Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Exclusive: In email to fellow officials after election loss, Jenny Goodwin warns disciplinary process leads to ‘accusation of bullying’
The president of the Queensland Liberal National party women’s branch has emailed fellow officials to warn of a “culture of anger and mistrust”, amid an increasingly fraught fallout from the party’s state election loss.
Towns west of Brisbane to swelter over next three days as western NSW continues to suffer and Sydney’s temperatures forecast to rise again on Tuesday
Queenslanders are in for a record-breaking hot day on Monday as Sydneysiders get a short-lived reprieve from the heat.
Dean Narramore, a senior forecaster with the Bureau of Meteorology, says much of southern Queensland will be experiencing an “extreme” heatwave over next three days.
NSW to ease coronavirus restrictions, including the number allowed to visit a home; Queensland prepares for influx of visitors ahead of December 1 border reopening. Follow updates
Scott Morrison has defended providing Mathias Cormann a government-funded Royal Air Force jet so he can travel around the world as he campaigns to be secretary general of the OECD.
The prime minister said there was an “extremely high” risk Cormann, who recently resigned as finance minister, would catch Covid if he were forced to travel on commercial flights.
That’s funded by the government because we’re taking this bid very seriously and the reason we need him to do that in the Air Force jet is because Covid is running rampant in Europe, and this is a very important position, and the OECD is going to play a really important role in the global economic recovery.
There really wasn’t the practical option to use commercial flights in the time we had available, because of Covid. If Mathias was flying around on commercial planes, he would have got Covid. The risk of that was extremely high.
Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has confirmed Victorians will be able to enter her state without quarantining from 1 December, after Victoria announced no new cases on Tuesday.
It comes a day after the same reopening was granted to residents of Greater Sydney, as both Greater Sydney and Victoria achieved 28 days of no community transmission without an unknown transmission source.
I just heard and that’s wonderful news and can I congratulate Daniel Andrews, their chief health officer and all of Victorians because this is just such fantastic news. So it means on 1 December, Victorians can also come to Queensland and, of course, Queenslanders can go to Victoria as well. So very, very good news.
We’re absolutely prepared for the influx of people for the Queensland holidays. In fact, just yesterday, we saw a 250% increase in some of our tourism operators across Queensland. So that is absolutely wonderful news.”
Victoria has only one active Covid-19 case but authorities are concerned about traces of the virus unexpectedly found at a Melbourne wastewater facility.
Victoria has gone 22 days with no new coronavirus cases while on Saturday New South Wales recorded 10 new cases in hotel quarantine. Queensland announced two new coronavirus cases and Western Australia one – all of which were in hotel quarantine.
Strict six-day lockdown begins today to allow for a ‘contract-tracing blitz’ to contain a coronavirus cluster that has so far infected 22 people. Follow live
Insurance companies have lost a crucial test case on whether they have to pay businesses who shut their doors due to the coronavirus pandemic under business interruption policies.
The NSW Court of Appeal says they do, and has thrown out arguments from insurers that coronavirus is excluded from policies.
Meanwhile, a huge chunk of Darwin and surrounds is experiencing a blackout, with the temperature expected to climb to 35C.
Wide spread power outages affecting Darwin and surrounding areas. #DarwinNT Crew responding.
Police say armed man tried to box in the car and chase the teenagers in a pursuit that could have ‘easily ended in tragedy’
A man armed with a tyre iron pursued a stolen car driven by young teenagers until they crashed into a power pole in Townsville, police say.
On Saturday night about 10pm, police say a 48-year-old man was driving along McLean Street in the suburb of Gulliver, when he saw a Hyundai Santa Fe that had been stolen from the neighbouring suburb of Aitkenvale.
Hundreds of people had started arriving in Perth and more were crossing into Western Australia by road after the scrapping of the state’s Covid-19 hard border closure on Saturday.
The move came as Victoria recorded its 15th day straight with no coronavirus cases or deaths.
PM and premiers meet as Covid-19 cases plummet. This blog is now closed
The day is winding down so we are going to wrap up the blog. Here are the main events:
The rise of rightwing extremism has coincided with the emergence of social media “echo chambers” and easily formed online communities of interest, the head of home affairs has said.
Michael Pezzullo, the secretary of the department, appeared before a parliamentary hearing into social cohesion and nationhood this afternoon.
He was asked about recent testimony from the head of Asio that rightwing extremism now made up 30% to 40% of its priority counter-terrorism investigations. Labor committee chair Kim Carr wanted to know whether Pezzullo thought the trend coincided with the rise or rightwing populist groups in the US and Europe.
Domestically it would seem to me that the groups that are of most concern are those that would either promote or seek others to adhere to a philosophy or an ideology of extra-constitutional action, and worse of course extremist action, and worst of all violent action rather than moderating legitimately held differences of political, ideological, economic views through our democratic process.
One of the world’s biggest gliding mammals, Australia’s greater glider is actually three separate species, according to new research
One of the world’s biggest gliding mammals, Australia’s once-common and unique greater glider, actually comprises three separate species, according to new genetic research.
Researchers said the findings should prompt urgent work to better understand the three species which are under pressure from rising temperatures, bushfires and land-clearing.
That’s it for tonight, thanks for reading. To recap today’s developments:
The chief of the defence force, Angus Campbell,has released a statement about the inquiry into alleged war crimes by Australian special forces in Afghanistan.
Campbell said he received the Afghanistan inquiry report today, which examined the conduct of elite Australian forces in more than 55 incidents of alleged unlawful killings between 2005 and 2016.
Today I have received the Afghanistan Inquiry report from the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force (IGADF).
The independent inquiry was commissioned by Defence in 2016 after rumours and allegations emerged relating to possible breaches of the Law of Armed Conflict by members of the Special Operations Task Group in Afghanistan over the period 2005 to 2016.
News Hub reports New Zealand’s US ambassador has commented on the election. As government employees, ambassadors are prevented from indicating political views (despite being political appointments) but it looks like Scott Brown, for one, is feeling confident enough in the result to be a little honest.
‘We need to keep moving forward as we live with Covid-19,’ Gladys Berejiklian says. We’ll also be bringing you Australian reaction to that election, as it happens
Daniel Andrews is asked if he would have done anything different in hindsight:
I don’t have hindsight. None of us do.
All we have his hard work and an absolute determination do not listen to the loudest voices, not be pushed to ignore the science, not listen to those who would appeal for us to act out of absolute frustration and nothing more than that.
Today’s meeting between federal, state and territory leaders will focus on removing social and border restrictions to jumpstart the economy. Follow live
In just the year to June, Australia Post paid $1.95 million in bonuses to 35 of its executives earning over $520,000 a year. That’s 648 Cartier watches - or 162 times the total Cartier watch spend. (Or about 27,850 Casio watches...) https://t.co/S8mmcqJmhh
We will probably be in a bit of a news lull while national cabinet is meeting and the US presidential election debate is on in about 25 minutes.
Storms over coming week forecast to peak on Saturday with ‘very heavy rainfall, damaging winds and large hail’
Dangerous thunderstorms are set to cause large hail and flash flooding, destroy crops and drive deadly spiders into homes across large swathes of eastern Australia over the next week.
Triggered by a low pressure system forming over the southern centre of the country and a trough across eastern Australia, the hazardous weather will escalate when the two systems combine on Friday, with the added tropical moisture present as a result of La Niña contributing to the severity of the storms.
Melburnians can now travel up to 25km and spend more time out of the house; and federal parliament resumes with Senate estimates. This blog is now closed
In the off chance you aren’t completely fed up with Covid-19 data, the federal health department has been publishing a weekly snapshot of how each state is going.
This is an interesting tool for assessing the success of contact tracing in various states, especially as the case load in Victoria continues to drop.
Victoria’s premier weathers upset after his top public servant resigned and NSW premier holds on after Icac revelations. In Queensland, opposition leader Deb Frecklington faces questions over event with Peter Dutton. Follow live
The Queensland Liberal National Party has categorically denied claims it referred its own party leader, Deb Frecklington to the electoral commission over concerns about her fundraising events.
The ABC reported this morning that the party referred Frecklington to the Electoral Commission of Queensland over a series of events, one where Peter Dutton was a guest, involving property developers.
NSW Health have set up a pop-up testing clinic, and alerted to more venues, after two GPs in the Sydney suburb of Lakemba tested positive for Covid-19.
Both doctors worked at the A2Z Medical Clinic, and are linked to a patient who was previously diagnosed with Covid-19, who attended Lakemba Radiology.
Victorian bar owner lodges legal challenge to the constitutionality of the state’s lockdown as fears in NSW grow over number of locally transmitted cases. Follow all the latest updates
Australian scientists have discovered that the virus that causes Covid-19 can survive for up to 28 days on surfaces such as the glass on mobile phones, stainless steel, vinyl and paper banknotes.
The virus survived longer on paper banknotes than on plastic banknotes and lasted longer on smooth surfaces rather than porous surfaces such as cotton.