Category Archives: Australian politics

Australia to dump Covid vaccine requirements and travel exemptions for international arrivals

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People arriving in the country will no longer need to use the digital passenger declaration under changes to come into effect next week

People arriving in Australia will no longer have to declare their Covid vaccination status or obtain a travel exemption under changes to come into effect this week.

The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, announced on Sunday that the government would dump the restrictions that have been in place since the country’s borders reopened late last year, with the changes to the Biosecurity Act made following advice from the chief medical officer, Paul Kelly.

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Jane Garrett, Victorian Labor MP, dies from breast cancer aged 49

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Former emergency services minister offered a state funeral to honour her ‘life of service’

The family of Victorian Labor MP Jane Garrett has has accepted the offer of a state funeral to farewell the former emergency services minister who has died from breast cancer at the age of 49.

The Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, said the service would be “a fitting way to mark her significant contribution” to the state.

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Three rescued from flood waters; abortion rights protests; 54 Covid deaths – as it happened

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SES warns of flooding across saturated NSW; airport chaos spreads from Sydney to Melbourne; Anthony Albanese meets Emmanuel Macron in Paris. This blog is now closed

Flights have been cancelled, ticket prices are through the roof and queues are out the door at Sydney airport as travellers looking to jet off have been caught up in more chaos.

More than two million passengers are expected to pass through Sydney airport during the July school holidays and it is not clear whether the airport will be able to handle the massive demand over the coming days.

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Vulnerable Australians ‘filled with dread’ over telehealth cuts

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Decision to end a range of services on 30 June will lead to ‘avoidable suffering and distress’, medical practitioners say

Living through Covid-19 with inflammatory arthritis, telehealth has been the only way for Eliza Sorensen to safely access her routine medical appointments.

Sorensen is considered severely immunocompromised due to the medication she takes to control her chronic disease. She also lives with asthma.

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Nation records 33 Covid deaths as Victoria reports fifth monkeypox case – as it happened

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Mark Butler urges Australians to get boosters as new subvariant circulates; nation records 33 Covid deaths. This blog is now closed

Australia ‘deeply concerned by continuing erosion of Hong Kong’s rights’

Penny Wong, minister for foreign affairs, released a statement last night saying Australia remains “deeply concerned” by the continuing erosion of Hong Kong’s rights.

Australia remains deeply concerned by the continuing erosion of Hong Kong’s rights, freedoms and autonomy, two years since the imposition of the National Security Law.

The National Security Law has been applied broadly to arrest or pressure pro-democracy figures, opposition groups, the media, trade unions and civil society. The electoral reforms imposed by Beijing in 2021 have further eroded Hong Kong’s democratic governance.

This will be the fourth time the government has offered to make the changes, announced the changes, and then backtracked as a result of internal politics.

I’m just not sure where we go from here but our members are resolute. We are going to continue fighting to get these trains made safe, and we’ll do whatever it takes to make that happen.

It’s going to be a very messy day. It’ll be a weekend timetable with other trains taken out of it.

The families of the railway workers right now could be having $3,000 deposited in their account, instead of having that money spent on modifying perfectly good trains.

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Anthony Albanese raises case of jailed Australian engineer Robert Pether with Iraqi PM

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Exclusive: Pether, who has been imprisoned for 14 months in Baghdad, has become ‘gravely ill’ according to his family

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has raised the case of jailed engineer Robert Pether with the Iraqi leader, Mustafa al-Kadhimi, as the Australian’s family warns he has become “gravely ill” and is rapidly deteriorating in his Baghdadi jail cell.

Pether has now been imprisoned for more than 14 months following a commercial dispute between his engineering firm and Iraq’s central bank, which had hired Pether’s company to help build its new Baghdad headquarters. Pether’s family say he is innocent and the trial was unfair and compromised.

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Acting PM says Australia will stand up for national interest amid fading hopes of China reset

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Richard Marles signals change in tone with biggest trading partner but pledges to avoid Coalition’s ‘chest-beating’

Australia’s acting prime minister has declared the government won’t take any “backward step” in pursuing the national interest, after Chinese state media said hopes of a diplomatic reset were “diminishing by the day”.

Richard Marles, who is acting in the top job while Anthony Albanese is in Europe, told Guardian Australia the new government would avoid “chest-beating” about China but admitted there may be limits to what a change in tone could achieve.

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Serious defects discovered in patrol boats Australia supplied to Pacific Islands

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Potentially serious faults in Guardian-class patrol boats may force some countries to pause use of vessels

Pacific island countries may halt the use of Australian-provided patrol boats after potentially serious defects were discovered, in a blow to a $2.1bn maritime security program.

The Australian government is now considering how to work with Pacific nations to close any gap in their maritime surveillance activities while the issues – including carbon monoxide entering part of the boat – are resolved.

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Victoria to demand governments set completion dates for energy transmission projects

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State energy minister, Lily D’Ambrosio, says investors need confidence electricity grid will be ready for renewables

Victoria will demand at the next meeting of federal and state energy ministers that governments set dates for the completion of transmission links to ensure renewable energy projects worth billions of dollars can be connected to the grid on time.

The latest roadmap for updating the National Energy Market, released on Thursday by the Australian Energy Market Operator (Aemo), identified five major new transmission lines requiring urgent action so enough new clean energy and storage capacity is built in time for the expected accelerated exit of ageing coal-fired power plants from the grid.

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Former Australian chief scientist to head review of carbon credit scheme after whistleblower revelations

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Climate change minister to announce Prof Ian Chubb will lead six-month probe of scheme labelled ‘largely a sham’ by one expert

The former Australian chief scientist and senior academic, Prof Ian Chubb, has been appointed to head a thorough review of Australia’s carbon credit scheme as experts escalate calls for a complete overhaul of the system.

Chris Bowen, the climate change minister, will announce on Friday that Chubb, a neuroscientist and former vice-chancellor of the Australian National University, will lead the six-month review of the scheme, after a respected whistleblower described it as a fraud and waste of taxpayer money.

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Nation records 60 Covid deaths as SA reports first monkeypox case – as it happened

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Nation records 60 Covid deaths; SA records first monkeypox case; Anthony Albanese meets Justin Trudeau at Nato summit. This blog is now closed

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has renewed his calls for China to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, declaring that Vladimir Putin “has made a strategic mistake because what his actions have done is unite the democratic world”.

Albanese – who has been in Madrid for a Nato summit – spoke to reporters yesterday after having a meeting on the sidelines with the leaders of Japan, South Korea and New Zealand.

There we discussed the important focus of this Nato’s summit on the Asia-Pacific region. The Russian invasion of Ukraine has solidified the support amongst democratic countries for the rules-based international order and a determination to continue to provide support to the government and the people of Ukraine who are suffering as a result of this breach of international law and this brutal invasion by Vladimir Putin’s regime.

Vladimir Putin has made a strategic mistake because what his actions have done is unite the democratic world and provide a real determination to make sure that the resilience being shown by the Ukrainian people is backed up by resilience and support from democratic countries, including Nato, but also countries throughout the world.

Well, what we saw is prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we saw a without-limits partnership between Russia and China. We’ve seen a failure of China to condemn any of the Russian aggression that has occurred against Ukraine. China must look at what is happening and look at the resolve that is there from throughout the world and should be condemning Russia’s actions.

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Just 24 health workers helped under Morrison government scheme to bring 2,000 medics to Australia

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Travel program set up by Greg Hunt in 2021 discontinued after two months with two dozen people receiving direct assistance

Just 24 medical practitioners received direct assistance to come to Australia under a travel program announced by the Morrison government which promised to bring an extra 2,000 doctors and nurses into the country.

As Australia faces skills shortages across the health and aged care sectors, information obtained from the Department of Health shows that a program set up by the former health minister Greg Hunt in October last year that promised to bring in an extra 2,000 health practitioners over six months was discontinued after just two months.

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Nations must work together through ‘conflict and crisis’ to reduce climate change risks, Albanese tells OECD

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Prime minister will say food insecurity has become a significant challenge and Australia has a major role to play in meeting the challenge

Australia’s prime minister Anthony Albanese will declare the world must raise ambition to reduce the risks of runaway global heating and cooperate amid national policy differences even when “long shadows of conflict and crisis are threatening our shared security”.

The prime minister will use a speech to a special session of the council of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris to launch a clarion call for international cooperation on climate policy, as well as practical measures to safeguard energy and food security, as the world grapples with disruptions created by the coronavirus pandemic and the war in Ukraine.

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Australia news live updates: ‘optimistic in the extreme’ to expect operational nuclear submarine by the 2030s, says Marles

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Defence minister blames Coalition for submarine delay; NSW parliamentary inquiry into Barilaro appointment begins; David Hurley apologises for promoting builder; Chris Bowen addresses National Press Club; NSW records 11 Covid deaths, Tasmania one. Follow live

Turnbull says Albanese ‘is not Scott Morrison and that’s a big advantage’

Australia’s new prime minister will have an easier time mending relations with the French “because he is not Scott Morrison and that’s a big advantage”, the former leader Malcolm Turnbull has told journalists in Paris.

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Governor general David Hurley apologises for video praising builder who renovated his home

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Queen’s representative says decision was made ‘on the spur of a happy moment’ and his words were not intended to be used in advertising

Australia’s governor general, David Hurley, has apologised for a decision made “on the spur of a happy moment” to pose for a photo with and provide a testimonial for a builder who completed his home renovation, which was later used in the company’s advertising material on its website and social media.

Hurley said he had received no benefit for his comments or the photo, had never intended them to be used in commercial advertising and had not made reference to his position as the Queen’s representative.

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Three in four Australians believe US ties increase chance of war involvement in Asia, poll shows

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Lowy Institute’s foreign policy poll also finds 74% of respondents support democracy over any other form of government

More than three in four Australians believe the alliance with the United States makes it more likely Australia would be drawn into a war in Asia against the national interest, a new poll shows.

The Lowy Institute’s annual foreign policy poll suggests that Australians are increasingly worried about the rise of authoritarianism and global instability, while their preference for democracy has reached a record high.

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PM says EU trade talks stalled over perception of Australia as ‘handbrake’ on climate action

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Anthony Albanese blames lack of climate leadership and relationship breakdown with France for hindering European deals

Negotiations for a “critical” trade deal with the EU have stalled over perceptions Australia isn’t “fair dinkum” on climate change action and due to a fractured relationship with France, Anthony Albanese said.

The prime minister met with his Spanish counterpart, Pedro Sánchez, on Tuesday in Madrid before the Nato summit, marking the first bilateral visit by an Australian prime minister.

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Uber and Transport Workers’ Union strike agreement on gig economy employment standards

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Ride-sharing giant and union support an independent regulatory body to create industry-wide standards and resolve disputes

Ride-sharing giant Uber and the Transport Workers’ Union have struck a landmark agreement on proposed employment standards and benefits ahead of expected new gig economy regulation from the Albanese government.

The union and Uber have also agreed to jointly support the creation of a new independent government-funded regulatory body to create industry-wide standards for ride share and food delivery gig workers following months of negotiations.

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Malaysian foreign minister says concerns remain about Aukus pact after meeting with Penny Wong

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Saifuddin Abdullah points to risk of regional arms race but pledges increased trade and cooperation on cybersecurity with Australia

Malaysia’s foreign minister, Saifuddin Abdullah, has said that his country’s concerns about the Aukus nuclear submarine pact remain unchanged, after a meeting in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday with his Australian counterpart, Penny Wong.

Saifuddin told reporters he communicated Malaysia’s ongoing concern about the security deal between Australia, the UK and the US during a “very candid” discussion with Wong on her first visit to the Malaysian capital as Australia’s foreign minister.

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Queensland integrity review a ‘wake-up call’ on government lobbying

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Peter Coaldrake calls for more accountability and transparency surrounding lobbyists in his final report

An integrity probe into the accountability and culture of the Queensland government is a “wake-up call” for greater transparency.

The report warned the only way to restore public faith in Queensland politics was to be “more accountable and transparent ... and behave with integrity”.

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