Confusion over why PM cancelled Bali trip

The federal government won't say why Prime Minister Tony Abbott cancelled a trip to Indonesia. Source: AAP

LABOR is demanding to know why Prime Minister Tony Abbott cancelled a planned trip to Indonesia, accusing him of further straining the relationship with one of Australia's closest neighbours.

Arrangements were being made for Mr Abbott to visit Bali early next week, where he'd been invited by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to attend a regional forum on open government.

But the trip has been put on ice, with speculation an asylum seeker operation underway northeast of Australia could be the reason behind the last-minute decision.

The prime minister's office has not confirmed why the visit was junked just days before the two leaders were expected to meet on the sidelines of the conference.

The invitation was seen as an opportunity to salvage relations damaged after a spying scandal late last year that saw Indonesia suspend high-level co-operation with Australia.

Shadow foreign affairs spokeswoman Tanya Plibersek is calling for answers.

"Rejecting this invitation at this late stage really does put extra strain on the relationship," she told reporters in Sydney on Saturday.

"It's very important that the prime minister discloses the reasons that he's really not going."

It's understood the trip was deemed too politically risky while Australian authorities were in the process of intercepting an asylum seeker vessel heading towards the mainland.

Turning back or towing an asylum seeker boat to Indonesia during the prime minister's visit could have caused embarrassment President Yudhoyono, sources say.

The Australian Greens said Mr Abbott's "cruel" asylum seeker policy had robbed Australia of a real chance to mend ties with Indonesia.

"That's the extent of the embarrassment that Tony Abbott is to Australia both domestically and internationally," Greens leader Christine Milne told reporters in Hobart.

"He's hoist on his own petard."

Finance Minister Mathias Cormann said there was nothing unusual or remarkable about the decision to cancel the trip, suggesting the impending budget was the reason.

"The prime minister is obviously very focused on his responsibilities here in Australia, 10 days out from our first budget," he told Sky News on Saturday.

Labor frontbencher Ed Husic rejected this explanation, accusing him of undermining Australia's foreign interests by snubbing Indonesia.

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Man abducts, attacks Qld woman in her car

A MAN has attacked a woman after jumping in her car at a north Queensland car wash and telling her to drive to an industrial area.

Police say the woman was cleaning her car in the early hours of Saturday morning when a man jumped in and told her to drive to a nearby industrial area.

When they stopped he snatched the keys from the ignition and the pair began to struggle.

But the sight of a patrolling police car caused the man to run away.

The woman was taken to hospital with cuts and abrasions to her face, back, legs and an injury to her arm.

Police are searching for the man.

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Ramsay Healthcare founder leaves $3b

Ramsay Health Care founder Paul Ramsay has died at the age of 78 after suffering a heart attack. Source: AAP

RAMSAY Health Care founder Paul Ramsay, one of Australia's richest men, has died, leaving more than $3 billion to the foundation bearing his name.

The 78-year-old died overnight in his home town of Bowral in NSW, after suffering a heart attack while sailing in Spain a week ago.

Mr Ramsay was Australia's ninth richest person and the 499th richest person in the world, with an estimated fortune of $US3.3 billion ($A3.57 billion), according to Forbes.

"He will be greatly missed by his family, friends, colleagues, staff and doctors and anyone that knew him, throughout the world," Ramsay Health Care said on Friday.

Most of Mr Ramsay's wealth came from his 36 per cent stake in Ramsay Health Care, which has more than quadrupled in value since 2009.

Single with no children, Mr Ramsay has left the bulk of his estate, including $3.27 billion in company shares, to the Paul Ramsay Foundation.

The foundation donates to many charities and supports several medical and health research groups.

Mr Ramsay started Ramsay Health Care in 1964 when he purchased a guest house on Sydney's north shore and converted it into a psychiatric hospital.

The company was floated in 1997 and now has more than 150 hospitals and clinics across Australia, Europe and Asia.

Mr Ramsay was also chairman of regional broadcaster Prime Media Group for nearly 30 years, before stepping down recently after selling his 30 per cent stake in the company.

Mr Ramsay also owned a stake in soccer club Sydney FC and was the club's chairman from 2009 to 2012.

In 2002, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia for services to the community.

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Myer looks forward to better 2015

Myer has blamed refurbishment work at three of its stores for a slide in its third quarter sales. Source: AAP

SPEAKING after the release of Myer's lacklustre third quarter sales results, Mr Brookes said the department store's sales would increase next year once refurbishment work at major stores and new store opening are complete.

Myer expects to lift sales by $100 million in 2014/15 and Mr Brookes expects costs, which have risen considerably in the last few years, to flatten out, providing a boost to the bottom line.

"All of the costs we've had in the prior couple of years are not repeated in 2015 and that's what helps us significantly," he told reporters.

Mr Brookes expects staff wages to rise around two per cent in 2015, below the five per cent growth seen in recent years, while operating costs are expected to fall following the end of refurbishment work.

Myer is currently refurbishing four stores: Adelaide City, Brisbane's Indooroopilly and Miranda and Macquarie in Sydney, and plans to open new stores at Mt Gravatt in Brisbane and Joondalup in Perth by Christmas.

It is also expanding its flagship Melbourne store, adding an extra 7,000 square metres of floor space as part of the adjacent Emporium development.

The department store on Friday blamed the refurbishment work for a one per cent slide in its third quarter sales to $646 million.

"That was almost solely due to the impact of refurbishments," Mr Brookes said.

Excluding the impact of the refurbishments, sales were up 0.24 per cent for the quarter, he said.

Myer shares fell 4.5 cents, or two per cent, to $2.12 on Friday in the wake of the figures.

Mr Brookes said the slide in sales would not impact Myer's expectations of a flat second half profit result.

"We said GP (gross profit) would be flat in the second half, that reflected the fact that we knew we'd be re-engineering some of the business, so therefore (there is) no further degradation at all from a profitability point of view, we'd already calculated that in."

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ERA strikes marketing deal with Rio Tinto

URANIUM miner ERA has struck a deal with its parent company Rio Tinto to improve how it sells uranium.

ERA operates the Ranger mine in Kakadu National Park, while Rio Tinto has uranium mining operations in Namibia.

Under the new deal, production from both mines will be pooled and then marketed and sold by Rio Tinto to global customers.

This will improve the value of ERA's marketing arrangements, it said on Wednesday.

When the arrangement begins in July 1, ERA will receive the same price for its production as Rio Tinto, minus a marketing fee.

ERA shares were down half a cent at $1.345 at 1126 AEST, while Rio Tinto shares were up 37 cents at $61.67.

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Faulkner plans to call it a day

VETERAN Labor Senator John Faulkner will step down at the next federal election.

Senator Faulkner, elected for NSW in 1993, says he will not re-nominate for preselection for the 2017 election.

"A quarter of a century is a long time, and my current term still has three years to run. To seek a further six-year term would be an indulgence," he said in a statement on his website on Wednesday.

Senator Faulkner said he had enjoyed the unqualified honour of representing Labor, its members and supporters, as a minister in three Labor governments and as Senate opposition leader for eight years.

In that time, he served under eight Labor leaders, four of them as prime ministers.

"Neville Wran nailed it when he once said that no one of us could ever claim to have given more to the Australian Labor Party than any of us had received from it. That is certainly true in my case," he said.

Although leaving parliament, he said he planned to maintain the association through Labor's community forums.

He said his commitment to party reform was undiminished and he would press for changes to NSW party rules at the conference in July to address internal corruption and open closed factional preselection processes.

Senator Faulkner, 60, started out as a teacher and party official before entering politics.

He served as minister for veterans affairs under Paul Keating, and special minister of state and defence minister under Kevin Rudd.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said Senator Faulkner had given decades of dedicated service to Labor, its members and the people the party has supported.

"John is a keeper of the Labor flame," he said in a statement, which also thanked him for the service and guidance he had given the party and Australia.

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Alleged Gold Coast sniper faces trial

A MAN'S failure to hang up a phone properly helped lead police to an accused sniper, a Gold Coast court has heard.

Rick El Masri, 37, is on trial for the near fatal shooting of father-of-three Hylton Miller on December 4, 2010, on the Gold Coast.

Miller was walking hand in hand with his wife along Surfers Paradise Esplanade when he was allegedly shot in a sniper-style attack from a high-rise apartment.

Prosecutors have already told Southport District Court that El Masri was targeting the strip club Hollywood Showgirls where he used to work as a bouncer.

Arresting officer Detective Senior Constable Lynton Bradbury told the court on Tuesday a colleague decided to call an apartment identified by witnesses who heard "firecrackers".

The colleague spoke to El Masri's friend Hakan "Harry" Altinoglu.

Sen Const Bradbury said Mr Altinoglu told police he had also heard the noises, but did not know who was responsible.

But when the call ended, the interviewing officer did not hang up and could hear Mr Altinoglu speaking in English and Turkish with his cousin, presumably under the assumption the officer was not listening.

"The statements provided included a reference to the speakers not trusting ... (El Masri) and a strong inference that they were extremely nervous about police attention being drawn to them," defence barrister Tony Kimmins told Sen Const Bradbury.

He replied: "That's what's in there, yes."

Sen Const Bradbury said detectives were able to narrow their search to Mr Altinoglu's apartment, helped by other residents in the complex who had heard the noises.

"We've ended up with, as I've described it, basically a Brady Bunch wall," he said, referring to the classic US sitcom.

"Where there's nine squares and everyone's pointing at the middle."

Sen Const Bradbury said Mr Altinoglu originally denied knowing anything about the shooting but, after realising what the police knew, identified El Masri as the shooter.

El Masri faces charges of grievous bodily harm, illegal possession of a weapon and two counts of dangerous conduct with a weapon.

Mr Altinoglu is expected to take the stand on Thursday.

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Smith takes on professor role at UWA

FORMER foreign affairs and defence minister Stephen Smith has been appointed a professor of international law at The University of Western Australia (UWA).

Prof Smith was awarded a Bachelor of Laws degree at UWA in 1977 and became a barrister of the WA Supreme Court that same year.

He was also admitted as a barrister of the Bar of England and Wales in 1980, and awarded a Master of Laws from London University in international law in 1982.

UWA Vice-Chancellor Paul Johnson said Prof Smith would add "tremendous intellectual value" to the university's law school.

"His experience as foreign affairs minister, trade minister and minister for defence will be a great asset to the university's law school, and its scholarship in international law and international relations," he said.

Dean of UWA Law School Erika Techera said Prof Smith's work would focus on the masters of international law and international relations courses.

"He will bring with him a practical understanding to the study," she said.

Prof Smith is also a board member at the Perth USAsia Centre and a member of the advisory board of the Perth legal firm, Lavan Legal.

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Canberra's great crockery outrage

INEVITABLY, in this era of cliches, it was dubbed PlateGate; though it might have been the Great Crockery Hunt, or two senatorial bulls in a china shop.

It was certainly the stunt of a very sleepy day in Parliament House.

Though it also had a serious message - Australian governments should buy Australian products as much as possible.

At issue was the foreign crockery in the Parliament House dining room.

Cross-bench senators Nick Xenophon and John Madigan found this outrageous and stumped up $11,000 to buy Australian crockery, which they presented to the Department of Parliamentary Services (DPS) in February.

Sadly the crockery, all boasting the Australian crest, hasn't made it to the dining room.

So the two good senators called a news conference on Monday to advance the cause.

They turned up with posters - "MISSING: 750 pieces of Australian-made crockery" and torches.

The torches, it soon transpired, were to be taken to the building's labyrinthine basement where the crockery has been stored.

First the two senators assured the assembled media that the disappearance of Australian manufacturing was a serious issue, that local procurement made good economic and moral sense and that Parliament House, of all places, should showcase Australian products.

A few posters were stuck up and everyone took a lift down to a well-lit basement where a couple of doors were peered into and a poster presented to a bemused trolley driver. The crockery wasn't found.

But it's there somewhere.

A spokeswoman said it was being stored while DPS looked at ways to use it.

The problem, she said, was that they had only 120 settings of the donated Australian crockery and the members' dining room uses 350 settings.

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Air search for MH370 called off

A report into the flight MH370 disaster is understood to recommend real-time tracking of aircraft. Source: AAP

THE air search for the missing Malaysia Airlines jet has been called off but the underwater search will be expanded.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott has declared a new phase in the search for MH370, saying it is now "highly unlikely" any wreckage will be found on the ocean's surface.

"By this stage, 52 days into the search, most material would have become waterlogged and sunk," he told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

The air search will end but a P-3 Orion patrol aircraft will remain on standby.

Authorities will instead focus all their efforts on the underwater search of the probable impact zone - an area of about 700km by 80km of the remote Indian Ocean.

Most of the ocean in the area is between 4000 and 4500 metres deep.

"We will search it all," Mr Abbott said.

"While the search will be moving to a new phase in coming weeks it certainly is not ending."

New specialised sidescan sonar equipment will be used to scour the seabed. The Bluefin-21 unmanned submersible will also continue its search.

The government will engage one or more commercial companies to undertake the search because some of the best expertise is in the private sector, Mr Abbott said.

That would cost an estimated $60 million and Australia would seek contributions from other nations.

It will take some weeks to put the new contract arrangements in place. In the meantime, vessels from Australia, Malaysia and China will continue operations.

Former defence force chief and search coordinator Angus Houston says the new phase could take up to eight months.

"We haven't given up hope yet," he said.

Mr Abbott conceded it was possible authorities may never find the plane, but that would be a "terrible" outcome.

"I want the families to know, I want the world to know, that Australia will not shirk its responsibilities in this area," he said.

"We will do everything we humanly can, everything we reasonably can, to solve this mystery."

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Vic Premier to ask feds for help at COAG

MAJOR infrastructure funding and a greater share of GST revenue are Premier Denis Napthine's targets for the next Council of Australian Government (COAG) meeting in Canberra on Friday.

Dr Napthine said Victoria needs more support from the federal government.

"I will certainly be raising with the federal government the need for key infrastructure funding for Victoria that is improving transport efficiency, improving business productivity and delivering jobs for Victoria," he said.

"I will also be putting the case for Victoria to get a fairer share of the GST.

"We are being dudded under the current GST arrangements.

Last week, Victorian Treasurer Michael O'Brien blamed a cut in the state's GST revenue from 90 cents in the dollar to 88 cents in 2014-15 for a $32 hike in car registrations and an increase in vehicle stamp duty.

The extra charges would be used to fund major transport infrastructure in the May 6 state budget, he said.

Dr Napthine said he would also raise a recycling initiative at the COAG meeting.

"I will also be raising one of my pet topics, and that is the need for a national container deposit legislation approach."

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Palmer 'induced' rebel NT trio: Newman

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman has accused federal MP Clive Palmer of inducing three Northern Territory MPs to join his political party.

Mr Newman says questions need to be asked about what cash, jobs and financial support Mr Palmer offered the MPs to jump ship.

"This is a man who tried to buy a government, my government," Mr Newman told reporters.

"We said 'go away', we said 'we're not for sale'."

"I ask what inducements were offered to these three MPs? What promises, what inducements were offered to them to jump ship?"

Mr Palmer on Sunday declared that Alison Anderson would be chief minister after the next territory election, after announcing that she, Larissa Lee and Francis Xavier Kurrupuwu had joined his Palmer United Party (PUP).

The three indigenous MPs quit the ruling Country Liberal Party at the beginning of April as a result of a rift between Ms Anderson and Chief Minister Adam Giles, saying they wanted to create their own regional political party.

Mr Newman's extraordinary spray came after a journalist asked Prime Minister Tony Abbott about the mining magnate calling Mr Giles a liar on national television.

That's what Mr Palmer said about everybody, Mr Newman said.

"As far as Mr Palmer goes everyone else is wrong and he's always right," he told reporters.

Mr Newman said it was time for Mr Palmer to stop spending money on election campaigning, adding that the PUP leader didn't "seem to have the money" to fulfil environment obligations at his Townsville nickel refinery and repair his Sunshine Coast resort.

After the trio moved to the crossbenches, Mr Giles accused them of driving a wedge between black and white Territorians.

But they argued the NT government, which ended 11 years of Labor rule when it won the 2012 state election, had not honoured its election commitments to the bush.

Mr Giles singled out Ms Anderson, saying she had form when it came to walking out on parties.

She became a parliamentarian for Labor in 2005 and in 2008 was appointed to cabinet. The following year, she left Labor after a dispute over indigenous housing and sat as an independent until 2011, when she joined the Country Liberal Party.

After it seized power, she was appointed minister for indigenous advancement.

But six months later in March last year, Mr Giles - Australia's first indigenous head of government - abolished the Department of Indigenous Advancement, saying he wanted his entire administration to focus on indigenous affairs.

Mr Giles told Sky News he was not concerned that other members of his party could join Mr Palmer's party.

"Clive can try and throw his money around as much as he wants but I can tell you the members of the CLP, the Country Liberals, are not for sale, the Northern Territory's not for sale.

"And we won't stand up for any of these bullyboy tactics by some rich bloke from the Gold Coast who wants to try and buy government in any jurisdiction, particularly the Northern Territory."

Prime Minister Tony Abbott reiterated his support for Ms Anderson in Brisbane on Sunday.

"In all of my dealings with her I say she's a fine person who's fiercely stood up for the rights of her people and who has done so as someone who is not only a proud Aboriginal Australian but a proud Australian and a proud Territorian."

Shadow treasurer Chris Bowen, when asked about the move by the rebel NT trio, told reporters that Labor was best placed to provide stable government in the NT.

"At least one of those MPs, of course, has joined the Labor Party, then the Country Liberal Party and now apparently the Palmer United Party," he said, referring to Ms Anderson.

"She is... doing a Billy Hughes and moving around the political spectrum."

"What's important is that the people of the Northern Territory get good and stable government and the person who can deliver that is Delia Lawrie and the Labor Party."

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