Category Archives: Australia news

Foot-and-mouth disease: Australian airports to step up precautions as farmers grow anxious

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Agriculture minister says disinfectant mats will be installed to prevent arrival of the disease, which is spreading in Indonesia

The federal government will install acidic disinfectant mats at airports as part of an expanded suite of biosecurity measures to prevent foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) entering Australia from Indonesia.

The new precautions come as viral fragments of the disease were detected in food products arriving from China.

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Jennifer Down wins 2022 Miles Franklin award for Bodies of Light

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Book prize judges have praised ‘ethical precision’ of Melburnian’s second novel, a poised unpacking of the horrors of institutional failure

Jennifer Down missed the call telling her she’d won the Miles Franklin. She was in a hotel room on a Zoom call for work, and rang back later with no idea of the news waiting for her. “I was quite speechless,” she tells Guardian Australia. “I was so shocked.” We get that a lot, the chair told her dryly.

Bodies of Light is the Melbourne writer’s second novel. Her debut and subsequent short story collection saw her named best young Australian novelist by the Sydney Morning Herald in 2017 and 2018, and she’s been awarded several fellowships. But the 31-year-old is still processing the “immeasurable impact” of the $60,000 prize – the country’s richest literary award, alongside the Stella – on her writing life. It goes deeper than book sales and overseas readers, though both are now likely.

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Daniel Andrews apologises for ‘disgraceful behaviour’ of Labor MPs after scathing Ibac findings

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Victorian premier pledges reforms after Operation Watts finds public funds ‘misused’ and codes breached

The Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, says he takes full responsibility for the “disgraceful” conduct uncovered in a damning report into Labor branch stacking, as he apologised to the public and vowed to implement sweeping reform.

The report of Operation Watts – a joint investigation between the state’s ombudsman and the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (Ibac) uncovered widespread misuse of taxpayer resources for political purposes and a “catalogue” of unethical behaviour in the Victorian branch of the Labor party including nepotism, the hiring of unqualified people for public roles and using those roles for political party work.

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Anthony Albanese stops short of calling for Australians to work from home amid Covid surge

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Prime minister says people should stay home if they are sick but there is no prescriptive position on working from home

Anthony Albanese has stopped short of calling for Australians to work from home if they can, as the chief medical officer, Paul Kelly, advised yesterday in the face of the rising Covid wave, saying the nation needed a “balance” to also consider the interests of business.

Despite numerous questions across a radio interview and a press conference about the latest recommendation from the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee that employers should allow working from home if feasible, the prime minister did not directly make that request himself.

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Redbubble ordered to pay Hells Angels more than $78,000 for using logo without permission

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Motorcycle club wins second copyright infringement case against online merchandise company in three years

Online merchandise store Redbubble has been ordered to pay the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club more than $78,000 for selling items depicting the club’s logo without permission, in the second ruling against the company in three years.

Redbubble is an online marketplace that allows users to upload images to be printed on merchandise such as stickers, mugs, T-shirts, masks and other items, which are then offered for sale.

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Queensland police misidentify domestic violence victims as attackers, inquiry told

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Inquiry hears no effort was made to communicate with deaf woman wrongly identified as a perpetrator

Queensland police regularly misidentify the victims of domestic violence, with a lawyer telling an inquiry that a woman was subjected to a protection order due to scratches she inflicted in self-defence when her partner was strangling her.

In another case, officers wrongly identified a deaf First Nations woman as a perpetrator despite making no effort to communicate with her, a lawyer from the Queensland Indigenous Family Violence Legal Service told the inquiry.

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Victorian spoke of wanting police to kill him before he was shot dead, inquest hears

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Coroner told Gabriel Messo attacked his mother before being shot three times by a police officer in 2020

A Victorian man who was shot dead by police after violently assaulting his mother told a social worker that he wanted an officer to kill him so his pain would end, an inquest has heard.

Gabriel Messo, who had bipolar disorder, was shot in the chest three times by a police officer at John Coutts Reserve in Gladstone Park, in Melbourne’s north, on 16 July 2020.

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Ben Roberts-Smith’s defamation trial hears Australian SAS soldiers ‘turned a blind eye’ to alleged war crimes

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In closing submissions, newspapers’ lawyer accuses several of Roberts-Smith’s witnesses of ‘outright dishonesty’

A powerful omertà within Australia’s SAS caused soldiers to “turn a blind eye to the most despicable and egregious breaches of the laws of war”, Ben Roberts-Smith’s long-running defamation trial has heard.

On the second day of closing submissions, Nicholas Owens SC, acting for the newspapers being sued by Roberts-Smith, said witnesses, including those called by the newspapers, were reluctant to report alleged war crimes because of a “pervasive culture” that forced new soldiers in particular to “toe the line” of the regiment’s culture.

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Mortgage holders could face large jump in repayments if interest rates increase by 3%, RBA says

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Deputy reserve bank governor, Michele Bullock, says most Australians are ‘well placed’ to absorb impact of rate rises

Up to 30% of mortgage holders could struggle to keep up with their home repayments if interest rates were to increase by 3%, according to the Reserve Bank of Australia, which says first-home owners, late entrants to the market and low-income loan holders are most at risk.

With the bulk of low fixed-rate loans due to expire in the next two years, about half of those coming into the new variable market will face increases in their repayments of at least 40%. For those whose fixed loans expire in the middle of next year, the reserve bank estimates a median increase of about $650 a month in repayments, or a 45% increase.

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China’s challenges to Australian ships: three reasons not to panic | Adam Lockyer

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It’s important to view encounters between the two militaries in operational context

Last week it was reported that in early July an Australian warship had been closely followed by a Chinese guided-missile destroyer, a nuclear-powered attack submarine and multiple military aircraft as it travelled through the East China Sea.

This incident followed a confrontation on 26 May, when an Australian maritime surveillance plane was dangerously intercepted by a Chinese fighter over the South China Sea.

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Calls for employers to allow working from home as 75 Covid deaths recorded – as it happened

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Victorian students aged eight and over are being urged to wear masks when indoors to help counter the Covid-19 surge.

The request comes in a joint letter from the state education department and independent and Catholic schools.

I respect the fact that people on the crossbench were elected to deliver action on climate change and our government wants to work with them to do just that.

That’s why one of the very first acts of the new government will be to legislate that higher ambition. They want more than the 43% that Labor is offering though.

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Former NSW ministers Eddie Obeid, Joe Tripodi and Tony Kelly charged with misconduct after Icac inquiry

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Charges flow from 2014 corruption investigation into infrastructure company Australian Water Holdings

Former New South Wales Labor ministers Eddie Obeid, Joe Tripodi and Tony Kelly are facing criminal charges flowing from an Independent Commission Against Corruption investigation into a controversial water infrastructure company.

The trio will face court charged with criminal offences after a 2014 NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption inquiry into infrastructure company Australian Water Holdings.

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Letter urges Victorian parents to send children to school in masks as Covid surges

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While masks remain optional in schools nationwide, authorities in several Australian states have strengthened requests for action

The Victorian education department and independent schools have written a letter to parents urging students over the age of eight to wear masks at school.

While masks are not currently mandated for general student populations anywhere in Australia, a letter signed by the heads of the Victorian government, Catholic and independent schools sectors asks students aged eight and over to wear masks during class and if travelling on public transport. The state opposition has seized on the recommendation, labelling it a “mandate by stealth”.

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Neighbours stalwarts tell of tears on set after 28-year stint on soap

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Alan Fletcher and Jackie Woodburne – who play Karl and Susan – reflect as fans prepare for final episode to air

The Neighbours stalwarts Alan Fletcher and Jackie Woodburne, who played Karl and Susan Kennedy in the Australian soap opera, have said they shared “a few tears and a lot of hugs” as their 28-year stint on the show came to an end.

With the Neighbours finale due to air later this month, some of the show’s longest-standing actors have been reflecting on their time on set and working alongside future Hollywood stars.

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Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz calls for windfall profits tax in Australia

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Tax is a ‘no-brainer’ after companies’ huge profits during Covid but corporate influence makes it ‘politically difficult’, Stiglitz says

The Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has called for a windfall profits tax, arguing the idea is a “no-brainer” that has been taken off the table due to the influence of big companies.

Stiglitz made the comments to reporters during a tour of Australia after personally lobbying the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, to introduce the tax and warning that excessive interest rate rises could push Europe, the US, and then Australia into recession.

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Majority of Aboriginal souvenirs sold are fakes with no connection to Indigenous people, report finds

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Productivity Commissions calls for mandatory labelling of inauthentic products to warn consumers and protect income of Indigenous artists

Two out of three “Aboriginal” souvenirs on the market are fake, with no connection to Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people, according to a new report by the Productivity Commission.

The commission is calling for mandatory labelling of these inauthentic products to help warn consumers, and curb the significant cultural harm that “Indigenous‑style consumer products” do to artists and communities, in its latest report released on Tuesday.

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‘Abusing China’s restraint’: Beijing accuses Australia of provocation at sea

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Global Times quotes comments by foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin on military encounters in the South China Sea

China has accused Australia of provocation in the South China Sea and said Australia – along with the United States and Canada – must “refrain from abusing China’s restraint”.

Foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin was responding to a question about recent military encounters in the South China Sea, including reports in Politico that a Chinese fighter jet had an “unsafe” and “unprofessional” interaction with an American C-130 aircraft.

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Australia news live; treasurer says fuel excise cut ‘too expensive to continue’; Denis Napthine resigns as NDIA chair; 31 Covid deaths

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Gorgeous images coming through from Tasmania where snow has fallen this morning.

NSW premier Dominic Perrottet is on ABC Radio following the national cabinet meeting which has seen emergency isolation payments reinstated.

If the state is taking away people’s liberty, then the state has an obligation to provide financial support.

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Jim Chalmers warns of ‘confronting’ inflation and wages forecast in July economic update

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Treasurer says rising interest rates will affect economic growth but Labor has plans to provide cost-of-living support

Australia’s July economic update will contain “confronting” news about lower growth projections and higher inflation cutting real wages, Jim Chalmers has said.

The treasurer said the update to be delivered on Thursday 28 July comes as the global economy is in a “difficult if not dangerous place” due to high debt and rising interest rises to combat inflation.

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Australia’s top end ODIs will not trumped by the Hundred

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  • Stoinis, Abbott, Maxwell and Zampa to return for series
  • Six ODIs scheduled against Zimbabwe and New Zealand

Pat Cummins will be rested for Australia’s ODIs against Zimbabwe and New Zealand but the Hundred will not take precedence for four other star players.

Marcus Stoinis, Sean Abbott, Glenn Maxwell and Adam Zampa are all set to cut their Hundred campaigns in England short after been included in a 14-man squad to play six ODIs in August and September in Townsville and Cairns.

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