Speaker 1: Live on Sky News. This is Sharry.
Speaker 2: Good Evening, and welcome to the show.
Speaker 3: I'm Caleb Bond filling in for Sharry Marks and this
Speaker 3: week he's what's coming up on the program tonight. Paul
Speaker 3: Keating's thinly veiled swipe at Labor over their super tax plan.
Speaker 3: He might just be protecting his legacy, but he does
Speaker 3: make some good points. I'll discuss that in just a moment.
Speaker 3: Glaston bree as you just saw, has made headlines for
Speaker 3: all the wrong reasons. This week, Alex Rivtchin will explain
Speaker 3: why chanting death Death to the IDF isn't appropriate at
Speaker 3: a music festival, though I think that's probably pretty self explanatory,
Speaker 3: and as Donald Trump saved TikTok, he seems to think so.
Speaker 3: The US President has announced that he's found a buyer
Speaker 3: for the Chinese owned app Generation Zed. I can imagine
Speaker 3: will be overjoyed, though not so much me. Kosher Garter
Speaker 3: on that a little later. Well, Former Prime Minister Paul Keating,
Speaker 3: as I said before, took a veiled swipe at the
Speaker 3: government today over its tax on unrealized capital gains in superannuation.
Speaker 3: We know he's been private critical, but this is the
Speaker 3: first time, the architect of compulsory super, the man who
Speaker 3: devised and envisaged this system, has taken a public swipe
Speaker 3: at his own party for thirty three years later, basically
Speaker 3: trying to dismantle what he fought for. From tomorrow, July one,
Speaker 3: the compulsory rate of SUPER will increase.
Speaker 2: Half a percent to twelve percent now.
Speaker 3: Keating sent out a statement today that read, tomorrow, thirty
Speaker 3: four years after I nominated a twelve percent wage equivalent
Speaker 3: as the appropriate level of compulsory contribution into superannuation, the
Speaker 3: system finally matures. This means that every young person joining
Speaker 3: the workforce this year will begin and remain at twelve
Speaker 3: percent of superannuation contributions throughout their entire working life. And
Speaker 3: this is where things get interesting, he continued. This level
Speaker 3: of contributions and compound earnings will guarantee personal super accumulations
Speaker 3: in excess of three million dollars at retirement, reducing the
Speaker 3: call on the age pension on the Australian budget to
Speaker 3: two percent of GDP by the twenty fifties. He specifically
Speaker 3: points out that every new employee in the country will
Speaker 3: be on the road to more than three million in
Speaker 3: their super account.
Speaker 2: That is not a coincidence.
Speaker 3: That is Keating taking a veiled but pointed swipe at
Speaker 3: the Albanese government and its Treasurer Jim Charmers, who happens
Speaker 3: to be doctor Charmers, because he did his PhD on
Speaker 3: Paul Keating. Now, the government, of course, is planning to
Speaker 3: increase the superannuation tax from fifteen percent to thirty percent
Speaker 3: on earnings above three million dollars and tax unrealized capital
Speaker 3: gains in those superfunds. That is, if an asset increases
Speaker 3: in value, you pay tax on that quote unquote profit
Speaker 3: even though you haven't actually made any physical money yet.
Speaker 2: And that three.
Speaker 3: Million dollars, as we know, is not indexed. It stays
Speaker 3: at that number in perpetuity. Now, this is the first
Speaker 3: public intervention by the former PM on this issue, but
Speaker 3: he's been privately seething about this for a year. The
Speaker 3: Financial Review reported in August last year that in private
Speaker 3: talks over the past month, mister Keating has told industry
Speaker 3: super executives and union leaders that the government's refusal to
Speaker 3: index the three million dollar threshold to increases in inflation
Speaker 3: is unconscionable. According to people familiar with the discussions who
Speaker 3: spoke to the AFR on the condition of anonymity. The
Speaker 3: paper reported that Keating has said any new tax shouldn't
Speaker 3: kick in until at least five million, not three million,
Speaker 3: and he was particularly worried about the three million dollar
Speaker 3: figure not being indexed. It wrote, in private conversations with
Speaker 3: a wide circle of people, mister Keating suggested that an
Speaker 3: unindexed limit on tax concessional superannuation would condemn super to
Speaker 3: becoming a low to middle income scheme, completely at odds
Speaker 3: with the universal scheme he introduced with the Superannuation Guarantee
Speaker 3: in nineteen ninety two. That is, Superannuation would lose its
Speaker 3: university out which mister Keating apparently regards as key to
Speaker 3: its strength, national appeal and longevity, the same qualities that
Speaker 3: have underpinned Medicare. That could eventually lead to a lack
Speaker 3: of political support and even the scrapping of compulsory superannuation,
Speaker 3: which would destroy Keating's legacy and hurt the superbalances of
Speaker 3: low income earners. The Australian's business columnist Robert got Libson
Speaker 3: wrote last month that according to super funds, Keating was
Speaker 3: quote unquote white hot with anger. He wrote a number
Speaker 3: of those funds now believe, as a result of receiving
Speaker 3: an air full of that keating anger, that in due
Speaker 3: course the former prime Minister and Treasurer will go public
Speaker 3: with a withering blast against charmers, more intense than ever
Speaker 3: directed to a cabinet minister. Now, today's statement wasn't a
Speaker 3: withering blast, but it was a shot across the bow.
Speaker 3: He fired the warning shot got Libson also wrote that
Speaker 3: former ACTU President Bill Kelty, an other of the US
Speaker 3: the architects of compulsory super, was likely to come out
Speaker 3: publicly and he since has a Fortnight Ago he told
Speaker 3: The Australian that I think taxing unrealized capital gains is
Speaker 3: bad policy. It distorts the effective tax changes your income flows.
Speaker 3: And if it was on superannuation generally there would be
Speaker 3: a revolution about it. It would destroy Super. Of course,
Speaker 3: Labor argues this as just a tax on the rich
Speaker 3: because it kicks in a three million, But as Kelty says,
Speaker 3: bad policy is bad policy for rich or poor, and
Speaker 3: this is the most important element of keeping statement today.
Speaker 3: This is not just a tax on the rich. It
Speaker 3: is a tax that will affect average income earners in
Speaker 3: just a few decades. The government well knows that bracket
Speaker 3: creep has helped generate record tax revenue in the past decade.
Speaker 3: Ten years ago, income tax receipts were two hundred and
Speaker 3: fifty eight point eight billion dollars. This financial year, according
Speaker 3: to the budget, there'll be four hundred and ninety seven
Speaker 3: point six billion dollars. That's ninety two point three percent
Speaker 3: more than a decade ago, nearly double, and it's also
Speaker 3: one and a half billion dollars more than was predicted
Speaker 3: in the mid year economic update, and over the forward estimates.
Speaker 3: Next financial year, it'll be five hundred and twenty two
Speaker 3: point seven billion, twenty twenty six, twenty seven, five hundred
Speaker 3: and forty seven point five to two billion, twenty seven
Speaker 3: to twenty eight, five hundred and seventy billion, twenty eight
Speaker 3: twenty nine, three hundred and five point three five billion,
Speaker 3: nearly one hundred and eight billion dollars more in income
Speaker 3: tax receipts over the next four years. This has become
Speaker 3: the dirty secret of successive federal governments. Inflation and pay
Speaker 3: rises naturally increase wages, but the tax rates don't move
Speaker 3: so proportionately, you end up paying more income tax without
Speaker 3: the government effectively raising taxes. Let's not forget that sham
Speaker 3: tax cut that Doctor Chalmers announced in the budget before
Speaker 3: the election that the lowest tax bracket of sixteen percent
Speaker 3: would drop to fifteen percent on July one next year
Speaker 3: and fourteen percent in twenty twenty seven. Now, that's meant
Speaker 3: to cut two hundred and sixty eight dollars from your
Speaker 3: tax in twenty twenty six twenty seven, which has equal
Speaker 3: to about five dollars a week a cup of coffee
Speaker 3: if you're lucky, and that's meant to increase to five
Speaker 3: one hundred and thirty six dollars in twenty seven twenty eight. Now,
Speaker 3: the most recent data collected by the Australian Bureau of
Speaker 3: Statistics from August last year put median weekly earnings at
Speaker 3: one thousand, three hundred and ninety six dollars. So that
Speaker 3: comes to seventy two thousand, five hundred and ninety two
Speaker 3: dollars a year. And if you received a pay rise
Speaker 3: of three percent this year, which is in line with
Speaker 3: the budget's forecast for the wage price index this financial year,
Speaker 3: that of course ends tomorrow, you'd now be earning seventy
Speaker 3: four thousand, seven hundred and eighty dollars, on which you'd
Speaker 3: pay fourteen thousand, seven hundred and eighteen bucks of tax.
Speaker 3: Wages are predicted to rise by three and a quarter
Speaker 3: percent next financial year, so that to take the median
Speaker 3: tick over seventy seven thousand, on which they'd pay fifteen
Speaker 3: and a half thousand dollars in tax. And in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty six to twenty seven that financial year, which is
Speaker 3: when you get that first tax cut, wages a fore
Speaker 3: cast to go up another three and a quarter percent,
Speaker 3: which will put the median wage annually at seventy nine thousand,
Speaker 3: seven hundred and fifteen dollars. Now, under the current tax regime,
Speaker 3: you'd pay sixteen thousand, two hundred and ninety seven in tax.
Speaker 3: Doctor Chalmers nice man that he is well not two
Speaker 3: hundred and sixty eight bucks off that, So that brings
Speaker 3: it to sixteen thousand and twenty nine dollars. So, despite
Speaker 3: being told you'll get a two hundred and sixty eight
Speaker 3: dollars tax cut tax cut, the average Australian will actually
Speaker 3: be paying one thousand, three hundred and eleven dollars more
Speaker 3: income tax when this alleged tax cut kicks in than
Speaker 3: they are today and that is why they don't want
Speaker 3: to index the increased tax rate on superannuation, because they
Speaker 3: know more and more people will eventually fall into this
Speaker 3: three million dollar category and they will cree more and
Speaker 3: more money off the top until eventually average income earners
Speaker 3: are included. That is the plan. It is part of
Speaker 3: the deal. If it wasn't the plan, that have included
Speaker 3: indexation from the start. I know the Treasury said, oh, well,
Speaker 3: a future government can deal with that in the future.
Speaker 3: They want a future government to deal with it. They
Speaker 3: could do it now, but they choose not to because
Speaker 3: they want the money. So let's hope this isn't the
Speaker 3: last we hear from keeping on this. As I said before,
Speaker 3: he's fired the first shot, but now he has to
Speaker 3: keep up the fight because the only people who can
Speaker 3: possibly convince doctor Chalmers to change course are those in
Speaker 3: the Labor Party itself. That it's nearly two years ago
Speaker 3: that sixty percent of Australians voted no to an Indigenous
Speaker 3: voice to Parliament, but we know states have pressed on
Speaker 3: with their own ideas. South Australia has its own voice.
Speaker 3: Victoria is going to entrine one in law. As we
Speaker 3: found out from the Premier Dissenter Allen today. Now their
Speaker 3: thing will be called the First People's Assembly, which it
Speaker 3: does already exist. It's a private, not for profit company
Speaker 3: that's been around since twenty nineteen that was designed to
Speaker 3: represent Indigenous people in negotiations with the state government over
Speaker 3: a treaty, which is another thing that shouldn't happen. But
Speaker 3: now Allan says this should be a permanent part of
Speaker 3: government in Victoria, and she was asked the obvious today,
Speaker 3: didn't we say no to the boys?
Speaker 4: The key difference to the referendum that was put nationwide
Speaker 4: a couple of years ago is that was changing the constitution.
Speaker 4: This is not changing the Victorian constitution. It's simply taking
Speaker 4: a common sense approach sitting the First People's Assembly, an
Speaker 4: ongoing representative body into our existing parliamentary structures. But the
Speaker 4: significant change is it'll be a body where we will
Speaker 4: be listening taking on their advice.
Speaker 3: It's not in the constitution, therefore its common sense. I'm
Speaker 3: not quite sure I follow. Alan also refused to answer
Speaker 3: questions today about what powers this voice would have, but
Speaker 3: the expectation is that it will be much the same
Speaker 3: as the one in South Australia. Which means it'll be
Speaker 3: able to have a say in all laws and government
Speaker 3: policies that affect Indigenous Victorians. But of course every law
Speaker 3: and every policy affects Indigenous Victorians because.
Speaker 2: All laws affect all people. So that would.
Speaker 3: Effectively give them carte blanche to interfere in absolutely anything
Speaker 3: and everything that it wants to. When they had the
Speaker 3: first election of the first People's Assembly in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 3: which is only open to Aboriginal people, as I'm sure
Speaker 3: you understand, only two thousand people voted. They had another
Speaker 3: election in twenty twenty three, and wow, they managed to
Speaker 3: double the number of voters to four thousand, two hundred.
Speaker 3: That's ten percent of the Aboriginal voting population in Victoria.
Speaker 3: Ninety percent did not vote. And meanwhile, thirty three people
Speaker 3: are put on this body at a minimum of ninety
Speaker 3: six thousand, nine hundred and forty six thousand dollars each
Speaker 3: nearly one hundred thousand dollars each a year, at least.
Speaker 2: For one or two days work a week.
Speaker 3: That's what it said when they sent out the application
Speaker 3: forms for twenty twenty three. And Jacinta Allen wants to
Speaker 3: enshrine this thing in law I mean on a pro
Speaker 3: rata basis. These people, some of them elected on buggrual votes,
Speaker 3: are paid more than an MP. I mean, if they're
Speaker 3: doing one day a week pro rata, they're earning more
Speaker 3: than the premiere. For God's say, gee whiz. This isn't equality,
Speaker 3: this isn't reconciliation. It's division. It's racism. It is a
Speaker 3: separate and well funded class of people. How much money
Speaker 3: do you think flows through to the communities, the people
Speaker 3: who really should have it. But if you're one of
Speaker 3: the privileged thirty three on this body, one hundred k
Speaker 3: a year and they want to enshrine this in law,
Speaker 3: what a joke. For more on Nervous Business with Paul Keating,
Speaker 3: I'm joined now by Sky News host Joe Hildebrand on
Speaker 3: the desk and the Institute of Public Affairs Saxon Davidson.
Speaker 2: Joe, it seems pretty clear that Keating.
Speaker 3: Is not happy with the direction that well we all
Speaker 3: thought he is a great fan. Dr Chalmers is going
Speaker 3: and as I said before, it's the first time he's
Speaker 3: publicly said anything about this.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 6: Look, Paul Keating blowing up is one of the great
Speaker 6: time on a traditions of Australian politics, and people in
Speaker 6: the Labor Party are obviously very used to it. They
Speaker 6: always listen to what he has to say, but they
Speaker 6: also take it with a grain of salt. I actually
Speaker 6: think when Paul Keating and Bill Kelty and people from
Speaker 6: that generation who I do think was the sort of
Speaker 6: greatest generation of Labor Party leaders, I think you do listen,
Speaker 6: and you should listen. I'm surprised that the government is
Speaker 6: being quite so stubborn on this issue. It strikes me
Speaker 6: that this is a policy that you could very easily
Speaker 6: just get rid of all the kinks, blast away all
Speaker 6: the opposition simply by carving out things like the family
Speaker 6: farm or small family businesses if you're investing in your
Speaker 6: own business, and also indexing it. And the Greens have
Speaker 6: actually suggested the Greens want to lower it to two million,
Speaker 6: so we don't do that. They're crazy little trots, but
Speaker 6: they've suggested indexing it as well. And you know, when
Speaker 6: the Greens are kind of being a bit more sensible
Speaker 6: than Dare I say it, I can't say it, but
Speaker 6: you know this is something you know, you shouldn't really
Speaker 6: die in a ditch over. So I think there's a
Speaker 6: bit of sort of there's a bit of pride I
Speaker 6: think the treasurer has where it's sort of, you know,
Speaker 6: doesn't want to compromise. But after pride, as a good
Speaker 6: book says, comes to fall, and.
Speaker 2: Let's not forget sex.
Speaker 3: And that he was Paul Keating basically the last great
Speaker 3: reforming economic treasurer we had in this country, and of
Speaker 3: course the guest he came in under Howard and Alden Costillo,
Speaker 3: but there were significant changes made by Hawk and Keating.
Speaker 3: He understands the superannuation system what it was designed to do,
Speaker 3: because he designed it better than anyone else. If he's
Speaker 3: saying this could potentially destroy superannuation in the long run,
Speaker 3: you think the.
Speaker 2: Labor Party would take some notice. You would absolutely think so.
Speaker 7: And Paul Keating is right to question the nature of
Speaker 7: these changes, particularly because it's unfair to the first real
Speaker 7: beneficiaries of superannuation that you're going to change it in
Speaker 7: this matter, and also unfair to future generations. This change
Speaker 7: basically embeds bracker creep into super in the same way
Speaker 7: that it is embedded into income tax. It's anti aspirational,
Speaker 7: it's against the basic tenants of super that it's supposed
Speaker 7: to benefit you after you retire, not in double basically
Speaker 7: the tax on people over three million dollars. But this will,
Speaker 7: of course, because it's embedding bracker creep, this will own
Speaker 7: increase the tax base of super and unfairly tax future
Speaker 7: generations of Australians.
Speaker 3: Indeed, let's hope Keating doesn't give it up now. It
Speaker 3: was the best story going around last week. This street
Speaker 3: sweeper in Melbourne who successfully challenged his sacking from DARREBN
Speaker 3: Council for objecting to acknowledgment of country for a toolbox meeting.
Speaker 3: For heaven's sake, well, James McPherson, he's filling in on
Speaker 3: Andrew Bolt this week. Of course, my mate from the
Speaker 3: late debate, he tracked him down this evening.
Speaker 2: Take a look.
Speaker 8: I just thought it was overdoing it, like we're at
Speaker 8: a toolbox meeting, no special occasion or anything like that,
Speaker 8: and I just thought it's getting overdone, Like.
Speaker 2: If you gain eight meetins.
Speaker 8: You're probably going to get acknowledgment of the countries.
Speaker 2: And he's right.
Speaker 3: A new IPA survey has found that fifty six percent
Speaker 3: of people think welcomes to country have become divisive. Saxon,
Speaker 3: of course you are at the IPA. You commissioned this
Speaker 3: polling no great surprise.
Speaker 2: I think this result.
Speaker 1: Not at all.
Speaker 7: Australians don't want to be divided by race, and this
Speaker 7: pole just reinforces that belief. We obviously saw that sixty
Speaker 7: percent of Australians rejected the Voice to Parliament in every
Speaker 7: state plus the Northern Territory, and we just saw a
Speaker 7: very similar result with this polling. Fifty six percent of
Speaker 7: Australians believe that that welcome and acknowledgment of countries is divisive,
Speaker 7: because how could.
Speaker 1: It not be.
Speaker 2: You're being welcomed to your own country.
Speaker 7: And I just think that people have just had a
Speaker 7: gutful of this racial divisionness in this country. And I
Speaker 7: think that the states that are continuing to pursue Voice
Speaker 7: to Parliaments like we've just seen in Victoria and that
Speaker 7: we saw with South Australia should stop it because the
Speaker 7: Australians had their say, they don't want this, and it
Speaker 7: should stop immediately.
Speaker 3: I know you and I talked about this last time
Speaker 3: on a Sunday Showdown, Joe, but it's just.
Speaker 2: It's at the point now everyone is sick of it.
Speaker 3: Just wind it back, you use it judiciously where it
Speaker 3: feels a pro pre it and otherwise don't do it.
Speaker 3: People won't complain if they don't feel like what they're
Speaker 3: being like.
Speaker 6: I noticed that Saxon is conveniently ignoring the very strong
Speaker 6: showing the voice Scott in the act and a number
Speaker 6: of teal seats which are suffering from the most tremendously
Speaker 6: acute Indigenous disadvantage in the country. I mean, the poor
Speaker 6: Indigenous community of Double Bay is I mean, you can
Speaker 6: me they're so they're so disadvantaged you can't even see them.
Speaker 6: It's just white people everywhere. I mean, that's that's colonization
Speaker 6: for you, isn't it.
Speaker 3: I did once ride in a column many years ago
Speaker 3: that the closest many of these people who carry on
Speaker 3: about Indigenous afees have ever been to an Aboriginal person
Speaker 3: is being in their beamer and dad.
Speaker 6: And I think that is exactly the point. The point
Speaker 6: is that this has become a sort of performance. I
Speaker 6: don't find it device or offensive or anything like that.
Speaker 6: And perhaps ironically, given what sort of started the latest
Speaker 6: iteration that I think probably a welcome to country on
Speaker 6: Anzac Day is one of the more profound occasions where
Speaker 6: you could do it. But the idea that you somehow
Speaker 6: sort of absolve all your white guilt just by saying
Speaker 6: a few words that you're reading from a bit of
Speaker 6: paper in front of you at the start of every
Speaker 6: HR meeting or every you know, I mean, what does
Speaker 6: that do? I think whenever you're looking at indigenous policy,
Speaker 6: there is a terrible gap that terrible things have been done,
Speaker 6: often unintentionally, but we've got to acknowledge there is a
Speaker 6: massive gap that we've got to fix. And every single
Speaker 6: thing you do in this area, you should just be thinking, right,
Speaker 6: what good.
Speaker 2: Is this going to do?
Speaker 6: What is what problem is this going to fix? How
Speaker 6: is it going to fix it? Anything that doesn't do
Speaker 6: anything is just a waste of time and space.
Speaker 3: I think it probably does as much good as giving
Speaker 3: thirty three people one hundred k each to sit on
Speaker 3: their first people's well Again.
Speaker 6: I think you'll find that these are often the people
Speaker 6: who are the least disadvantage indigenous community.
Speaker 3: The Daily Telegraph had this story today that the only
Speaker 3: money in the New South Wales state budget to combat
Speaker 3: smoking was two point four million dollars for vaping. The
Speaker 3: paper reports that the money quote has been set aside
Speaker 3: this year in the budget to maintain the government's pave
Speaker 3: app platform, designed to help young people quit vaping. I
Speaker 3: didn't know there was such a thing, Joe, you're a
Speaker 3: vapor I'm not sure.
Speaker 6: I'm zero point one percent of Australians who actually purchased
Speaker 6: their legally.
Speaker 2: And that's the real problem, right, you know.
Speaker 3: I'm sure they're with this app for vaping or whatever,
Speaker 3: but you can't tackle the problem for as long as
Speaker 3: the federal government allows legal tobacco to flood into the
Speaker 3: country because their exercis is too high, and they won't
Speaker 3: regulate vapor.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 6: I think you're looking at two labor governments on two
Speaker 6: different sides of the Labor Party. One is more ideologically
Speaker 6: driven and is trying to do the right thing, but
Speaker 6: is actually making the problem worse in pursuing it because
Speaker 6: it is driven by ideology and not by pragmatism. And
Speaker 6: then you've got another in the New South Wales government,
Speaker 6: which is purely practical, which is unclouded by any kind
Speaker 6: of ideology, and they clearly have seen that it's just
Speaker 6: not working and they are just sitting this one out.
Speaker 6: They are just quiet quitting on this one and they've
Speaker 6: just decided they're not going to throw cops at it
Speaker 6: when they could be busting other criminals, and not showing
Speaker 6: to throw millions of dollars when they not won't work.
Speaker 6: But they have to do a kind of, you know,
Speaker 6: a token thing to show they're sort of on board.
Speaker 3: And this is what really annoys me about it, sex
Speaker 3: is that it's not the state's fault that illicit tobacco
Speaker 3: has exploded in this country. It's the fault of the
Speaker 3: federal government who jacked up the excise and refused to
Speaker 3: properly regulate vapes, and then the states are meant to
Speaker 3: clean up the mess for them. I don't think it's
Speaker 3: their job to do so.
Speaker 7: No, you're exactly right, and I agree with Joe that
Speaker 7: the new South Wales labor government is far more practical
Speaker 7: and pragmatic about this issue than the federal government. The
Speaker 7: basic point is is that the onerous taxes, excise taxes
Speaker 7: on cigarettes and the regressive regulations with tobacco and vaping
Speaker 7: in general is causing this black market and this sort
Speaker 7: of organized crime in tobacco markets to flourish. There are
Speaker 7: a lot of parallels with the nineteen twenties probitioning period
Speaker 7: of alcohol where you saw a black market thrive and
Speaker 7: organized crime to flourish, and now you're seeing the same
Speaker 7: in the twenty twenties with tobacco. I mean, it's just
Speaker 7: ridiculous the sort of violent crime you see, particularly here
Speaker 7: in Victoria, regarding tobacconists and vaping and illicit cigarettes. And
Speaker 7: I just think that the federal government needs to take
Speaker 7: a step back, see what's happening, and allow the states
Speaker 7: to function properly with policing.
Speaker 2: And not have to deal with all this crime.
Speaker 3: Ye indeed, very quickly before we move on. China's ambassador
Speaker 3: to Australia has worn camera against boosting defense spending on
Speaker 3: a sourbriet.
Speaker 2: He wrote in the Odds today, good reason to do easily.
Speaker 3: Recently some countries hyped up the circle Gina threat narrative,
Speaker 3: proclaiming to significantly increase diffentsic spendaches and even inside it
Speaker 3: Australia to follows suit I noticed really not thirty seconds.
Speaker 3: So the PM was asked about this today by reporter
Speaker 3: from the Odds about whether it was interference, to which
Speaker 3: the PM said, well didn't you run the column?
Speaker 2: So the PM's editude seems.
Speaker 3: To be will attack the media for reporting what people
Speaker 3: say instead of saying maybe China shouldn't be tell like,
Speaker 3: I think the PE is.
Speaker 6: Having a bit of fun enough, and when you see
Speaker 6: these kind of supposed barbes, there's always a little smile
Speaker 6: on his face. But I don't think the PM will
Speaker 6: be instructed by China or the US on how much
Speaker 6: it spends on defense, at least not publicly. And I
Speaker 6: think that it will quietly follow the US's lead far
Speaker 6: more than it follows China's.
Speaker 3: Well, let's hope they do so. Joe Saxon, thank you
Speaker 3: so much for your time to right all right now,
Speaker 3: I'm now. The well known Glassonbury Music Festival was on
Speaker 3: in England over the weekend. I heard Steve Price confirm
Speaker 3: earlier that he's never been. I'm sure it'll be shocked
Speaker 3: to hear that I haven't either, but I don't think
Speaker 3: I'll be rushing there anytime soon After this dross from
Speaker 3: a legit artist Bob Villain, I'm sure you've already seen it,
Speaker 3: but have a.
Speaker 9: Look to the idf idf ID.
Speaker 3: His real name is Pascal Robinson Foster. By the way,
Speaker 3: I guess you can see why changed his stage name,
Speaker 3: but that garbage was broadcast live by the BBC and
Speaker 3: rightly it's been called out by the organizers and British
Speaker 3: Prime Minister Saki Istama. He wrote, there is no excuse
Speaker 3: for this kind of appalling hate speech. The BBC needs
Speaker 3: to explain how these scenes came to be broadcast. Let's
Speaker 3: bring in our Executive Council of Australian Jury CO Chief
Speaker 3: Executive Alex Rivchen. Alex, I mean, of course we've got
Speaker 3: to acknowledge the fact that this was done at a
Speaker 3: music festival, and a music festival was where October seven started.
Speaker 3: I mean, you could fail to be much more offensive
Speaker 3: than this.
Speaker 5: You're right, Caleber. I mean it's incredible the fact that
Speaker 5: these people could have so little historical awareness, so little compassion,
Speaker 5: that at a music festival when, as you said, almost
Speaker 5: four hundred Israelians were butchered dancing at a festival. Now
Speaker 5: they're using their festivals to preach hatred and chant for
Speaker 5: death and it's just extraordinary. It's as though this is
Speaker 5: a has Bala rall in downtown root and on a
Speaker 5: music festival in Somerset. The fact that people would be
Speaker 5: compelled and like sheep go along with these chants by
Speaker 5: these little known artists who are trying to drum up
Speaker 5: attension calling for death to people. But this is what
Speaker 5: happens when you deal with fanatics, and fanatics have a
Speaker 5: characteristic of them that they eventually reveal who they are.
Speaker 5: And this movement, which really swelled post October seven, it
Speaker 5: began by calling for ceasefires as though it wanted peace
Speaker 5: and was anti war. They very quickly dropped that and
Speaker 5: turned to donning their cafirs and chanting for Palestine. Then
Speaker 5: they started cheering on a Ranian rockets and hoodie drones.
Speaker 5: And now they've gone a step even further. Now they're
Speaker 5: openly calling for death. This is what they are and
Speaker 5: it's not merely glassen with the same chant was heard
Speaker 5: on the streets of Melbourne just last night. So this
Speaker 5: is something that's with us in our society and around
Speaker 5: the world, and until we see serious consequences, commercial consequences,
Speaker 5: criminal consequences, this is going to.
Speaker 10: Go on and on and on.
Speaker 3: And this is the thing that I just it to me,
Speaker 3: is that the crowd was just shouting it back, seemingly
Speaker 3: not even thinking about it. I mean, I find it
Speaker 3: hard to believe that you could get such a large
Speaker 3: group of people together who all feel the same way
Speaker 3: about that thing. But like sheep, as you say, in
Speaker 3: that circumstance, they just shout it back as though it
Speaker 3: has no meaning, as though it's just a normal thing
Speaker 3: to say. I mean, do they think it's edgy or
Speaker 3: has it just seeped into the culture now that that
Speaker 3: is an entirely acceptable thing to shout at a music festival.
Speaker 5: Well, look, we know from history that when you have
Speaker 5: a mob, a large group of people, and you kind
Speaker 5: of shed personal responsibility and you take on anonymity and
Speaker 5: you can behave into a different way, you get swept up.
Speaker 5: And even if you don't necessarily hold those views, even
Speaker 5: if you didn't come into that crowd intending to chant
Speaker 5: death towards a group of people, you get swept away.
Speaker 5: And we saw it with Nazis, we saw it with
Speaker 5: you know, clan rallies. It's that same sort of group
Speaker 5: dynamic where people take on the ideology of sometimes a
Speaker 5: small minority people of fanatics, and that's what we're seeing here.
Speaker 5: But whether it's a lot of people that support this
Speaker 5: or a small minority, everyone who stood there waving those
Speaker 5: flags and going along with those chants best personal responsibility.
Speaker 5: We're responsible for own actions that are own conduct. And
Speaker 5: they could have booed, they could have shown displeasure with it,
Speaker 5: but they didn't. They're either silent or they went along
Speaker 5: with it. And I think that reveals something really nasty
Speaker 5: about the crowd there, but also wider society, you know,
Speaker 5: the apathy, the complicity, the moral fold, the unwillingness of
Speaker 5: people to see evil for what it is and to
Speaker 5: stand up to it.
Speaker 3: Indeed, now, of course, after successfully ending the war between
Speaker 3: Israel and Iran, the US prison is now pushing for
Speaker 3: Israel and Hamas to have a Ceasari posted on truth
Speaker 3: Social make the deal in Gaza, get the hostages back,
Speaker 3: and this was him over the weekend saying he thinks
Speaker 3: that a deal could be imminent.
Speaker 11: I think it's close. I spoke with some of the people.
Speaker 11: It's a terrible situation that's going guy. So he's asking
Speaker 11: about and we think within the next week we're going
Speaker 11: to get.
Speaker 3: Us alex wishful thinking or potential reality.
Speaker 5: Look, it's difficult to know. I mean the president has
Speaker 5: said similar things early on, and you know he pledged
Speaker 5: upon taking office to bring the water or close and
Speaker 5: that's been elusive, and he's applied diplomatic pressure. You know,
Speaker 5: as we saw with Iran, he can show us power
Speaker 5: in very extravagant, spectacular ways. But when you're dealing with
Speaker 5: a phote like Hamas, which is you know, psychologically unstable
Speaker 5: in their calculations, which wants death of a life, which
Speaker 5: will yield up its own civilians to pursue its propaganda aims,
Speaker 5: it's difficult to know how they can be compelled to
Speaker 5: actually release the hostage and end this war and surrender
Speaker 5: on conditioning. They're not a conventional fighting force that accepts
Speaker 5: defeat and moves on, so it's difficult to see how
Speaker 5: this plays out. But we know that we've gotten into
Speaker 5: where we've gotten through power and through a demonstration of
Speaker 5: Israeli force, and you know, the attention is shifted somewhat
Speaker 5: from that theater of war. We've been focused on what's
Speaker 5: happening in Iran, But every day Israelis are fighting bravely
Speaker 5: and they're falling in combat. Every day the hostages remain
Speaker 5: in captivity in the most hellish circumstances imaginable, and we
Speaker 5: fight for them and we pray for them, and we
Speaker 5: hope they'll be home soon, and we hope that this
Speaker 5: war does end. But I think it will take the
Speaker 5: complete dismantlement of Hamas to a point where they see
Speaker 5: no way out and will rather accept surrender or exile
Speaker 5: for their leadership. I think that's the only way we'll
Speaker 5: get to a conclusion here.
Speaker 3: Just finally, New South Wales, we will. In p Anthony Roberts,
Speaker 3: his office was vandalized over the weekend. Some pathetic low
Speaker 3: life was seen on CCTV footage allegedly spitting on the
Speaker 3: glass at the front of the office before writing if Israel.
Speaker 2: I mean for goodness?
Speaker 3: So I thought we'd given up on this stuff a
Speaker 3: while ago, but there were still dopes running around doing alex.
Speaker 5: Look. I think pathetic low life is an apt characterization
Speaker 5: of this sort of individual, someone who's so filled with
Speaker 5: hatred and is so petty and looking for their own
Speaker 5: emotional nourishment that they would spit on an electorate office,
Speaker 5: on an inanimate object and vandalize it in this sway.
Speaker 5: But it's criminal conduct. And you know, in this instance,
Speaker 5: I'm less concerned for the Jewish community. We've put up
Speaker 5: with a great deal more than this. We've dealt with
Speaker 5: fire bombings and boycotts and what's happening to our brethren
Speaker 5: in Israel. But I'm concerned more for the state of
Speaker 5: our democracy because this is another act which I think
Speaker 5: dissuades as strange from participating in our democracy and running
Speaker 5: for public office. I mean, who would want to put
Speaker 5: themselves in the firing line of people like that? And
Speaker 5: you know, John Howard once said that politics was the
Speaker 5: only game in town. But I think increasingly people will
Speaker 5: look at this sort of thing and think, you know,
Speaker 5: I'll do something else with my life. But ultimately it's
Speaker 5: our represent democracy that suffers for it.
Speaker 3: Indeed, Alex Trifan, thank you for joining me, and I'll
Speaker 3: give you a tip as well. If you think vandalizing
Speaker 3: MP's office is going to change anything, mate, you are
Speaker 3: so stupid.
Speaker 2: Just give it up.
Speaker 3: Still to come, Labour's renewables plan is looking more and
Speaker 3: more like a pipe dream.
Speaker 2: Who would have thought that anything serious?
Speaker 3: Graham Lloyd will join me later to discuss, but first
Speaker 3: Foreign Minister Penny Wong jets off to Washington for the
Speaker 3: Quad talks. But with the to do list as long
Speaker 3: as the flight itself, will she really be able to
Speaker 3: achieve all that much LNPMP. Garth Hamilton will weigh in.
Speaker 3: Next interesting story in the Career Mail today about a
Speaker 3: teacher at a special school in Redcliffe, north of Brisbane.
Speaker 3: She was on long service leave when Cyclone Alfred hit
Speaker 3: in March, so she wasn't at work, but the school
Speaker 3: ended up being shut for three days and all the
Speaker 3: staff were put on special leave. So she argued that
Speaker 3: she should be given special leave for those three days
Speaker 3: and then given back the long service leaf, but the
Speaker 3: Education Department said no, so she took it to the
Speaker 3: Queensland Industrial Relations Commission and they ruled that she can't
Speaker 3: get her long service leave back basically because she was
Speaker 3: already on leave, which meant she wasn't expected to go
Speaker 3: to work and the only reason her colleagues got special
Speaker 3: leave was because they were otherwise expected to go to work.
Speaker 2: I don't know. To me, that seems a bit unfair.
Speaker 3: Her colleagues were given effectively three extra days off free
Speaker 3: of charge, So it seems a bit petty to me
Speaker 3: for the Education Department not to just give her a
Speaker 3: three days back.
Speaker 2: How hard can it be?
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, Penny Wong is flying to Washington this week to
Speaker 3: meet her counterparts from the US, Japan, and India. This
Speaker 3: meeting could not come at a more pressing time. Albanezy
Speaker 3: courses so far failed to secure a meeting with the
Speaker 3: US president or a tariff exemption, but it also comes
Speaker 3: as Australia refuses to boost defense spending and of course
Speaker 3: was late to support Trump's strikes on Iran. With me
Speaker 3: now as MP Garth, Hamilton Garth, it's going to be
Speaker 3: an interesting week for Penny Wong, particularly being in the same.
Speaker 2: Room as Marco Rubio.
Speaker 3: And in the same room as Marco Rubio, it's about
Speaker 3: the closest we can get at the moment to having
Speaker 3: someone directly ask the administration if we can get a room,
Speaker 3: get in a room, sorry with Donald Trump.
Speaker 2: Surely she's asking that question this week.
Speaker 9: Look, i'd very much hope so, and I can sincerely
Speaker 9: say that's what we need, That's what Australia needs. We're
Speaker 9: going through a period where the US Australian relationship is
Speaker 9: in a period of degradation, and I think this could
Speaker 9: actually come to define mister Alberze's time as our Prime minister.
Speaker 9: We're seeing that relationship slip away. I'm not presumptuous enough
Speaker 9: to give any wrong advice. But if I would, I'd say, look,
Speaker 9: take a leaf out of Bob Hawk's playbook. This was
Speaker 9: a guy who really a labor leader, who really put
Speaker 9: the US relationship first. He was willing to stand up
Speaker 9: against the anti American elements of his own party. Compare
Speaker 9: that unfortunate mister Albanzi on his front bench. He's got
Speaker 9: Don Farrell who was openly questioning whether the US even
Speaker 9: are our best. So I think there's a way that
Speaker 9: labor can do this. Australia needs them to. We really
Speaker 9: do need them to. We're only at the start of
Speaker 9: a three year term goodness with this relationship. Can't afford
Speaker 9: to get any worse than a little tip. I don't
Speaker 9: think mister Trump is for changing. I don't think he
Speaker 9: is in a position where he thinks he needs to
Speaker 9: change anything about how he's engaging with us. We're going
Speaker 9: to have to adapt to that. Penny Wong's got a
Speaker 9: lot on her shoulders right now.
Speaker 3: Indeed, and of course I'm sure there will be talk
Speaker 3: about the decision at NATO last week for every country
Speaker 3: but Spain to increase the defense spending to five percent.
Speaker 3: We've said, we're not interested in even getting to three
Speaker 3: and a half percent. I mean to walk into that
Speaker 3: room at the QUAD. It just makes us look pathetic,
Speaker 3: look sadly.
Speaker 2: I think it does.
Speaker 9: And this is a no brainer. Our closest trusted ally,
Speaker 9: the only country that we can genuinely trust, will stand
Speaker 9: side by side with us should we find ourselves imperilled.
Speaker 9: They're asking us to increase our spending. I don't think
Speaker 9: that's a non reason ask given everyone will say this,
Speaker 9: The Prime Minister himself will say this all the time.
Speaker 9: We're in a period of heightened geopolitical uncertainty. Surely the
Speaker 9: correct response for us, without the US asking us to
Speaker 9: do so, is to increase our defense spending to be ready.
Speaker 9: We've seen the Ukraine gives us an incredible example of
Speaker 9: what's happening in terms of technology change in defense. We've
Speaker 9: gone through a time where we have drone warfare. Now
Speaker 9: we've got anti drone warfare. The world's are changing place
Speaker 9: rapidly in defense. We need to be making those investments
Speaker 9: to make sure that I think we can look our
Speaker 9: allies in the eye and say we're carrying our share.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, I took about meetings of course, as
Speaker 3: I've said, the PM hasn't managed to cop on with Trump.
Speaker 3: But I mean it looks like Albanezi is going to
Speaker 3: meet with the Chinese President, Jijingping next month in Beijing,
Speaker 3: which will be the fourth meeting he's had with Gi.
Speaker 3: And I know he didn't technically choose to meet Gi
Speaker 3: before Trump. But it kind of goes to the point,
Speaker 3: doesn't that our relationship with the United States is nowhere
Speaker 3: near as strong as it should be, and we're certainly
Speaker 3: giving off the overture that we're much closer to China
Speaker 3: than we are to the US will use flash. China
Speaker 3: ain't going to step in and protect us in the conflict,
Speaker 3: but the US will.
Speaker 9: I think there's a very clear perception problem that mister
Speaker 9: Albert Easy is facing. You know, if I'm positive, I
Speaker 9: think it's important we do have a strong relationship with China.
Speaker 9: I always remind people during the Cold War, we continue
Speaker 9: to sell wall to Russia. You know, even in the
Speaker 9: depths of the Cold War, we were reaching out making
Speaker 9: sure that we had that trade established and secured. We've
Speaker 9: got some important trade with China we need to keep
Speaker 9: on the table. That's okay, that's important. The perception at
Speaker 9: the moment, though, is that we're being set aside by
Speaker 9: the US and that we are leaning a little bit
Speaker 9: too closer to China. And when we see the Chinese
Speaker 9: ambassador come out and tell us we shouldn't be increasing
Speaker 9: our defense spending and in that particulicular argument, we're siding
Speaker 9: with China and not the US. Goodness me, it looks bad.
Speaker 9: It looks very, very bad. And I think we need
Speaker 9: to be making a very clear demonstration that we sit
Speaker 9: right beside the US, that they are our ally and
Speaker 9: we do so because that's the right thing for us,
Speaker 9: not because the US are leaning on us, because it's
Speaker 9: our choosing. It's what we want and what we understand
Speaker 9: is best for the Australian nation.
Speaker 3: Well, yes, and we believe in protecting ourselves. You'd think
Speaker 3: that'd be a pretty basic thing, but hard to get
Speaker 3: through their minds, it would seem Garth Hamilton, thank you,
Speaker 3: mate for joining me as always. Coming up after the break,
Speaker 3: jen Z's breathing a sigh of relief after Donald Trump
Speaker 3: announced he's found a buyer for TikTok Kosher Garda will
Speaker 3: clue us in on how he plans to save all
Speaker 3: of that later, and cracks are deepening in the Albanese
Speaker 3: government's green dreams.
Speaker 2: What a surprise.
Speaker 3: The Australian's Environment editor, Graham Lloyd will explain the damage
Speaker 3: that the collapse of yet another hydrogen project will cause next.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 3: Deliberations in Erin Pattison's death kept Mushroom trial began the safteroon.
Speaker 3: I think the whole country will be hanging on for
Speaker 3: this verdict. They put up black bunting around her house
Speaker 3: this afternoon, so.
Speaker 2: We're at the business end now.
Speaker 3: The jurors are basically locked in the court and then
Speaker 3: their hotels for as long as it takes them to
Speaker 3: reach a unanimous decision. Skyne News reporter Georgie Dickerson has
Speaker 3: been following the case in Morwell.
Speaker 2: She filed this for as little earlier Caleb.
Speaker 12: The final twelve jurors has been decided and they are
Speaker 12: the ones that will ultimately decide the fate of Aaron Pattison.
Speaker 12: Now this trial has now entered its tenth week. Ten
Speaker 12: weeks ago. We did start with fifteen jurors and that
Speaker 12: was always going to be brought down to just twelve.
Speaker 12: As for why they do this, they start with a
Speaker 12: larger number in case a jura falls unwell if they
Speaker 12: or if they have to be dismissed from the trial,
Speaker 12: and that happened a few weeks ago. There were allegations
Speaker 12: that one dura had been speaking to family and friends
Speaker 12: about the trial, so they were dismissed. Now today it
Speaker 12: was picked at random. Two men were dismissed, leaving just
Speaker 12: twelve people. This was seven men and five women are
Speaker 12: now the ones that will decide the fate of Aaron Pattison. Now,
Speaker 12: in terms of how they reach this verdict, it must
Speaker 12: be a unanimous verdict. They will deliberate from ten thirty
Speaker 12: am with a break at lunch until four point fifteen
Speaker 12: in the afternoon. But they don't go home. When they
Speaker 12: came into court today they had to bring their luggage
Speaker 12: and each day after court finishes, they go back to
Speaker 12: a hotel in an undisclosed location and that's where they stay.
Speaker 12: They don't have access to any media, Internet or even
Speaker 12: their phones. This is to ensure that a fair trial
Speaker 12: takes place.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 12: In terms of this, they will then come back here
Speaker 12: each day to deliberate. The judges warned and said that
Speaker 12: there are strict conditions in place for these jurors. While
Speaker 12: they can discuss the trial here in court with all
Speaker 12: of the jurors, they aren't to discuss it in small
Speaker 12: groups back at the hotel. Now, in terms of what
Speaker 12: to from here and how long this will take, well,
Speaker 12: it's anyone's guess. It has to be a unanimous verdict.
Speaker 12: They need to take into account the four different charges,
Speaker 12: three counts of murder and one count of attempted murder.
Speaker 12: And so this trial and this jury will then continue
Speaker 12: to deliberate until they come back with that unanimous verdict.
Speaker 12: But Caleb, it has been a long ten weeks for
Speaker 12: these jurors. Fifty three witnesses have been present in this trial,
Speaker 12: and now it's down to the pointy end. We'll all
Speaker 12: be waiting here when we received that message and ultimately
Speaker 12: find out if she is guilty or not guilty in
Speaker 12: this highly anticipated trial here and more.
Speaker 3: Well, ten weeks, it's been a hell of a trial.
Speaker 2: Plenty more to come.
Speaker 3: We will keep you updated, of course, right here on
Speaker 3: Sky News. Now it must be a day ending in
Speaker 3: why the Albinizi government's renewable energy aginder had another major
Speaker 3: reality checked today with the cancelation of the country's biggest
Speaker 3: green hydrogen project that Lee Developer confirmed that it pulled
Speaker 3: out of the twelve and a half billion dollar Central
Speaker 3: Queensland hydrogen project over the weekend, which all guarantees it's dead.
Speaker 3: With me now is the Australians Environment editor Graham Lloyd?
Speaker 3: I mean, Graham always talk of green hydrogen. Even a
Speaker 3: couple of months ago, the Prime Minister was.
Speaker 2: Still talking it up.
Speaker 3: How we were the envy of the world. Have we
Speaker 3: actually got a single one of these projects up?
Speaker 13: Well, all good evening, Caleb, but the short answer is no,
Speaker 13: nothing past a real bench scale testing.
Speaker 1: Same story around the rest of the world.
Speaker 13: And out of a one hundred billion dollar pipeline of
Speaker 13: projects that were going to make us a renewal energy superpower,
Speaker 13: none of them have actually taken flight. So it's a
Speaker 13: big reality check for hydrogen and the failure of this project,
Speaker 13: which is the largest in the country is it's very illustrative.
Speaker 13: It was really going to supply the industrial city of
Speaker 13: Gladstone with renewable hydrogen to keep the industry going.
Speaker 1: Now that's obviously not going to happen.
Speaker 13: So that raises some very awkward questions about the future
Speaker 13: of aluminum smelting and other things in that district.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean it's all over now, baby Blue. But
Speaker 3: when does the government admit it.
Speaker 1: Well, certainly they're slow to call it off.
Speaker 13: The change here has come about because of the election
Speaker 13: of the LNP government in Queensland.
Speaker 1: They had a look at the books.
Speaker 13: It was being sponsored by a state owned electricity company.
Speaker 13: That company needed more money and the state government said no,
Speaker 13: this is a fool's errand and throwing good money after bad.
Speaker 13: So once they pulled out, the overseas back has lost
Speaker 13: confidence as well and it's not going ahead. But we're
Speaker 13: still yet to hear from the federal government that they've
Speaker 13: got a plan B or they even acknowledged that things
Speaker 13: have us die as in fact they.
Speaker 2: Are well there.
Speaker 3: While we're talking about energy, the Energy Minister Chris Bowen
Speaker 3: announced a review into gas market regulations today.
Speaker 10: And today I'm releasing the terms of reference and a
Speaker 10: consultation paper about making sure that Australian government policy holistically
Speaker 10: instead of having three different mechanisms, holistically is looking at
Speaker 10: ensuring the efficient supply of gas to industrial users, to
Speaker 10: domestic users and to the energy system.
Speaker 3: In basic terms, what's in this what will it do.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 13: They're looking now at the supply of gas for the
Speaker 13: domestic market, and it's been like a slow flat freight
Speaker 13: train coming that there's a shortage in the domestic market
Speaker 13: and something needs to be.
Speaker 1: Done about it.
Speaker 13: To a large extent, the government has hid behind the
Speaker 13: hope that our hydrogen fuel will become available and it
Speaker 13: will replace the need for gas.
Speaker 1: But it's now.
Speaker 13: Obvious that's not going to happen, so there needs to
Speaker 13: be an urgent effort to increase the domestic stocks. The
Speaker 13: Energy minister there is saying he's going to have a
Speaker 13: review into all the policy, and the thing that can
Speaker 13: be drawn from it is it's likely that future developments
Speaker 13: will have to contain a domestic reservation, so they will
Speaker 13: have to supply gas to the domestic market.
Speaker 1: But the trick is to get those projects off the ground.
Speaker 3: Indeed, I don't think that's a bad thing necessarily, but
Speaker 3: how many time do we see reviews and nothing happens afterwards?
Speaker 2: Graham, thank you so much for your time. Don't go anywhere.
Speaker 3: We'll turn to the United States to get the latest
Speaker 3: on Trump and his secret TikTok buyer right after this
Speaker 3: quick break. Don't know whether you saw the press conference
Speaker 3: with US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Joint chiefs of
Speaker 3: Staff Chair and General Dan Kaine on Thursday night. We
Speaker 3: took it helived during the late debate. It was pretty
Speaker 3: extraordinary how General kin went through how the bunker busting
Speaker 3: bombs used in around work and how they were developed.
Speaker 2: And Hegseth was seething.
Speaker 3: He was absolutely seething over the leaked report into the
Speaker 3: effectiveness of the strike. He read a bits that were
Speaker 3: published in the media that said it was a low
Speaker 3: confidence report. Let's bring a nawska and use contributor Kosher Garda.
Speaker 3: In response to all of that, Kosher, Donald Trump is
Speaker 3: now saying that if he wants to, he could compel
Speaker 3: the journalists to report it on it to reveal their source.
Speaker 14: Yes, great with you, quieleb. I think it'll be a
Speaker 14: little bit tricky for him to do that because we
Speaker 14: do have the First Amendment in the US, which has
Speaker 14: the strongest protections in the world against the press, even
Speaker 14: press that is adversarial, not always honest. There are trust
Speaker 14: is at an all time law. It is very difficult
Speaker 14: to compel them to reveal their sources. So it may
Speaker 14: just be rhetoric and and bluster from him. However, there
Speaker 14: is value in intimidation and putting pressure on him. More
Speaker 14: likely he's going to probably find success by trying to
Speaker 14: trace the leak or within the government, within the Pentagon
Speaker 14: who did it. This has been a problem. We've seen
Speaker 14: a low level person leak the Dobs decision at the
Speaker 14: Supreme Court, and there have been other leaks. So it
Speaker 14: would actually be good for the country, I think if
Speaker 14: they can snuff out who that is internally within the
Speaker 14: government and make an example so that these types of
Speaker 14: leaks don't keep happening.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know it's the leak's fault, it's not
Speaker 3: the journalist's fault.
Speaker 2: We should note meanwhile, Trump said that he's found a.
Speaker 3: Very wealthy group of people, that's his word, to buy TikTok,
Speaker 3: which would potentially save it from a ban in the
Speaker 3: United States, and he sort of kept putting this ban
Speaker 3: off every ninety days. Do we have any detail about
Speaker 3: who these people are, where they're from, what the deal
Speaker 3: might be.
Speaker 14: Not much, I think classic Trump style. He's dangling it
Speaker 14: out there and saying he'll reveal it in two weeks.
Speaker 14: We do know from the past six months or so,
Speaker 14: there have been a few different very wealthy investors that
Speaker 14: have pressed interest. Kevin O'Leary, who's one of the Sharks
Speaker 14: on the American version of Shark Tank and very successful investor,
Speaker 14: has been putting together a consortium of investors, institutional and
Speaker 14: personal ones, and they've or individual investors and they've been
Speaker 14: the only group that's put out a public offer, So
Speaker 14: it could be them. Others like Elon Musk, Larry Ellison,
Speaker 14: founder of Oracle, Steve Manuchin who worked in the Trump
Speaker 14: administration before as a billionaire. All of them have at
Speaker 14: different points mentioned that it might be them. I think
Speaker 14: the key also is the Chinese Party Communist Party has
Speaker 14: what's called a golden share in TikTok, so they have
Speaker 14: veto rights to block who TikTok decides to divest it to.
Speaker 14: So that's another angle that I think Trump is juggling
Speaker 14: and trying to find a group that can buy this
Speaker 14: at a fair price and also appease changing Ping's golden share,
Speaker 14: and we'll see what happens in a couple of weeks.
Speaker 3: I think it's just a shame that he didn't invoke
Speaker 3: the band at some point and try to force him
Speaker 3: to do things a little earlier.
Speaker 2: Of course, what we're talking about.
Speaker 3: Trump's big beautiful bill made it through the Senate, but
Speaker 3: we know it had its career, including from within the
Speaker 3: Republican Party. One of them we know, of course, is
Speaker 3: he's ex best friend, Trump's expst friend to Elon Musk,
Speaker 3: who went on his platform mix over the weekend and
Speaker 3: said it will destroy millions of jobs in America and
Speaker 3: cause Immitt strategy cam to our country utterly insane and destructive.
Speaker 3: The process, though, by which this thing was passed, was
Speaker 3: creite extraordinary, though kosher it was.
Speaker 14: They're using this reconciliation process, which is the only mechanism,
Speaker 14: and you can't use it too many times. You can
Speaker 14: basically use it once in a term that allows them
Speaker 14: to get it through with just a simple majority fifty
Speaker 14: percent or fifty one percent of the votes, whereas otherwise
Speaker 14: they'd have to meet a sixty percent threshold. And that's
Speaker 14: next time possible, just given how divided the country is
Speaker 14: right now. So it's squeaked by but the skin of
Speaker 14: its teeth, not everything in it is going to make
Speaker 14: everybody happy. Elon Musk's gripe with it is that it
Speaker 14: doesn't cut spending deeply enough. This is true. However, the
Speaker 14: Trump team is prioritizing immigration enforcement over spending cuts. And
Speaker 14: it has the greatest funding for immigration enforcement that's ribbon
Speaker 14: passed by Congress for the wall, for more ICE agents,
Speaker 14: for more deportation related mechanisms and needs that they have.
Speaker 14: So that's what he's prioritizing. And you know it's not
Speaker 14: some spending, but not as much as we would like.
Speaker 14: But you know, life is about trade offs, and that's
Speaker 14: a tradeoff he's made, indeed.
Speaker 3: And it does come with text cats to Koshergata. Thank
Speaker 3: you so much for your time, and that's all we
Speaker 3: have time for tonight. I'll be back here tomorrow at
Speaker 3: eight o'clock, but stay tuned, of course. The Great Man
Speaker 3: Paul Murray in the Man Cave