Category Archives: Australia news

Daily Mail Australia to appeal Erin Molan’s win in defamation case over racism accusations

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Notice of appeal lodged in federal court says $150,000 in damages paid to Sky News broadcaster is ‘manifestly excessive’

The Daily Mail Australia is appealing a defamation win by Sky News broadcaster Erin Molan, who was awarded $150,000 over an article and two tweets that accused her of appearing to mock Polynesian names in a radio broadcast.

Molan told the federal court last year she did not think she was mocking Polynesian names when she said “hooka looka mooka hooka fooka” on Radio 2GB in 2020.

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Limits on paracetamol purchases could reduce injury and death from overdoses, expert panel says

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TGA report recommends reduced packet sizes and restricting over-the-counter sales of the drug to people 18 and over

The size of paracetamol packets sold in supermarkets could be reduced and limits introduced on the number of boxes that can be bought, in a bid to reduce injury and death from intentional overdoses.

The recommendations are contained in an independent expert report published by Australia’s drugs regulator, the Therapeutic Goods Administration. The report found rates of intentional paracetamol overdose were highest among adolescents and young adults, and more common among women and girls.

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Crisis support services can be reached 24 hours a day: Lifeline 13 11 14; Suicide Call Back Service 1300 659 467; Kids Helpline 1800 55 1800; MensLine Australia 1300 78 99 78; Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636

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BoM forecasts wetter-than-average summer for eastern states – as it happened

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Hearing that house prices are going down but looking around and seeing they are still astronomical?

Grogs explains why – yup, house prices are falling, but they are coming from eye-watering heights.

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Australia is funding just one-tenth of its fair share of global climate action, study finds

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Wealthy high-polluting countries to face growing calls from poorer nations to help cover cost of extreme weather and sea level rises

Australia is being urged to increase its investment in climate action, with a new report estimating the country is funding just one-tenth of its fair share globally.

The study being released by Oxfam and ActionAid Australia on Thursday calls on Australia to immediately increase its climate finance commitments to $3bn ahead of the UN climate meeting Cop27 to be held in Egypt in November.

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Indigenous protest planned on national day of mourning – as it happened

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New Covid variant is probably inevitable in northern winter, says Monique Ryan

The independent MP for Kooyong, Dr Monique Ryan, says we need to “rejig” how we are dealing with Covid.

I think we need greater transparency about the federal and state government’s approach to Covid and their plans for what is probably an inevitable new variant emerging over the northern winter.

I think workplaces and schools and aged care childcare facilities lack clarity about what the plan is for the inevitable next outbreaks of Covid and there’s a lot of uncertainty and anxiety about the fact that the government seems to have been winding back the mitigation strategies, whether we’re talking about mask-wearing, social isolation, quarantine, without really a plan for how this is going to affect people going forward.

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Melbourne cancer patient went to Adelaide for urgent scan due to ‘miscommunication’, minister says

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Victoria’s health minister defends colleague who suggested Kylie Hennessy, who has a brain tumour, ‘roll with the punches’

Victoria’s health minister, Mary-Anne Thomas, has claimed a “hospital miscommunication” caused a woman with a brain tumour to travel to Adelaide for an urgent medical scan.

Kylie Hennessy travelled to Adelaide last week for a functional MRI (fMRI) scan after she was told she would face a months-long wait in Melbourne.

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Qantas confident its post-Covid operations will settle into a new normal within weeks

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Despite backlash from customers and calls for CEO Alan Joyce to resign, airline has ‘a lot of confidence’ for September school holidays

Qantas has vowed its operations will settle into a new post-Covid normal within weeks after months of customer complaints over flight cancellations and lost baggage.

The Qantas group executive of associated airlines and services, John Gissing, told the Centre for Aviation summit in Adelaide the airline had “a lot of confidence” going into the September school holidays.

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Russian embassy confirms legal action over its expulsion from Canberra site

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Planning authority says the embassy had left the site disused since approval to build new embassy was granted in 2011

The Russian embassy has confirmed it will push ahead with legal action over a decision to expel it from the site of its new Canberra embassy.

Last month, the National Capital Authority (NCA) publicly announced a decision to terminate the Russian government’s lease on a block of land in Yarralumla, where it was building its new embassy. The Russian government was ordered to clear the site within 20 days.

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New South Wales government ‘ready and willing’ to discuss bringing rebel LIV golf tour to Australia

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Exclusive: State’s sports minister says NSW is ‘the perfect place’ for major tournaments, with Greg Norman believed to be scouting Sydney courses

The New South Wales government is “ready and willing” to have discussions with Greg Norman in a bid to bring the Saudi-backed LIV golf tour to Sydney, the state’s sports minister has said.

Amid increasing speculation Norman is seeking to bring the controversial breakaway tournament to Australia, the minister, Alister Henskens, confirmed he was open to hosting the multi-million dollar rebel series.

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‘Racist and disgusting’: inquest into Kumanjayi Walker death hears of ‘shocking’ texts sent by Zachary Rolfe

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• Warning: this story contains extremely offensive language heard in court

Court hears police constable Rolfe talked of having ‘smashed’ Aboriginal community and described local people as ‘neanderthals’

An inquest into the police shooting death of Kumanjayi Walker has heard that Zachary Rolfe, the constable acquitted of his murder, was involved in text message exchanges in which officers described Aboriginal people as “losers”, “grubby fucks”, “coons” and “niggas”, and discussed using force to “towel them up”.

Walker, 19, was shot three times by Rolfe during an attempted arrest in the remote Northern Territory community of Yuendumu in November 2019. Rolfe was found not guilty of murder and two alternative charges after a six-week trial in the NT supreme court in Darwin earlier this year.

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Indigenous man’s death in Victorian custody the second in a month

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Family of 38-year-old Gunditjmara and Wiradjuri man Clinton Austin say he was let down by police and justice systems

An Aboriginal prisoner in central Victoria has become the second Indigenous person to die in custody in the state in a matter of weeks.

Clinton Austin, a 38-year-old Gunditjmara and Wiradjuri man, died at Loddon prison near Castlemaine in Victoria on Sunday. Austin’s family has said they are devastated by his death.

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Farmers fined for failing to comply with workplace laws as new minimum wage takes effect

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Compliance blitz by Fair Work Ombudsman has found many farmers continue to flout rules designed to protect workers from exploitation

Many farmers are continuing to defy workplace laws designed to protect vulnerable workers, including failing to provide them with proper payslips, a compliance push by the Fair Work Ombudsman (FWO) has found.

Since December, inspectors have targeted more than 200 farms across the country and found that in some areas as many as 60% were non-compliant with workplace laws. It’s a result the National Farmer’s Federation (NFF) described as “troubling”.

It comes after new laws requiring farmers to start paying a minimum wage to pickers under the horticultural award came into effect in April.

The FWO would not say if any of the infringements were to do with the award changes, but compliance notices are typically served to employers when they have underpaid workers.

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Obesity-related cancer rates nearly quadruple in Australia over three and a half decades

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Researchers call on governments to implement national obesity strategy to help stem further rises in preventable cancers

The rate of obesity-related cancers in Australia has almost quadrupled in a few generations, new research suggests.

Researchers at the Daffodil Centre, a joint venture of Cancer Council New South Wales and the University of Sydney, analysed the rate of 10 obesity-linked cancers between 1983 and 2017.

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Coalmine wastewater spill south of Sydney turns Royal national park creek to black sludge

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NSW EPA investigating third coal pollution incident this year involving Peabody Energy’s Metropolitan mine

A creek running through the Royal national park, south of Sydney, has been hit by a coal wastewater spill that turned its water into thick, black sludge.

It is the third coal pollution incident investigated by the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority this year involving Peabody Energy’s Metropolitan mine at Helensburg.

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Falls festival to return after pandemic with move to Melbourne

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Lil Nas X and Arctic Monkeys to headline at Sidney Myer Music Bowl after farmers appeal plans to hold event in Birregurra

Victoria’s Falls festival will make its long-awaited return in December following a two-year hiatus but with a second location change to the fringe of Melbourne’s CBD.

For the first time in its nearly 30-year history, the three-day festival will relocate from regional Victoria to the inner-city.

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Mixed reaction on potential delay to integrity commission bill – as it happened

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And the London police have responded to the viral video of a police officer talking to a protester at Parliament Square – with a statement that reads like it is reminding officers people have the right to peaceful protests.

If you haven’t read the UK Guardian’s editorial today, you may enjoy it

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‘The scariest thing is insecurity’: Australia’s renters over 50 fear uncertain future, report shows

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Anglicare Australia finds a couple on age pensions could afford to rent only 1.4% of properties advertised

Nearly three-quarters of renters over 50 fear an expensive and unstable future with spiralling housing costs resulting in insecurity, according to a new report by one of Australia’s largest charities.

Anglicare Australia recently polled 500 over-50s about their housing circumstances, hopes and fears. The subsequent report, Ageing in Place: Home and Housing for Australia’s Older Renters, released on Tuesday, revealed housing costs are the biggest barrier to older renters staying settled in the same place as they age.

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Cleared of wrongdoing, the political fate of former NSW minister Stuart Ayres remains uncertain

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Whether Ayres returns to cabinet or retires to the backbench, Dominic Perrottet faces further headaches

For Stuart Ayres, the release on Monday of a report clearing him of breaching the New South Wales ministerial code of conduct was vindication.

Bruce McClintock SC was unequivocal in finding the former deputy Liberal leader and trade minister had not acted improperly in John Barilaro’s appointment to a lucrative New York trade job.

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Insider cyber threats pose ‘significant’ risk to Australia’s defence force, brief warns

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Incoming brief to Albanese government cites risk of malicious employees accessing and inappropriately using systems

Defence is at “significant risk” from cyber insider threats, the department’s incoming brief to the Albanese government says.

That could include malicious, disgruntled or merely duped employees accessing Defence’s systems and threatening their security.

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‘Interspecies innovation arms race’: cockatoos and humans at war over wheelie bin raids

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Research shows Sydney residents devising increasingly sophisticated ways to keep highly intelligent but ‘bloody annoying’ birds out of household waste

Cockatoos and humans are locked in what Australian researchers have described as “an interspecies innovation arms race”.

Sydney residents are resorting to increasingly sophisticated measures to prevent sulphur-crested cockatoos from opening and raiding household wheelie bins, detailed in new research published in the journal Current Biology.

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