Friday 29th of March 2024

turnbull political stunt, protocol and royalities...

 

stuff the protocol

10:45am: Senator Parry is having none of it: "This is the last bastion of standing orders that we must defend."

Senator Conroy moves away from anything of a regal or vice-regal nature and confines himself to the government's motives (with space for a swipe at the Greens).

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10:42am: Senator Conroy argues he is not being disrespectful to Her Majesty: "Never has the need for a republic been more evident that today."

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10:41am: Senator Brandis makes a point of order saying that Senator Conroy has been disrespectful to the Queen.

The President of the Senate, Stephen Parry, rebukes Senator Conroy saying that Her Majesty should never be dragged into political arguments.

"You can't do that," Senator Parry says.

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10:39am: Stephen Conroy says the recall of Parliament is a "tawdry political stunt" that a "strong Governor-General would never have agreed to".

"The Governor-General has demeaned his office," Senator Conroy says.

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10:33am: A Labor senator also invokes the "dead hand" imagery.

This time it is "long, dead arm" of Sir John Kerr and the "ghost of 1975" that has been invoked in the name of this "blight on our democracy".

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10:30am: He links the government's two pieces of construction legislation to the Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal.

"We have seen the dead hand of the Rudd Gillard Rudd government reach out to" to stymy families and small business operators, Senator Brandis says.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/the-pulse-live/politics-live-april-18-2016-20160417-go8lrk.html#ixzz468kAaMav 
Follow us: @smh on Twitter | sydneymorningherald on Facebook

 

the nicer language to promote inequality...

 

The voters of Sydney's gayest suburb, Darlinghurst, have deserted the Prime Minister. Those of Potts Point have gone too.

Their departure may have been involuntary, the result of a redistribution, but is prescient. Malcolm Turnbull is proving deflatingly disappointing to many who support him, and many gay people in particular, even if the polls still have him comfortably the preferred PM.

We knew Tony Abbott would be a disaster for equality, and he was. But Turnbull?

We thought him better than merely the welcoming face of the Liberal Party. We thought him the harbinger of change on the remaining legal inequities facing gay Australians. We thought the smartest man in Parliament House would be a true friend to gay Australia. He even went to Mardi Gras last year, in a pink shirt.

We hoped his support for marriage equality, detailed in his compelling 2012 lecture, would see it quickly passed, then he yielded on Tony Abbott's moronic $160 million plebiscite to get to The Lodge.

But incomprehensibly, he has lent his support to the review of a voluntary school program to reduce homophobic bullying and self-harm among LGBT teens.

What is the point of a gay-friendly prime minister if he can't slap down those keen on perpetuating teenage hate, angst and suicide? What is the point of an ally if it's an alliance in photo-op only?

Discouraging kids from beating up others for being different is surely the low-hanging fruit of tolerance. After him not picking it last week, Turnbull seems more frenemy than friend.

We've been here before. Julia Gillard blocked marriage equality, despite her own non-traditional take on the institution. Once out of power, she changed her tune.

Kevin Rudd, from whom the United Nations must be saved, opposed marriage equality when he could've passed it in his first spell as PM, and supported it only when he couldn't, in his second.

If the political consequences of scrapping the plebiscite were too hefty for Turnbull, at least he could have properly called out Queensland MP George Christensen's odious comparison of an effective anti-bullying program to grooming by paedophiles. He could have blocked the determination of the hateful right to destroy it.

But he didn't. He caved, and told everyone to use nicer language.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/equality-is-far-away-with-friends-like-malcolm-turnbull-20160228-gn5is5.html#ixzz4697VacAu 
Follow us: @smh on Twitter | sydneymorningherald on Facebook

Note Julia Gillard wanted to introduce equality for LGBTs but could not as she had to pander to a fascist religious nutter in order to maintain her very tenuous position during which she managed nonetheless to introduce major changes such as the NDIS and the progressive Gonski reforms for education and other reforms towards more equality in the population. Julia only "changed her public views", once she was booted out by Rudd, himself used by the merde-och media to undermine Julia until Rudd was dropped like a dirty sock by the said media, after having "knifed Julia back". We are witnessing the same rigmarole with Turnbull though he has far less principles than Gillard and floats with far more hubris. Meanwhile, the merde-och media is trying to re-promote Tony Abbott, but on this score, the merde-och media knows it is on the side of a loosing battle, BECAUSE THE majority of the AUSTRALIAN POPULATION THINKS TONY ABBOTT is shit.

 

this is a political stunt designed to silence the senate...

The Prime Minister has called on the Opposition Leader Bill Shorten to disassociate himself with Stephen Conroy after he launched an attack on Sir Peter Cosgrove over Parliament's recall.

Could Australia be going to the polls as early as July 2? Follow live throughout the day to find out.

read more: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-04-18/federal-politics-live-blog-april-18/7333356

 

 

Senator Conroy is correct: this is a giant political stunt brought on by a sneaky low-life Malcomius Turnbullus — and the GG, Sir Pete, is in on it. Malcolm the promoter of "the republic" in 1999, is a shameless agent of the kingdom. SHAME MALCOLM SHAME

brandis is designing the plebiscite to fail...

The attorney general, George Brandis, has said he plans to ask cabinet to decide on the wording of the same-sex marriage plebiscite in the next few weeks.

He also wants the plebiscite to be compulsory, and says the Australian electoral commissioner will hopefully provide guidance this week about how early the vote can be held.

“The question should be as simple and as self-explanatory as possible,” he said on Sunday.

“I would like to see it happen before the end of this year, so would the PM. Whether it is practicable to do that is something about which we will be guided by the advice of the AEC.”

Penny Wong says homophobic election slurs show perils of plebiscite

In an interview on ABC’s Insiders program Brandis said that if there was going to be public funding for the plebiscite then equal funding ought to go to the “yes” and “no” campaigns.

Asked to clarify that statement, his office said he was talking about public funding to help the yes and no campaigns promote their arguments, which would likely come on top of the estimated $160m cost of running the plebiscite.

But his office also said if that money would drawn from other areas in the budget so it wouldn’t contribute to the deficit.

His comments about the way in which the votes should be counted also caused confusion.

When asked to explain if the votes should be counted as a simple national majority, or electorate by electorate, Brandis said the vote should follow “normal reporting requirements”.

“I think that the plebiscite should be conducted as closely as possible to the manner in which, for example, a constitutional referendum is conducted … so that there will be the normal reporting requirements.”

That means the votes should be reported electorate by electorate, he said.

The shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, said that comment confirmed the Turnbull government was planning to undermine the cause of marriage equality to please the right wing of the party.

“This subterfuge allows conservative MPs opposed to same-sex marriage to defy a national ‘yes’ vote and vote against same-sex marriage, and justify that behaviour by pointing to the vote in their electorate,” he said.

“Let’s be clear – there is absolutely no reason for a national plebiscite to be counted electorate by electorate,” he said.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/jul/24/marriage-equality-george-brandis-to-ask-cabinet-to-decide-plebiscite-wording