The Point Live: 'Surrendering Australia, the AUKUS Deception'. As it happened.

And that is it from the press club. A reminder you can find the whole report here.

Thank you to everyone who joined us – we will bring you more as it comes over the next couple of weeks (and months)

We’ll put the blog to sleep again now until parliament comes back – we are heading to the last sitting of the year! Yay!

Until then, take care of you, and cause good trouble. Ax

Chris Barrie says Australia should also keep what is a ‘national security threat’ in check:

I think the threat of national security has been beaten up for quite some time in this country.

But if I put on my climate change hat, I’d say the largest national security threat and most important national security threat to this country comes from climate change consequences.

China and submarines is a man-made issue.

Climate change is coming down the turnpike much faster than anyone expects. That’s the serious priority.

Peter Garrett is asked:

Q: One for Peter Garrett. AUKUS was a captain’s call by the Prime Minister in opposition, I don’t think there’s been a prime minister, a Labor prime minister, as in total control of the party as Anthony Albanese has now. If Labor is going to detach itself from this policy, is leadership change a necessary part of that equation? Given how totally committed Anthony Albanese and his handpicked defence and defence industry ministers are to AUKUS?

Garett has obviously planned for this question:

So there’s there’s there’s never a time in politics that I’ve experienced, and as a student of history, when issues don’t essentially come back up to the surface again when they’ve either been ignored or pushed down for too long, and when that happens, the mark of our system, including all those that participate in it, from the prime minister through, is how you respond to those issues.

And I really do think that if this report has succeeded in doing anything, it’s bringing back the question of AUKUS to the surface, and I hope that the party will consider it.

Q: Is is that yes?

Garett:

That’s my answer.

Asked about the state of the Labor party today, former Labor minister, Peter Garrett says:

Well, I think it’s extraordinary that there hasn’t been a big debate about AUKUS in the party, but the Labor Party and its history is bigger, if you like, than any set of serving politicians, and it has a history of being a strong voice around debates of this kind in our modern history, at least I’m I’m talking about our post-colonial history, and I very much hope that this this report will stimulate that discussion.

And I thought it was really really disappointing that in Adelaide, essentially technical you know meeting procedures were used to stop a full debate about AUKUS coming onto the floor of the national conference. I mean, whether you’re a Labor supporter or not, not not only were they entertaining, but they were necessary to hear people who shared different views, perhaps the same underlying value system, but shared different views about a particular topic, actually getting a chance to express it and hear one another’s arguments, so that is something which I really hope the Labor Party takes account of. And make one final quick point: amongst the most eloquent presentations that this AUKUS inquiry received, one in Melbourne and one in Sydney came from former Labor foreign ministers, Foreign Minister Gareth Evans and Foreign Minister Bob Carr, and I really invite people to read those submissions.

And I know for a fact that there are many Labor people in branches, and many who’ve moved motions about AUKUS, and it’s time that AUKUS was ventilated again within the party.

Q: Would you still say the party would welcome views like yours if you were to consider running again or entering politics for the first time?

Garrett:

Well, hypothetical, you know, the hypothetical land still lives, you know, actively in Canberra, but not in this inquiry and this report. We’re dealing with the material that came to us, and it’s the Labor government up to this point in time that inherited the AUKUS decision from Morrison and just agreed to go on with it. And that is something which a lot of Labor people and Labor voters and former Labor members like myself, a former Labor minister and a current Labor member, think should be should be relitigated

Q: You mentioned a couple of times that your inquiry didn’t hear from current Labor federal MPs or ministers. Were you expecting that when you set out? And how do you do? You have a plan for how you actually affect change when you can’t get the government to pay attention.

Peter Garrett:

So look, I think it really was a matter of great regret that the government chose not to appear or to present any material to this inquiry because it was a bona fide, open consideration, and everything is on the record, so there was every opportunity for people in the community to be able to have a look at what the government may have put for together as a position statement or the like, against the other advice and material we received. One of the things that you’ll note if you’ve gotten to it in the report, I don’t, I can’t remember whether it’s footnoted or it’s in there as well, but we also found, and I think this is particularly troubling, that both the Commonwealth and the South Australian government had chosen to make representations, public representations to the British Parliament on AUKUS and put that on the public record. But as as we we felt had chosen, you know, to give us the finger, as it were.

So, I’ve written to the Prime Minister on a couple of occasions, inviting the government to present, and again to come and present the report to the government for consideration. It will be made freely available to ministers and to the caucus and to parliamentarians, to the opposition and to all of the parties.

And it would be my, and I’m sure the other commissioners, very dear and strong hope that the government will have a look at it, contest it, tell us where we’ve got it wrong, by all means. But at least enable that discussion to happen with the Australian people. It’s nothing short of extraordinary, really. And for the fourth estate, nothing short of extraordinary.

That this has been allowed to to go on for so long. This this thing’s rolling along as though there’s no tomorrow, and yet there are so many holes in it. So let’s see what they say and do when the report gets delivered to their doorstep.

Chris Barrie:

I went down to Rockingham to the Australian Submarine Agency’s visitor center while we were in Fremantle, and it was a very interesting visit. There was a lot of propaganda about how AUKUS is such a great deal for Australia, so I took copies of all that propaganda material, but the thing that struck me was they were showing videotapes of Collins class submarines doing submarine escape exercises in Coburn Sound, and I thought it was almost like being in Disneyland.

I asked the people in there how many visitors they had had. They’d been open about a month and a half, 40 visitors. So we have a problem, government.

Q: Do you concede that that we do need what defence calls an apex predator for that for that deterrence, including China?

Chris Barrie:

No, I don’t. Look, I think we need to carefully think about what is required in the defense of Australia. This is what the DIB report did in ’86, and they had trouble selling the idea that Australia would define its defense very differently from the United States. And I think that’s what we need to go through again, because when I look at the globe and ask myself, where are the Australia’s primary defense interests?

They’re all south of the equator, and I think the whole idea that we’re going to march off and do whatever against China as routine deployment of a submarine force is is not soundly based, because I think we’re a country that wants to look after our own defense interests, but we don’t want to be threatening anybody else, so that’s where I look at it at the moment. But without going through the process of a proper thing like the deep review, it’s very hard to make the final judgment on that.

Q: Do you recognize that China has changed under Xi Jinping?

Barrie:

Of course, China has changed, but so have we all. I mean, when you look at the China that’s been drawn out of poverty, and you look at, you know, I was looking yesterday at a figure about 15-year-old students and their capacities in reading, writing, and arithmetic. They are way ahead of any other country on the planet.

So, what does that tell me? In 1.4 billion people who are living in China. China, the international capacity of what’s coming down the turnpike from a China that’s in whose industry has been reformed, my modern technologies and way we still can only dream about.

You know, I just think it’s a mistake to say this is not right. I mean, we’ve got to get on that wagon.

Ret. Admiral Chris Barrie is asked about China and says:

I’ve been to China a number of times. I had the privilege of traveling around the country with the chief of the PLA for over a week when I was CDF, and I visited China and had quite a lot to do with Chinese military people.

What really sticks in my mind is the chief of the PLA said to me, “You know, you showed me what an Australian battalion looks like. Nine are still growing vegetables.” That was 20 years ago. I think we need to recalibrate the way we deal with China, and I remember a few years ago when we were lecturing the Chinese via the media that they reacted to that quite badly for people who had a trading relationship with China. But whatever way you want to look at the future in this region, by 2050, Australia will be sorry, China will be the world’s largest power, the world’s greatest power, and that says to me, in our region with six and a half billion people in it, we’re all going to have to learn to build our relationship with China along lines that work. So where would I be looking?

I’d be looking at our embassy in Beijing. I am not sure that it’s being staffed to the way it ought to be. I think it should be our second largest embassy, if not the largest embassy that we have overseas now, I think we need to be more understanding about where the Chinese are coming from. And finally, I don’t see any evidence of global aspirations and global dominance aspirations that we’ve seen out of the United States, and that’s why I worry about the contest between the United States and China.

These two great powers are coming from entirely different perspectives of how the world ought to run.

Questions have begun and you might find this one interesting:

Asked if there was anything he learned or anything that changed his view, Peter Garrett says:

My major objection to AUKUS in the first instance was that there was no debate. I mean, I’m a member of a political party where vigorous debate is, or should be, part of the ordinary course of discussing issues of importance. Where was the vigorous debate in the caucus, where was the vigorous debate in the caucus?

Where was the vigorous debate in the cabinet? We don’t have any sense that there’s been a debate. So that’s my starting point. And the second thing is looking at the cost and looking at the fact that safe storage of high-level radioactive waste wasn’t included, and then examining the actual contracts, the deals, the agreements, the arrangements, just makes you realize that if your first sense was that you thought there was something wrong with a deal and it wasn’t as needed to be examined, your conclusion after looking at it and hearing from expert advice is that it is a complete, absolute crock.

Peter Garrett:

The single recommendation of the AUKUS public inquiry to the public is to share, publicise, debate, and connect with politicians about AUKUS and these findings.

It’s made with a regrettable assumption, already mentioned, that the government will likely ignore or possibly even disparage this report.

That has been the case up to now.

Still, this is the most important point we can make.

For government and politicians, we recommend a royal commission into AUKUS, investigating and assessing the processes, procedures, responsibilities, and implementations up to now.

Only a royal commission with broad terms of reference can provide a detailed understanding as to how and who got Australia into this mess, but also how better to approach major defense procurements in the future.

Other recommendations include the termination of AUKUS Pillar One and a recasting of Pillar Two, preparation of a Plan B for submarine fleet replacement, suspension of the plans for the U.S. Naval Base at Stirling in Western Australia, and the base at Osborne in South Australia.

The development of a national security strategy, including a recalibration of our major power relationships, as enunciated by the former chief of the defense force Chris Barry here today.

The release of the 2022 Office of National Intelligence threat assessment on the national security risk of climate change, which still is being kept secret by the Albanese government.

Climate change is an identifiable growing risk to all Australians and our regional neighbors. That information should be in the public domain, and an immediate and forensic Australian National Audit Office audit of AUKUS.

Of these, as I said, the recommendations to the public to get involved is key. As Abraham Lincoln noted long ago, and may in fact be expressed right now in another continent, in another hemisphere, public sentiment is everything.

With it, nothing can fail.

Against it, nothing can succeed, and it is on this point that we conclude the work of the AUKUS public inquiry.

If Australians from all walks of life and all political persuasions favor our governments using public monies wisely, making defence decisions based on the national interest, and not at the behest of other nations, and believe that ultimately our long-term security and peaceful prosperity lies in standing on our own feet and charting our own course, then AUKUS should be scrapped. And scrapped now.

Ret. Admiral Barrie finishes with:

When I was a young officer, I worked with my bosses on a navy program to acquire a new aircraft carrier to replace HMAS Melbourne. The program had been keenly debated under the Fraser governments before the Hawke government was elected in 1983. Within two weeks of taking office, it scrapped the carrier program. It then reviewed Australia’s strategic position through a new lens, and built a new defence force around contemporary and prospective strategic needs. The Dibb Review of 1986 and the 1987 Defence White Paper are examples of the kind of work we need to do now. It is urgent.

To be clear, we support submarines as part of our present and future force structure. But before deciding what future submarines Australia needs, we must decide what we need them to do—and only then explore sensible options.

What are we seeking to achieve? What are we seeking to protect against? What dangers must we prepare for? Where are we vulnerable? How should diplomacy, economic policy, intelligence, defence and national resilience work together? And how do we set priorities between the impacts of climate change and man-made existential threats?

These questions must be answered in public, by a government prepared to explain its reasoning—not left to Washington and London to answer for us.

Answering them would also force the question AUKUS has never addressed: what are these submarines for? If the real answer is hunting Chinese submarines near China’s home bases, or escorting huge American carrier battle groups, the government should say so—and explain why those missions serve Australia.

Ending the submarine plan does not end our need for submarines. We must keep a credible capability, under full Australian command and control, while we properly evaluate a replacement for Collins.

And we must safeguard our capacity to decide for ourselves. Sovereignty is not ownership of a submarine or a flag above a base. It is the ability of an Australian government to decide and act in Australia’s interests—including when our allies would prefer that we did not.

The test is not whether we can say yes — that may look easy, but it will be hard. It is whether we can say no — and that is likely to be the toughest decision an Australian government has to make.

I have fewer years ahead of me than those left behind. Younger Australians will live with these choices far longer than I will. We owe them more than assurances. We owe them an honest account of the dangers, the alternatives, and the decisions being made in their name.

Please do two things:

Ask your Member of Parliament where they stand on AUKUS and quiz them if necessary.

Read the report.

(Ret) Admiral Barrie:

The report we are releasing today is very clear: the AUKUS submarine plan is untenable.

It should be ended as soon as possible. And we should never allow an acquisition program like AUKUS to define our national security strategy.

Why?

First, what are the prospects that Australia, of its own volition, would ever go to war with any other country, including China? It would not be in our interest. China is in the region in which we live. It has the world’s largest navy by number of ships, and the world’s largest shipbuilding capacity. It is also one of our most important trading partners. It is also the country of ancestry for over one in twenty of fellow citizens. It would be madness for us to take on a great power like China. The only way I can conceive of Australians being involved in a war with China would be by joining a conflict between the United States and China. That may serve the interests of the United States. It would not serve ours.

My point is that it makes no sense to build our defence force around that possibility. Yet the long-range missions these submarines are designed for make most sense in exactly that kind of war.

Second, AUKUS has put Australia’s long-standing support for the NPT and the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone under strain. We are grappling with what it means to become the first non-nuclear-weapon state to operate nuclear-powered submarines fuelled with weapons-grade uranium. There are many questions. But again no answers.

AUKUS has come at a time when the world is dismantling the safeguards put in place to reduce the risk of nuclear war— proudly, by some Australian leaders over the last half century. Last year, 129 Nobel laureates signed a declaration warning of the growing threat of nuclear weapons use. This year that risk has increased further as arms control agreements have collapsed. We should all be concerned. Every nation should be taking steps to support non-proliferation and disarmament. AUKUS points in the opposite direction.

Third, Australia has agreed by treaty to manage and dispose of all spent fuel and radioactive waste from its AUKUS submarines—including the highly enriched uranium in their reactors—but we still do not know how or where. After six decades, neither the United States nor the United Kingdom has a permanent disposal site for spent submarine fuel. And ten years ago, the nuclear waste proposal that followed the South Australian Royal Commission on the Nuclear Fuel Cycle failed to win community support. That is salutary. Any plan to dispose of highly enriched uranium waste in Australia will be unacceptable to many Australians.

The views of the Australians we heard from—young people, their mums and dads, and First Australians—are very clear. They are concerned about nuclear issues. Many have come to realise that AUKUS is all about nuclear issues: the waste from the submarine program, and the rotation of American and British nuclear-powered submarines through Western Australia—American submarines that could in future carry nuclear weapons. They think something needs to be done about it.

I say again—the AUKUS submarine plan is not tenable.

It’s time for our government to take the lead on this matter: scrap the AUKUS submarine plan now, and rebuild national security decision-making processes—the developmental work and community consultation—needed to produce a comprehensive national security strategy. We need a strategy, based on a whole-of-government approach, to guide us into the future. Such a strategy would provide a sound basis for policy.

By Staff Writers

Former Chief of the Australian Defence Force, Admiral Chris Barrie, has told the National Press Club that he has been worried about AUKUS since its inception.

“Since September 2021, much of what I have read about AUKUS has worried me. That is why I agreed to serve as a commissioner on this public inquiry,” he said.

“The report we are releasing today is very clear: the AUKUS submarine plan is untenable.

“It should be ended as soon as possible. And we should never allow an acquisition program like AUKUS to define our national security strategy.”

“It would be madness for us to take on a great power like China.”: Former ADF Chief Chris Barrie

Not mincing his words, Chris Barrie has warned it would be “madness” for Australia to get dragged into a war with China.

First, what are the prospects that Australia, of its own volition, would ever go to war with any other country, including China? It would not be in our interest. China is in the region in which we live. It has the world’s largest navy by number of ships, and the world’s largest shipbuilding capacity. It is also one of our most important trading partners. It is also the country of ancestry for over one in twenty of fellow citizens. It would be madness for us to take on a great power like China. The only way I can conceive of Australians being involved in a war with China would be by joining a conflict between the United States and China. That may serve the interests of the United States. It would not serve ours.

Commissioner, (Ret’d) Former Chief of the Australian Defence Force, Admiral Chris Barrie has taken to the stage.

He says that no one serving in the Coalition or Labor party currently took up the invitation to attend the inquiry, and the same went from anyone currently serving in the ADF.

He says that is a shame, as they could have examined the reasons the establishment thinks that the AUKUS deal is worth it.

But all in all, Barrie says the deal will make Australia less safe.

The report we are releasing today is very clear: the AUKUS submarine plan is untenable.

It should be ended as soon as possible, and we should never, never allow an acquisition program like AUKUS to define our national security strategy.

Why is this?

First, what are the prospects that Australia, of its own volition, would ever go to war with any other country, including China.

It would not be in our interests, and China is in the region in which we live.

China has the world’s largest navy by a number of ships, and the world’s largest shipbuilding capacity.

It’s also one of our most important trading partners, and it’s also the country of ancestry for over one in 20 fellow Australians.

It would be madness for us to take on a great power like China.

The only way I can conceive of Australians being involved in a war with China would be by joining a conflict between the United States and China, and that may serve the interests of the United States, but I cannot see that it would serve ours.

My point is, it makes no sense to build our defense force around that possibility.

Yet the long-range missions these submarines are designed for make most sense in exactly that kind of war.

By Staff Writers

The report has made 18 principal findings, including that the plan jeopardises national security, undermines sovereignty, risks conflicts of interest and that there is no evidence that will provide more jobs.

“There are no refunds, no enforceable obligations on partner countries, and no recourse if things go wrong. In fact, Australia indemnifies the US and the UK against any claims concerning nuclear risks,” Peter Garrett told the National Press Club.

“By any measure AUKUS is a terrible, one-sided deal. We therefore recommend that notice should immediately be given to scrap AUKUS before more money is wasted, and the many risks inherent to the project are allowed to escalate.”

Read the recommendations here: https://aukuspublicinquiry.com/

Peter Garett finishes with:

Meanwhile, Australia hosts visits of nuclear-powered and, in the future, possibly nuclear-armed submarines from the U.S. here in Australia into the port of Stirling in WA, Stirling is fast becoming a de facto U.S. base, with over 2,000 U.S. troops to be housed at Australia’s expense.

By the way, as part of America’s containment of China policy, this makes suburbs like Rockingham and Fremantle near the port likely targets.

Yet governments so far have failed to prepare or even consider how to manage such a calamitous possibility.

There are no refunds, no enforceable obligations on partner countries, and no recourse if things go wrong.

In fact, Australia indemnifies the U.S. and the U.K. against any claims concerning nuclear risks by any measure.

AUKUS is a terrible one-sided deal.

We therefore recommend that notice be given immediately to scrap AUKUS before more money is wasted, and the many risks inherent in the project allowed to escalate. And Chris will address key matters from these and other findings shortly.

But one stands out.

This is the absence of costing or any thorough plan for the safe disposal, including specifying the location of the high-level radioactive weapons-grade nuclear waste produced by the AUKUS submarines that Australia has agreed to take and store indefinitely.

For First Nations peoples in particular, with a history of suffering the impact of British nuclear testing in South Australia. This omission is galling, but this is AUKUS pushing on under the cover of darkness while ignoring the fact that after decades and with more resources and nuclear expertise than Australia, neither the United Kingdom nor the United States has yet managed to construct a permanent, high-level radioactive waste storage facility at all.

We also find there is a significant conflict of interest dimension to AUKUS with the rapid transition of senior ministers and defense officials from government to the arms industry, that the education sector is being increasingly penetrated by the military-industrial complex associated with AUKUS, that existing legislation with environmental protections and consent expectations is being overridden by AUKUS legislation, that the employment benefits of AUKUS are exaggerated, and crucially, that there are practical alternatives to the Pillar One nuclear-powered submarines.

In all of this, we note there is no social or political license for AUKUS at all.

Certainly, no deep public understanding, let alone acceptance of the abrogation of Australia’s sovereign capacity in defense that is implied in the AUKUS agreement.

At a time of dwindling trust in our democracy and its institutions, especially politics and the media, this is a key finding which should not be discounted, nor we urge ignored.

By Staff Writers

The Public Inquiry into AUKUS has been released at the National Press Club, and it has lashed the deal.

“Our findings cohere with these majority and expert views and we concluded that AUKUS is ‘the worst, most costly and riskiest defence decision ever made by an Australian government, and, without adequate scrutiny’” Former Labor Minister, and Commissioner, Peter Garrett said in his speech.

The report has been released in full, you can read it here: https://aukuspublicinquiry.com/

Peter Garrett:

So, if the Parliament wouldn’t do its job properly, the job of rigorously examining the agreement, that left it to the community to roll up its sleeves, investigate, and report on the deal, and that is what we have done.

We travel widely. We heard from military experts and former senior defence officials, including the former head of the Royal Australian Navy submarine squadron, retired Rear Admiral Peter Briggs, a former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, three former Defence Ministers, two former Foreign Ministers, First Nations communities, academics, former military officers, former senior public servants, community groups, unions, and most importantly, a very concerned and thoughtful public.

The inquiry received numerous written submissions and considered carefully the material and views that were presented to us. And with the exception of former defence ministers [Kim] Beazley, [Christopher] Pyne, and [Linda] Reynolds, along with a handful of others, the vast majority presented compelling arguments to the inquiry that AUKUS was seriously flawed and unlikely to deliver future security to Australia.

Our findings cohere with these majority and expert views, and we concluded, and I quote: “That AUKUS is the worst, most costly, and riskiest defence decision ever made by an Australian government, and without adequate scrutiny.”

This echoes the verdict of another former Prime Minister, Paul Keating, who, like Malcolm Turnbull, has argued that AUKUS is, and I quote, the worst deal ever.

We additionally found AUKUS represents a massive cost for submarines whose usefulness is debatable, which may never arrive, and that the deal undermines our sovereignty, risks our prosperity, distorts the defense budget and fails to promote regional peace and security.

Under AUKUS, Australia subsidizes construction facilities in the UK and the US to the tune of a preliminary budget approaching $9 billion initially for the construction of their own fleets, despite both countries being way behind in schedule. There is next to no hope of the AUKUS submarines ever being delivered on time.

Peter Garrett opens by explaining why the People’s Commission was established:

The AUKUS public inquiry shows when people roll up their sleeves and bring genuine conviction to think about, inquire, and judge a matter of national importance, then things can happen. A big shout out to everyone involved in the hearings and who submitted to our inquiry.

We witnessed the best expression of love and concern that we could have hoped for, and I note in passing, all done without drawing down on the public purse at all.

This alone marked AUKUS the public inquiry as a substantial achievement. Why was the inquiry undertaken? How did it play out? And what have we found?

It came about because it is the biggest ever defense deal in our modern history, with two key features.

The first feature: the vast amounts involved, an initial figure of some 368 billion dollars.

That’s 33 million dollars a day for the next 30 years. years spent by Australia, which blows out to around half a trillion dollars by our estimate when some 180 extra billion dollars for radioactive waste management and burial is included.

And secondly, the lockstep embrace with the military interests of another nation, the United States, that is the central feature of AUKUS. Yet, despite this, AUKUS was never fully debated, let alone seriously considered, by the national parliament.

As Greg has pointed out, the agreement was authored five years ago by then Prime Minister Scott Morrison, referred to by U.S. President Biden as, and I quote, “that fella down under,” on announcement day, and agreed to immediately by Anthony Albanese.

Since coming to power, Labor has failed to conduct a thorough review of this most significant of defence agreements. Conceived in secret, AUKUS has spurned established defence and parliamentary oversight practices.

Hence, the title of this report: Surrendering Australia, the AUKUS Deception.

Anthony Albanese is at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting where he has met with his UK counterpart. They have released this statement:

Addressing online violence in our democracies – promoting equality in Commonwealth Parliaments.

A toxic online environment is a threat to all Commonwealth democracies. It threatens our values and undermines our people’s freedom and choices.  

Workplace violence in any context is unacceptable, including that faced by journalists and media who are crucial to protecting freedom and democracy. We also condemn rising violence and aggression towards all frontline workers, including health and retail workers.

There are more than 6000 women parliamentarians across 180 State and Federal Parliaments in Commonwealth countries.  

We know that in Australia and the UK women parliamentarians are three times more likely to report receiving sexualised or gender-based threats, online and in person, than men in parliament.  

And in the UK and Australia, elected representatives have been killed or injured for doing their jobs, out in their communities. 

Similar horrific stories exist across the Commonwealth and disproportionately feature women parliamentarians as the targets.  

This erodes our democracies. Talented and principled people choose not to stand for election because of the hate they see their elected representatives and their families face.  

Addressing these harms requires collective action. Governments, technology companies, and other stakeholders must all play their part in creating safer online spaces that protect individuals and communities, support respectful public debate and enable safe participation in public life. 

At the UN General Assembly, our governments committed to working together to make the online environment safer and give people back their choice. The choice of what they see in their feeds, and the protections to ensure children are not exposed to harmful content online.  Australia and the UK have also committed, through our bilateral Memorandums of Understanding to Collaborate on Ending Gender-based Violence and on Online Safety and Security, to deepen cooperation on shared online safety challenges, including technology-facilitated gender-based violence.

We commit to working together with the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, with the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians, and with countries from across the Commonwealth to bring together technology, expertise and practical solutions to help protect parliamentarians from online abuse and support democratic participation across the Commonwealth. We’ll hold the first forum in 2027 and will engage all those in the Commonwealth who share these values.  

There are a range of software tools that are being trialled in our Parliaments and around the world, and we welcome and encourage this innovation.  

While we work to change attitudes, restore respectful debate and return people’s choice, in the short term we can commit to take steps together to protect our democracies.

The midterm results are on all the TVs outside the main press club room – and there have been some protesters who have greeted attendees of both the AUKUS report release and those coming to watch the US midterm results.

Hello and welcome to a special edition of The Point Live.

We are breaking into the midterm watch to watch the National Press Club, where “Former Labor Minister the Hon Peter Garrett and Commissioner, (Ret’d) Former Chief of the Australian Defence Force, Admiral Chris Barrie will answer the critical questions, “will Aukus keep us safe – and at what cost”.”

The AUKUS public inquiry was the first of its kind – asking the questions successive governments have so far refused to do – namely, is this a deal that is in AUSTRALIA’S public interest?

You can find more details of the commission here.

Full disclosure – Co-CEO of the Australia Institute, Leanne Minshull is one of the commissioners on this inquiry. But that’s not why we are here. Polling tells us most Australians are at the very least, very skeptical about this deal. And rightly so.

So we’ll cover off the NPC and then see where it takes us. See you soon.