Your morning Briefing: PM considers parliamentary inquiry into Emma Husar’s staff claims

Hello readers and welcome to your two-minute digest of the day’s top stories.

Hello readers and welcome to your two-minute digest of what’s making news this morning.

08/08/2018: Embattled Labor MP Emma Husar reveals on Channel Nine news that she will quit politics. PIC: Nine News

PM mulls Husar probe

Malcolm Turnbull says it was “unbelievable” that Bill Shorten did not know about the staff dysfunction in the office of Labor MP Emma Husar’s office before it became public as he considers holding a parliamentary inquiry into the saga. The Labor backbencher’s decision yesterday not to recontest her seat of Lindsay at the next election came after NSW ALP officials bluntly told her the manner of her departure would be “her way or their way’’. After being told she had to go by ­tomorrow, Ms Husar gave an emotional televised interview in which she described her surrender as a “very sad day”. Brad Norington, meantime, writes that turning a blind eye is not a good look for Labor HQ.

“A few nasty, faceless people, can ruin someone’s career. Almost completely smash it in absolute pieces. And leave my reputation in absolute pieces.”

Emma Husar

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08/08/18 Former chairman of NAB fund trustee NULIS, Nicole Smith leaves the commonwealth courts building in Melbourne after giving evidence to the royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry. Aaron Francis/The Australian

NAB on criminal charge alert

National Australia Bank may face criminal charges over a probe by the corporate regulator into the company’s “suspected offending”, amid revelations the lender charged fees of more than $3 million to dead people. Financial services royal commissioner Kenneth Hayne also raised the prospect that NAB’s taking of money “to which there was no entitlement” for services it never provided might be a crim­inal offence during an at-times torrid day of hearings yesterday.

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chris collins and donald trump

Insider scandal

An Australian-listed biotechnology company has become embroiled in an insider trading scandal in the US that has led to one of Donald Trump’s leading supporters in Congress being charged. Republican Congressman Chris Collins was arrested in New York today after he leaked secret information about Sydney biotech company Innate Immunotherapeutics, knowing that its stock price was about to collapse.

The congressman, who was a 16.8 per cent shareholder in Innate, is alleged to have told his son Cameron — who owned 2.3 per cent of Innate — that the company was preparing to announce that a trial into the effectiveness of MIS416 had failed. According to the indictment, the investors collectively avoided around $US768,000 ($1 million) of losses by selling ahead of the announcement.

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Dozens of police some in riot gear gather near Lonzo Park in Taylors Hill . Police also blocked off part of Gourlay road. Picture: Jason Edwards

Gang of youths

Residents of a Melbourne street where dozens of youths of African appearance last night set upon police and hurled rocks at their cars described how they feared for their safety and their children. Police ordered people in ­Bronte Way, Taylors Hill, in Melbourne’s west, to lock their doors as they tried to gain control of a group that had gathered at about 7pm in a nearby park. Projectiles, believed to be rocks, were hurled at officers and a police car was damaged before heavily armed specialist officers were called in.

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Kudelka’s view

Jon Kudelka Letters cartoonf or 09-08-2018Version: Letters Cartoon (1280x720 - Aspect ratio preserved, Canvas added)COPYRIGHT: The Australian's artists each have different copyright agreements in place regarding re-use of their work in other publications.Please seek advice from the artists themselves or the Managing Editor of The Australian regarding re-use.