Tomorrow it will all be about Trump’s tariffs, so brace yourself for that.

The ‘debate’ is about to get realllllllll stupid.

So we are going to go stare at a wall and prepare ourselves for that. Maybe watch Top Gun in honour of Val Kilmer.

Keep your questions coming – amy.remeikis@australiainstitute.org.au (put Questions for blog in the subject line so I can make sure I spot it) and we’ll keep on those fact checks for you.

Until then, do good – and take care of you. Ax

There has been a high court decision today that will, no doubt, make its way into the election campaign.

Here is what the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre (ASRC) had to say about the CZA19 and DBD24 case (asylum seekers are given these names to protect their identities):

The Court held that detaining people seeking asylum while their visa applications are pending is lawful in some instances, even when there is no real prospect of their removal in the foreseeable future.

The ASRC’s client, LPSP, was allowed to join the case as a “friend of the court” because he had started a class action in the Federal Court with the same argument as the main applicants. His argument was that once someone is recognised as needing protection, their detention is no longer lawful.

High Court Justice Edelman called LPSP’s arguments “strong,” even though the court ultimately disagreed with the main claim made by CZA19 and DBD24.
The decision permits the continuation of prolonged detention practices that are cruel and inhumane.
The judgment means that even if it’s clear someone will eventually be released into the community – either because they get a visa or removal isn’t possible – they can still be kept in detention indefinitely while their visa application is processed. This goes against human rights and moral standards, continuing a system of long, unnecessary, and harmful detention.

Despite the landmark NZYQ decision, the ASRC continues to see people seeking asylum held for years
and the devastating impact on their lives, their family and community. The ASRC’s Human Rights Law
Program will continue to challenge and advocate for a migration system grounded in fairness, justice and human dignity.

Labor campaign spokesperson and education minister Jason Clare was asked at an earlier press conference whether he has ever had a parent raise concerns about ‘woke’ with him (that is in reference to Peter Dutton saying that ‘many parents’ were concerned about school’s “woke” agendas)

Clare:

I tell you what, parents come up to me asking about, how are we going to make sure that our kids learn to read and write and count? How do we make sure that more kids finish high school? They don’t talk about indoctrination. This is straight out of the United States. This is a cut and paste from the United States. This is cut and paste.

Let’s be very, very clear about what’s going on here. But Peter Dutton talks about the curriculum — message to Peter Dutton, the curriculum is the Liberal Party’s curriculum. They signed this curriculum three years ago yesterday.

He talks like this curriculum was written by Adam Bandt. Wrong. I’m not interested in fake fights or talking about indoctrination. I’m making sure and I’m focused on making sure that our kids learn to read and write and count, that kids who fall behind catch up and keep up and finish high school.

The Liberal Party ripped the guts out of funding for public schools when they were last in office, $30 billion worth, and we’re still feeling the consequences of that today. This is personal for me. I’m a kid who grew up going to public school.

I know the kids who are suffering today as a result of the cuts that Tony Abbott, Scott Morrison and Peter Dutton made. As a result of those cuts, the number of kids finishing high school today in public schools is going backwards, from 83 per cent 10 years ago to 73 per cent today. We’ve got to turn that around. That funding is about fixing that. And I’m not interested in these fake fights about indoctrination. It’s not what mums and dads are talking to me about.

Where have the campaigns been?

Labor:

Deakin (Fair Work Submission) and a Childcare centre

Braddon (Tas) (health announcement)

Coalition:

McEwen (cost of living and crime)

Hawke (Headspace funding announcement)

We would have a strong case, but it would also be pointless.

Why? Because the US has stripped the WTO’s ability to hear appeals. There are supposed to be seven judges on the WTO’s appellate body. But the US has blocked all appointments since 2017. It now has no judges and can’t hear any appeals.

But even if the WTO was working perfectly, the only way WTO decisions can be enforced is with the consent of the countries involved.

If Australia won, Trump would have to agree to drop the tariffs because the WTO told him too. Can anyone really see that happening?

Trump says he is going to impose tariffs on a lot of countries. If he does, I expect some of them will take the US to the WTO. All I can say is good luck.

For those wondering what Anthony Albanese was referencing when he said Peter Dutton would cut the ABC’s budget, it came from an interview Dutton gave to ABC radio earlier this morning.

Dutton phoned into Raf Epstein’s program where he was asked if he knew Melbourne and if Melbourne and Victoria knew him (Dutton has not visited Victoria that often as opposition leader)

Dutton said Victoria knows him because he does [Sydney based] commercial TV network breakfast shows quite regularly, which broadcast into Melbourne.

I do know the city, and I’ve been coming this city for the last 25 years, and I love Melbourne. It’s a great, great city, and I have lots of friends and family here. I have lots of support here.

Dutton has long been seen as a drag on the Coalition vote in Victoria since he said people were afraid to dine out in Melbourne because of a made up ‘African gang’ fear. But that has changed since the state Labor government has become increasingly unpopular with voters.

Now on the ABC’s funding, Dutton said:

Well, Raf, we’re going to make sure that we can, I think, reward excellence. And we’ve said very clearly, if families are really having to tighten up their budgets and they’re looking for savings just to get, you know, through the week or the month until the next paycheck, then I think where we find waste and we find ineffective spending, then we don’t support that.

I think there’s a lot of very good work that the ABC does, and if it’s being run efficiently, then you would keep the funding in place.

If it’s not being run efficiently and there is waste, then I think taxpayers who pay for it, and who are working harder than ever just to get ahead, would expect us to, you know, to not to not support the waste, but to invest into areas where the ABC is doing [good work]

So is that an efficiency drive on the ABC specifically?

Dutton says:

No, there’s just going to be a ruler run across where we’re spending money in government, and we are spending more money under this government than we ever have in our history, which is why inflation is going up.

None of that last bit is true. Inflation is GOING DOWN – both trend and headline (so the volatile prices and the measure with the volatile prices wiped out]. Every government spends more because populations grow, which means spending increases. The opposite of this is AUSTERITY.

At the Press Club, Angus Taylor was asked about how few women the Liberal Party is nominating as candidates.

It’s a reminder that despite women making up half the population, men outnumber women in most Australian parliaments and most party rooms.  

Ten years ago the Liberal and Labor parties set the same target for women’s representation: 50% of parliamentarians to be women by 2025, this year.

While the Labor Party meets that target, the Liberal Party is far short of it.

When the Australia Institute crunched the numbers last year, male Liberal parliamentarians outnumbered female Liberal parliamentarians more than two to one.

The Liberal Party used to lead on women’s representation. Eight of the first 10 female federal MPs and senators were Liberals.

Gough Whitlam’s “It’s time” win in 1972 included 93 male MPs and senators – and not a single woman. While things soon improved (it was not possible for them to get worse), it would be another three decades before the Labor Party was consistently more gender-representative than the Liberals at the federal level.

Nor were early Liberals opposed to quotas. As former Liberal senator Judith Troeth notes, “from 1944 the Liberal Party had reserved 50 per cent of the Victorian Division’s executive positions for women”. The argument that quotas do not allow women to be selected on “merit” is facile: Coalition Cabinets always have a quota for National MPs.

For more details, see last year’s article.

Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor has confirmed Peter Dutton’s view that excessive gas exports are the cause potential gas shortages and driving up energy prices for Australian households and businesses.

In his National Press Club speech today, Mr Taylor has confirmed that a Coalition government would divert gas from current production which gas companies plan to export to the lucrative global spot market, to Australian customers.

This is consistent with the views of almost all independent members of Parliament including Sen. David Pocock, Sen. Jacquie Lambie and the Greens.

Only Labor opposes diverting uncontracted gas that multinational gas companies are planning sell on the global spot market to Australians.

LNP senator Susan McDonald has told a gas industry conference in Sydney that a Coalition government would make gas a critical mineral.

That would give the gas industry access to the $4bn fund established to help new industries transition to net zero.

It’s also insane.

The Guardian’s incredible environment reporter Lisa Cox has written on that here.

The Coalition has told a gas industry conference in Sydney it would give gas the same status as a critical mineral, to allow the industry to access a $4bn export finance fund set up to support the transition to net zero.

Adam Bandt had some thoughts:

Labor and Liberal are now in a contest as to who loves gas the most.

They’re each trying to outbid each other to open up new coal and gas projects and to say they’ll bend even further for the big gas corporations that pay no tax and get their gas for free.

Well gas is as dirty as coal, and the scientists have said very clearly, there can be no new coal and gas mines open if we’re to have any chance of meeting our climate targets. The Greens are now the only party at this election saying we’ll put a stop to opening these massive new gas projects that are just climate bombs and contain countries worth of pollution.”