Snapchat says it will comply with ‘unevenly applied’ under-16s social media ban
Josh Taylor
Snapchat users under the age of 16 will be kicked off the platform from 10 December, with the company telling the parliament that although it disagrees that the ban should apply to Snapchat, it will comply with the law.
Jennifer Stout, Snap’s SVP of global policy and platform operations, said in her written opening statement to a parliamentary inquiry on age assurance measures that Snapchat should be excluded as it would meet the definition of a messaging service that is supposed to be excluded under the ban, but the company will accept the ruling of the eSafety commissioner. She said:
We will comply with the law, even though we believe it has been unevenly applied and risks undermining community confidence in the law.
Beginning 10 December, we will disable accounts for Australian Snapchatters under 16. We know this will be difficult for young people who use Snapchat to communicate with their closest friends and family.
Stout said the ban could see teens pushed on to platforms that are not included in the ban, and that are less safe as a result.
Meta and TikTok are also appearing before the inquiry this morning.
Key events
Minister defends government’s transparency record
Trade minister and special minister of state Don Farrell says he doesn’t agree that the government has dropped the ball on integrity and transparency.
The latest report from the Centre for Public Integrity, first released to Nine Newspapers, has given the government a failing grade following Anthony Albanese’s decision to cut opposition staff and attempts to tighten freedom of information laws.
Farrell tells ABC News Breakfast the government is doing more to increase transparency, including through its laws passed last term on electoral donations.
The amount [disclosure threshold] was $17,000. So, we have significantly dropped that money. More importantly, those donations have to be disclosed before the election. So, every … donation above $5,000 has to be disclosed before the next election. Now, I’d say that was very significant transparency issue
Labor will ‘probably end up’ doing EPBC deal with Coalition, Greens leader says
Jumping back to Larissa Waters on RN Breakfast this morning, the Greens leader said she’d been appalled by what the environment minister “has put in these so-called nature laws”, and accused Labor of writing a blank cheque for business.
Waters says she’s willing to work with the government and negotiate on the legislation, but believes Murray Watt will come to an agreement with the other side.
At the moment, this package is written for big business. And the Coalition, I think, are posturing and probably will end up doing a deal with Labor on this. The Greens want to see environment laws that work for nature, protect communities’ rights, and actually don’t see coal and gas and logging fast-tracked unabated. We’re willing to talk to government about that.
Last night it was revealed the environment minister would be able to approve projects at odds with nature laws if it was deemed in the “national interest” under the new EPBC legislation.
Safe to say, Waters is not happy with that.
They’re [the laws] already riddled with loopholes. But rather than fix those loopholes, the proposal by this environment minister under this government is to add additional loopholes and yet more fast-track mechanisms for coal and gas.
Chance of RBA rate cut at next meeting is very slim, markets believe
Patrick Commins
The chance of a Melbourne Cup rate cut has been slashed to just 10%, according to financial markets.
Investors had been pricing in more like a 60% chance yesterday – but that was before Michele Bullock, the Reserve Bank’s governor, made it clear that she was more worried about a recent pick-up in inflation than last month’s jump in unemployment.
“There are still jobs being created, just not as many,” Bullock said on Monday night, adding that a jobless rate of 4.5% was “still pretty low”.
We’d always thought [unemployment] would drift up a bit. Maybe it’s drifted up a bit further than we thought, but it’s not a huge amount yet.
Tomorrow’s inflation report is expected to show price pressures were stronger than the RBA expected in the three months to September.
Economists still think there’s another rate cut or two in the works over coming months, although not likely until next year.
And financial market pricing still puts the chance of a rate cut by December at 80%.
Former Nationals leader thinks Joyce won’t be going to One Nation ‘any time soon’
The Nationals MP and former party leader Michael McCormack reckons Barnaby Joyce won’t be going to One Nation “any time soon”, despite missing the partyroom meeting yesterday.
On the Today show a bit earlier, McCormack said Joyce has the responsibility to see out the rest of his term (he’s said he won’t recontest the next election in his seat of New England) with the Nats.
But he did say it was a “shame” Joyce didn’t turn up to yesterday’s meeting.
I think that’s what you need to do when people are prepared to hand out for you, and they’re prepared to don your yellow T-shirt with ‘I’m backing Barnaby’ on the back. I mean, he needs to continue to serve and sit with the Nationals …
I’ve always believed that life is determined by those who turn up. And it was a shame he didn’t turn up to the partyroom meeting.
The Nationals leader, David Littleproud, was at pains to say yesterday that it wasn’t the first time a sitting MP or senator had skipped out on party room meetings.
TikTok and Meta to comply with under-16s ban
Josh Taylor
Both TikTok and Meta have also told the parliamentary inquiry on age assurance they will comply with the under-16s social media ban when it comes into effect.
There had been speculation that Meta might use its new teens account features for accounts of users aged between 13 and 18 to try to win an exemption for Instagram and Facebook for teens, but the company’s director of policy in Australia, Mia Garlick, told the inquiry that Meta was working to comply with the under-16s ban from 10 December and deactivating accounts from that date.
TikTok’s director of public policy in Australia, Ella Woods-Joyce, said the ban would push younger people into darker corners of the internet, but TikTok would comply with the law.
One Nation announces name change and rebrand in ‘defining moment’ for party
In all the hubbub around parliament yesterday, Pauline Hanson announced a change to the name of her political party.
“Pauline Hanson’s One Nation” will officially become “One Nation” which she called a “defining moment”. In a statement, Hanson said:
The rebranding reinforces One Nation’s commitment to restoring trust in politics, protecting Australian values, and continuing the fight for everyday Australians across every state and territory.
One Nation has been gaining ground by targeting conservative voters frustrated with the Liberal and National parties.
It also coincides with some … discussions … between Hanson and Barnaby Joyce (though Joyce hasn’t confirmed anything yet on a possible defection from the Nationals, and has said he’ll keep his options open).
Snapchat says it will comply with ‘unevenly applied’ under-16s social media ban
Josh Taylor
Snapchat users under the age of 16 will be kicked off the platform from 10 December, with the company telling the parliament that although it disagrees that the ban should apply to Snapchat, it will comply with the law.
Jennifer Stout, Snap’s SVP of global policy and platform operations, said in her written opening statement to a parliamentary inquiry on age assurance measures that Snapchat should be excluded as it would meet the definition of a messaging service that is supposed to be excluded under the ban, but the company will accept the ruling of the eSafety commissioner. She said:
We will comply with the law, even though we believe it has been unevenly applied and risks undermining community confidence in the law.
Beginning 10 December, we will disable accounts for Australian Snapchatters under 16. We know this will be difficult for young people who use Snapchat to communicate with their closest friends and family.
Stout said the ban could see teens pushed on to platforms that are not included in the ban, and that are less safe as a result.
Meta and TikTok are also appearing before the inquiry this morning.
Greens push for inquiry into Optus triple zero outage
Optus still hasn’t been hauled in front of a Senate inquiry to explain the triple zero outage in September, says Greens leader Larissa Waters, who is pushing for another inquiry into the incident, above the investigations already under way.
On ABC RN Breakfast, Waters hails the government’s agreement to triple the penalties for telcos when they fail to connect customers to triple zero.
People’s very lives depend on it. And those increased penalties are long overdue. And so I’m really pleased that we’re now going to have that deterrent and try to make sure that telcos perform this essential service. And having them be accountable in front of a Senate inquiry is part of that.
The government’s legislation to introduce a triple zero custodian for oversight of the whole triple zero system is currently in front of the parliament. Are the Greens supportive?
Waters says the custodian should have been “up and running for quite some time” and that her party is “looking forward to that bill coming before the Senate”. It’s not a tick and flick exercise though – she warns the minor party will consider how high the penalties are whether criminal penalties should be introduced.
Can the Liberals be an ‘effective opposition’ without a net zero policy?
Moving on to a different issue, “what on earth is going on” in the Liberal party with net zero, asks host Sally Sara.
Julian Leeser doesn’t give much away, giving us the standard lines of “we are going through a process” and “we’re reviewing our policies”.
A recap: shadow energy minister Dan Tehan is taking a relook at the net zero commitment, which is tricky because the Liberal moderates want it to stay but the hardline conservatives want it scrapped completely.
Sara asks if the Liberals can be an “effective opposition” at this time without a policy. Leeser says:
We’re a couple of years away from an election. This is the policy formulation process. Well, it’s only five months since the last election, and this is a sort of Bismarck laws and sausages moment. We are looking at our new direction, and we’re having a debate, and people are expressing different views.
OK … so I just had to Google that one – 18th century Prussian politician Otto von Bismarck apparently said “laws are like sausages. It’s better not to see them being made” (or something similar to that effect).
Leeser on childcare predators: ‘We need to throw the book at these people’
The shadow education minister, Julian Leeser, says last night’s Four Corners program on predators in childcare was “one of the most chilling things I have ever seen on television”.
Leeser, who was moved from the shadow attorney general portfolio in Sussan Ley’s latest reshuffle, tells ABC RN Breakfast “every available alternative” needs to be looked at to oversee the sector, when asked whether the opposition would support a national childcare commission (as many advocates have been pushing for).
We need to ensure that we’re giving law enforcement adequate tools. We need to ensure that the childcare regulators have the tools that they need as well. And that’s why I’ve written again to the minister this morning to offer our support because this just can’t be allowed to continue.
We need to throw the book at these people and we need to ensure that we’re throwing every resource to weed people out of the system and to bring people who are engaging in child sexual exploitation on the web or the dark web to justice.
Leeser introduced his private member’s bill to parliament yesterday which would introduce mandatory minimum sentences for child sexual abuse crimes. He calls on the government to pass it.
Australia must ‘rapidly’ reduce emissions to meet 2030 target, Bowen’s department warns
The government will need to “rapidly” reduce emissions to get to its 2030 target, warns Chris Bowen’s department.
The warning comes from the incoming governmental brief, first reported by the Australian newspaper, by the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water. It’s a brief every department gives their new minister, and is generally released through a freedom of information request. But this one took a little longer (and a little more effort) to be made public.
The minister for climate change and energy released the document after an order of production of documents request by Liberal senator Dean Smith.
The document is heavily redacted with entire pages blacked out.
The brief states:
Emission reductions need to accelerate rapidly to meet the 2030 target. Full and timely implementation of your first-term reforms will be essential. You can chart the forward path by setting a credible and ambitious 2035 target, building on the Future Made in Australia investments and through ongoing focus on leveraging Australia’s comparative advantages— renewable energy, critical minerals, and access to global capital as a global investment location.
The brief also warns the government must respond to the National Climate Risk Assessment as “a priority”.
