US RAISES MILITARY OPTIONS AFTER BOMB TEST

US Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis has raised the spectre of a massive US strike on North Korea after Pyongyang announced it had successfully tested a hydrogen bomb, a weapon 10 times more powerful than the five nuclear devices it has previously exploded.

While North Korea’s claims about its weapons stockpile are hard to confirm, experts have said the size of an earthquake measured at the suspected test site indicates the weapon was either a hydrogen bomb or something nearly as powerful. North Korean state television reported the country now has the ability to deliver a hydrogen bomb via an inter-continental missile, though observers of Pyongyang have not confirmed that.

After the meeting with US President Donald Trump and the national security council, Mattis told reporters: “We are not looking to the total annihilation of a country, namely North Korea, but as I said we have many options to do so.” On Twitter Trump earlier made a number of threats, criticising South Korea for “appeasement”, attacking China for having “little success” in solving the problem, and announcing the US was considering “stopping all trade” with counties that did business with North Korea.

TURNBULL’S FORTUNES IMPROVE

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has had a small dose of relief in the polls, with the latest Newspoll showing the Coalition inching higher, but still trailing Labor 47% to 53% in the two-party preferred stakes. It was better news from a personal perspective for Turnbull, whose own lead over Opposition Leader Bill Shorten reached its highest level, with 46% of voters choosing Turnbull as their preferred prime minister over 29% for Shorten.

Turnbull will be grateful for small comforts as a hectic week looms in Parliament. The PM will travel to Samoa later in the week, leaving Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce to take over as acting prime minister for the first time since he was engulfed in the citizenship chaos that could end with him being ruled ineligible. This will be an area of attack for Labor, with Fairfax saying Deputy Opposition leader Tanya Plibersek has refused to rule out a parliamentary walkout in response. 

“We have never before been in a situation where the government of the day has publicly admitted that they’re not sure they are in fact eligible to be the government,” she said. “Given we are in uncharted waters I think we have to say anything could happen this week.”

The story notes that according to Labor sources, a full walkout is unlikely, with the opposition more likely to delay any votes in the House of Representatives until Joyce steps down.

Turnbull’s popularity in Western Australia, incidentally, doesn’t seem to have improved much — following his address to the WA Liberal state conference on Saturday, the WA Liberals passed a controversial motion to establish a committee exploring the option of seceding from Australia. 

CBA TO FACE FURTHER INVESTIGATIONS?

CommBank’s year continues to get worse and worse. After allegedly failing to report tens of thousands of transactions involving money laundering and possible funding of terrorist activities, which could result in billions of dollars in fines, the embattled bank also faces an APRA probe into its workplace culture, and is now in the sights of US regulators. 

According to Fairfax, CBA is already fielding requests for information from a raft of US agencies, and a formal investigation is now “only a matter of time”.

Now would not be the time to cut costs around cybersecurity, one would think, but that’s apparently exactly what CBA intends to do. The Australian reports that the bank is seeking to offshore a substantial portion of its information technology services, possibly to India, in a bid to cut costs. The move, according to an “industry source”, goes against industry practice: “There are no other banks that are actually talking about this.”

MORE UNION DEALS UNDER SCRUTINY

Yet more deals struck by the Shoppies union are under the microscope, with Employment Minister Michaelia Cash saying deals struck with Big W, McDonald’s, Pizza Hut and David Jones undercut their employees’ penalty rates and show the union movement to by “hypocrites”.

“Their excuse that employees are compensated through higher weekday rates has now been proven to be false,’’ she  said. “Labor and the unions are clearly happy for Sunday penalty rates to be cut so long as is being done by unions.”

SDA national secretary Gerard Dwyer responded that Cash was “manipulating data from her department to take political pot shots at her opponents”.

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Labor to oppose $10m penalties for sympathy strikes and boycotts

Pauline Hanson‘s burka stunt prompts Senate to push for tighter dress code

WHAT’S ON TODAY

Melbourne: Court hearing to approve $70 million in compensation to Manus Island detainees after the Australian government settled a class action

Sydney: AUSTRAC to hold its first case management meeting regarding the 54,000 alleged breaches of money laundering and terrorism financing requirements leveled at CBA.

Canberra: Federal cabinet meets

THE WORLD

Kenya has been thrown back into political turmoil after the country’s Supreme Court annulled its election results. Defeated opposition figure Raila Odinga has said he will not share power with the current president Uhuru Kenyatta. Kenyatta has said the election should be re-run, as requested by the court, though he has also denounced the justices as “crooks”. — Reuters

Cambodia’s autocratic Prime Minister Hun Sen is overseeing a fresh crackdown on the opposition. In a surprise raid, leading opposition figure Kem Sokha has been arrested on charges of conspiracy, while a leading independent news outlet has faced a tax crackdown, forcing it to close. — The Guardian

COMMENTARIAT

Why I cherish Jan 26 in all its complexity — Scott Morrison (The Australian $): “You don’t dig up a time capsule and replace its contents because you don’t agree with what’s inside it. Such contents shed light on what was important at the time; what moved people to act and what formed their beliefs.”

North Korea’s nuclear ambitions are not unstoppable — Peter Layton (Sydney Morning Herald): “External countries can begin a campaign to persuade the North Koreans to change leaders. This is not seeking regime change in the sense that the communist party falls, but rather simply that Kim Jung-un falls.”

Tony Abbott is Liberals’ only hope as voters stray from Malcolm Turnbull — Andrew Bolt (Herald Sun $): “Julie Bishop is obviously disloyal and poor on policy. Scott Morrison is not trusted by many MPs and has not starred as Treasurer. Immigration Minister Peter Dutton is at least a conservative but is yet to show he has policy breadth.” 

CRIKEY QUICKIE

How Dutton is slowly undermining the rule of law in Australia — Michael Bradley: “Tony Abbott has a famous disregard for the separation of powers, but he is best left alone. His urbane faux doppelganger, the current Prime Minister, overstepped gloriously during the recent citizenship debacle when he told Parliament how the High Court will rule on Barnaby Joyce’s case. He knows how egregious an error that was, but he apparently doesn’t care because he hasn’t retracted it. In one sense, it’s good that this government has become increasingly loose with its willingness to overstep the conventionally respected boundaries that preserve the judiciary’s role as the unquestioned peak branch of government. It serves to remind us of what’s going on under the covers.”

Money for nothing: WA MPs given an annual $80k unreported, unaudited slush fund — Charlie Lewis: “In addition to their base remuneration MPs are paid a base electorate allowance of $78,000 per year — members for regional electorates receive additional money, in some cases pushing the total to over $100,000 … But, as Martin Drum, associate professor of politics at Notre Dame Australia, pointed out to Crikey, MPs do not have to disclose how they spent their allowance, and no one would ever know if members just pocketed the cash.”

Tips and rumours: Bankers will be bankers: We know bankers are less than happy with all the kicking the government has been giving them lately (the “South Australia needs jobs, not a banking tax” ads playing endlessly on Sky News ensure we never forget), but are the titans of industry planning to fight back? A Crikey spy tells us this intriguing anecdote:

“As heard in a very exclusive gentlemen’s club among the upper echelons of Sydney’s finance fraternity: a couple of banks are very seriously considering a legal challenge to certain ministerial decisions of the Turnbull government. Among the much slurred banter and anti-regulator bashing, loose tongues let it slip that even certain specific laws specifically targeting their bottom lines and risk profiles could be challenged depending on a much anticipated High Court decision. Silly drunk and high private school boys, will always be boys …”

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