Texas sends another busload of migrants to Kamala Harris’s home

About 50 mainly Venezuelan migrants including a baby deposited unannounced at Naval Observatory in Washington

About 50 migrants, including a one-month-old baby, have been sent in a bus from Texas to the Washington DC residence of Vice-President Kamala Harris, in the latest move by Republican-led states to transfer migrants unannounced across the country.

The bus let off the migrants, who are believed to be mostly Venezuelan, outside the Naval Observatory, the traditional home of US vice-presidents, on Saturday morning.

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Revealed: Suella Braverman sets Home Office ‘No boats crossing the Channel’ target

UK’s new home secretary upsets civil servants with speech on migrants, trashy TV and back-to-office call

The new home secretary has already prompted consternation among Home Office officials after telling them she wants to ban all small boats crossing the Channel, the Observer has learned.

During her inaugural address to departmental staff last Wednesday, Suella Braverman said a top priority would be stopping all Channel crossings. She has also asked all staff to watch “trashy TV” to help their “mental wellbeing”, a source said, specifically citing Channel 4’s Married at First Sight and First Dates as well as Love Island.

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How red flags were brushed aside to push through Rwanda deal

Documents disclosed to high court case show repeated warnings about asylum processing plan

Until the then home secretary Priti Patel and Rwanda’s foreign minister, Vincent Biruta, sat together at a table in Kigali on 14 April and signed a deal to send asylum seekers to the east African country, few thought the agreement would actually happen.

Rumours had swirled for months about the controversial plans but nothing had come of previous Home Office ideas, both confirmed and unconfirmed, to halt the growing number of asylum seekers arriving in the UK on small boats, including wave machines in the Channel and a policy to turn around dinghies.

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The ‘egregious’ history of likely new Nauru operator includes allegations of gang rape and murder in its US prisons

A Guardian investigation reveals the firm has been accused of ‘gross negligence’ that allegedly led to gang rape, murder and mistaken solitary confinement in its US facilities

The US private prisons operator likely to take over Australia’s offshore processing regime on Nauru has previously been accused of “gross negligence” and “egregious” security failures that allegedly led to the gang-rape of a woman in detention, the murder of two retirees by escaped prisoners, and the months-long solitary confinement of a US citizen wrongfully held in immigration detention.

The Department of Home Affairs is finalising negotiations with the US-based Management and Training Corporation, which the department has announced as its preferred tenderer to provide “facilities, garrison, transferee arrivals and reception services” for Australia’s offshore regime on Nauru from next month. No contracts have yet been signed.

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Eight killed and dozens rescued from river at hazardous US-Mexico border crossing

Days of heavy rain caused dangerous currents in the Rio Grande in an area where people frequently cross into Texas

At least eight people were found dead in the Rio Grande while attempting a hazardous crossing in Texas, officials said on Friday.

The discovery was made by US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Mexican officials on Thursday while responding to a large number of people attempting to migrate across the river near the city of Eagle Pass.

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Increased migration must come with planning and expanded services, councils say

Fairfield mayor says ‘people are suffering’ due to lack of affordable housing in migrant communities as PM pledges $575m investment

Increasing Australia’s migration intake without improving key services will increase the strain on housing, hospitals and schools as well as inflation, councils in migrant communities have said.

The Albanese government on Friday announced at its jobs and skills summit it would lifting the migrant intake to 195,000 in 2022-23, from the current 160,000 cap, addressing calls from businesses for more skilled workers to be brought in to Australia to meet shortages. A review planned for next February would set intake levels for coming years.

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Labor to relax work tests for pensioners following jobs and skills summit – as it happened

Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the policy change will cost around $55m, and the government will do further costs. This blog is now closed

Tasmanian Tafe needs to be fit for purpose before additional places can make a difference, Lambie says

The government yesterday kicked off the jobs and skills summit with the announcement of 180,000 more free Tafe places.

We certainly would like to do more, but some of these issues, of course, are within the budget constraints, which are there … we have inherited $1tn of debt. Yes, it is a worthy idea and worthy of consideration.

No, that’s not on the agenda. But it is a good thing that people are able to put forward ideas.

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First refugee families welcomed to Australia under new community sponsorship program

Shadi Al Daoud says chance for family to restart their lives on NSW Central Coast with support of local church is a dream come true

Ten-year-old George Al Daoud arrives in Australia with a declaration. “My English is … medium,” he announces, smiling broadly.

George and his family are among the fortunate first to be resettled in Australia under the new Community Refugee Integration and Settlement Pilot, which allows community groups across the country to sponsor new refugees.

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Business lobby joins unions in calling for lift in minimum wages for skilled visa workers

Business Council of Australia also calls for migrant intake boost as Greens set up Senate standoff to raise wages in female-dominated industries

Big business has agreed with unions that the pay floor for temporary skilled visa workers should be raised to $90,000,in a split with smaller employer organisations that warned this could “kill” migration.

The Business Council of Australia (BCA) has also called for a two-year boost to the annual migration intake to 220,000 a year in a submission ahead of next week’s jobs and skills summit.

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Truss and Sunak face Tory hustings after both say Covid lockdown went too far – as it happened

Latest updates: Tory leadership frontrunner reacts to Sunak comments, saying school closures went too far; pair meet Tory members in Norwich

Lee Cain, who was director of communications in Downing Street during the early phase of the Covid crisis, says Rishi Sunak’s comments about the lockdown policy (see 9.22am and 9.47am) are “simply wrong”.

But Sunak is not saying lockdown should not have happened, as Cain suggests. He is just saying that it was implemented too rigidly, and perhaps for too long, and that more consideration should have been given to the downsides.

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Rise in Albanian asylum seekers may be down to criminal gangs

Albanian gangs controlling UK drugs trade offer minibus trip and Channel crossing for £4,000 on TikTok

Official data released on Thursday has confirmed suspicions that Albanians are now a prominent national group among the asylum seekers travelling across the Channel.

But the Home Office and refugee charities are still trying to explain why there has been a recent surge in demand.

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Babies among people who crossed Channel in small boats in last 24 hours

Pause in crossings recorded between Friday and Sunday as almost 5,000 made journey to Dover in August

Babies and young children are among some of the people who have crossed the Channel in small boats to the UK in the last 24 hours after a three-day hiatus in arrivals.

Arriving in Dover by dinghy and other vessels, large numbers of people made the treacherous journey to the Kent coast after a pause in crossings was recorded between Friday and Sunday. Piles of life vests were pictured at the arrival scene at the dockside.

Almost 5,000 people have made the journey so far in August and more than 21,300 people have arrived in the UK by small boats in 2022, according to provisional government figures.

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‘Free riders’: NSW unions want to charge non-members for pay rises they broker

Exclusive: Peak body also wants employers to pay skilled visa applicants 30% above median wage to encourage local training instead

Non-union workers would be forced to pay fees for union pay deals while the requirement to advertise jobs domestically, before sponsoring foreign workers, would be abolished in favour of a higher wage floor, under two proposals by Unions NSW.

Under the plan employers could be forced to pay a skilled visa applicant 30% above the industry median wage before sponsoring an offshore worker, a move designed to incentivise training Australians.

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Khaby Lame, TikTok’s most followed star, granted Italian citizenship

Top TikTok user was born in Senegal but has been in Italy since age one and says he ‘always felt Italian’

Khaby Lame, the Senegalese-born comedian who is the most followed TikTok user in the world, has been granted Italian citizenship.

Lame, 22, has lived in Italy since he was one and has said he “always felt Italian”. He received his citizenship during a ceremony in Chivasso, his home town, close to Turin in the northern Piedmont region, on Wednesday.

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Greece finally aids refugees stranded on scorpion and snake-infested islet

Five-year-old child reportedly died of scorpion sting after nearly 40 Syrians spent a month marooned between Greece and Turkey

A group of adults and children who spent a month stuck on a scorpion- and snake-infested spit of land between Greece and Turkey – and denied help by both nations – were finally taken to temporary accommodation by Greek police this week.

Among the group of nearly 40 Syrian refugees forced to seek refuge on the islet in the Evros river was a five-year-old girl, Maria, reported to have died from a scorpion sting. Her nine-year-old sister remains gravely ill.

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Revealed: Indonesian workers on UK farm ‘at risk of debt bondage’

As farms look further afield for labour, investigation finds Kent pickers saying they struggle to pay fees charged by unlicensed brokers

Indonesian labourers picking berries on a farm that supplies Marks & Spencer, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s and Tesco say they have been saddled with debts of up to £5,000 by unlicensed foreign brokers to work in Britain for a single season.

Pickers at the farm in Kent were initially given zero-hours contracts, and at least one was paid less than £300 a week after the cost of using a caravan was deducted, according to payslips and other documents seen as part of a Guardian investigation.

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‘My family need my support to eat’: how Indonesians came to work on a Kent farm

Drawn to the prospect of a job abroad, people such as Banyu signed up to a language course. From there, their debts to brokers grew

Sitting in a caravan in the hot Kent countryside, Banyu’s face is etched with worry. It is July and he is less than a month into a job picking fruit at Clock House farm near Maidstone, which supplies strawberries, raspberries and other soft fruit to leading supermarket chains.

He says he arrived from Indonesia this summer £5,000 in debt to an unlicensed broker in Bali, handing over the deeds to his family home as surety. He only has a six-month visa for the picking season and is scared that the work is not as lucrative as he hoped.

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EU border agency accused of exploiting interpreters ‘paid under €2.50 an hour’

Petition accuses Frontex of violating European standards by using contractor that offers low wages

The EU border agency Frontex has been accused of exploiting staff by using a contractor who it is claimed offers interpreters an effective wage of less than €2.50 (£2.11) an hour.

The European Border and Coast Guard Agency, the EU’s best-funded agency with a budget of €754m, is being petitioned by interpreters who work with vulnerable asylum seekers in places such as Greece, Italy and the Canary Islands.

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Labor vows to prioritise Australian jobs as it eyes migration boost

Annual intake could potentially rise from 160,000 to up to 200,000 places as businesses cry out for skilled workers

The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, has vowed Labor “will always prioritise jobs for Australians” as the government eyes increasing the migration cap potentially to 200,000 places per year.

A boost from the current annual migration intake of 160,000 will be on the table at the federal government’s jobs and skills summit next month.

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Daniel Andrews backs federal plan to boost migration – as it happened

Labor’s plan to tackle skills shortages would lift the annual migration cap from 160,000 to between 180,000 and 200,000. This blog is now closed

Bowen says climate reforms will help Australian industry avoid carbon tariffs

Bowen says how this will work has yet to be determined and gives a nod to an upcoming discussion paper, with the details to be hammered out in consultation with industry. But he raises some interesting points that this needs to happen as there is a growing risk Australian industry will be exposed to carbon tariffs if nothing changes.

This will help us avoid these, by showing the EU and the rest of the world, you don’t need to slap tariffs on our manufacturers and our producers because Australia is working with industry to get emissions down in a very sensible way.

The safeguard mechanism is taking the 315 biggest emissions and working with them to reduce emissions, because if we don’t, we will continue the 10 years of no reductions from those facilities and it won’t cut the mustard.

Any facility which emits more than 100,000 tonnes … whether it is new or existing, which is just increasing its activity, we are not having the same architecture. They will be put on a trajectory to net zero, facility by facility. We have designed this in a very sensible way.

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