Queen of Queensland resigns

MILES AHEAD

Outgoing Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has endorsed her deputy, Steven Miles, as her successor, the Brisbane Times ($) reports, after the country’s longest-serving female leader announced her resignation effective Friday, ending nine years at the top. She’d been plagued with ailing popularity in the polls opposite LNP leader David Crisafulli. Here’s what happens now: nominations will open today, with Health Minister Shannon Fentiman (Labor left) and Treasurer Cameron Dick (Labor right) expected to put their hands up. All three are reportedly trying to work out a quick deal, The Australian ($) says, because a contested ballot could mean a months-long vote of members and unions. There’ll also be a byelection in Inala, which Palaszczuk holds by 28.2%.

Palaszczuk announced her resignation yesterday — a Sunday, no less — with no pre-planned media interviews or leaks from her cabinet, which Guardian Australia says was no accident. She was known for surprises — three election wins after being appointed as a seat warmer in 2012 when just seven Labor MPs were in Queensland Parliament. A trailblazer for the gals, she was the first woman to be reelected as leader in 2017 and the first elected from opposition. Former PM Julia Gillard commended her “many achievements” and “resilient leadership”, and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the “vibrant and prosperous setting” of the 2032 Brisbane Olympics would be thanks to her, the Bendigo Advertiser adds.

DECLARING AN INTEREST

Interest will soon be the government’s fastest-growing fiscal problem, our mid-year budget update will show, with payments to overtake the cost of the bloated NDIS. The ABC reports loan repayments will cost the Commonwealth $80 billion over the next 11 years, or about 11.7%, because of high interest rates. But NDIS spending will grow by only 10.1% over a decade, the mid-year budget will continue, not 13.8% as we thought last year. We’ll see the papers on Wednesday, but don’t expect any new spending, Treasurer Jim Chalmers has vowed, as SMH ($) reports — the priority is getting debt down, though there is “room for key investments in housing, in Medicare, in energy, in skills”.

Meanwhile it costs $45,000 excluding university debt to become a radiologist right now, the SMH ($) reports, after the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Radiologists raised the cost of its final trainee exam ($5,718) to $10,200 this year. There’s also a $6,000 “admission to fellowship” fee — it’s mandatory. The college said it was inflation at work, but one trainee pointed out the final exam has moved online, so where is all this money going? This comes as the paramedics’ union rejected an offer of a 19.5% increase in salaries over four years, Sky News Australia reports, with 2,000 paramedics vowing not to renew their registration until a deal is reached. It’s prompted NSW Premier Chris Minns to warn of a “catastrophic” scenario by January 1 where “triple-O will go into meltdown”. Speaking of Sky — Chinese-Australian journalist Cheng Lei has joined Sky News Australia as presenter and columnist after her three-year imprisonment in China for breaking a media embargo by a few minutes.

SORRY STATE OF AFFAIRS

Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil has apologised that alleged crimes had been committed by former stateless detainees who were released after the High Court ruled they couldn’t be in detention forever. Speaking to the Herald Sun ($), she said it was “distressing” to read about the allegations that a woman was allegedly assaulted in Adelaide, adding that she feels “terrible” when anyone is the victim of a crime. It comes after Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus apologised to Sky’s Olivia Caisley for telling her her question asking if he needed to apologise to alleged victims and families was “absurd”. Opposition Leader Peter Dutton told 2GB if it had been a Coalition pollie, the ABC would’ve accused them of “misogynistic” and “mansplaining” and “talking over a female journalist”, The Australian ($) reports. The A-G’s wife of 44 years, Deborah Chemke, died mere weeks ago.

We’re going to halve our net migration in the next two years, the SMH ($) reports, from the record high 510,000 down to 250,000. That’s according to the Albanese government’s new migration strategy. Here’s how: before migrants can enter, they’ll have to both pass a tougher English language test and prove they’re genuinely a student. After they’re in, they won’t be able to stay if they don’t choose jobs that plug our skills shortage (considering 36% of occupations are coming up short right now, that’s a wide remit). O’Neil says if those measures don’t work, she’ll consider higher fees or a cap on students. Guardian Australia continues that the 10-year strategy will also introduce new visas for highly skilled workers who earn more than $135,000 a year, such as in cyber or green technology.

ON A LIGHTER NOTE

Clean dinner dishes were gleaming in the kitchen sink, the tap was dripping from the kids’ showers, and a mother was staring at her six-year-old’s homework in a quiet yet consuming existential crisis. She’d read the question so many times she knew it by heart, while a seemingly endless number of answers flew past in her head like she was perusing some sort of mental teledex. Which word is the odd one out, she read out loud slowly. Is it friend, toothbrush, desk, egg or silver? Explain why. Baffled, she took to a Facebook group called “family lowdown tips & ideas” to access the hive mind.

More than 4,000 people weighed in. Some said egg — it’s the only thing you can eat, and the only one that starts with a vowel. No way, it’s friend, others countered, because it’s the only animate thing among a list of objects. It’s toothbrush, some said, because it’s a compound word, and the only word that doesn’t contain the letter “e”. Silver, more people commented, because it’s an adjective and the rest are nouns. Not so fast, others said — it could be a noun if it referred to the metal silver, rather than the colour. There was an uproar after the mother posted that the teacher had told the class the answer was indeed silver, the only non-noun. Egg voters, we were robbed!

Hoping your mind feels sharp this morning.

SAY WHAT?

This is a misleading and inappropriate use of Margot Robbie’s image. Furthermore, we can confirm that despite making her career in the US, she has not resigned as a member of #MEAAequity — and she is a member of [the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists union]!

Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA)

The West Australian, along with business groups representing BHP and Qantas, were not happy IR laws that’ll give workers more rights passed last Friday. The paper ran a photo of actor Margot Robbie in a bath (in reference to her explainer in film The Big Short) above the headline: “They’re a dud”. A simple google, however, would’ve revealed Robbie is a proud unionist who has appeared in ads for them.

CRIKEY RECAP

The weird silence amid the shrieking of employers as government secures industrial relations bill

BERNARD KEANE

“You can see a recurring theme: costs are going to go up for business, and will therefore push inflation up. But where will those rising costs come from? Unmentioned by any of the employer groups or the Coalition is why, exactly, they’re so convinced that it will push costs up: because the whole point of the bill is to prevent employers from underpaying workers compared with the enterprise agreement applying to the job they’re doing, just by outsourcing to a labour-hire company.

“Rather than impact ‘every worker in Australia’, as the Business Council claims, it will in fact affect around 327,100 people — that’s the total number of labour-hire workers, at June 2023, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). That’s 2.3% of all workers. In fact, it won’t even affect that number, because …”

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THE COMMENTARIAT

With Annastacia Palaszczuk gone, can Labor achieve the unachievable in Queensland? — Paul Williams (The Conversation): “Palaszczuk has already endorsed her deputy (and Left faction leader) Steven Miles as the next premier, despite her factional colleague and treasurer, Cameron Dick, often being touted for succession. Given the Left has controlled the Labor parliamentary party since 2015, Miles will inevitably become premier, although there is emerging caucus support for another Left star, Health Minister Shannon Fentiman. There will, however, be no ballot. Given Queensland Labor rule changes in 2015 — where ballots for leadership contests are shared equally among caucus, rank and file members and trade union representatives — a drawn-out public brawl with a Labor Party in limbo will be avoided at all costs …

“That Miles is poised to take the premiership today is arguably an accident of history. First, it is unusual for Queensland Labor to be dominated by the Left. Second, Miles was promoted to the deputy position in May 2020 only because former deputy premier and Left leader, Jacqui Trad, resigned from cabinet following an investigation by the state’s corruption watchdog. Trad lost her seat to the Greens on LNP preferences in 2020. Miles was not initially well received as deputy premier, with voters anecdotally disliking him, and especially his attempts at the ‘attack dog’ role deputies so often assume.”

What the university presidents got right and wrong about anti-Semitic speech — David French (The New York Times) ($): “First, let’s deal with the law. Harvard, Penn and MIT are each private universities. Unlike public schools, they’re not bound by the First Amendment and they therefore possess enormous freedom to fashion their own custom speech policies. But while they are not bound by law to protect free speech, they are required, as educational institutions that receive federal funds, to protect students against discriminatory harassment, including — in some instances — student-on-student peer harassment …

“As a result, what we’ve seen on campus is a mixture of protected anti-Semitic (as well as anti-Islamic) speech and prohibited harassment. Chanting ‘globalise the intifada’ or ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’ at a public protest is protected speech. Tearing down another person’s posters is not. (My rights to free speech do not include a right to block another person’s speech.) Trapping Jewish students in a library while protesters pound on library doors is not protected speech either.”

HOLD THE FRONT PAGE

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Eora Nation Country (also known as Sydney)

• Federal Education Minister Jason Clare will meet state and territory education ministers to talk about the national school reform agreement.

Yuggera and Turrbal Country (also known as Brisbane)

• Natura Pacific, the Gympie Regional Council, the Queensland government, Kabi Kabi People’s Aboriginal Corporation and local landholders will launch the Back from the Brink film and podcast on the Nangur spiny skink at Enoggera Reservoir’s Walkabout Creek Cafe.