Australia news live: Labor’s hate speech laws pass the Senate; experts warn research gap on NDIS tool could lead to ‘tragedies’ | Anthony Albanese

Morrison fires back over Albanese comments on when antisemitism started rising

Josh Taylor

Former prime minister, Scott Morrison, has fired back over comments Anthony Albanese, made in question time on Tuesday after the opposition leader, Sussan Ley, asked Albanese if he would apologise for not acting on antisemitism sooner.

Albanese told the parliament that antisemitism didn’t start when the Labor government was elected in 2022, pointing to comments from Liberal senator Andrew Bragg that antisemitism began rising in 2019, when Morrison was prime minister.

On X, Morrison posted:

Hamas never praised the actions of my Government @AlboMP, but they did praise yours.

Morrison appeared to be referring to a report in the Nine newspapers last year that co-founder and senior official Hassan Yousef had welcomed the decision of Australia to recognise a Palestinian state. The veracity of the statement, however, was disputed, and Nine later clarified that the statement came from Yousef’s office, not the man himself.

Kate Lyons

The head of Australia’s peak body of psychologists and disability experts have warned the NDIS’s new assessment tool hasn’t been tested on a variety of disability types – including diverse autistic needs – which may lead to “tragedies” occurring, if more research is not conducted.

The NDIA called the tool the “gold standard of available, validated needs assessment tools. It has been developed over more than 20 years in the Australian context and tested through multiple research studies across a range of disability groups”.

The president of the Australian Psychological Society, Dr Kelly Gough, which represents more than 25,000 psychologists across Australia, said APS members had raised concerns that the I-CAN is “not particularly good at understanding the sorts of requirements and support needs for people in [some disability] categories” including those with acquired brain injury and psychosocial conditions.

Gough warned that if the I-CAN were to be implemented broadly without further research and validation, there could be consequences.

What will probably happen is that there will just be terrible outcomes for six months or a year and complaints … and people talking to the government and the ombudsman and whatever else and maybe a couple of tragedies and then something will get fixed.

Josh Taylor

‘Not proposing to look at this again’: Labor backs down from racial vilification laws

The attorney general, Michelle Rowland, has said the government does not plan to try to pass laws targeting racial vilification in Australia after it was removed from hate speech bills in parliament on Tuesday in order to secure Liberal support through the Senate.

Rowland told ABC’s 7.30 program she understood the “frustration” from Jewish experts that those parts of the bill were removed but the government would not return to it later.

The direct response to your question, the prime minister has made it clear the time to have brought this forward and the time to have he had bipartisanship on this matter is now. We are not proposing to look at this again. And we understand the frustrations that are felt around that.

It would be something that the royal commission could examine, Rowland said, but the government would not proceed with a future bill unless there was bipartisan support.

Despite repeated questioning, Rowland would not say what other factors beyond a group accusing Israel of genocide or apartheid, and if that meant Jewish Australians feel intimidated, would lead to that group being banned under the legislation.

Good morning. Nick Visser will be here shortly to guide you through the day’s news.

Laws to ban hate groups and establish a national gun buyback scheme have passed the Senate after the Albanese government struck separate deals with the Liberals and Greens to legislate its response to the Bondi beach massacre.

The two bills were rushed last night at the end of a special two-day sitting to deal with the political fallout of the 14 December shooting.

The hate speech laws divided the Coalition, with the Nationals splitting from the Liberals to oppose what leader David Littleproud described as a “mess” that “over-reached”.

Plus: the head of Australia’s peak body of psychologists and disability experts have warned the NDIS’s new assessment tool hasn’t been tested on a variety of disability types – including diverse autistic needs – which may lead to “tragedies” occurring, if more research is not conducted.

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