Pauline Hanson is trying to get ahead of the Nationals (and maintain cultural political relevancy) by entering a motion to scrap net zero in the senate today, which means absolutely nothing, because it will go nowhere and is just a desperate ploy for a bit of attention.

It’s so transparent that even LNP senator Matt Canavan can see it. He told the Seven network this morning:

We’re here to make laws, not make statements or do stunts. A motion in the Senate today is nothing but a stunt. It’s not going to do anything. If Barnaby’s law were to be passed, that makes a real difference*. Because since we’ve adopted net zero, electricity prices are up 31%, gas prices are up 40%. We’ve lost three major industries in nickel in plastics and urea, which is our most important fertiliser. This is not working. Net zero is just not working for the Australian people. And we’re meant to be here to deliver results for the Australian people. So I support Barnaby’s bill. I can’t do that from the Senate, but I plan to introduce something similar in the next few weeks. When he first told me about that he was doing this, my immediate reaction was why didn’t I think of that first? So good on him and I hope he’s successful.

*It won’t be passed and the type of difference it would make would not be the positive kind.

Here, they find some unity – Barnaby Joyce agrees:

I support greater controls on social media because of exactly what Tanya said. The damage that can be done especially to young girls and eating disorders. It really does happen. It really concerns so many parents, the fact you get bullying online.

I think Google could easily come forward and say they have the capacity to control that noxious stuff. They have AI. They’re incredibly capable. The question you have to ask why do they allow such content to go on their platform. The content to go on their platform. The content that’s not informative it’s completely toxic, completely dangerous. Such things as competitions to how skinny you can be and people saying outrageous things to one another. Why do they allow it to happen? Because they don’t… They still allow it to happen they sit back and say, you’re not the model person, model commercial person in this and therefore we have to try and control it somewhat.

(So there is political unity over the FM radio policy that plays well to parents, but looks questionable as to having any material impact when it comes to keeping kids safe, as well as putting the onus on parents to ensure the bans are upheld, and not the tech giants to ensure the spaces they have created are safe)

Will the government continue to push to include YouTube in the social media ban?

Tanya Plibersek:

We will do whatever we have to, to make sure Australian kids are kept safe. Like most parents I struggle to get the kids faces out of their devices sometimes. It’s frustrating for parents, but we know beyond just that conflict, in family homes, for a lot of kids they’re really genuinely harmed by what they’re being exposed to on social media. We node to make sure that, as a government, we back in parents’ efforts to protect their kids from some of the harmful stuff that’s online. We’re not going to be bullied out of taking action by any social media giant. We will do what’s in the best interests of Australian kids.

Tanya Plibersek endured her latest ‘debate’ with Barnaby Joyce on the Seven network this morning. Asked about Taiwan’s request to take part in Australia’s military training exercises, Plibersek said:

Australia really values our unofficial relationship with Taiwan. We have got a lot of exchange on trade and investment and on regional security and stability. We think the best way to maintain security and stability in region is for no unilateral changes for the status of relations wean China and Taiwan. We’re not currently considering involvement in Taiwan in Exercise Talisman Sabre. I mean, it’s a very important thing for Australia’s defence, we’ve got a lot of countries, about 19 nations involved at the moment in the north of Australia, with about 40,000 personnel. But, that exercise is really focused on making sure that we are operationally fit.

Joyce, as you would expect was OUTRAGED:

I think what Tanya said then was concerning and incorrect. 

You have have to understand the strategic ambiguity to be backed up with incredible strength. Talisman Sabre with 35,000 troops from 19 nations. They have one thing in common that’s what Emmanuel Macron said there’s not multiple rules- based orders in the world. There’s one. If a country wants to outside that, by just taking the South China Sea, by what we’ve seen with journalists in Hong Kong, just taken off the street with tennis players who disappear if they say the wrong thing. (I mean, he could also be talking about the US here as well)

We’ve had a massive build up of their armed capacity, including their nuclear capacity and no real explanation as to why and Minister Wong brought that to our attention.

…I think the military has and strategic people have, but the Australian people really haven’t grasped exactly what’s before us. We need to become as strong as possible as quickly as possible. We really are putting the future of your children and grandchildren at threat. China does not believe in a Democratic world order. (Well, neither does the Trump administration)

They believe in an alternate order that does not include democracy and ultimately, you know, where we lie in that if we don’t get this right is as a vassal state. (Oh come on)

You will be dominated by economically, socially, socially in your media by a totalitarian regime. We’re not as strong as we should be at the moment. We’re miles away where we should be at the moment. We need to work with these other countries. You could be caught in danger if you bring in Taiwan. You have to look like you are strong enough, if required, if the decision was ever made, and you hope like God it never has to be, without even declaring you make the decision, but you have to look like you are strong enough to back yourself in.

Yesterday in his ABC Insiders’ interview, Anthony Albanese reiterated Australia’s position that it continued to believe in a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine, but that it would be part of a process.

Which is shorthand for Australia won’t be following France and recognising a Palestinian state in the immediate future.

The ABC has spoken with Penny Wong, where she reiterates the same point – Wong changed Australia’s position ever so slightly a few months ago, where she said that recognising a Palestinian state needed to be PART of the peace process, rather than the end result, and she doesn’t shift from that in this latest interview:

[The prime minister] made the point — there are challenges associated with this,” she said.

We have to see Hamas demilitarised. We have to see the hostages released.

We need to see progress in terms of the Palestinian Authority and its moves to a more democratic and accountable governance, and it’s pleasing to see some of that happening.”

The New Daily reports Labor MP Josh Burns and his partner, Victorian Animal Justice MP Georgie Purcell have announced they are expecting a baby:

“Our little baby already has the most excited and loving big sister in Tia. And she’ll have a home full of animals, love, and fun,” Burns, the Member for Macnamara, revealed on social media on Sunday.

“Next year, my team and I will keep working hard for the community we love, but I also plan on being a present and involved dad every step of the way.

“I’m over the moon excited and can’t wait for this next chapter with my beautiful partner, Georgie, who I love with all my heart.”

The Guardian’s Caitlin Cassidy has reported on the open letter the Australian Historical Association has released, urging the Albanese government to abolish the jobs-ready graduate program and address the cost of arts and humanities degrees by implementing a more equitable system.

Cassidy interviewed Tim Winton about the delay in Labor addressing the Morrison government changes, which Labor have “under review”:

That any Australian government should seek to make getting a humanities degree more difficult is upsetting … but the idea that a Labor government would do nothing at all to right this wrong is utterly mystifying.

“If Labor won’t act to defend equity in education, what is the point of them – I mean, what do they really stand for?”

Hello and welcome back to chilly Canberra, where the only thing more frosty than outside is the relationships in parliament house.

Anthony Albanese was on Insiders yesterday where he actually used the words “quite clearly it is a breach of international law to stop food being delivered, which was a decision that Israel made in March” as well as:

…I tell you what it’s a breach of – it’s a breach of decent humanity and of morality and everyone can see that. I’m a supporter of Israel and Israel’s right to defend itself, but that boy isn’t challenging Israel’s right to existence, and nor are the many who continue to suffer from the unavailability of food and water. The fact that people have lost their lives queuing to get food and water distributed, not by the UN, but distributed by the joint Israeli-American operation is a tragedy. And what I have said to the Israeli President, Isaac Herzog, is that what sometimes friends have to say to their other friends when they are losing support – Israel is, I think, when you look at internationally the statements that have been made by, including this week more than two dozen nations, combining to call out the lack of aid being allowed into Gaza, is that they need to recognise the need to operate within international law. As I go back to after October 7, the motion, the resolution that was carried by the Parliament on a bipartisan basis, I think, stands quite well.

The reporting around the prime minister’s comments will all point to it being ‘his strongest statement yet’ but Albanese wasn’t asked and the government hasn’t committed to any actual action – no sanctions against Israel’s leaders or trade was announced, and weapons parts are still leaving Australia and ultimately ending up in weapons Israel is using to kill Palestinian civilians.

In the parliament, the focus is on productivity and the Coalition attempting to hold itself together. The WA Liberals (state) have decided to support a motion to abandon net zero by 2050 (as well as to remove the Aboriginal and Torres Strait flags from appearing in leaders’ press conferences, and to ‘reduce’ Welcome to Country’ ceremonies) in a closed door meeting in Andrew Hastie’s electorate of Canning over the weekend.

If anyone doesn’t think Hastie is actively making a play for the Liberal leadership (or whatever party emerges from this mess, then you are not paying attention.

The WA Liberals are in the electoral wilderness when it comes to state politics and WA not only held for Labor at the last federal election, it also picked up Moore from the Liberals. But Hastie increased his margin in Canning after running a campaign that rarely featured Liberal branding (he mostly ran under his name, which even included a darker blue) and that has given him all sorts of ideas.

The Australian reports that Liberal senator Sarah Henderson wants to publicly canvass support for amendments to Labor’s HECS/HELP debt cut, which would index HELP loans to inflation. The amendment isn’t controversial, but Henderson moving to make one is – Sussan Ley has indicated the Coalition will wave this Labor bill through, but Henderson, dumped from the frontbench is making her views known.

We’ll cover all of the day mess and more, with Mike Bowers from the New Daily still in the parliament. You have Amy Remeikis with you for most of the day. It’s a three coffee morning.

Ready? Let’s do this.