Category Archives: Queensland

New Queensland government bins Labor’s hydro project set to be key part of renewable transition

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LNP energy minister rules out considering a smaller version of the Pioneer Burdekin scheme

Queensland’s new Liberal National party government has cancelled a Labor hydro project despite public service advice that a downsized version of the scheme would have delivered “exceptional value on both a capacity and storage basis”.

Announced under premier Annastacia Palaszczuk in 2022, the gigantic Pioneer Burdekin pumped hydro scheme formed a key element of the state’s legislated plan for a renewables transition by 2035.

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Heatwave to turn parts of Australia into ‘one of the hottest places in the world’ this week

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Some of the east coast and the north will bake in a furnace of potentially life-threatening heat, the Bureau of Meteorology forecasts

A heatwave is due to strike Australia’s east coast, with temperatures expected above 40C, making the country’s north “one of the hottest places in the world” this week, the Bureau of Meteorology has forecast.

Residents in northern New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory are being warned to brace for unsettled weather through the week, starting on Monday, as a mass of heat moves eastward from central Australia.

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Queensland truth-telling inquiry chair says premier ‘hugely disrespectful’ to demand work cease via media

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Joshua Creamer says he has had no contact from new LNP government after David Crisafulli told press conference inquiry should cease its work

The chair of Queensland’s truth-telling and healing inquiry says the new premier, David Crisafulli, should “just have the decency to front up” to First Nations people, after delivering an edict via the media for the inquiry to immediately cease its work.

Joshua Creamer, a Waanyi and Kalkadoon man, told reporters on Friday he had still received no communication from Crisafulli or any member of the new LNP government.

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Respawned: Queensland magazine the Cane Toad Times takes aim at a post-truth world

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It emerged from the slime of the sunshine state during Bjelke-Petersen’s oppressive regime. Now it’s back – but can it survive more sensitive times?

A man whose pseudonym is Johnny La Rue is holding a yellowed magazine with two toad-headed lovers embracing on the front. He reads aloud a headline that would likely trigger a firestorm on social media were it written today.

“Who wrote that?!” he exclaims.

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Australia news live: PwC reveals it sacked eight staff over data breaches; Perth man dies after being taken to police watch house

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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.

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David Crisafulli breaks election promise to elevate shadow team to Queensland government frontbench

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LNP leader’s cabinet includes several changes, including former leader Tim Nicholls as health minister and Fiona Simpson in women’s portfolio

Queensland’s new premier, David Crisafulli, has unveiled his new cabinet, breaking a pre-election promise to automatically elevate his existing shadow team to the government frontbench.

The LNP leader repeatedly promised the shadow cabinet he took to last week’s election would be the cabinet after it.

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David Crisafulli: premier and minister for veterans

Jarrod Bleijie: deputy premier, minister for state development, infrastructure and planning, and minister for industrial relations

David Janetzki: treasurer, minister for energy and minister for home ownership

Ros Bates: minister for finance, trade, employment and training

Dale Last: minister for natural resources and mines, minister for manufacturing and minister for regional and rural development

Tim Nicholls: minister for health and ambulance services

Deb Frecklington: attorney general and minister for justice and minister for integrity

John-Paul Langbroek: minister for education and the arts

Dan Purdie: minister for police and emergency services

Laura Gerber: minister for youth justice and victim support and minister for corrective services

Brent Mickelberg: minister for transport and main roads

Ann Leahy: minister for local government and water and minister for fire, disaster recovery and volunteers

Sam O’Connor: minister for housing and public works and minister for youth

Tony Perrett: minister for primary industries

Fiona Simpson: minister for women and women’s economic security, minister for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Partnerships and minister for multiculturalism

Andrew Powell: minister for the environment and tourism and minister for science and innovation

Amanda Camm: minister for families, seniors and disability services and minister for child safety and the prevention of domestic and family violence

Tim Mander: minister for sport and racing and minister for the Olympic and Paralympic Games

Steve Minnikin: minister for customer services and open data and minister for small and family business

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Teen found not guilty of murdering Emma Lovell in Brisbane home invasion

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Queensland judge finds 18-year-old guilty of burglary and assault occasioning bodily harm in 2022 home invasion

A teenager who broke into the home of Emma Lovell, alongside another teen who stabbed her to death, has been found not guilty of murder in a case that shocked Queensland in December 2022.

In a Brisbane court on Thursday, the now 18-year-old – who cannot be named for legal reasons as he was 17 on the night Lovell was killed – was also found not guilty of manslaughter and not guilty of malicious act with intent.

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Four Davids and two Nigels: can Crisafulli deliver a modern and inclusive cabinet? | Ben Smee

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As Queensland’s new premier prepares to announce his frontbench, he may struggle to incorporate women and multicultural MPs into the LNP lineup

David Crisafulli will be breaking a promise either way. He said he’d keep his old opposition frontbench in place after the election. He also promised to lead a forward-thinking, modern-looking government.

It’s unlikely he can do both.

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Attorney general considering releasing full robodebt report – As it happened

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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.

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Australia news live: PM to announce clean energy projects; property market losing heat but prices still going up

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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.

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Australia news live: Dutton says he ‘respects’ Crisafulli’s rejection of nuclear power but will push for a ‘mature conversation’

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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.

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Labor lost Queensland election partly because it was obsessed with the Greens, Chandler-Mather says

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Greens housing spokesperson argues that lesson for federal Labor is if PM spends next six months fighting party ‘he’s going to hand the keys to Peter Dutton’

The Greens’ federal housing spokesperson, Max Chandler-Mather, says the Queensland election result shows federal Labor needs to drop its “deep hostility” to the minor party – or risk losing next year’s national poll.

The Liberal National party’s victory at the weekend – its first majority in almost a decade – relied upon gains from Labor in regional areas, including heartland seats in central and north Queensland.

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New Queensland premier David Crisafulli vows to legislate ‘adult time for adult crime’ policy by Christmas

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LNP leader plans to ‘get cracking’ in majority government but critics have said locking up more children isn’t the answer

Queensland’s incoming premier, David Crisafulli, and his deputy, Jarrod Bleijie, will be sworn in as an interim cabinet of two so the LNP can “get cracking” with governing, the party’s leader says.

“We’ve got to get to work,” Crisafulli said on Sunday after securing majority government.

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Labor accuses Peter Dutton of trying to ‘force nuclear energy on Queenslanders’

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Nationals MP Keith Pitt claims Coalition would have mandate if it won federal election despite opposition to nuclear power from state’s incoming LNP government

A senior federal Labor minister has accused Peter Dutton of trying to “force nuclear energy on Queenslanders” following the LNP’s state election win after which a Coalition MP claimed the federal party would forge ahead with its power plan.

The federal Nationals MP for Hinkler, Keith Pitt, on Sunday said the Coalition would have a mandate to press ahead with its nuclear policy if Dutton won the next election.

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Crisafulli makes first speech as premier-elect; trucks deliver food aid to western NSW after power outages – as it happened

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The LNP leader again thanked unsuccessful candidates from both sides before declaring he would get to work quickly. This blog has now closed

A look at ‘incredibly expressive and very flirtatious’ Maratus spiders

Australian Maratus spiders, which measure 3-5mm, are known as “peacock spiders” because of the extravagant colourings they display during courtship rituals and combat.

They’re incredibly expressive and very flirtatious. The male wants to get all the attention of the female, like birds of paradise.

That’s not talking about net zero. That’s talking about actual emissions reductions as a total.

So what’s the proposal? Are you intending to wipe out the cattle herd, are you going to reduce traffic by 75%?

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LNP will need to show Brisbane voters it can be a moderate government if it’s to stay in power

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The party won decisively in the regions but was rejected by the city, which was scared off by the hard-right social views of some candidates

The story of the Queensland election is the story of Mackay and Mansfield.

The voters of Mackay stuck with Labor during the landslide loss to Campbell Newman’s Liberal National party in 2012. They voted for the party in the “Adani election” of 2017, at the nadir of the state’s climate wars.

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David Crisafulli claims LNP victory in Queensland election ending Labor’s decade-long reign

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Outgoing premier Steven Miles concedes he cannot form majority government despite a last-minute vote surge

David Crisafulli has claimed victory for the Liberal National party in the Queensland election after a campaign that focused heavily on a series of hardline crime promises.

The election marks the end of Labor’s decade-long reign in Queensland and is only the second time the Liberal or National parties have won a state poll since 1989.

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WiseTech shares surge after CEO stands down – as it happened

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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.

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David Crisafulli backtracks on promise to resign if crime victim numbers do not fall under an LNP government

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Opposition leader adds caveat to campaign vow on eve of Queensland election day as polls tighten

The Queensland Liberal National party leader, David Crisafulli, has walked back his campaign promise to resign if crime victim numbers do not reduce under a government led by him, claiming on Friday that he was referring to per capita rates, and not the overall number of victims.

The qualification, on the eve of the state election, comes as polls suggest the opposition has squandered a huge polling lead at the beginning of the month, and is in now danger of not winning enough seats to form a majority government.

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Australians must keep up the fight for abortion rights, Jacinta Allan warns

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Exclusive: Conservative forces pose ‘genuine threats to the protections women have fought for and won’, Victoria’s premier says

Jacinta Allan is warning that the battle for abortion rights must continue as conservative forces pose “real and genuine threats to the protections women have fought for and won” amid “frightening” debate in South Australia and Queensland.

Victoria’s Labor premier made her strongest comments to date on abortion in an interview with Guardian Australia, just days before Queenslanders go to the polls in an election that has become dominated by the issue.

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