Richard Marles, Deputy Prime Minister and defence minister聽committed hundreds of billions of dollars to defence spending over the next decade. Pip Hinman reports.
National Press Club
If anyone was expecting a flash of independence from foreign minister Penny Wong鈥檚聽address to the National Press Club, they were bound to be disappointed, argues Binoy Kampmark.
Anthony Albanese publicly revealed that he had been lobbying the Joseph Biden administration to stop proceedings against Julian Assange, reports Binoy Kampmark.
Jennifer Robinson, Julian Assange's lawyer, told the National Press Club that if the appeal fails and Assange is extradited to the US,聽his prison conditions will be at the whim of intelligence agencies which plotted to kill him. Binoy Kampmark reports.
In her first address to the National Press Club as ACTU secretary on March 29, her earlier statement that it was right to break unjust laws.
She said Australia鈥檚 workplace laws were broken and that 鈥渨age theft鈥 had become the new business model for too many employers. McManus also set out the ACTU鈥檚 case for a $45 a week increase in the minimum wage.
Australia鈥檚 most popular children鈥檚 author, Mem Fox, has criticised the federal government鈥檚 unfair funding of private schools.
Fox was addressing an audience of public school educators at the National Press Club. She said the "confidence trick" of private schools marketing was being revealed, but governments persisted with unfair funding models.
"The federal government spends two-thirds of its school education dollars on the one-third of students in Australia who go to private schools,鈥 she said. 鈥淲here is our national sense of shame at that statistic?