Sharma backs Ley but will support ‘whoever’ Liberal party elects as leader
Penry Buckley
Senator Dave Sharma says he backs the opposition leader, Sussan Ley, amid a possible spill, but says he will support “whoever has been elected by the Liberal party room to be leader”.
Sharma, who is part of Ley’s moderate faction, has told ABC Sydney that Ley “has my support as leader”, adding he is not involved in speculation or discussions about her future.
Asked if he would support Angus Taylor as Liberal party leader, Sharma says:
I will support whoever has been elected by the Liberal party room to be the leader. I think it’s important that we all make that commitment. Because, you know, whoever has been chosen to be the captain of the time, it’s ultimately a team sport, politics, and if the team is trying to play different games or different strategies on the field, we’re not going to win.
Sharma says he is “very frustrated” with the current state of the Liberal party:
I think we have a lot of problems and national issues, and it is our job as an opposition to highlight those and to put forward alternative ideas … and at the moment, we’re not doing as good a job of that as we should be.
Key events
Mother of teen alleging her son was assaulted by police at Sydney rally says she plans to press charges
The mother of a 16-year-old who alleges her son was assaulted by police at Monday’s rally at Sydney Town Hall plans to press charges.
Kefah Maradweh and her son, Nedal, spoke to ABC Radio Sydney this morning about the violent interaction between protestors and police. Nedal recounted seeing a group of Muslim men praying in the area before they were allegedly grabbed and pushed by officers. He said he was with his sister and her young baby nearby before an officer allegedly pushed her.
I told them she had a baby. As I said that, they just grabbed me by the keffiyeh, my scarf, and just dragged me, pulled me, kicked me on the floor. … Knee to my head, knee to my neck, and then yeah, just put me in handcuffs.
Kefah, a nurse from Western Sydney, said it was difficult watching video footage of her son’s encounter, saying it was “traumatising” and she couldn’t get the images out of her mind.
To be honest, it was a war zone. When I was looking around me, I did not believe my eyes that I live in Australia at the moment.
She said she planned to press charges:
I will because that was a deliberate attack on my son, and that was an assault on a minor. And that was like an attack on someone who did nothing, just to stand up for humanity in a way.
It’s our right in this country, we are citizens like everyone else. So why we can be treated different?
Patrick Commins
Labor introduces $3m super tax legislation
The government has introduced its modified $3m super tax legislation into parliament this morning, as part of a reform which will also lift the threshold for the low income super tax offset that will boost the savings for more than a million Australians.
Under the new rules, the tax on earnings from balances over $3m will double to 30%. After much debate, the original proposal was modified to tax only realised (rather than unrealised, or paper) gains, and the threshold will be indexed.
Assuming the changes pass through parliament, the extra $3m super tax will start from the middle of 2026.
As for the low income tax offset, this is a long overdue change that will boost the super balances of workers on low incomes and permanently remove the perverse situation where some Australians were paying more tax on their super than on their normal pay.
Jim Chalmers in a statement said “these changes will make the super system fairer from top to bottom”, adding:
Our reforms are all about helping workers earn more, keep more of what they earn, and retire with more, while also strengthening Australia’s world-class superannuation system.
Sharma backs Ley but will support ‘whoever’ Liberal party elects as leader
Penry Buckley
Senator Dave Sharma says he backs the opposition leader, Sussan Ley, amid a possible spill, but says he will support “whoever has been elected by the Liberal party room to be leader”.
Sharma, who is part of Ley’s moderate faction, has told ABC Sydney that Ley “has my support as leader”, adding he is not involved in speculation or discussions about her future.
Asked if he would support Angus Taylor as Liberal party leader, Sharma says:
I will support whoever has been elected by the Liberal party room to be the leader. I think it’s important that we all make that commitment. Because, you know, whoever has been chosen to be the captain of the time, it’s ultimately a team sport, politics, and if the team is trying to play different games or different strategies on the field, we’re not going to win.
Sharma says he is “very frustrated” with the current state of the Liberal party:
I think we have a lot of problems and national issues, and it is our job as an opposition to highlight those and to put forward alternative ideas … and at the moment, we’re not doing as good a job of that as we should be.
Patrick Commins
More on the rent figures from our economics chief …
Tim Lawless, Cotality’s research director, said “the fact that rental growth is accelerating, even after such a large cumulative increase since 2020, is a real concern”.
It suggests demand for rental accommodation still far exceeds available supply, and that renters are facing an even larger portion of their income just to keep a roof over their heads.
Tenants are on average dedicating a record 33.4% of their pre-tax income on rent, according to Cotality data.
As the dream of home ownership has become increasingly out of reach for many Australians, a larger share of homes are rented.
In the mid-1990s, 25% of households aged between 35 and 49 years were renting, according to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare.
By 2019 – and before the post-pandemic squeeze that has intensified the housing crisis – that proportion had blown out to nearly 40%. Lawless said:
Unless wage growth accelerates meaningfully, or we see a step-change in rental supply, the risk is that affordability will deteriorate further for low income households in particular.
There is also evidence that recent measures aimed at helping first-home buyers into the market have instead boosted home prices and made it harder for lower income Australians to buy.
As housing costs have soared over recent decades, Australia has underinvested in social housing.
Only 3.6% of homes are dedicated to social housing, or about half the OECD average.
Fewer than 2% of homes being built now are for social housing, down from 15% in the 1970s, and 22% in the 1950s.
Patrick Commins
Hopes for a reprieve in runaway rental growth have been dashed, after rent rises reaccelerated into the new year, pushing affordability to new lows.
Despite efforts by the federal and state governments to lift the supply of new homes, housing costs continue to rise faster than wages amid historically low vacancy rates.
Following a brief period where rental growth seemed to be easing, the national average asking rent jumped by 5.4% in the year to January, according to new analysis from Cotality, a property research firm, released today.
Rental growth had slowed to 4.3% over the 12 months to September, but picked up through late 2025, contributing to a broader rise in inflationary pressures that triggered the first Reserve Bank rate hike in over two years.
The latest rental figures come amid rising speculation that the Albanese government will move to lower the 50% capital gains tax discount, which many experts believe is too generous and has helped drive a culture of property speculation at the expense of home ownership.
Renters, many of whom aspire to own their own home, have seen asking rents surge by 44% over the past five years, or two-and-a-half times more quickly than the 18% rise in wages.
Native title holders challenge NT’s largest water licence in high court
Native title holders from the Northern Territory have taken a case to the high court to assert their water rights over an aquifer after a horticulture company was granted a massive water allocation to grow fruit and vegetables in the desert, AAP reports.
Six native title holders from the Mpwerempwer Aboriginal Corporation attended a hearing in Canberra on Tuesday to challenge the licence — which was issued for free by the Northern Territory government in 2021.
It authorises Fortune Agribusiness to extract 40 gigalitres of groundwater at Singleton Station every year for 30 years, equal to draining Sydney Harbour twice.
It is the largest groundwater licence issued in the NT as part of a plan to develop thousands of hectares on Singleton Station, south of Tennant Creek, into an intensive irrigated horticulture business.
Traditional Owners say the project threatens sacred sites, cultural survival and a fragile desert water system. They say it risks permanently damaging the ancient aquifer, and at least 40 groundwater-dependent sacred sites and community water supplies.
Alyawarr traditional owner Frankie Holmes said water was central to people’s identity and survival.
Looking after land and country, especially sacred trees, is very, very important for us. Ancestors hand it over to us to look after these waters and these lands.
The Central Land Council is also backing the claim, which alleges that the NT government did not take into account the impact on Aboriginal cultural values before granting the licence.
The NT government is standing by a decision in the NT court of appeal in 2025, which upheld the licence. Fortune has called on the court to dismiss the appeal.
Photojournalist Isabella Moore was in Kaytetye country in September, and spoke to traditional owners about their fight. You can read that story here.
I support Ley ‘unequivocally’, Leeser says
A few of Sussan Ley’s closest allies are still staunchly defending her publicly, including the Liberal MP Julian Leeser who says he supports Ley “unequivocally” because of her actions after the Bondi terror attack.
Bondi was the worst terror attack Australia has ever faced, it was Sussan Ley who called for a royal commission when the prime minister needed to be dragged kicking and screaming to do things to protect our country and the Jewish community. It was Sussan Ley who called for the parliament to be returned.
Leeser says no one outside parliament is talking about the issue.
But if Angus Taylor does as he’s expected to do and resigns from the frontbench along with his allies, the chatter might start spreading a bit further.
Anti-Islamophobia envoy warns of ‘erosion of trust’ in police
Australia’s envoy to combat Islamophobia, Aftab Malik, says he was “in shock” watching footage of men praying during a protest in Sydney being dragged by police.
Speaking to ABC News Breakfast this morning, after calling for NSW police to apologise, Malik says there was no context to justify “the excessive use of violence for people who are peacefully worshipping away from protesters”.
Asked what the broader impact will be on the Muslim and Arab community, Malik says:
The first one is fear. I spoke to a handful of people who were actually grabbed and thrown to the floor by the police. And they weren’t angry. They were scared. A lot of them were saying to me, we don’t know what was happening, we were just praying. The second one is erosion of trust. That’s why it’s imperative the premier of New South Wales and the police commissioner come out with an official apology and investigation.
Kelly Burke
A fiery exchange erupted at senate estimates last night as Liberal senator Sarah Henderson accused Creative Australia of failing to implement recommendations to strip funding from artists who engage in anti-semitism.
Creative Australia chief executive Adrian Collette defended the agency’s position, insisting that the body lacked the legislative authority to act as a moral adjudicator.
The debate centred on a report by Jillian Segal, the government’s special envoy to combat antisemitism, which proposed cancelling public funding for institutions that promote hate.
Henderson pressed Collette on whether he accepted the obligation to pull funding from those who promoted anti-semitic tropes. Collette said Creative Australia funded artists exclusively on the merit and impact of their work. Collette said:
We are not qualified to start adjudicating on what might qualify as antisemitic or any other kind of behaviour… we simply don’t have that legislative authority.
The senate estimates hearing confirmed that the artist Khaleb Sabsabi – whose commission to the Venice Biennale was rescinded and, after public outcry, restored, had received approximately $800,000 from Creative Australia over 20 years, including commissions for the upcoming Venice Biennale.
Collette emphasised the distinction between “freedom of artistic expression” and general freedom of speech, noting that the agency was not responsible for the personal views of the almost 4,000 artists it funds annually, unless their work itself crossed into “unlawful expression.”
Protests against Herzog visit ‘really difficult’ to watch: Israeli minister
Israel’s deputy foreign minister Sharren Haskel says Isaac Herzog’s visit is really important for the Australian Jewish community which is “completely broken and shattered”.
Haskel, who once lived in Australia for eight years, has been a vocal critic of the Albanese government and regularly appeared in Australian media.
Speaking to RN Breakfast, Haskel says it’s “really difficult” to watch the protests against the visit when its intention has been to stand in solidarity with the community.
It’s absolutely heartbreaking to see that during these times, to hear and to see on live television those chants in Sydney, it’s quite difficult.
Host Sally Sara asks Haskel about what impact Herzog’s visit is having on the Palestinian community in Australia who have watched their loved ones die in Gaza, particularly those who died as a result of the military action of Israel. Haskel says:
Look, a war is a war. It’s a terrible thing. There’s casualties and there’s death and destruction. We know that. A war is not a pretty thing. You cannot give me one example of a war worldwide when you can picture it in a romantic way with no casualties.
Haskel says that she understands that its OK to protest, but believes there is a “red line” on chants like “globalise the intifada”.
There’s a red line that needs to be drawn with calls for violence.
Record quarter jump in bulk billing rates, government says
Natasha May
GP bulk billing rates have seen a record jump in the three months since the government’s bulk billing incentives began, the health minister claims.
Since bulk billing incentives were expanded to all Medicare card holders in November, the rate for all Australians has risen to 81.4% nationwide – the largest quarterly jump in bulk billing in 20 years outside of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to a statement from the health minister Mark Butler.
In October 2023 before any of Labor’s bulk billing reforms were introduced the rate was 75.6%, government data showed.
The new data shows there are over 3,400 bulk billing practices across the country, of which almost 1,300 of these were previously mixed billing. “The number continues to grow every week”, the minister’s statement said.
For 16-64 year olds, who previously weren’t captured by the October 2023 reforms which tripled the bulk billing incentive for children under 16 and concession card holders, the 6.9% increase in the bulk billing rate is the largest quarterly increase on record, the statement said.
There has been an increase in the GP bulk billing rate in every state and territory and approximately 96% of Australians are now within a 20-minute drive of a registered bulk billing practice, according to the statement.
You can read more about the rebound here:
Bragg on Liberal leadership: ‘If people want to do something, they should put their name to it’
Angus Taylor and his allies are under growing pressure to come out publicly against Sussan Ley.
Taylor is speculated to announce he’ll resign from the frontbench today – which he has to do to run for the leadership.
The Liberal moderate Andrew Bragg seems extremely over the drama, and tells ABC News Breakfast that Taylor and his allies who want a spill should put their names down and make it known publicly.
We’re not paid to play games, tiddly winks. We’re paid to work hard for the Australian people. If people want to do something, they should put their name to it.
He says there were no leadership issues “of substance” raised at yesterday’s party room meeting and that he believes Ley still has the numbers.
You might remember, Ley won the leadership with a very tight 29 votes to 25, with three of those votes from the now retired senators Hollie Hughes and Linda Reynolds, and Gisele Kapterian who lost the seat of Bradfield in a recount.
Bragg says Ley has been dealt a “bad hand”.
I would say over the last eight months or so, Sussan has been dealt a bad hand. We had the cataclysmic election loss and two bust-ups with the Nats, and haven’t had a chance to put out many policies.
Commonwealth Bank posts record profit but warns of ‘upward pressure’ on interest rates
Jonathan Barrett
The Commonwealth Bank has warned that interest rates remain under “upward pressure” from inflation after reporting a record $5.45bn half-year cash profit backed by surging home loan volumes and business lending.
Australia’s biggest lender said in an earnings release this morning that the economy was struggling to meet increased consumer demand. CBA said:
As a result, inflation is now expected to remain above the Reserve Bank’s target band for some time, placing further upward pressure on interest rates.
The bank’s cash profit was up 6% from a year ago, beating expectations. It announced an interim $2.35 dividend, up 10c from a year ago.
CBA reported a fall in the number of people falling behind in their mortgage repayments as a percentage of its total mortgage book, after last year’s three interest rate reductions and tax cuts eased household pressure.
The arrears level is still elevated and the impact of last week’s rate hike is yet to hit mortgages.
The strong profit result drew criticism from the Finance Sector Union, which has complained that the bank’s workers are subject to rising workloads and are anxious over an increase in automated processes.
Butler says ‘globalise the intifada’ is ‘not a proper phrase to be using’
The health minister, Mark Butler, has defended Isaac Herzog’s visit to Australia and reiterated that its purpose is to “provide comfort and solace” to the Jewish community.
Almost every politician is being asked about former Australian of the Year Grace Tame’s use of the phrase “globalise the intifada” at a Sydney march on Monday.
Butler is next in the RN Breakfast hot seat, and says that the phrase isn’t “useful”, and adds his name to the list of politicians telling people to turn the temperature down.
To the extent that globalise the intifada means bring the conflict to the streets of Australia, it is not a proper phrase to be using.
I think we have a great tradition of freedom of speech, of the right to demonstrate and protest here in Australia. People have done that for decades, including about their views on conflicts that are happening in many other parts of the world. People did it in relation to the Vietnam war and the Iraq war and many others. Really it is a question of reiterating the importance of peaceful protest, of respectful dialogue.
On Tame’s use of the phrase, Butler says:
That’s a matter for every individual who uses the phrase to answer to.