ONE NATION CRASHES PM’S GRAVY TRAIN

One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has backflipped over crucial support for the government’s company tax cuts, citing her disappointment over the government’s strategy on employment, debt reduction and coal-fired power plants and producing instead a list of seemingly impossible demands.

According to The Australian ($), Hanson believes Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has failed to sell the reform’s employment benefits, and should make a dramatic change to the Petroleum ­Resource Rent Tax and a new gas pipeline connecting Australia’s west and east coasts in order to change her mind. The Centre Alliance, which controls two crucial Senate seats to One Nation’s three, has likewise reaffirmed its opposition to the cuts unless the government provides an “iron clad” guarantee not to cut essential services.

DAY ONE OF ESTIMATES, BRC AND PARLIAMENT

Day one of the latest rounds of Senate Estimates, the Banking Royal Commission and federal Parliament has revealed a number of signifiant claims, admissions, and defections over party policies.

As The Guardian covered, Senate Estimates revealed that there was no tender process for an outwardly suspicious $444m Great Barrier Reef grant to an $8-10m/year non-profit, Australian Border Force defended a dawn raid and attempted deportation against a Sri Lankan family from central Queensland, and the Australian Public Service commissioner repeatedly rebuffed questions over an alleged investigated into his relationship with right-wing think tank, the Institute of Public Affairs. 

Elsewhere the AFR ($) reports that the big four banks, Suncorp and BOQ have admitted to fresh examples of fraud, incorrectly taking the homes of customers, overcharging and hounding customers over debts at the Banking Royal Commission. Finally, May’s return to Parliament saw Labor’s Ged Kearney and Liberal Sussan Ley break party ranks with speeches/private members bills arguing against the abuse of people seeking asylum and sheep, respectively. 

PERTH MAN GUILTY OF SA AXE MURDERS

Perth man Henri Van Breda has been found guilty of the axe murders of his mother, father and brother in South Africa, as part of an attack that reportedly also nearly included killing his teenaged sister.

The West Australian reports that a Cape Town judge ruled against Van Breda’s story of a laughing, masked intruder killing the family, and instead found that the 23-year-old was responsible for the axing deaths of his mother Teresa, father Martha and brother Rudi. The ruling also found that Van Breda attempted to murder his young sister Marli, who survived but was reportedly left with no memory of the incident.

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THEY REALLY SAID THAT?

MO: Under the Migration Act, if someone is an unlawful non-citizen then our officers are obliged, under the Act, to detain them.

NM: Well what happens to the backpackers who are unlawfully in the country because they overstay a visa and just get a text message asking them to leave within a week, why aren’t they detained?

MO: Well, because we don’t have the 64,600 officers to go and detain all the people who are unlawful at any point in time.

Michael Outram and Nick McKim

The Commissioner of the Australian Border Force explains to Senate Estimates that while Australia would love to detain everyone who overstays their visa, there was just something special about a Tamil family of four in Biloela, Queensland, that required a dawn raid.

CRIKEY QUICKIE: THE BEST OF YESTERDAY

We should abolish ASICBernard Keane and Glenn Dyer

“James Shipton should be the last chair of the Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC), a regulator unfit for purpose, led by a man who simply doesn’t seem to get it. Last week’s extraordinary speech by Shipton to a superannuation conference was equal parts Pollyanna-ish about ASIC’s achievements and ‘its international reputation as a world class regulator’ (he actually described it that way), and managerialist bromides.”

Australia’s green battery revolution will be a long time comingChris Woods

“Australia is ramping up for an energy storage boom, but, once again, political apathy and outdated attitudes are limiting a revolutionary transformation of energy supply. When South Australia’s Hornsdale Power Reserve came online last November, what was then the world’s largest lithium ion battery received both international attention and the expected disinterest from the Coalition.”

Separating facts from emotion on boiling sheep to death for commercial gainBernard Keane

“This morning, Liberal southern NSW backbencher Sussan Ley, backed by Victorian MP Sarah Henderson, introduced the Live Sheep Long Haul Export Prohibition Bill 2018 to end the long-haul live sheep export trade in five years and ban shipment during July, August and September during the transition. Both MPs gave excellent speeches. Ley pointed out that demand for live export sheep is propped up by subsidies being progressively withdrawn across the Middle East, and that there is no future for the industry. She made the critical point that if current rules were properly enforced — which even the government itself accepts has not been the case — then the industry would not be viable.”

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Government switches approach after AGL rules out sale of Liddell coal plant

Telstra outage meant 85 prisoners were roaming free across the Northern Territory ($)

High rents force low-income earners out of Brisbane ($)

Senator Penny Wong took confidential Budget papers from lockup ($)

Premier says ambo attackers will get same treatment as rapists, murderers

ETU Victoria branch returns to the Labor Party fold

More power in push to increase MP numbers ($)

Spotless loses contracts with Flinders Medical Centre and Modbury Hospital amid criticism over food quality at RAH ($)

Guilty plea, finally, in Reserve Bank bribery case

Grenfell Tower: Inquiry begins with father paying tribute to stillborn baby as survivors share stories

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Canberra

  • National Palliative Care Week Breakfast with feature former Wallaby Mark Ella as well as a number of federal politicians, doctors and advocates.

  • Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack and Labor agriculture spokesman Joel Fitzgibbon will speak at the Regional Australia Institute forum on migrants in regional towns.

  • Day two of Senate Estimates will continue looking at Environment and Communications, Finance and Public Administration, Legal and Constitutional Affairs, and Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport.

Melbourne

  • Day two of round three of the Banking royal commission will examine case studies involving loans for buying franchise businesses.

  • The state government will hold a press conference on slated law reforms to ensure attacks that injure emergency services workers will be treated akin to murder and rape.

  • Day one of the inaugural, three-day #SAFETYSCAPE Convention will provide space at the Melbourne Convention & Exhibition Centre for different not-for-profit health and safety organisations to run their own events, which could include workshops, forums, seminars, conferences and exhibitions.

Adelaide

  • SA Opposition leader Peter Malinauskas and ACTU secretary Sally McManus will address the Transport Workers Union national council.

  • Over 150 truck drivers and supporters will protest against ALDI supermarket, which advocates claim encourages poor work practices that allegedly force drivers into “long and dangerous hours”.

  • SA’s Australian of the Year recipients will share their stories at a state library panel discussion.

Hobart

  • The Tasmania Law Reform Institute (TLRI) will release a report into the state’s consent laws, arguing that the current system does not adequately protect those most at risk to family violence.

  • The Rascals & Ratbags Roadshow, marking the 150th anniversary of the last convict ship’s arrival in Australia, will see the Royal Australian Mint travel around Tasmania from May 21st to 24th. Today will include a Hobart Pop-Up Shop along the Elizabeth Street Mall.

Sydney

  • About 100 truck drivers subcontracting to the bulk car carrying industry will protest, after they voted last night to commit to industrial action stopping the transport of new motor vehicles to dealers.

  • Australian Museum and Bunnings Warehouse announce a new partnership with FrogID to build frog ponds in schools across Australia.

  • Vivid preview week will today visit Royal Botanic Garden Sydney.

Australia

  • Justin Langer officially starts as head coach of Australian men’s cricket team.

THE COMMENTARIAT

She was a nurse. So why did Helen shun conventional cancer treatment? — Aisha Dow (The Age): “Helen, 50, had shunned mainstream cancer treatment. Her grieving family says the ‘bright and successful’ woman had fallen under the influence of a self-described healer and hypnotherapist who told her not to undergo surgery. Instead he allegedly prescribed an aggressive and painful treatment called black salve, which ate away at her flesh, leaving her swollen and in pain.”

John Setka will set Labor’s industrial laws agenda ($) — Michaelia Cash and Craig Laundy (The Australian): “Recent comments by CFMMEU Victorian secretary John Setka should act as a dire warning about the type of economy, society and workplace relations agenda we would see under a Shorten Labor government.”

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