Category Archives: Australia news

Qantas and Virgin among 1,200 major companies that paid no income tax in Australia in 2022-23

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ATO finds 31% of large businesses reported nil tax paid as many companies deducted losses and used offsets to dial their bills down to zero

A major streaming service, media outlets, big airlines and a pizza chain are among more than 1,200 large companies that paid no income tax in 2022-23, a new ATO report reveals, as many businesses deducted losses and used offsets to dial their tax bills down to zero.

Netflix’s Australian operations generated more than $1.15bn in income in the 2023 financial year, documents show, but had no tax payable.

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David Crisafulli breaks election promise to elevate shadow team to Queensland government frontbench

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LNP leader’s cabinet includes several changes, including former leader Tim Nicholls as health minister and Fiona Simpson in women’s portfolio

Queensland’s new premier, David Crisafulli, has unveiled his new cabinet, breaking a pre-election promise to automatically elevate his existing shadow team to the government frontbench.

The LNP leader repeatedly promised the shadow cabinet he took to last week’s election would be the cabinet after it.

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David Crisafulli: premier and minister for veterans

Jarrod Bleijie: deputy premier, minister for state development, infrastructure and planning, and minister for industrial relations

David Janetzki: treasurer, minister for energy and minister for home ownership

Ros Bates: minister for finance, trade, employment and training

Dale Last: minister for natural resources and mines, minister for manufacturing and minister for regional and rural development

Tim Nicholls: minister for health and ambulance services

Deb Frecklington: attorney general and minister for justice and minister for integrity

John-Paul Langbroek: minister for education and the arts

Dan Purdie: minister for police and emergency services

Laura Gerber: minister for youth justice and victim support and minister for corrective services

Brent Mickelberg: minister for transport and main roads

Ann Leahy: minister for local government and water and minister for fire, disaster recovery and volunteers

Sam O’Connor: minister for housing and public works and minister for youth

Tony Perrett: minister for primary industries

Fiona Simpson: minister for women and women’s economic security, minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships and minister for multiculturalism

Andrew Powell: minister for the environment and tourism and minister for science and innovation

Amanda Camm: minister for families, seniors and disability services and minister for child safety and the prevention of domestic and family violence

Tim Mander: minister for sport and racing and minister for the Olympic and Paralympic Games

Steve Minnikin: minister for customer services and open data and minister for small and family business

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Ellie Price murder: anguished mother blasts sentence that could see ‘vicious’ killer Ricardo Barbaro released in 17 years

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Barbaro, 38, killed Ellie Price, 26, in her South Melbourne home in a stabbing attack a judge described as senseless and cruel

A killer who stabbed his defenceless girlfriend to death in a vicious and senseless attack should have been jailed for life, his victim’s mother says.

Ricardo Barbaro, 38, will instead be eligible for parole in 17 years. A judge sentenced him on Friday after he was found guilty of murdering Ellie Price at her South Melbourne home.

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At least 18 federal passport office officials under investigation after scathing audit report

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Auditors examined APO contracts and found undeclared conflicts of interest and wrongly identified preferred suppliers

At least 18 officials within the federal government’s passport office are facing investigation after a scathing audit report revealed multiple instances where conflicts of interest were not declared and preferred suppliers had wrongly been identified ahead of time across $1.6bn in contracts.

The Australian National Audit Office’s report into the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade’s Australian Passport Office, released Thursday, found its contracting processes “fell short of ethical standards”, including a failure to keep proper documentation, appropriately deal with conflicts of interest and find value for money.

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How will the outcome of the US election affect Australia, Aukus and our region?

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Australia’s future is closely tied to the future occupant of the White House. What impacts could a Kamala Harris or Donald Trump presidency have?

More people have gone to a ballot box in 2024 than in any other year in human history. Billions have cast votes across scores of countries, including some of the largest, most powerful democracies on Earth.

But America’s remains the world’s global election, the most forensically examined, the most consequential all over the world. America matters.

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‘Alive in our hearts’: grieving family pays tribute to 11-year-old Jack Davey after Melbourne school crash tragedy

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‘Beloved son and brother’ mourned, as three children injured in Auburn South primary school car crash remain in hospital with one discharged

Michael and Jayde Davey are clinging to the memories of the positive influence their son Jack had on the community in his 11 years of life after he was killed in a school crash.

Grade 5 student Jack Davey died after a car ploughed through a fence and into a school yard on Tuesday afternoon, hitting a group of Auburn South primary school students sitting at a table.

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Anti-abortion advocate Joanna Howe banned from South Australia’s upper house for alleged ‘threatening’ tactics towards politicians

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Upper house president Terry Stephens says of ‘highest concern’ is suggestion Howe attempted to ‘improperly influence the free performance’ of MLCs’ duties

The anti-abortion activist Joanna Howe has been banned from South Australia’s upper house after its president revealed in parliament that he had received several complaints from MLCs alleging she had used “insults and threatening and intimidating tactics” towards politicians during a debate about the state’s controversial “forced birth” legislation.

The legislation, if passed, would have meant any South Australian seeking an abortion after 27 weeks and six days, would instead be induced, give birth, then either keep or adopt out the child.

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Teen found not guilty of murdering Emma Lovell in Brisbane home invasion

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Queensland judge finds 18-year-old guilty of burglary and assault occasioning bodily harm in 2022 home invasion

A teenager who broke into the home of Emma Lovell, alongside another teen who stabbed her to death, has been found not guilty of murder in a case that shocked Queensland in December 2022.

In a Brisbane court on Thursday, the now 18-year-old – who cannot be named for legal reasons as he was 17 on the night Lovell was killed – was also found not guilty of manslaughter and not guilty of malicious act with intent.

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NSW Labor accused of ‘pretty deliberate attempt’ to minimise impact of long-promised drug summit

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Once-in-a-generation summit set to commence in Griffith on 1 November amid concern over transparency and questions over commitment to meaningful change

New South Wales Labor has been accused of trying to minimise the impact of a once-in-a-generation drug reform summit amid last-minute changes and concern from experts over transparency.

The long-promised NSW drug summit begins on Friday in the regional city of Griffith before hearings in Lismore and Sydney.

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Peter Dutton’s office asked Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting for flight on private jet

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Opposition leader, who says Anthony Albanese is ‘obfuscating’ in his answers on Qantas upgrades, says he never personally asked mining magnate

Peter Dutton has admitted his office asked the mining billionaire Gina Rinehart’s company for a lift on a Hancock Prospecting jet to a Bali bombing memorial service, days after he said he had never personally asked Australia’s richest person for help with flights around Australia.

The opposition leader said his office’s request to Hancock came after he claimed the government would not help him get a flight on a special purpose flight, that commercial options were not available, and that a chartered jet would be too expensive. The admission came as Dutton again ridiculed Anthony Albanese for his explanations over the widening Qantas upgrades scandal, accusing the prime minister of being “dishonest”.

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Victoria to cut more than 130 bushfire forest service jobs – As it happened

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Young man dies in multi-vehicle crash in Queensland’s Bundaberg Region

A fatal multi-vehicle traffic crash last night at Elliot in Queensland’s Bundaberg Region last night is being investigated by the police forensic crash Unit.

All travel has been appropriately declared and is a matter of public record.

The only people that need to look at the rules are [shadow transport minister] Bridget McKenzie and Peter Dutton. They’ve got some serious explaining to do.

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Australia’s thirst for power drives a rise in coal and gas-led emissions for third quarter in a row

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Output from gas plants up 29% on average from a year earlier, Aemo says, even though price was up by a fifth over same period

Greenhouse gas emissions from Australia’s main electricity grid increased for a third quarter in a row as higher power demand drove more use of black coal and gas plants, the Australian Energy Market Operator says.

For the September quarter alone, emissions from the national electricity market (Nem) that serves the eastern states and South Australia rose 2% from a year earlier, Aemo said in its quarterly market report.

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‘Bias’ finding over robodebt investigation undermines faith in anti-corruption watchdog, legal expert says

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Review into integrity body especially concerning as it relates to ‘the person at the top’, Geoffrey Watson SC says

The federal anti-corruption watchdog’s conflict of interest is “really concerning” because it relates to “the person at the top”, Geoffrey Watson SC, a former counsel assisting to the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption, has said.

On Wednesday, the inspector of the National Anti-Corruption Commission released a excoriating review of the Nacc’s decision not to investigate robodebt corruption referrals, finding it to be “affected by apprehended bias”.

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‘Wicked problem’: five charts that show how the climate crisis is making Australia more dangerous

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A report by BoM and CSIRO checks ‘vital signs of Australia’s climate’ – and shows temperature trends will only worsen

“It is a wicked problem,” says Dr Karl Braganza at the Bureau of Meteorology, after running through Australia’s latest State of the Climate report.

The effects of rising heat on land and in the oceans, coupled with rising greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, are changing Australia’s climate rapidly and “flowing through to how our society, economy and other things operate”.

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Four Davids and two Nigels: can Crisafulli deliver a modern and inclusive cabinet? | Ben Smee

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As Queensland’s new premier prepares to announce his frontbench, he may struggle to incorporate women and multicultural MPs into the LNP lineup

David Crisafulli will be breaking a promise either way. He said he’d keep his old opposition frontbench in place after the election. He also promised to lead a forward-thinking, modern-looking government.

It’s unlikely he can do both.

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Remote Indigenous Australians paying more than double capital city prices for everyday groceries

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Choice finds basket of nine items cost $99.38 on average at four remote community stores in Western Australia and the Northern Territory

People living in remote Indigenous communities are paying more than double the capital city prices for everyday groceries including flour, tasty cheese, apples and milk, new research has found.

A basket of nine items, which also included penne pasta, beef mince, teabags, carrots and Weet-Bix cost $99.38 on average at four remote community stores in Western Australia and the Northern Territory, the research by Choice found.

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ABC chair says pressing ‘digital titans’ for revenue is a ‘mainstream democratic imperative’

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Kim Williams says funding local news and public interest journalism is crucial in a world where ‘the distortion of culture poses such a grave threat to democracy’

The tech giants must be pursued for a cut of their substantial revenue to fund journalism in order to fight disinformation and “navigate the dangerous world”, ABC chair Kim Williams has said.

Last week a parliamentary committee recommended the government impose a tech tax on companies like Meta and Google as well as establish a fund to help traditional news media organisations.

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Jacinta Nampijinpa Price to pay federal court over delay in defamation defence

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Legal team for NT senator and shadow Indigenous Australians minister failed to file defence on time

The Northern Territory senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has been ordered to pay up by the federal court, before a defamation suit against her has properly begun.

The shadow Indigenous Australians minister is being sued by the Central Land Council chief executive, Lesley Turner, over a media release which he claims defamed him.

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Anthony Albanese denies ever calling ex-Qantas CEO Alan Joyce to ask for an upgrade

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Prime minister issues statement saying ‘all travel has been appropriately declared’ after allegations made in new book over politicians’ travel

Anthony Albanese has denied ever calling Alan Joyce for free Qantas flight upgrades during his time as transport minister and opposition leader.

The rebuke comes days after the claims were made in a new book by former Nine newspaper columnist Joe Aston, alleging a number of federal politicians had regularly received free business or first-class upgrades as part of their membership to the Qantas Chairman’s Lounge, described as the “speakeasy for Australia’s ruling class”.

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Attorney general considering releasing full robodebt report – As it happened

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Mark Butler flags importance of an Australian CDC in future pandemic responses

The federal health minister, Mark Butler, spoke to ABC News Breakfast this morning, after the Covid inquiry report was released yesterday.

Currently, we’re the only developed country that doesn’t have that single authoritative body that can provide to governments and communities about an evidence-based approach to pandemic response and to other communicable diseases. So that is the foundation on which we build a system to respond to the next pandemic - because there will be a next one – much more effectively than we did to Covid.

We all remember just how incredibly difficult and challenging it was, how it affected every aspect of our lives. And in terms of how the government worked during that period of time – we worked with those public health experts and advisers. Our focus was very much on the health and wellbeing of our community, particularly the vulnerable members of our community who were most at risk.

This was a deadly disease. We saw, particularly overseas, it killed so many people. So we were focused on a public health response – a public health response that was focused on supporting the health of our community, and also too understanding the significant additional supports that we needed to provide to small businesses to support them during this incredibly difficult time.

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