Live news and politics: Tensions rise as Tony Burke quizzed on Labor government’s weak border protection

Elon Musk’s X fought against an order to remove harrowing Bondi massacre content, telling eSafety commissioner Julie Inman Grant the footage showing murder victims was “no worse than a gore movie”.

Australia’s internet regulator detailed the struggle to purge graphic terror attack footage amid ongoing friction with tech giants at the Royal Commission into anti-Semitism and Social Cohesion on Thursday.

Following the December 14 attack on a Hanukkah celebration, highly graphic and confronting material circulated online, including footage of the shooting, images of victims, and explicit witness accounts.

In response to the spread of this violent content, the eSafety Commission set up a dedicated investigation team to address it.

Ms Inman Grant said takedowns can be delayed as Australian law requires a Classification Board ruling before the regulator can force tech platforms to remove content.

“We fought hard against X in terms of not allowing that post-mortem Bondi content,” she said.

“We fought really hard and we were able to get them to agree to keep that ‘Refused Classification’.”

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A Liberal leader has sought to distance herself from a political donations scandal ensnaring a former premier’s brothers, senior party powerbrokers and a fugitive developer.

NSW Opposition Leader Kellie Sloane said she supports an Independent Commission Against Corruption probe into long-standing allegations of misconduct involving members of the state Liberal branch.

She described the timing of the inquiry due to start in July, less than a year out from state elections, as a “massive distraction” that was damaging to her party in pleading its case to govern.

“To be absolutely clear that I don’t stand for the kind of behaviour that is being alleged,” she told reporters in parliament on Thursday.

“This behaviour, if it’s proven, is absolutely reprehensible, has no place in the party that I lead.”

The inquiry was sparked when state Liberal MP Ray Williams in 2022 used parliamentary privilege to claim powerbrokers within his own party were engaged in branch-stacking and improper local council dealings.

Controversial property developer Jean Nassif was alleged to have drawn on his political connections through donations to facilitate favourable planning decisions.

The claims led to a parliamentary inquiry in 2023 that engaged professional process servers to search for then-Liberal premier Dominic Perrottet’s brothers, Jean-Claude and Charles, without success.

- with AAP

Dodgy disability providers could be named and shamed, fines for bad conduct increased and greater powers granted to agencies overseeing the NDIS in a bid to crack down on fraud in the scheme.

As the Federal government plans to kick hundreds of thousands of participants off the National Disability Insurance Scheme, a parliamentary inquiry warned tougher measures are needed to limit the amount of taxpayer money stolen by fraudsters.

The Labor-led committee has warned fraud is increasingly becoming a major issue in the $56 billion scheme and threatens to undermine public trust.

The government is planning to increase fines for some NDIS-related offences, but the committee warned stronger deterrents may be needed to crack down on exploitation, neglect and abuse of vulnerable Australians.

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Things heated up in Parliament after Question Time, when Dan Tehan tried to censure the Minister of Defence Industry, Pat Conroy, over a quote in his National Press Club speech.

Tehan appeared visibly angry and called for Contoy to be censured for calling former Prime Minister Robert Menzies a “nazi appeaser”.

“This is an utter, utter disgrace.,” he said.

Leader of the House, Tony Burke, immediately moved to shut down the motion, saying Tehan should “no longer be heard”.

During the final Question Time before the midwinter break, Independent MP Monique Ryan has asked about reports that the Australian Tertiary Education Commission won’t advise on reasonable costs of degrees until next year.

This means the controversial Job Ready scheme will continue until at least then.

“How can you justify this when you have acknowledged on many occasions that Job Ready isn’t working?” she asked.

Education Minister Jason Clare said he acknowledged the Job Ready scheme had been a failure and the commission not advising on new costs until next year was unmoveable..

“I have said it’s failed. I’ve said work on fixing it is unfinished business,” he said.

“What is also a fact is that no government has done more to cut student debt.”

Independent Sophie Scamps has asked about the proposed gambling reforms put forth today, which have been widely criticised for failing to go far enough.

MP Scamps asked why the Albanese government had opted to “protect the profits of gambling, media and sports companies” rather than implementing all recommendations from the 2023 inquiry.

The Prime Minister said his government has done more than any other to combat harm from gambling, and he insists the reforms will make an “enormous” difference.

“We’ve worked constructively with the anti-gambling sector, and with commercial broadcasters and sporting organisations,” he said.

“This is good reform, this is a major step forward, and the Parliament should vote for it.

“We have taken the strongest possible action that the government has taken in history.”

Question Time has heated up, with the Shadow Foreign Minister Ted O’Brien demanding to know why the Albanese government is so weak in protecting Australian borders.

On Thursday morning the government said an operation involving twelve people who arrived in North Queensland by boat had closed and all individuals without visas had been removed from the nation.

Mr O’Brien demanded to know how the group “managed to have a frothy at the pub before authorities detained them”.

The line of questioning had Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke incensed.

“It has been more than a decade since there has been a successful people smuggling operation, more than a decade . . . but this character, this leader of the opposition, the guy who wants to bring all three right wing parties together,” he began, but was cut off by Dan Tehan.

Tehan, the manager of opposition business, asked the Minister to refer to Angus Taylor by his correct title.

Burke snarked back: “Mr Speaker, at 2.30pm on 2 July, he’s the Leader of the Opposition and I refer to him as Leader of the Opposition.”

Tehan then queried why Burke hadn’t addressed the officers who had a “frothy” before the arrests.

Burke was fired up and began shouting in response.

“Instead of standing with those Australian officials, you want to mock them,” he said.

The Minister for Defence Industry, Pat Conroy, has denied any split between the Labor rank-and-file and the federal party over AUKUS.

During a speech at the National Press Club on Thursday, Mr Conroy was asked about the divide the trilateral security partnership has caused in the Labor party.

The MP rejected the premise that the debate hasn’t settled across the Labor movement.

“At the national conference it got well over an 80% vote. For any contentious issue that’s an overwhelming majority and I’m confident that the support is strong,” he told reporters.

When asked if vocal AUKUS critics like Peter Garrett could be convinced to support the deal, Mr Conroy said it was “frankly ridiculous” that Garrett would change his position after spending four decades campaigning against nuclear.

“We need to be reasonable about this,” he said at the National Press Club on Thursday.

“The debate in this country sometimes . . . I just think there’s a hyperbole here that is just ridiculous.

“We’re hitting every milestone.”

The Opposition has called for the government to back legislation that passed through the Senate this morning, which would return human oversight to Labor’s aged care assessment tool.

The Coalition passed a bill calling for human override to be reinstated in all aged care assessments, but it will need to pass through the lower house to be enacted into law.

Aged Care Minister Sam Rae said the Labor government did support the Bill’s intent, but were concerned it would lead to ‘subjective and inconsistent decisions’.

“This morning, I announced the government will itself, through legislation, establish a new legislative escalation option so outcomes of the aged care integrated assessment tool can be changed in extenuating circumstances,” she said.

“This means that in the small number of cases where a person’s complex circumstances are not fully captured by the tool.

“Under this new pathway, their assessment can be escalated to the Secretary of the Department, and adjusted if necessary, so they get appropriate care.”

Prime Minister Albanese denied that the system lacked human oversight, with the Labor leader saying the Coalition was in no position to criticise after the Robodebt scandal.

“There is human oversight over all of these processes … For the party of Robodebt to actually have the hide to come in here and talk about these issues shows extraordinary gumption,” the Prime Minister said.

Liberal MP Simon Kennedy has been kicked out of today’s Question Time over unparliamentary behaviour after calling out Prime Minister Albanese on gambling reforms.

Just hours after the NSW MP said Albanese had “a gambling problem” with the reforms, the Liberal took aim at the Prime Minister during a dixer.

“Don’t you care about the suicide victims of gambling?” he shouted at Albanese.

The interjection got the MP booted out of the Parliament hearing, with Speaker Milton Dick offering a stern warning to the rest of the room afterwards.

“We’re not going to have that behaviour, with people just yelling out non-stop during an answer . . . I ask all members to just reflect on their behaviour today.”