Australia news LIVE: Real wages not expected to rise until later this decade; Labor’s climate bill negotiations continue
Key posts
- Liberal MPs oppose Voice to parliament over lack of detail
- Inflation to erode real wages until 2024
- Greens elders say emission targets not as important as coal exports
- This morning’s headlines at a glance
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Liberal MPs oppose Voice to parliament over lack of detail
A growing rebellion in Liberal Party ranks threatens the federal government’s push for bipartisan consensus on enshrining the Indigenous Voice to parliament in the constitution.
The fierce opposition of new Liberal senator Jacinta Nampijinja Price to a Voice to parliament has prompted three senior Liberals to express grave concerns about the proposal to hold a referendum, which was a key Labor election promise.
Liberal Senator Jacinta Price shortly after delivering her maiden speech.Credit:James Brickwood
The division in Coalition ranks comes as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is due to deliver a major speech at the Garma Indigenous cultural festival in the Northern Territory on Saturday to outline details of Labor’s referendum plans.
The 2017 Uluru Statement of the Heart, which has been endorsed by hundreds of Indigenous leaders, calls for the creation of an Indigenous Voice to parliament, that would provide advice on laws and policies that affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.
More on this issue here.
Inflation to erode real wages until 2024
Australians’ real wages will not return to pre-pandemic levels until the second half of this decade as the federal government reveals a further lift in inflation that will eat into household buying power.
New forecasts revealed in parliament yesterday by Treasurer Jim Chalmers show the government will struggle to deliver its pre-election promise to lift wages as inflation out-paces wages until at least 2024.
But the federal budget is poised to improve, thanks to low unemployment and high commodity prices, even as the government confronts extra costs of at least $30 billion over the next three years.
Read the full story here.
Greens elders say emission targets not as important as coal exports
Australian Greens elders Bob Brown and Christine Milne have dismissed negotiations between current leader Adam Bandt and Labor over a minimum 43 per cent reduction in emissions by 2030 as little more than “symbolic”.
Brown, the founding leader of the Australian Greens, and Milne, his successor, said the real and bigger problem is the federal government’s insistence on retaining coal and gas exports as essential to the Australian economy.
Former Greens leader Bob Brown with his successor, Christine Milne, pictured here in 2012. Credit:The Age and Sydney Morning Herald
However, Brown offered no criticism of the likelihood that the Greens will accept the 43 per cent figure – despite Bandt’s earlier calls for a 75 per cent cut by 2030 and net zero by 2035.
The Greens have been under pressure to pass the Albanese government’s climate bill. That’s in part because in 2009, when the party was helmed by Brown, it voted twice with the Coalition to defeat then prime minister Kevin Rudd’s carbon pollution reduction scheme, citing its lack of ambition.
Former prime minister Julia Gillard’s carbon price, subsequently legislated, survived less than three years.
Read the full story here.
This morning’s headlines at a glance
Good morning and thanks for your company.
It’s Friday, July 29. I’m Broede Carmody and I’ll be anchoring our live coverage for the first half of the day.
Here’s what you need to know before we get started.
- The founder of the Australian Greens, Bob Brown, says coal and gas exports are a bigger problem than coal and gas exports. As regular readers of this blog will know, Labor and the Greens are locked in negotiations over the government’s signature climate policy. Tony Wright has the full story.
- James Massola and Lisa Visentin write that senior Liberals are digging in over their opposition to an Indigenous Voice to parliament following Jacinta Nampijinja Price’s maiden speech. Members of the opposition say the major reform, which Labor wants to put to a referendum, lacks enough detail.
- And Australians’ real wages aren’t expected to rise until the second half of this decade. That’s due to inflation. Shane Wright and Rachel Clun have more detail here.
- And in international news, the Commonwealth Games have kicked-off in Birmingham. And the United States economy has shrunk for the second straight quarter.
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