🟡 Searching for doctors

🚪 Coalition in tatters as Cowper MP Pat Conaghan joins Nationals exodus from Shadow Ministry

Cowper MP Pat Conaghan has joined Nationals leader David Littleproud and six other frontbench colleagues in resigning from their positions, after the entire party quit the Coalition’s shadow cabinet following disagreement over Labor’s proposed hate speech laws.

📍How we got here: Conaghan, who acted as shadow assistant Treasurer and shadow minister for Financial Services, said in a statement that while he and the party may support the intent of Labor’s hate speech bill, “we do not support the rushed iteration that has been presented”.

• “The legislation needs and deserves to have amendments heard and tested,” said Conaghan. “These laws are too important to get wrong. They are too important not to consider the unintended consequences fully.”

The National Party had put forward multiple amendments to the bill, however all were voted down.

🗓️ The next day: On Thursday morning, Nationals leader David Littelproud declared the relationship with the Liberal Party “done”, saying he had made Liberal Party leader Sussan Ley “fully aware” earlier that day. 

Speaking to reporters, Littleproud said he had “made it very clear [the Nationals] cannot be part of a shadow ministry under Sussan Ley”.

🗞️ Keep on keepin’ on: This latest rupture is the second time in months the Coalition has split, and occurred after three National Party senators publicly broke shadow cabinet rules to vote against Labor’s hate speech reforms.

🔫 Gun law reform? Maybe, maybe not.

Federal Member for Cowper Pat Conaghan has slammed Australia’s new gun laws, claiming the nation doesn’t have “a gun problem” but “a radical Islamic extremism problem”.

What happened: The tightened gun laws passed in the Senate on Tuesday night after parliament returned two weeks early for two days of emergency debate – a response to the Bondi terror attack.

What does it mean: The newly passed federal laws include:

• Prevent non-Australian citizens from importing firearms;

• Tighten background checks for gun licences and review current licence holders;

• Promote intelligence sharing between agencies, and states and territories, when completing checks;

• Tighten restrictions on the importation of firearms, parts and ammunition, and;

• Expand the Home Affairs minister's powers to refuse the importation of firearms.

These reforms will be paired with a buyback scheme, with further details to be announced.

Don’t blame the weapon: MP Pat Conaghan said in a social media post the new legislation was “unfair to good, law-abiding gun owners in Australia” and that Australia already had “some of the strictest gun laws in the world”.

• “Primary producers, sporting shooters and gun collectors did not cause the terrorist attack at Bondi on 14 December - the failure of this Prime Minister over the past two-and-a-half years to listen to the Jewish community and security experts and agencies did,” Conaghan said.

He said the Bondi terror attack was the result of “a failure in procedure that allowed the father of a known Islamist extremist to hold firearms”.

“There was a failure by a security organisation to pick up that the two Islamic extremists travelled to a known terrorist training ground and returned to Australia to change our history,” Conaghan said.

On a state level: New South Wales passed major gun reforms late last year, which included limiting individuals to having no more than four firearms with commercial users and farmers limited to 10.