A weather system moving in from the south-west will bring rain across southern regions from Monday, according to the Bureau of Meteorology
The long weekend has brought fine weather to Australia’s capitals – but most cities will see a soggy return to work on Tuesday.
Despite a foggy start to Saturday morning in Melbourne and rain across Brisbane and Darwin, sunshine is forecast for Sydney, Canberra and Adelaide with similar conditions to continue through Saturday and Sunday.
Continue reading...At a fundraising sausage sizzle ahead of the rally, Kennedy quoted the words of her father explaining why the US wanted to land a man on the moon
The US ambassador to Australia might become the first person to complete the charity Shitbox Rally with a blacked-out, armoured SUV in tow.
Caroline Kennedy is to swap her chauffeured BMW for the driver’s seat of beat-up Ford Falcon, driving from Adelaide to Perth in April in a car worth less than $1,500 to raise money for cancer research.
Continue reading...Prime minister says ‘there needs to be an explanation’ after former deputy prime minister was seen lying on a Canberra street swearing into his phone
The prime minister has called for the Coalition leadership to explain the actions of former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce, who was last week filmed lying on a Canberra footpath having a phone conversation.
Guardian Australia understands Joyce won’t attend the Nationals party room meeting scheduled for Monday.
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Meakin agreed that The Project was “going further” towards identifying Lehrmann than Samantha Maiden’s article in news.com.au which was published first.
He said The Project was relying on Maiden’s article to promote the program that evening and that the promotion could improve ratings.
Continue reading...A warning for readers: this blog contains graphic details of allegations of sexual assault. Lehrmann is suing Network Ten and Lisa Wilkinson in the federal court of Australia over allegations Higgins was raped by a Liberal staffer in Parliament House. Follow the latest news and updates
Higgins questioned about sequence of events
Steve Whybrow SC asked Higgins: “I’m suggesting to you that you alter and evolve your evidence as you find that extra information. Do you accept that?”
Continue reading...Peter Nally was flying light plane that vanished from radar 16 minutes after taking off from Canberra airport
The family of an experienced pilot and his grandchildren who were killed in a light plane crash near Canberra have asked for privacy as they grieve.
Peter Nally and the three school-aged children died when the five-seater Cirrus they were travelling in crashed and then caught alight in a paddock at Gundaroo, north of Queanbeyan, on Friday afternoon.
Continue reading...Reserve bank considered a 25 basis point hike before deciding to hold benchmark cash rate unchanged at 4.1%, minutes reveal. Follow the day’s news live
O’Neil: government response on cybercrime will not take away responsibilities of corporations to secure data
Clare O’Neil is asked whether the government is considering implementing a “safe harbour rule” like other countries have that would enable businesses to report what’s happened but then be saved from prosecution.
What’s really important to understand … is the way in which a cyber attack unfolds is quite different than other types of crime. So if you get something stolen from your house, the police can come in and you can identify the items that are gone usually pretty much immediately. Cybercrime is not like that. Often what is taken is invisible and it will take sometimes months to understand exactly what has happened.
So what what we are thinking about at the moment is how to make sure we’ve got as open disclosure as possible at the crisis point of the attack. So when we know there is an intruder on the system … we need to help companies [eject] them from the system as quickly as possible. That doesn’t take away from any responsibilities that corporations will have ultimately around the transparency of what has happened, and reporting that to government and to regulators.
We’ve got really good reason to believe that the cybersecurity environment is actually going to worsen. And I say that not to scare people, but to help them understand that we can see what is coming at us and that is why the government is so fiercely active on this issue.
What I mean by that is that cybercrime is a relatively new form of criminal activity. And I think what we’re seeing is countries around the world start to build and develop responses that will actually help us bring perpetrators to account …
Continue reading...Police allege the man initially attacked a male student with a frying pan then stabbed two female students
The man alleged to have stabbed two young women during an attack at the Australian National University appeared in court on Monday charged with attempted murder.
Alex Ophel, 24, appeared briefly before the ACT Magistrates Court, wearing a grey tracksuit and white thongs, one day after he allegedly stabbed two 20-year-old women on the ANU campus, leaving one with critical injuries.
Continue reading...A national ceremony in Canberra will mark the 50th anniversary of the end of Australia’s involvement in the war
Researchers at the Australian War Memorial say they have identified 285 Indigenous servicemen who fought in the Vietnam war and seven involved in the battle of Long Tan.
Veterans on Friday mark the 50th anniversary of the end of Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam war, which will be commemorated in a national ceremony in Canberra.
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Continue reading...Director general of national intelligence says NSI Act needs to be modernised but defended tough secrecy laws amid ‘unprecedented’ levels of espionage
Australia’s intelligence community believes foreign spies are using sensitive court proceedings as an “intelligence collection tool” while defending the need for tough secrecy laws.
Australia’s national security law watchdog, the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor, on Wednesday began public hearings examining the use of laws designed to protect sensitive information during court proceedings.
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Continue reading...Four-day operation results in 1,107 domestic violence charges being laid against 592 people. Follow live
‘Textbook fiscal policy’ from Labor about getting economy ‘in nick’
Chalmers is asked whether it’s possible to control inflation without the unemployment rate growing further.
Remains to be seen.
We’ve got the budget in better nick, not the expense of the economy but in addition, and cost-of-living help is targeted in out-of-pocket health costs, electricity, rent and some particular pressure points. We found $40 billion of savings over two budgets compared to zero in savings in the last Liberal budget.
So all of those things are about get getting the economy in nick at the same time we provide help for people to get through through a difficult period.
The point that Michele Bullock was making in that speech, which, again, I think is relatively uncontroversial, is that as the Reserve Bank forecast and the treasury forecasts, have inflation moderating in coming months, they have a tick-up in unemployment. I’ve been upfront. The challenges in the economy are unsubstantial, globally and domestically, I think the slow-down is expected in the forecasts to be significant. That will have implications for the unemployment rate, which is the point that Michele Bullock was making.
Continue reading...Canberra records its coldest June morning since 1986 and Sydney its coldest June morning since 2010, with the record-breaking weather forecast to continue
Many Australians woke up on Wednesday to record-breaking cold temperatures as Sydney and Canberra experienced their coldest June mornings in more than a decade.
Canberra’s minimum temperature of -7.2C was its lowest since 2018 and the lowest for June since 1986, according to Ben Domensino, a meteorologist at Weatherzone.
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Liberal senator David Van is speaking to Sydney radio 2GB about independent senator Lidia Thorpe’s allegations in the Senate yesterday.
Thorpe withdrew the remarks to comply with the Senate’s standing orders but said she would be making a statement on the issue today.
Continue reading...Albanese praises ‘courage’ of former prime minister and those affected by Port Arthur massacre
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, has praised John Howard’s “courage and determination” to legislate gun control in the wake of the Port Arthur massacre and says a national firearms register would be the “next step” for the reforms that began in 1996.
Albanese will make the remarks at the National Museum on Thursday at a ceremony with Howard and Walter Mikac, who lost his wife and two daughters at Port Arthur. The ceremony will mark correspondence between Mikac and Howard entering the museum’s collection.
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Continue reading...The federal court will consider the audio and text messages of Higgins and her partner David Sharaz published by several media outlets
The leaking of private material linked to Brittany Higgins is to be raised in the federal court on Friday during a hearing of the defamation case brought by Bruce Lehrmann against several media outlets.
An audio recording of Higgins, her partner David Sharaz and two Network 10 journalists, along with text messages sent from Higgins to various parties, have been published by multiple outlets over several weeks.
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Continue reading...Former political staffer suing national broadcaster over a February 2022 joint address by Higgins and Grace Tame at the National Press Club
Bruce Lehrmann has accused the Australian Broadcasting Corporation of acting maliciously by broadcasting Brittany Higgins’ National Press Club address, saying in court documents it was “wilfully blind” to the risk of her defaming him or making prejudicial comments close to his trial.
Lehrmann is suing the ABC over a joint address by Higgins and Grace Tame to the National Press Club in February 2022, which was broadcast live and later uploaded in full to the ABC’s YouTube channel.
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Continue reading...Canberra’s National Capital Authority terminated lease on block of land in Yarralumla but federal court rules the move was ‘invalid and of no effect’
The Australian government has made an embarrassing backdown in its attempts to turf the Russian government off the site of its new embassy in Canberra.
The National Capital Authority (NCA) last year announced a decision to terminate the Russian government’s lease on a block of land in the wealthy suburb of Yarralumla, where it was building its new embassy.
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Continue reading...Kamal Fadel, a representative of the Sahrawi people of Western Sahara, was initially blocked from entering venue by Moroccan embassy staff
A diplomatic celebration of African unity in Canberra has degenerated into an undiplomatic altercation, with officials from the Moroccan embassy verbally abusing a representative of the Sahrawi people of Western Sahara while attempting to block him from entering the venue.
The representative Kamal Fadel, who had been formally invited to the Albert Hall event on Thursday evening, was initially stopped from entering by Moroccan diplomats. Australian federal police officers and other African ambassadors were forced to intervene, a video seen by Guardian Australia shows.
Continue reading...The two parties reportedly settled with News Corp saying it had not paid any damages and the articles in dispute would remain online
Bruce Lehrmann has discontinued defamation proceedings against News Corp over its initial reporting of Brittany Higgins’ allegations after he settled with the media company.
News.com.au said in a statement that the settlement involved the payment of a portion of Lehrmann’s legal costs only.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is chasing hundreds of overdue fines amid repeated requests to respect the law
Russian diplomats have refused to pay hundreds of overdue speeding, parking and traffic fines dating back more than 15 years, frustrating Australian officials who can only politely ask that they respect local laws.
Freedom of information documents obtained by Guardian Australia indicate the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Dfat) is chasing almost $90,000 from the Russian embassy for fines dating back to 2007, despite repeated requests for diplomats to respect the law.
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