As it happened: ADF support for aged care considered; plans to revise the national curriculum; COVID-19 cases continue to grow across the nation

Good evening and thank you for reading our live coverage of the day’s events, here’s what has been happening:

• The laws that control employment arrangements for political staffers will be reviewed as the federal government takes the first steps to respond to Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins’ examination of harassment in parliamentary workplaces.
• An elite soldier has told the Federal Court that he witnessed an Australian soldier shoot an Afghan man with a prosthetic leg at close range with a distinctive machine gun that he later saw in the possession of war veteran Ben Roberts-Smith.
• The Prime Minister, speaking in Melbourne, said the army was not a “shadow workforce”, even though Defence Minister Peter Dutton says the government will bring defence force personnel into aged care facilities to help if needed as the Omicron outbreak continues to devastate residents and their families.

• Stood-aside cabinet minister Alan Tudge won’t be back on the frontbench when Parliament resumes next week, with Prime Minister Scott Morrison saying the processes of examining allegations relating to an affair Mr Tudge had with a staffer are not yet resolved.
• Qantas boss Alan Joyce has likened Western Australia’s borders to North Korea and questioned why Australia’s borders remain closed to all international tourists despite the country’s high COVID case load.
• A revised national curriculum will elevate the study of Western and Christian heritage in history, remove references to the Anzac legend as “contested”, cement the importance of phonics in teaching reading and reverse changes to maths that left experts worried the subject was being dumbed down.
• The historical front doors from Old Parliament House were removed on Friday morning and sent off for restoration after they were damaged in a fire amid protests outside the building in late December.

  More than 100 ACT and AFP police officers have surrounded the National Library as the “convoy to Canberra” protest enters its fifth day. On Wednesday, the National Capital Authority requested ACT police enforce legislation to prohibit illegal camping and parking on the Patrick White Lawns in front of the library.

The historical front doors from Old Parliament House were removed on Friday morning and sent off for restoration after they were damaged in a fire amid protests outside the building in late December.

Photographer Alex Ellinghausen captured their removal, along with the damage done in the blaze.

The doors have been in place since their installation in 1927 and have welcomed countless significant figures into Old Parliament House.

They’ll be sent to the International Conservation Services lab for further restoration.

An elite soldier has told the Federal Court that he witnessed an Australian soldier shoot an Afghan man with a prosthetic leg at close range with a distinctive machine gun that he later saw in the possession of war veteran Ben Roberts-Smith.

Person 14, a serving Special Air Service soldier who cannot be identified for national security reasons, gave evidence in Sydney on Friday in Mr Roberts-Smith’s long-running defamation action against The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Canberra Times.

The SAS soldier said he was involved in a mission with his patrol on Easter Sunday, 2009, which involved clearing buildings in a compound known as Whiskey 108.

He said he witnessed three Australian soldiers outside the compound who appeared to be from two different patrols with “a black object which was ... similar to a human”. The object was “thrown to the ground” with a thud, he said, before a soldier raised a machine gun known as an F89 Para Minimi and “fired, like, an extended burst”.

One of the big political stories this week has been the leaked text messaged purportedly between former NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian and an unnamed federal cabinet minister, in which Prime Minister Scott Morrison was painted as a “complete psycho” and someone who cares more about politics than people.

Ms Berejiklian has said she doesn’t recall sending or receiving such messages. Speaking on ABC TV earlier today, Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce said he didn’t think we’ll ever find out exactly who sent the messages.

“It is indicative of a person who won’t put their name to it and won’t stand behind it,” the deputy PM said.

“They’ve done it for the purpose of creating hurt. They’ve leaked it out of malice and they won’t stand behind it and say it was them.”