Category Archives: Australian education

Australia news live: Shannon Fentiman announces tilt at Queensland Labor leadership

Posted on by

Follow the day’s news live

Palaszczuk made decision ‘in the interest of the state’, Swan says

ALP national secretary Wayne Swan has spoken to ABC RN about Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk’s resignation announcement yesterday.

That’s always ever present for any leader at any time but I think she made the decision in the interest of the state and I think in her own interest as well.

I think people are sensibly discussing what the options are and if one candidate has a pretty clear majority then I think it would be unlikely that you’d see a battle, because it would simply be very difficult for the government over a period of time when they need to re-establish a leader in the job.

Continue reading...

Labor targets student and some worker visas in overhaul of Australia’s temporary migration program

Posted on by

Government says temporary migration system is ‘broken’ and changes to student and skilled worker visas are needed to address exploitation

The Albanese government will lift the bar for international students and some workers to get a visa and as it seeks to overhaul what it says is Australia’s “broken” temporary migration program.

A new 10-year temporary migration strategy to be released on Monday will include moves to crack down on the use of student visas as a “back door” entry for employers looking to import low-skilled workers, while the government will also create new visas targeting highly skilled workers, particularly those in growth industries. It comes with the government flagging that overseas migration has peaked and is set to fall in the next 12 months.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Australia news live: Daniel Andrews fires up over ‘Dictator Dan’ moniker; festival-goers warned about heatwave conditions

Posted on by

Former Victorian premier gives first interview after resignation, saying ‘the haters hate and the rest vote Labor’. Follow the day’s news live

James Ashby to stand for One Nation in Queensland seat

James Ashby, the chief of staff to One Nation leader Pauline Hanson, will stand for the party in the seat of Keppel at next year’s Queensland state election, AAP reports.

The Nationals are dead in Queensland’s parliament while the Liberals are lurching further left in their attempts to secure inner-Brisbane seats.

Continue reading...

Final question time of the year – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed.

MPs don casual wear for late-night sitting

Given the late sitting (the house has been doing “family friendly” hours for most of the year, which has made sittings past 8pm or 8.30pm rare) there were a few more casual looks on the benches than we are used to.

Continue reading...

Teachers to get training to deal with poor behaviour in Australian classrooms but experts say more must be done

Posted on by

Government reveals $3.5m plan to reduce disruption but Greens say focus should be on socioeconomic and psychosocial challenges facing students

One in three educators are losing teaching time due to disruption, with experts calling for more to be done to address rising rates of poor behaviour in Australian classrooms.

According to the OECD’s disciplinary climate index, Australian classrooms are among the world’s most disorderly, affecting teacher safety and work satisfaction and school-leaving results.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Stage set for national cabinet clash over GST – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed.

The NSW Australian Paramedics Association will take part in a 12-hour strike today, from 7am to 7pm, despite the threat of legal action.

Members will still attend emergency “lights and sirens” jobs as part of an ongoing pay dispute.

We want to assure the public that emergencies will still be attended to, with our focus intensifying on life-threatening cases.

Our decision to limit responses to non-emergency jobs enhances our capacity to manage critical cases.

Facing potential legal repercussions and a substantial fine of up to $20,000 per day, our commitment remains firm.

Continue reading...

Australia politics live: PM delivers national apology to thalidomide survivors; Pocock and Plibersek strike deal on Murray-Darling

Posted on by

Plan will remove a cap on buybacks and extend deadlines for water recovery targets. Follow the day’s news live

For what kinds of crimes would preventive detention be used?

Preventive detention can be used for terrorists or terrorism suspects already (yes, we already do this) so what other crimes will be added to the list? (Not all of the cohort have committed crimes.)

What I can tell you is that we’ll work through the detail of the law over the coming days. We’ve had a high court decision for about 17 hours now.

But the high court decision actually specifically refers to child sexual abuse as one of the grounds on which preventive detention might also be lawful.

We will work through these issues and will do so in a way that is fast but also constitutional. What we have seen on the other side of politics is a pretty torrid history of rushing laws, doing it improperly and writing things that aren’t constitutional, that are later thrown out by the high court and the consequence is that the Australian community is less safe.

We don’t want to make that mistake. We will work through this carefully.

The most important thing to understand from the high court’s ruling is that the high court has said that politicians don’t get to make that decision (indefinite detention).

And so politicians have previously been allowed to hold people in immigration detention for very long periods of time. The high court has told us that that’s not constitutional under these circumstances.

Continue reading...

Stephanie Foster appointed new home affairs secretary – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed

The NSW Council for Civil Liberties (NSWCCL) has backed the campaign for a royal commission into immigration detention – including onshore and offshore detention on Nauru and Papua New Guinea.

As mentioned earlier in the blog, the campaign will be launched in Canberra today.

Our mandatory, arbitrary immigration detention regime is unnecessarily cruel and degrading. Instead of offering refuge for those who seek the safety of our shores, we imprison people, strip them of their humanity and allow them to be demonised in our media and by our politicians. It is a system that conditions the Australian public to dehumanise others. This cruelty has persisted for decades.

Increased discussion and debate around gender equality, a tight labour market and impending legislative reform have helped drive action on workplace gender equality over the last year.

We see an increase in the proportion of women in management and at the upper pay quartiles, and we also see the proportion of women being promoted and appointed at manager level is higher than the proportion of women managers overall. As this trend continues, we can expect to see the gender pay gap continue to fall.

The management opportunities for part-time employees are negligible; the number of men taking paid primary carer parental leave has barely shifted; and the number of women in CEO roles and on boards has stagnated.

If we want real change, we need employers to take bold action. We need employers to look across the drivers of gender inequality and be imaginative in their solutions.

Continue reading...

Australia news live: Bruce Lehrmann back in the witness box as defamation case kicks off third day

Posted on by

Former Liberal staffer’s defamation trial against Network Ten and journalist Lisa Wilkinson continues in the federal court. Follow the day’s news live

The minister for Indigenous Australians, Linda Burney, has said the government is yet to decide how to best consult with First Nations people after the loss of the Indigenous voice referendum.

Burney was on RN Breakfast earlier and said today’s Closing the Gap meeting, the first since the referendum, would focus on the silver linings from the loss.

What we have seen is a group of young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people get involved in the political process.

We had 6 million Australians say yes. And the thing that really excited me about the outcome in places like the Tiwi Islands, where … Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people wanted this change. And those votes are really important.

Education is the most powerful cause for good in this world, that is where you learn.

If you want to protest, do it on the weekend. School is on, we expect them to be there.

Continue reading...

Man found dead after statewide search – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed.

Hostage release essential if truce to last, Paterson says

Rewinding to Liberal MP James Paterson’s appearance on RN Breakfast this morning, wheN he said more needs to be done to free the hostages Hamas is holding in Gaza.

We don’t know how many of them are still alive, and their continued release would be essential for any continuing ceasefire because otherwise Israel continues to have a legitimate military objective.

Continue reading...

Melbourne school students defy education minister and strike in support of Palestine

Posted on by

Hundreds rally in CBD to call for an end to the war in Gaza and for Australia to stop military aid to Israel

Amid chants of “free, free Palestine”, hundreds of Victoria school students have walked out of classrooms to call for an immediate end to the war in Gaza and for Australia to stop military aid to Israel.

Students gathered at the steps of Flinders Street station in the Melbourne CBD on Thursday afternoon, rallying for Palestine. The crowd spilled out on to the road, bringing traffic to a standstill at the busy Flinders and Swanston Street intersection.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Australia’s 100 wealthiest schools earned almost $4.8bn in 2021, data reveals

Posted on by

Exclusive: education department figures reveal the private schools received about $767m in government money amid a public schools funding shortfall

Australia’s 100 wealthiest schools had a combined income of $4.8bn in 2021, data reveals, as calls grow for the federal government to urgently address inequity in the education system.

About $767m of that income came from government funding; the rest from fees, private contributions and donations.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Australia news live: school strike for climate protests draw huge crowds in Melbourne and Sydney; Albanese says Apec leaders ‘very interested’ in Tuvalu deal

Posted on by

This blog is now closed

‘A ceasefire is where we need to get to,’ Zoe Daniel says

Asked by RN Breakfast host Patricia Karvelas if she supports calls for a ceasefire, Zoe Daniel says:

If you call for a ceasefire, you’re letting down the Jewish community, if you don’t you’re allowing death and destruction to happen in Gaza.

At the end of the day, if I say to you right now, yes, I support ceasefire, that will make zero difference to what is happening in in Gaza.

I’m a former foreign correspondent. I know the logistics of this, of course, a ceasefire is where we need to get to, but you have a terrorist organisation in the middle of this. If there’s just a ceasefire, and there’s no capacity there to try to dismantle Hamas, does that allow Hamas to regroup? What does that actually lead to? That said, I’ve said to you before, very clearly, and I still stick to the position that the Israeli government has to adhere to international law and the rules of war, and I think, in some ways, has not been.

Continue reading...

‘Desensitised’: calls for better education after research suggests Victorian boys less likely to stop harassment

Posted on by

Study of students finds marked drop from Year 7 to Year 9 in proportion of those willing to intervene

Chanel Contos, a sexual consent education advocate, says teenagers may be getting so desensitised to porn that it’s affecting their reaction to sexual harassment, with research suggesting male students become less likely to intervene when a female classmate is targeted as they reach Year 9.

The study of Victorian school students by Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety (Anrows), released on Wednesday, found that 20.2% of Year 7 boys intended to intervene when sexual harassment was taking place. However, just 12.8% of those in Year 9 shared that attitude.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup

Continue reading...

Optus confirms ‘network event’ behind outage – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed.

Rowland: ‘consumers were clearly frustrated with lack of information’ over outage

Rowland says the key issue of the Optus outage was “getting some more understanding of the nature of the problem”. She tells ABC TV:

I made it clear from the outset that consumers were clearly frustrated with the lack of information. Australians are reasonable people. They understand that things need to be resolved and that may take some time, but the key issue here was getting some understanding of the nature of the problem, how long it may take and what the impacts would be.

And I think it goes to the issue of how reliant we are on our digital devices and connectivity overall, including for consuming messages and news media. And, in this case, the broadcasting platforms were there to be utilised and I did encourage Optus to do that as well.

It’s important, I believe, to have a post-incident review that is both thorough in scope but also is completed expeditiously and goes to the precise issues of what has caused this, considering the considerable amount of disruption, the distress it has caused, but also the economic impact as well. And to understand what [can] be done in future by the sector as a whole to take the lesson and mitigate that going forward.

So this is important, because Australians expect that there will be follow-up, that there will be lessons learned. But, importantly for the sector as a whole, it’s important to understand how this can be certainly avoided in future.

Continue reading...

Victorian education official to apologise in person for antisemitic bullying at Brighton secondary college

Posted on by

A judge also ordered the state to pay the five men more than $500,000 in compensation, including interest and legal costs

A Victorian education department official will make an in-person apology to five students who experienced antisemitic bullying at a Melbourne school.

The former Brighton secondary college students – Joel and Matt Kaplan, Liam Arnold-Levy, Guy Cohen and Zack Snelling – successfully sued the school and the state of Victoria in the federal court, which handed down its decision last month.

Continue reading...

Labor MPs air clashing views over Israel-Hamas conflict – as it happened

Posted on by

This blog is now closed

Abbott suggests ‘scaling back’ on ‘separatism’ after no referendum vote

Former prime minister Tony Abbott has some ... opinions ... on what the defeat of the voice referendum means the country should do next. It’s fair to say they’re not uncontroversial.

Flying the Aboriginal flag co-equally (as if Australia is a country of two nations) and the routine acknowledgement of country by all speakers at official events (as if those whose ancestry here stretches beyond 1788 are more Australian than anyone else).

The Department of Justice wishes to express deepest sympathies to the boy’s family, friends and community for their tragic loss. The department is continuing its investigation into all the circumstances of the incident.

The death will be subject to a mandatory inquest and the department will fully co-operate with the coronial process.

Continue reading...

Australia politics live: Penny Wong condemns ‘any indiscriminate attacks and targeting of civilian infrastructure’ after Gaza hospital blast

Posted on by

‘Protection of civilian lives must come first and respect for international humanitarian law is paramount,’ Australian foreign minister says. Follow the day’s news live

Lingiari MP Marion Scrymgour speaks on the referendum

Just before the house adjourned for the evening on Tuesday, Labor Lingiari MP Marion Scrymgour gave a speech about the referendum which is very much worth your time:

I want to say a few things about what led us to the recent referendum and what it means for those first peoples Australians most affected by the outcome, particularly the first peoples Australians in my electorate of Lingiari.

Because of some arcane parliamentary tradition, which I understand derives from English House of Commons, we are obliged to call the making of a speech at this time and in this place a ‘grievance debate’.

The price tag of Israel’s right to defend itself cannot be the destruction of Palestine.

Israel’s right to defend its civilians cannot equate to the annihilation of Palestinian civilians. I hereby call for an immediate ceasefire to come into effect, alongside many world leaders and experts.

Continue reading...

Australia politics live: Albanese accuses Ley of lack of respect for Indigenous voice campaigners in fiery question time

Posted on by

Albanese highlights ‘concerning’ Coalition voice rhetoric as Dutton targets PM over treaty and truth telling. Follow the day’s news live

‘We’re holding a thorough consultation process,’ Jacinta Allan says

Under the proposal, a government minister will appoint commissioners, though the Greens-chaired integrity and oversight committee will have the power to veto candidates.

A new parliamentary ethics committee

Improvements to mechanisms relating to public interest disclosures about MPs

Updates to the MP code of conduct

We’re holding a thorough consultation process to ensure we achieve the highest standards of conduct and integrity of MPs in all aspects of their work for Victorians.

Continue reading...

Australia news live: Minns says NSW police response to pro-Palestine rally will be ‘reasonable and proportionate’; voice referendum latest updates

Posted on by

Follow today’s news live, including the latest updates on the voice referendum

A strong no vote could hold back reforms in Indigenous affairs, Wyatt says

Ken Wyatt said he doesn’t think the government has made a mistake deciding against legislating the voice if the referendum is defeated, but he fears what a strong no vote will mean for the future of Indigenous affairs:

We’ve got to respect what Australians are saying if there is an overwhelming no majority …

The fear I have now is with a strong no, whether the government will become reticent to be adventurous on doing significant reforms in the future in the Aboriginal affairs portfolio, and on programs and policies that could reshape the landscape of Aboriginal affairs and the way in which Aboriginal people access the plethora of services that we all take for granted across this nation as our inherent right.

Continue reading...