Hello and welcome back to The Point Live, where we have made it to the final week of parliament! Huzzah! We did it, Joe.

Almost.

Labor looks like extending the final week so that the parliament sits on Friday as well so it can pass its mining friendly environment laws, now that the mining industry seems to have pushed the Liberals into agreeing to negotiate on the bill (it had been pushed into March next year by way of an inquiry, but as we said at the time, these things can always be changed if a deal is made).

This all comes as the Coalition falls to 42% in the latest Newspoll and Sussan Ley is beaten by ‘don’t know’ as preferred leader of the Liberal party. (We predicted this too – turns out not standing for anything DOES end up being an electoral liability).

While the decline of the Coalition continues to suck up all the oxygen, Labor is continuing to get its own way and doing a bunch of things no one asked it to, including upending the presumption of innocence and pushing legislation that will give police powers over welfare payments. Labor wants to pass a law that allows police to recommend cancelling the welfare payments of someone suspected of a crime – not convicted, just suspected. Right now, they say it will only be in the worst case scenarios, but the thing with these laws is that they end up being applied to everyone. Especially protesters.

More than a hundred experts and advocacy workers have co-signed a statement on why it’s a very bad idea, but the government is trying to push the legislation through the senate, with it re-appearing on the list for this morning.

We will keep you updated on that, and everything else that is going on. Mike Bowers, on loan from The New Daily, is roaming the halls for us, and you have a whole team of experts ready to let you know all the missing information and context surrounding what the media is talking about.

It is going to be a three coffee morning. This week is going to be tough, so I am trying to ease into it. I also have one last chocolate frog, which a lovely friend of the blog gifted me last week following an event and which I have been saving for this very day. Treat yourself.

Ready? Let’s get into it.