ATTENTION GRABBERS
* ASYLUM SEEKER POLICY
Bill Shorten unveiled Labor's new asylum seeker policy, 18 months in the making. A Labor government would double the humanitarian intake by 2025, give $450 million to the UNHCR, have independent oversight of immigration detention centres, ensure no one who arrives by boat settles in Australia, and keep all the coalition's options for stopping the boats on the table. The Left was still unhappy and attempted to explicitly ban boat turn-backs during debate but lost out.
* PROTESTS OUTSIDE
A couple of hundred people protested outside the conference on a kind of rolling agenda covering climate change, asylum seekers and gay marriage. The Labor Environment Action Network plus GetUp and assorted environmental bodies were thrilled the party adopted a 50 per cent target for renewable energy. A placard change later and many of the same people were upset about the possibility of boat turn-backs forming part of Labor's policy to deal with asylum seekers. And the Equal Love group demanded the conference force federal MPs to vote in favour of legalising same-sex marriage.
* PROTESTS INSIDE
Shortly after the asylum seeker debate began, a group of protesters got down to the stage and unfurled a banner reading "no refugee tow backs" - interrupting Andrew Giles who was, in fact, attempting to make Labor agree to just that. Another group at the back of the hall started chanting "you're a traitor", swearing and calling Shorten a "dumb racist". But these rowdy protests backfired, with even Left faction observers grumbling that was not what they were there for and they wanted to hear the debate in peace.
* SHORTEN GETS INVOLVED
Shorten got around to many of the conference's associated events on Saturday, in contrast with Friday when his public appearances were limited to the opening speech, a tribute to Gough Whitlam and a brief pep talk to delegates over drinks. But on the second day he outlined the party's new asylum seeker policy before speaking at a fringe event on climate change and attending another with family violence campaigner Rosie Batty. He also moved a resolution on dealing with climate change (successfully) and made the final speech in the asylum seeker debate.
* GILLARD TEA TOWELS
Emily's List has been selling tea towels printed with Julia Gillard's misogyny speech for $25 a pop to raise funds for the group's activities promoting progressive women in politics. After Fairfax ran a story about the novel merch, the tea towels sold out at a stand on the conference outskirts and well over 700 orders were taken online. A group of (fairly paid) women are madly screen-printing new tea towels in a back room in Melbourne as you read this.
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