Labour leader asked if he would have served in a Corbyn cabinet and declines to say council tax won’t rise if his party wins
Q: [From Emma in Greenwich] How will you protect single-sex spaces for girls, while making it easier to get a gender recognition certificate?
Starmer says he is passionate about protecting single-sex spaces. As director of public prosecutions, he dealt with a lot of cases involving violence against women and girls.
Continue reading...Visit is Russian president’s first to North Korea in 24 years as he seeks continued military support from Kim Jong-un
Nato’s outgoing secretary general has called for China to face consequences if it keeps up support to Russia as he trumpeted a sharp increase in allies’ defence spending since the invasion of Ukraine.
Jens Stoltenberg said that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit this week to North Korea, which has supplied shells to Moscow despite being under UN sanctions, further showed how Moscow was “dependent” on authoritarian leaders.
We will develop alternative mechanisms of trade and mutual settlements that are not controlled by the west, and jointly resist illegitimate unilateral restrictions.
And at the same time – we will build an architecture of equal and indivisible security in Eurasia.
Continue reading...Al-Jazeera reporter says it has been ‘another bloody night across central Gaza’ with attack on camp housing families evacuated from Rafah
The national news agency in Lebanon reports that US special envoy Amos Hochstein is expected to visit prime minister Najib Mikati in his Beirut home within the next hour.
Hochstein was in Israel yesterday speaking to government and opposition leaders, in an attenpt to defuse the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah forces which has displaced tens of thousands of people from northern Israel and southern Lebanon.
Continue reading...Tens of thousands of letters signed by former prime minister expected to be delivered this week
The Conservatives will turn to Boris Johnson in an attempt to boost their faltering election campaign, according to reports.
Tens of thousands of letters signed by the former prime minister are expected to be delivered later this week in the closest campaign engagement yet by Johnson, whose involvement so far has been limited to endorsing individual Tory MPs.
Continue reading...Country on track to become third in Asia – after Taiwan and Nepal – to legalise same-sex marriage
Thailand’s senate has passed the final reading of a historic marriage equality bill, paving the way for the country to become the first in south-east Asia to recognise same-sex marriage.
The bill gained the support of nearly all upper-house lawmakers and will be sent to the palace for the pro-forma endorsement by King Maha Vajiralongkorn. The law will come into force 120 days after it is published in the royal gazette.
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Liberals criticise treatment of journalist by Chinese officials at press conference
Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham has condemned the treatment of journalist Cheng Lei at federal parliament yesterday.
This was an entirely counterproductive and inappropriate act by Chinese officials that should have been called out by our prime minister and government officials.
It is a reminder that we have two very different systems, the Chinese system and the Australian system, different systems of government, of course as a democracy, different respect when it comes to media, to freedom of speech, but this visit is taking place in Australia.
It is concerning, I think a lot of this comes from so many Australians genuinely doing a tough at the moment, having to make really tough decisions, from telling their kids that they can no longer play basketball or be part of the scouts group because they can’t afford the … 500 bucks a year that costs, to other Australians who are deciding between going to see the GP or fulfilling a script and putting food on the table.
People are doing it tough and so when they hear politicians talk about these targets in the future … I think Peter Dutton use this to whip up fear.
Continue reading...Party were ‘fierce champions of Palestine’ in opposition and they must ‘summon that spirit of old’, she writes for Al Jazeera
The Labor senator Fatima Payman has called on her own government to “recognise Palestine” and undermined efforts by the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, to discredit protests against Israel’s military actions in Gaza.
Payman, writing for Al Jazeera, argued that nations needed to take a “definitive stance” on Palestinian statehood because Israel “continues to disregard its obligations under international humanitarian law to protect civilians and cease genocidal acts”. Israel denies committing genocide in its military response to the 7 October attacks by Hamas.
Continue reading...NSW Liberal MP rules out running for federal parliament as he exits state politics after 13 years
New South Wales Liberal MP Matt Kean has announced his resignation from politics after 13 years in state parliament.
Kean made the surprise announcement in a snap press conference at NSW parliament on Tuesday, hours after the Minns Labor government handed down its second budget.
Continue reading...Bookseller tells ASX it will announce outcomes from strategic review, including ‘progress in seeking additional funding’
Australia’s largest online bookseller has entered into a voluntary share trading suspension, just two weeks after axing 50 jobs and losing its chief executive.
Booktopia Group Ltd notified the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) on Monday, saying its securities would be suspended from quotation immediately pending an announcement on “further outcomes” from a strategic review, “including its progress in seeking additional funding”.
Continue reading...David Omand says pledges on nuclear deterrent shows party can be trusted ‘to stick to serious defence policy’
Labour’s position on national security has been endorsed by a former head of the UK intelligence agency, GCHQ, who said the party can be trusted to “stick to serious defence policy.”
The backing by Sir David Omand is a boost in a key area for Keir Starmer, who has sought to promote Labour’s security as a way of emphasising how the party has changed since Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership.
Continue reading...Simon Birmingham contradicts Nationals’ leader, saying renewables are ‘an important part of the mix’ while Queensland LNP leader rules out nuclear
The federal Coalition’s climate and energy policy is in disarray, with a senior Liberal contradicting the Nationals’ anti-renewables push and the Queensland LNP leader ruling out allowing nuclear energy in that state.
After the Nationals further undermined the push for net zero by 2050 by claiming the Coalition would “cap” investment in large-scale renewable energy, the Liberal leader in the Senate, Simon Birmingham, declared on Tuesday it is an “important part of the mix”.
Continue reading...From bulk billing GPs and frontline workers to renters and the environment, here’s who won and lost in the Minns government’s state budget
The New South Wales government has unveiled a bold plan to ease costs for GP clinics in order to nudge doctors into bulk billing more patients, as part of a suite of budget measures it hopes will deliver cost-of-living relief to citizens.
However, in announcing a $3.6bn deficit, the Minns government’s budget of “must-haves not nice-to-haves” leaves a raft of key societal issues without new funding or a clear path to improvement.
Continue reading...In today’s newsletter: The war has devastated Sudan, destroying much of the country and leaving 18 million facing acute hunger
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Good morning.
The war in Sudan has caused destruction throughout much of the country. And with every passing week the conflict seems to get worse between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) – a paramilitary group who say their main goal is to establish democracy, though the frequent human rights abuses they commit do not support this claim.
Conservatives | Jeremy Hunt said Liz Truss’s economic ambitions were a “good thing to aim for” and her disastrous mini-budget hadn’t left an impact on the economy, according to two leaked recordings obtained by the Guardian. The chancellor was recorded at a meeting of students when he said he was “trying to basically achieve some of the same things” as the former prime minister, but that he was doing it “more gradually”.
Israel | Benjamin Netanyahu has dissolved the Israeli war cabinet that had been overseeing the conflict in Gaza, rebuffing his far-right allies who had been seeking seats, and apparently moving to solidify his grasp on decision-making over the fighting with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah across the Lebanese border.
Italy | At least 10 people died and dozens were missing after two separate shipwrecks close to the Italian coast, rescuers said. Ten bodies were found on Monday in the lower deck of a wooden boat in the central Mediterranean by rescuers from Nadir, a ship operated by the German charity ResQship.
Germany | Eight alleged members of the German far-right Reichsbürger are to go on trial accused of a plot to violently overthrow the state, in the third in a row of similar court cases being held across the country. The defendants, including a GP, a celebrity chef and an astrologer, are accused of serving as the plot’s leadership council and, prosecutors say, were set to become a cabinet in waiting if the group’s plan overthrow the government had succeeded.
UK news | Officers who hit an escaped cow with a car “probably did the right thing at the time” even if it looks “horrendous”, a union leader and farmer has said. A video showing a police car hitting the calf on Friday night on a residential street in Staines-upon-Thames was met with widespread outrage, including from the RSCPA which criticised it as “disproportionate”.
Continue reading...Russian leader will have talks with Kim Jong-un with shared aim of expanding security and economic cooperation
Vladimir Putin has praised North Korea for supporting Russia’s war in Ukraine, as he travels to Pyongyang to seek continued military support from one of the world’s most isolated nations.
In his first visit to North Korea since 2000, Putin will meet Kim Jong-un for one-on-one talks in Pyongyang as the two leaders pledge to expand their security and economic cooperation in defiance of western sanctions against both countries.
Continue reading...The federal court dismissed the case brought by Save the Children and ruled that the government had no legal obligation to bring them home
If the federal government had “the political will” to repatriate Australian women and children from Syrian detention camps “it would be a relatively straightforward exercise”, the full bench of the federal court has said in a judgment.
But there is no legal obligation on the government to bring its citizens back to Australia, the court ruled.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Leaked recordings reveal chancellor ‘trying to achieve some of the same things’ as former prime minister
Jeremy Hunt said Liz Truss’s economic ambitions were a “good thing to aim for” and her disastrous mini-budget hadn’t left an impact on the economy, according to two leaked recordings obtained by the Guardian.
The chancellor was recorded at a meeting of students when he said he was “trying to basically achieve some of the same things” as the former prime minister, but that he was doing it “more gradually”.
Continue reading...