July 19, 2023

Australia news LIVE: Migration intake too high, voters say; 2026 Commonwealth Games cancelled in Victoria

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‘I’ve felt very unsafe’: Lidia Thorpe reveals she is receiving formal protection following death threats

By Josefine Ganko

In an interview with Channel Ten’s The Project, Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe revealed she is receiving formal protection after experiencing death threats.

Thorpe said there was “pretty serious” backlash to her June 14 speech in the Senate where she accused a fellow senator of sexually assaulting and harassing her. Thorpe withdrew the allegation, citing the “rules of the senate”.

“I’ve felt very unsafe over the last few weeks,” Thorpe told The Project’s Hamish McDonald.

“There are a lot of people who don’t want me in parliament, don’t want me alive,” she continued.

Lidia Thorpe made sexual assault and harassment allegations in a speech to the Senate in JuneCredit: Screenshot

Thorpe also discussed her opposition to the proposed Voice to parliament, and said that she doesn’t recognise King Charles III as sovereign, but as “a violent invader”.

“He wasn’t personally responsible, but he relished in the wealth that has been created on the back of slavery and massacres and murder.”

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7.53pm

Today’s headlines at a glance

By Josefine Ganko

That’s where we’ll leave today’s live blog coverage. Here are the headlines you need to know from today.

An exclusive survey conducted for the Herald and The Age found a majority of voters believe Australia’s migrant intake is too high. Only 3 per cent of voters regarded the nation’s overseas migration numbers as being “too low”, while 59 per cent said they were “too high” and 25 per cent believed they were “about right”.The fallout from Victoria’s scrapping of the 2026 Commonwealth Games continued, with pundits weighing in on all sides. We covered the consequences of the cancellation, including speaking to some of the athletes who are devastated by the cancellation.A proposed levy on the almost $10 billion universities make each year from international student fees could be used to pay for student housing or research, says Education Minister Jason Clare, as he unveils proposals to fund 1.8 million more tertiary students by 2050.

Jason Clare at the National Press Club.Credit: Martin OllmanThe northern hemisphere is sweltering as an unrelenting heatwave sweeps across southern Europe, temperatures skyrocket across North America, and flash flooding ravages the US east coast and parts of Asia.Ahead of tomorrow’s cinematic release of Barbie, reviews have started to trickle in for the highly anticipated film. We asked, does the movie live up to the insane hype?

Thanks for joining us.

7.39pm

‘I’ve felt very unsafe’: Lidia Thorpe reveals she is receiving formal protection following death threats

By Josefine Ganko

In an interview with Channel Ten’s The Project, Independent Senator Lidia Thorpe revealed she is receiving formal protection after experiencing death threats.

Thorpe said there was “pretty serious” backlash to her June 14 speech in the Senate where she accused a fellow senator of sexually assaulting and harassing her. Thorpe withdrew the allegation, citing the “rules of the senate”.

“I’ve felt very unsafe over the last few weeks,” Thorpe told The Project’s Hamish McDonald.

“There are a lot of people who don’t want me in parliament, don’t want me alive,” she continued.

Lidia Thorpe made sexual assault and harassment allegations in a speech to the Senate in JuneCredit: Screenshot

Thorpe also discussed her opposition to the proposed Voice to parliament, and said that she doesn’t recognise King Charles III as sovereign, but as “a violent invader”.

“He wasn’t personally responsible, but he relished in the wealth that has been created on the back of slavery and massacres and murder.”

7.32pm

Gina Rinehart loses fight for secrecy ahead of Hope Downs courtroom showdown

By Jesinta Burton

Billionaire mining magnate Gina Rinehart has lost a last-ditch bid to throw a veil of secrecy over swaths of her impending court showdown with the descendants of her pioneer father’s business partners.

Gina staunchly defends her image.Credit: Getty

Justice Jennifer Smith shut down her company Hancock Prospecting’s push for a confidentiality order over more than 16,700 pages of material on Wednesday, which would have forced the closure of the court during the trial, and prevented allegations levelled against her by her eldest children from being aired publicly.

The Supreme Court stoush, set to get underway next week, centres around a partnership deal inked between Lang Hancock, Rinehart’s father, his business partner Peter Wright and pioneer Don Rhodes back in the 1980s.

Wright’s billionaire descendants have been sparring with Rinehart for more than a decade over how the spoils of one of the most lucrative assets in the partnership, the Hope Downs tenement Hancock Prospecting co-owns with Rio Tinto, should be distributed.

The Rhodes family have also been fighting for a 1.25 per cent cut of those funds.

But it has also seen her eldest children, Bianca Rinehart and John Hancock, dragged into the mix, courtesy of crossovers between their own highly publicised claims about their mother’s conduct in relation to assets their grandfather allegedly left them.

Read the full breaking news story here.

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6.41pm

How a Chinese criminal group withdrew $137m to avoid paying tax

By Perry Duffin

A Chinese criminal group withdrew $137 million in cash to pay exploited foreign construction workers in a long-running tax avoidance scheme in Australia.

Operation Underpitch, a joint force between the Australian Border Force and the Australian Taxation Office, was revealed this week when the tax evasion scheme’s ringleader was convicted in Sydney’s Local Court.

Wenfang He, 55, a Chinese national, was spared prison but convicted and fined for two counts of dealing with the proceeds of crime on Tuesday.

Her conviction marked the fourth conviction arising from a two-year investigation into a group that hired and paid foreign workers in cash for construction jobs around Sydney and Canberra.

The group used cash to pay workers undocumented wages without any superannuation and without any income tax.

Underpitch’s first arrests came in 2021 when the Australian Federal Police arrested a “senior money mule” in south-west Sydney.

You can read the full exclusive story from crime reporter Perry Duffin here.

5.50pm

Sex education book removed from Big W after internet furore led to staff abuse

Welcome to Sex, a sex education book aimed at teenagers, has been pulled from shelves at Big W following “multiple incidents of abuse” directed at staff.

The book was published back in May but recently became the subject of an internet pile-on from critics who think the content is too explicit for its target age group.

Dr Melissa Kang and Yumi Stynes’ new book Welcome to Sex has sparked a fresh moral panic. Picture: Louise KennerleyCredit: Louise Kennerley

“We know there has been a wide range of views about the book, however, it’s disappointing that there have been multiple incidents of abuse directed at our store team members in the past 24 hours,” a Big W spokesperson said in a statement.

“To keep our team and customers safe, the book will now only be available online.”

The book was written by Dr Melissa Kang, who previously authored the popular Dolly Doctor column, and journalist Yumi Stynes. It’s the latest in a series of books by the pair on similar topics, with titles like ‘Welcome to Consent’ and ‘Welcome to Your Period’.

While some expressed their disappointment with the backlash to the book and subsequent abuse of staff, others celebrated its removal from Big W’s shelves.

5.29pm

US defence leaders to visit Australia, PNG

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin will fly into Brisbane next week for high-level talks with Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles ahead of the joint military exercises conducted by Australian and US troops in far north Queensland.

The meetings will discuss deepening defence and economic ties in the wake of the AUKUS security pact, as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese mulls the timing of a visit to Beijing on China’s invitation.

Marles said Australia’s defence cooperation with the US is “unprecedented in scale, scope and significance.”

Austin will also be the first US defence secretary to visit Papua New Guinea.

Nuclear-powered submarines eventually bound for Australia under the AUKUS deal.

The meeting comes as grassroots Labor members in Tanya Plibersek’s Sydney seat voted on Tuesday night to oppose AUKUS.

The members claim the submarines, which are slated to cost $368 billion over three decades, do not align with the values of Labor and the trade union movement which prioritise education, health, aged care and housing.

AAP

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5.08pm

Albanese announces first official trip to New Zealand

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has announced he will travel to Wellington next week to join New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins for the annual Australia-New Zealand Leaders’ Meeting.

The quick trip, from 26-27 July, will see the leaders discuss trans-Tasman cooperation on a range of topics including “trade and investment, security and defence, our shared commitment to the Pacific region, and deepening connections between our people”.

2023 marks 80 years of diplomatic relations between Australia and New Zealand, with the meeting taking place during the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which the two nations are jointly hosting.

Albanese said he was “delighted” to be making his first official trip to New Zealand.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese with New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins. Credit: AP

4.21pm

Who’s responsible for the Commonwealth Games debacle?

Business columnist Elizabeth Knight has given her view on the Victoria Commonwealth Games debacle, calling the backflip “a massive case of project mismanagement”.

Whether it was the state government’s stuff-up, or the consultants who advised it, it is implausible that a project that was costed at $2.6 billion last year can come in at around $7 billion now.

One of these two figures was, or is, a fiction. Probably both.”

Knight argues that the fiasco will add further fuel to the view that governments should reduce their reliance on consultants, especially in the wake of the PwC scandal and resulting federal Senate inquiry.

There is certainly a school of thought that consultants tend to give their clients what they want to hear.”

You can read Knight’s full column here.

3.55pm

Stan Grant to return to the public arena tonight

By Josefine Ganko

Journalist Stan Grant will make his return to the public arena tonight, moderating an expert panel that aims to demystify the Indigenous Voice to parliament.

Grant, one of Australia’s most prominent Indigenous Australians, stepped away from his ABC commitments eight weeks ago citing the toll of racist abuse.

Other than an appearance at a Sydney Writers’ Festival event in late May, Grant has kept a low profile for the last two months.

Journalist Stan Grant spoke at an event at the Sydney Writers’ Festival on May 26, 2023.Credit: Jacquie Manning

Tonight’s forum at Sydney Town Hall will feature addresses from Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney and lawyer and land rights activist Noel Pearson, before the panel of experts, including prominent ‘yes’ campaigners, take audience questions.

The audience will be able to quiz Kerry O’Brien and Thomas Mayo, who co-authored a handbook on the voice, as well as one of the nation’s leading constitutional experts, Anne Twomey.

Grant’s return comes a day after both the Yes and No camps revealed the arguments they will make to win voters to their respective sides in the coming referendum, as campaigning from both groups starts to heat up.

Australians will be asked whether they support an Indigenous advisory body being enshrined in the constitution in a vote to be held between October and December.

With AAP

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3.26pm

Extreme weather lashes the northern hemisphere

The northern hemisphere is sweltering as unrelenting heatwaves sweep across southern Europe, North America and parts of Asia, leaving forest fires, emergency health alerts and a heightened risk of death in its wake.

A man tries to extinguish a fire with a hose near Loutraki 80 Kilometres west of Athens.Credit: AP Photo/Petros Giannakouris

Another consequence of increased ocean temperatures is torrential rain and flash flooding, which has ravaged the US east coast and South Korea, among other countries.

The UN’s weather agency has warned temperatures in North America, Asia, and across North Africa and the Mediterranean will surpass 40?C for a number of days this week.

Lucy Cormack has summarised all the different weather events taking place across the globe in this story.

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