As it happened: Review finds defence role in emergencies ‘unsustainable’; Greens to block housing fund unless rent freeze introduced

Returning to reaction to Labor’s pharmacy reforms, and the head of the powerful pharmacy lobby has launched an emotional attack on the federal government, Health Minister Mark Butler and several Labor MPs over plans to double the amount of medicine a person can collect with each script, saying “they don’t give a shit” about the impact on businesses.

Pharmacy Guild president Trent Twomey choked back tears during a press conference at Parliament House on Wednesday, telling government MPs to “get off your arse” and talk to owners who would be forced to cut staff, reduce hours and slash services when they suffered estimated $170,000 losses each year under the change.

Butler has announced the government will increase the length of scripts from one to two months’ supply for 325 common medicines, halving the cost for consumers who have chronic conditions such as heart disease, cholesterol, Crohn’s disease and hypertension.

The government will save $1.2 billion over four years in dispensing fees. But to placate pharmacies, who have been lobbying against the policy by bombarding MPs with calls and emails, Butler promised all that money would be directly reinvested in community pharmacy to help them expand their services.

“I don’t pretend this is going to be easy for community pharmacy. I value the work that they do enormously and that is why we have phased this in over this year and next year,” the minister said on Wednesday.

However, the Guild is concerned about the income it will lose from out-of-pocket patient fees, which the lobby group has modelled at $2.3 billion over four years and the government puts at $1.6 billion over the same time frame.

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Construction of a new fertiliser plant has started on Western Australia’s world heritage nominated Burrup Peninsula, amid an outcry from traditional owners.

Multinational petrochemical company Perdaman is building a $6 billion facility to produce urea about 20 kilometres northwest of Karratha.

It’s the first industrial construction in more than a decade on the rock art-rich peninsula that was formally nominated for UNESCO’s world heritage list in February.

“This important project represents a significant investment in the Pilbara and WA, underlining the region’s role as the engine room of Australia’s economy,” Premier Mark McGowan said on Wednesday.

“It is estimated the project will create thousands of jobs within the state and generate a total revenue of $77 billion over its life.”

The plant will convert natural gas from Woodside’s Scarborough Gas Project into an estimated 2.3 million tonnes of urea for domestic sale and export per year.

Murujuga traditional owners said the announcement would lead to the removal of Indigenous rock art from the site despite cultural heritage assessments not being completed.

“I am so angry and hurt right now. It is a sad, sad state of affairs,” Josie Alec said.

“The free, prior and informed consent has still not been given to Perdaman to remove these rocks - not all traditional custodians have been consulted on this.”

Murujuga is among the world’s most significant rock art sites with up to two million petroglyphs.

It contains evidence of continuous traditional culture over at least 50,000 years.

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has previously said a proposed world heritage boundary of almost 100,000 hectares of land and sea has been negotiated.

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Damascus: The government of President Bashar al-Assad has condemned the European Union’s new sanctions on Syria over making and trafficking an amphetamine saying the move was based on lies.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad steps off the plane as he arrives at Vnukovo airport in Moscow, Russia, last month.

The Syrian Foreign Ministry issued a statement a day after the EU imposed sanctions on several Syrians, including members of Assad’s family, blaming them for the production and trafficking of narcotics, notably the amphetamine Captagon.

“The European Union is repeating its lies,” the ministry said, adding that such sanctions helped block the flow of aid, medical equipment and food products into his country. It called the sanctions “unilateral and illegitimate”.

The EU asset freezes and travel bans were imposed on 25 people and eight “entities” — most of them companies — at a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg on Monday.

Syria has denied accusations that it produces and markets Captagon, but the ministry did not provide evidence refuting the EU’s allegations.

AP

GPs have hailed the federal government’s changes to prescription medicine as “a win for patients”, saying the reforms would make medications cheaper and easier to access for millions of Australians.

Labor says it will double the amount of medicine a person can collect with each script, from one to two months’ supply, for more than 320 products treating chronic conditions such as heart disease, cholesterol, Crohn’s disease and hypertension.

The shake-up is expected to save people up to $180 a year and will apply to as many as 6 million Australians.

Royal Australian College of General Practitioners president Nicole Higgins said the changes were “momentous” and “a win for patients”.

“Cost-of-living pressures are placing tremendous strain on households across Australia, so there has never been a more important time to save patients money and time. Patients with a range of chronic conditions, including heart disease, will be able to save up to $180 a year and that will make a huge difference for so many households,” Higgins said.

Health Minister Mark Butler dismissed concerns from the Pharmacy Guild the changes would lead to widespread medicine shortages, saying only seven of the medications faced supply woes.

The Pharmacy Guild of Australia warned the medicine shortage was worse than Butler was indicating, and warned it could become more difficult for patients to get life-saving medication.

Medicines Australia chief executive Elizabeth de Somer told ABC’s Afternoon Briefing there were risks of shortages, and “shortages are not new”.

De Somer said she hadn’t been consulted but wanted to work with the government to determine “how we can mitigate or manage any demand or supply discrepancies over the coming months”.

“We have recently signed a five-year strategic agreement with the Commonwealth government and there is a stock holding requirement in that agreement, so we’re happy to work closely with the pharmacists, the wholesalers and the government as to how we can meet those requests.”

She had heard some people had to choose between continuing their medications and paying their mortgages, as rising interest rates and other cost-of-living pressures continued to bite.

“For me, the important thing is, to manage chronic illness and to prevent further deterioration of your health, you need to take your chronic medications consistently.

“If this measure helps people for their medicines, I think it has to be good for Australians.”

Time is running out for Australia and other democracies to deter China from launching an invasion of Taiwan, Japan’s departing ambassador to Australia has warned.

Shingo Yamagami, whose Canberra posting ends this weekend after almost 2½ years, accused his Chinese counterpart of launching a character assassination against him and rejected suggestions in the diplomatic community he had been called back to Tokyo early because of his outspoken style.

Australians needed to abandon outdated stereotypes that Japanese diplomats would be placid and softly spoken, he said.

As the Albanese government seeks to stabilise the nation’s diplomatic and trade relationship with Beijing after years of tension, Yamagami urged Australia not to overlook the risk China posed to peace and security in the Asia-Pacific.

Describing a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan as an increasing concern, Yamagami said: “My point is: time is running out.

“Time is quite limited because our response has been slow. So rather than letting our counterpart think they see a window of opportunity to resort to military action, we have to do our best to narrow or even close that window of opportunity.

Cambridge, Massachussetts: Former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern, who led her country through a devastating mass shooting, will temporarily join Harvard University later this year.

Ardern, a global icon of the left and an inspiration to women around the world, has been appointed to dual fellowships at the Harvard Kennedy School, its dean Douglas Elmendorf said.

She will serve as the 2023 Angelopoulos Global Public Leaders Fellow and a Hauser Leader in the school’s Centre for Public Leadership beginning in the northern autumn.

“Jacinda Ardern showed the world strong and empathetic political leadership,” Elmendorf said in a statement, adding that she would “bring important insights for our students and generate vital conversations about the public policy choices facing leaders at all levels”.

Ardern, who was just 37 when she became prime minister in 2017, shocked New Zealanders when she announced in January she was stepping down from the role after more than five years because she no longer had “enough in the tank” to do it justice.

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Greens leader Adam Bandt says he wants to hear less talk from the federal government about missiles and more about fixing the worsening rental and housing crisis confronting Australians.

Bandt used a National Press Club address today to push for support for renters in the May budget.

The Greens say they will block Labor’s $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund in the Senate unless the federal government forces the states to freeze rents for two years and tackle the crisis.

Bandt said during his address in Canberra: “I want to hear less talk about missiles and more about fixing the rental and housing crisis and building an adequate number of public housing so that everyone in this country has a place to live.”

He said a rent freeze was not only legal but politically possible, after the prime minister dismissed the suggestion.

“Rents have skyrocketed. There are not enough affordable homes. Millions are stressed just trying to keep a roof over their heads,” the Greens leader said.

“If Labor wants our support on its housing bill, it needs to come to the table on the rental crisis and on building more public and affordable housing.”

The minor party, which hold the balance of power in the Senate, will also push to pump an extra $1.6 billion into states and territories through the national affordable housing agreement.

The rent freeze and extra money for social housing will be offset by phasing out negative gearing and removing capital gains tax breaks for people with more than one investment property.

“This isn’t about someone who owns one extra house or flat as an investment,” Mr Bandt said.

“It is about the 20,000 wealthy moguls who own more than six properties each.”

Ending the tax breaks will raise $74 billion, while the Greens’ proposed double rent assistance, freeze and more affordable housing would cost $69 billion.

Earlier today, Albanese said the minor party’s plan was “completely illogical”.

“They are out there saying they want more investment in social and affordable housing and their strategy to do that is to block $10 billion to create a fund for investment in social and affordable housing that is on top of the Commonwealth state housing agreements, on top of all the other investments that the federal government will be making in housing,” he said.

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The National Gallery of Australia has announced an independent review of the provenance of 28 Indigenous artworks due to be hung next month for a major exhibition of artists from the remote Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands (APY Lands).

While the review is underway, the Canberra-based institution has halted all promotion of the upcoming exhibition, Ngura Pulka - Epic Country, which opens in less than six weeks.

Leading Melbourne barrister Colin Golvan and Sydney lawyer, Shane Simpson, both experts in copyright law, will determine whether the exhibition paintings “can properly be described as having been made under the creative control of the persons named as the artists”.

Under its terms of reference, the inquiry will consider the scope and extent of any third-party contributions and, in particular, the involvement of studio assistants and managers at the APY Art Centre Collective to create the 28 paintings in the Ngura Pulka exhibition.

It will come to a view on whether those works were actually made under the creative control of the artists to whom they are attributed, and can make recommendations to the NGA’s director Nick Mitzevich based on its findings.

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