From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

This is inside politics.

I'm Jacqueline Maley.

It's Friday, December the 5th.

This week the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, was on his honeymoon, of course, after his low key wedding at the Lodge last weekend.

But Senate estimates rolled on in Canberra and we did uncover some interesting secrets.

Joining me to discuss is our chief political correspondent, Paul Circle, and our political correspondent Natassia Chrysanthos, both beaming in live from Canberra.

Hi, Jack.

Hello.

So on this podcast, regular listeners will have clocked that we've recently focused a lot on the opposition.

Last week we interviewed Opposition Leader Sussan Ley, and we've talked a lot about their internal implosion over net zero.

So we feel a little bit like we've undercooked the government or sort of scrutiny on the government these last few weeks.

So I want to correct that.

To that end, the big story this week was the government's social media ban, which will come into effect next week on December 10th, I believe.

And Communications Minister Anika Wells, who is was young and were led to believe up and coming minister, gave a speech to the National Press Club about that ban.

Natasha attended and it was sort of tasks supposed to be sort of like a crowning achievement type speech, wasn't it?

Because this social media ban has got bipartisan support.

It's hugely popular amongst parents, maybe not so much amongst teens and tweens, but the whole speech kind of got hijacked by another issue.

Can you tell us what happened?

Yeah.

And in terms of the kind of scene setter, you know, I think people criticize this government for a lack of of ambition at times.

The social media ban is probably one of the big policies it would point to as a sign of its appetite for bold reform.

So there's a lot resting on it.

Anika Wells inherited this big policy after the election, and so the speech this week was a bit of a kind of, I guess, laying the groundwork for that, but also tempering expectations, I think, for what people should expect.

Hugely.

Next week.

At the same time you have a story break.

The previous night around Senate estimates.

Taxpayers coughed up almost $100,000 for flights, so the communications minister and her staff could spruik Australia's world first social media ban in New York.

The controversy comes.

And according to this document, the flights for wells cost about $34,000 return and for her staff member cost about $38,000 return.

So there was a big please explain over that.

Well, according to our story, it was nearly $100,000 on flights for the three of them.

So Minister Wells and then two staffers basically, which is an extraordinary amount of money.

And I actually struggle to understand how any flight can cost $30,000.

But apparently they did.

They haven't really explained how.

No the only well, so this and as you say, this was to the UN General Assembly and they got really good publicity out of it at the time because it was this world leading thing.

And I think the president of the EU showed up to this event and it got really good coverage and I think not just in Australia, but also a little bit globally because because it's a world leading ban, as they keep saying.

And now we're finding out that the cost was just astronomical.

It always amazes me when this stuff comes up, because so many politicians have fallen on their sword over it.

And it's a really easy reference point for voters because they know, like, hang on, how can a how can a flight cost $30,000 or Susan Lee got done for this when, you know, in 2017, when she was found to have taken a taxpayer funded flight to the Gold Coast to buy an apartment privately.

And I think this one is like, you know, it was strictly government business.

They have an argument for why it was important.

So I think perhaps they, you know, they knew how much the flight cost.

They had a night's preparation that this story was going to come out.

There could have perhaps been a slightly more robust defence of that.

I was actually really intrigued to know how one single flight could cost $30,000 or in excess of $30,000, $80,000.

Having, you know, I'm more of a kind of bogan missile type flyer.

Like I'm Jetstar or Bust.

I'm the same.

Actually a Jetstar.

Yeah, actually, you know, shout out to Jetstar.

I think everyone was very intrigued when we the The Office by like 8 a.m.

was googling how much it would cost to fly first class Qantas to New York the next day, and that came up at 16 grand return.

So we're talking double that now.

And this was $38,000, but.

It was 38,000 return.

I was talking to a government staffer about it.

And they were kind of saying, you know, flights do fluctuate wildly, especially the business class prices for these big global summits and events.

Right.

Because the airlines are aware, like and especially I think it was maybe New York Fashion Week around that time as well.

And it was the UN.

And there were a couple of things on.

So and she had to delay a flight right till the last moment because she was dealing with the Optus trip.

Look, it's a matter of public record that I delayed my departure because of the Optus outages.

So the scale of the tragedy linked to Thursday's Optus outage is becoming clearer tonight.

In the last hour, the death of a fourth person has been confirmed by the West Australian premier.

A 49 year old man.

But the Prime Minister was questioning whether she should go and he gave.

The Prime Minister's plane.

Then she couldn't end up going on the Prime Minister's plane, so.

It wasn't very last.

Minute.

Sorry.

I just loved the idea of all the journalists going, what?

What is a business class flight even cost?

And what is a first class flight cost?

And it's beyond our.

World, like everyone was also like first class flight tomorrow.

Only $16,000 worth it.

I don't know, but what was interesting, I think that in her, because it's more just like it, I think the reason it became a story was that it didn't make clear sense.

No.

When you when you kind of benchmark typical flight prices.

And so I think it was an interesting decision In that given there was then so much speculation, for example, like was it a first class flight?

Because that that tends to be kind of toward the higher end of first class flights, those prices.

Was it a charter flight like there are all these questions.

Um, but at the press club, she was asked, you know, why did they cost so much?

Then she was asked again, you know, can you just explain the costs?

Were they were they first class flights, for example?

She said no, they weren't.

So then that leaves an assumption there.

Business class flights, in which case they're very expensive business class flights.

She was then thrown a bone, I think, by the host of the press club who said, well, you know, was it because it was such a last minute flight that it just cost that much?

And again, she didn't really say.

Uh, no, they weren't first class flights.

We will disclose further through the usual ipea processes that haven't rolled out yet.

The reason you have this information now is because it was a question on notice that we've provided ahead of the Senate estimates process, all absolutely usual.

Um, and we'll continue to comply with all the usual rules.

I would refer you back to the fact that this is about one of the most important public policy challenges.

I think that those numbers I'm probably making some leaps here, but I feel like the average voter would understand a minister on a really long haul flight, taking a business or first class tickets within the guidelines.

They're looking at sensitive documents.

They need to be fresh immediately when they land, to go to their events and deal with dignitaries, and then they're on a different time zone, and they pretty much stay up all day on on when they're back on their previous sleep cycle.

But I think it was the numbers that just leapt out and looked absurd, like a $38,000 flight strikes you as ridiculous.

And her her reluctance to explain why it was so high, which might have a decent explanation, just furthers the narrative.

And there's a lot of a lot of the commentary in the last day has been along the lines of this looking on the nose in a cost of living crisis.

I mean, we live in a period of very high distrust of government.

Yes, some people are doing it tough, but even people who are not would look at this and just think, oh, really?

And I think the instinct of voters these days is to immediately look for a reason why this casts the political class as out of touch and corrupt.

That's where most voters minds go.

Cost of living, crisis or otherwise.

And I think if the government was just front footed on this and said why her trip was important, why it cost so much, they'd probably do a better job of winning the argument.

Yeah.

And Paul, so the story came out sort of through the estimates process, didn't it?

So when Anika Wells talks about transparency and sort of makes a virtue of the transparency was actually, I think, opposition questions on notice that they sort of that they had to answer basically, and then they slipped out very late or sort of reasonably late on Tuesday night.

Is that right?

I think it came out through a Senate question.

Yeah.

But I think it is disclosed ultimately through finance.

But was it finances decision to put it out at that time?

Or is that when the.

I think they generally have to bring they have to, um, publish answers to before the next estimates hearing.

Okay, so it needs to get published before finance rocks up in Senate estimates.

Yeah.

So that's.

Generally.

Yeah.

So I mean our story says that the government replied to an opposition question on notice from Senate estimates in October.

So, you know, I guess it's a month or two old this question.

And they've slipped it out on Tuesday, late on Tuesday, which is, you know, standard operating procedure, I suppose, for most governments who who want to downplay something.

Let's talk about the actual social media ban.

Paul, do you think there's a risk here for the government?

It's such a it's such a popular policy amongst parents like myself, who have such huge anxiety over what social media is doing to their kids.

Um, what do you think the risks are?

Why?

Why do you think there are risks in it?

Well, I think this this little blow up over the expenses helps bring to light this interesting paradox on this policy debate.

In one sense, the government's taken a huge step forward here.

They're a world leader in this space.

Anika Wells was in the UN General Assembly.

Speaking at a conference alongside Ursula von der Leyen, the EU president.

As you say, there's global momentum, momentum around what Australia is doing.

We look like the outlier nation that's willing to take on the tech giants and do a reform that, as you say, Jack, parents love.

So we're getting a lot of kudos internationally.

Anika Wells did an interview with the BBC the other night.

For this interview.

I met Anika Wells, the Australian communications minister, at her electorate office in Brisbane.

You're going to hear about a new digital law that she's spearheading to protect children's health and wellbeing.

But in Australia in particular in the press gallery reporting on this reform, there is a tendency to needle in on the flaws, the messiness of how it's been put together.

This sense that only a week out, we're still adding social media platforms to the ban.

You're seeing the bipartisanship on the coalition side, and they were actually the party that first proposed this start to break away, they're questioning whether it will work.

They're saying that parents are worried about data retention on the on the part of the tech giants.

You're saying teal MPs like Monique Ryan, who support the essence of the ban, say, I don't think this is going to work.

And so you've got, on the one hand, the government saying this is a momentous reform.

And it is in some ways.

But there's this other part of the debate about how it will work.

And over summer, as kids get bored during the school holiday period, if there is a growing view that kids are just getting around this through VPNs or using different apps like Yope or lemonade, I don't know what those words meant in a in an app sense until a week ago.

Then you could see a a growing narrative that this reform, while worthy, is not practical.

Yeah.

Or just that the government's done a not a very good job at implementing it.

So then it becomes I mean and I agree like we don't know how it's going to work.

It seems very audacious and brave actually.

And I think most people would agree that it's a good thing to try whether or not they get points for trying if and when it sort of falls apart.

And yeah, like tweens and teens around the nation are way, way savvier than the adults who are trying to police them in getting around this stuff.

It could become sort of a competency issue for the Albanese government that they're not particularly good at getting stuff done, particularly complex policy reform like this.

I mean, it'll be really interesting one to watch because as I say, I do think it's enormously popular.

And it was it's a real winner.

And you sort of, you know, you can't really go wrong when you're standing up to big tech giants who are so on the nose internationally at the moment in terms of their behaviour.

And also it's protecting children and people always want to do that.

I think like at the end of the day, this is about kind of long term behavioural change.

Yep.

Um, sending a signal.

Yeah, yeah.

And it's like, you know, even even if the kind of tech element is like half or two thirds effective at getting kids off the apps, kind of what the intent is, is that you change the kind of social norms or behaviors or expectations of that age group over time.

And so they've got a two year review, I think, like an expert review of Australian academics and overseas academics monitoring it.

And it'll probably take at least that long before we can actually tell.

Yeah.

And she's a she's kind of at pains to point out over and over.

She's almost the first thing she says when asked on this topic is that kids might find a way around it.

And she's fine.

She's finding new points to emphasize about how kids can get around it.

Like she said the other day, that you can get your 17 year old brother to log you into Instagram.

So it's one of the only policy proposals I've seen put forward where the government is trying to emphasize the downside risk to manage.

The really tricky part of this is, is for that current 13 to 16 year old age group, you're turning the tap off.

So this is the real troublesome point.

Whereas kind of eventually the whole point is you're not turning the tap on for 13 year olds for a few years.

So I think it's going to be hardest for this group of kids.

And that's also why it's going to there's going to be a lot of evasion or whatever.

They're like the existing smokers.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

The price of darts.

Yeah.

It's not it's not the kind of policy you can grandfather.

So there'll be 13 year olds who are or sort of 15 year olds will be turned off this week and be able to go back on next week when they turn 16.

It's imperfect in that sense.

But I mean, I've got a tween and it's just an easy way.

It's actually quite a good way to open up a conversation about all this stuff.

You know, they hear on the news and you can say, there's a lot of talk now about why adults, you know, why this stuff maybe isn't so good for children.

Social media can be harmful for them.

It's all about protecting your brain, that kind of stuff.

So look, I do think it's really popular, but it's going to be really, really interesting to see how it's implemented.

And if it's messy, it might end up it might end up going to the government's competence as we talked about before.

It was Senate estimates this week.

But Paul, it wasn't supposed to be Senate estimates.

The Senate estimates week was sort of forced upon them all by independent Senator David Pocock.

How did that happen?

Yeah.

So this wasn't booked in this final week of Senate estimates.

So Senate estimates means that the senators are here grilling bureaucrats.

All the members of the House of Representatives, 151 or however many it is, are back in the electorate.

It's only the 76 senators.

David Pocock, the Act independent senator, big on transparency, big on government accountability.

He had been pushing labor to release this report called the Briggs Report, which they'd been sitting on for, I think, more than a year commissioned during the Morrison know, commissioned by labor two years.

Yeah.

Natasha says two years.

Commissioned by commissioned by labor.

After a long running debate about the Morrison government stacking boards and other organizations with political appointments labor had commissioned, the review, had its recommendations on the ministerial desk, and spent a long time agonizing over what to do because they also make some political appointments.

And David Pocock thought this was a disgrace, and effectively teamed up with the coalition to Penalize Penalise Labour for not releasing this report, and part of that penalty was to add an additional week of estimates on.

So Penny Wong and Katy Gallagher, the Labour leaders in the Senate, have been complaining privately to coalition MPs this week, saying, you know, we didn't want to be here.

You don't want to be here either.

Why are you working with Pocock?

We had the Prime Minister's wedding on Saturday and all we had to do was prepare for estimates.

So there's lots of grumbling across Canberra.

The coalition people are flat as a tack.

Don't really want to be here.

Labor ministers don't want to be defending these questions.

But here we all are.

I think, though, that also just like as a throw forward to next year, this kind of emerging alliance on certain things between coalition Greens and Pocock, it's kind of like an unholy trinity of of independent centre right opposition and left.

And because they are finding points, they're finding points to cross.

And it really annoys the government.

It's the beauty of the bicameral system that, you know, governments almost never control the Senate.

So it's a real wildcard.

And it always, always annoys the hell out of them.

The fight that all of this was about was this report a very sort of bold and dynamic title, I thought called No Favorites.

And as you say, it was commissioned in 2023.

It was basically about government board appointments.

So, you know, there's all of these government boards like I was having a look at them.

There's so many of them like Airservices Australia Board, the Australia Post Board, Australian Building Codes Board, you know, things in more high profile things like the board of the ABC.

And they all need people highly qualified.

One hopes meritocratic appointments to these boards.

But governments often have been known to disappoint their mates or people who are former politicians or people who have been good to, you know, good to the party in whatever way.

The Morrison government was notorious for it.

And particularly with the Administrative Appeals Tribunal, which is a very important it's not actually a government board.

It's a very important, you know, legal institution basically that oversees, um, and scrutinises government decisions.

And they were absolute bandits for political appointments to that to the eight.

So much so that the that the labor opposition actually made a big thing of it and ended up abolishing that the 18 and replacing it with the art.

So that's sort of the background, right.

So they've made a big deal about this in opposition.

And then they've come into government, commissioned a report about it.

And then they've said on the report for a long time, Paul, why would they do that?

And what did the report sort of find?

The report recommended stripping a lot of power from the government to make political appointments, not allowing them to make them within six months of an election, because that's seen as a period where you can make some contentious calls just before you might lose power.

And effectively, without going into too much detail on the recommendations, they recommended a total overhaul of how appointments work to make it much harder for government to put in friends of a political party or former MPs or former staff into bodies.

Labor wanted to do some of it, but not all because they think there's a balance to be struck here.

They do want to appoint Kevin Rudd to be an ambassador.

They do want to appoint Kim Beazley to be the war memorial director or chairman or whatever he is.

But they do think there's a problem that needs to be solved.

And this is a similar kind of dynamic.

You see play out with labor on a bunch of different transparency issues now where they came into power wanting to reverse course on the Morrison era, which was seen to be, you know, a degradation of how good government operates, maybe played up and exaggerated by labor.

And then on Labor's left flank now, particularly with David Pocock, who's becoming a real figure of annoyance for labor, he can always outflank them on the transparency side.

And he's expert at using social media and traditional media to portray labor as not interested in integrity.

And on this issue, labor needs to find a middle path through where they can continue to make politically expedient decisions, but also appear to be less corrupt than previous governments.

but they've got David Pocock making them making them appear.

Yeah.

You know, not quite pure enough.

Yeah.

It's interesting sort of turning of the tables because and I think it's called gray corruption.

So it's not like sort of, you know, cash piles of cash in brown paper bag type corruption.

But it is the sort of, as you say, the the rewarding of friends with appointments that are often very, very well remunerated, like we're talking sort of salaries in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

And it over time, as the, as the report sort of makes clear, erodes public trust in institutions.

It further erodes public trust in politicians because, you know, voters get the sense that politicians are only in it for themselves and maybe to enrich or help their mates.

So it is it is an issue.

And I think I personally think it was a it was a major issue along with sports rorts for painting this picture of the Morrison government as being very self-interested and interested in in themselves above and beyond the interests of the Australian people.

And Morrison with the eight like the Liberal Party like.

To be blunt, they started to take the piss with the eight like they were.

They were 85.

I think it's 85 MPs, staffers or former party associates.

But and that's labor.

That those jobs.

I mean, you require, you know, solid legal minds to do those jobs.

It's actually a very important arm of government.

The the old art.

So yeah, that was that was actually quite egregious.

But I remember the yeah, the labor opposition, Tony Burke at the time, they were so onto it, they were really upset about it.

They made a big deal of it.

And to their credit, they actually sort of, you know, got a little bit of sort of public, um, they got a little bit of publicity over it, even though it was a pretty dry area of administrative sort of law.

And now they're being scrutinised and it's not so fun on the other side.

Yeah.

And labor knows that say for example, the the Australia Post board or any bunch of these kinds of important agencies, labor knows that some of their former MPs and party officials have the kind of executive authority and political go getter mindset to to play important roles in some of these bodies.

So it's not it's not that easy to find a bureaucrat with no link to a political party to go and do these roles for people who have been involved in politics or had had a role for a period in a ministerial office, are often the best suited person for a job.

So Labor's trying to strike that balance, and we probably don't help in the media where we scrutinize every single one of these decisions as if they are gray corruption, when sometimes these other people for a job.

No, I mean, I would I would disagree on that because I think what the report says is not don't make political appointments because as like politicians, former politicians have skills.

They know how government works, they have personal relationships.

You know, they have a lot of knowledge and experience to bring to the kinds of things, you know, the kinds of things they need for a government board role.

But I think the report just says that's fine, but they need to go through a process like they need to apply for it like everybody else does, which is perhaps is not always convenient if you're the government minister and you just need someone to be appointed straight away, and it's just easier to pop them in there.

But, um, I guess you've got to balance that against the public trust issue.

Very interesting stuff.

We know also, Albanese has been on his honeymoon this week.

Any ideas where he's been on his honeymoon?

Guys in Australia, as all we know.

Not Hawaii.

Okay.

And maybe, um, he played for his own flights.

I'm sure.

They were.

They were papped at the airport with the punters.

In the Sydney International terminal.

Domestic terminal?

Terminal, please.

Yeah.

Okay.

So what did they sit down?

Did they sit down in the general area and, like, read the paper and like, have a coffee with the with the hoi polloi or were they in the.

Corners holding both the bags.

Oh, gentlemen.

So no bag carrier.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay, good.

Well, we wish them well, I think.

Just two normal people in a honeymoon over December.

Anika Wells could take some pointers on how to do how to do air travel the right way.

Good luck to them.

I think the Anthony Albanese and Jodie Hayden back this weekend and I'm sure on the Prime Minister will be on deck for work next week I think.

Guys, thanks so much.

That was fun as always, and I'll see you next week.

Talk to you next week.

Bye!

Today's episode was produced by Kai Wong with technical assistance from Debbie Harrington.

Our executive producer is Tammy Mills, and special thanks to Lisa Muxworthy and Tom McKendrick.

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I'm Jacqueline Maley.

Thank you for listening.