Labor says PM has continually shifted his position on the tax rate and should accept a compromise. Follow it live...
4.29am GMT
BREAKING: Govt and Greens do a deal for a 15% backpacker tax @Skynewsaust #thelatest
4.29am GMT
As the votes continue, Joel Fitzgibbon shouts across the chamber at Barnaby Joyce:
How much will a lamb roast cost if we go to 32.5%?
4.21am GMT
Tony Burke is successfully shut down by the House.
Joel Fitzgibbon rises to second the motion, yelling:
This is Barnaby Joyce’s greyhound ban.
4.20am GMT
Labor’s Murray Watt has given a valedictory speech on attorney general George Brandis’s behalf, the conceit being that he accepts rumours that Brandis will leave parliament if appointed to a plum job and wants to send him off in style.
The valedictory is a timeline of Brandis highlights:
4.19am GMT
Now this is a suspension motion.
@gabriellechan The Suspension: An allegory. #qt @murpharoo pic.twitter.com/NWoJ7RPADt
4.18am GMT
Fashion police.
4.16am GMT
The vote continues, by the way, for the last suspension of standing orders in the last question time for 2016.
Pardon! They are voting on the gags before the suspension motion.
4.15am GMT
Bipartisan friendship.
4.14am GMT
4.12am GMT
Tony Burke’s motion notes the different backpacker tax rates proposed since the 2015 budget change and that the government has been “unwilling to accept the sensible compromise put forward by the Labor party” and condemns the PM for preferring to hurt rural and regional Australia and the tourism industry with a 32.5% tax rate instead of accepting a sensible compromise.
4.10am GMT
Labor has moved a suspension of standing orders on the backpacker tax.
4.09am GMT
Labor to Scott Morrison: I refer to the treasurer’s claim in question time that a 32.5% backpacker tax was introduced in the 2012 budget. If that is true, why was no revenue raised from backpacker tax in 2013, 2014 or 2015? Isn’t it the real truth that this government introduced a 32.5% backpacker tax in the 2015 budget?
Morrison:
The non-resident tax rate which now applies was set by the member for Lilley and he claimed more than $80bn in revenue in that budget. Now, when this became clear, Mr Speaker, that this is what had transpired, the government sought to give certainty to these arrangements.
4.00am GMT
A new Senate inquiry has been established to investigate the problem of employers underpaying or not paying their employees’ compulsory super.
Labor senator Katy Gallagher called for the inquiry. It will be due to report by 22 March 2017.
The Australian Tax Office’s internal risk assessment indicates that as many as 11% to 20% of employers could be non-compliant with their super guarantee contributions, and that non-compliance is “endemic”, especially in small businesses and industries where a large number of cash transactions and contracting arrangements occur. Importantly this non-compliance primarily affects lower paid employees and those are most likely to rely on the age pension in later years.
3.59am GMT
Labor to Barnaby Joyce: what will be the consequences for rural and regional Australia of a 32.5% backpacker tax?
Joyce says the hours are counting down before the parliament can fix the backpacker tax:
We have approximately two hours left to do it. Approximately two hours left to do it...we are looking into the heart of the Labor party to say, “Do you honestly believe in the Australian Labor party, the party of shearers, the party of farmers, do you honestly believe that it is morally right that a person from Paris is going to have a tax advantage over Australian workers? Do you honestly believe that? Or have you travelled that far, have you travelled that far from your base, is it that far in the past?
3.54am GMT
The NFF continues to mop up.
In reply to Sky’s tweet:
Well no. I confirmed we supported 15% yet would support another rate that parliament decides. It's up to parliament to get the job done. https://t.co/QidHueDN5Y
3.53am GMT
Labor to Turnbull: Since being elected PM, the PM has been willing to back down on everything he has ever believed in. Why doesn’t he back down on the backpacker tax and fix this mess before parliament rises today?
Turnbull flicks the question to Scott Morrison.
3.48am GMT
The NFF tweet Turnbull referred to:
Clock ticking to avoid #BackpackerTax. Pls contact @HumanHeadline, @SenatorCulleton & @JacquiLambie. Tell them 15% is competitive & fair! pic.twitter.com/OjVxsh3lXU
3.46am GMT
The beard between.
Member for Chifley @edhusicMP photo bombs Pyne & Marles @gabriellechan @GuardianAus #politicslive pic.twitter.com/MFp7TO7owl
3.46am GMT
Labor to Turnbull: Is the PM saying the following words were not said by the president of the NFF with in an interview with David Speers. “Do the deal today. Well, look, we don’t want to leave here with 32.5. But I do need to be consistent in this and we’ve always called for 15.” “Speers interrupted, “Yeah, yeah, but if it needs to be 15, just do it.” The president of the NFF, “Do a deal, do a deal.” Is the PM saying that that didn’t happen?
(We are in danger disappearing up our own tax schedules here.)
What this shows is the utter inability of those opposite to tell the truth. I was talking earlier today about post-truth politics, this is what is called truthiness. It used to be a satirical term used by Stephen Colbert where people say things which are sort of true but not really true ...
Opposition leader is doing is thoroughly misrepresenting the farmers of the union, of course we want a resolution, but this is what the leader said, “The president of the National Farmers’ Federation has called on the government to adopt Labor’s position on the backpacker tax”, and in fact that’s exactly what they’re not doing.
3.43am GMT
Senator Kimberley Kitching has asked the attorney general, George Brandis, why the prime minister won’t rule out getting rid of him with a diplomatic or judicial appointment.
Brandis then gets up and accuses the shadow attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, of “crying wolf” over the many times he has called him to resign or criticised his performance.
3.41am GMT
The National Farmers’ Federation has just called me to say they do not support 13%.
I reported on it earlier in the day based on an interview with the NFF president, Fiona Simson, by David Speers of Sky.
.@David_Speers reports the @NationalFarmers are urging the government to accept Labor's 13% backpacker tax proposal https://t.co/1TB5BhD5TJ
Do the deal that it takes to get the deal done. If 13% is the rate that is going to fly today, well, look, we don’t want to leave here with 32.5%. I need to be consistent in this and I have always called for 15%.
Do the deal.
3.31am GMT
Labor to Joyce: Is it seriously the government’s position that it would rather inflict a 32.5% tax on rural and regional Australia rather than accept Labor’s sensible 13% compromise offer?
I want to quote exactly what the National Farmers’ Federation said and then place it clearly before the leader of the Opposition and see if he wishes to correct the record after misleading the House. The National Farmers’ Federation says, and I quote, “to be clear, we continue to support 15% as the best policy outcome”.
3.28am GMT
Independent Bob Katter asks energy minister about supporting ethanol in contrast to former National and LNP ministers. Part of the question from Katter:
Minister [John] Anderson rejects biofuelling and now works for an oil and gas company. [Mark] Vaile works for an oil and gas companies. [Ian] McFarlane heads the Resources Council. To quote the AMA, atmospheric health [expert], Professor Carney, more people die from motor vehicle emissions than motor vehicle accidents...Minister, will you consider a health safe, cheap, reliable home-grown fuel supply, biofuels, or are you just another oil puppet?
3.22am GMT
Labor to Scott Morrison: Last week the Treasurer declared there was no room for compromise on a backpacker tax of 19%. Today the Treasurer stated that 15% was the line in the sand? Is this the Treasurer’s final position, or just his latest? Why doesn’t the Government negotiate with the Senate the same way the PM negotiates with the hard right of his party room, and just give in?
Scott Morrison goes through the history of the backpacker tax and says Labor is playing political games.
3.18am GMT
Joyce answers a government question on backpackers tax and goes all stream of consciousness.
Joyce yells at Shorten:
He sits there with a Cheshire grin and the Member for Hunter [Joel Fitzgibbon], you are so clever with the damage you’ve done, you’ve so clever with the damage you’ve done. You don’t care about Australian workers, you never have cared about Australian workers, you are so inside the belt way, that is all this is about. You are a disgrace about what has happened today, when you should have shown tomorrow turnaround, show some ticker, get that grin off your face, it is not funny at all. The whole point of what you are doing to the Australian horticultural industry is exactly what you did to the Australian live cattle industry.
3.13am GMT
Labor to Turnbull: On the backpacker tax, the PM has gone from 0% to 32.5%, then to 19%, then threatened 32.5% again, then to 15%, then threatened 32.5% again and every time he said it was his final offer. When will the PM accept Labor’s sensible compromise of 13%? PM, it’s time to end the chaos.
Turnbull says Bill Shorten is a representative of the foreign workers union.
Foreign backpackers from some of the richest countries in the world pay less tax than Australians, and they even pay less tax than Pacific islanders working here as part of an aid exercise, designed to enable them to remit money to their families in their communities in some of the poorest countries in the world. The Labor party has no principles, it has no consistency, it has no values.
3.08am GMT
Labor to Turnbull: Today the President of the National Farmers’ Federation has called on the government to adopt Labor’s position on the backpacker tax, stating, and I quote, “Do the deal today. Do what it takes to get the deal done. Do the deal. Do a deal!” Is the PM seriously going to inflict a 32.5% backpacker tax on rural and regional Australia because he is too arrogant to sign up to Labor’s sensible compromise?
Turnbull describes Labor’s position as “sheer satire”.
This is the sort of contemptuous approach of the Labor party and they talk about it as if it is all about a number and they say it must be a number, if you’ve moved from 10.5% to 13%. We’ve moved from 32.5% to 19% to 15%, and yet all the time all you do is destroy. You are a wrecker, you want to destroy...
Well, the Australian people are watching you with your swarmy look, your swarmy little press conferences, your smile, it is all just a joke. It doesn’t matter. It is just other people’s jobs and at the heart of this, what is it? What does he stand behind? He stands behind having a worse rate, a worse rate for Australian workers, actually discriminated against.
2.59am GMT
Question time is in two minutes.
2.54am GMT
2.27am GMT
2.18am GMT
@gabriellechan I have 12% for this delightful foreign itinerant workers tax..12.5 I HAVE 12.5%..looking for 13..it's a steal at 13% folks.. pic.twitter.com/F8hXlTHSQM
2.17am GMT
.@David_Speers reports the @NationalFarmers are urging the government to accept Labor's 13% backpacker tax proposal https://t.co/1TB5BhD5TJ
2.14am GMT
This day can’t get sillier.
Watch this amazing kick from Jean-Claude Van Damme @JCVD, the Muscles from Brussels... pic.twitter.com/En7NQkv76W
2.12am GMT
Now that the Greens’ Nick McKim has confirmed they will back the 13% rate, we will have:
1.53am GMT
Fiona Simson, NFF president told Sky:
Do the deal that it takes to get the deal done. If 13% is the rate that is going to fly today, well look we don’t want to leave here with 32.5%. I need to be consistent in this and I have always called for 15%.
Do the deal.
1.51am GMT
The Senate isn't here to rubber stamp bills. The majority of the Senate don't want the 15% backpacker tax. Negotiations continue #auspol
1.50am GMT
Two protestors have been summonsed appear in court after the protests this morning.
.@AFPmedia on today's protest at Parliament House@abcnews #auspol pic.twitter.com/QtIrmwcWIY
1.45am GMT
The Greens have flagged they will consider a 13% backpacker tax.
1.42am GMT
Labor agriculture shadow Joel Fitzgibbon says he has been receiving phone calls from farm representatives all morning all saying while they backed Labor on 10.5% “but if you can get 13%, please let’s just do this”.
But the most significant call was one from Stuart Armitage. Stuart Armitage is the chair of the Queensland Farmers Federation, an arm of the National Farmers Federation, very, very interestingly.
He said, ‘Joel, I’m backing you at 10.5, but, mate, if you can’t get 10.5, can you go 13?’ I thought that was a significant contribution from him.
1.32am GMT
Bill Shorten:
We are prepared to support a 13% backpacker tax from every dollar earned by backpackers. We think it gets the balance right and I will get Chris to explain more about that in a moment. There is a solution on the table for Malcolm Turnbull. Our message to Malcolm Turnbull is grow up, swallow your pride, accept a solution.
1.26am GMT
Derryn Hinch is speaking alone on the backpacker tax.
He said the crossbenchers could not come to an agreement on the backpacker tax.
I got into the chamber and realised the 15% could not pass. I just want to get a deal done ... I don’t care what figure ... the figure doesn’t fuss me.
1.22am GMT
More of the freedom conversation, widening from Murph to Tim Wilson and cartoonist Fiona Katauskas.
@FionaKatauskas not at all, freedom of speech sits in a context, that's why different laws apply in public speech vs workplaces etc
1.09am GMT
I did not get to this final reflection from Bill Shorten in his Christmas speech.
On the 30th of October this year, in a moment of unthinkable horror, a Brisbane bus driver was set on fire and killed while still behind the wheel.
As the flames spread, the fire trapped 11 of his passengers in the back of the bus – unable to access the front door.
1.00am GMT
No comment II.
'Anus of proof' #auspol pic.twitter.com/cLOYPANvH8
12.57am GMT
Quick recap prior to crossbench conference.
The government’s proposal for the backpacker tax is now 15%.
12.54am GMT
Rod Culleton, Jacqui Lambie and Derryn Hinch are holding a press conference – in answer to Scott Morrison’s no deal presser earlier.
12.51am GMT
No comment.
Mixed messages much?? This is, bar none, the GAYEST image I've ever seen! Totes could pass for 1 of my lezzo mates pic.twitter.com/slR3ro1UyO
12.47am GMT
The safety fence in question.
12.44am GMT
12.42am GMT
Protestors are taken away.
12.40am GMT
Police are waiting for the protestors.
12.38am GMT
Protestors pack up the sign and come down.
12.37am GMT
Police negotiate with protestors to pack up.
12.32am GMT
With all the parliamentary protests, with the PM saying protests in parliament are an interruption of democracy, Katharine Murphy expressed her confusion on Twitter and got a reply from the former freedom commissioner and now Liberal MP Tim Wilson.
@murpharoo @FionaKatauskas like I can't just walk into your home and start shouting, but I can on the street outside
@murpharoo @FionaKatauskas that's an exercise of your property rights, but I don't do that, I'm too polite :-)
12.28am GMT
Labor is trying to amend the VET bills in the house.
The government is gagging Labor MPs who want to speak on the bill, including Kate Ellis and Anne Aly. That required two votes.
12.11am GMT
In the lower house, Christopher Pyne is gagging Labor on the vocational education and training bills which seek to clean up some of the dodgy training colleges.
12.07am GMT
The Senate is voting on the criminal code amendment that enables continuing detention for high risk terrorist offenders.
12.00am GMT
Scott Morrison advises that growers should withhold 32.5% in tax from backpackers.
The ABC rural reporter Anna Vidot asks: as the 32.5% rate hasn’t come in yet, we’ve been contacted at ABC Rural who says that their bosses are already withholding the 32.5% because there is a lot of confusion out there.
My advice to them is they should, they should withhold at that rate because [backpackers] are non-residents for tax purposes and the compliance programs that will be implemented will be following things up.
Legislating that specifically has not occurred and so the law will default to the common law position, and the common law position is 32.5. That’s what it is right now.
11.50pm GMT
Scott Morrison is asked how he thinks farmers feel. In the answer, unlike Barnaby Joyce, he gives a nuanced reply that concedes it was a change in the 2015 budget that started this.
Like me, [farmers] will be very disappointed. I will be very disappointed and they will be very disappointed.
Let’s just understand what the 32.5% rate is. The 32.5% rate has not been introduced by the government. The 32.5% rate is the non-resident tax rate which was set by Wayne Swan.
11.41pm GMT
Scott Morrison on backpackers tax:
But this is not a game. This is not a game of ping-pong on legislation and tax rates. That’s not how sensible tax rates should be set in this country. We have been willing to engage in the spirit of reasonable compromise. Our position is 15%.
Because I think that would frankly make a farce of the whole process – 15% is based on the seasonal worker rate, it is a sensible rate. It has a basis that relates elsewhere in the tax system and that is the least administratively complex way to deal with it, with the agricultural sector, and if people are prepared to vote for it at 19, they could be prepared to vote for it at 15 in order to achieve an outcome. The 13% rate is arbitrary.
11.39pm GMT
Cmon @fitzhunter @JacquiLambie @HumanHeadline Restore some credibility in the job get on w 15% #backpackertax @NTCattlemen @NationalFarmers
11.38pm GMT
Scott Morrison is speaking now on backpackers tax.
He has met with the crossbenchers last night and this morning.
11.34pm GMT
In the Senate, all eyes will be on the backpackers tax.
At the moment, the bill is listed for 12.45pm but all things liable to change without notice.
11.31pm GMT
Scott Morrison has a press conference coming up.
There may be a resolution on the backpackers tax coming up.
11.29pm GMT
Bill Shorten also mentions people he has met, troops serving overseas and firefighters. He mentions Indigenous kids and remembers mourning for the LGBTI people murdered in Orlando.
He also thanks all the parliamentary staff and his family.
Nobody in this chamber needs to be told how hard this job is on our families. Those Saturday night goodbyes, trying to help with the homework from the other side of the country, the netball games, the plays, the concerts you miss, the re-emerging you do when you return from these long parliamentary sittings, and the re-acquaintance with your family. None of our parents or children asked for a parent in public life, but they live with it, they live with us, and we couldn’t do it without them.
11.26pm GMT
Bill Shorten starts by revealing he and Malcolm Turnbull actually get on quite well behind the scenes. He thanks the Speaker and the prime minister.
In fact, I recall one meeting where the prime minister actually asked me if there was some way we could be nicer about each other in public. I said we could swap jobs.
I thought I was pretty agile, really. I did discover there is a little limit to Malcolm’s commitment to innovation. The PM and I actually have more in common than people realise. We’re both married to brilliant women, we’ve both battled the Member for Warringah. We have both grown up wanting to help run the AWU and join the Labor Party.
11.23pm GMT
The prime minister also thanks troops serving overseas, the parliamentary staff who “enable democracy”, his team in Coalition, including Barnaby Joyce, the Nationals and his family.
He also thanks the families of all MPs.
We are the volunteers, but our families are the conscripts and we could not do this job without the support and love of our families. So I urge all honourable members that each time over the summer break that someone asks you to set the table or do the dishes, play another round of backyard cricket, mind kids while the other half heads out for the night, or spend the day with the grandkids, to ensure your ongoing ability to serve in this place, I urge you to comply each time and do so with a very big smile.
11.18pm GMT
Turnbull mentions Indigenous people he has met and the progress towards constitutional recognition of our First Australians.
There are now five Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the parliament and I want to thank them all, as I know the leader of the opposition does, for their wisdom and support.
Perhaps a more realistic goal is to vow to speak more plainly and with more candour to the Australian people. They are weary of the political games, the sense that politicians say one thing and could easily mean another, and that our promises are throw-away lines with a shelf life of a carton of milk. The Oxford dictionary has declared “post-truth” as the international word of the year. Mr Speaker, let’s do all we can to ensure that post-truth politics has no place in Australia. If we promise to be bound by our words, we will be much more careful in choosing them.
11.14pm GMT
Turnbull talks about Lulu, a young cancer survivor he met while announcing another $20m for the Zero Childhood Cancer Initiative.
I’ve been brought to tears a few times in this job and I admit there was some more that day. I’m wearing Lulu’s bracelet and it reminds me, if I ever need reminding, that what we do here is about the future of our nation, about the future of people like Lulu, our children and grandchildren.
11.12pm GMT
The prime minister says it has been a privilege to meet so many people around the country. And with their stories, he says he hopes it makes him a better leader.
He documents the story of a domestic violence victim whose children were murdered by their father, a woman who was suffering breast cancer, families of MH17 victims.
One day we’re here in the House debating legislation, the next I’m at the Birdsville Hotel on the edge of the Simpson Desert, chatting to locals alongside a wall of well worn Akubras, great company, cold beer, and a curried camel pie. And the next, representing our nation overseas gave me the chance to meet Australians having a go around the world, like Nick and Andy Stone whose new cafe is booming, bringing decent coffee to all New Yorkers.
11.08pm GMT
Malcolm Turnbull says he has learned the lessons from the elections elsewhere, including Brexit and the US election.
This year saw elections in other countries, too, with Britain’s decision to leave the European Union and the election of Donald Trump in the United States, both leaving pollsters and pundits red-faced. The forces at play in those countries and their political systems are, of course, very different to ours, but we must always be aware of what the public expects from its government, from its parliament, from its leaders. Many people are anxious about change or feel that their leaders are not listening, and we should not dismiss their concerns.
11.06pm GMT
Malcolm Turnbull begins his Christmas speech.
He notes the election campaign.
Over eight weeks political parties and candidates of every size and persuasion presented their vision for Australia to the people. Mr Harbourside Mansion was surely the epithet of the campaign. Of course, Bill desperately wanted the title for himself, but like all good Socialists he wanted a harbourside mansion paid for by the taxpayer.
The campaign was hard-fought, but while our political battles can bebruising, we resolve our differences by casting and counting votes, not with guns and violence, and I know we all take great pride in the way the Australian people peacefully choose their government many I want to thank, Mr Speaker, the electors of Wentworth for reelecting me this year.
In their wisdom, the Australian people elected a parliament that requires us to work together to talk, to compromise. The decision is proving to be a very workable one. The 45th parliament is making and passing good legislation for the benefit of all. Since the election, we’ve passed 38 bills, including those that took us to the double dissolution election.
11.00pm GMT
Labor’s backpacker motion is voted down.
10.59pm GMT
The Labor motion on backpackers currently being voted on:
That the House:
10.58pm GMT
Greens democracy spokeswoman Lee Rhiannon has appeared at the WACA protest, praising the activists and bringing them a gift of chocolates.
Asked whether the action, including hanging from the edifice of parliament, is appropriate she said: “It’s a non-violent protest” and “they should be here”.
The problem lies with the human rights abuses, the mental health problems, the anguish. We’re breaking our international obligations … that’s where the laws are being broken.
These people are courageous, they are showing what the parliament should do.
10.55pm GMT
A little bit more from LNP senator James McGrath:
10.53pm GMT
Anthony Albanese has a crack at the “chaotic government” and is shut down.
Now the house is voting that the motion be put. Then they will vote on the substantive motion.
10.51pm GMT
The vote is proceeding in the lower house. Chris Bowen is successfully gagged 75-72.
Agriculture shadow Joel Fitzgibbon gets up to second the backpacker motion and yells into the mike before Pyne gags him:
This is Barnaby Joyce’s greyhound ban.
10.47pm GMT
Protesters today & yesterday, undermining my campaign to keep the Parliament House grass open for the children to roll down #getofftheroof
10.43pm GMT
As it turns out, both leaders were in the house for Christmas valedictories and goodwill to all men and women.
10.41pm GMT
Christopher Pyne is gagging Chris Bowen.
10.39pm GMT
Now Chris Bowen is moving a motion – presumably leading to a suspension of standing orders – on the backpackers tax.
10.37pm GMT
Parliament security is the first issue of the day.
Speaker Tony Smith is speaking about plans to improve security around and at parliament house. It will include new perimeter security, CCTV cameras and glassing off certain areas.
Parliament has always been known as the people’s house, says Smith
The world has changed since the original design brief.
10.30pm GMT
LNP senator James McGrath is furious at the protestors.
He told Sky’s Kieran Gilbert:
What a bunch of grubs. Parliament is the house for all Australians ... and we have these Kmart Castros out the front its all about them and their views and nobody else ... If they want their views to be heard run for parliament ... they should wake up to themselves and get a job.
10.21pm GMT
Lee Rhiannon giving presser after bringing chocolates for @akaWACA refugee protesters #auspol @gabriellechan pic.twitter.com/uksNufJqd9
10.21pm GMT
10.19pm GMT
I promised to bring you some of the commentary on the detail of what passed in the radically amended Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC).
Here is Judith Sloan from the Oz:
Let’s face it, Malcolm Turnbull hasn’t the faintest clue about the rough and tumble of industrial relations. His business experience was limited to fancy deal-making and appearing in court rooms.
So allowing himself to get involved in negotiating with populist, horse-trading crossbench senators about the details of the bill to re-establish the Australian Building and Construction Commission was a big public policy mistake. But just like the boy who has his heart set on a particular Christmas present, Malcolm really, really wanted the ABCC bill to pass the Senate, and he was prepared to do pretty much anything to get it.
10.12pm GMT
Whistleblowers Activists and Citizens Alliance (WACA) spokesman Phil Evans said today’s action “continues the call for urgent action on refugees” including closing offshore detention camps and bringing all refugees and asylum seekers in them to Australia.
Evans confirmed no charges were laid over yesterday’s protest, nor were they given any paperwork banning them from the parliamentary precinct.
10.08pm GMT
Parliament will sit at 9.30am.
Richard di Natale has told Sky News as far as he knows, there is no involvement from Greens MPs and senators in the protests yesterday or today. Though there are reports that Greens senator Nick McKim may move a motion in the Senate congratulating the protestors.
10.00pm GMT
That Xenophon digit is aimed at Leyonhjelm due to a story by Tory Shepherd of the Adelaide Advertiser.
Here is but a taste:
A NSW Senator has compared South Australia to a stinky fat man who enjoys artificially flavoured cheesy snacks.
In a sign other states are envious of the state for securing promises on shipbuilding and water, Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm said we should be stripped of some of our GST revenue and have our “bleatings” ignored.
9.55pm GMT
Meanwhile...
Channelling my inner libertarian, here's my (cheesy) response to Senator @DavidLeyonhjelm's pathetic bagging of SA: https://t.co/dtzgB3JZHR pic.twitter.com/gFhuETNwbf
9.54pm GMT
9.50pm GMT
I’ve spoken to Zianna Fuad one of the organisers. Thursday’s refugee protest at parliament is by the same group as Wednesday’s disruption of question time – that is Whistleblowers Activists and Citizens Alliance (WACA).
There are 13 protesters in the fountain, dyed red to symbolise blood. They are carrying signs singling out the Liberals as “world leaders in cruelty” and Labor for providing “no opposition to cruelty”.
9.47pm GMT
Protestors in the fountain out the front of Parliament House @gabriellechan @GuardianAus #Panorama #politicslive pic.twitter.com/O0wB4rD8yh
9.40pm GMT
Protestors on the forecourt of Parliament House in Canberra @gabriellechan @GuardianAus #politicslive pic.twitter.com/cvpT0NuWrg
9.39pm GMT
There are lots of pictures coming now of the protest. Here are some from Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young.
Powerful peaceful protest happening outside the people's parliament right now pic.twitter.com/HmMArInbkB
Did they have any affiliations with any groups? It was obviously organised so under what banner was it organised. I really question the Greens going down and congratulating them. Are you congratulating them for shutting down our nation’s parliament? Have you completely and utterly lost the plot Richard Di Natale? Why would you do that?
9.28pm GMT
Lots of police, as you'd expect. pic.twitter.com/07OXNgafvI
9.25pm GMT
Mike Bowers is out the front of parliament. There are more protestors outside. They have hung the sign on the building and dyed the fountain red. People are standing in the water with signs.
Close the camps now! @gabriellechan @GuardianAus @mpbowers @smh @theage @abcnews @SBSNews @BenDohertyCorro pic.twitter.com/aLM86FpYa8
9.18pm GMT
They're back #refugees #naru #Manus #auspol pic.twitter.com/JcG4u871bC
9.14pm GMT
Good morning,
Today, I am feeling lucky. It is the last day and I am almost done. You could say, I might get out scot-free. Because scot-free is the term of the day.
I wasn’t concerned for my personal safety but I was concerned that the parliament could be in trouble like that. The demonstrators, who rioted in the gallery, were interrupting the people’s house. They were interrupting democracy.
It’s not for me to press charges, Kochie. That is a matter for the police. They let them off scot-free. The security needs to be looked at.
We should never do that. This is the people’s house ... Our forebears fought very hard over centuries to secure parliamentary democracy to have their elective representatives come together and speak their mind. Interrupting that, is a denial of democracy.
#BREAKING Derryn Hinch says he will support a backpacker tax rate of 13 per cent, says Rod Culleton also on board. https://t.co/sGwWrXIh91
Labor want our rich kid from Germany, from Norway to be paying less tax than someone from one of the poorest countries in the world.
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