Thread by @iMusing

good morning☀️happy Sunday! Today on #Insiders are Guardian Aus exec editor Lenore Taylor, murdoch political editor Samantha Maiden and AFR senior corro Jacob Greber. The interview is with Aged Care minister Anika Wells.

opening spiel: the economy slows to a crawl and fears of a recession. Interest rates up. These are cited as independent events, which is false. #Insiders

Speers then launches into the murdoch campaign against anyone who supports rape victims. He calls this “the opposition”, omitting the fact that the Liberals are trailing along behind the murdoch outlets. #Insiders

montage: interest rates. The economy, being spitefully tanked by the RBA. Corporations and landlords get off without a mention as per. The Liberal party handmaidens reciting their accelerator-break metaphor, extremely unconvincingly. #Insiders

#MakingNews more of the campaign against Gallagher. PwC was paid by government and private sector clients on cost of medical supplies was it? Speers describes the corporation as “embattled”. #Insiders

clip of Trump. Nobody seems to have Leary how to report on Trump without amplifying his message. Speers then editorialises that voters should start blaming the Labor Party for what corporates, banks and landlords are doing [paraphrased] #Insiders

panel starts with Greber stating the obvious: that Lowe is creating inflationary expectations instead of dealing with the actual current cause of inflation, the rent-price boss-landlord spiral. #Insiders

clip of Lowe. Clip of Chalmers. Taylor says the wage rises are less than inflation ie not even a real wage increase. She questions what level of pain in the community is acceptable. Everyone is in pain right now, says Taylor. Not uncle Phil, he’s fine (Ed) #Insiders

according to Lowe people should be looking for an extra job or a lodger, says Maiden. We chatter on about the not-inflationary wage rises for a bit. The price gouging and rent gouging and interest rate gouging goes unmentioned. Speers says Lowe is dampening expectations #Insiders

productivity, a thing in bosses’ control. Never mind that workers were never compensated by the massive productivity of pivoting to functioning in a pandemic for two years. No mention of the disease burden impacting productivity. #Insiders

wages are not the only lens for viewing productivity, says Taylor. Greber says productivity has not been part of the wages discussion. It has in the coverage I have seen. #Insiders

politically? Speers asks Maiden. She says the RBA is independent and it is unlikely the government will extend Lowe’s contract so he is in nothing-left-to-lose mode. Greber says sacrificing Lowe will not appease the inflation gods #Insiders

we keep getting metaphors about the narrow path to avoiding recession, says Taylor, and Lowe will be gone so the government will wear any recession. #Insiders

clips of Speers to lead into interview by Speers on the idea that the public should pay for the failure of neoliberal for-profit aged care policy, an unmitigated failure for everyone but the profiteers who trousered billions of public dollars to neglect old people. #Insiders

why are you willing to have a crack at reforming aged care after only a year as minister? Her mum worked in aged care, says Wells. Where do we need to start? How much money? Wells says the priority is how to get better care. #Insiders

if you need to raise an extra $10 billion a year then a levy on taxpayers might be the way to go? Wells says she is looking at the innovative funding models overseas. The Netherlands village model. Tasmania has a facility with cargo bikes #Insiders

a place where grandkids want to visit, says Wells. Not too institutionalised. Designed like a small town, with a front porch and all the shops, health services. Sounds wonderful and expensive, says Speers. Now about a levy, he says. #Insiders

it is too soon to say, says Wells. Is a levy on high income Australians a way to claw back tax cuts that will flow to the top income households? More user pays for people who can afford to? If they can afford to, says Wells. #Insiders

so rich people will have to pay for their own care [instead of the public subsidising inheritance for their kids]? It is too soon to say what the taskforce will recommend to government, says Wells. She wants people to feel they have a choice. #Insiders

workforce shortages are the biggest issue in the sector, says Wells, and has been since for her mum in the early 2000s. (At least). The regulator will have to be satisfied by what alternative care arrangements are put in place by bosses who can not meet minimum staffing #Insiders

how many foreign workers will be required for the nurse staff and 200 minutes per resident per day minimum? Thousands, says Wells. They have a tripartite agreement - unions, governments, bosses - to fast track migrant workers into the sector #Insiders

the labour hire reforms? Same job same pay? Yes. Wells says the aged care-migrant worker-gov labour agreements in no way undercut rigorous labour law. #Insiders

recommendations of the aged care royal commission. One review has been done. The minister will release it when she can #Insiders

the murdoch campaign targeting Senator Gallagher. Wells says Gallagher was asking the questions at the time about who knew what. The craven political operators now making public interest claims are totally beyond the pale, says Wells. #Insiders

back to panel. Speers pushes his levy narrative again despite zero confirmation of a levy policy. Taylor says they might want to take it to an election. Like the super tax change says Speers. #Insiders

there is an intergenerational issue the government has to tackle, says Greber. We identify a problem in a silo and sit back and say tax is the solution. Good point, says Speers, who is he one pushing the levy. #Insiders

why should the next generation pay for boomers to have lava lamps in aged home? asks Maiden. A lot of these families are very asset rich, says Maiden, they live in million dollar homes. The opposition will make hay [abbr] we agree. #Insiders

let’s go to [the murdoch campaign against] Katy Gallagher says Speers, his face the picture of rubbing his hands with glee. Clip of Reynolds being the most disgusting hypocrite. Misleading parliament is important, says Taylor. Not Coalition politicians, says me. #Insiders

it is open and shut, says Maiden. She mislead parliament. This is interesting says Speers, tell us more. Maiden put questions to Gallaghers office last October about the Shiraz boast. She will get away with it because no one resigns for misleading parliament says Maiden #Insiders

and there is nothing wrong with Shiraz or Higgins contacting Gallagher, says Maiden. She has no time for the way Cash and others have seized on the notion of “weaponisation”. The opposition are weaponising leaked texts and recordings, she says #Insiders

there is white hot rage in the Coalition about this, says Greber. Jesus Christ. Really? The manufactured anger of politicians matters how? #Insiders

they are handing out subpoenad materials like it is in a chum bucket, says Maiden. The real moment of reckoning [on sexual violence/#MeToo etc] is being attacked and we should not lose sight of that, says Taylor. It is very disturbing #Insiders

it will have a chilling effect on people coming forward, says Taylor. Regular reminder that rape victims disclose to friends, family, colleagues, counsellors, just about ANYONE but police for the very reasons we are seeing play out here #Insiders

discussion moves to Fiona Brown, who really did care about Brittany Higgins, says Maiden. The idea that Higgins attacked Brown came later, she says. Clip of Dutton making accusations of conspiracy and collaboration #Insiders

there is a complexity to compensation payouts, says Greber. This just prompts another round of political violence, he says👏🏼#Insiders

12 minutes now on this murdoch campaign. Dutton knew about the story before it broke says Maiden because he was briefed by the AFP and told Morrison’s office “and there were things that flow from that. #Insiders

#TalkingPictures is up. Anthony [who plays the insufferable ministerial staffer on Utopia] is a back to you David man. #Insiders

https://twitter.com/abcnews/status/1667681801958043648

#FinalObs 1 is Taylor on the Ombo report into the $2 billion of unlawful Morrison government handouts to community health in seats the Coalition wanted to win. #Insiders

#FinalObs 2 is Greber mentioning the federal law to ban some nazi symbols [but not nazi swastikas] #Insiders

#FinalObs 3 is Maiden asking why the Sofronoff inquiry is not showing more interest in why text messages from personal phones keep leaking [to the murdoch press] #Insiders

the outtake is a clip of Gillard describing bumping into Abbott. She is remarkably good humoured about a male who attacked her so viciously. #Insiders

this has been another edition of watching #Insiders so you don’t have to👋🏼👋🏼👋🏼