Australian Politics

(The article isn't that long, but its content is hard to summarize without significant information loss.)

Temporary migration has jumped sharply over the past year — largely driven by foreign students — leading to a record intake. This was previously described as a post-COVID 19 influx of returning foreign students, but the ABC understands the government believes this is more than a one-off surge.

As part of the new migration strategy — which has already been signed off by cabinet and follows months of consultation with the higher education sector, business groups and other stakeholders — steps will be taken to cut the intake of foreign students entering low-quality courses.

The ABC understands the government will not cap the number of foreign students allowed in but will crack down on low-quality training providers and limit opportunities for student visas to be used as a backdoor for low-skilled workers to stay in Australia.

The new strategy will also involve new efforts to retain the best-performing students in Australia and new pathways to attract more high-skilled permanent migrants.

"People are coming here, enrolling in courses that don't really add substantially to either their skills base or to the national interest here," Mr Albanese said.

Coverage from SBS has a bit more background on the "why" for those interested.

Edit: ABC has some followup coverage of its own, mostly on the "what".

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's salary is set to increase by almost $50,000 by mid-2025 as part of an 11 per cent pay rise over three years for Queensland politicians.

The determination by the Queensland Independent Remuneration Tribunal (QIRT) means all 93 members of state parliament will receive the following three salary increases:

• three per cent from July 2023 (to be back-paid)
• four per cent from July 2024
• three per cent from July 2025

While a new [Senate] inquiry looks set to examine [Coles and Woolworths'] profit margins, New Zealand offers a lesson in just how difficult it is to disrupt a duopoly. [They have] no Aldi or IGA, and the duopoly there has also faced allegations of price gouging.

The New Zealand competition watchdog has already held a market study into why food costs so much in Aotearoa and established a grocery commissioner to help implement its recommendations.

But 18 months down the line, Kiwis are still reporting their grocery bill as a major financial concern — for the first time, some families are struggling with the cost of putting food on the table.

Based on this experience, advocacy group Consumer NZ said an inquiry could be helpful to establish the facts around whether or not supermarket giants were making more than what was fair.

But they warned the process was slow, and ultimately if it did not lead to bold changes, the business of selling food to Australians was likely to continue being a very closed, and expensive, shop.

• Mike Pezzullo was a central architect and inaugural boss of the Home Affairs Department.
• He has been stood down on full pay pending an inquiry into his conduct.
• Changes to secretary pay and conditions mean Mr Pezzullo might not receive a termination payment.

One of the most powerful figures in the public service has been sacked after leaked conversations revealed the depths of his attempts to influence the government on policy and the shape of government.

Mike Pezzullo, the head of the Home Affairs Department, was considered one of the most influential figures in the machinery of government even before alleged private conversations with a Liberal powerbroker exposed he had seemingly spent years using a political backchannel to influence prime ministers and undermine others.

[...]

The inquiry found Mr Pezzullo had broken the public service code of conduct on at least 14 occasions. The breaches included:

• Using his duty, power, status or authority to seek to gain a benefit or advantage for himself
• Engaged in gossip and disrespectful critique of ministers and public servants
• Failed to maintain confidentiality of sensitive government information
• Failed to act apolitically in his employment
• Failed to disclose a conflict of interest

Key excerpt:

According to the late professor Patrick Troy, here's how things were viewed in the early 1970s:

"The cost and price of housing continued to be a source of social and political concern. Over the period 1969-1973 the number of years' average earnings required to buy a house site increased substantially. In Sydney, it increased from 1.7 to 2.7 years, while in Melbourne it grew from 1.2 to 1.8 years."

Compare that to what modern researchers have to say about Australia in 2023:

"Since 2001, the national ratio of median house price to median income has almost doubled to 8.5, and the time required for the accumulation of a deposit for a typical property has increased from six years median earnings in 1994 to 14 years currently."

I am prepared to toast myself a bit here but if you asked this 3 or 4 years ago you would have been flammed alive, now 90% of the comments are backing it. So why has attitudes to immigration changed ?

"What I'm asking for are five things that ... are all possible with the technology we have," he told ABC Radio Canberra.

"It's not as hard as going to the moon."

Those demands are for Australia to stop subsidising fossil fuels; for coal and gas exports to be phased out "as soon as possible"; for the logging of native forests to cease; for the prime minister to release the findings from the National Security Climate Risk Assessment report; and for Australia's Environment Protection Biodiversity Act to be amended to include climate impacts.

Mr Andrews said it was time the Australian government began "taking responsibility".

"Australia is the third-largest fossil fuel exporter in the world," he said.

"When I think about what that means for my children, and all of Australia and all of the world's children, it's quite unbearable.

"So that's why I'm doing it."

The Albanese government is about to have to make a really important decision.

It’s going to have to decide what’s more important: supporting Australians who are financially under water, or keeping an election promise.

And it’ll have to do it soon. It’s already working on its May budget, now just six months away.

That choice will affect almost every Australian, and it could shape whether you’re thousands of dollars a year better off – or not – from July next year.

[...] When asked in an Australia Institute survey what was more important – keeping a promise or reacting to changing economic circumstances – 61% picked reacting to changing circumstances.

Even among Coalition voters, 56% supported reacting to changing circumstances.

It puts the Stage 3 tax cuts in play. There’s still time, and plenty of electoral and economic reasons to rejig them.

Economists tie them selves in knots trying to justify record immigration:

If you own a business, of course it lowered wages, give us a pat on the back.

If you are a worker, of course it didn't lower wages, give us a pat on the back.

One thing that isn't getting mixed messages is what the increased demand has done to the housing market. Albo would like all the renters to starve harder for the economy please.

So, it appears the first SMR project in the US was scrapped due to rising costs.

An Aussie SMR would take 10-15 years before even being online and we'd be the guinea pigs.

Perhaps it's time to pivot to technology already available and that can be implemented in the short term?

While Australian media coverage focused on the historic nature of [Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's four-day visit to China], as well as the importance from a trade perspective, what mattered most to China? And how was the visit covered by the media there?