Daughter and ABC presenter Laura Tingle pays tribute to her father who she says was her ‘greatest urger-on, fan and critic’
John Tingle, a journalist, broadcaster and founder of the Shooters party, has died aged 90.
Tingle’s daughter and ABC journalist Laura Tingle posted the news of his death on Saturday morning and paid tribute to her father.
Continue reading...Captain Michael Hooper has withdrawn from the Wallabies’ Rugby Championship Test against Argentina 24 hours before kick-off, saying he isn’t in the “right mindset” to lead or represent the country.
The tireless flanker had been named to lead the side in his 122nd Test on Sunday morning (AEST) but will now return to Australia, missing both matches against the Pumas. Fellow Test centurion James Slipper will captain the side in Mendoza, while Fraser McReight will replace Hooper in the number seven jersey.
Continue reading...Australia began day eight of the Commonwealth Games with 50 gold medals, a metaphorical bat raised towards the pavilion with hopes of more to come. Instead, after such a dominant opening week, the Australian team stalled for the first time and were unable to add to their golden tally in Birmingham.
Host nation England promptly closed the gap on the medal board with a swag of golds to sit on 47, trailing by just three with as many days to go. But the one-day drought did not mean the day was a complete disappointment for Australia.
Continue reading...As jobseekers face ‘humiliating’ tasks to maintain payments, vast network of job agencies rakes in hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars
Two words make the money go round in Australia’s multi-billion dollar welfare-to-work industry: mutual obligation.
When someone loses their job and applies for the dole, they are sent to an outsourced job agency to get help looking for work. It triggers a payment to the provider – and the possibility of more to come.
Continue reading...The world heritage site still has some capacity for recovery but the window is closing fast as the climate continues to warm
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The Great Barrier Reef is one of the planet’s natural jewels, stretching for more than 2,300km along Australia’s north-east.
But as well as being a bucket-list favourite and a heaving mass of biodiversity across 3,000 individual reefs, the world heritage-listed organism is at the coalface of the climate crisis.
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Continue reading...Exclusive: asylum seekers in the offshore detention centre who had contact with Australian journalists, lawyers and advocates were closely watched, documents reveal
The Australian government used private security contractors to collect intelligence on asylum seekers on Nauru, singling out those who were speaking to journalists, lawyers and refugee advocates, internal documents from 2016 reveal.
Intelligence officers working for Wilson Security compiled fortnightly reports about asylum seekers “of interest”, including individuals flagged as having “links with [Australian] media”, “contact with lawyers in Australia” or “contacts with Australian advocates”.
Continue reading...Music festival organisers say they are notifying patrons after two infections reported in people who visited Byron Bay site
Authorities have told people who attended Splendour in the Grass to be on alert for symptoms of meningococcal disease, after reporting that one man who attended the festival had since died of the disease.
Two cases of meningococcal have been confirmed in people who attended the Byron Bay music festival, including the man in his 40s from Sydney, who died this week.
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Continue reading...PM marks public broadcaster’s 90th birthday with a defence of its importance and thinly veiled attack on former government
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Only a government ruled by ideology or fear would attack the ABC, Anthony Albanese has said at the 90th birthday celebration of the public broadcaster in Sydney.
In a thinly veiled attack on the former Coalition government’s fraught relationship with the ABC, the prime minister on Friday evening said a strong independent broadcaster was vital to democracy and brought Australia together as a nation.
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Continue reading...Minister for Indigenous Australians says negotiating organisations have one week to agree on future of community centre
Linda Burney has given the organisations negotiating the future of the National Centre of Indigenous Excellence in Redfern one week to determine the future of the social and community hub, before the government intervenes.
In a heated community meeting on Friday, the minister for Indigenous Australians said her priority was for the tenants of the George Street facility to be given permanency, for the centre to stay open, and for its 50 staffmembers to keep their jobs.
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Continue reading...Brigid Heywood has stood down but denies wiping saliva on a schoolgirl’s face and commenting on her skin colour
The vice-chancellor at the University of New England has resigned after she was charged with assault over an International Women’s Day event where she allegedly wiped saliva on a schoolgirl’s face while commenting on the colour of her skin.
Brigid Heywood, who has led the university since 2019, has been charged with common assault and behaving in an offensive manner in or near a public place over an incident at a club in Armidale in March.
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Continue reading...Adelaide-based public servant blew the whistle on the use of garnishee notices to claw back debts from taxpayers
Commonwealth prosecutors are seeking suppression orders in the case of former tax office worker Richard Boyle.
Boyle blew the whistle in 2018 on the Australian Taxation Office’s aggressive use of garnishee notices to claw back debts from taxpayers and businesses.
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Continue reading...From US floods to drought in France, communities around globe are still feeling effects of July’s extreme weather
Central US states are still reeling from a week of extreme flooding events in the final days of July. Initially, the extreme rainfall into St Louis gave a quarter of the normal annual rainfall in just 12 hours, according to the National Weather Service (NWS). A few days later, in eastern Kentucky, at least 10-12 inches (about 25-30cm) fell in the space of a few days, causing devastating flooding in the Appalachian region of the state.
The complex, numerous and steep valleys in the region enabled rainwater to quickly run down valley sides and build up on the limited and often built-up floodplains. Deforestation and historic mining activity in the region have also been mentioned as potential contributors. Both flooding events have been classified as one in 1,000-year events by the NWS.
Continue reading...The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, says he will be “taking a break” next week, with his deputy, Richard Marles, to act in the top job in his stead.
Speaking on ABC Melbourne radio, Albanese said he would take a short period of leave and travel somewhere in Australia. He will be on leave from August 6-14.
Taking a break with security issues is more complex, I have found.
Three people remain in custody. We believe one of those persons is responsible for this matter.
Continue reading...As Grace Brown was preparing for the first leg of an Australian clean sweep of the Commonwealth Games individual time trials, the task ahead was brought into harsh focus. English rider Hayley Simmonds, a bronze medallist on the Gold Coast four years ago now working as a commentator while injured, articulated perfectly the demands of the event.
“It’s called the race of truth,” Simmonds said on the BBC. “In the end, it’s just you and the pain in your legs and thoughts in your head. You cannot hide behind your teammates. It is literally the strongest rider who will win.”
Continue reading...Despite pleas from unions and the Greens, the bill easily passed upper house after Coalition sided with Labor
New laws to crack down on protests at Victorian logging sites have been pushed through state parliament despite an 11th-hour push from unions.
The Sustainable Forests Timber Amendment (Timber Harvesting Safety Zones) Bill 2022 passed Victoria’s upper house on Thursday evening, with the final vote count 30 to five after Labor and the coalition joined forces.
Continue reading...Stuart Ayres’ replacement, David Elliott, urged to broaden scope of his portfolio beyond ‘roads and sports’
Western Sydney community leaders are calling on the new state minister for western Sydney, David Elliott, to broaden the scope of his portfolio beyond “roads and sports”.
Elliott, who also holds the transport and veterans affairs portfolios, will be sworn into his new role on Friday, after his predecessor, Stuart Ayres, stepped down on Tuesday.
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Continue reading...Exclusive: Complaint lodged with human rights commission after man turned away at gate of Sydney airport flight
A passenger with a disability has lodged a discrimination complaint after he was turned away at the gate when trying to board a Jetstar flight in Sydney.
Tony Jones, who suffered a spinal cord injury after falling off a balcony at the age of 18 and has since relied on a wheelchair, said he had contacted the airline to organise assistance in advance of his flight to Ballina in May last year.
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Continue reading...Renters express shock as property managers told to provide tenants with notice to leave at same time as new leases
Queensland’s peak real estate body has recommended property managers issue every tenant with a notice to leave at the same time as they are offered a new lease, as a way of circumventing the state’s new no-grounds eviction laws.
Renters who spoke to Guardian Australia criticised the recommendation, which they said has left them shocked and worried about their future.
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Continue reading...Veteran diver struck by ‘intricate detail’ sent footage to be uploaded to Jellyfish app
A diver has captured footage of an unusual-looking jellyfish off the coast of Papua New Guinea, sparking interest among researchers.
The video was captured by Dorian Borcherds, who owns Scuba Ventures in Kavieng, in the New Ireland province of PNG.
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Continue reading...The parliament will sit at 9am – once the morning proceedings are done, it will be into the climate bill – people are getting ready to head to the galleries to watch it pass the house.
It has been a very, very long decade. There are a lot of people who need to see this, even if there is still a very, very long way for us to go to actually start acting.
The inclusion of an Objects clause that addresses targets, accountability, expert advice and the need for climate action in line with the science makes it clear that this is the beginning of a new era in Australia,” Chaney said in a statement.
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