Category Archives: Australia news

Man’s body found in floodwater in western Sydney suburb

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More than 160 people rescued in eastern New South Wales as deluge causes landslips, flash flooding and rapid rises in rivers

A man has died and more than 160 people have been rescued as a deluge across eastern New South Wales caused landslips, flash flooding and rapid rises in river levels.

Suburbs on Sydney’s fringes are facing the threat of significant flooding after more than a month’s rain fell overnight, while a major landslip in the Blue Mountains has cut off a community.

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Make-up of Tasmanian parliament finally settled as ‘anti-politician’ independent takes last seat

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Premier Jeremy Rockliff says he will advise governor Barbara Baker that he be recommissioned to form a new government

Independent candidate and salmon farming opponent Craig Garland has secured the final spot in Tasmania’s parliament, leaving the Liberals with 14 seats, Labor 10, the Greens five, Jacqui Lambie Network three and three independents.

Tasmanian premier, Jeremy Rockliff, said with the 35 members of the state’s assembly elected, 13 of them new faces, he would advise governor Barbara Baker that he be recommissioned to form a new government.

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Mohamed came to Australia as a teenager. Now, he faces being deported to a country he doesn’t know

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After almost a decade in immigration detention Mohamed Coker was told he would be put on a plane to Sierra Leone within hours

“My dad was murdered there. The people that murdered my dad are still around … I fear the same thing will happen to me.”

Mohamed Coker, 33, spoke to Guardian Australia on his way to the airport.

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‘Deadly failure’: Australia demands Israel take ‘appropriate action’ against those responsible for killing aid workers

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Foreign minister Penny Wong says IDF’s killing of the seven aid workers, including Australian Zomi Frankcom, ‘cannot be swept aside’

The Australian government has demanded Israel take “appropriate action” over its military’s “deadly failure” that killed seven aid workers, including Australian Zomi Frankcom.

The foreign minister, Penny Wong, said she and the deputy prime minister, Richard Marles, wrote to their counterparts in Israel overnight on Friday after a verbal briefing on the initial findings of Israel Defense Forces’ investigation, which Wong said had not yet satisfied the government’s expectations.

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Julie Bishop ‘deeply honoured’ to be appointed UN special envoy for Myanmar

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Former Australian foreign minister named as secretary general António Guterres’ special envoy to country gripped by civil war

The former Australian foreign minister Julie Bishop has been appointed the United Nations secretary general António Guterres’ special envoy on Myanmar, the world body has said.

Bishop, the Australian National University’s chancellor, will take up the UN role that has been vacant since June last year, when Singaporean diplomat Noeleen Heyzer stepped down.

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NSW weather: significant flooding threat remains for parts of Sydney despite heavy rain easing

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NSW premier says rising flood levels present ongoing danger for some communities, including in western Sydney

Sydney may have woken up to blue skies on Saturday, but flood levels were continuing to rise across parts of New South Wales with evacuation orders issued after an overnight deluge broke rainfall records.

Suburbs on the city fringes were facing the threat of significant flooding after copping more than a month’s worth of rain while a major landslip in the Blue Mountains left one community cut off.

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Fears parliamentary behaviour watchdog could be curbed by confidentiality agreements

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Greens senator Larissa Waters vows to ensure the new process expected to open in October should be led by the complainant

The Greens senator Larissa Waters has vowed to push for a powerful complainant-led sanctions body in parliament following reports those coming forward about bad behaviour in Canberra could be forced to sign confidentiality agreements.

After years of Parliament House’s poor workplace culture being in the spotlight, the independent enforcement body, described as the “final” piece of the puzzle this week by finance minister Katy Gallagher, is finally expected to open its doors in October.

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‘Financial abuse’: how a debit scheme to help vulnerable Australians led to exploitation instead

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A Guardian investigation has revealed that Centrepay is exposing scores of welfare recipients to financial harm. Advocates say the government must act now

In February the Albanese government announced a $97m compensation scheme for thousands of Aboriginal people who lost all that they had paid to the predatory funeral insurer ACBF-Youpla.

When ACBF-Youpla collapsed in 2022, it left more than 13,000 Aboriginal people, some of them elderly and in palliative care, without the means to pay for funerals.

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Online ads promote ‘simple’ access to super to pay for healthcare, despite strict rules

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Peak consumer body and financial services minister warn against private providers encouraging patients to tap into super to fund medical procedures

Advertisements offering patients “simple” access to their superannuation to pay for medical treatments have been described by the peak consumer health body as a “worrying trend” amid the cost-of-living crisis.

The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) approved 37,400 individuals to access their superannuation early on compassionate medical grounds in 2022-23, releasing a total of $730m.

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Gaza killings: Australia plans to appoint independent adviser to scrutinise Israeli inquiry

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Penny Wong demands Israel preserve evidence because of unsatisfactory initial inquiry as Israel dismisses two officers over death of seven aid staff

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Australia has demanded that Israel preserve all evidence surrounding the killing of seven aid workers in Gaza and it also plans to appoint an independent adviser to scrutinise the official investigation.

The Australian government said on Friday that the information provided by Israel on its investigation into the killing of Australian citizen Zomi Frankcom and her World Central Kitchen colleagues “hasn’t yet satisfied our expectations”.

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East coast weather: flood warnings for Queensland and NSW as BoM forecasts heavy rainfall

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Drivers have been urged to reconsiders their travel plans ahead of a forecast deluge

Heavy rainfall will drench parts of Queensland and New South Wales this weekend, with motorists urged to stay off roads.

Laura Boekel, senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, said a trough is affecting both Queensland and New South Wales, producing a significant amount of rainfall across the two states.

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Australia weather live updates: more heavy rain forecast for NSW and Qld as SES issues flood warnings; Sydney downpours cause train delays and airport flight cancellations

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Dozens of flights cancelled at Sydney airport and drivers told to avoid non-essential travel as inland low and coastal trough combine

Helen Reid from the Bureau of Meteorology has just provided us with an update on the Sydney rain and said the city could very well receive a month’s worth of rain in one day.

She pointed to the Observatory Hill gauge and said on average in April, there is around 126.5mm of rainfall during the month. Since 9am yesterday morning, there has been 106mm of rain.

We are expecting rainfall over Sydney to increase during today … I would suggest that if we got more than the April average, that wouldn’t be too beyond too far beyond this stretch of imagination.

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The Picture of Dorian Gray’s Kip Williams steps down as Sydney Theatre Company artistic director

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Williams, who directed the play, leaving company to prepare for its potential Broadway season following acclaimed West End run starring Sarah Snook

The Sydney Theatre Company artistic director, Kip Williams, who steered the theatre to new heights with the global success of his one-woman production the Picture of Dorian Gray, has announced he is stepping down after 13 years with the company.

Williams was the youngest artistic director of the STC when he was appointed at the age of 30 in 2016. He will finish his tenure at the end of 2024 after eight years, in anticipation that The Picture of Dorian Gray will head to Broadway next year. In its recent run in London’s West End, Succession star Sarah Snook played all 26 roles to huge acclaim. The role was first performed by Eryn Jean Norvill in multiple sell-out runs across Australia.

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Bruce Lehrmann defamation trial live updates: judge asks Ten lawyer why ‘sordid’ evidence is relevant to case findings – latest news

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Lehrmann’s defamation trial against Network Ten and Lisa Wilkinson has reopened to hear evidence from the former Spotlight producer. Follow the latest news and updates from the federal court of Australia today

There has been a big document dump on the federal court’s website this morning, with 17 exhibits and affidavits relating to yesterday’s evidence uploaded to the site.

These include screenshots of text messages between Auerbach and Steve Jackson during the night of the alleged “bender” in January 2023, during which Auerbach says Lehrmann bought cocaine and ordered the services of sex workers. Auerbach told the court on Thursday that the drugs and sex workers were paid for by Lehrmann, who was then reimbursed by Channel Seven as “per diem” charges.

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Police operation in which NSW man shot dead during psychotic episode was ‘flawed’, inquest finds

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Todd McKenzie’s death prompts calls from deputy coroner for summit into police responses to mental health incidents

A New South Wales police operation that resulted in a man being shot dead by the force while suffering psychosis was significantly “flawed”, an inquest has found.

Todd McKenzie, 40, was suffering from a psychosis when he shot three times by police in his Taree home in 2019 following a nine-hour siege after police responded to reports he was on the street yelling and holding a knife.

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‘Time to be fearless’: NT attorney general urges Australian leaders to pursue treaty after voice defeat

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Chansey Paech says the Uluru statement is ‘not finished’ despite the result of the voice referendum

The Northern Territory’s attorney general is urging the nation’s leaders to put last year’s voice referendum result behind them and move to forge treaties with Indigenous people because “the time for sorry business is over”.

The attorney general and deputy chief minister, Chansey Paech, is urging the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and state and territory colleagues not to allow the referendum result to stall progress on the other elements of the Uluru statement from the heart.

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Australia’s east coast forecast to avoid gas shortfall despite claims of looming supply crisis

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ACCC report says region is expected to have surplus of six petajoules in third quarter ‘even if all uncontracted gas is exported’

Australia’s east coast is expected to have a small surplus of gas in the third quarter of 2024, with an improvement in forecast supply since the gas market code was introduced.

Those are the results of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s interim update on gas supply, to be released on Friday, which the Albanese government has said shows new enforceable supply commitments are making a difference.

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Government ignored warnings more than 100 companies may be misusing Centrepay scheme, Asic says

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Services Australia’s failure to act ‘inexcusable’ and urgent action needed to help people struggling to get by, senators say

The corporate regulator repeatedly warned Services Australia that it should review and consider removing more than 100 companies from a government-run debit scheme that allows early access to welfare payments.

But it said its attempts to sound the alarm about potential misuse of the scheme have had no impact.

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US shipyards up to three years behind schedule on submarines as concerns grow for Aukus pact

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Greens senator David Shoebridge says review of shipbuilding program ‘adds to the growing list of reasons why Aukus is likely to fall over’

US shipyards are running up to three years late in building new Virginia-class submarines, despite suggestions from a senior US diplomat that the Aukus pact with Australia will help deter Beijing from seizing Taiwan.

Australia is relying on a US promise to sell it at least three Virginia-class nuclear-powered submarines in the 2030s, prior to Australian-made boats starting to enter into service in the 2040s.

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Australian neo-Nazis must be monitored better, Senate inquiry told

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White supremacists are training members in combat under cover of ‘active clubs’ promoting self-defence, counter-extremist experts say

Australian white supremacists and neo-Nazis who are creating crowdfunding campaigns and “active clubs” to train members in combat must be monitored more closely, a prominent global counter-extremist organisation has told a Senate inquiry.

Some Australian extremists “have become leading voices in the decentralised online neo-Nazi sphere”, according to the Counter Extremism Project (CEP), a global anti-terror group and non-profit. It has warned a parliamentary inquiry into rightwing extremism that some such groups in Australia may seek to promote combat sports and self-defence clubs as an “evasion tactic” to avoid police attention, as has been seen overseas.

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