Late Night Live — Full program podcast · ABC Australia

Ian Dunt's UK, Geoffrey Watson finds the NACC wanting and the power of presidential pardons

·55 min·5 clips

David Marr opens the program with Donald Trump and the pardoning power. He points to Trump at his most monarch-like when he opens prison doors for frauds, donors, drug czars, and the January 6 rioters, and says the show will come back later to Trump and the pardon clause itself. The program then moves to robo-debt and the National Anti-Corruption Commission. Jeffrey Watson, SC, sets out Commissioner Holmes's findings about Scott Morrison, including that he knew averaging robo-debt was a bad scheme, knew he was responsible for administering it lawfully, had been warned it was unlawful to introduce, failed to tell the Expenditure Review Committee of Cabinet, and misled Cabinet either deliberately or by omission. Watson also says Holmes found Morrison gave untrue evidence to the Royal Commission on a critical issue. He then contrasts that with the NACC's different conclusion, with Assistant Commissioner Kylie Kilgour drawing different inferences and reaching a different outcome. The final segment goes to Ian Dunt after his victory lap. The discussion lands on Prime Minister Keir Starmer's decision to allow US fighter planes to use UK bases to pursue the forever war with Iran, with Marr pressing the broader questions about alliance, escalation, and the language governments use around such moves. The episode closes by returning to Saif Prakash on the history of presidential pardons and the long, troubled life of the clause, including the awkward fact that someone can be pardoned for an offense that has already been pardoned once.

As heard by us

A brisk tour of power, from the pardoning power to robo-debt, with law doing most of the talking.

This episode treats power as a habit, moving from Trump's pardoning power to robo-debt and the NACC, then to Ian Dunt on Keir Starmer's decision to let US fighter planes use UK bases.

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Why you'd press play

If you want politics, law, and constitutional power in one sitting.

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