Your afternoon Briefing: Palmer: Labor ‘lies’ ended preference talks

Your 2-minute digest of the day’s big stories.

Hello readers. Clive Palmer says Labor ‘lies’ ended preference talks, and giant of Australian literature, Les Murray, has died at age 80.

Clive Palmer, leader of the United Australia Party (UAP) reads a statement without taking questions from the media during a press conference in Brisbane, Monday, April 29, 2019. Australians will be voting in the federal election on May 18. (AAP Image/Dan Peled) NO ARCHIVING

Palmer: Labor ‘lies’ ended preference talks

The Australian Labor Party has denied offering Clive Palmer a preference deal, despite his claims they have courted him since 2013.

Mr Palmer lashed out at Labor leader Bill Shorten, calling him a “two-faced liar” for saying the ALP would never do a preference deal with his United Australia Party. Keep up with the latest from the campaign trail in our live blog, PoliticsNow.

-

Prime Minister Scott Morrison and wife Jenny sing during an Easter Sunday service at his Horizon Church at Sutherland in Sydney, Sunday, April 21, 2019. (AAP Image/Mick Tsikas) NO ARCHIVING

‘Have you read Matthew 6:5-6?’

Labor senator and devout Catholic Kristina Keneally has taken aim at Scott Morrison’s faith,

with the Senator tweeting that he was a “hypocrite”, referencing the Gospel according to Matthew. Keneally has also been at the Federal Court today, dodging questions about Sky and the Greens at the David Leyonhjelm defamation trial.

-

18/09/2016 Poet Les Murray next to a 1927 Dodge ute out the front of The Settlers Arms Inn in St Albans NSW, 120km from Syndey. Les and Journalist Nikki Gemmell have come together for the St Albans Writers Festival. Ryan Osland/The Australian

Poet Les Murray Dies

Les Murray, poet and giant of Australian literature, has died in Taree at age 80.

The Bard of Bunyah, so named for his beloved home on the NSW mid-north coast, was sometimes mentioned as a possible future winner of the Nobel prize for Literature.

-

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young speaks to the media as leaves the Federal Court in Sydney, Monday, April 29, 2019. Senator Hanson-Young is suing former Liberal Democrats Senator David Leyonhjelm for defamation over comments he made about her during interviews he gave between June 28 and July 2, last year. (AAP Image/Dean Lewins) NO ARCHIVING

Hanson-Young’s fight for senate survival

Sarah Hanson-Young is facing an uphill battle in her bid to be re-elected to the Senate, with a new poll showing support for the Greens on the slide.

-

Barry Humphries who is in Melbourne to perform his new show The Man Behind the Mask where he plays himself. Picture: David Caird

We don’t always have to be nice

Barry Humphries has defended his controversial brand of comedy after his name was stripped from the Melbourne International Comedy Festival’s top gong, declaring comedians aren’t “obliged to be nice”.