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Jacinta Nampijinpa Price declines to back Sussan Ley’s leadership
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has repeatedly refused to confirm her confidence in Sussan Ley’s leadership of the Liberal party, saying the opposition should be holding Labor to account for what she called “a mass migration issue”.
The firebrand Northern Territory senator was asked repeatedly if she had confidence in Ley’s leadership. She said:
Those matters are for our party room. My focus is to go forward and to ensure that we’re doing the right thing by the Australian people, which is what we’re elected to do.
Price’s remarks about Indian immigration sparked public backlash but also internal fallout within the Liberal party room as she resists colleagues’ calls for her to apologise. She again offered no apology this afternoon.
Asked how she would repair the divide within the party, Price encouraged her colleagues in the Liberal party to move forward and focus on the Albanese government’s policies. She said:
Those matters in terms of our party are obviously for our leadership. I would love to be able to move forward from this because there are issues. We’ve been elected by the Australian people to stand up as the opposition to address the failures of the Albanese government … and that’s what I would love to encourage, certainly, my colleagues to be focused on in moving forward.
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Protest permits flagged by Melbourne’s deputy lord mayor
Melbourne’s deputy lord mayor has suggested protest permits should be instituted so police would not have to “babysit’ neo-Nazis and counter-protesters, who may again take to the streets of Melbourne on Saturday.
Victoria police said they would have a significant presence in the city where anti-immigration protests are set to be held alongside opposing leftwing protests to mitigate the risk of violent confrontation.
Roshena Campbell, the deputy lord mayor of Melbourne, said the prospect of violence between protesters was expending police resources. She told the ABC:
They are taking police officers from across the state, asking them to come in on the day off to essentially babysit these protesters and keep them apart like quarrelling schoolchildren.
Asked whether she believed new laws were needed to deal with hostility between activists, Campbell pointed to the permit systems used in jurisdictions including NSW:
The time has come for a serious discussion about how we deal with protest in Melbourne. I do think Victoria is in a different position to other jurisdictions. Many jurisdictions have a permit system that in the vast majority of instances work successfully …
[When] multiple protest groups [plan] to be in the city at the same time, when they are sending messages they are seeking confrontation, it’s almost impossible to protect public safety … Victoria has operated in the space with one hand tied behind its back and that is not the appropriate thing going forward.
Hospital admissions in NSW jump during ‘difficult’ winter
Hospital admissions have reached record levels in Australia’s largest health system, but further highs are expected after a “very difficult” winter, AAP reports.
More than 515,000 patients were admitted to NSW hospitals in the three months to June, the state’s health statistics agency said on Wednesday.
The state’s health minister, Ryan Park, expects further records to be set once figures taking in the rest of the cold and flu season are released. He said:
We’ve had a very, very difficult last winter period. Vaccinations have been down … respiratory cases have been up … presentations have been very high.
Nearly 65,000 elective surgeries were performed across NSW, the most in any quarter since the bureau began reporting in 2010.
Fewer patients were waiting longer than clinically recommended for their surgery in June, dropping to 2,534 from 8,588 at the end of March, but only two-thirds of non-urgent surgeries were performed on time. Non-urgent surgeries should be completed within a year.
However, people with less severe illnesses or injuries are beginning to use urgent or virtual care clinics set up to reduce strain on emergency departments, which Park said had diverted about 220,000 ED presentations.
Men charged over January’s alleged antisemitic attacks in NSW
Two men have been charged by counter-terrorism detectives for allegedly graffitiing Nazi symbols on a synagogue and three more incidents across Sydney in January.
The men were charged over allegedly damaging the synagogue in Allawah, in Sydney’s south, with antisemitic graffiti including a Nazi swastika. One, 26 years old, is alleged to have carried out the attack on the instructions and with assistance of the second man, 27.
The 27-year-old is also alleged to have contributed to attacks on a childcare centre in Maroubra, a Jewish primary school in Maroubra and a home in Dover Heights once owned by Alex Ryvchin – the co-chief executive of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry.
NSW police said the younger man was charged in late June and the older was charged in mid-July. They will face court separately in late October.
Caitlin Cassidy
Australian students have more class time and shorter holidays than overseas peers
Australian students spend more time in the classroom than their peers and have shorter school holidays, a new report has found.
The OECD’s annual Education at a Glance survey, released on Tuesday evening, showed students in Australia received about 11,000 hours of instruction during their primary and lower secondary instruction (the first three years of high school), well in excess of the OECD average of 7,604 hours.
At the same time, school holidays were shorter in Australia than the OECD average, sitting at 12 weeks compared with 13.5.
The report also found primary and secondary school teachers were among the highest paid out of 30 surveyed countries, receiving almost $US74,000 ($112,000) last year, or 42% more than their counterparts.
The report found the salary cost was a trade-off with class sizes. Australia’s above-average salaries were partially offset by above-average class sizes.
The federal president of the Australian Education Union (AEU), Correna Haythorpe, said Australia’s above-average class sizes and high compulsory instruction hours compounded the pressures on teachers.
It is no surprise that teacher shortages are worsening when Australian teachers are working longer hours in larger classes with fewer resources than their colleagues overseas. Governments must deliver on their commitments and invest in the teaching workforce through better pay, manageable workloads, and schools that are fully funded and properly resourced.
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price declines to back Sussan Ley’s leadership
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has repeatedly refused to confirm her confidence in Sussan Ley’s leadership of the Liberal party, saying the opposition should be holding Labor to account for what she called “a mass migration issue”.
The firebrand Northern Territory senator was asked repeatedly if she had confidence in Ley’s leadership. She said:
Those matters are for our party room. My focus is to go forward and to ensure that we’re doing the right thing by the Australian people, which is what we’re elected to do.
Price’s remarks about Indian immigration sparked public backlash but also internal fallout within the Liberal party room as she resists colleagues’ calls for her to apologise. She again offered no apology this afternoon.
Asked how she would repair the divide within the party, Price encouraged her colleagues in the Liberal party to move forward and focus on the Albanese government’s policies. She said:
Those matters in terms of our party are obviously for our leadership. I would love to be able to move forward from this because there are issues. We’ve been elected by the Australian people to stand up as the opposition to address the failures of the Albanese government … and that’s what I would love to encourage, certainly, my colleagues to be focused on in moving forward.
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price says she ‘won’t be silenced’ about migration
A defiant Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has said she “won’t be silenced” when speaking up about mass migration, a week after she suggested Labor was giving India preferential treatment for political benefit.
Speaking to reporters in Perth, Price said she was grateful to the Indian Australians who had offered her “overwhelming outreach” and support in the wake of her controversial comments. She said:
Last week, I made comments on the ABC. I almost immediately clarified those comments and expressed, of course, the fact that while, you know, my comments were certainly clumsy, unfortunately the issue that’s of great concern, which I won’t be silenced on, is the issue of mass migration in our country … and we should all be focused on that.
I’ve spoken directly to those who are Australians of Indian heritage and they have pointed out to me that that’s how they like to be regarded as well and have thanked me for my previous efforts in the voice [to parliament campaign] to ensure that we’re not divided along the lines of race in our country.
Luca Ittimani
Thanks to the wonderful Nick Visser. I’ll be with you for the rest of the day.
Nick Visser
That’s all for me. Luca Ittimani will guide you on the blog for the rest of the day. Take care!
Wet and unsettled weather, including threat of severe thunderstorms, coming for NSW this afternoon
Large stretches of NSW may be in for severe thunderstorms this afternoon as a band of clouds pushes across the state, with the Bureau of Meteorology warning of “wet and unsettled weather”.
Central and eastern NSW may see severe thunderstorms with damaging winds, heavy rainfall that could lead to flash flooding and large hail. That includes the Sydney metropolitan area, northern parts of the Illawarra and the Hunter district, which could see severe weather most likely in the afternoon and evening.
The BoM is also warning of intense and hazardous surf and swell conditions along large parts of the NSW coastline on Thursday, which will generate from strong to gale force winds.
Strong to gale force south to southwesterly winds around a coastal low are expected to generate large and powerful surf conditions on Thursday, with damaging surf possible.
These are expected to ease during Thursday evening.
More: https://t.co/scFbjpLi1I pic.twitter.com/bXm1g0NTJm
Nearly 200 tipoffs sent to police since $1m reward offered over alleged Porepunkah gunman
Police are providing an update amid the ongoing hunt for Dezi Freeman near Porepunkah, Victoria, saying they have searched extensively, including caves and mine shafts. They said while hundreds of tips had come through in their search, police are still asking for more information to track down “every avenue of inquiry possible”.
Nearly 200 pieces of information have come through since police offered up to a $1m reward for information leading to his capture.
Supt Craig Darlow said:
We’ve searched caves, we’ve searched mine shafts, huts, and we’ll continue to do that over the coming weeks if need be …
Whilst some of the people in the community might be frustrated with this and have difficulties with this, we request they be patient and understand that we have a job to do in identifying where Desmond Freeman is, and trying to arrest him to enable the community to feel safe.
Tom McIlroy
PM will negotiate an upgrade to security deal with Fiji
Anthony Albanese says he will negotiate an upgrade to Australia’s security agreement with the government of Fiji, part of regional efforts being pushed at the Pacific Islands Forum in Solomon Islands.
The prime minister held a one-on-one meeting with his Fiji counterpart, Sitiveni Rabuka, on the sidelines of the summit in Honiara on Wednesday, agreeing to upgrade security ties through the Vuvale agreement.
Progress on the Fiji deal follows talks between the two leaders in Australia in July, and comes a day after Vanuatu said a separate $500m deal with Australia needed more work before it could be signed.
Albanese said preliminary discussions were under way for the scope of the agreement:
That could range from increased interoperability, the sort of training we are seeing with the Pacific policing initiative being expanded, to increased engagement between our defence forces.
I don’t want to pre-empt the discussions. They’re at early stages but certainly the relationship with Fiji is an important one. Fiji has a very significant position in the Pacific.
Australia is pursuing agreements across the Pacific in an attempt to push back on China, as it seeks to build influence in the region through infrastructure deals and funding for national governments. Deals with Tuvalu and Nauru have already been signed, and a major defence treaty with Papua New Guinea is complete.
Albanese is expected to sign it during a visit to coincide with 50 years of PNG’s independence from Australia later this month.
Eva Corlett
Solomon Islands PM calls for unity in Pacific Islands Forum opening address
The Solomon Islands prime minister, Jeremiah Manele, called for Pacific unity during the opening plenary at the annual Pacific leaders summit today, amid intensifying geostrategic competition.
The Pacific Islands Forum (Pif) kicked off in Honiara on Monday, against a backdrop of tensions over Manele’s decision to exclude external partners – including China, the US and Taiwan – from talks.
Manele told leaders the Pacific’s strength lay in its “solidarity” and how it responds to challenges as a collective:
The world around us is changing fast, competition among powerful interests is intensifying and the Pacific must never be seen as an arena for others.
Pacific nations were not “passive bystanders” and he urged leaders to commit to defending regionalism.
Solomon Islands is China’s biggest security ally in the Pacific and Manele’s decision to block external partners fuelled speculation he was trying to keep Taiwan out – a claim Manele has rejected.
The forum is expected to endorse a climate resilience fund and a declaration calling the Pacific an “Ocean of Peace”.
