Category Archives: Queensland

Are schools open or closed for term 2 amid coronavirus in Australia? State-by-state guide

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Many parents have been left confused about whether students can or should return to school after the Easter holidays

The position of the federal and state governments on whether to send children to school in term two while coronavirus social distancing rules are in force have many parents confused.

Throughout March the Morrison government opposed school closures on the basis of medical advice, but the issue was forced by Victoria bringing forward its school holidays, and other states and territories introducing pupil-free days to prepare for online learning.

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Australia coronavirus live: NSW arts minister Don Harwin resigns after breaching health order – latest updates

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Paul Kelly says league is ‘not a law unto themselves’ and would need permission to resume play next month as it intends. Follow the latest updates

We will close the blog for this evening. Thank you for your company and contributions.

A summary follows of Australia’s Covid-19 situation, the evening of Good Friday 2020.

“I would really urge caution there. Most of the cases we’ve seen so far have and still remain related to overseas travel and so our local epidemic is very early. There’s only a couple of thousand of those 6,000 cases are actual local transmission.

The NSW premier, Gladys Berejiklian, has accepted the resignation of her arts minister, Don Harwin, after he was fined $1,000 for staying at his Central Coast holiday home, breaching a Covid-19 public health order.

While Harwin maintained he had sought, and followed, official advice on whether he was allowed to relocate to his holiday home, he accepted the controversy surrounding his move – as the government was urging people to stay home over Easter – was a “distraction”.

During this health crisis my government has asked the community to make greater sacrifices than all of us have ever had to make before.

These sacrifices are saving lives, and I am proud of the people of NSW for continuing to uphold the law in the interest of public health.

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Australia coronavirus live update: education minister orders independent schools to reopen – latest news

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Dan Tehan wants all schools to provide in-person teaching to children whose parents want it. Follow live

The NRL season will recommence in late May, but it’s still unclear in what form it will happen.

#BREAKING: The NRL has announced a competition restart date of May 28. #9News pic.twitter.com/e5uwbe0fAj

Liberal Senator Sarah Henderson is calling for road blocks on the Great Ocean Road to force people to stay home this long weekend. @Kieran_Gilbert

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Queensland hospital workers denied promised payrise because of Covid-19 preparations

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Exclusive: in principle agreement was shelved after Annastacia Palaszczuk announced public sector payrises would be put ‘on hold’

• Palaszczuk’s Campbell Newman moment: freezing public sector wages in a time of coronavirus

Frontline health workers in Queensland have been denied a promised pay increase because they agreed to prioritise coronavirus preparations ahead of finalising an industrial agreement, their union says.

Last week, the Queensland premier, Annastacia Palaszczuk, blindsided the union movement and announced during a television interview that agreed public sector pay increases were “on hold” amid the coronavirus pandemic.

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Australia’s coronavirus victims: Covid-19 related deaths across the country

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As the number of cases rises, so does the number of those who have died. Here is a state-by-state list of virus-related fatalities

The Australian death toll from Covid-19 related illnesses stands at 34, as of 4 April. This story will be updated as further deaths are confirmed and Australia’s coronavirus victims are identified.

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Coronavirus Australia live news: chief medical officer says global cases could be 5 to 10 million – latest update

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Brendan Murphy says he is totally confident of infection rates in Australia because of our high rate of testing. Follow live updates

• Free childcare: what do the Australian government’s coronavirus changes mean for my family?
• Your questions about Australia’s coronavirus lockdown rules answered
• Have you encountered police enforcing social distancing laws?
• Sign up for Guardian Australia’s daily coronavirus email
• Coronavirus Australia maps and cases: live numbers and statistics
• See all our coronavirus coverage

We might leave it there for the night. Thanks so much for reading today.

Hopefully you’re enjoying your Friday night, despite these strange times.

The @YourAFAP union says all 220 @TigerairAU pilots have been made redundant effective today.

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Coronavirus in Australia: how many cases are there? Map, latest numbers and statistics

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We bring together all the Covid-19 confirmed cases, data and stats from NSW, Victoria, Queensland, SA, WA, Tasmania, ACT and NT to get a broad picture of the Australian outbreak and track the impact of government response

Due to the difference in reporting times between states, territories and the federal government, it can be difficult to get a current picture of how many confirmed cases of coronavirus there are in Australia.

Here, we’ve brought together all the figures in one place, along with comparisons with other countries.

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Climate crisis may have pushed world’s tropical coral reefs to tipping point of ‘near-annual’ bleaching

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Exclusive: Mass bleaching seen along Great Barrier Reef could mark start of global-scale event, expert warns

Rising ocean temperatures could have pushed the world’s tropical coral reefs over a tipping point where they are hit by bleaching on a “near-annual” basis, according to the head of a US government agency program that monitors the globe’s coral reefs.

Dr Mark Eakin, coordinator of Coral Reef Watch at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told Guardian Australia there was a risk that mass bleaching seen along the length of the Great Barrier Reef in 2020 could mark the start of another global-scale bleaching event.

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Great Barrier Reef’s latest bleaching confirmed by marine park authority

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Severity of damage has increased, with areas spared in previous years experiencing moderate or severe bleaching

The government agency responsible for the Great Barrier Reef has confirmed the natural landmark has suffered a third mass coral bleaching episode in five years, describing the damage as “very widespread”.

The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority said the assessment was based on information from in-water and aerial observations, and built on the best available science and technology to understand current conditions.

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NSW Port Authority warned in January of ‘gaping hole’ in coronavirus biosecurity checks

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Maritime union said the requirement for ships to ‘self-declare’ illness was ‘woefully inadequate’ 50 days before Ruby Princess allowed to offload sick passengers in Sydney

The New South Wales Port Authority ignored warnings in January of the need for tighter biosecurity checks, the Maritime Union of Australia says.

In an email seen by Guardian Australia, MUA secretary Paul Garrett warned the NSW Port Authority chief executive, Philip Holliday, that ship captains could not be relied upon to self-disclose illnesses on board.

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‘Fright of her life’: Gold Coast woman finds five-metre python on her doorstep

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Queensland snake catcher says 80kg albino Burmese python found in Oxenford is the largest he has come across in 27 years

As a seasoned snake catcher, Tony Harrison is used to the people the claiming there is a five-metre snake on their doorstep. But for the first time on Monday, the caller wasn’t exaggerating.

“This was the largest snake I have come across in 27 years,” Harrison said. “The poor old lady who opened the front door to see it there got the fright of her life”

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Great Barrier Reef watchers anxiously await evidence of coral bleaching from aerial surveys

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Planes will this week cover areas in the southern half of the reef that escaped earlier bleaching but may have undergone high levels of heat stress

The full impact of coral bleaching across the Great Barrier Reef will become clearer this week as aerial surveys of hundreds of reefs are completed in the bottom two thirds of the world’s biggest reef system.

An aerial survey carried out last week over almost 500 individual reefs between the Torres Strait and Cairns revealed some severe bleaching of corals closer to shore, but almost none on outer reefs.

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Tropical Cyclone Gretel set to bypass Norfolk Island but damaging winds expected

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Strong wind warnings also in place for coastal regions across south-east Queensland and northern NSW

Tropical Cyclone Gretel is set to bypass Norfolk Island in the next 48 hours, although it will still create damaging winds.

Tropical Cyclone Gretel may not make landfall but was still expected to have an impact with damaging wind warnings of around 100km/h for coastal regions across south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales.

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‘Potentially dangerous’: One Nation’s tactics at family law inquiry concern women’s advocates

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Discredited themes, including that men’s aggression is caused by partners who seek to deny access to their kids, have drawn most of the attention this week

l The only authorised video stream of this week’s federal parliamentary hearings into Australia’s family law system was broadcast on Pauline Hanson’s Facebook page. The camera was operated by Hanson’s aide James Ashby, the stream captioned like an official broadcast but published with hundreds of unfiltered live comments from apparently aggrieved fathers, who called witnesses and MPs “man-hater” and “dirty snake”.

In the shadow of the murders of Hannah Clarke and her three children, expert witnesses have told the inquiry that reform to family law is increasingly urgent to better protect mostly women and children, primarily from men who perpetrate acts of coercive control and domestic violence.

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Businesses affected by coronavirus should have access to disaster relief funds, says Queensland

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State says virus ‘is no different’ to floods, cyclones and bushfires as it prepares to ramp up pressure at Coag meeting

Queensland will use the upcoming meeting of state leaders and the prime minister to appeal to the federal government to open up its natural disaster assistance payments to local industries impacted by the coronavirus.

Scott Morrison has previously rejected Queensland’s request for the disaster recovery funding arrangements to be made available for businesses knocked by the economic slowdown resulting from Covid-19 on 4 February, and again on 28 February.

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Six grants worth a total of $260k approved in marginal seat of Longman before election

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LNP candidate advertised one of the grants on Facebook a month before election without specifying source of funds

Six taxpayer-funded grants were approved in the key marginal seat of Longman through the Department of Social Services in the month before the last federal election, including $177,000 for the Bribie Island and Districts Junior Rugby League Club.

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Power cuts that left Aboriginal people on NT islands with no food were widespread

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Population received no emergency support and scant information during three-day outage in Northern Territory, says resident of one of the areas hit


Telecommunications outages that left Aboriginal people living on islands off the Northern Territory coast without food, fuel and essential supplies for almost three days last week were more widespread than originally reported, fuelling concerns about the network’s ability to support contact with remote communities as fears over coronavirus spread.

Telstra has confirmed the NT mainland communities of Borroloola and Numbulwar were affected by the same outage, while the Cape York community of Kowanyama was also without telecommunications for three days.

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Drought-breaking rain brings joy to some Australian towns, but many dams still await relief

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Heavy rainfall across New South Wales and Queensland boosts rivers and allow farmers to plant crops for the first time in several seasons

Heavy and widespread rain across three states is bringing joy to parched towns with some farming regions receiving “drought-breaking” rains.

Further rainfall from ex-Tropical Cyclone Esther was delivering water into regional water storages and rivers, with farmers able to plant crops for the first time in several seasons.

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Clive Palmer charged with criminal offences by corporate regulator

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Asic boss confirms mining magnate and former politician charged with four offences by the regulator for conduct dating back to 2013

Mining magnate and former politician Clive Palmer has been charged with criminal offences that could see him jailed by Australia’s corporate regulator.

The head of the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, John Price, revealed on Friday that the Queensland businessman had been charged with four offences by the regulator for conduct dating back to 2013.

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Queensland police’s problem with domestic violence

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Police comments last week that they were keeping an ‘open mind’ on the murder of Hannah Clarke and her three young children by her former partner were widely condemned. In this episode of Full Story, reporter Ben Smee looks at the track record of Queensland police on domestic violence, and we hear from one woman about her own shocking story

You can read Ben Smee’s reporting on Dani’s case here, and his piece about how Hannah Clarke’s murder exposes a ‘failure in our system’.

You can also read his reporting on Queensland woman Julie, who was forced to go into hiding after a senior constable, Neil Punchard, accessed her address from a police database and sent it to her violent former husband.

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