We will cover this dixer because it is being raised in parliament for a reason – it is dealing with legal matters, after Victorian police announced an arrest a little earlier today.

Josh Burns asks Tony Burke:

What actions has been taken today in respect of the investigation into the Adass Israel synagogue arson attack?

Burke:

I note that no member of Parliament wants to have the situation in the electorate where we see the sort of hatred that the member for Macnamara dealt with with the synagogue fire on Adass Israel synagogue.

Earlier today Australian Federal Police executed the seven different search warrants at locations across Melbourne as part of… the investigation into the arson attack.

Federal Police today have arrested a 21-year-old man who was alleged to be one of three people responsible for the attack on the AdassIsrael synagogue in December last year.

I want to acknowledge the patience of the Jewish community.

People, when there is an attack as reprehensible as this what to see someone be charged immediately. Understandably.

There is always a tension between wanting to see immediate action and making sure the investigation gets to every person involved.

While the attack happened last year, the winds from the attack are still raw.

…The investigation is not limited to Australia. The Federal Police are investigating criminals offshore who are suspected of working with criminal associates in Victoria to carry out the attack.

This follows the arrest two weeks ago of another individual who was charged over his alleged role into the back of a vehicle used by those involved in the attack.

I want to thank on behalf of the government and I think it is fair to say the Parliament and the nation the more than 200 members of the counter-terrorism team from across the Australian Federal Police of Victoria Police and AFP.

Together they have worked with more than 50,000 hours on this investigation and continue to do so. Following the horrific attack last year, the site was visited by the Prime Minister and the member for Macnamara, the government and myself into occasions, I remember going the second time with the member for Macnamara which would be been more than a week after the attack and you could still smell the smoke as though it was fresh.

And you could still see it at your feet the rubble of the building which had been burnt. The government committed to $250,000 almost immediately for the restoration and replacement of those and in this year budget further $30 million to rebuild the synagogue in the community centre.

Not widely known but in the week following the attack, I was with the Prime Minister who had raised with me that the Rabbi was on a temporary visa and his family which was soon to expire.

Given an act of hate where people had tried to say that the members of the Jewish community and that Rabbi in particular were not welcome in Australia, I took a behalf of the government the most deliberate action you can take which was that week to make him and every member of his family permanent residents of Australia to say they belong, the hatred does not.

This arrest cannot undo the pain and fear are caused that it does seem to be strongest message that this kind of hate and violence has no place in Australia. This attack was not simply an attack on Jewish Australians, an attack on the synagogue as an attack on Australia. It is treated as such. Jewish Australians like all Australians have the right to feel safe and to be safe.

The opposition are playing the greatest hits of 2024, and talking about the ALP promise in the 2022 election campaign to deliver cheaper electricity prices.

That the LNP are still doing this after the 2025 election says a bit about where they are at the moment.

Today’s CPI figures showed that electricity prices actually jumped a fair bit in the  June quarter – but that was mostly due to the end of the Qld and WA state subsidies.

The govt’s decision to extend the federal subsidy means however that overall Australians are still paying about 14% less for electricity than they otherwise would be.

$100 worth of electricity in June 2023 now costs around $101. If we didn’t have the subsidies, it would cost $117.

So the strategy here from the opposition, on a day that shows inflation has fallen under the RBA target band for a year now and that all the economic data is pointing the right way, is to try and remind people that their power bills are not as low as was promised three years ago.

Which I get as a strategy – except there has been an election in between and it wasn’t part of the last election and Labor won.

So it isn’t a big a deal as the Coalition would like it to be, and also the market intervention Labor made managed to keep power prices lower than it otherwise would be, and so people are not as mad as they might have been.

Which means it is a waste of time trying to make people mad about something most people outside of politics have already forgotten about (in terms of the number)

But given the Coalition don’t have an energy policy, relying on the same shiz as the last term is all they have.

In more evidence the Coalition have not moved on from the last election (or the last three years) the next question from Dan Tehan is….

Do you still stand by your governments commitment to cut power bills by $275 by the end of the year?

Chris Bowen:

The honourable member refers to model done in 2021.

Which we gave to the Australian people in 2022 and then the Australian people did have a chance to have their say in 2025 on the matter.

And we accept that judgement of the Australian people, we accepted modestly the Australian peoples judgement on 3 May and perhaps the people looked at the fact that energy prices have fallen as I just said by 6.2% in the year just gone and they would know that that was not inevitable, they would have been 16.6% higher if the honourable member had his way in energy bill relief not being applied, that was the key difference.

They also know the Opposition went to the election with a very significant plan, we have always recognised it as significant on energy, the people passed judgement on that and knew that the plan would lead to higher energy bills.

There is a point of order that is kinda a point of order. Bowen is told to stick to the topic.

Bowen:

I was asked if we can stand by things and we stand by a policy to reduce energy prices by introducing cheapest form of energies which is renewable and rejecting plans to introduce the most expensive form of energy. We stand by the election commitment we made on the election just gone to deliver cheaper home batteries to people and that is our policy which is being delivered and taken up by the people with great enthusiasm and the people rejected those and gave the Government amended to keep going.

Sussan Ley decided that asking about inflation on a day when the official CPI was 2.1% was a good idea.

She picked out three items – bread, cereals and eggs as having risen in price since the Albanese government. Problem is in June 2022 quarter, when the ALP won the election bread prices were going up 7% now they going up just 2%, cereals were going up 9%, now 1%.

Eggs are the only thing where you can say prices are rising faster now – and that is as the world deals with the global bird flu ructions

The opposition will keep talking about price rises since June 2022 (or March 2022 – sometimes they fudge the starting point) because that makes things look worse. This is smart during the election campaign, but it is less powerful now, because well, the big price rises are in the past. Prices are not about to fall – that’s not how inflation works. If prices on average go down, that is actually a very bad thing – that is very much recession town.

Bread price rose very quicky in 2022 And 2023, but since then have slowed

That is why you are going to keep hearing the opposition refer to prices since the middle of 2022, and the Government will talk about price rises over the past year

Dan Tehan gets a question! What a special treat for all of us.

My question is to the Minister for Climate Change and Energy. Electricity prices are now up 32% since Labor came to office. Some households are paying more than $1300 for the electricity. Do you still stand by the Prime Minister’s commitment to the Australian people of a $275 cut to power bills by the end of this year? Or is the Prime Minister saying things he knows are not true?

So that’s the new line – which is also the old line – trying to paint Albanese and senior government ministers as ‘saying things they know not to be true’. Which is something the Coalition tried out in the last term and well, it didn’t go particularly well. But maybe the next three years are the charm!

Chris Bowen

I thank the honourable member for the question and a little surprised he didn’t reference today’s CPI figures but perhaps I should because it shows energy prices are down 6.2%.

Perhaps that is an explanation or another explanation is that is in no small part due to the Government ‘s energy bill relief which the member opposed, that’s another possible explanation although he referenced $1300 which is roughly the amount you can save by installing a cheaper home battery under our policy.

I thank the honourable member for the plug.

Independent MP Dai Le asks Anthony Albanese:

Last time I introduced my fair study and opportunity bill to reverse the Morrison governments punitive fee highs and art students with salt cost double. Hitting students invalid the hardest. The 1-off reduction does not fix this. We support my bill when I reintroduce it or allow this 80% increase to unfairly burden many students.

Albanese:

Of course, she was not here when the Morrison government made those changes. That is what she’s talking about. She has been here in the chamber and I know supported the reduction in student debt that past this parliament today, it will pass the Senate as well if it has not already.

That will benefit 23,000 people in the electorate of Fowler 23,000 people will benefit by an average of 5.5 thousand dollars each.

Students who studied to get a better start in life at university, people training or retraining through TAFE making an enormous difference across the board. What is more is that people will benefit from the changes in the threshold that we have made.

The changes to indexation that we have made. The students who will benefit as well in her electorate and others from fee free TAFE, that we are making permanent. That has already benefited over half a million Australians and many of them would have been in the members electorate.

We will support good government legislation, we have come into this place in the first fortnight and have concentrated with the first introduction being things that make that practical difference to people’s lives that we were elected on or re-elected on.

Whether it be the changes to student debt and then reduction, the changes in the threshold, the changes to how much people have to pay back and when, which will put more dollars in people’s pockets. Or whether it be the support for cheaper medicines that we have also done in this parliament that will benefit 70 people in the elector of Fowler what we are determined to do it each and every day is to focus on the issues that people in her electorate and electorates like hers are most concerned about.

That is how do we make their lives better and increase opportunity, how do we support aspiration and how do we make sure that no-one gets left behind and no-one gets held back?

OK, there is the inflation question and the tactics team have thought it better to have Sussan Ley ask it instead of Ted O’Brien, probably because of the amount of gear in sledging O’Brien and his new chief of staff available to the government.

Part of the tactics of the Liberal party is to make it as difficult as possible for the senior men to launch political attacks – this is all about tone. A core difference between how the Labor party presents and the Coalition has presented though is that there isn’t the same level of gendered response. So it’s not as easy as it would be with a Scott Morrison type, for example.

Ley asks:

This afternoon on the news out of touch treasurer describes today’s inflation numbers as quote, absolutely outstanding. According to the ABS under three years of Labor the cost of eggs as increased by 34%, the cost of bread by 18%, and the cost of cereal by 17%. Prime Minister, what is the Treasurer say things he knows are untrue?

Milton Dick says to can it with the descriptors.

Chalmers:

Let me get this straight, on Monday they asked us about the unemployment rate and this government is presided over the last average unemployment in the last 50 years of any government. They asked us about Medicare when we have just been re-elected on a platform of strengthening Medicare and now on a date when we get absolutely outstanding inflation numbers, they would ask us about inflation.

I am asked in particular about food inflation stop I want to make it really clear for the member for Farrow. When we came to office that food inflation was running at 5.9%. And now it is about half of that. 3.0%.

If the member for Farrer is unhappy about food inflation, she must be absolutely livid at the under performance of her own government, the government she was a cabinet minister in. Because when when we came to office, inflation had a six in front of it and it was absolutely galloping.

Because of the work that we have done together, because of what Australians have been able to achieve together, we have got these absolutely outstanding and patient numbers today and they are outstanding because they are a powerful demonstration of the progress that Australians have made together in the fight against inflation.

I am asked about particular elements of the new numbers today. Read inflation has gone down. Housing construction costs inflation has gone down. Food and non-alcoholic beverages inflation has gone down. Fruit and vegetables inflation has gone down. Insurance and financial services inflation has gone down. That is why we have seen today, that is why we have seen today both underlying and headline inflation in the Reserve Bank ‘s target band, headline inflation at the very bottom of the band, monthly inflation is below the Reserve Bank ‘s target band and has a one in front of it.

So I hope they keep asking me about the inflation data today because the inflation data today was very, very encouraging.

We know from that question that nothing makes them grumpy that when Australians make progress in the economy together, whether it is the fact that how inflation is much lower than we inherited, real wages are growing again, unemployment is low, we got there debt down, we delivered to surpluses, interest rates have started to come down as well. We know there is more work to do because people are still under pressure and that is why we are rolling out more help this month for the cost of living much of which was opposed by those opposite.

This dixer is basically ‘tell us why this government is so amazing’ which is why we do not cover dixers unless we absolutely have to.

We are back to the Medicare card!

Sussan Ley asks Anthony Albanese:

The Prime Minister has said on at least 71 occasions that it is free to see a GP and all you need is your Medicare card, not your credit card. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has contradicted the Prime Minister with data showing Australians paid more than $166 million in out-of-pocket costs to see a GP in the month of May alone. What is the Prime Minister say things he knows are not true?

Albanese is straight to his pocket for his Medicare card.

We are strengthening Medicare, we are cementing quality bulk billed healthcare at its heart. Something we are absolutely committed to and something I announced in the electorate of bus with the $8.5 billion commitment that before I finished speaking the Coalition then packed in. That position. Back in 2023 in the budget we tripled the bulk billing incentive for pensioners and concession cardholders.

Those 11 million Australians go to the GP they are bulk billed 90% of the time. It is our plan for Medicare in action and it is working. That is why we took that principle and then made a decision to extend to all 26 million Australians for the very first time stop lifting bulk billing rates for every patient to 90% by 2030. This is an important part of the reform agenda where Labor not only created Medicare but we will always work to strengthen it. I know it annoys those opposite to see this little bit of green and gold. Green and gold the same colour…

There is a point of order which is not a point of order and then more of the same from yesterday from Albanese. Which, after the election campaign, you should all know by rote now.