David Van back in a hot seat

UNMARKED VAN

Former Liberal Senator David Van is planning to return to Parliament next week pending a doctor’s approval, causing a seat shuffle in the upper house, the SMH ($) reports. It comes as the Herald-Sun ($) reports a fourth unnamed woman has alleged Van touched her bottom “at least three times on two separate occasions” in 2018 at a Melbourne bar. She alleges a “squeeze and then lingering there afterwards”, calling it “predatory”. Van was thrown out of the Liberals after independent Senator Lidia Thorpe accused him of sexual assault, an allegation that (somewhat unfairly) raised eyebrows until others, including former Liberal senator Amanda Stoker, came forward with their own stories, as the SMH ($) reported. Van denies everything and has so far refused to resign from Parliament even though both Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese agree he should go. He’ll sit next to United Australia Party Senator Ralph Babet, two rows back and across the aisle from Thorpe.

Meanwhile Australia’s former “first bloke” Tim Mathieson, the long-time (now former) partner of former PM Julia Gillard, will plead guilty to sexually touching a woman without her consent, The Australian ($) reports. He and Gillard got together in 2006, but broke up more than a year ago — two weeks before the assault allegedly happened, the paper says. Meanwhile,  2021 Australian of the Year Grace Tame’s push to reform the country’s sexual abuse laws continues as the Northern Territory passed legislation that “criminalised stealthing [removing a condom during sex without consent], removed the ability for child sex offenders to rely on good character references during sentencing, and introduced a new offence of grooming a child”, the NT News ($) reports. It also changed its criminal code lingo so “sexual relationship with child” became “repeated sexual abuse”. The conviction rate for child sexual abuse is an “incredibly low” 0.3%, Tame says, and this reform has the power to change that.

HOME ADVANTAGE

Two mentions of Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews were cut from the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission’s (IBAC) latest report that delved into political donors and lobbyists buying their way to senior politicians, The Australian ($) says. It compared the draft and final reports and found the bit about Andrews’ secret evidence was “watered down” — but IBAC says it just wanted it to pertain to other senior members of government too. It comes as Victoria is set to revamp its planning and housing policy, The Age ($) reports, after the watchdog found property developer John Woodman paid about $1.2 million to former Casey Council mayors and Liberal Party members Sam Aziz and Geoff Ablett in a bid to sway planning decisions. IBAC found the cash came in suitcases and shopping bags — we’re moving on up from brown paper bags, at least. IBAC recommended the state government strip some planning powers from councils, raise tax on windfall from land use changes, and tighten donation and lobbying laws.

Speaking of housing — Labor’s $10 billion housing bill will go before Parliament again next week, the AFR ($) reports, after being knocked back in the upper house by the Greens and the Coalition last month. It’s likely to sail through a vote in the Labor-strong lower house in October before going before the Senate — more than three months will have passed since June, as the ABC reports, so a double-dissolution trigger will appear before Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s eyes if the Greens dig their heels in again. Would the PM really put every seat in the House and Senate up for election? It’ll be right after the Voice referendum, so he may choose to ride the high of a Yes result all the way to the polls in a bid to snatch Labor some extra seats. If the referendum is a No, however…

HEY BIG SPENDERS

Taxpayer spending on government contractors such as PwC has surged five-fold in less than 10 years, a report has found via The Australian ($), from $33 billion to a whopping $190 billion. The e61 Institute also found political donors got $5 million more in government contracts than non-donors. Political donors made up only 2% of contractors, but they raked in 8% of the total the government spent in 2022. It’s mostly the top end of town that benefits (a tale as old as time), with 80% of the spending going to the firms making more than $100 million a year. That was up from 65% in 2014. PwC is also making headlines after the Australia Institute’s Rod Campbell reports via Michael West Media that PwC supported the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility (NAIF) in the development of its risk management framework around the time NAIF had reportedly given “conditional approval” of a $1 billion loan to Adani… while PwC was also working for Adani.

Speaking of the big four — 15% of current and former female employees at consultant giant EY say they were sexually harassed, according to a new report from former sex discrimination commissioner Elizabeth Broderick that the SMH ($) reports on. Nearly one in five women (17%) reported bullying — nearly the same number of ethically Indian (16%) and Chinese (15%) staff reported racism. In addition, two in five told Broderick they were thinking about quitting — many of the 4500 surveyed said they worked 51 or more hours a week, The Australian ($) added. EY calls the findings “distressing and completely unacceptable” but says it’s not like people expect it to be a 9 to 5 job. Dismal. Just a Friday reminder that a job will put you in the grave if you let it, and then replace you before your funeral.

ON A LIGHTER NOTE

Diver Jayde Theodore was bobbing away on his boat off the coast of Batemans Bay when he noticed a silky black head pop up amid the seemingly endless ocean. Staring incredulously at the now vacated spot, he realised he’d just seen an orca — the first in the more than two decades the guy had spent at sea. Magical, Theodore thought. “I’ve never been lucky enough to spot an orca,” he tells the ABC. Still basking in the moment, suddenly the water around him was alive with action — it was a large pod of them, as many as 100, he says, and they were looking to show off.

The orcas started jumping and diving all around him as he watched on in awe. It was a “once-in-a-lifetime experience. It’ll probably never happen again.” He swiped his camera on his phone and recorded the sight, but there was nothing like the real thing. “There’s three, four, five other patches all around you doing similar stuff, plus all the ones under the water,” he says. It went on for about an hour, with some killer whales exposing their bellies like sea dogs angling for a scritch. Then they’d eyeball him, Theodore says — like Rusty’s “Are you not entertained?” I imagine. Orca expert Bec Wellard says they were Antarctic type C killer whales because of the white patch near the eye, no doubt up in warmer waters for a “day spa”. Theodore was incredibly lucky, she says happily.

Hoping something blows you away today, and that you have a restful weekend.

SAY WHAT?

The credibility of [Australia’s carbon] markets is brittle. We can’t offset our way to 2 degrees.

Andrew Campbell

Like throwing your coffee cup on the ground while donating a dollar to a dubious charity, a top Canberra bureaucrat says our reliance on carbon credits is not going to save us from a climate disaster. Campbell is the departing chief of the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.

CRIKEY RECAP

Peter Dutton’s Game of Thrones moment as rivals gather to take out Sussan Ley

ANTON NILSSON

“Ley says she has Dutton’s support, and Crikey understands she is right about that. It appears most Liberals are happy with the deal hammered out after the election that put the conservative Queenslander Dutton in the opposition leader’s job; Ley, a centre-right-winger from NSW, as his deputy; and Simon Birmingham, a moderate South Australian, as Senate leader. The set-up ensures a certain factional and geographical balance.

“But the challenge in Farrer throws uncertainty into the mix, and some Liberals who’ve spoken to Crikey see both opportunities and risks for Dutton. Should the challenge by conservative ex-NSW Liberal executive member and schoolteacher Jean Haynes be successful — and it appears she has gathered impressive numbers among local Liberals voting in the preselection — Dutton could go down the same route as former PM Scott Morrison did and intervene to save Ley.”

READ ALL ABOUT IT

July 2023 set to to be the hottest month ever recorded, climate scientists say (euronews)

Who is Omar Tchiani, the suspected brain behind Niger coup? (Al Jazeera)

[NZ] PM Chris Hipkins responds to Nicola Willis claims govt planning to remove GST from fruit, vegetables (NZ Herald)

Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints (Reuters)

Brazil: descendants of Africans who escaped slavery gain census recognition (The Guardian)

US economic growth accelerates [by 2.4%], defying slowdown expectations (The Wall Street Journal) ($)

THE COMMENTARIAT

Scoffing at the Commonwealth is easier when you live in a rich, white nation — Waleed Aly (The Age) ($): “It fundamentally mischaracterises what the Commonwealth is, and who it should benefit. It simply assumes that because its membership is built on a shared history within the British empire, it must be a mere extension of imperial domination. The more plausible interpretation is that the Commonwealth was always about the very opposite of this: moving on from imperial control. The idea emerged in the 19th century as some British colonies — especially places like Canada and Australia — became increasingly independent. The ‘Commonwealth of Nations’ concept was meant to capture Britain’s declining sovereignty over such places …

“Who cares about this? Not Australians, Canadians or Brits. Indeed, a 2009 survey found UK citizens to be the least supportive of the Commonwealth. Support was twice as high in less wealthy countries like Malaysia, South Africa and India. And that’s significant when you consider that the Commonwealth is made up of mostly developing countries. Of its 56 members, 21 are in Africa. A whopping 33 are ‘small states’, such as islands in the Caribbean and the Pacific. That makes it the only major world forum in which small states are the majority. These nations face unique disadvantages that come from being small, isolated, and often without valuable natural resources. They are particularly economically and environmentally vulnerable.”

Even in the heat of war, there must be dialogue. To save lives, a new grain deal with Putin must be struck — Simon Jenkins (The Guardian): “The recent collapse of the Russia-Ukraine grain deal spells disaster for millions. The year-old deal has allowed 1000 ships to export food products from Ukraine by sea, including 80% of the grain going to the World Food Program. The biggest recipients of Ukrainian grain have been China, Spain, Turkey and Italy, but 57% of it went to 14 countries currently defined as most threatened with starvation, including Afghanistan, Sudan, Yemen and the war-hit Horn of Africa. Russia has stopped Ukraine’s food exports through the Black Sea, citing multitudinous western sanctions imposed on its own trade …

“I have asked for, but failed in all attempts to find, evidence that the UK government — or, I assume, any Western government — did any forecast of the consequences of sanctions before imposing them. Elementary economics should have predicted that Russia’s huge dollar reserves, reputedly about $650 billion, would protect its economy from severe damage. Predictable too was the impact of retaliatory sanctions on European energy and food prices. Was this never discussed? It would have been far better to concentrate all resources on aiding Ukraine on the battlefield.”

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Yuggera and Turrbal Country (also known as Brisbane)

• Author Angela O’Keeffe will talk about her new book, The Sitter, at Avid Reader bookshop.

• Defence Minister Richard Marles and Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong will meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin for AUSMIN talks.