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Court to rule in Pauline Hanson-Mehreen Faruqi case
A federal court judge is ready to rule on whether Pauline Hanson made a racial slur when she told Greens senator Mehreen Faruqi to go back to Pakistan.
Continue reading...Investigation under way into whether mechanical failure resulted in deaths of German shepherds Xtra and Soldier in Sydney
New South Wales police are investigating whether engine failure led to a police car’s air conditioning failing and the subsequent death of two police dogs inside a special “dog pod”.
The German shepherds Xtra and Soldier were found dead inside the police vehicle by their handler on Thursday at about 12.30pm.
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Continue reading...Once-in-a-generation summit set to commence in Griffith on 1 November amid concern over transparency and questions over commitment to meaningful change
New South Wales Labor has been accused of trying to minimise the impact of a once-in-a-generation drug reform summit amid last-minute changes and concern from experts over transparency.
The long-promised NSW drug summit begins on Friday in the regional city of Griffith before hearings in Lismore and Sydney.
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Young man dies in multi-vehicle crash in Queensland’s Bundaberg Region
A fatal multi-vehicle traffic crash last night at Elliot in Queensland’s Bundaberg Region last night is being investigated by the police forensic crash Unit.
All travel has been appropriately declared and is a matter of public record.
The only people that need to look at the rules are [shadow transport minister] Bridget McKenzie and Peter Dutton. They’ve got some serious explaining to do.
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Mark Butler flags importance of an Australian CDC in future pandemic responses
The federal health minister, Mark Butler, spoke to ABC News Breakfast this morning, after the Covid inquiry report was released yesterday.
Currently, we’re the only developed country that doesn’t have that single authoritative body that can provide to governments and communities about an evidence-based approach to pandemic response and to other communicable diseases. So that is the foundation on which we build a system to respond to the next pandemic - because there will be a next one – much more effectively than we did to Covid.
We all remember just how incredibly difficult and challenging it was, how it affected every aspect of our lives. And in terms of how the government worked during that period of time – we worked with those public health experts and advisers. Our focus was very much on the health and wellbeing of our community, particularly the vulnerable members of our community who were most at risk.
This was a deadly disease. We saw, particularly overseas, it killed so many people. So we were focused on a public health response – a public health response that was focused on supporting the health of our community, and also too understanding the significant additional supports that we needed to provide to small businesses to support them during this incredibly difficult time.
Continue reading...Origin and EnergyAustralia agree to defer bills after brownouts cripple region for better part of a week
Customers who have suffered through Broken Hill’s mass outages are set for a temporary reprieve on their bills as locals continue to be hit with night-time power cuts in sweltering conditions.
Two power companies – Origin and EnergyAustralia – have agreed to defer bills to those who have been affected by the outages that crippled the region for the better part of a week.
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Continue reading...Rising Tide event would involve thousands of paddling climate activists blocking coal exports
The New South Wales police force is challenging a planned protest through the supreme court for the second time this month – this time an event in Newcastle calling for climate action.
The November protest is organised by Rising Tide and known as the “People’s Blockade of the World’s Largest Coal Port”. It would involve thousands of activists paddling into the Port of Newcastle on kayaks and rafts to stop coal exports from leaving Newcastle for 50 hours.
Continue reading...Anthony Albanese to launch schemes in NSW and Victoria today; Domain says rate of price increases is cooling. Follow today’s news headlines live
Bowen derides Coalition’s ‘nuclear fantasy’
Chris Bowen, minister for climate change and energy, is speaking on ABC Radio National this morning.
If I was the energy minister of another country, I would consider the opportunities that I had in that country – but a country saying to Australia, with our excellent renewable resources, that we should go down the nuclear road when we have no nuclear industry, no nuclear expertise of the scale that we would need for a nuclear power industry, is like us going to Finland or Scandinavia and saying, ‘Listen, we know [you have] a lot of snow, but you should really try beach surfing.’ It just doesn’t make any sense.
We have to play to our strengths in Australia, and we have the best renewable resources in the world, and the opposition wants to stop us using them, and in turn, keep coal in the system for longer. They’re quite explicit about that while we wait for this nuclear fantasy to come on board. That would be terrible for emissions and fatal for energy reliability.
Continue reading...Lovisa Sjoberg had suffered a snake bite, dehydration and a rolled ankle in the days she spent lost in the Snowy Mountains – and was ‘pretty fortunate’ to be alive
The alarm was raised by a car hire company.
Lovisa Sjoberg, known as Kiki, had hired a grey Mitsubishi Outlander and driven it out to the Kosciuszko national park, where she was known to go hiking and take photographs of brumbies.
Continue reading...Earlier this morning, David Crisafulli said it was still a ‘no’ to any nuclear proposal, and Dutton said he ‘respected’ that. Follow the day’s news live
Employment minister Murray Watt has refused to comment on reports Anthony Albanese used his membership in Qantas’s chairman’s lounge to solicit flight upgrades when he was transport minister and opposition leader.
Watt was on RN Breakfast, where he refused to be drawn on what he called “unsourced claim by a journalist” that Albanese would reach out directly to former Qantas CEO Alan Joyce directly about his travel.
If you have a look at Peter Dutton behaviour, for example, several upgrades from the Qantas and other airlines, he’s had free flights paid for by Gina Rinehart.
I really would wonder whether it’s wise for the opposition to start calling this kind of stuff into question.
We obviously spend an enormous amount of time at airports. I think this week, I’m going to be in about three or four different cities, flying from place to place. And it is helpful from time to time, to be able to have private meetings or private environments, to be able to have teams meetings with your office, which I do every time I fly.
We want Labor to negotiate like we did in the previous housing legislation, where we not only improved and passed Labour’s housing legislation, but we got $3bn to start building public and community housing.
I think this is part of the message that we’re trying to give to the government. We are up for negotiation.
Continue reading...Lovisa Sjoberg hadn’t been seen for almost a fortnight when she was located on Sunday afternoon at Kiandra about 85km south-west of Canberra
A woman missing for more than a week in the Snowy Mountains region has been found alive four days after she was reportedly bitten by a snake.
A search was launched for Lovisa “Kiki” Sjoberg, 48, on Monday 21 October after she was last seen driving a grey SUV in the Kosciuszko national park the previous Tuesday.
Continue reading...NSW police say two crime scenes secured after reports two light planes collided near Oakdale
Three people are dead after two light planes collided in mid-air before crashing in Sydney’s south-west.
NSW police confirmed the fatal crash occurred at about 11.50am on Saturday, at Belimbla Park, near Oakdale.
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Continue reading...Since 2017 in NSW, 120 officers have been charged with domestic violence offences. But advocates believe many victims are too scared to report
Annie* was in a relationship with a police officer for more than a decade. During that time, she says, he was manipulative and assaulted her.
When she finally got the courage to report her allegations of domestic violence to the police, a different command to where her partner worked investigated it. But then she realised that some of the officers in that command knew him.
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Continue reading...Shelly beach, Bronte, Coogee and Malabar among those rated ‘poor’ as swimmers urged to check water quality online
More than a quarter of New South Wales’ favourite swimming spots have been polluted by faecal matter over the past year including Sydney’s Coogee, Bronte and Malabar beaches.
With the Bureau of Meteorology predicting a wet summer, the government has urged swimmers to check its online water quality monitor for updates after its annual state of the beaches report found 28% of the 218 tracked sites experienced pollution.
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Continue reading...Court finds Fairvale high school failed duty of care in case of 14-year-old boy who was assaulted in 2017
A student subjected to an unprovoked and lengthy bashing by 12 of his classmates has been granted $1.2m in compensation.
The student at Fairvale high school in western Sydney was 14 years old when the other students prevented him boarding a bus on 16 October 2017.
Continue reading...NSW police charge 67-year-old man with murder of Edwin Dobbin, 82, who disappeared from Leppington in late September
A body believed to be that of a missing man who police allege was murdered and then buried on a semi-rural property on Sydney’s outskirts has been found.
While the body is yet to be formally identified, investigators believe it is that of 82-year-old Edwin Dobbin, who disappeared from his Leppington home in south-west Sydney late last month.
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Dutton and Shorten weigh in on Queensland state election
The federal opposition leader, Peter Dutton, and the NDIS minister, Bill Shorten, both spoke with the Today show earlier from Queensland, before the election.
He’s focused on the issues which affect Queenslanders: housing, health, cheaper transport and of course tackling youth crime. So we’ll find out soon enough who’s going to win.
The fact is that it’s time for a change in Queensland and law and order is out of control.
Well, yes, he did. He did three days ago and, despite that, the government’s scare campaign continues.
The scare campaign on a sensitive issue that has been run, quite frankly, crosses the line, and we’re better than that as Queenslanders … There won’t be changes to abortion laws and Queenslanders need to know that.
Continue reading...The child’s mother and another woman, aged 22 and 37, were also arrested as part of joint investigation by police in Australia and Manila
A 33-year-old Sydney man has been charged with child sexual abuse offences against a boy living in the Philippines and is facing 10 years in prison.
Australian federal police officers were given information in September about a man in Australia who was allegedly engaging in the live online child sexual abuse of the boy, which was allegedly being facilitated by the child’s mother.
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The Rail, Tram and Bus Union of NSW (RTBU) conducted a five-minute work stoppage early this morning, which is leading to delays across the network.
Sydney Trains says this has led to minor delays and “larger than normal gaps in services may be experienced”, according to an alert:
Trains stops and platforms may change at short notice and some trains may be cancelled. Extra travel time may be experienced in some cases and you may need to change to continue your trip.
The action was set to happen in select locations across the network to ensure we could ramp up stoppages whenever needed.
The rail agencies continue to bargain in good faith with the Combined Rail Unions for a new enterprise bargaining agreement. Sydney Trains are working to minimise the disruption to commuters as much as possible.
Continue reading...Co-owner of Nomad held sign mirroring Israeli flag but with swastika in place of Star of David and the words ‘Stop Nazi Israel’
The prominent Sydney restaurateur Alan Yazbek has pleaded guilty to displaying a Nazi swastika at a pro-Palestine rally.
Yazbek appeared at Downing Centre local court on Thursday where his lawyer said he was pleading guilty to the charge.
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