment … Their access to necessary treatment should not be restricted simply because some bean counter somewhere thought he could save the department money. Because you can never, ever put a price on veterans’ life.

It would be welcome news for more than half a million Australians (581,139) who have served or are currently serving in the ADF.

By the numbers: 84,865 are current serving members and 496,276 are former serving members.

The parliament is reacting quickly to the allied health decision this morning.

Liberal MP and veteran Phil Thompson who’s been a very vocal critic of the changes, has moved to suspend standing orders in the house to move a no-confidence motion against the veterans’ affairs minister, Matt Keogh. The Coalition have been calling for Keogh’s head for weeks.

The government is very unlikely to oblige and will move to shut the whole thing down.

Thompson thanks the veterans who have lobbied the government for this action and calls the caps “insidious”:

Today, veterans, you have won, you have done this, you have made a bad government back down.

We must honour those who put on the uniform that serve this nation – those that deploy on combat operations, that deploy on humanitarian missions, and when national disasters occur the first people we look to is members of the Australian defence force.

And then when they become veterans they deserve the respect and they deserve a government that looks after them. Sadly the Labor minister for veterans’ affairs has not done this. He has failed in his duty, he has let them down.

Allied health cap backdown a ‘win for democracy’, say Greens

The Greens have also welcomed the government scrapping the allied health cap for veterans that was due to start on 1 July 2027.

Senator David Shoebridge also says the cap should never have been proposed and called the backdown a “win for democracy”.

The Greens had put forward a petition for the government to scrap the cap which had more than 5000 signatures.

The Greens say they will support Jacqui Lambie’s bill in the Senate which would stop the government from being able to put caps on healthcare services for veterans into the future. The government is extremely unlikely to support it.

Shoebridge said:

This is a win for decency and the thousands of veterans who pressured this parliament to do the right thing … You did not back down, and today the government had no choice but to follow.

We’ll keep pushing for genuine consultation on any future changes to veterans’ health funding.

Taylor calls for minister to be sacked over allied health cap for veterans

Angus Taylor must have been given the heads up that the government were going to back down on the widely condemned $5,000 cap for allied health services for veterans.

When speaking to reporters a little earlier this morning he said said the decision had taken too long accused the government of being “not committed to our veterans”.

We’ve seen outrage from veterans across the country, and rightly so. These are people who have served our country with distinction, and they need to be treated with respect by this government.

They haven’t been. They haven’t been treated with respect by this minister either … It has taken too long to scrap this cap, it should never have happened, and frankly, it’s time for this minister to go.

Independent Tasmanian senator and veteran Jacqui Lambie revealed her own health struggles in parliament last month in her calls for the cap to also be scrapped.

Alternative breast cancer and endometriosis treatment added to PBS

The government has approved a new breast cancer and endometriosis treatment drug, following AstraZeneca pulling out a critical medication from the PBS.

The drug company announced in June that the Zoladex 3.6mg implant would no longer be available on the PBS from November, raising concerns for thousands of women reliant on the drug. It can provide crucial pain relief for women who use it.

The health minister, Mark Butler, has this morning announced that Triptorelin, an alternative treatment, will be available on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme (PBS) from 1 October.

Butler said:

We know thousands of women were concerned about the prospect of losing access to the Zoladex 3.6mg Implant, which is why our government has taken action to find an alternative treatment for women.

Labor has backflipped on a decision to cap allied health support for veterans after wide backlash.

In a statement released this morning, the veterans affairs’ minister, Matt Keogh, said the cap will be removed after consulting with veterans.

The Coalition had been calling for Keogh’s head over the decision, urging the prime minister to sack him. He’d faced criticism for not meeting with veterans who came to Parliament House to lobby him against the reforms.

Keogh said:

We have been consulting on this measure, and we have heard from veterans there are concerns about this approach.

We have been listening carefully and today, the Government is taking the proposed $5,000 threshold off the table.

We will not change our commitment to improving access to allied health care through the fee increase to allied health providers.

‘The standards are too low’: Taylor says Labor not serious on migration cuts

Angus Taylor says Labor will not be able to achieve their own migration targets and that the party is too divided on the issue.

Speaking to journalists at Parliament House, he repeats his well-worn line that the “numbers are too high, the standards are too low”.

There’s no change to the targets, and Labor’s never reached its targets anyway. I mean, seriously, what is there to believe here, what is there in this that we can support at this point?

We’ve been clear with the prime minister and the government about what our expectations are on immigration policy. I laid that out in a letter to the prime minister last week. And we know what we want to see.

Taylor and Anthony Albanese met last week to discuss the issue – but evidently it didn’t go anywhere.

‘It’s not going to work’: Hanson says Labor has sat on its hands on migration

Pauline Hanson claims her plan of net-negative migration is the will of the people, and says One Nation has forced Labor’s hand to release its policy.

Labor was due to unveil its plan a month ago, while One Nation revealed its policy on Monday. The Coalition says it’s still working out the detail for its own plan.

Hanson spoke to reporters on her way into parliament:

Labor again has lied to the people, they’ve sat on their hands. One Nation has forced them to [release] its immigration policy, but it’s not going to work … both the Liberal party and Labor party and the Nationals are starting to see they’ve done the wrong thing by the country.

I’m implementing the will of the people who’ve been crying out this for years.

‘Don’t send the wrong message’: university vice-chancellor’s migration warning

University of Sydney vice-chancellor, Mark Scott, has warned the government to be careful in its messaging around migration, and not make international students feel unwelcome in Australia.

The families of international students could be targeted in the cuts which will be unveiled later today.

It’s also probably worth noting that the University of Sydney has the highest number of international students in the country.

Scott says international students contribute to university life and the economy and we should “treat [them] with respect to the mining sector, the agricultural sector, the tourism sector.”

He told RN Breakfast earlier:

We just need to be very sure we’re not sending any sort of message that the best international students from around the world aren’t welcome in Australia, don’t make a powerful contribution to Australia while they’re here, and we want them to be welcome and befriended in this country.

It’s that on top of the political debate, on top of a dramatic increase of visa cost, on top of a dramatic increase of visa rejections, we need to be very sure we’re not sending a message to the world that international students aren’t welcome here. We must welcome them.

Scott says he was once an international student at a university in the US and was allowed to travel with his family, “and if they had not been able to come with me, then I probably wouldn’t have gone to America.”

Matt Canavan has hit back against calls from Labor for the Coalition to condemn the Plymouth Brethren Christian church, following allegations the group paid far-right individuals to disrupt the Labor campaign.

Canavan claimed it shows Labor “seems to have a problem with people of faith, especially people of faith who involve themselves in politics”.

The Nationals leader tells RN Breakfast that the group has denied the allegations.

They [were] denied. They’re not proven. And I was aghast during the election campaign when the prime minister called a group of Christian people a cult, a group that he’d never met.

I’ve met with them [the church] since those allegations. I was pretty impacted by them. And they’re good people. They get in the community. Now, of course, like any group, some people might do the wrong thing, some might do the right thing. But to just run around allegations like that … the Labor party’s hands aren’t clean here. A lot of the Brethren members did campaign against them. OK, welcome to politics. I don’t condemn people who campaign against me.

Canavan says the allegations should be looked at and investigated but not in the “witch-hunt style process” he claims Labor is running.

Canavan says ‘not an issue’ Coalition is releasing its migration policy after Labor and One Nation

Nationals leader Matt Canavan says it’s not a problem that the Coalition will be the third party to reveal its migration plan, after One Nation revealed its plan on Monday, and Labor unveils its today.

Canavan says One Nation’s policy has no detail and no costings, and doesn’t believe that Labor will be able to hit its own targets.

I don’t see that as an issue given that the election’s not for 18 months. I mean, we can’t obviously implement any of our policies today. It’s also the case that it’s somewhat difficult here to outline plans that we won’t put in plan 18 months because things can change within 18 months.

All we’re going to get today, apparently, is another plan to implement the plan that they put in place to implement the plan that they couldn’t get done in the first place. That needs to come down. The numbers don’t seem to be coming down.

He says the numbers aren’t coming down – they are, but the government has conceded there is still a way to go.

Burke says net overseas migration fell in the last financial year to 301,000, a 45% drop from the post-Covid peak in 2023. But the government under its current projections wants to see it drop down to 225,000 in coming years.