Your noon Briefing

Welcome to your noon roundup of how the day has played out so far and what to watch for.

Hello readers. Here is your noon digest of what’s making news and a long read for lunchtime.

Barnaby Joyce walks into the Royal Hotel Armidale while on hols .pic John Grainger

‘Played for fools’

Cabinets leaks have emerged suggesting ministers believe Barnaby Joyce is acting hypocritically in refusing to stand down over his affair with pregnant former staff Vikki Campion, given the hard line he reportedly took on scandals involving former ministerial colleagues Sussan Ley and Jamie Briggs. The reports come as Nationals MP Andrew Broad savaged Mr Joyce for having failed the “character” test in a tweet this morning and others reportedly expressed concern about his capacity to manage serious national security events as a future acting prime minister. Witnesses have reportedly said that during cabinet discussions relating to the scandal over Ms Ley’s travel, Mr Joyce was “ruthless”, insisting that Ms Ley “had to go”.

-

15/11/2017: Alan Joyce speaking at the Boss Leadership Summit in Sydney on the day of the same sex marriage plebiscite results. Hollie Adams/The Australian

Joyce’s Qantas record

Alan Joyce’s presentation of Qantas’ first-half results made several references to the group’s “momentum”. It’s hard to argue with that after the group produced a record result, outstripping the high-water mark recorded in the first six months of Qantas’ boom 2015-16 year. The underlying pre-tax profit of $976 million was above the guidance of a profit of $900m to $950m Qantas provided with its first-quarter trading update last year, 15 per cent ahead of the same period last financial year and solidly above the $921m in the same period of 2015-16.

On a statutory basis, including $119m of one-off costs, the growth rate was even stronger, up 20 per cent to $857m.

-

Former prime minister Tony Abbott addresses the Sydney Institute on Tuesday, February 20, 2018. (AAP Image/Brendan Esposito) NO ARCHIVING

Abbott ‘wrong’

Acting Prime Minister Mathias Cormann and Trade Minister Steven Ciobo have added to the chorus of senior ministers slamming Tony Abbott’s calls to cut Australia’s immigration intake.

Senator Cormann said Mr Abbott was “wrong”, while Mr Ciobo said the former prime minister’s calls were “lazy and inaccurate”. Mr Abbott yesterday hit back at his former immigration minister Scott Morrison, accusing the Treasurer of being “captured by his department” after Mr Morrison dismissed Mr Abbott’s calls to cut Australia’s migration numbers by 80,000 a year, saying the permanent intake was the same as it was when Mr Abbott was prime minister.

-

Festive day of November in the Moscow Kremlin in the early autumn morning. Istock

The long read: Inside Russia’s fake news HQ

Trolls tweeted disinformation long before the US election, writes Rob Barry. “Well before it was focused on the 2016 election, what Russia was doing was stockpiling capabilities,” said Keir Giles, a specialist in Russian information warfare at the Chatham House think tank in London. “They were doing test runs of ‘what happens if we launch this kind of Twitter attack or attempt to start this kind of panic’. Sit back, refine your results, see what works and what doesn’t

-

Comment of the day

“It would have between Barnaby and his God if he hadn’t involved the taxpayer.”

Kate, in response to ‘Barnaby Joyce, Vikki Campion move out of townhouse, Nats leader says he has support of locals.’