Live on Sky News.
This is Shari.
Good evening, and welcome to the show. I'm Caleb Bond, filling in for Sharry Marks and this week coming up on the program tonight, I asked the biggest Islamic groups in the country what they thought of hate preacher Hadad being ruled racist by the Federal Court. I'll tell you their response shortly. Plus no albow, Trump meeting, no tariff exemption, no Walcus guarantee. What did Pennywong actually achieve in Washington? David Gazzard and Graham Richardson, Hopefully we'll have some answers soon.
And Trump announces that Israel has agreed to a sixty day cease far in Gaza, But of course, will Hamas accept the conditions. Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharen Haskell will discuss with me a little later now. I talked at length last night about the Federal Court's judgment against hate
preacher Wizam Hadad. He was found to have breached Section eighteen C of the Racial Discrimination Act in a number of sermons in which he said Jews with the descendants of pigs and apes, that they were vile and treacherous, and on and on it goes. He also justified the killing of Jews in the end times.
Some of it was.
Loosely based on the Qur'an and the Hadith. But as I showed you last night, the court found that the Qoran itself doesn't actually instruct Muslims to hate Jews or say that they are inherently bad people.
But the expert witnesses on Islamic theology from both sides agree that neither the Qur'an nor the Hadith teach that Jews have an inherent negative quality as a people. Ibrahim, the respondence expert, said that Islam does not encourage hatred towards Jews. I was not called on to decide whether religious belief can ever be a justification for propagating racist, bigotry and hate, but.
I also pointed out that even if that's the case, it's strange how the biggest Muslim organizations in Australia have failed to the rancid hatefield preachings of Hadad. I mean, you'd think that if Hadad isn't representative of what most Muslims think, mainstream Imams, the biggest Islamic groups in the country would come out and repudiate him and say this is not on this isn't us. We can't have this kind of bile being preached in the name of our religion.
Even if they hadn't said anything until now, which they hadn't. You'd think after he lost in court that they might say something, and yet they have it. I'll let you come to your own conclusions.
About why that might be.
And I said last night that we'd extended the opportunity for someone from the Australian National Imam's Council to come on the show and talk to me to condemn Hadad's comments or explain why they don't think they deserve condemnation.
And I would have thought.
They'd be pretty keen to clear the air, given that Hadad said in court that Shaik Shady, the president of the National Imams Council, was the man who took him under his wing and led him to religion.
But we didn't hear.
My team also extended the same opportunity to the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils and the Lebanese Muslim Association today and we didn't hear back from them either, and in venis just in case they thought I was too scary as an interviewer. We gave them the opportunity to provide a written statement instead. Funnily enough, none of the three groups took me up on that. I keep in mind this is a bloke. Well, actually bloke is probably a
bit generous. This pond scum doesn't believe in democracy, has advocated for jihad and has supported ISIS is one from the archives.
Supporters of IS in Australia are predictably angry at the federal government's decision with some Hadad Is, a carpet layer turned militant activist who ran the Al Rissala bookstore and community center at Bankstown and Sydney's West. Al Rissala became notorious for giving a platform to hardliners sympathizing with global jihad.
T it hit the height of notoriety. The Al Rissala bookstore had become a lightning ride for militants enraged by the slaughter of sorting Muslims in the Syrian Civil War, but its ideology is about more than just the Syrian opposition. Our Rissala's online presence conveyed an ideology that was sympathetic to global jihad. The restoration of the Caliphate and the rejection of Western government. Wis Hadad ran the operation until last Friday, the day he says the business was finally
wound up. On social media, he flies the shiharda flag used by the self proclaimed Islamic state group.
That was eleven years ago.
So again I'll ask, why won't three allegedly mainstream, prominent Islamic bodies in Australia come out and condemn the hate preachings of a man who's flown the ISIS flag. Of course I can't answer that question. They have to answer it, but for some reason they don't seem to want.
To do so.
I'll tell you what, if the Victorian Liberal Party was a girl, you'd tell your son she was crazy and never to be brought home to dinner. Again, the never ending John Pursuito and more Redeeming saga continues to drag on. Today it's that four more members of the party's administrative committee have joined Colleen Harken in challenging a loan from the party to mister Pursuito to pay what he owes to misdeeming after he was found to have defamed her. Now,
if you're not aware of the recent details. In short, mister Pursuito had to pay Misdeeming two point three million dollars in legal costs on top of the three hundred thousand that he had to cough up for defaming her. He managed to raise nearly eight hundred grand himself, but the deadline to pay was looming last month and he didn't have the rest of the cash. So there were two options. Either someone stepped in to pick up the tab,
or it'd had to declare bankruptcy. Now, bankrupts aren't allowed to sit in Parliament, so that had forced a by election in his seat of Hawthorne, and there was a real risk that the could lose it. So the party's administrative Committee agreed in a secret ballot to loan one and a half million dollars to Pursuito from a party entity called Vapold, and that was meant to ensure that Pursuito didn't go bankrupt. Deeming got her money and then
everyone would be able to move on. Except they haven't been able to move on because, as Stevie Wonder could have seen coming, there are plenty of people in the party not happy that members and donors are having to stump up a serious amount of money to essentially bail out a fool who picked a fight he didn't need to and never should have to bring down a female MP, and then refuse to settle, which would have stopped all
of this pilava in the first place. So Miss Harkin launched an injunction on the money through the courts last week, and now four of her fellow committee members have joined her. They argue that the loan was invalid under the party's constitution. Now my understanding is that the party was made aware of the injunction on the day it was lodged and then paid the money before it could be heard in court, basically preventing the possibility of an emergency injunction. But the
case will return to court this Friday. The Herald Son reported today that in new documents lodged with the court, the five member group wants the one point five to five million dollar loan to be repaid in full, with a declaration that the funds are held in trust for
the members of the Liberal Party. They also want the court to declare that Vappold directors Alan Stockdale, a former Victorian treasurer current party treasurer Karen Sobles and Christopher Pius have acted in breach of trust by paying the funds to the trust account of lawyers for Missus Deeming Giles George. That would mean Misdeeming giving the money back and mister pursuito they're knowing her again, which would most likely end up in new bankruptcy proceedings that could force him out
of parliament. Sources close to the case told the paper that it could go on for as long as twelve months, which is the last thing the Liberal Party needs, because there's a state election in November next year and they'd like to think that they'd have a chance of finally
running Andrews turn Allen government out of town. Some senior Liberals certainly hope this loan would be the end of the matter and that they'd be able to get on with trying to win an election, but that's certainly not how it's played out, and they have no one to blame but themselves. Fancy thinking that you could just bail out a former leader who's trashed and defamed one of his own MP's exiled her from the party and that there wouldn't be a backlash from members and donors and party officials.
I mean, these are the people who.
Pay their hard earned money for the benefit of the party, and they do that so the party can succeed, so it can win elections, not so it can protect dopey men like Pursuito, who's done a great deal to hurt the Victorian Liberal Party in recent years and may will be the reason that they lose their fourth election on the trot because you just know Labor is going to bring all of this stuff out and all the dirty laundry that was aired during the defamation case come out
again when the campaign starts, and I'm sure the proponents of this loan will be screaming and carrying on and accusing Colin Harken and co. Of tearing the party apart, But they may want to reflect on the fact that it was mister Pursuito who tore the party apart when he decided to wrongly accuse Miss Deeming of being connected to neo Nazis after she spoke at a women's rights rally. It was mister Pursuito who tore the party apart when he then moved for her to be kicked out of
the party. It was mister pursuito who made matters worse when he refused to settle.
The matter for one hundred rand and instead.
Let it go to trial, which is what led to this massive debt and a court case where Liberal front benches gave evidence against their own then leader. And for all this, the party rewards him by saving him from bankruptcy. They should have just let him go bankrupt and forced a buy election, because let's be honest, if they're worried about the fact that they could lose a by election, I mean, they really think that Pursuto would be able to defend his seat next year after all this carry on.
He's the one who caused this mess in the first place. Well, the quad meeting has wrapped up and lots of lingering questions. Penny Wong didn't do his self any favors with the media rounds afterwards.
We can't secure a meeting between our leaders. There has been no tariff deal. Are you concerned?
I think that the Trump administration and President Trump has made very clear to the world that he envisages a different role for America in the world. I was very grateful that the Secretary again express his regret for the meeting that was scheduled for the G seven having to be rescheduled.
He did Marco Rubio guarantee that August will go ahead.
I think we both understand the importance to both our countries and to the United Kingdom, and you would have seen what Secretary Rubio has previously said. The issue of Australia's defense budget was not raised with me, either in the Quad or in my Bilatural meeting.
Not one hundred percent sure what she's managed to achieve. I'm not sure she is either with me now. Is labor Legend Graham Richardson and DPG Advisory Solutions founded David Gazzard Richo.
I mean, it doesn't sound like.
The chats were overly productive, perhaps friendly, but what really came out of this.
Not a whole lot.
I think I'd have to concede. I think we'd all have liked to have seen a little more come out. But you know Trump, dealing with the Trump administration is an incredibly difficult thing. Rubio himself, I think it's probably a pretty good fellow. It always looks to me to be slightly out of his death. I think they need better cattle than they've got in some of these positions.
But Ruby O, David is close to the president to not come out of this meeting with a future meeting date set down to meet with the president, and it is surely a failure.
Well it's not. It doesn't look good. I'm not going to defend that.
But you know what Trump's like, I've been trying to deal with that administration is really pot luck.
One day you're going well, the next day you're not, and you never know why.
It's an incredibly difficult job that Penny Wong's got.
I do not envy her task at all.
Your view, David, Well, the other members of the quad have all got meetings. That's the truth to it. And I think Graham is overlooking the point that we've got an ambassador in Washington that has personally denigrated the president and he is the key lynch pin in trying to secure a meeting with the president. Now, Penny Wong says
America has changed. That is true, but the other countries have all managed to secure meetings, and they probably don't have the lead in their saddlebags are having an ambassador that's personally attacked the president, and most of the cabinet, including the Prime Minister himself. So these are not good omens. And we've already heard over the course of the week the President's polster because we heard this before election from one of his former chief of staff that they've got
a target on Kevin Rudd. So I think Anthony Albneazi faces an invidious choice here to withdraw his handpicked ambassador in the interests of the of the Alliance, or to leave it there and Australia doesn't get a meeting.
That's true.
The only thing we'd have to consider though is if they moved right on, he might come back to Australia and then we'd have to deal within here. So I'm not sure whether that's good for us either, to be honest. Part of the reason though, that things may not have gone as well as they should have, is that she took it upon herself while she was over there, Penny Wong to gift Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State a
Port Adelaide, Guernsey. He's got all the trimmings, it's got his name number one and all this sort of stuff. You know, rich O, I know you're probably an NRL man, being from New South Wales, but I'm from RSA and I'm an Adelaide crows man, and I know Chris Kenny, if he's watching, will be feeling exactly the same as me. This is an absolute disgrace of all the things Penny Wong has ever done. To give a port Adelaide guernsey to the US Secretary of State is so offensive.
Absolutely, I couldn't agree more. There should have been a sin George rug Jersey and I would be applauded.
And my girlfriend would agree with you on that count too. I should note that Alexander Downer did exactly the same thing in two thousand and five, but with a crows Gundi. So I guess they're balancing the Ledger now. Quantus was hit by a major cyber attack today. The personal information of six million customers, names, birthdays, phone numbers, email addresses have all been breached. Thankfully, David, there was no credit
card information or passports being passed on. I think most of this comes from their quarters Frequent Flyer pro but it seems like every second day now we see one of these cases where there is a hack, a significant hack on large amounts of user data that then ends up on the dark web and sold for nefarious purposes. We have to be seriously careful about this stuff. Will ask the question, why do we keep handing so much data over for free? It's so valuable, that's why people keep hacking it.
Well, this is I agree with you on that, Caleb. You're almost forced to You don't have a choice. Sign up to a new bank account, you get to a restaurant, you order a meal with a QR code. They're collecting your data. But what you don't know is the safety of that data. So if you're going to move into the next frontier and jump into the next frontier and offer these AI driven solutions and tech solutions, you've got to have the capability of protecting people's data, no doubt
about that. The government keeps threatening a big stick on this, but there seems to be no unified effort to force big corporates in particular that do store valuable information with the threats to make them update their cybersecurity controls. So you know, in the case of Connis today, they've promised there, well they're going to go out and review all of their call centers because this one seems to have happened through Philippines. But that should have happened that this is
part and parcel of running a serious international business. You are going to be under cyber attack. It is just the new cost of doing business. So you know, at some point, I think we need practical guidelines from the government about what the minimum standards are for companies that are in this space, so that customers and voters everywhere can have the confidence that their data is protected.
And of course, Richo, the the Fedial government wants to bring in all these age verifications for social media etc. Very soon, and that will involve private companies collecting biometric data and god knows what happens to it after that. I mean, the amount of stuff that these companies have on us now is obscene and seemingly there's no real protection of it.
I think a lot of these companies know more about us than we know ourselves.
I mean, it's quite terrifying the amount of data that they've been able to collect on individuals. I don't think you consider out anymore and talk about privacy because we have very little left and with each day it seems to be eroading more.
Yeah, look, this should be front and center for governments, but it just doesn't seem to be creecket Australia. Goodness, they've decided to be politically correct again.
Second year in a row.
There won't be a game on Australia Day next year, which is only the second time. It should be noted in thirty one years that they haven't had anything on Australia Day.
But they're a bit tricky about it.
They insist it isn't about Australia Day because they say that if the Big Bash Final is washed out the night before the Sunday, the twenty fifth, then they'll play it on Australia Day instead, So they claim, David, they have no issue with.
Australia Day whatsoever. But it seems a.
Little convenient that for nearly thirty years you have matches, whether they're tests, then one days and eventually t twenties on Australia Day, and then the last two years, when things are heating up, not there.
Anymore, the Boxing Day tests, the Australia Day test. Icons of Australia will get the fact that there's a group of Australians who feel aggrieved by this, but we also get the fact that we've had a referendum about treating people differently and most Australians have rejected that idea. Now you can be sensitive towards the views of our Indigenous brothers and sisters without having to stop playing a cricket game. I mean, it's a day of unifying all Australians, no
matter what race, creed or color. Playing a sporting game on Australia Day I just I mean you kind of weep over the pointless virtue see signaling of our sporting codes. Thankfully, it appears to me that we've sort of crossed that rubicon and people are starting to underwind those positions and they're listening to the view of the majority, and the majority, you know, to want to support Australia Day and they want to support things like the Australia Day Test.
Yeah, they should have the Australia Day Test back in Adelaide where it belongs, I reckon rich O. The New South Wales Liberal members are weighing up whether to fund a court challenge and indignified Bradfield candidate Zill Capteriian in a bit to have her failed election result overturned and a prompt buy election in the country's most marginal seat
that's directly from the Sydney Morning Herald today. The some members are apparently lobbying the party to challenge it in the Small Claims Court, sorry, at the Court of Disputed Returns, because of course there was a recount and then the seat went to nicol Itt Buller, the Teal seat.
Why would you bother?
I mean, surely they're on a hiding to nothing if they try to challenge this in court. They've had the recount, it came back with the result.
Yeah, I think you're wasting your time. Look, when you look at a seat like Bradfield, it is extraordinary that we're even talking about it. If you drive around Bradfield, trying to imagine how the Liberals don't win it by our country mile is very difficult. It's the kind of the seat that you'd think they'd be getting seventy five percent of every time. I don't understand what's happened to the Liberal vote in Bradfield, but obviously an awful lot of people have lost confidence in them.
Now that suits me to say, I admitted, but it's a fact that Well.
Just quickly before we go, gents, I'll ask you about you know, Kanye West, controversial American rapper Tony Burke said today that his Australian visa had been canceled because he released a song called Hale Hitler, and of course his wife is Australian, so he apparently had a visa that meant he could sort of come and go from Australia as he likes.
Richo. Correct decision, I'd.
Say, so, Look, I don't think we need this fella. You know, I don't know problems in Australia. Why import another one? The guy?
I mean, I can use the crude expression the guy is a dickhead. Everyone knows that.
David.
Look, I'm for free speech right that I'm an ex journalist, so that's my sort of starting position. I can accept that some of these people aren't savory characters. I don't really care if Kanye Weste comes or not. To be perfectly honest, I just want an even application of the rules.
Good point.
The lead into the program was a good one about hate speech coming out of out of at a mosque in Western Sydney. There's crickets from a huge segment of society that gets worked up about Kannye or Israel Falao or people who come from Israel who are democratically elected. The thing that I think a noise Australians is there's an unequal or an asymmetrical application of the rules, the regulations and the laws that apply to one side of
the of the debate not the other. So they if they're even handed in their application, in their application, I won't have a problem with it, even though I start from the principle of protecting free speech.
Yep, I agree with you, David, and then look to be honest. Is it really going to make a difference with Kanye We're probably not rich O'david, thank you so much for joining me. Now the cf ME you might be administration, but they don't seem to be short of a dollar. Of course, the federal government put them in administration after reports of corruption and that the union had been infiltrated by bikis.
I mean, who to thunk it?
But the Herald son Today reported that they've been giving the so called gold plated redundancy packages out to officials, organizers and office staff, apparently in exchange for their silence because they're made to sign a non disclosure when they leave. So these people are getting at least four weeks pay per year of service plus a minimum three month bonus for signing up.
It's a pretty extraordinary deal.
The former head of the Australian Building and Construction Commission, which should still be around but it's not, John Lloyd, joins me. Now, John, I mean, you know, the union's meant to be an administration. It's meant to be being cleaned up, and they're getting rid of people and paying them off with obscene amounts of money. I mean, it would almost look like it's the union doing what the union's always done.
Well it does. They're very high amounts, or at the higher end of any redundancy payment scheme most Australians they max out it after nine years. At sixteen weeks redundancy pay. These people will be getting about forty eight weeks, so well ahead of the national employment standard. And yes, it's the looks like the union is going back to old ways. There's one hundred and six staff apparently in the Victorian Office according to the latest figures, so there's a fair bit
of money involved. If most of those they're given a redundancy payment, well.
If they're able to do this kind of thing, what's the administrator doing. The Union is meant to be being cleaned up in some regard, they're carrying on almost like its business as usual. Of course they've cleaned out some which would call ghosts from the past, like John Setka, but it would seem as though the union still believes it can do whatever it wants, that it can make significant amounts of money and make sure people have their pockets lined as it has ever been.
Thus, yes, it seems that way, and you wonder why, particularly why they offer the incentive of an additional three months pay. The administrator has strong powers. He can obviously terminate people. He's got that power, and why he has to offer an inducement is very unquestionable in my view. And as you say, sounds like the union, which has
always played hardball on these sort of things, wins. It wins big paying conditions for its members and seems to be adopting its old sort of approach that it's well above everybody else and they should be paid decent amounts.
Well, we know that the CFMU was quite upset to be put into administration, and Stephen drill it to the Newscall papers has been writing these stories. Another one he had to day was a leaked tape which shows just how angry the union was at being forced into administration and particularly at the act you boss, Sally McManus, take a listen.
So where the laws the bodies sland. Then these laws used to remove the fire keys, to remove criminals, to remove people who have done highly illegal activity.
She lied, She lied.
That was at a labor day lunch in Ballarat, by the way, she lied. Apparently, why is the union so upset that they're actually being cleaned up?
Well, look, they've had a many years and years of privilege of abusing their their position of thinking they're above
the law, where you know, unlawful conduct was endemic. So you know, the comfortable existence has been shaken up, and that's why they reacted so strongly to it, and shown by I think the other payment highlighted down the paper, the four hundred and fifty thousand to John Setka that was awarded by the previous administration but also as an extraordinarily high payment for separation from an organization when he's sell it was about one hundred and forty five thousand
dollars a year. It's just that culture, that culture of entitlement have been above the law if you like, and doing things their way and don't caring about the consequences. And in this regard, I think one thing to be of concern perhaps might be to the members. Members pay one thousand, two hundred dollars a year membership fees, and that's where some of those fees are going now into these massive redundancy payments.
But let's be honest, if this is how the union is still behaving, what hope is there that it comes out the other side of administration looking any better than it did when it went in. I mean, of course, you know there was the BLF, and then the BLF was deregistered, and along came to see if MEU. I mean, this has always existed in some way in the construction industry and whatever construction union exists at the time. So we're really on a hiding to nothing, aren't we.
Yeah, that's a really big question. When you have the next union election, which I think is enduring three to five years time, who steps into power, who has influence, and now you elect a few senior positions and then they recruit other people as organizers and it's just who
controls the union then? And I really think you only really ensure that things go on to the right track for the long term if not just the union but also the clients of the industry, particularly governments and also the head contractors agree to take a tougher line and ensure the proper standards are upheld. If you don't have that, I think there's a huge risk that you and you will return to its old wines.
Quite right, John Lloyd, thank you for joining me, and keep in mind John used to run the COP on the beat, the Building and Construction Commission, which the Labor Party dismantled because of course that's what the CFIM you wanted. They didn't want anyone having oversight on what they were doing on construction sites. And then when all these reports came out that there was infiltration by barking gangs into the the Labour Party said, we didn't know that was happening.
How could that possibly have happened?
Well, maybe if it kept the COP on the beat, it wouldn't have happened in the first place.
Stupid stuff still to come.
Two more renewable projects could be on the verge of barting the bullet Albaneze's renewables future is on shaky ground. Aiden Morris joins me a little later. But first, the battle of the egos is back on, with trumpet his former best friend Elon Musk once again taking their private spat into the public domain. Adam Crichton, we will sorry with me next. Donald Trump's Big Beautiful Bill has passed through the Senate with the casting vote of Vice President JD.
Vance.
He had to come down and vote because three Republicans voted against it, so that put the count at fifty
to fifty. But not everyone was so pleased. Just before the legislation got through, Trump's former breast best friends orr Elon Musk went on another social media tirade, posting that every member of Congress who campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history should hang their head in shame and they will lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this earth. The US President then threatened to deport Elon Musk.
His upset is that he's losing his ivy mandate.
And music sad.
Yeah, he's very upset about things. But you know he could lose a lot more than that, don't you tell you?
Right?
Elan can lose a lot more than that made after Boozio. Elan, you know, you know doj Dojh's the monster that might have to go back and eat Ilin.
It's nothing if not entertaining with me now as senior fellow and chief economist at the IPA Adam Christ and Adam It's it's the greatest reality show of all time really watching this go on between these two men, and you know from how the marty you've fallen, I suppose. But to Tomsk's point about the big spending in this bill, there is huge spending in this bill. They have increased the dead celing. It also comes with.
Tax cuts, etc.
And I suppose there would be a lot of people in the Republican Party thinking, well, you know, if Donald Trump is not interested in cleaning up the books and DOGE wasn't as effective as many people thought it would be, then who on earth is going to do it?
Well?
Certainly, look, I'm very sympathetic to Elon on this issue. The fundamental question is this bill soon to be law, has not changed the fundamental trajectory of the US budget. I mean, the basic fact is the US government spends about seven trillion dollars a year and it only raises five trillion dollars or so in taxes, and that is two trillion dollar deficit. It is absolutely enormous and totally unsustainable.
And basically this has been going on pretty much since since the COVID pandemic, and basically US presidents hope that the financial crisis is going to happen on the next president's watch, and that is what Donald Trump is hoping. And it's a big gamble because, as you point out, debt is extremely high in the US. I mean, basically it makes the Victorian government look like some sort of paragon of fiscal refugee by comparison. You know, it's well
over one hundred percent of GDP. Now, of course it's a reserve currency, so it gets a very long leash from financial markets.
But it's a real problem. And I sympathize with Elon.
I mean, he found a couple of hundred billion dollars of savings and they couldn't even do that. To stand his anger, Plus it was great personal financial cost to him.
You know, the share price of Tesla fell greatly.
It cost him a lot of money, So I understand why he's angry and.
Elon obviously feels personally aggrieved by all this, to the point, you know, as I said before, he's saying that if it's the last thing he does on earth, it'll be to stop these Republicans who voted for it from winning their ritary. That's pretty extraordinary intervention.
Now, it's an extraordinary intervention, I would say, the most serious so far, and would certainly worry a lot of Republican backbenches because there's no preferential voting system in the US, so if he does launch a new party, it could well split the Republican vote and be absolutely chaos for them at the next election, which is next year for the Congress. So that's a very serious threat, and I'm actually shocked he did it, because I mean, he's making
powerful enemies. Of course, he's a powerful man himself, but I don't know why he wants to do that. I mean, to his credit, he's obviously very principle and doesn't really care much about him share price or his wealth because he stands to lose a lot more of that.
I would say by going down this path.
He's not mucking around.
Meanwhile, Trump's got an inventive on his immigration policy. He's unveiled this new migrant to teach in center in Florida, which is surrounded by alligators and pythons, which is meant to deter people from escaping.
Here.
He was touring this so called alligator Alcatraz.
No, but this is air conditioned facility.
So if any of the news claims are keeping him out in the hot human solf Florida, that is wrong.
It's probably sixty.
Good to bree here to be one.
Hey, Baiden wanted.
Me in here.
Okay, he wanted me.
It didn't work out that way, but he wanted me in here.
So I love the idea, to be honest.
I mean, it's probably cheaper than paying security to look after the perimeter.
Yeah.
Look, it's very trump this, I mean, I don't think it hurts him. His fans love this sort of thing. He loves this sort of thing. It's made for TV, of course, which of course.
Is his specialty.
Look, he promised in coming into office that he would crack down on you know, on the illegal immigration, and that's what he's doing.
You know.
Of course it's controversial, but we always criticize politicians for not living up to their words.
But he is doing that on this issue.
So look, it's you know, it's unusual, it's unorthodox, but it also does send a powerful signal to would be immigrants not to come. And I think, you know, much of the benefit from this policy is probably that this is going to ricochet all around the world and you know, it will probably change the minds of some people who
are otherwise thinking of coming this. Remember when Biden came in in twenty twenty one, there was a huge influx of people into the US and that's because of perception, and perception really matters.
And I think Trump is right to do things like this.
I want to see if they can get one going up in Queensland. How good would that be David Chrisphole to get on top of it. Jeff Chambers in the Odds Today exposed that Australia's top seventeen public service boffins have all received pay bumps with the total value of up to sixteen point three million dollars. Treasury boss Jenny Wilkinson now joins the one million dollar club, along with
Australia's most senior bureaucrat, Stephen Kennedy. And you know, I know that if you want serious people to do these jobs, you do have to pay them well, but when you compare what the heads of these departments get versus what the ministers who are controlling the departments get, I mean it is a big difference.
Look, it certainly is.
I think it's just outrageous the levels of these pay and I think it brings great shame to Australia to be honest. I mean, if you look at the head of the UK Treasury for instance, which you could argue is a much a much harder job than being the head of our treasury, that the pay is something like one hundred and eighty thousand pounds of years. That's three hundred and sixty thousand Australian dollars, So it's vastly lower. We really stand out globally on these metrics, and it's embarrassing.
You know, you could have all of these salaries and you would get exactly the same sorts of people in the jobs. So you know, this argument about you know, we pay million dollars a year and we get great talent, well, you know, look at the last ten years of policy making it in Australia. I mean, do you think the ndis is you know, is great policy well, that's the product of these so called million dollar salaries. You know, it's very embarrassing and you know it just makes Australians
hate the government. I mean basically, it's not it's not good for social cohesion, it's not good for this country. And you know it should be seven hundred, six hundred thousand dollars, not a million dollars. You can be very well in Canberra on six hundred thousand dollars.
I think, yeah, there's no doubt about that. I'm with you on that, Adam Crichton, thank you so much for joining me.
As always.
Coming up after the break, Trump gets to Israel to agree to a new guys As cease fire, but the question, of course is whether Hamas will play ball. Saran Haskell will be on the program to discuss a little later, and Australia's renewable energy projects are falling left, right and center.
Another two today.
Aidan Morris will join me next to discuss the impact this will have on alban Ezi's far Fitch green dream Don't go away. I think every day this week there's been another story about a renewable energy project falling over the other day, it was the biggest green hydrogen plant
in the country. Today it's a double hit with news that offshore Wind develop a Blue Float Energy is considering selling its Victorian project and getting out of Australia, while the Victoria to New South Wales Electricity Interconnector, which is supposed to be integral to getting renewable energy across the country after coulfied stations shut down in a few years, that's been hit with a two year delay, with me now as Director of Energy Research at the Center for
Independent Studies, Aidan Morrison, it doesn't get any better.
How can anyone still be clinging.
Onto the idea that we will reach our net zero targets in time. We're not going to do it. Everyone in the energy sector knows we're not going to do it. Everyone knows we're not going to hit eighty percent renewable by twenty thirty. At what point do we just say this is not happening. Let's just do our best with what we have now.
Look, that's a really good question, because it's been very clear all the markers for a very long time have been that these things just do not add up and cannot stack up. The economics of hydrogen green hydrogen has never been there. It's never made any sense in an
engineering or economic sense. Same with offshore wind. Offshore wind even the CSIRO admits it's nearly double what normal onshore wind would cost and those projects are startling struggling to get past, so there's never been a realistic prospect this work. The v and I West one, that transmission line being pushed back, that's a little bit different because the question we should ask there is to why that was brought
forward in the first place. Actually, the a email analysis said that wasn't required till twenty thirty one, assuming we've built all the other renewable things that we're not currently succeeding in building, so there's really no case that was required.
They made an odd case to say it had to be rushed forward by getting extra funding from the federal government to bring it forward to the date of twenty twenty eight, and now they're having to admit just a few months later that that doesn't work and that was impossible. So questions should be asked about why the Australian Energy Market Operator was pulling forward these dates when there was
really no chance they could even deliver on them. It's a really bizarre circumstance and serious questions have to be asked about that.
Well, well, in your view, Aid, and why might that be?
Look in my view it has to be connected to the cases for the other transmission projects like Humelink. We have a private company in New South Wales Transgrid and they stand to benefit and get a profit from building transmission lines, and their big project, Humlink, had a huge cost increase, and I actually think that the business case was massaged to overcome that cost increase by pulling V and I West forward because there were better benefits if there was another big cable for it to link up to.
And so now I think there's serious questions to be asked. Why was the market operator who are now they're the ones that currently own V and I West, doing a favor for another private company when their project probably should have been pushed back as well.
Wasn't that the biggest question in all of this because we've been told we need, you know, ten thousand kilometers of new power lines and whatever to make all of this renewable business work. But of course it's in the interests of private investors to have all these power lines build because they're regulatory assets, so they're guaranteed to get
a profit out of them. It's the same of course, you know, ten to fifteen years ago we were talking about gold plating the poles and wires because they know they're going to get money back if they invest in it. I mean, is this nothing more than basically a Ponzi scheme to line the pockets of the investors at the expense of us, the paying consumer.
Yeah, that's exactly right.
And that's why I think we have to consider the transmission spend a little bit differently, because we can be fairly confident that for things like offshore wind and things like hydrogen, if there are private companies putting together proposals for that, eventually reality will hit them and they will pull out their own private funding. But transmissions different because
these companies get to send the bill to consumers. The regulator writes a rule and says you get to send the build of the consumers, whether it makes sense or not.
So we should be extremely cautious about our institutions who are meant to be looking after consumers rights and consumers' bills, pushing through big transmission projects because private companies still benefit, and of course all the other private companies get to buy up land and build a wind farms and solar farms with government subjects around them, they can benefit too. So it really is a potential hotbed that's really ripe
for conflicts of interest and corruption to arise. And so we should be extremely careful about scrutinizing decisions about where big power lines get built and when they get built, and why the timeline is as fast as it is, because I don't think there's any case to building this sort of transmission at the timeline that's been currently advanced, well.
Assumingly doing it by force to just very quickly aiden the telly. At a story today that government contractors have been caught trespassing on private property quote unquote in a bid to forcibly acquire land for renewable energy transmission lines. So these people are from energy code. They've been told by the landowner not to go on the land, and he found them there.
Anyway, Look, it doesn't surprise me if you spend any time with people around the areas where these power lines are going to go, you'll hear no end of stories of misconduct and extreme arrogance and failing to comply with a whole bunch of rules and regulations. So I'm a little surprised that this is some of the first instances being reported, because there is plenty more where that came from,
I can guarantee you. So there's no real wonder why a lot of people in the bush are really fed up because the assumption, I suppose, the arrogance that the country needs this and these infrastructure is doing is everyone a favor. I think it's really rubbed a lot of people in the bush the wrong way. And that's I suppose, just one instance of what I'm sure is very many.
I should note Energy Code says it was an accident, but the go aiden, thank you for joining me, don't go anywhere yet.
Trump's foreign policy.
Credentials of ballooning, of course, after getting Israel to accept the conditions for a Gaza sease far after the deal with Iran, But ofcause will Hamas agree?
That is the question?
Scharen Haskell will join me right after this quick break. The major breaking news today Trump announcing that Israel has agreed to a sixty days cease far in Gaza. The US President urged Hamas to take the deal, warning that it will not get better, it will only get worse. And this of course comes after his success with Israel and Iran joining me. Now is Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharen Haskell, Sharen welcome. What more can you tell us about this potential deal.
Well, on Monday, Prime Minister Natanio is going to go to Washington and he's going to speak to President Trump a little bit more in depth about the details. But it's important to understand as well. We said yes to a ceasefire three months ago with the whitpop proposal. Then he put another proposal goes further a few steps towards
Commas's demands. Israel said yes to that as well. Only three weeks ago he put the third proposal that took a few steps further towards Tamas's demands, and Israel said yes again. We you know, our goal is not a war. Our goal is to bring back our family members as quickly and as safely as possible. And the problem is that Hamas continues and continues to refuse and to say no.
So in your view, then do you think they should be a ceas far or not?
Well, yes, there could have been a ceaspired three months ago, but The problem is that we are facing not a logic person or a logic entity with value similar to me and you cherish line. We are standing against a terrorist organization, a death cult where its highest achievement is death murdered him. And so if that's then it is very very difficult to speak to them, to negotiate with them.
This is very complex, and so the reason the reasonable logic of me and you, you know, if you can't count on commas to have the same logic, and that's what makes it far more difficult. But we've seen before President Trump putting so much pressure, whether it was on Kamas or his Baladh or on Iran, So I have confidence in trying to break through this time towards that ceasefire.
Of course, this meeting you mentioned before between Benjaminitya, who the Israeli Prime Minister, and Donald Trump at the White House next week, I think it's the third meeting.
Of course, we.
Had some strong words from the President Tanitanyaho last week about Israel and Iran, and then had a phone conversation that ended up in plans being turned back on what terms do you think they will be speaking?
You know, it hasn't been easy for Israel. Throughout many of these East fire we had to make a lot of concessions. Every time there's a ceasefire in Gaza, we have to withdraw our troops. It means that the terrorist organization Ramas is taking more and more positions that we've already cleared from the terrorist organization. It means that later on our soldiers have to go back in to the same area they've already cleared risk their lives. Sometimes we've
lost the lives of our soldiers because of that. Just in a cease fire, Gaza was flooded with humanitarian a that was delivered through the terrorist organization Ramas. And you need to understand that humanitarian a. There was billions, millions of dollars that went into the pockets of Ramas. Because of that means was the first time they could pay salaries to all of their terrorists for the first time since the seventh of October. With that money, they recruited
new terrorists to fight Israel. And so when we speak about concessions that we need to make, it is difficult, it's not easy, but we're willing to do that in order to first bring back our family members back home. They are being held in the dungeons of torture of Ramas. Look when in Hebrew, when you cheer, you know, with the glasses with wine, you cheer to life. Israel is about life. Our culture is about life. It's about protecting
our children. And so you know, our goal is to make sure that our children can live here safely and securely, not just us, but to create stability in our region so that we have prosperity and peace among everybody.
Sure, and we've run out of time, but I was going to talk about these satellite image is now coming out of Iran that they're building a new road into the Ford our uranium Enrichmond facility. It seems that they're going in there to assess the damage. So we shall see what comes out of that. Sharin Haskell, thank you for joining me tonight, and thank you for joining me
at home as well. I'll be back here tomorrow at eight pm to round out the week coming up now though in the man cave of course for Murray