Boy, two, bitten on the face and neck during attack at a motel at Cowra in the NSW central west
A toddler who was attacked by two dogs in the New South Wales central west is in a critical condition, police say.
The two-year-old boy was mauled on the face and neck by the dogs at a motel in the town of Cowra on Tuesday morning, NSW police said in a statement.
Continue reading...Australian census data shows 102,000 people left New South Wales and 10,000 abandoned Victoria
Far more people are moving to Queensland than any other state or territory, while New South Wales recorded the biggest net loss, Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows.
There was a net gain of more than 100,000 people to the Sunshine State in the five years to 2021, according to internal migration numbers from the census.
Continue reading...Migration system review will focus on process
For those wondering, here is a little more detail on the migration review Clare O’Neil announced this morning.
Accessed the name, date of birth, address, phone number and email address for around 9.7 million current and former customers and some of their authorised representatives. This figure represents around 5.1 million Medibank customers, around 2.8 million ahm customers and around 1.8 million international customers.
Did not access primary identity documents, such as drivers’ licences, for Medibank and ahm resident customers.
Medibank does not collect primary identity documents for resident customers except in exceptional circumstances.
Accessed Medicare numbers (but not expiry dates) for ahm customers.
Accessed passport numbers (but not expiry dates) and visa details for international student customers.
Accessed health claims data for around 160,000 Medibank customers, around 300,000 ahm customers and around 20,000 international customers.
This includes service provider name and location, where customers received certain medical services, and codes associated with diagnosis and procedures administered.
Additionally, around 5,200 My Home Hospital (MHH) patients have had some personal and health claims data accessed and around 2,900 next of kin of these patients have had some contact details accessed.
Accessed health provider details, including names, provider numbers and addresses.
Did not access health claims data for extras services (such as dental, physio, optical and psychology).
Did not access credit card and banking details.
Continue reading...NSW police want details of case suppressed while Gunathilaka’s lawyer has suggested T20 World Cup player could appeal bail decision
Sri Lankan international cricketer Danushka Gunathilaka has been refused bail by a Sydney magistrate after he was charged with raping a woman in the city.
Gunathilaka, who is in Australia for the T20 World Cup, was arrested at his central Sydney hotel in the early hours of Sunday and refused bail by a court later that day.
Continue reading...Floods crisis continues across NSW and Victoria although waters are subsiding in parts of the country including Forbes and Wagga Wagga
The body of a second man who died when a ute was swept into New South Wales flood waters last week has been found in the southern tablelands, as towns throughout the state and in Victoria remain on high alert.
NSW police confirmed on Sunday that police divers had found the man’s body after the ute was swept off a flooded causeway in Bevendale, about 280km south-west of Sydney, on Monday.
Continue reading...State opposition leader Chris Minns also pushes for tighter rules around evicting tenants without reasonable grounds
Almost a million renters in New South Wales would be able to transfer their bond from one property to the next and couldn’t be kicked out of their homes without reasonable grounds given, under a plan proposed by state Labor.
The pledge ahead of the 2023 election comes amid soaring rents in Sydney and rising accommodation costs in regional areas, with NSW’s median rent increasing from $386 to $420 a week between 2016 and 2021.
Continue reading...Pregnant woman and midwife among 10 rescues in NSW town of Forbes. This blog is now closed
Victorian Labor lead narrows in polls in lead-up to state election
The Victorian election race appears to be tightening three weeks out from polling day, with Labor in danger of slipping in to minority government, AAP reports.
The AMA analysed the documentation these media reports relied on and, like the department, found nothing – not a skerrick of evidence – to support the claims made in headlines splashed across some news organisations.
The AMA has acknowledged consistently that while some fraud does occur, the vast majority of doctors are doing the right thing. And we have seen the mental toll these reports have taken on Australia’s doctors.
The minister has again highlighted the impact of years of cuts and neglect of Medicare, and, while this latest review may identify potential savings that could be made, what Medicare really needs is genuine reform and an injection of new funds.
Continue reading...La Niña brings an increased chance of above average rainfall for Australia’s north and east and a lingering risk of flooding for the months ahead
Flood waters continued to rise in the New South Wales town of Forbes, where there had been 10 flood rescues and more than 237 calls for help in the past 24 hours, including for a pregnant woman.
The woman, whose water broke on Friday, was transported across the middle of the river in Forbes to the town’s hospital by a local volunteer, where she could be cared for by doctors and nurses.
Continue reading...The 34-year-old woman killed the man with an axe purchased from Bunnings in a jealous quest for revenge, court hears
A Sydney axe murderer who Googled “what part of body to go for” before killing her partner has been sentenced to 27 years in jail.
The 34-year-old mother, who cannot be named be named for legal reasons, killed her partner with an axe purchased from Bunnings in a jealous quest for revenge.
Continue reading...Recent flooding is believed to have caused the pipeline outage in central-west NSW and is hampering repair
It could take weeks to completely fix a pipeline outage that has left more than 20,000 New South Wales residents without natural gas during an unseasonal cold snap, with recent flooding believed to have caused the outage as well as hampering its repair.
Residents in the central-west towns of Bathurst, Lithgow and Wallerawang woke up on Thursday to find their homes without natural gas, a day after snow fell in the region and a temperature of 1C was recorded in Lithgow. The towns of Portland and Oberon are also affected.
Continue reading...Census data shows Sydney’s northern suburbs had highest WFH proportion, with lowest in regional areas such as Maryborough in Victoria and Taree in NSW
Areas with higher incomes in NSW and Victoria were more likely to have a higher percentage of people working from home during the pandemic, according to a Guardian Australia analysis of census data.
The data provides further evidence of how differently people in areas with different socioeconomic backgrounds experienced the pandemic.
Continue reading...Industry minister says gas companies are ‘not picking up the signals’. Follow all the day’s news live
Gas supply not a problem, ‘glut of greed is’, industry minister says
Husic:
This is not a shortage of supply problem; this is a glut of greed problem, that has to be basically short-circuited and common sense prevail.
The pricing mechanism is the one that I think needs to be seriously examined.
The LNG exporters are offering gas to the domestic market at prices they couldn’t reasonably expect on the international market.
We have the ACCC looking at that [code of conduct] and that code of conduct is to help better guide the way in which these contracts get negotiated … in terms of the other areas, we want to work through that internally.
If you look at what the treasurer has said over the last few days, he is examining those type of options and again that will be in the mix of things he thinks through.
I think the bigger focus long-term is the price mechanism.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Kerry Chant expected to reiterate importance of vaccine boosters as Omicron subvariants BQ.1 and XBB tipped to become dominant
A new wave of Covid-19 infections is looming in New South Wales, the state’s chief health officer, Dr Kerry Chant, will warn on Thursday, with transmission of the virus predicted to increase in coming weeks.
It follows Victoria’s chief health officer, Prof Brett Sutton, making a similar announcement last week, with Omicron subvariants BQ.1 and XBB tipped to overtake BA.5 as the dominant variants throughout Australia.
Continue reading...Experts say Australia is ‘definitely still in a rental crisis’ but there is only so much people can pay
Twelve months ago, during the height of rental market demand, Carley Eder was issuing lease renewals with price increases of up to $80 a week. Now, her clients will be lucky to have tenants approve $25.
“The market has definitely shifted,” the Central Coast rentals principal said.
Continue reading...Search continued for two people swept off ute near Boorowa as prime minister said he hoped for positive news
Anthony Albanese says he is concerned about two men missing in flood waters after their ute was washed off the road in central New South Wales.
As the Riverina town of Gundagai braced for its worst flooding in 33 years, the State Emergency Service undertook 39 flood rescues in the 24 hours to Wednesday morning.
Continue reading...Activist among 30 people in three states and ACT to report visits from officers at request of NSW police ahead of mining forum
Counter-terror police in Queensland have visited the home of an environmental activist following a request from New South Wales ahead of planned protests at a mining conference in Sydney.
The activist is one of about 30 people across four jurisdictions to report visits from police in the past week ahead of the International Mining and Resources Conference, which starts on Wednesday.
Continue reading...We’ve been bringing you some of the news about rain causing more flooding in NSW. Here are some visuals from Wagga Wagga in southern NSW and the Newell highway in the state’s central west.
Jacinta Allan avoids question of whether families returned from Syria would be welcome in Victoria
The first group of families the wives and children of Islamic State fighters arrived in Sydney over the weekend from Syria and are now living in the community in Sydney. Will Victoria accept returnees?
I was with the premier [Daniel Andrews] on Sunday at a at a media event… where the premier was asked this direct question and I’ll give to you the answer he gave on Sunday which is these are very sensitive security matters. They are primarily the province of the federal government, it would not be appropriate -
As a matter of principle, will you accept them [in] Victoria? Or have you asked for them not to come during the election campaign?
We’ve not, Patricia. There is a … As I think we’ve seen from the media reporting around this issue, this is a very careful matter. There is a very -
Sure, but as a matter of principle, do you think returning citizens – they’re Australian citizens – should be allowed to live in Victoria?
I would really direct you to the federal government and the federal … I think you would appreciate that this is not a simple yes or no proposition because there needs to be robust and careful assessments that are not undertaken by the Victorian government. They’re undertaken by the federal government and the federal Department of Home Affairs.
And if they do all the checks and balances, should they be welcome in Victoria?
Firstly it’d be entirely inappropriate to cut across that and secondly, I am in no position to run a commentary.
Continue reading...Moustafa Kheir says women and children have returned to NSW ‘from hell on earth’ and are cooperating with authorities
The lawyer for four Australian families repatriated from Syria says the focus should be on their recovery, not on the prospect of them being charged with terror offences.
Moustafa Kheir, who represents the four women and their 13 children who arrived in Sydney on Saturday, said he had been involved in interviews the women have had with authorities.
Continue reading...Single-use plastic straws, cutlery and cotton buds will be among items banned from Tuesday
Single-use plastic straws and other items will be banned in New South Wales on Tuesday. The decision follows similar action to ban single-use plastic bags earlier this year.
We take a look at what this means for customers and businesses, and how it will be enforced.
Continue reading...People have been cleared to return to their homes as flood threat eases in Victoria, but the Bureau of Meteorology is warning of renewed flooding in parts of NSW. This blog is now closed
Chalmers on the size of government debt and making it ‘sustainable’
The treasurer is asked whether the government will consider rethinking taxes like GST and PRRT.
We have already found $22bn in savings, $28.5bn in budget improvements overall. We kept real spending growth flat across the forward estimates. We have got the debt down over the forward estimates. We have let 99% of the temporary revenue surge from higher commodity prices flow through to the budget.
That is good progress when we have shown in doing that … you can move sensibly on all fronts, restraint, trimming spending, sensible tax reform, you can make the budget more sustainable and that will be the task of the two or three budgets remaining in this parliamentary term as well.
We need to work out how do we maintain a focus on Australians with a disability and their families, how do we put them front and centre, and at the same time make sure that spending on the NDIS is sustainable and important part of that is making sure we get value for money for every dollar that is spent in what is a really important, really, really important service that we provide to Australians.
I do understand there is a substantial part of the community that would prefer that that PRRT take was higher.
We haven’t been working up an option to do that to change the PRRT arrangements but the treasury has been commissioned by my predecessor and by his predecessor to do some of this work around the taxing point in the PRRT.
We do want to make sure Australians get a good return for their resources. We need to balance that against the investment that’s been made into the sector. When I get that advice from I will engage in it a meaningful way and I will listen to it.
We have seen I think as you acknowledged in your first question, on this topic, company taxes are up quite substantially. That’s a good thing and we have let that flow through to the budget. The PRRT, there’s a modest increase. I will wait to see what the treasury advises us on the conclusion of the review that my two predecessors put in place.
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