Liberal senator Jane Hume has stated that Peter Dutton’s submissions to the party’s election review should never have been made public. Hume was responding to a recent report outlining Dutton’s views about Liberal MP Andrew Hastie’s performance during the last term.
“It’s very disappointing to see that what is a confidential submission to a review has somehow become public,” she said. “As a former election reviewer myself, I know it’s really important for those submissions that we retain their confidentiality to ensure people can feel candid.”
Hume also described it as preposterous to blame any single individual for the historic election loss, emphasizing that it was never just one person or one issue at fault.
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Meanwhile, Communications Minister Anika Wells is set to meet with the heads of Australia’s three largest telecommunications companies in Canberra tomorrow. The meeting will focus on how they plan to avoid a Triple Zero outage during the upcoming bushfire season, amid growing concerns following a fatal Optus outage in September.
“These meetings will be laying down the law, and we’ll be bringing more laws to parliament later this week,” Wells told Seven’s Sunrise this morning. “Australians must have confidence in the reliability of our Triple Zero system. And telcos need to do better.”
Wells added, “They’ll be getting together with me in Canberra tomorrow to make sure that we are all, from our individual positions in the system, doing everything we can to make sure that Australians do and can have confidence in Triple Zero ahead of the natural disaster season.”
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In other political news, Deputy Liberal leader Ted O’Brien has backed party leader Sussan Ley’s version of events in her feud with Liberal MP Andrew Hastie. O’Brien claimed that Hastie never raised his grievances with Ley before quitting the frontbench.
Hastie, the former home affairs spokesman, resigned last week. He said he believed Ley had stripped him of responsibility for immigration policy through a letter of expectations she sent him on Friday. Ley, however, said Hastie never raised this issue during their two conversations last week.
“My understanding is there was no discussion about the immigration portfolio… at all,” O’Brien said on Nine’s Today show. “If he believes he can make a better contribution from the backbench, it’s absolutely his right to do so. And I’m not going to criticise that.”
O’Brien also said he was unaware of former leader Peter Dutton’s scathing submissions about Hastie’s performance last term until reading about it in a recent report. “You know more than me,” he added.
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Defeated opposition leader Peter Dutton has placed significant blame for the Coalition’s election loss on Liberal MP Andrew Hastie. In explosive, secret submissions to the party’s election review, Dutton accused Hastie of going on strike and fumbling key policies.
Hastie’s shock exit from Sussan Ley’s frontbench on Friday has fueled speculation about Ley’s leadership as MPs return to Canberra on Tuesday. This development is likely to weaken the opposition’s attacks on the government regarding the Optus saga and the repatriation of so-called ISIS brides.
The West Australian MP’s social media posts on net zero by 2050 and migration have drawn mixed reactions from colleagues—some enthusiastic, others questioning his strategic judgment and commitment to keeping the party unified.
Dutton, who spent years alongside Hastie as senior leaders of the party’s Right faction before losing his seat, was particularly critical of Hastie’s performance in his submissions to the Liberal Party’s election review probing the historic loss.
“It was inconceivable to Dutton and his senior colleagues that Hastie effectively went on strike during the last term,” said one source familiar with Dutton’s submissions but not authorised to speak publicly.
Read the full exclusive by chief political correspondent Paul Sakkal.
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In US news, President Donald Trump has deployed 300 National Guard troops to break up immigration protests in Chicago. California Governor Gavin Newsom has vowed to challenge the decision in court.
Newsom described the deployment as “a breathtaking abuse of the law and power” in a statement.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson confirmed the president authorized using Illinois National Guard members, citing what she called “ongoing violent riots and lawlessness.”
The deployment follows frequent rallies near an immigration facility outside Chicago and a statement from the Department of Homeland Security that federal agents shot a woman in Chicago on Saturday morning.
The statement said the woman was shot after Border Patrol agents patrolling the area were ambushed by “domestic terrorists” who rammed federal agents with their vehicles.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/australia-news-live-telco-heads-to-face-government-for-triple-zero-meeting-tomorrow-trump-sends-300-national-guard-troops-to-chicago-to-break-up-protests-20251006-p5n0a7.html?ref=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss_feed
