COLLISS PARRETT begs to disagree with political columnist Michael Moore when it comes to drugs…
I STRONGLY disagree with Michael Moore’s comments (“Finally, injecting some sense into drug policy”, CN April 29).
On the one hand, he says: “The ACT is leading the nation with drug and alcohol policies.”
A little further on, he writes that there is significant risk of further delay saying, as the minister pointed out a month ago, “additional scoping will be required before a decision is made on whether to proceed on a drug-consumption room in the ACT including community consultation, an assessment of the existing legislative framework and further development of an appropriate model”.
Port of Darwin Lease to Chinese Company ‘Unfathomable’: Sen. Abetz
Liberal Senator Eric Abetz has welcomed a review into the Port of Darwin’s 99-year lease to a company with strong ties to Beijing and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), saying it was a “serious mistake that must be rectified.”
This comes amid tense relations between Canberra and Beijing, which sharply declined after Australia called for an inquiry into the origins of COVID-19 and implemented measures to protect its national interests, including reviewing the port lease. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks to the media during a press conference following a national cabinet meeting at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on April 22, 2021. (AAP Image/Lukas Coch)
(Image: Tom Red/Private Media)
Scott Morrison’s address to the Australian Christian Churches (ACC) gathering on the Gold Coast last week began with a roll call of Christian influence on the government. The words were music to the ears of an adoring audience of Pentecostal Christians lapping up the proof of how far they’d come with one of their own in the highest political office in the land.
“Brother Stewie,” the prime minister said, name-checking Employment Minister Stuart Robert, a fellow Pentecostal. Robert has recently been promoted to the government’s powerful Expenditure Review Committee.
Then there was “brother Matt”, who’d “recently joined us”. This was West Australian Liberal Matt O’Sullivan, elected to the Senate in 2019, who graduated into politics via billionaire Christian businessman Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest’s Minderoo Foundation. In his brief time in Parliament, O’Sullivan has already distinguished himself as a defender of the governmen
Termination of Victoria’s Belt and Road Deal Affirms Australia’s Soveriegnty
Federal and state politicians from around Australia have welcomed the federal government’s termination of Victoria’s Belt and Road deal, calling it a step in the right direction.
Federal Liberal Senator Eric Abetz, from Tasmania, welcomed the decision telling The Epoch Times that it has given Australia back its sovereignty over its ability regulate its national interests.
“As we’ve seen with Belt and Road initiatives in every other country of the world, it has never been within the interests of that country and has only been in the interests of the Chinese dictatorship,” Abetz said. “And that is why it was right and proper for the former agreement with the Victorian Labour government to be terminated.”
(Image: Private Media)
The small polity of Tasmania has always been a knot of contradictions. A week out from the state election, in which the Liberal Party are seeking a third consecutive term for the first time in the state’s history, this holds.
Both Premier Peter Gutwein and Labor leader Rebecca White have pledged they will not lead a minority government. But for several reasons, this may well be the reality one of them faces after May 1.
There’s Tasmania’s Hare-Clark voting system which divides the state into five electoral divisions that each return five members through proportional representation and is primarily good for generating a “confused? Let me explain” style explainer every few years.