Welcome
Krishani Dhanji
Good morning, Krishani Dhanji with you here for another busy sitting week (and the second last joint sitting week for the year).
The Liberals are facing some pressure after the Nationals came out and scrapped their commitment to net zero. The Liberals are still considering their position on the policy.
The government is keeping somewhat of a lower profile early this week; they’re still spruiking their pre-election promise to increase bulk-billing incentives which came into force over the weekend.
And the Optus boss will face a parliamentary hearing today into the September outage. The Greens and Coalition have been pushing for a full inquiry into the incident.
It’s going to be another busy week, stay with us!
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Key events
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SingTel should appear before Optus inquiry, Greens and Coalition say
The Greens and the Coalition will grill Optus over its outage earlier this year during a parliamentary hearing.
Shadow communications minister, Melissa McIntosh, told ABC News Breakfast a bit earlier that the inquiry would “get to the bottom” of what happened.
When I met with the CEO of Optus he said it was human error and I asked ‘How can human error result in the outage where lives were lost?’ That is not good enough.
Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, who’s also been heavily critical of Optus, also told News Breakfast the inquiry will be looking to call in the CEO and board members of SingTel to face questions.
I’ve been worried for far too long that Optus is much more worried about its profits than it is people’s safety. And now we have a situation where people have died because Optus put profits ahead of safety, and SingTel needs to take responsibility for that.
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Updated at 15.27 EST
‘I have a lot more to ask’ says Joyce on Nationals’ energy policy
Barnaby Joyce isn’t completely sold on the Nationals’ energy policy despite being one of the most vocal advocates to scrap net zero (and still has a bill in the House to do that).
On Sunrise this morning, Joyce says he still has concerns over the Capacity Investment Scheme (CIS) which underwrites renewable projects. The Nats have decided that they’ll keep the scheme but will expand it to also underwrite fossil fuel projects.
Joyce says he will go through the fine print with senator Matt Canavan, who led the Nationals review with Ross Cadell.
I have a lot more to ask and I will do my job and ask.
Few in the Liberal party, who have been staunch net zero supporters, are concerned this could be the end for the Coalition. Asked whether the Coalition is “over”, Joyce says:
I don’t know, that is above my pay grade. In the past, I’ve argued against splitting the Coalition.
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A third of metropolitan GPs to be fully bulk-billing
Just one third of all metropolitan GP practices will be fully bulk-billed under the government’s increased bulk-billing incentive, which came into effect on 1 November, as the government has promised that there will be no out-of-pocket payment for 90% of all GP visits by 2030.
Labor has released new data overnight showing how many clinics have indicated they will now fully bulk-bill.
In metro areas, of 4,720 practices, 1,557 will be fully bulk-billing (33%) – an increase of 622 clinics that say they will now bulk-bill due to the incentive.
In regional centres, of 620 practices, 209 will be fully bulk-billing (33%) – an increase of 108 clinics.
But in remote communities, almost half of all practices will now be fully bulk-billed – with 51 out of 110 practices indicating they won’t charge out-of-pocket costs for patients.
The top ten electorates that will see the most number of mixed billing practices become fully bulk-billed include: Labor-held Ballarat in regional Victoria; Labor-held Rankin in outer suburban Brisbane; LNP-held Hinkler and Flynn in regional QLD; Labor-held Hawke outside Melbourne; Labor-held Calwell and Hotham in metropolitan Melbourne; LNP-held Spence in South Australia, LNP-held Parkes in regional NSW, and LNP-held Cowper in regional Victoria.
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Updated at 15.17 EST
Welcome
Krishani Dhanji
Good morning, Krishani Dhanji with you here for another busy sitting week (and the second last joint sitting week for the year).
The Liberals are facing some pressure after the Nationals came out and scrapped their commitment to net zero. The Liberals are still considering their position on the policy.
The government is keeping somewhat of a lower profile early this week; they’re still spruiking their pre-election promise to increase bulk-billing incentives which came into force over the weekend.
And the Optus boss will face a parliamentary hearing today into the September outage. The Greens and Coalition have been pushing for a full inquiry into the incident.
It’s going to be another busy week, stay with us!
Share
