Governor’s mea culpa for flawed interest rates guidance

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Original article by Patrick Commins
The Australian – Page: 5 : 29-Nov-22

Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe has used an appearance before a Senate estimates hearing to apologise for the RBA’s flawed guidance during late 2020 and most of 2021 that interest rates would not go up until 2024. However, he stated that its advice at the time needed to be taken into context, noting it was the height of the pandemic, and the dire situation that the country was in suggested to the RBA that inflation was unlikely to pick up quickly. Lowe also said he was "very glad" that workers were getting higher pay, while he did not think that labour costs would increase sufficiently enough to cause a 1970s style wage-price spiral.

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RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA

Australian LNG cargo reaches gas-starved EU

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Original article by Angela Macdonald-Smith
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 14 & 18 : 29-Nov-22

Woodside Energy has shipped a 75,000-tonne cargo of LNG to north-west Europe, amid the ongoing energy crisis in the region. The shipment had been bought by Germany-based Uniper and arrived at Rotterdam nearly one month after leaving the North West Shelf export terminal in Western Australia. It is estimated that the shipment would be worth around $194m, based on the current spot price. Australia’s LNG exporters generally prefer markets in Asia, given the distances involved in shipping gas to Europe.

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WOODSIDE ENERGY GROUP LIMITED – ASX WDS, UNIPER, NORTH WEST SHELF LNG PTY LTD

Greens threaten to support Liberal amendment in move that could derail passage of key integrity bill

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Original article by Paul Karp
The Guardian Australia – Page: Online : 29-Nov-22

The federal government is still aiming to pass legislation for its National Anti-Corruption Commission before parliament rises for the year. However, it has received a setback after the Liberal Party proposed an amendment which would require the appointments of the NACC commissioner and inspector to be approved by at least three-quarters of the joint parliamentary oversight committee’s members. The Greens have indicated that they may be open to supporting this amendment unless the government agrees to allow the NACC’s parliamentary oversight committee to be chaired by a non-government MP.

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LIBERAL PARTY OF AUSTRALIA, AUSTRALIAN GREENS

Firms war-game the new IR rules

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Original article by Hannah Wootton
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 6 : 29-Nov-22

Perth-based conglomerate Wesfarmers has indicated that it will continue to use enterprise agreements rather than shifting to multi-employer bargaining. CFO Anthony Gianotti says Wesfarmers believes that traditional enterprise agreements are the best way of driving real wage growth. Ramsay Health Care’s CFO Martyn Roberts in turn says that negotiating pay rises across rival companies in the same sector may be "quite challenging". Gianotti adds that the Secure Jobs, Better Pay reforms have not gone far enough in simplifying the industry awards system.

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WESFARMERS LIMITED – ASX WES, RAMSAY HEALTH CARE LIMITED – ASX RHC

‘Publishing is not a crime’: media groups urge US to drop Julian Assange charges

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Original article by Jim Waterson
The Guardian – Page: Online : 29-Nov-22

The media organisations that first helped WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange to publish leaked diplomatic cables in 2010 have called on the US to drop its prosecution of him. They contend that the prosecution of Assange is an attack on media freedom, and that "publishing is not a crime". Assange is currently being held in a UK prison, where he is awaiting the outcome of an appeal against a ruling in June by then UK home secretary Priti Patel that he be extradited to the US.

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WIKILEAKS

Inflation tipped to rise to highest level in 32 years

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Original article by Emma Rapaport
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 29 : 29-Nov-22

The latest monthly inflation data will be released on Wednesday. Catherine Birch from the ANZ Bank expects the data to show that the headline inflation rate rose from 7.3 per cent in September to 7.8 per cent in October. Birch also forecasts that the Reserve Bank’s preferred measure of trimmed mean inflation will rise from 5.4 per cent to 5.9 per cent. The ANZ expects the quarterly headline inflation rate to peak at eight per cent in the final three months of 2022 and remain above the central bank’s target range of 2-3 per cent until the end of 2024. It also anticipates that the Reserve Bank will begin to ease monetary policy in November 2024.

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AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND BANKING GROUP LIMITED – ASX ANZ, RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA

Morrison will be censured by parliament – but not by the Coalition

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Original article by Phillip Coorey
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 10 : 29-Nov-22

Federal cabinet has agreed to censure former prime minister Scott Morrison over revelations that he secretly took on five ministerial portfolios. The censure motion is expected to be debated in parliament on Tuesday, although the Coalition will oppose the motion. The Opposition’s manager of business Paul Fletcher has described the censure motion as a "political stunt", arguing that such motions are meant to hold ministers to account rather than being used as a "political payback exercise". Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says the actions of his immediate predecessor were extraordinary, unprecedented and wrong.

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AUSTRALIA. DEPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER AND CABINET

Public hearing test strikes right balance

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Original article by Rosie Lewis
The Australian – Page: 4 : 24-Nov-22

The Greens have confirmed that they will support legislation to establish the National Anti-Corruption Commission. However, Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather and other crossbenchers have urged the federal government to lower the threshold for public hearings of the NACC. As it stands, the NACC bill requires hearings to be held in private unless there are "exceptional circumstances". Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has defended the exceptional circumstances test, arguing that it strikes a balance between the benefits of public hearings and the potential negative impacts.

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AUSTRALIAN GREENS, AUSTRALIA. DEPT OF THE PRIME MINISTER AND CABINET

Multi-employer bargaining pays off for workers and businesses

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Original article by Chris F Wright
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 39 : 24-Nov-22

The multi-employer bargaining provisions of the Secure Jobs, Better Pay Bill have been widely criticised by employers’ groups. However, even these groups agree that the current enterprise bargaining system is broken, but they have not put forward an alternative to multi-employer bargaining. The Fair Work Act placed collective bargaining at the enterprise level at the heart of the workplace relations system, but the current laws make it too easy for businesses to opt out of enterprise bargaining while it has become too hard for workers to negotiate new agreements. The rest of the world is moving towards multi-employer bargaining, as it benefits businesses as well as workers. Australia should embrace this once-in-a-generation opportunity to do so as well.

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Debelle steps down as Fortescue CFO in latest reshuffle

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Original article by Brad Thompson
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 14 & 18 : 24-Nov-22

Fortescue Metals Group has appointed Felicity Gooding as the interim chief financial officer at its clean energy subsidiary, Fortescue Futures Industries. This follows Guy Debelle’s decision to step down as CFO; he took up the role in March following his retirement from the Reserve Bank of Australia, where he had been the deputy governor. Debelle is still recovering from injuries sustained in a bike accident in August, and says this means he cannot do justice to the role of CFO. He will instead join FFI’s board of directors.

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FORTESCUE METALS GROUP LIMITED – ASX FMG, FORTESCUE FUTURE INDUSTRIES PTY LTD, RESERVE BANK OF AUSTRALIA