Upper house member had been suspended from the party room after allegedly sending messages with ‘heated words’ to former girlfriend
The New South Wales Liberal party has expelled state MP Taylor Martin as a result of an investigation into text messages he sent to a woman with whom he was in a relationship.
Martin, who has been a member of the NSW upper house since 2017, has sat outside the Liberal party room since July last year after the party launched the investigation.
Continue reading...Broken Hill’s only newspaper, The Barrier Truth, closes due to cashflow problems, with staffer saying loss is ‘really sad for the community’
Broken Hill’s only newspaper has closed after almost 130 years of operation in a major blow to the outback NSW community.
The Barrier Truth’s board told staff the union-run bi-weekly paper would shut down as its final edition went to press.
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Continue reading...Reports of explosions in Iranian city of Isfahan prompt sell-off of stocks in Australia – and in other markets such as Japan. Follow the day’s news live
The NSW police commissioner, Karen Webb, is speaking to the media after a 16-year-old was charged with a “terrorist act” for allegedly stabbing a bishop on Monday and is expected to appear at a bedside hearing today.
She said members of the joint counter-terrorism team interviewed the alleged offender at a medical facility last night, and he was subsequently charged with a commonwealth offence for terrorism and refused bail.
We expect he will be attending a bedside court hearing today to determine bail. This relates to the stabbing of the Bishop [Mar Mari Emmanuel, who] we allege on Monday night [was] stabbed up to six times.
We also allege that the boy had travelled for 90 minutes to attend that location from his home address.
We’ve got a crisis of male violence in Australia. We know that it’s a scourge in our society, we know it must end and I think it’s really clear women can’t be expected to solve violence against women although it is time for men to step up.
I don’t think debating definitions is the way to go … We need to act, we need to educate ourselves, men need to step up, we need to talk to our sons, to our colleagues, to our friends. We need to work together to a solution. And I think going down some kind of almost a wrong path to say let’s redefine – it’s not about definitions. This is about action. We need to shift the way in which we think about this …
Continue reading...Police have charged 16-year-old boy with terrorism offence over stabbing of bishop at church in Sydney suburb of Wakeley
A teenage boy facing a possible life term in prison for terrorism over the stabbing of a bishop has shown behaviour consistent with mental illness or intellectual disability, his lawyer has said.
The 16-year-old is accused of travelling 90 minutes from his home to attack Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel during a livestreamed sermon at Christ the Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley, Sydney, on Monday night.
Continue reading...Bishop was injured in alleged attack in Wakeley with the teenager expected to appear at a bedside court hearing on Friday
Police have charged a 16-year-old boy alleged to have stabbed a bishop and priest at a western Sydney church with a terrorism offence.
The teenager was due to face a hospital bedside hearing of the Parramatta children’s court on Friday. He is still recovering from surgery after his finger was severed during the alleged attack on Monday night.
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Marles continues breakfast rounds to discuss defence spending
The defence minister, Richard Marles, has been making the rounds this morning and has also spoken to ABC RN about yesterday’s defence announcement.
The reason why we make the observation that an invasion of Australia is a very unlikely scenario, no matter what happens, is because any adversary that wished to do us harm could do so much to us before ever setting foot on Australian soil – and disrupting those specific sea lines of communication, which I’ve described, would obviously achieve that. That that is where the risk of coercion lies, as one example.
And in order to protect ourselves in respect of that, we do need the ability to [project], because if you think about it, … the geography of our national security when seen through those lands is not the coastline of our continent. It in fact, lies much further afield.
We’re looking at a substantial increase on what’s already in the Online Safety Act. So not only a large amount – so for example, a $3m fine for an offence and ongoing fines, but a percentage of turnover as well.
We know that the revenues of some of these online platforms exceed those of some nations and so it needs to be a meaningful and substantial penalty system that’s put in place.
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Unemployment ‘might take up a little bit’ when new numbers released later this week
Q: Given the economic conditions we’re seeing, what should households with mortgages expect?
[Inflation] won’t necessarily continue to come off in a perfectly straight line, but [it] is a fraction of what it was a couple of years ago when we came to office. That’s a good thing.
So we’ve got a whole bunch of things going for us in Australia, but enough to concern us as well about the global conditions about the way that people are still under considerable cost of living pressure.
The way that I would describe it to your listeners is we’ve got inflation lingering in parts of the world, we’ve got growth slowing in China and elsewhere, we’ve got tensions rising in the Middle East and the war in Europe. We’ve got supply chains which are straining and we’ve got a global economy which is fragmenting and transforming and so all of these factors are really important to us as we finalise the government’s third budget.
These are going to be these global conditions are going to be a really big influence on our budget, so the trip to DC which will be a pretty quick and make the most of it but it’s a good opportunity to take the temperature of the global economy.
Continue reading...NSW premier says a ‘major and serious criminal investigation’ is under way after incident at Assyrian Christ the Good Shepherd church in Wakeley was deemed terrorism attack
Political and religious leaders are pleading for calm amid a “combustible situation” set off by a stabbing at a western Sydney church and subsequent riot, as the state mulls tighter knife laws following two serious stabbing incidents in as many days.
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, held a joint press conference with police and security chiefs in Canberra on Tuesday morning, hours after New South Wales declared as a terrorist attack the stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel at a service at the Assyrian Christ the Good Shepherd church in Wakeley just after 7pm on Monday.
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The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, says he has been briefed by the Australian federal police following an alleged stabbing at a Wakeley church overnight.
Albanese wrote on X:
I have been briefed by the AFP and our security agencies regarding the shocking incident at Wakeley’s Christ the Good Shepherd Church.
As police continue their investigations, Australians are thinking of those who have been injured, the first responders who rushed to help and the police who worked to restore order.
They are coming out on a united front irrespective of religion, political [or] ideological views, and I think that is really important to send a message [that] we are collectively one community …
We are a fairly big mixed community now in NSW but it doesn’t mean we can’t live side by side.
Continue reading...Riot police called in to disperse angry locals after 15-year-old arrested over suspected attack on Mar Mari Emmanuel at Assyrian church in Wakeley
Hundreds of people clashed with police in western Sydney on Monday night after a prominent Orthodox Christian leader was allegedly stabbed at the altar of his church.
The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, called for calm after the alleged attack took place while Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying mass at the Assyrian Christ the Good Shepherd church in Wakeley just after 7pm.
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Albanese on Bondi attacker’s motive: ‘The gender breakdown is of course concerning’
I just wanted to go back to the PM’s appearance on ABC radio earlier, where he was asked what he thought of the motive behind the attack.
NSW police have said they’re looking at that as part of the investigation.
The gender breakdown is of course concerning.
We’re working with Westfield. As I said, we handed back the crime scene last night. But it spread over seven floors at Westfield. It will take some time to prepare the stores for reopening. No doubt there’s some work to be done with stakeholders inside the Westfield, in terms of their own reaction and trauma to what has happened. So, that will be done very carefully, no doubt.
Continue reading...Galleghan, 16, died of his injuries two days after he was brutally bashed in August 2021
Nearly three years ago, Jason Galleghan met his friends at a western Sydney train station.
A few hours later, the teenager was left for dead after a brutal bashing, lying alone in his boxer shorts.
Continue reading...Police believe 40-year-old Queensland man suffered from mental health problems and had only moved to Sydney a month ago
The family of Bondi Junction attacker Joel Cauchi have described his actions as “truly horrific”, offered condolences to the loved ones of the victims and expressed support for the police officer who ended the stabbing spree by shooting him dead.
Police say Cauchi had mental health problems and that he had moved from Queensland to New South Wales only a month before he took a knife into the crowded Sydney mall on Saturday afternoon and killed six people in an unprovoked stabbing spree.
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Mental health dimension to Bondi Junction attack – police
Cooke says “nothing that we have, no information we have received, no evidence we have recovered, no intelligence we have gathered that would suggest that this was driven by any particular motivation, ideology or otherwise”.
We know that the offender in the matter suffered, suffers from mental health. We are continuing to work through the profiling of the offender but very clearly to us at this stage it would appear that this is related to the mental health of the individual involved. Investigations will very clearly continue through the day.
We will make arrangements promptly to ensure that people are advised how they can go about retrieving whatever that might be, including for example motor vehicles. But, as you would understand, it is absolutely necessary that we do what is necessary to ensure that we provide a detailed and precise brief of evidence in relation to this incident which has occurred yesterday.
Continue reading...Police say 40-year-old was an itinerant who moved to NSW last month and had a history of mental illness
Queensland man Joel Cauchi has been named as the man who killed five women and one man at the Bondi Junction shopping centre during a horrific mass stabbing on Saturday.
The 40-year-old was shot dead by a police officer, Amy Scott, who responded to the attack at the busy shopping centre while on duty for an unrelated matter.
Continue reading...Anthony Albanese has praised a lone police officer who pursued a man on a stabbing spree through a shopping mall, saying ‘there is no doubt that she saved lives through her action’
A New South Wales police inspector has been hailed as a hero after she shot dead a man who stabbed six people to death in a shopping centre in Bondi Junction.
The senior officer was conducting routine duties nearby when she was directed to head to Westfield shopping centre following reports a man was using a “massive” knife to stab shoppers.
Continue reading...Byelection in the south Sydney seat expected to be won by Liberal candidate Simon Kennedy as AEC warns voter turnout could be low
The Liberal party will be hoping to the exorcise the ghost of Scott Morrison on Saturday as voters in Sydney’s south go to the polls to elect his replacement.
The byelection in the seat of Cook, which comes after Morrison announced his resignation from politics in January, is almost certain to be won by the Liberal candidate Simon Kennedy.
Continue reading...New South Wales police say a 16-year-old has been charged over death of 18-year-old and will appear in court on Saturday
A 16-year-old boy has been charged with murder after two stabbings, one of which resulted in the death of another teenager, near a school in western Sydney on Friday.
Emergency services responded to reports that two teenagers had been stabbed near a school on Power Street in Doonside at about 3.40pm on Friday.
Continue reading...Tasmanian Liberal MP labels comments ‘wholly inappropriate’ after PM says he was ‘taken aback’ by opposition leader’s speech
Peter Dutton has drawn widespread criticism, including from one of his own MPs, for comparing the 1996 mass murder of 35 people at Port Arthur to a pro-Palestine protest at the Sydney Opera House.
The Tasmanian Liberal backbencher Bridget Archer labelled Dutton’s comments “incredibly disrespectful” and “wholly inappropriate”.
Continue reading...Survey reveals locals’ disappointment with NSW transport agency’s response after bungled opening of $3.9bn junction
Hundreds of Sydney residents have vented their frustration about the traffic chaos caused by the Rozelle interchange in a survey released on the first day of an inquiry into the $3.9bn junction.
The majority of the 1,034 people who participated in the survey said the interchange had negatively affected them since it opened last November, with many voicing their disappointment at the New South Wales transport agency’s response.
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