Australia shouldn’t ‘muzzle ourselves’ over fear of offending Trump’s ‘huge ego’, says Turnbull
Dan Jervis-Bardy
Malcolm Turnbull says Australia should be “free to speak the truth” about Donald Trump, rubbishing suggestions it was unwise to criticise the US president as the Albanese government attempts to secure an 11th-hour exemption to steel and aluminium tariffs.
The former Liberal prime minister clashed with ABC RN Breakfast host Sally Sara on Tuesday morning as he defended speaking out against Trump in the latest clash between the pair.
Trump had described Turnbull as a “weak and ineffective leader” who never understood China in a social media post that appeared to be in response to an interview Turnbull conducted with Bloomberg, in which he suggested the US president’s chaotic leadership would benefit Beijing.
After doubling down on his comments in an interview with ABC 7.30 on Monday night, Sara asked Turnbull if it was “reckless” to criticise Trump as the tariff threat hangs over Australia.
In response, Turnbull said:
Are you suggesting that we should engage in self-censorship in Australia for fear of offending the huge ego of Donald Trump?
Is that really the state that we’ve got to? Surely we should be free to speak the truth. Or are we going to muzzle ourselves for fear of offending Mr Trump?”
Turnbull said despite the best efforts of Anthony Albanese and Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, the prospects of the government securing a carve out to the tariffs were “very, very low”.
Photograph: REX/Shutterstock
Key events
Video: ‘Fake terrorism plot’ designed to create fear, say police
Federal police say a caravan with explosives found in Sydney earlier this year was “never going to cause a mass casualty event” and was a “fake terrorism plot”.
The federal police deputy commissioner, Krissy Barrett, told reporters investigators now believed the caravan incident was concocted by criminals who wanted to cause fear for personal benefit.
Watch the video here:
Emergency teams conduct rapid damage assessments in cyclone-affected NSW regions
There are 50 multiagency teams conducting rapid damage assessments in the aftermath of evacuation warnings in NSW regions affected by ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred.
Jihad Dib, NSW minister for emergency services, spoke a short while ago:
Fifty multiagency teams up and down the coast … are doing rapid assessments of damage to all of the places where we did have different warnings in place. What that means is the teams are made up from volunteers and members of all the different agencies and they literally go from place to place to place making sure that it’s safe to return home.
There are no more emergency warnings that are in place at the moment for evacuation.
NSW will demolish flood-prone houses it reclaimed in Lismore after squatters put emergency workers in danger, says Minns
Minns said the NSW government and Reconstruction Authority will work to demolish properties previously reclaimed by the state government in Lismore’s flood-prone areas due to squatters “still in danger”:
I want to speak a little bit now, about our concern when it comes to squatters in the Northern Rivers moving into properties that have been reclaimed by the New South Wales government. The government has spent $900 million of taxpayer funds to remove people from very flood-prone areas of the Lismore region. These are flood-prone, low-lying areas where the household elected to move out, to move to higher ground, and the house would effectively be condemned so as that the community could be safe and that we could reduce the exposure of affected communities and families in the event of a natural disaster.
I wasn’t aware that we were currently in court trying to execute eviction notices on some members of those communities when Tropical Cyclone Alfred emerged in the last week. This is a completely unacceptable set of circumstances. It’s not tolerable to have so many people located in flood-prone land, still in danger, and have SES personnel, volunteers, have to go and check on those households, check on those communities, to keep them safe. We bought those houses so that we could keep communities safe so that no-one would live there. And to have squatters move in off the back of that is completely unacceptable. So, I’ve made a decision in conjunction with the Reconstruction Authority that we’re going to demolish those houses.
Minns announces personal hardship grants for cyclone-affected areas in NSW
NSW premier Chris Minns has announced a personal hardship grant worth $180 for individuals and up to $900 for families for residents who had to evacuate or had their electricity cut for 48 hours amid ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred.
Minns, joined by other authorities, is speaking live:
The New South Wales government, in conjunction with the Commonwealth government, has also announced a funding package of emergency financial assistance of $180 for individuals up to $900 for families who need to cover essential costs such as food, clothing, medicines emergency accommodation over the past week.
The personal hardship assistance grants is for those individual, and it’s aimed to help them get back on their feet and recover. It will apply to communities that were subject to an evacuation order or had their electricity cut off for a period of 48 hours.
‘We won’t be intimidated’ from supporting peace in Ukraine, Wong’s spokeperson tells Russia after warning
A spokesperson for the foreign minister, Penny Wong, has responded to the Russian Embassy warning of “grave consequences” should Australia deploy troops to Ukraine as part of an international peacekeeping operation.
In a statement, first provided to the Sydney Morning Herald, the Russian embassy in Australia said joining the coalition “would entail grave consequences” for Australia:
Russia has repeatedly made it clear that foreign military presence in Ukraine is totally unacceptable. Therefore, the idea of deploying Western military contingents in Ukraine under the guise of peacekeepers is meant to undermine peace efforts. Canberra remains firmly on the side of war along with those in Europe who are betting on continuing and escalating the conflict despite encouraging shifts towards peace negotiations.
For Australia, joining the so-called coalition of the willing would entail grave consequences. Once again, western boots on the ground are unacceptable for Russia, and we will not remain passive observers.
Wong’s spokesperson reiterated that if Australia receives a request to support a peacekeeping mission, “we’ll consider it”:
Australia has a proud tradition of supporting peace through eighty years of contributions to international peacekeeping missions.
Such a mission does not yet exist in Ukraine, where Russia continues its brutal and unjustified war.
Australia has said that if we receive a request to support a peacekeeping mission, we’ll consider it.
Our message to Russia is: end your illegal invasion of Ukraine. We won’t be intimidated from working towards a just peace for the people of Ukraine.
Read more from Henry Belot here:
Australia shouldn’t ‘muzzle ourselves’ over fear of offending Trump’s ‘huge ego’, says Turnbull
Dan Jervis-Bardy
Malcolm Turnbull says Australia should be “free to speak the truth” about Donald Trump, rubbishing suggestions it was unwise to criticise the US president as the Albanese government attempts to secure an 11th-hour exemption to steel and aluminium tariffs.
The former Liberal prime minister clashed with ABC RN Breakfast host Sally Sara on Tuesday morning as he defended speaking out against Trump in the latest clash between the pair.
Trump had described Turnbull as a “weak and ineffective leader” who never understood China in a social media post that appeared to be in response to an interview Turnbull conducted with Bloomberg, in which he suggested the US president’s chaotic leadership would benefit Beijing.
After doubling down on his comments in an interview with ABC 7.30 on Monday night, Sara asked Turnbull if it was “reckless” to criticise Trump as the tariff threat hangs over Australia.
In response, Turnbull said:
Are you suggesting that we should engage in self-censorship in Australia for fear of offending the huge ego of Donald Trump?
Is that really the state that we’ve got to? Surely we should be free to speak the truth. Or are we going to muzzle ourselves for fear of offending Mr Trump?”
Turnbull said despite the best efforts of Anthony Albanese and Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, the prospects of the government securing a carve out to the tariffs were “very, very low”.
Photograph: REX/Shutterstock
Alfred’s economic impact will be ‘significant’, says Crisafulli
The Queensland premier’s earlier update on ABC News Breakfast continued:
We have to do beach restoration on the coast. We have to make sure, in the north of the state, that we get our agricultural producers back on their feet.
The challenges that Mother Nature can throw at you are vast, but you have to respond. And you have to then make sure that, as you recover, you do it in a way that can build a little bit more resilience into your infrastructure and that people can just go about their lives.
Alfred recovery a ‘big task’, Crisafulli says
The SES had 3,500 jobs in 24 hours on Sunday – “the most ever recorded,” the Queensland premier says.
One thousand SES volunteers are on the ground today, with another 100 flying in from interstate. Meanwhile, 2,000 Energex and Ergon staff are also working to recover power.
This is going to be a big task. And at the other end of the state, we’re still picking up the pieces from the flood in north and far north Queensland a month ago. I’s big effort.
118,000 Queensland homes without power as river levels ease, says premier
While Queensland river levels are easing, the region is still working to recover 118,000 homes without power after ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred.
Premier David Crisafulli gave an update on ABC News Breakfast earlier this morning:
Rivers are starting to come off the major levels and starting to fall down. Those that did reach the emergency alerts are in the process of being withdrawn. So, we do wake to good news. But … there’s still a lot of people who’ve got damaged homes. There’s still 118,000 homes without power. And we’ve got a state that’s got a lot of work to do.
We will make sure that we move from response to recovery, and we move there quickly. We have to make sure that every single person is given the opportunity to get life back to normal, and that work is certainly underway.
Across south-east QLD and northern NSW, 125,000 homes were without power at 6am.
Discovery of fake terror plot doesn’t undo Jewish community’s fear, says Burke
Burke says the discovery of the plot does not undo fear felt by the Jewish community. He said on ABC Radio National:
If there’s a chance of graffiti or of firebombing or whatever threat there might [be] to cause fear coming from organised crime, or coming from people who are motivated by antisemitism and hatred, then an individual will receive it the same way … It’ll take a bit of processing, but it doesn’t undo the the fear and the concern that people have.
Muslim community faced suspicion and blame due to fake caravan terror plot, says Burke
Burke says the “fake” caravan plot saw suspicion and blame of the Muslim community become “well and truly part of the public narrative”.
The home affairs minister and member for Watson was speaking on ABC Radio National a short while ago:
I don’t think there’s any doubt whatsoever, and the Australian Federal Police referred to this in this statement yesterday, about communities receiving blame … You only have to look at the combination of what was said on radio at the time, what was said on social media, the blaming and the suspicion of the Muslim community throughout those attacks is something that was well and truly part of the public narrative.
Because of my role in social cohesion, and obviously also because of the part of Sydney that I represent, I know exactly the backlash that the community was receiving.
Organised crime ‘may as well have written Peter Dutton’s words’ on fake terror plot, says Burke
Tony Burke says the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, played into the hands of organised crime by not getting briefed by police before making multiple public statements about a sequence of apparently antisemitic attacks.
“The script that Peter Dutton was running was exactly what organised crime wanted the narrative to be,” the home affairs minister says.
Burke was speaking on ABC Radio National a short while ago after federal police yesterday revealed a caravan with explosives found in Sydney earlier this year was a “fake terrorism plot”.
He was continuing his attack on Dutton that began yesterday, after the police revealed the plot, when he said Dutton had been “conned”.
This morning Burke said:
The view of the police, as they made public yesterday, developed. [But] Peter Dutton continued along this line while the government was saying, get a briefing, while the government was reminding him, and reminding him publicly, that he had not yet taken a briefing.
The script that Peter Dutton was running was exactly what organised crime wanted the narrative to be. They may as well have written Peter Dutton’s words for him. That is the definition of recklessness.
To simply take a briefing and to listen to the advice that ASIO had given publicly about lowering the temperature would have resulted in very different behaviour, and behaviour that did not suit the narrative of organised crime.
One day in the parliament, he made the assertion that we were dealing with a planned mass casualty attack four times in less than an hour … [but] the investigation [had discovered this] was entirely untrue, and we continued to remind him that he had not yet sought a briefing.
Nuclear energy like ‘building a Blockbuster video’ store in the age of Netflix, says Kean
Matt Kean, former NSW minister for energy, likened building nuclear power plants in 2025 to opening a Blockbuster store “when Netflix is already here” on Q+A last night.
He was responding to policy strategist Parnell Palme McGuinness, who was urging a start to nuclear “right away” for “prosperity long-term”.
Kean said:
We’re not starting 20 years ago, we’re talking about today, and people talking about building nuclear today are the same people that are … arguing that we should be building a Blockbuster video complex when Netflix is already here.
There’s new technology which looks like wind, solar and storage … We need more energy, I agree with you, energy to the system grows our economy and under the frontier modelling it will have 40% less energy than alternative and that will mean a massive hit to our economy. Under the frontier economics modelling, there’s a $300m smaller economy for Australia, that’s the reality.
