Campaigner for no vote in voice referendum received $5.2m last financial year, 47% of it ‘dark money’ from sources not revealed publicly
Advance Australia, the conservative lobby group that claimed success for defeating the voice referendum, more than doubled the amount of donations it received during the 2022-23 financial year.
But the origin of almost half of the funds remains unknown.
Continue reading...Party room divides as some keen to allow new plan while others want to keep up attack on government’s ‘broken promise’ and warn against falling into a ‘trap’
Liberal MPs are split on whether to support the Labor government’s stage-three tax changes, with some angling to oppose the legislation even as leader Peter Dutton signals the opposition may not stand in the way of larger refunds for millions of Australians.
Julian Leeser has urged his colleagues to oppose the tax changes, while Keith Wolahan warned against falling into a “trap” set by the government. Dutton said the opposition would push for lower taxes, a statement some see as an inclination to wave through the changes, but the view is not universal inside the Liberals ahead of a crucial party room meeting in Canberra next week.
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BoM issues wind weather warning for Tasmania
The Bureau of Meteorology has issued a severe weather warning for damaging winds in parts of Tasmania.
Australia has a very important role to play as a signatory to the ICJ, a signatory to the genocide convention, to ensure the protection of Palestinian civilians and ensure that the investigations that are occurring with UNRWA … don’t inhibit funding and delivery of services that are going to basically save lives in coming days and weeks and months.
UNRWA has done the right thing in standing down the staff, sacking them. They have got an independent investigation occurring. 150 UN UNRWA staff have been killed, their families and children as well, over the past several months of this conflict. The UN is in the middle, sandwiched in the conflict, trying to do its best to save lives. Donor governments like Australia need to bear this in mind that, if funding ceases, there is nowhere else to turn to. People will simply collapse and die.
Continue reading...The policy platform, to be considered later this month, also seeks to abandon annual wage rises for middle and high income earners on award safety nets
The New South Wales Liberals are set to adopt an industrial relations policy to water down unfair-dismissal protections and abandon annual wage rises for middle and high income earners on award safety nets.
The policy, to be considered at the state council annual general meeting later in February, is an ambitious blueprint for reforms to the federal Fair Work Act likely to spark a hostile reaction from unions over weakening worker protections.
Continue reading...Federal and WA state governments’ public school funding deal dismissed as ‘not good enough’ by Australian Education Union
Education experts say a “landmark” deal to fully fund Western Australia’s public schools by 2026 is “not good enough” and still lets the state government “off the hook”.
The “statement of intent”, announced on Wednesday by education minister, Jason Clare, would increase funding for Western Australian public schools by $1.6bn over the next five years, with $770m coming from the commonwealth.
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The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, is speaking to ABC RN, and says news that the inflation rate has plunged to a two-year low of 4.1% is “welcoming, encouraging progress”.
… We know that people are still under pressure and we need to not be complacent about it. We need to continue to work as we have with our three point plan, having the surplus, making sure we deal with cost of living pressures without putting pressure on inflation, and dealing with … supply-chain issues as well.
With parliament resuming next week, this is a wake-up call that 2024 is the last chance for meaningful democratic reform ahead of the 2025 election …
Australians should go to the next election with strict political donation disclosure laws, truth in political advertising laws in force and information about who’s meeting ministers made public as a matter of course.
Continue reading...Australian foreign minister says UNRWA is only organisation that can provide substantive support to occupied Palestinian territories
The foreign minister, Penny Wong, has signalled that resuming Australia’s funding to a key UN agency delivering aid to Gaza is the only realistic route “if we are serious about trying to ensure that fewer children are starving”.
Wong has directed Australia’s humanitarian coordinator, Beth Delaney, to “lead urgent work coordinating with like-minded partners as well as UNRWA” to work out the next steps, after more than 10 countries suspended funding to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees.
Continue reading...Postal service says 3,600 current and former employees will receive any owed pay with interest and super where applicable
Australia Post has apologised after admitting to “payroll errors” that saw 3,600 employees underpaid by $5.6m over a decade.
The postal service says affected workers still employed by the corporation will have their outstanding wages added to their next pay cheque.
Continue reading...Albanese government is yet to publicly outline conditions to reinstate funding to UNRWA but it is unlikely to move before US or UK
The Australian government is in talks with close allies including the US and the UK to consider conditions to reinstate funding to a key United Nations agency delivering aid in Gaza.
The talks come after Australia and other donor countries met with the UN secretary general, António Guterres, in New York to discuss the investigations into UNRWA staffers over alleged involvement in the 7 October attacks on Israel.
Continue reading...The latest ranking of revenue foregone shows the usual suspects topping the list
Concessions for superannuation cost the federal budget almost $50bn a year while rental deductions, much of them for negative gearing, have jumped by more than half in three years, the annual treasury summary of tax expenditures shows.
The ranking of revenue foregone in 2023-24, released on Wednesday, was headed by many of the usual groups, finding for example that shielding taxpayers’ main residence from capital gains taxes, saved them a combined $47.5bn for the year, up about a third from 2018-19.
Continue reading...Ms Bernard, a Kowanyama woman, was last seen at Archer River quarry on 10 February in 2013. Follow the day’s news live
Update on Queensland flooding
Senior BoM meteorologist Angus Hines spoke to ABC News Breakfast just earlier to provide an update on the rain and flooding in Queensland.
Last night the rainfall totals were between 50mm and 120mm which is still a very significant dose of rain, but bear in mind this time yesterday we were talking about 300mm leading to widespread flooding.
We could see these rivers with elevated levels for the next several days, as it will take a while for those flood waters to drain out, long past when the rainfall conditions have cleared up.
The goal for the AI taskforce is to be a trusted source of expert advice and assistance for the Law Society, and through it, for the solicitor profession across NSW. Its members will be drawn from the law, justice system, academia, and government.
The work of the taskforce will enhance the Law Society’s work to ensure that NSW leads the way in harnessing the best that AI has to offer for the legal profession while mitigating the risks.
Continue reading...Inquiry into invasive pest hears of risks species poses to health, agriculture and environment if it becomes endemic
Fire ants could sting 8.6 million Australians a year if they were to become endemic – but a pathogenic fungus and pesticide-loaded drones might help avert that scenario, according to submissions posed to the federal government’s fire ants inquiry.
Submissions to the Senate inquiry into red imported fire ants (Rifa) in Australia closed on Monday, just days after the latest in a string of fire ant detections beyond south-east Queensland, where an infestation of the invasive pest is ongoing.
Continue reading...Inability of staff to inspect cabinet records means they were were not released to the national archives, as was usual
A “forgotten” box of cabinet records and a series of administrative errors are among the reasons why a tranche of Howard-era documents was mistakenly kept from public release earlier this year.
An independent review into why 82 cabinet records from 2003 were not handed to the national archives, released on Tuesday, found there was no political interference or influence at play.
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We’ve just spoken to St Vincent’s hospital and confirmed that the woman bitten by a shark in Sydney Harbour last night remains in hospital in a stable condition.
The woman, in her late 20s, was bitten on the right leg by a suspected bull shark in Elizabeth Bay last night.
Continue reading...The announcement of a business case budget is the latest development in the Albanese government’s slow moving high speed rail project
The Albanese government will spend $80m developing a business case for the Sydney-to-Newcastle stretch of its east coast high speed rail line, as the decades-long project inches further forward.
The transport minister, Catherine King, said the allocation of $78.8m was part of Labor’s $500m election commitment to the early stages of high speed rail, with the initial Sydney-Newcastle leg representing a “crucial waypoint” on the project.
Continue reading...Labor’s bid to skew package towards low- and middle-income earners given boost, as only 22% say it should go ahead unchanged
Almost half of voters support revising the stage-three tax cuts to help low- and middle-income earners while only about one in five believe the plan should go ahead unchanged in July.
That is the result of the Guardian Essential poll of 1,201 voters, which provides a boost for the Albanese government’s plan to reform the tax package, finding only 22% of respondents agreed the previously legislated cuts should be left untouched.
Continue reading...Assistant competition minister Andrew Leigh says it is often cheaper to fly from Darwin to Singapore than to Sydney as Labor targets monopolies
Ticket prices are halved when three airlines fly a route compared with a monopoly situation and fares fall further as more rivals are added, according to new findings designed to inform Australia’s competition and merger laws.
The assistant competition minister, Andrew Leigh, will tell a Melbourne audience on Tuesday there are worrying signs that competition intensity has weakened over recent decades, with evidence of increased market concentration and profit markups in several industries.
Continue reading...Nearly 90% of areas in Australia better off under new plan, with taxpayers in remote and regional communities to gain the most, ANU analysis shows
Working-class communities in Coalition-held remote and regional electorates stand to gain the most from Labor’s proposed changes to income tax cuts, while voters in the byelection seat of Dunkley are also big winners.
The average taxpayer in Whitsunday, in the electorate of Dawson, East Pilbara in Durack, and Cairns in Leichhardt stands to gain over $600 more from Labor’s package than the Morrison government’s stage-three tax cuts, according to an analysis by the Australian National University associate professor Ben Phillips.
Continue reading...Key senator calls for broader tax reform, while arguing changes to stage-three plan could fund increases to jobseeker and other payments
The independent senator David Pocock has called on the Albanese government to use $28bn of savings from its new tax-cuts package to increase welfare payments and urged Labor to trim other tax concessions.
With the Greens signalling that they will press Labor to recoup even more from high-income earners, Pocock has suggested the revamp of stage three should be a springboard to other tax reforms in the too-hard basket including capital gains tax.
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Continue reading...Anthony Albanese rejects calls for a fresh election by the opposition leader who continues to accuse the PM of breaking a promise
Peter Dutton has refused to commit the opposition to an official position on Labor’s amended stage-three tax cuts, as the government begins negotiations with the Greens and key independents.
Anthony Albanese said on Friday he would soon begin discussions with crossbenchers to get the updated tax cuts through parliament, as the Greens say they will push for further support for low-income earners.
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