Australian news and politics recap May 20: National Party splits with Libs, ending Coalition

A journalist asks the Nationals leader if nuclear is the right policy to stick with given the election result, saying Australia “voted against” nuclear energy.

“That is a brave assessment to say they voted against nuclear energy,” he said.

“I think they got a very good s$600 billion scare campaign.

“I don’t think that was the reason. It was more about a scare campaign on nuclear and Medicare. It was about work from home. We saw that in regional electorates where we copped a lot of pain because of that. Have to be honest.

“You cannot put your head in the sand and say it was a great campaign, it was not. The numbers show that. You have to have the courage to look people in the eye and say we have got that wrong and not do that again.”

“Everything is possible. When you have commitment and leadership from both Sussan and I committed to one another, about how we can move forward and how we can get to a position where we come back together.

“That commitment is the foundation stone for us to rebuild from. This will give the air to the space the Liberals need.

“If they don’t have that, if they don’t identify who they are, none of us win.

“This is a great thing for our democracy we can do this. This is not anything personal. This is principle.”

“I had a meeting with Sussan Ley half an hour ago,” Mr Littleproud said.

“The dignity she showed with how she took this and see as a way forward is reaffirming that this is an opportunity to reset ourselves and do that and an environment where we can.

“I think that is important. There is no animosity, no angst, no heat. It is predicated on respect and understanding and that this and we will go forward.”

The Nationals leader spent the first few minutes of his speech talking about how he had been respectful of the process fitting in with Ms Ley after her mother died in recent days.

“Our party room has made a decision - a very tough decision,” Bridget McKenzie said.

“It’s not a decision they’ve taken lightly. We know that the Coalition has only been breached three other times in our history of our over a century of being representing the nine million Australians that don’t live in capital cities.

“But, a reasonable request was put to a trusted partner and it was refused.

“Policies that we had fought for, that only a few weeks ago, we fought an election on.

“Policies that in the main, rural and regional Australia backed. They are obviously, divestiture powers.”

Energy seems to have been the big division, with the two parties unable to agree firstly on nuclear.

“We couldn’t get comfort around nuclear being a part of an energy grid into the future,” Mr Littleproud said.

The other blockers were the Regional Australia Future Fund, divestiture powers, as well as technology around mobile phone towers in regional areas.

Mr Littleproud kept using the word “principled” in terms of how the decision was made.

It seems the Nationals aren’t willing to reset policy areas that the Liberals have been forced to re-think following their landslide election loss.

“This morning, after the discussions that both Sussan Ley and I have had over the ensuing period, our party room has got to a position where we will not be re-entering a Coalition agreement with the Liberal Party after this election.

“What we have got to a position is that the National Party will sit alone on a principle basis.

“On the basis of looking forward, not having to look back and to try and actually regain important policy pieces that change the lives of the people we represent.

“It’s on a principle position of making sure that those hard-fought wins are maintained and respected, we continue to look forward.”

The Nationals are about to hold a press conference in Canberra, but Sky News is reporting that they have failed to reach an agreement with the Liberals on forming a Coalition.

It’s huge news if so. We’ll bring you all the latest from the press conference as it happens.

Australia has joined 22 other countries in demanding Israel fully resume humanitarian aid deliveries into Gaza, and accusing Israel of politicising the delivery of essentials to Palestinian civilians.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday announced Israel would allow some aid to enter Gaza following a two-month blockade, but international aid organisations have warned it won’t be enough to meet the needs of the two million Palestinians living in the besieged enclave, and would also risk the lives of humanitarian workers.

It comes as Mr Netanyahu ordered the IDF to intensify ground operations and said Israel would take full control of the strip.

Penny Wong joined 22 other foreign ministers from Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and the UK; as well as and signatories from the EU to warn Israel their limited aid delivery model is not acceptable.

“It places beneficiaries and aid workers at risk, undermines the role and independence of the UN and our trusted partners, and links humanitarian aid to political and military objectives,” the foreign ministers said.

“Humanitarian aid should never be politicised, and Palestinian territory must not be reduced nor subjected to any demographic change.”

Australia has not gone as far as Canada, France and the UK - who all co-signed the joint statement - who have all threatened to impose sanctions against Israel unless it halts the new military offensive and lifts aid restrictions.

The Liberal party has denied they are running a scare campaign over Labor’s superannuation tax plan.

“When the proponents of policies have nowhere else to go when they start calling questions about a policy and concerns being expressed on behalf of some of our community a scare campaign,” he told Sky News.

“Frankly, there are questions that need to be answered, and you did pose the question, why not index it now to allay the concerns of a great many Australians who will be affected over the course of time by this policy today?”

Labor’s new assistant treasurer has rejected suggestions the plan to increase tax concessions on super balances over $3 million is to push workers towards industry funds.

Daniel Mulino, sworn into the role last week, says the Coalition has launched a “scare campaign” on the policy, first announced two years ago, that would increase the concession rate from 15 per cent to 30 per cent.

Dr Mulino said industry and self-managed funds would be impacted by the change in the same way.

“People with $3m accounts in either of those scenarios would be affected in the same way, and so that’s certainly not any kind of motivation that I would see as being part of this,” he told Sky News.

“It’s really just saying that above a certain level, the concessional treatment should be a bit less generous, where accounts get to very, very high levels.

“So look, they’ve had over two years to raise concerns about this, we brought this measure forward in the previous term, we took this measure to the election.

“And it does seem strange that we’re now seeing this kind of scare campaign.”