Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
The former chief of staff to the CEO was motivated by greed, personal gain and self-gratification, prosecutors argued
A former NAB executive who fraudulently enjoyed $5.4m worth of benefits unwittingly paid for by the bank has been jailed for at least four years and nine months.
Rosemary Rogers, 45, became so used to “enjoying the benefits of her fraud” she was unable to stop over a four-year period, acting judge Paul Conlon told the New South Wales district court on Wednesday.
The attorney general says her arrival ‘finally concludes the long-running process to see Ms Leifer returned to Australia’
Alleged child abuser Malka Leifer has landed back in Australia and is expected to face a Melbourne court after being extradited from Israel.
Leifer arrived at Melbourne airport about 9pm on Wednesday following a decade-long effort by accusers to have her brought back from the country she moved to in 2008 amid child abuse accusations.
Biggest ever survey finds two-thirds of people think climate change is a global emergency
The biggest ever opinion poll on climate change has found two-thirds of people think it is a “global emergency”.
The survey shows people across the world support climate action and gives politicians a clear mandate to take the major action needed, according to the UN organisation that carried out the poll.
Berejiklian was asked to comment on the new Covide-19 vaccine advertising campaign, and said the Therapeutic Goods Administration “would not have approved it if it wasn’t safe”.
We’re able to rely on research, the experience that other nations have had, and I for one will be getting it absolutely the day it’s available to me...I know some people feel strongly about not having a vaccine. I’m not one of them. I think it’s really important for us, for as many of us to get the vaccine as possible in a timely way, to safeguard all of us moving forward. And potentially to give us greater freedoms.
Oh, look, I just focus on what I need to focus on.
My view is all of us should always follow the health advice. We have experts appointed and serving in positions which have kept all of us and Australia safe to this point in time. All of us owe it to the health experts to follow the advice and what we present is based on science and fact.
He’s not in my team. You have to ask...
I’m not going to add any further to what I said. Please ask me other questions.
I think I have answered the question twice already. To say you should always base, base the advice, the actions you take based on health advice. And I think I’ve been saying that straight for about a year everyday. And I don’t think any of us should waste our time on people who express opinions not based on evidence.
NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian said she is “hoping” to receive medical advice that will allow her ease to coronavirus restrictions this week, but wouldn’t be drawn on exactly when or what that might look like.
She told ABC News Breakfast:
Well, look, we’ll behaving those discussions and getting the advice today. I’m hoping to make a announcement by the end of the week. We’re doing more. There’s more contagious strains of the virus coming into Australia. In New South Wales our policy always is don’t keep restrictions or burden our citizens a day longer than you need to. I hoping to have confirmation of advice that allows us to announce that later this week.
I think perhaps people will be looking forward to welcoming more people into their homes, and mask policy moving forward. There’s a number of areas looking forward. The hospitality sector also wants certainty moving forward. We’re looking forward to making the announcements later. I get advice on a daily basis from the health experts and today and tomorrow we’ll be having longer conversations about what it means.
They’re the conversations we’ll have. There could be some settings where we do think it should be an ongoing way of doing things, a way of living. In other settings we may ease off and say we remembered you do this, but you don’t have to.
The important message on public transport and we’re encouraging people to go back to work in a Covvid-safe way. We do want people to catch public transport, where they’re going to work from and how they’re going to work. Because jobs and focusing on the economy is critical for us this year. I think people will feel safer if there’s masks on public transport. Those are the conversations we’ll be having.
Four protesters arrested at Sydney demonstration; rallies take place around Australia as debate around the national day rages. Follow all the latest news and updates, live
And with that comes the end of today’s blog. This is what went down today:
An update on the bushfire burning in Booderee national park on the NSW south coast: the NSW Rural Fire Service have said crews are backburning in order to build containment lines and slow the blaze.
Watch and Act: Booderee Fire (Shoalhaven LGA). Crews are implementing backburning operations to build containment lines and slow the spread of the fire, burning to the SW of Jervis Bay Airport. Those in area of Wreck Bay Village and Jervis Bay Village should monitor conditions. pic.twitter.com/nMLxwiKktL
Split emerges within Coalition as Nationals call for tariffs and subsidies while Liberals are keen to stick with free trade regime
A split has emerged within the Australian government, with members of the junior Coalition partner pushing protectionist policies as a way of “fighting fire with fire” in the trade war with China.
National party MPs have called on the government to consider imposing tariffs and expanding subsidies to protect domestic manufacturers, but Liberal backbenchers told Guardian Australia on Tuesday it would be against the national interest to abandon free and open trade.
Amid debates about abolishing the holiday, Australia Day honours and whether protests should go ahead at all, people have rallied in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Canberra to mark the day
As the sun rose on 26 January, thousands gathered in the rain and cold to pay tribute to elders, past and present, at the annual Invasion Day vigils.
Physically distanced crowds gathered in Barangaroo Reserve in Sydney from dusk until dawn to reflect on the impact of colonisation, and celebrate what life was like for Indigenous communities before the First Fleet arrived.
So much has happened in such a short time. All of a sudden, it feels as if life is progressing too fast, when only a week ago I was impatiently waiting for my new life in the city to begin.
Late February Pfizer vaccine rollout planned. Meanwhile, South Australian authorities warn residents as bushfires erupt in Adelaide Hills. Follow all the latest updates, live
A truck carrying toilet paper has burst into flames, causing traffic chaos on Melbourne’s Eastern Freeway.
It is still unclear what caused the fire, but firefighters are on the scene, attempting to bring the fire under control.
The truck exploding into flames on the Eastern Freeway, Melbourne near the Elgar Rd exit. I saw this while passing by and hope no one is hurt. The fire is now out but traffic is banked up on the city-bound lane. A terrible incident on a 40c day. #truckOnFireMelbourneFreewaypic.twitter.com/tj5MANXAQh
The Bureau of Meteorology has said the heatwave is over in Melbourne and is easing in South Australia, with rain and thunderstorms expected later this evening.
Dean Narramore, a senior meteorologist at the BoM, warned that the focus will shift to New South Wales tomorrow, with temperatures forecast to get near 40C in Western Sydney, with the city expecting to reach 35C.
But by tomorrow night the cool change will have moved across all of south-eastern Australia and temperatures will return to near seasonal averages for the rest of the week.
Since 2019, Lucienne Rickard has been drawing detailed sketches of lost species in a Hobart gallery. On Sunday she erased the final one
The Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery in Hobart is filled with people waiting for the swift parrot to disappear.
Hobart artist Lucienne Rickard has spent five weeksdrawing a large-scale pencil sketch of the critically endangered bird. Picking up her eraser, she tells her audience, “If we don’t do something soon, this is what will happen.”
Egypt has launched a Covid vaccination campaign, with the first shots of the Sinopharm’s vaccine given to healthcare workers in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia.
Italy will take legal action against Pfizer and AstraZeneca over delays in deliveries of Covid vaccines, with the aim of securing the doses rather than seeking damages, the foreign minister, Luigi Di Maio, said on Sunday.
Di Maio said on RAI state television:
We are working so our vaccine plan programme does not change. We are activating all channels so the EU commission does all it can to make these gentlemen respect their contracts.
‘Accidental’ mayor, elevated to top job under a controversial runner-up succession rule, claims moral (if not actual) victory
A barefoot climate change activist dubbed Queensland’s accidental mayor appears set to fail in his bid to put the coal and beef-loving city of Rockhampton on a greener path.
Chris “Pineapple” Hooper, a bike-riding, self-declared ratbag, is running third as the count continues in Saturday’s mayoral byelection, sparked by the shock resignation of long-serving civic leader Margaret Strelow in November 2020.
At a doorstop on Sunday, the treasurer said the Morrison’s government intended to become a “world leader” in regulating social media and search companies, who he accused of shifting the goalposts in their opposition to the proposed bargaining code of conduct.
When Alice Rummery sees a problem, she has one overriding thought: “What are we going to do about it?”
That’s been the driving force of an activism that was first ignited as a university student in 2018 when she was a critical part of a campaign for women’s safety in cities. Trained and supported by Plan International’s Activist Series, she worked to enable women in five cities in the world to map precisely where in that city they felt safe or endangered. Now, she is working in the public service, tasked with implementing the Women’s Safety Charter for the city of Sydney and taking the momentum of her campaigning work into practical application.
Tse Chi Lop detained at request of Australian police investigating $70bn-a-year Asia-Pacific drug trade
Dutch police said on Saturday they had arrested the alleged leader of an Asian drug syndicate who is listed as one of the world’s most wanted fugitives and has been compared to Mexican drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.
Tse Chi Lop, a Chinese-born Canadian national, was detained on Friday at the request of Australian police, who led an investigation that found his organisation dominates the $70bn-a-year Asia-Pacific drug trade, Dutch police spokesman Thomas Aling said.
Mark McGowan’s government accuses Fremantle council of failing to withdraw consent for occupancy of Pioneer Park in reasonable timeframe
Western Australia’s government has formally seized control of Fremantle’s tent city, ramping up the blame game over the troubled homeless camp.
The treasurer and lands minister, Ben Wyatt, has signed a revocation order under the Lands Administration Act removing the City of Fremantle as the management body for Pioneer Park.
Despite a near record total of export goods to China last year, there are fears rocky relations between the two countries have yet to hit bottom
If anyone was hoping for a breakthrough in the relationship between Australia and China in 2021, the signs are not good. The year has started much as 2020 ended, with dozens of ships carrying Australian coal still stranded off the Chinese coast and with Beijing accusing Canberra of “weaponising” national security by blocking an investment proposal.
While the Morrison government is bracing for a protracted standoff with Australia’s largest trading partner in what officials call “strategic patience”, there are fresh questions as to whether Canberra has a comprehensive plan for managing the relationship with an increasingly assertive and powerful China.
Analysis: tech firm’s refusal to pay news publishers comes as it agrees to do exactly that in France
The biggest companies in technology love an ultimatum but rarely do they spell out their threats. This week, however, Google has done exactly that, telling an Australian parliamentary hearing that a proposed law forcing the company to pay news publishers for the right to link to their content “would give us no real choice but to stop making Google Search available in Australia”.
The threat, from the company’s Australian managing director, Mel Silva, is the latest escalation in a war of words over the proposal, which seeks to undo some of the damage online business models have dealt to the country’s publishing industry.
Sources at IOC adamant Games will go ahead in July
Country has surge in Covid cases centred on capital
The Japanese government has vehemently denied a story that it has privately concluded that this summer’s Olympic and Paralympic Games in Tokyo are doomed, calling them “categorically untrue”.
Sources at the International Olympic Committee have also told the Guardian that they are still planning for a “full Games” in July, despite the spiralling number of Covid-19 cases in Japan and across the globe. They also dismissed a Times report that said that government officials had resigned themselves to cancelling the Olympics and were instead hoping a wave of sympathy would help Tokyo secure the 2032 Games.