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Nationals leader David Littleproud is staring down a whispering campaign about his leadership, declaring he has the confidence of the party room amid rumblings of a challenge from the camp of former party head Barnaby Joyce.

Littleproud played down speculation over his leadership when he spoke to this masthead on Monday, arguing he was notching wins for the party within the Coalition.

Nationals Leader David Littleproud: ‘People will want us to stick by the 2050 [net zero] agreement.’Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Asked if he feared a potential coup, Littleproud said he had no reason to suspect a challenge to his position.

“No, I have no reason to believe that. I’m just simply getting on with the job,” he said.

“I am comfortable in my own skin. Since I became leader, I asked for a national energy summit that has now got even the Liberals across the line in wanting to explore nuclear energy.”

You can find the full piece on this here. 

Earlier, shadow treasurer Angus Taylor said the government shouldn’t be relying on the Reserve Bank to do “all the work” to take pressure off inflation.

He told ABC News Breakfast this morning the government needs to be pulling every lever to tackle inflation.

“That’s not what we’re seeing. And that will take pressure off the Reserve Bank. It will mean that they won’t have to push through interest rate increases and cause even further pain than what we’ve already seen,” Taylor said this morning.

Shadow treasurer Angus Taylor says the government is not doing enough to tackle inflation. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

He also labelled the Labor government’s plan to use the surplus to pay down government debt as “propaganda”.

“That’s their propaganda. But let’s look at the facts. They’re spending $185 billion more than when they came into government,” he said.

Taylor said that was adding “fuel on the fire for inflation”.

He said the Coalition opposed $45 billion worth of additional spending in a bid to help reign in inflation.

“We’ve done that because we feel this is the wrong time to be spending that kind of money. We’ve got to take pressure off Australians,” he said.

The former Coalition minister at the centre of the Brittany Higgins saga has accused Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus of denying her funding for legal assistance throughout the inquiry into Bruce Lehrmann’s trial for political reasons.

Liberal senator Linda Reynolds said she was left prejudiced when she wasn’t legally represented while ACT top prosecutor Shane Drumgold raised suspicion of a political conspiracy to derail the case, after she asked the government to foot the bill for a barrister for the public inquiry in a request Dreyfus later refused.

Reynolds, as defence industry minister at the time, was the boss of Bruce Lehrmann and Brittany Higgins when the latter alleged she had been raped by Lehrmann in her ministerial office.

Linda Reynolds has accused Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus of prejudice over legal funding for the Lehrmann inquiry.Credit: Mick Tsikas

He pleaded not guilty in March 2019 in a criminal trial that was aborted in October 2022 due to juror misconduct. A retrial was scrapped in December due to Higgins’ mental health. Lehrmann has always maintained his innocence.

The ACT government launched an inquiry, led by Walter Sofronoff KC, into the handling of the trial following a public fallout between Drumgold and police. It is due to hand down its findings by the end of this month.

Reynolds was granted public funding for responding to two subpoenas from the inquiry and hired a solicitor to monitor proceedings.

Continue reading this here. 

In breaking news, embattled consulting giant PwC Australia has offloaded its government business to private equity group Allegro Funds for $1 as it seeks to move on from its damaging tax leaks scandal.

The sale of the company’s public sector advisory business, which includes all its work for federal and state government departments including healthcare and education, became effective on July 1 after PwC and Allegro signed off on the terms of the deal, the private equity fund said in an emailed statement today.

PwC has offloaded its scandal-damaged government business.Credit: Martin Ollman

The new company, to be named Scyne Advisory, will be fully independent of the scandal-rocked consulting firm and take on 1750 PwC employees. The private equity fund said it expected to invest more than $100 million to support the business in the future.

Public work represented about 20 per cent of PwC’s revenue for the 2023 financial year.

Updates on this story are available here.

Australian Wikileaks founder Julian Assange spent another birthday in a UK prison cell, with Foreign Minister Penny Wong saying the matter has “dragged on too long.”

Assange is being held at Belmarsh Prison, where he is appealing his extradition to the United States to face charges related to the theft of hundreds of thousands of secret cables from the US government.

Wong said the legal case was in another jurisdiction involving another country, and there were limits to what Australia could do.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange holds up his Sydney Peace Prize after receiving the award at the Frontline Club in 2011.Credit: Reuters

“I know people believe that somehow we can fix this, actually, there are limits to what Australia can do,” she told ABC radio.

The foreign minister said Australia would continue to advocate to both countries.

“Our view is that this has dragged on too long and our request that this be brought to a close, and that those matters have been raised at the most senior levels,” she said.

But she wouldn’t go into when she last spoke to her counterparts in the UK and the US about Assange.

“I’m not going to go into that ... but I’ve engaged with the foreign secretary and obviously, we have engaged with the United States, so you would expect those matters are raised at the highest levels.”

The foreign minister says Australia has expressed concern about the national security laws in Hong Kong after bounties were issued for information about activists who fled a crackdown.

The bounties were offered for information leading to the arrests of Melbourne lawyer Kevin Yam, who is an Australian citizen, and former Hong Kong legislator Ted Hui, who has settled in Adelaide with his family.

Hong Kong political exile Ted Hui has been living in exile in Australia since March 2021.Credit: Eamon Gallagher

Penny Wong said Australia had “deep concerns” about the national security laws in Hong Kong and their broad application on ABC Radio this morning.

“I want to be very clear: Australia has a view about freedom of expression, we have a view about people’s right to express their political views peacefully and people in Australia who do so in accordance with our laws will be supported,” she told the RN Breakfast program.

She said Australia would support those in Australia who exercise those rights.

The other activists named by Hong Kong police and who are based in the UK and US include other exiled politicians Nathan Law and Dennis Kwok, activists Finn Lau, Anna Kwok, and Elmer Yuan, and unionist Mung Siu-tat.

The foreign minister hasn’t said whether the government has asked Indonesia to allow Australia’s future AUKUS submarines in its waters.

Penny Wong was asked on ABC radio this morning whether Australia would raise the question when Indonesian President Joko Widodo visits the country.

“Obviously, Indonesia is keen to understand what we’re doing [in relation to AUKUS],” Wong told RN Breakfast host Patricia Karvelas.

Nuclear-powered submarines eventually bound for Australia under the AUKUS deal.

“It’s keen to ensure that [nuclear] non-proliferation is observed ... we are very conscious of Indonesia’s interests, we share the same motivations, we want a peaceful and stable region, and we acquired the new submarine capability and participate in AUKUS with that objective in mind,” she said.

The foreign minister said Australia would continue to be transparent with Indonesia about the submarines, and will engage with them about the issue.

Wong was pushed again on whether Australia would ask Indonesia to allow the submarines in its waters.

“We ... are in the process of acquiring a new submarine capability, and we’re focused on doing that not on those sorts of operational matters,” she said.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong has foreshadowed the government will make it easier for Indonesian business travellers to come to Australia.

Wong was questioned about Indonesian visitors coming to Australia after this masthead reported that the federal government is set to relax onerous visa rules for people coming from that country.

“It’s one of the things that has been consistently raised with us,” Wong said of the visa issues with Indonesia on RN Breakfast this morning.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong says there will be changes to the business visas for Indonesians. Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

She said the Albanese government was focused on how to improve economic ties with the country, which is becoming one of the region’s growing economic powers.

“We want to make sure we’re partners in that, so there will be a greater emphasis on the economy, and the economic relationship ... as part of that, you’ll see some visa changes to make sure we make business travel easier,” Wong said.

But the foreign minister said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would have more to say about visas later today.

“What I can flag ... is that we will be making business travel easier for Indonesians to come to Australia.”