Australia news live: Sussan Ley claims PM’s approach to Jewish Australians ‘one of the biggest threats to social cohesion’

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Hundreds of volunteer firefighters and farmers have banded together in a last-ditch effort to stop the controversial expansion of an emergency services levy, AAP reports.

The Victorian Labor government wants to replace the state’s fire services property levy with a emergency services and volunteers fund from 1 July.

Under the tax change, households across the state are expected to pay an extra $63 a year on average and farmers an extra $678 a year.

The levy is forecast to raise an extra $765m a year by 2027/28 to fund more agencies including the State Emergency Service, Triple Zero Victoria and Emergency Recovery Victoria.

With the legislation scheduled for debate this week, Country Fire Authority volunteers and farmers were among several hundred people to rally outside Victoria’s parliament on Tuesday.

They chanted “scrap the tax” in front of fire trucks and held signs with slogans such as “no farms, no food, no future” and “burn the levy, not our wallets”.

Treasurer Jaclyn Symes who will hand down her first budget on 20 May, hinted relief was in the offing for drought-hit farmers, with “more to say in coming days”.

Greens acknowledge role of Guardian reporting in spurring NSW abortion bill

The Greens NSW member for Newtown, Jenny Leong, has acknowledged the role that Guardian Australia’s reporting played in spurring the Greens to introduce the bill.

Leong referenced Guardian’s reporting last year that “only three of the 220 public hospitals in New South Wales consistently and openly provide abortion services. Rural and regional communities disproportionately bear the brunt of this inconsistency with people in these areas forced to drive hours simply to access their right to choose.”

When reporting from the ABC and the Guardian revealed the scale and prevalence of barriers to abortion access in New South Wales, there was widespread outrage and concern in this place and beyond.

The original bill Amanda Cohn introduced to the upper house had intended to legislate to ensure abortion services are provided across the state within a reasonable distance of residents’ homes, and giving the health minister the power to compel public health services to comply with any directions to offer abortion services. However, that part of the bill has been removed through amendments. Leong said that part of the bill existed because:

We don’t want to be in a situation where we are relying on whistleblowers or traumatic situations experienced by individuals to go to the media about challenges they have facing when another public hospital and then have a government having to intervene in that process.

NSW lower house begins to debate abortion bill

After passing NSW parliament’s upper house last week, the Greens’ abortion amendment bill has now begun to be debated in the lower house. If passed, it will come into law.

Abortion was decriminalised in the state in 2019. The Greens member for Newtown, Jenny Leong, has begun telling the Legislative Assembly “we are now taking the next and important step in this chapter to ensure the work being done to decriminalise abortion, is followed through by ensuring that all people have access to that critical healthcare”.

After amendments, the bill being passed will expand access by allowing nurse practitioners and endorsed midwives to prescribe medical abortions up to nine weeks gestation.

Leong said:

This will have an immediate major impact on access to reproductive justice, particularly in regional and remote communities, where many struggle to get an appointment with a GP, or indeed cannot access the healthcare that they require.

However, Leong said there had been an “enormous amount of misinformation about this bill”:

This bill is an essential expansion of access for people to healthcare, access to their reproductive rights at a time when we are seeing abortion bans imposed in several states in the US and organised campaigns of harmful, harmful disinformation that has caused considerable stress in our own communities.

You can read more here:

Ley will be the oldest first-time opposition leader since 1960s

Sussan Ley will be Australia’s oldest first-time opposition leader since the 1960s, after winning the Liberal leadership this morning.

At 63 years and five months old, Ley is just a handful of weeks younger than Arthur Calwell was when he took the Labor leadership in 1960. Calwell went up against Robert Menzies and Harold Holt.

Ley comfortably beats the previous title holder, Anthony Albanese, who was 56 when he became opposition leader.

She’s the third-oldest first-time opposition leader in Australia’s history, behind Calwell and post-second world war Labor leader Ben Chifley, who was 64 when he lost the prime ministership.

Many thanks to Cait Kelly for guiding us through today’s news. Cait #2 here for the rest of the afternoon.

Two people missing off Streaky Bay in South Australia

Two people are missing off the waters off Streaky Bay, near Back Beach Road, in South Australia.

Emergency services are searching for the two people who were reported missing at about 11:15am.

The search is being conducted by local police, including the water operation unit, and the State Emergency Service (SES).

Record spending on law and order in NT budget

This from AAP: Record spending of $1.5bn on law and order will deliver for voters who demanded community safety be the top priority for government, a territory treasurer says.

Delivering his Country Liberal party’s first budget for the Northern Territory, treasurer Bill Yan slammed the previous Labor government for years of economic mismanagement and failing to tackle growing crime rates:

Today’s budget puts crime victims first, prioritises law and order and begins the long task of repairing Labor’s mess.

The budget would restore confidence but it was not a time for austerity, Yan said, with the territory needing to play to its strengths in mining, gas, agriculture, tourism and defence.

Victorian Socialists aiming to expand to run socialist candidates across Australia

Victorian Socialists have said they are going to expand across Australia to run more candidates.

Jordan van den Lamb, who headed the Victorian Socialists Senate ticket in the recent election, said:

Victorian Socialists has, in this state, provided an alternative to pro-capitalist politics of major party politicians, and we want to ensure everyone, no matter where in Australia you live, has the opportunity to vote socialist in future elections.

We want to build branches in every state and territory, and ultimately every city and town in Australia. We won’t win a better, more equal society if our struggles remain isolated and divided. The more of us there are coming together across Australia to fight the rotten status quo of capitalist politics, the more powerful our movement will become.

If we can build socialist parties across Australia on the model of Victorian Socialists, our movement will be impossible to ignore. The long-term decline in the vote share of the major parties shows people want change. We’re announcing ourselves today as people who are determined to deliver that.

Ley claims PM’s approach to Jewish Australians ‘one of the biggest threats to social cohesion’

Sussan Ley then pivots, unprompted, back to the situation in Gaza. She said:

One of the biggest threats to social cohesion and the country is the prime minister’s approach to Jewish Australians.

Everything that happens overseas, and I have reflected on that, has domestic implications.

We have a foreign minister, Penny Wong, who let down Australia in the UN this year and we have a prime minister who is intent on letting down Jewish Australians on the streets of our cities.

One thing I have heard consistently over the last two years has been the sense of isolation, fear and real concern for our wonderful Jewish Australians. I want to make clear, going forward, we will work very hard to hold this prime minister and government to account because it is not acceptable to see what we have seen on the streets of our cities and in the universities.

Ley says “there won’t be a climate war” under her leadership.

There will be sound and sensible consultation.

Ley asked about standing in front of Indigenous flag and welcome to country

Ley has also been asked about standing in front of the Indigenous flag and her views on welcome to country.

We should unite under the one Australian flag. That is my firm view.

Of course, I’m happy to stand in front of the flag and quickly, with respect to welcome to country, it is simple: if it matters, it resonates then it is in the right.

As environment minister and health minister, I listened carefully and participated in welcome to country ceremonies that were all of those things. If it is done in a way that is box-ticking on a Teams meeting, then I don’t think it is relevant. I think it diminishes the value of what it is an important we understand that.