The Library Bulletin

Malcolm Turnbull’s government has finally defied fiction In a week belonging more appropriately to Shaun Micallef comedy than parliamentary reality, it’s arguable Pauline Hanson’s burqa stunt wasn’t the most extraordinary thing that happened in Canberra. Let’s call out her action, but not play into her cynical pursuit of mega publicity. Entirely beyond imagination was the week being bookended by the Nationals leader, Barnaby Joyce, and his deputy, senator Fiona Nash, standing up in their respective houses to announce they were dual citizens (he a Kiwi, she a Brit).

A-G issues advice on judiciary’s public presence Commonwealth Attorney-General George Brandis QC has offered his advice on the public presence of judges, in response to the parliamentary inquiry into family violence and the family law system.

High court upholds Australia's right to send asylum seekers to Papua New GuineaThe high court has upheld Australia’s right to send asylum seekers to offshore detention in Papua New Guinea, despite the PNG supreme court ruling the Australian-run processing centre on the island was “unconstitutional and illegal”. The full bench of the high court, sitting in Brisbane, ruled Australia’s offshore arrangement with PNG was valid.