Australia politics live: Scott Morrison in last-ditch talks with Nationals on net zero

The joint party room meeting is under way. We’ve heard from a lot of voices already so we’ll let you know who was the loudest in the room.

Craig Kelly has temporarily relocated to Canberra because he has not been vaccinated. He quarantined for 15 nights before the sitting in Canberra and has no plans on travelling back to NSW in between sittings.

So he has plenty of time to spend on social media. It seems there are quite a few people – including the president of the Royal Australian College of GPs – who have had enough:

Meanwhile, in very loud minority world:

NSW CHO Dr Kerry Chant was at today’s health presser. She said the health system was under strain but holding up and she was heartened by the vaccination rates.

But she said she also expects infection rates will begin to increase again, from next week:

There are a lot of uncertainties about what case numbers will do. We would believe they would go up, as we have more interactions. But as I said, it is in the hands of everyone.

So, the more people who continue to get tested, the more people followed a public health advice, the more people that get vaccinated, all give us protections.

So we have, to some extent, all of the modelling depends on judging what testing levels are, what the vaccination levels are, what the number of interactions people have.

So we have given guidance, so to some extent it is about how people behave responsibly as we open up, but the models will show.

But we are expecting it does take a lag. So we would not be expecting numbers to rise within a two-week period, so next week I will be really interested in what our numbers are …

I am so pleased we have 90,000 tests. We are going to need to keep those testing rates up and thank you to everyone of those individuals who have come forward.

There is no universe where Matt Canavan would accept a net zero by 2050 target, even if he was given every single piece of modelling in the world. We know this.

Canavan is playing the role of the strong holdout National MP, so when it comes to the election campaign, he can speak to all of those people in Nationals electorates (particularly central Queensland) and let them know he was always on their side – and therefore, they still have a voice in the Nats.

It’s a little more quiet this morning – Tuesdays are always a little calmer (at least in the morning) because all the MPs get locked up in party room meetings.

We’ll let you know the outcome of those as soon as they happen.

ACT chief minister Andrew Barr has announced changes to the ACT’s Covid roadmap, now that the territory has reached 80%.

The main takeaways – face masks won’t be needed outdoors from 29 October and the NSW Covid declaration will be lifted from 1 November.

Retail will reopen (with Covid plans) from this Friday.

Which means there will be no need to quarantine if you go anywhere in NSW and return to the territory – including Sydney – from 1 November.

Yesterday it was Pikachus – today koalas.

Extinction Rebellion spokesperson Miriam Robinson has commented on the latest XR protest outside Parliament House:

Environment Minister Sussan Ley has recently given approval for three new coal mines. This is not the action of a minister who understands that the climate emergency is real and that the government owes a Duty of Care for future generations, not only of people, but animals too.

We demand government drop itsappeal against the Federal Court ruling that it owes a ‘Duty of Care’ to protect Australia’s children from the dangers of climate related harm. We just want our government to do their job. All we ask is that they act in the interests of the people, not their donors and not the corporations. Is this too much to ask?

The Liberal MP for Reid, Dr Fiona Martin, seems to be bracing for something:

Barnaby Joyce now has his lines and is sticking to them, when it comes to how he speaks about the climate debate:

We’ve been down this path before – ETS, the single desk, the carbon tax debates. The Nationals are well-versed in this. We’re not concentrating on that.

We’re concentrating right now on one thing. That’s making sure we look after regional people – they send us to Canberra, they have their concerns, they’re conveying it to our office loud and clear, and we are making sure they have a time to be heard and a time for us to give our best endeavours to make sure their best concerns are dealt with.

The Nationals are going through that process. People are aware and we want to make sure we get to a conclusion to make sure that we can go back to our electorates and say, “These were the concerns you conveyed to us. And this was the valid attempt we put towards trying to make sure that those concerns were dealt with.”

Extinction Rebellion protesters have staged another protest outside parliament this morning: