The National Anti-Corruption Commission won’t investigate six individuals referred by the royal commission. It’s yet another blow for victims
An email landed in my inbox not long after the National Anti-Corruption Commission announced its refusal to investigate the robodebt scandal.
It was from Michael Griffin, a robodebt victim. Griffin, like countless others, descended into a spiral of shock and shame after he was wrongly told to repay a $3,197 welfare debt in late 2016.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Apology issued to staff includes pledge ‘to foster a safe, inclusive, empowered, accountable and supportive workplace’
The Australian Border Force has apologised to its staff for failing to “prevent workplace misconduct from occurring” after two damning reports found sexual discrimination and harassment rife in the ABF.
The ABF’s senior leadership issued the apology in May, after Australian Human Rights Commission reports into the culture of the marine unit and the broader ABF found bullying and harassment “are normalised” in some sections of the workforce.
Continue reading...Exclusive: ALP president and former treasurer tells environment group he shared their disappointment over the contentious pre-budget announcement
The Labor party’s national president, Wayne Swan, has criticised the Albanese government’s future gas strategy, opposing its encouragement of new gas fields and telling the party’s environment activists they should push for a plan to lessen domestic demand.
In an online address to the Labor Environment Action Network (Lean) on Tuesday night, Swan sympathised with the activists who were dismayed that the strategy, released a week before the budget and which frustrated some inner-city Labor MPs, emphasised a role for gas “to 2050 and beyond”.
Continue reading...Unrwa chief says 6,000 displaced people were sheltering at school when it was hit and at least 35 have been killed. This live blog is closed
Local authorities report that 37 people have been killed after an overnight Israeli strike on the UN-run Unrwa school in the Nuseirat refugee camp in near Deir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
Inages from the site show a large number of bodies laid out for burial outside a hospital in Deir al Balah. Unrwa communications director Juliette Touma told Reuters on Thursday that the number of those reported killed in the Israeli offensive on the Nuseirat school is between 35 and 45, but it still cannot confirm the number at this stage, she added.
Continue reading...Claims of looting as dozens injured during Rapid Support Forces clash with Sudanese army in Gezira province
At least 100 people were killed and dozens more injured after the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) attacked a village in Gezira province in Sudan on Wednesday.
Women and children were among the victims in the RSF attacks on Wad al-Noura village in Gezira, Mini Arko Minawi, the governor of Darfur province, said on X.
Continue reading...Up to 90% ‘lost in the blink of an eye’, say scientists studying Cyclone Ilsa’s effect on birds on Western Australian island
Increased tropical cyclones due to global heating could lead to dramatic declines in seabird populations, according to a new study.
Scientists found that after Cyclone Ilsa – a category-5 tropical cyclone – hit Bedout Island in Western Australia in April 2023, several seabird populations experienced a collapse of 80-90% due to the storm at the internationally important breeding site.
Continue reading...Video shows The Australian’s Liam Mendes fall to the ground during encounter with Nine Entertainment chairman at Canberra airport
Peter Costello, the former federal treasurer and current chairman of Nine Entertainment, has been accused of assaulting a journalist from The Australian newspaper as he refused to answer questions about the embattled media company.
But Costello has dismissed the allegations, saying “there was no assault” and that the journalist “fell over an advertising placard”.
Continue reading...‘The industry is rapidly strangling our planet,’ says Andrew Wilkie, who joins Allegra Spender, Sophie Scamps, Zali Steggall and Monique Ryan in call for ban
At least nine independent MPs and the Greens have backed the UN secretary general’s call for the Australian government to ban fossil fuel advertising and for media companies to stop accepting money to promote coal, oil and gas companies.
Many described fossil fuel advertising as greenwashing that damaged the climate, the environment and people’s health, and compared its use to steps taken by “big tobacco” before cigarette advertising was banned in 1992.
Continue reading...