Editor Brian Harrod Provides Comprehensive up-to-date news coverage, with aggregated news from sources all over the world from the Roundup Newswires Network
Government is withdrawing critical support when it is most needed and has no proper plan for jobs, federal opposition says
The Morrison government faces new calls to offer targeted support to businesses in the hardest hit parts of the Australian economy as the Coalition presses ahead with cuts to emergency wage subsidies from Monday.
Labor has accused the government of withdrawing critical support from the economy at a time when Covid-19 outbreaks in New South Wales and Victoria have sparked the return of tight domestic border rules and curbs on business activities.
MEDIA RELEASE: From 1am Monday 4 January, anyone who has been in Victoria on or since 21 December will be restricted from entering vulnerable facilities, including aged care facilities, hospitals, disability accommodation and correctional facilities.https://t.co/xd8p24VvdZ
Some more details on that cyclone warning from AAP.
A severe weather warning has been issued for far north Queensland as a tropical cyclone is expected to develop in the Gulf of Carpentaria.
Australia, whose early call for inquiry sparked furious Chinese response, says it expects ‘robust, independent and comprehensive’ report
Australia is pushing to ensure the global inquiry it helped trigger into the early handling of the Covid-19 pandemic doesn’t pull any punches – a move that has the potential to risk further recriminations from China.
Amid scepticism among several government backbenchers that the inquiry will fully address Chinese authorities’ early missteps and reporting delays, Australia is using its final months on a top World Health Organization board to press for the investigation to remain robust and independent.
State breaks 12-day streak with no local transmission as Sydney airport driver test positive and two mystery cases emerge in the northern beaches. Follow latest updates
Late morning the treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, will release the mid-year economic and fiscal update which is expected to show that the budget deficit will be less than $200bn due to a $11bn saving on jobkeeper and rising iron ore prices boosting revenue.
Asked about the $11bn jobkeeper saving, the finance minister Simon Birmingham told Channel Nine:”Look, it is really encouraging to see the strength of the recovery in the Australian economy. Now, there is still a long way to go but we’ve seen more than 650,000 jobs created across Australia in recent months. More Australians back in work, fewer Australians on JobKeeper - this is a trend that we want to see continue but we know that there are always threats present.
The Victorian Ombudsman has tabled an investigation into the detention and treatment of public housing residents at the onset of the second wave in the state.
Ombudsman's Investigation into the detention and treatment of public housing residents arising from a COVID-19 'hard lockdown' in July 2020 tabled today, a non-sitting day https://t.co/cXTFf4wPIy#springst
Boosted iron ore prices due to anxious markets are likely to help federal budget’s bottom line, Deloitte says
Australia’s losses from trade tensions with China are being offset by rising iron ore prices, according to new analysis, which also predicts the Morrison government will announce a smaller budget deficit than originally forecast.
Deloitte Access Economics said Chinese government moves against wine, beef, barley, lobsters and thermal coal have cost Australia money “but we’ve more than made that up in overall terms thanks to iron ore – and the taxman will be a considerable beneficiary of that”.
That’s where I’ll leave you for this evening. Thanks as always for reading.
Here’s what we learned today:
Five asylum seekers, who were transferred to Australia under Medevac, have been released from immigration detention this week, it has been confirmed.
Three asylum seekers were released today – including musician and artist Farhad Bandesh – and two people were released on Tuesday, according to the Refugee Advocacy Network.
Trade minister Simon Birmingham says ‘targeted nature’ of China’s measures raise concern about its adherence to trade deal and WTO obligations
China appears to be breaching its trade deal with Australia by taking a series of “disruptive and restrictive measures” against Australian exports, the Morrison government has said.
As concerns grow among Australian exporters about the impact of a widening range of actions, the trade minister, Simon Birmingham, told the Senate on Wednesday all dispute settlement options were on the table.
MP Andrew Hastie has criticised the release of details included in the war crimes report for allowing China to ‘malign our troops’; PM faces questions over Murdoch Christmas party flight; NSW awaits update on new Covid cluster. Follow all today’s news
Good morning, Matilda Boseley here. It’s nearly the end of the week and what better way to reach the finish line than to stick around on the Guardian live blog and get all your much-needed news updates, Covid-19 or otherwise.
First up, Liberal MP Andrew Hastie has criticised the Brereton Report which he says was filled with “unproven rumours” of Australian soldiers murdering Afghan children, saying the report has given China an opening to malign Australian troops.
Philip Lowe is accompanied at today’s hearing by Guy Debelle, a deputy RBA governor. Debelle has just shown Lowe the growth number in the national accounts.
The governor is pleased. It’s very good, he says. (Lowe was hoping for more than 2% in today’s numbers. The growth number is 3.3%).
Jim Chalmers has responded:
Today’s headline number is cold comfort for millions of Australians looking for work, or more work. For many people what looks like a recovery on paper will still feel like a recession. #auspol
What really matters is not one quarterly GDP number on a page but how Australians are actually faring and whether they can provide for their loved ones. #auspol
Analysis: Amid rising trade tensions, Chinese interests are keen to develop a high-quality deposit inGuinea. Analysts warn any restrictions on Australian sales to China would ‘send shockwaves through the market’
Across China and around the clock, furnaces fuelled by Australian iron ore pump out the steel the country needs to build its way out of the coronavirus downturn.
But as China’s trade war with Australia has become louder, working its way from unofficial stoppages to swingeing tariffs on barley and wine, so too have rumblings that the country may slow or end its use of Australian ore.
Markets respond as manufacturing in China and South Korea grows at fastest pace in a decade
Hopes that the world will bounce back from the ravages of coronavirus in the new year have been buoyed by strong growth in output from Asia’s huge manufacturing centres, led by an accelerating post-pandemic boom in China.
China’s factory activity expanded at the fastest pace in a decade in November, a closely watched survey showed on Tuesday, in the latest sign that the world’s second-largest economy is recovering to pre-pandemic levels.
Further to Andrew Hastie’s comments on the Brereton report, which we reported earlier, the WA Liberal MP has been on the ABC expanding on his call for greater parliamentary oversight of the military.
He tells Andrew Probyn:
Defence is a huge organisation. In order for parliament to exercise proper civilian oversight of the military you have to have a baseline understanding of the capabilities, the methods, and the operations of the ADF. If we can’t talk about those things in public, we can’t talk about them at all.
So we need to talk about them in a classified space and right now there is no such mechanism in the parliament to increase parliamentarians’ understanding of defence and therefore enable parliament to hold it to account.
Scott Morrison and the Indonesian president, Joko Widodo, swapped notes on Covid-19 situations in their two countries during a phone call this afternoon.
A readout issued by Morrison’s office says the pair also discussed progress on vaccine trials and they “were encouraged by the more positive trajectory of their economies in the third quarter”.
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.
The Coalition is likely to scrap any further increases to the compulsory superannuation contribution
It’s more than 600 pages and doesn’t make any recommendations. Yet, the retirement income review will inform future government policy decisions, provide cover for the government to ditch the superannuation guarantee increase and sets out what retirement could look like for today’s workforce. So what do you need to know?
Retirement income review to emphasise Australians using ‘voluntary savings’, saying a lift in compulsory super rate would hurt wages growth
The Morrison government is laying the groundwork to scrap the already legislated increase to the superannuation guarantee, declaring the retirement income review has found current policy settings are suitable.
A summation of the retirement income review distributed by treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s office ahead of the report’s official release on Friday put greater emphasis on Australians using “voluntary savings”, including equity within their homes, ahead of raising compulsory superannuation contributions.
Australia hopes 15-country Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership will help reset economic relations with China
Simon Birmingham has urged China to respect the “spirit” – not just the letter – of the new 15-country Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.
Australia is hoping the deal, signed on Sunday, will help reset economic relations with China after a rolling series of trade disputes or disruptions widely regarded as retaliation for Australian policies towards China.
Successive cuts will cost federal budget three times what is spent on public schools, Greens leader to say in push to have next round scrapped
Income tax cut packages since 2017 will cost the budget $325bn by the end of the decade, with high-income earners capturing 58% of the benefit.
That is the result of a Parliamentary Budget Office analysis prepared for the Greens, released on Saturday ahead of a speech by Adam Bandt vowing to use the balance of power to force a future Labor government to repeal the next round of cuts.
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.