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Bowen is asked whether allowing elevated prices for fossil fuels would encourage the shift to renewables. He says:
Nobody is more in favour of the move to renewables than I am. Nobody. But the way to do it is not to make the prices of existing power exorbitant. That is not the way to do it. The way to do it is what we are doing, have the capacity investment scheme to bring the investment on and to provide all relevant assistance for community solar banks and batteries as we are doing. It is not to see Australians paying these war prices, that is not the answer to the transition to renewables.
Bowen is asked whether he would consider taxing the fossil fuel sector. He responds:
The cap is an intervention, which I don’t expect every coal and gas company to welcome. It is an intervention on the national interest. We looked at all sorts of models, all sorts of things, this is the one we decided to give for the most impact, most sensibly, most quickly.
In addition, I think most Australians would say it is fair enough of the government to step in with these rebates to help those Australians most at risk of these increased power bills impacting on their way of life, to give them some relief. That is an appropriate thing for a government to do.
Bowen is asked about concerns from the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association, which says the plan will deter investment and drive up prices in the long term.
He says:
With respect, I just reject that argument. I mean, people were making $12 a gigajoule last year, and they were investing … I find that a particularly difficult argument for people to mount. These caps don’t apply to new gas installations. We have carefully designed to ensure, just as governments around the world are intervening, you know, every government around the world has had to come up with a response they would not have contemplated 12 months ago. Rightwing governments, leftwing governments are all working through these issues.
Bowen says the government is not suggesting its plan is a “magic bullet” or that energy prices will fall.
We are suggesting this takes the big impact of the increases out of the system, especially when you add in the rebates, which the treasurer will be discussing with his colleagues in coming weeks, that sees real relief flow through to those who need it most.
Bowen says the scheme will be temporary.
We certainly intend for this to be a temporary and targeted measure, absolutely. The gas caps will be replaced by the managed code of conduct for gas purchases, so that comes into place after the gas cap comes off …
Obviously the coal caps will also be temporary because they shouldn’t be in place forever. What we will do, though, is continue with the medium-term plan.
Chris Bowen describes energy plan as ‘decisive action that makes a difference to consumers’
The energy minister, Chris Bowen, is speaking about the “energy price relief plan”, announced on Friday.
The four-point plan will cap, for 12 months, the price of black coal at $125 a tonne and the price of gas at $12 a gigajoule, within about a week. The commonwealth will transfer $1.5bn to the states and territories to cut energy bills for eligible households and small businesses.
Bowen says:
I welcome the feedback from groups around the country.
The Australian Industry Group said this package would likely be very helpful in dampening the immediate economic pain of this global energy crisis. Acoss said it was an important step towards preventing disaster for the most vulnerable people in our society.
The Energy Users Association said yesterday’s announcement was a balanced approach for the gas crisis that looks after energy users and the national interest and gives manufacturers hope.
The Energy Consumers association said it would help to curtail further price increases while shielding consumers from the very high impact of high energy bills. That’s what it’s all about. That’s what we were trying to do, that’s what we did do yesterday.
There is one group that hasn’t welcome yesterday’s announcement, that’s the federal opposition.
Our political editor, Katharine Murphy, has analysed the government’s attempts to achieve a diplomatic reset. She writes:
For weeks, all eyes have been on soaring energy prices, and what the governments of Australia will do to give households and businesses relief. Governments answered part of the national water cooler question on Friday, agreeing to new price caps for coal and gas, and to rebates for people on low and middle incomes.
The impact of the proposed price caps seems clear. Power bills will increase, but they will be lower than they otherwise would be in the absence of government intervention. Consumer rebates are still a bit of a work in progress, requiring final agreement between the treasurer Jim Chalmers and his state counterparts.
While energy has dominated the headlines since October, other important policy conundrums are gathering speed as we stagger towards the summer break. The Albanese government has been pushing ahead in diplomacy, security and in defence policy.
Medibank back online after completing cybersecurity overhaul
One of Australia’s largest private health insurers has completed a cybersecurity overhaul, months after a major hacking scandal.
Medibank has resumed all customer-facing platforms on Saturday morning after temporarily shutting down its IT systems to improve security.
“All customer-facing platforms have been fully tested with IT security experts from Microsoft and are operational with enhanced security protections,” the company said in a statement.
“The IT systems were back online ahead of schedule at 6.15am (AEDT) on Saturday 10 December 2022. Customers can now access Medibank systems as usual, including the website and apps, and they can use Hicaps when claiming again.”
All retail stores and call centres will remain closed until Monday.
Medibank’s IT systems had been offline since 8.30pm on Friday in a planned procedure as part of Operation Safeguard, which was carried out at the company’s Melbourne headquarters with IT security experts from Microsoft.
The overhaul was in response to a massive cyber attack in October.
– AAP
Speaking of Knaus, he’s back behind the steering wheel for a while and I’ll see you here again later.
Christopher Knaus pointed out this fabulous piece on former prime minister Paul Keating’s famous Redfern speech a bit earlier. Here’s the full transcript if you want more:
Richard Marles speaks about the need for nuclear-powered subs and other defence technology
Yesterday, Daniel Hurst wrote about the deputy prime minister and defence minister, Richard Marles, opening the door to Japan on Aukus. In a speech Marles gave to the Sasakawa Peace Foundation in Tokyo, he talked about the need for nuclear-powered submarines and other defence technology:
Aukus will also drive the development of other advanced capabilities, allowing our three countries [Australia, the US and the UK] to pursue advantage in undersea and electronic warfare, hypersonics and counter-hypersonics, advanced cyber and quantum technologies and artificial intelligence.
Aukus is a capability and technology partnership; one which we hope will form part of a broader network Australia seeks to build, in which Japan is central.
My intent is to grow defence industry integration with Japan: bilaterally, through our trilateral mechanisms with the United States, and, when ready, via our advanced capabilities work in Aukus as well.
This is an incredibly ambitious agenda. But the world is changing and so we must respond.
My excellent colleague Kris Swales is on a mission to get your “weekend juices flowing” (!). Please enjoy:
Female workers’ needs being ignored in skilled trade workplaces, survey finds
Women are being widely ignored across skilled trade workplaces, which can act as a barrier to female participation, new research suggests.
One in five women electrical workers don’t have access to sanitary bins in their workplace, according to a national survey by the Electrical Trades Union.
The amenities survey, which examined 2,656 responses from women in the trades sector, found multiple gender disparities among workers, raising serious health and safety concerns.
Women are eight to 10% less likely to have access to gendered or permanent bathrooms compared with their male comrades.
The survey reflected the gender disparity in electrical trades workers. Only 8.5% of respondents identified as female. Just 2% of Australia’s electricians are women.
Nearly half of the female respondents said they raised an issue in their workplace about inadequate amenities compared with less than 30% of men.
Industry experts have called for a review into setting minimum health and safety standards for workplace amenities. The ETU acting national secretary, Michael Wright, said:
Suitable toilets aren’t ‘nice to haves’. Having access to hygienic, reliable and adequate loos at work should be a basic expectation and a no brainer in 2022.
White-collar workers expect these basic standards, yet for women on construction sites, there’s still no guarantee of a usable toilet.
– AAP
Josh Butler has been talking to Dr Michelle Ananda-Rajah about access to vaccinations, which feels like the next chapter in an unsatisfactory conversation we’ve been having for years now:
Sydney grandfather walks to Perth to raise money for Landcare
Good morning! I hope your respective weekends are extremely productive. Are they this productive? Via AAP – the 68-year-old man crossing the Nullarbor:
After eight months on the road and battling wind, rain, heat and fatigue, a Sydney grandfather will this week reach his Perth destination, having crossed the continent on foot.
Richard van Pijlen has been pushing a trolley of supplies for more than 4,000km to raise money for the community bush regeneration group Landcare to plant one million trees. He told AAP:
I didn’t really think things through too much, and just focusing on, you know, 30km and then another 30km.
When AAP first caught up with Van Pijlen in May a few weeks after he’d set out, he was expecting to walk around 25km a day. But on one occasion he reached 85km.
In November, after spending six weeks crossing the vast arid Nullarbor Plain, the former painter walked 27 hours almost non-stop, resting only to eat. He said:
I’ve never been as exhausted in my whole life, like that moment. You think you have nothing left, but there’s still a little bit left.
Attorneys general release draft report on age of criminal responsibility
The nation’s attorneys general have released a 2020 draft report on the age of criminal responsibility which urged for the minimum age to be raised to 14 years.
Federal attorney general Mark Dreyfus met state and territory counterparts on Friday to discuss justice issues. They agreed to release the 2020 draft report, following significant pressure from advocates.
The draft report has now been released. It recommended commonwealth, state and territory governments should raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility to 14 years of age.
The report says:
This report has found that the reasons for children coming into contact with the criminal justice system are varied and complex. The entry of children into the youth justice system disproportionately impacts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children. Most children under youth justice supervision come from backgrounds that are disadvantaged. These children have often experienced violence, abuse, disability, homelessness and drug or alcohol misuse.
They may have witnessed family members who are part of the criminal justice system, thereby normalising their own potentially criminal behaviour. There is a direct correlation between criminality and entrenched social and economic disadvantage. The major risk factors for youth criminality include poverty, homelessness, abuse and neglect, mental illness, intellectual impairment and having one or more parents with a criminal record.
Studies have shown that the younger the child is when first having contact with the justice system, the more likely they are to go on to reoffend. This may suggest that criminalising the behaviour of young children may result in them becoming entrenched in the justice system.
A win for #RaisetheAge! 💪🏾 After sitting on it for 2 years, Aust Attorneys Generals have finally agreed to release the secret report telling them what we already know – we need to raise the age of criminal responsibility to at least 14, without exception.
— Change the Record (@Change_Record) December 9, 2022
Remembering Paul Keating’s Redfern speech 30 years on
It’s 30 years to the day since Paul Keating gave his famous Redfern address. The speech is often referred to as the greatest in Australian political history. It was the first time a prime minister spoke about the dispossession and violence Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples had survived.
Guardian Australia asked those who were on the stage with Keating, and some of those who were in the crowd, to share their memories of the day and reflect on the legacy of those words.
You can read what Sol Bellear, Stan Grant and Matthew Doyle remembered of that moment here:
Fallout from Bruce Lehrmann case continues
The fallout from the Bruce Lehrmann case continued on Friday, after the Guardian revealed the director of public prosecutions Shane Drumgold SC made a series of explosive allegations against investigators in the case.
He accused them of trying to pressure him into accepting their view that Lehrmann should not be charged, bullied Brittany Higgins to the point where she needed to be insulated from contact with them, and then aligned themselves with the defence during the trial.
His concerns are now being dealt with by the Australian Commission for Law Enforcement Integrity, which works in private.
In a letter on 1 November, he told chief police officer Neil Gaughan that he wanted a public inquiry to examine police and political conduct.
The ACT attorney general, Shane Rattenbury, is yet to decide on whether such an inquiry should be held.
On Friday, both Gaughan and Lehrmann’s barrister, Steven Whybrow, supported calls for a public inquiry. They said they wanted the inquiry to examine the conduct of all parties, including the DPP.
In a letter to his officers, Gaughan said the allegations made by the DPP were untested. He said:
In his letter to me, the DPP did raise with me his view that there should be a public inquiry into political and police conduct during the investigation and the trial of this matter.
I welcome a public inquiry into all aspects of the matter including (but not limited) to the actions of police, the prosecution and defence, issues leading to delays in the trial, issues leading to the subsequent mistrial, the decision not to proceed and the associated allegations of contempt of court.
Lehrmann has consistently maintained his innocence and pleaded not guilty to one charge of sexual intercourse without consent.
He says no sexual activity occurred with Higgins, a fellow political staffer. The collapse of the trial leaves him with the presumption of innocence.