JOURNALIST: Just to start, the White House has labelled your new policy extortion. Is there any threat from the White House or the US that would make you correct or reverse course on your new policy?

WELLS: I wouldn’t characterise that statement as that whatsoever. That’s a statement in response to questions from the Australian Financial Review that incorporated things like the ATO tax arrangements. That’s speaking to a digital services tax, which obviously Australia doesn’t have. The Digital Duty of Care is a longstanding reform agenda of the Albanese government. It’s one of the recommendations of the review into Online Safety Act that delivered [indistinct] some years ago now. Like you heard the PM say yesterday, we’re a sovereign nation. We're proud to stand up for Australian parents and kids, and he looks forward to hopefully seeing the President when he goes to the UN.

JOURNALIST: Minister, the Coalition won’t support the amendments you are putting through the Senate on the social media age ban. They think that the examination powers you want to give the eSafety Commissioner are overreach. Are you confident the Coalition will still support the substantive amendment to the age ban you’re trying to get through the Senate today?

WELLS: Well, the powers to strengthen the eSafety Commission’s ability to hold big tech to account are important. The eSafety Commissioner asked the Parliament for these powers a couple of months ago now, because people want to see big tech held to account.  People want to see big tech fined. The eSafety Commissioner said these things would help her do that, so we make no apologies for trying to put those things through the Parliament.

Now, we’re having constructive negotiations with the Coalition and the Greens about how we progress that through the Senate, but Senator Henderson calling them, I think, very draconian, these cross-examination powers exist elsewhere in the Online Safety Act – for example, in the cyber abuse scheme, cyberbullying scheme. The Online Safety Act was brought in by Liberal minister Paul Fletcher. These are laws that the Coalition themselves drafted and passed. They were happy with them then, and the eSafety Commissioner is someone that the Coalition appointed and reappointed, so I guess it’s on Senator Henderson to explain what’s changed.

JOURNALIST: Do you accept that $100 million is a drop in the ocean to tech giants? Are you open to considering a percentage of earnings to make it mean something to them?

WELLS: I am happy to engage in constructive negotiations with everybody about what amendments we need to get these laws as good as they can possibly be and to get them passed so that they’re in effect. So I’ll continue those discussions.

JOURNALIST: But Minister, just a follow-up on Ellen’s question, one of the issues that they have- the documents can be compelled to virtually anyone. They know- that includes children and parents. If your concern is big tech, why include such a broad sweeping to basically anyone?

WELLS: Well, you’re, Nick from the Daily Mail, characterising Senator Henderson’s remarks there. The eSafety Commissioner does not characterise them that way, and that was the evidence provided through the Senate inquiry hearing that was held about these amendments. So I basically don't accept the premise.

JOURNALIST: Minister, should the Prime Minister declare his honorary membership of a golf club that’s getting millions of dollars in taxpayer funds?

WELLS: The Prime Minister provided the ABC with some very strident feedback about that on Breakfast News this morning, that the ABC had this information and chose not run it in their piece, that this was something that happened 15 years ago. He personally wasn't aware of it. He’s never used the facilities himself. As local MPs, we are asked to be honorary members, become honorary patrons frequently, and we're not always told, like he said. He's accounted for himself on the ABC, and the ABC also should reflect upon why it chose not to run relevant information in the story.

JOURNALIST: Have you always declared honorary memberships?

WELLS: To the best of my ability. But like you say- well, actually I wasn't in Parliament 15 years ago, so the equivalent doesn't apply.

JOURNALIST: The Prime Minister says that the money was going towards sewage in the Cook River, but Darcy Byrne, the inner west mayor, has said it's about renovations for the clubhouse. Who's correct there?

WELLS: How would I possibly know that?