Police say assailants shot man multiple times in chest as his son sat in passenger seat of car outside martial arts gym in ‘egregious, violent act’
A man has been shot dead in front of his 12-year-old son during a drive-by shooting in south-west Sydney.
Police said the 40-year-old man was outside the Elite Fight Force mixed martial arts gym in Sefton just after 6.30am on Thursday when the killers struck.
Continue reading...Fifa’s decision to appoint supermodel Adriana Lima as an official ambassador for the Women’s World Cup was “tone deaf” and unnecessary, according to former football administrators, players and gender equality campaigners.
Fifa president Gianni Infantino said Lima, a former Victoria’s Secret model, “lives and breathes” football and would be an “excellent link” between the sporting body and fans worldwide. Lima describes herself as a football fan, but appears to have had no official involvement in the sport before now.
Continue reading...Latest statistics show migration from metro areas is still higher than pre-pandemic levels
Australia’s shift towards the regions is continuing, with new figures showing an increase in the number of city dwellers moving out and a lift in the number of regional residents moving to smaller centres.
According to the latest Regional Movers Index, a quarterly report by the Regional Australia Institute and Commonwealth Bank, net “capital to regional” migration was up 16% on pre-Covid levels despite a small uptick in regional Australians returning to cities.
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Continue reading...Submission says agency’s push to enable LGBTQ+ role models ‘preferences one worldview over another’
The Sydney Anglican church has accused the Australian Law Reform Commission of a “double standard” for seeking to give LGBTQ+ students role models while limiting the ability of religious schools to hire by faith.
The church’s submission to a review of exemptions for religious schools from discrimination law is part of a broader conservative backlash that has prompted the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, to recommit the government to allowing schools to select staff based on faith.
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Continue reading...Competition watchdog analysis of 247 businesses showed 57% had promoted concerning claims about environmental credentials
The competition watchdog will step up its probe of companies’ environmental claims after an initial sweep found more than half made misleading statements ranging from overstating climate action to developing their own certification schemes.
The survey of 247 businesses or brands across eight sectors by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission last October found 57% had promoted “concerning claims about their environmental credentials”.
Continue reading...Questions marks sit over daily letter deliveries as government releases discussion paper on postal service
Australia Post is famous for its “we deliver” slogan – but when it comes to letters, it may soon need to add the caveat “but not every day”.
The government released a discussion paper on the future of Australia Post on Wednesday, with question marks once again sitting over daily letter deliveries.
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Continue reading...Apartments surveyed found to be above safe level on average nine hours a day as tenants cut back on cooling to save on energy bills
Despite the cooler summer, renters are sweltering through temperatures as hot as 40C in their homes, new research has revealed, with advocates saying the cost-of-living crisis is forcing people to live in unhealthy conditions.
Tenant advocacy organisation Better Renting tracked the temperatures in 77 rentals across Australia between December 2022 and February this year and found that for nine hours a day they were above a safe level on average. Four jurisdictions recorded indoor temperatures above 40C.
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Continue reading...Case is latest in series where church seeks to capitalise on landmark ruling that a priest’s death meant church could not receive a fair trial
The Catholic church is attempting to use the death of a paedophile, who had been jailed for the abuse of 17 children, to shield itself from further civil claims from his survivors.
In recent months, the church has adopted an increasingly aggressive approach to survivors in cases where paedophile clergy have died. It has sought to capitalise on a recent decision in New South Wales’s highest court that ruled a priest’s death meant the church could not receive a fair trial in a claim brought by a woman known as GLJ.
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Chalmers reaffirms the government wants to include the defined benefits scheme, which apply to politicians’ and public servants’ pensions, in the changes:
Yes, we’re trying to include the defined benefits schemes in this. There’s a lot of complexity in this. Our intention is to include defined benefit.
What we said is that there’s an opportunity now, between yesterday’s announcement and the budget in May, to engage in some meaningful consultation … One of the things that we do want to engage on and consult on is how we include defined benefit in the changes we have announced.
We made it really clear yesterday that our focus in the system is on these superannuation tax concessions.
$150bn worth of concessions in the top 10 of those tax breaks by value – a third of that is superannuation.
Continue reading...Union calls document ‘incontrovertible proof’ institutions using ‘concerted’ plan to drive down wages
Universities are being advised how to avoid being “roped into” multi-employer bargaining for better wages and pay conditions, a leaked roadmap has revealed.
The strategy roadmap written by the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association, which represents more than 32 tertiary institutions, gives advice to universities about three enterprise agreement scenarios under Labor’s multi-employer bargaining reforms, which will come into effect in June.
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Continue reading...Party joins chorus of super funds and crossbenchers who want to use government’s tax concessions bill to call for broader changes
The Greens will seek to push Labor to increase paid parental leave to 26 weeks sooner than planned and to pay superannuation on it through possible amendments to the government bill to reduce tax concessions for high super balances.
The Greens employment spokesperson, Senator Barbara Pocock, said women “shouldn’t have to wait” until 2026 for 26 weeks of paid parental leave (PPL), slamming Labor’s plan in the October budget to increase the entitlement by “a miserly two weeks year after year”.
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Continue reading...Opposition leader acknowledges ‘divergence of views’ but says the Liberal moderate represents the constituents in her marginal seat
Peter Dutton has declared the outspoken Liberal moderate Bridget Archer is “an important part of our team” in response to a suggestion from a veteran party insider that the Liberal party could dump her ahead of the next federal election.
The federal opposition leader told journalists on Wednesday that Archer worked hard and represented the views of her constituents in the marginal electorate of Bass in Tasmania.
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Continue reading...Court hears allegations against Ashlyn Nassif, 27, relate to Skyview development in Castle Hill
Ashlyn Nassif, the daughter of Jean Nassif, a Sydney property developer has been released on bail after she was arrested by the New South Wales organised crime squad as part of a major fraud investigation into a controversial multimillion development in the city’s north-west.
Nassif, 27, appeared in the Downing Centre local court on Wednesday to apply for bail after spending the night in prison after a series of raids across Sydney.
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Continue reading...Lower than expected inflation rate suggests worst of the price increases may be over
Australia’s annual inflation rate in January eased, implying the worst of the price increases may be over as the economy absorbs a record run of interest rate hikes.
The consumer price index for the month was 7.4%, compared with 8.4% for December alone, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Wednesday. Economists had been predicting the January CPI would be 8.1%.
Continue reading...Report says Aboriginal kids now account for 43.8% of children in out-of home care, up from 38.4%
The New South Wales government has been lashed for effectively abandoning its own strategy to reduce the representation of Aboriginal children in out-of-home care and failing its own targets.
The state ombudsman, Paul Miller, handed down a scathing report into the five-year Aboriginal Outcomes Strategy (AOS), noting that since its 2017 launch the Department of Communities and Justice appears to have abandoned it without explanation.
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Continue reading...Human rights commissioner Scott McDougall warns against making breach of bail an offence for children at tense parliamentary committee hearing
Queensland’s human rights commissioner has told a parliamentary committee that “public anxiety” is no justification for overriding the state’s Human Rights Act to make breach of bail an offence for children, warning that doing so could set a precedent.
In a tense back-and-forth during a hearing into the proposed youth crime laws, Scott McDougall said he was deeply concerned about the impact that the suspension of the act could have.
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Continue reading...Murray Smalpage tells coroner he is ‘struggling to find a reason’ for deviation from arrest plan on day Warlpiri teen was killed by Zachary Rolfe
The Northern Territory police’s second-highest serving officer has told an inquest he is “struggling to find a reason why” there was such a deviation from the “detailed” plan to arrest Warlpiri teenager Kumanjayi Walker on the day he was shot and killed by Constable Zachary Rolfe.
Walker, 19, was shot dead by Rolfe during a botched arrest in the remote Northern Territory community of Yuendumu in 2019. Rolfe was cleared of all criminal charges in relation to the shooting.
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Continue reading...Former human services secretary says Coalition minister told her ‘legal advice is just advice’ when briefed on solicitor general’s opinion on scheme’s legality
The former government services minister, Stuart Robert, told the boss of his department the Coalition would “double down” after he was informed the robodebt scheme was unlawful, a royal commission has been told.
Fronting the high-profile inquiry on Tuesday, Renee Leon, the former human services secretary, revealed she was forced to stop the scheme before the government agreed, amid the cascading personal legal risks of continuing to administer the program.
Continue reading...Company announces biggest product expansion in years as pets increasingly become part of Australian families
The hardware chain that encourages you to make improvements to your home knows there’s something else you are willing to fork out cash for – your pet.
Bunnings has announced an increase in its range of pet supplies to compete with supermarkets and specialty retailers, marking its biggest product expansion in two decades, since offering kitchen fit-outs.
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‘Really clear’ wages are not driving inflation, Tony Burke says
Circling back to the interview with employment relations minister, Tony Burke. He’s asked about soaring corporate profits, which were up more than 10% in the December quarter compared to wages which rose 2.6%, and whether that demonstrates that it’s corporate profits driving inflation – as the union movement is arguing – not wages.
It is really clear that wages are not driving inflation, are not the principal driver of inflation here. It’s really clear we don’t have some sort of spiral of inflation being caused by high wage growth. It’s also really clear we don’t have high wage growth.
I was pleased that the last wage price increase got up to 3.3%. To the extent that that’s the highest it’s been for some time and had we not taken actions that we took last year, particularly with respect to the minimum wage and awards, you wouldn’t have got to figure as high as but it’s still much, much lower than inflation.
Supermax prisoners are served better food than the workers building Snowy Hydro 2.0.
You have workers living, literally locked up in a camp with limited recreational facilities in the middle of nowhere, being fed maggot-infested food.
The problem is the joint venture who was awarded the contract is pinching every penny they can to try and improve their profit margin.
The whole site’s a tragedy waiting to happen.
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