good morninghappy Sunday! Today on #Insiders are Guardian political editor Katharine Murphy, murdoch journo Annika Smethurst and David Crowe from ninefax. This thread is not fact-checked.

daily infection rate in Melbourne dropped by half yesterday. Good. Speers says it “appears the current lockdown is working” and comes as the Treasurer prepares to announce changes to federal income support policy #Insiders

montage is Melbourne and Sydney outbreaks and NSW and Vic restriction measures. It is basically framing “aggressive suppression” vs elimination, showcasing CMOs, various experts, Berejiklian, Morrison and Andrews #Insiders

#WhatThePapersSay Smethurst has a leak scoop on where Jobkeeper goes next. As Tingle wrote this week, media are obsessed with speculating and Liberal Party leaks on that one payment at the expense of reporting on total unemployment and long term poverty [paraphrased] #Insiders

#TheCurve presents the facts on Victoria and NSW which Speers segues immediately into “pressure on Premier Dan Andrews”. He doesn’t distinguish the intense pressure of managing a pandemic and the huge and irresponsible pressure being applied by murdoch media #Insiders

Smethurst runs the usual journo defence - “questions to be asked” - to “question” how Andrews has managed Melbourne outbreaks. The security guard line gets a run. There are “questions” to be asked about the Morrison-Andrews relationship too #Insiders

these questions are out to Murphy, who says it is legitimate to interrogate how the Vic Premier is managing Melbourne outbreaks and the Morrison-Andrews relationship #Insiders

next questions to be asked are about canceling parliamentary sittings. Crowe says the constitution does not restrict parliament from meeting on line lol and that there is a lot of demand for the required technology around the world so ramping up is difficult #Insiders

both Davids say there is need for scrutiny [of executive government]. Speers put the question about online Senate Estimates, notes the politicians are not taking a pay cut nor turning up to work. Smethurst says politicians are working hard in electorates #Insiders

general consensus that ACT record on zero community transmissions (I think) should not be put at risk by returning politicians which seems pretty flimsy. There are not that many parliamentarians. They can talk shit from quarantine. Their staff do the real work #Insiders

ah the app. Footage of an HO - sorry I missed who - conceding that the app has not identified any contacts who were not traced manually. It has taken weeks to get any kind of questions and reporting that is not rote repeoduction of Morrison government comms on this #Insiders

clip of Morrison on income support to segue into ACTU prez Michele O’Neil. This is the coded attack on workers that was leaked to Phil the fave this week. Signal word is “flexibility” #Insiders

some back and forth on where the government will go with jobkeeper - tea leave reading that the gallery has been speculating about for a while now - and we get to the ACTU jobs plan #Insiders

Michele O’Neil sets out the facts on affordable accessible child care and women’s participation in the paid work force. She says we need a jobs-led recovery. A national reconstruction plan is needed. This includes free TAFE for high demand skills #Insiders

asked if the TAFE component is an enhanced version of [Morrison slogan] O’Neill points out that the Coalition took $3 billion from TAFE so it is good to see two-thirds of that returned. She also distinguishes TAFE from private colleges (Morrison conflates the two) #Insiders

the ACTU manufacturing plan calls for 75% Australian content? Is that what he said? O’Neil points to flow on effects of job creation as well as building up capacity to export manufactured goods. #Insiders

oh god. Tax cuts. Speers says “tax cuts will put $1,000 in the pocket of people on $70 grand a year” (pretty sure $70K is higher than the AMWFTE). O’Neil says tax cuts will not put anything in the pockets of people without a job #Insiders

Q: has Labor got it wrong by supporting bringing tax cuts forward?
A: We have a different view.

regular reminder that tax cuts disproportionately benefit the comfortable classes and poor people pay for it.

the interview is bookended by another clip of the prime minister foreshadowing income support after jobkeeper expires. For those he as not already withdrawn it from, that is. Like the childcare sector #Insiders

god this jobkeeper speculation is infuriating. Murphy says it will taper and the government will not remove it altogether. Again, the fact that jobkeeper has been taken away already from the most critical sector to mothers in the paid workforce is erased #Insiders

and despite the fact that we just got played clips of the prime minister running his hints and winks comms strategy on jobkeeper changes, and the gallery has enthusiastically followed along, Smethurst says they have been “tight lipped”. Um. See #WhatThePapersSay. #Insiders

still on the deliberately confusingly named jobkeeper and jobseeker, so poorly understood by most comfy white journos that Murphy spells out (again) the base rate, the old newstart. It was too low, she says unambiguously #Insiders

ACTU and ALP childcare policies. First says free, second says capped. Where do you see that debate going? asks Speers of a murdoch journo who chooses the conflict frame for her answer. #Insiders

most of this discussion is about child care as a “cost” to the government and means to increase womens participation in the paid workforce ie all in the service of capital. O’Neil in contrast also pointed to the benefits of early childhood education #Insiders

the chances of a travel bubble between Aust and NZ - when we shipped another 30 NZ-born offenders back home last week - are pretty low imo #Insiders

#PalaceLetters time. Murphy says she went “full Irish”. She calls Sir Kerr an “unelected outpost of the British Empire” who should not be communicating behind the back of the elected government of the day with the palace #Insiders

Murphy is firmly in the letters-are-significant camp, and rejects the Palace statement, although she repeats the false claims in it. clip of Prof Hocking underlining the significance of the letters. #Insiders

lol Smethurst has a foot in each camp she says, which means countenancing the possibility that it is proper for an unelected official to sack the Prime Minister, who has the confidence of the House, which is a pro-tory position. #Insiders

#TalkingPictures is also on #PalaceLetters. A couple on the theme of explaining what letters are. Not a gentler time, says Mike, contrary to what we may assume #Insiders.

#FinalObservations 1 is Smethurst on the logistics of Frydenberg returning from Melbourne to Canberra to deliver a political statement [paraphrased] #Insiders

#FinalObservations 2 is David Crowe on what 94(?) year old Labor Senator Doug McClelland wrote back to him about #PalaceLetters highlighting the fact that the House voted no confidence in Malcolm Fraser #Insiders

#FinalObservations 3 is Murphy reiterating her warm recommendation to have a read of #PalaceLetters. #Insiders

we go out with that appalling footage of the federal health minister screwing up the act of putting on a mask and the HO who showed him up #Insiders

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

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