Category Archives: Queensland

US activist investor who accused Adani of ‘biggest con in corporate history’ dares Indian group to sue

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Hindenburg Research accusations denied by Adani as ‘baseless’ while activist investor claims legal action will reveal accounting fraud

The US investor targeting Indian conglomerate Adani Group over what it claims is the “biggest con in corporate history” has dared the company to sue, given it would open the coal producer to further scrutiny.

Hindenburg Research’s report has already wiped billions of dollars of value from the sprawling empire of Gautam Adani, the world’s third richest man, and drawn in the contentious Carmichael coal and rail project in Queensland.

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Adani’s Queensland coalmine cited in US investor’s claims of ‘biggest con in corporate history’

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Scathing allegations, which company rejects as ‘baseless’, will hamper access to Wall Street but surging coal price will ease burden, experts say

The ability of Adani Group to raise money will be curbed after scathing allegations in a report by an activist US short-seller, although surging coal prices that underpin the Indian conglomerate’s contentious Queensland operations will help alleviate some pressure, analysts say.

Adani, which operates the Carmichael coal and rail project via its rebranded subsidiary Bravus, is the target of US investment firm Hindenburg Research, which alleges the company has engaged in a “brazen stock manipulation and accounting fraud scheme”.

A private company called Carmichael Rail and Port Singapore Holdings with ties to Adani paid A$147m for unspecified “work in progress” assets from the Australian operations, without a detailed description.

The same private company paid A$155m for the right to use the rail facilities at the Queensland operation.

The private Carmichael company also received A$100m from an Adani subsidiary to pay off debt.

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Senator may go against party room on voice – as it happened

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Should governments have acted sooner on alcohol restrictions in Alice Springs?

The Northern Territory chief minister Natasha Fyles and the minister for Indigenous affairs Linda Burney have appeared on ABC Radio after the announcements in Alice Springs yesterday.

It was the previous coalition government that walked away and left the Northern Territory with no measures.

I had expressed that there needs to be some very, very real thoughts put into our alcohol restrictions.

Do you think it took too long?

Look, I’m not going to get into whether they’ve taken too long, If you ask the people in Alice Springs, the answer might be yes.

I went to Stuart Park last night and met with local people living in town camps ... many of who had obviously experienced violence. And one of the things that really shocked me is, I was talking to the local member Marion Scrymgour who had visited the hospital and there are 16 beds in ICU, 14 of those were taken by Aboriginal women who had been beaten ... I think alcohol is one of the major contributors to some of the problems.

It’s about balance – but being able to drink is not more important than being safe, in my view.

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Queensland cracks down on hate crimes in wake of recent Nazi propaganda

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Labor will introduce a bill to move serious vilification from the anti-discrimination act into the criminal code

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The Queensland government will make changes to the criminal code and increase jail terms for vilification as it cracks down on hate crimes after a series of “horrific” antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents.

The attorney general, Shannon Fentiman, announced on Monday that a bill would be introduced into Queensland parliament in March to amend existing offences.

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MP calls for action on crime in ‘under siege’ town – as it happened

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Pearson urges voice dissenters to ‘be smart’

Karvelas also asks Pearson about the concerns that are coming from the left, including Indigenous affairs spokesperson for the Greens, Lidia Thorpe, who will be calling for treaty before voice at the Invasion Day rally.

And when you have a breakthrough response, a breakthrough response like constitutional recognition, you’ve got to grab it. You’ve got to switch from protest to grabbing the opportunity.

… And I believe that a full response to the Uluru statement will achieve actual real reconciliation. We’re at a point in our history where the protest has achieved the result we desire. And, and so we’ve got to be smart about it.

This this year is the most important here in the past 235. That’s my assertion. This is the most important year and and this referendum is the most important question concerning Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians since the first fleet.

We’ve got to understand what is at stake, and that is the chance for reconciliation and if the referendum is kiboshed through game play and spoiling game by the opposition, we will lose the opportunity forever.

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Queensland public schools to join NSW in banning students from ChatGPT

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Exclusive: Artificial intelligence expert questions firewall strategy, as Victoria opts to wait and see

Queensland will join New South Wales in banning access to ChatGPT in state schools, though artificial intelligence experts have questioned how effective such a strategy is.

Nine newspapers revealed on Sunday morning the NSW Department of Education would ban the technology using a firewall, as concern mounts over the use of bots to cheat in assessments.

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Wieambilla shootings: killers’ daughter speaks out about their descent into world of conspiracies

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Madelyn Train talks publicly for the first time about their ‘evil’ final act and the last message she got from them

A woman whose parents killed two Queensland police officers and a neighbour before dying at a remote property has spoken for the first time about their descent into conspiracy theories and ultimately, violence.

Madelyn Train’s father, Nathaniel, mother, Stacey, and uncle Gareth were killed by police in the incident that left six people dead at Wieambilla last month.

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Two NDIS providers banned after fraud claims – as it happened

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New Australian factory to make construction material from recycled goods

A company making construction products entirely from used drink cartons, soft plastics, disposable coffee cops and similar products will launch its first Australian manufacturing plant at Warragamba next month.

It’s basically like making a big cheese toasty. You heat it up and cool it down a couple of times and the plastic melts between the gaps in the fibre.

It’s a straightforward process, but it’s focused on reducing problematic waste ... materials which, until we came along, had been completely un-recyclable and collected by container deposit schemes.

In Australia alone, we could unlock a massive $2tn worth of potential savings across two decades.

Those potential savings could come, for example, through reusing valuable resources currently going to waste in landfill, such as plastics, glass, masonry and metals.

For far too long healthcare in western Sydney has been an afterthought.

The thousands of people moving into the area every year deserve world class healthcare.

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Michael Clarke and partner Jade Yarbrough fined by Queensland police over Noosa dispute

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Former Australian Test captain and Yarbrough fined with public nuisance

Former Australian Test captain Michael Clarke and his girlfriend have been fined after their public spat in Noosa.

Vision emerged on Wednesday of an expletive-laden argument with Clarke, partner Jade Yarbrough and her brother-in-law, Karl Stefanovic.

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Irving case prompts review of redress options for miscarriages of justice

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Exclusive: Australia is alone among democracies who have not ratified UN provision enabling legal remedy for someone wrongfully convicted or imprisoned

The Queensland attorney general, Shannon Fentiman, is “actively” pursuing reforms that would expand redress options for people who have been wrongfully convicted, including the possibility of allowing a second appeal in cases where new evidence emerges.

On Thursday, Guardian Australia wrote about the Aboriginal man Terry Irving’s 25-year pursuit of justice. Irving was wrongfully convicted of a bank robbery in Cairns in 1993. He was released from prison in 1997 after the high court said it had “the gravest misgivings about the circumstances of the case”.

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What a crock: second Stradbroke Island crocodile sighting confirmed as dugong

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After hours of debate among locals, Queensland’s acting premier Steven Miles declared that rangers had spoken

Queensland’s acting premier has shut down speculation of a second crocodile sighting on North Stradbroke Island, also known as Minjerribah, revealing rangers had declared new footage taken on Friday as showing a dugong.

After reports of a “credible” crocodile sighting on Wednesday, 400km south of its usual habitat range, the island was again in a frenzy on Friday as residents swarmed to One Mile jetty to catch a glimpse of something moving through the water.

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Tara shooting incident brings back Wieambilla memories for traumatised residents

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Four teenagers in custody after reports of shots fired in centre of Queensland town

Residents of Tara, in Queensland’s western downs, say a shooting incident on Wednesday afternoon has stoked trauma after last month’s murder of two police officers and a neighbour in nearby Wieambilla.

Four teenagers have been taken into custody after reports of shots being fired in the area at 3.30pm. Police declared an exclusion zone covering several blocks in the centre of town at 5.30pm.

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Police seize neo-Nazi paraphernalia in series of raids across south-east Queensland

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Exclusive: Three men charged with damage offences, with the state government yet to outlaw the display of hate symbols

Queensland counter-terrorism police have charged three men in relation to the displaying of neo-Nazi material, after conducting raids on three separate addresses across south-east Queensland.

Police told Guardian Australia that officers had discovered a number of offensive banners, stickers and flyers after executing search warrants on residential addresses in the Brisbane suburb of Toowong, and Gold Coast suburbs of Pimpama and Oxenford.

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Four teenagers in custody after shots fired in southern Queensland town of Tara

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Police had declared an exclusion zone in the centre of Tara, 40km south of Wieambilla which saw a deadly ambush of police in December

Four teenagers have been taken into custody in a small town in south-east Queensland after reports of shots being fired in the area.

Police were called to reports of a shooting in Tara about 3.30pm on Wednesday and declared an exclusion zone covering several blocks in the centre of town at 5.30pm.

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Australia news live updates: Queensland flood waters rising; tributes roll after death of Jim Molan

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Rising flood waters have cut north Queensland’s main transport corridor, the Bruce Highway, with more rain on the way. Follow the day’s news live

Dreyfus opens discussion about judicial watchdog

Today the attorney-general, Mark Dreyfus, will open consultation for the creation of a federal judicial commission, to police what he described as the “relatively rare” instances of “problematic conduct by judges”.

The three diseases that we’re focusing on on this trip – malaria, HIV and tuberculosis – three diseases that Australia has a good control over or good management over.

HIV cases are on the rise for a range of different reasons. Tuberculosis is just devastating and any young child with tuberculosis is an extremely confronting and devastating thing to see it’s a horrible disease. And malaria is an ongoing killer.

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NSW MP to contest election despite husband’s death – as it happened

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Australian Open CEO reflects on ‘very difficult journey’

Australian Open 2023 kicks off at Melbourne Park this morning.

A Balmain pub crawl

Craft breweries around Marrickville

The Corinthian restaurant for Greek food in Marrickville

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Queensland urged to end its ‘failing’ shark nets and drum lines program

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Scientists call on government to replace lethal control measures amid criticism of its use of federal money at the Great Barrier Reef

Scientists are urging the Queensland government to remove shark nets and traditional drum lines from coastlines, saying “ineffective” lethal methods are inhumane, amid criticism of the state’s use of federal money for measures at the Great Barrier Reef.

Lawrence Chlebeck, a marine biologist at Humane Society International, said Queensland’s lethal shark control program is “failing” on both environmental and public safety fronts and should be “discontinued”.

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‘Absolutely buggered’: paddleboarding couple survive three days adrift off Queensland coast

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Lorne Benussi says he found the pair 55km from North West Island, from where they had drifted out to sea

A Queensland man who rescued a couple who say they spent three days adrift at sea has told the extraordinary tale of their survival.

Lorne Benussi said he had just fallen asleep on Monday night when he heard screams for help outside his boat.

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Man sentenced to six years’ jail over hours-long torture of woman in Brisbane hotel room

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Trent Wayne Lawson, 38, pleaded guilty to common assault, wilful damage, stealing and torture for 2021 attack and can apply for parole

A Queensland man has been sentenced for the “reprehensible” assault and torture of a woman for at least two hours while he held her captive in a hotel room.

Trent Wayne Lawson, 38, faced Brisbane district court on Tuesday for sentencing after pleading guilty to common assault, wilful damage, stealing and torture.

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Concerns over use of ‘cheap and easy’ offsets – as it happened

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More than 80% of council areas declared disasters in the past four years, Watt says

Murray Watt was hesitant to attribute the individual disaster in the Kimberley to climate change, unlike his colleague Chris Bowen. But he said the overall pattern of increasing disasters was “undoubtedly climate change”:

I don’t think that you can point to one particular event and say it’s due to climate change, but there is no doubt that we are seeing before our eyes is climate change happening. We know from all the scientists that we’re going to be facing more of these intense events more frequently.

I was actually advised yesterday by our agency that just in the last 12 months we’ve seen 316 of Australia’s 537 council areas disaster-declared: that’s about 60% of the council areas in the country. And if you go back four years to the black summer, 438 council areas in Australia have been disaster-declared, which is over 80%.

A lot of people aren’t aware but the wet season in northern Western Australia … generally doesn’t begin until later this month. So their wettest months actually tend to be February and March rather than starting as early as January. So to have this amount of water come through the system this early in the wet season is a concern.

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