Australia news live: six more charged over riot outside Wakeley church; Jason Clare says social media ‘cesspit’ needs a technological fix to protect children | Australia news

AFL CEO Andrew Dillon has backed umpire boss Steve McBurney, who has come under fire from the CFMEU’s Victorian leader John Setka for his alleged “anti-worker” position as a former Australian Building and Construction Commissioner.

Dillion was on 3AW this morning, and said McBurney was doing an “incredible job” and had a “massive impact” on the AFL.

He started in his role only quite recently – he’s had a massive impact – and he’s been really good for the AFL and really good for the umpires. So he’ll be staying at the AFL.

What I’m hoping is that any intended action or foreshadowed action [from the union boss] doesn’t end up impacting on our spectators and our fans.

The New South Wales health minister, Ryan Park, says it is “absolutely critical” the federal government provides state health systems with additional funding.

Speaking on ABC Radio National, Park said the pressure on NSW hospitals was unprecedented:

It is absolutely critical. The pressure on NSW hospitals right now is like we’ve never seen before.

In the last quarter, we had over 800,000 people come to our emergency departments. We are seeing big increases in not only the number presenting but also the severity of the illnesses they’re presenting with.

That is as a result of a reduction in GPs in the community and challenges with primary care and that means when they come to an ED they’re sicker and it often means they come to the ED as their last time of resort because there’s nowhere else for them to access care.

That puts an enormous amount of challenge on an emergency department.

Park said NSW needed a “good deal” on health funding and that an agreement for more funding made before Christmas was not being fulfilled:

This deal with the commonwealth is worth billions of dollars a year to us and at the moment the commonwealth is sitting at about 38% in terms of the funding that they provide to hospitals from a NSW perspective.

At the national cabinet before Christmas, there was an agreement to get to 42.5% over five years, and then to get to 45% over 10 years.

We’re not even close to getting to that and now we’re aware that we’ve essentially been told that these discussions have to pause and wait, I simply can’t have that occur. We need to get a good deal for NSW now.

Gallagher says government working on new code of conduct for consultants

I just wanted to return to Katy Gallagher’s appearance on ABC Radio National earlier, because the finance minister said the government was working on releasing a new code of conduct for consultancy companies that would set out their responsibilities when contracted to work for the public service.

Gallagher stopped short of committing to the recommendations of a Senate committee report that investigated the behaviour of consultancy groups, adding that the sector had already taken a financial hit.

She added that PwC, the firm at the centre of a scandal in which it misused confidential government tax information for commercial gain, had already suffered reputational and financial damage over the incident:

Their work with the commonwealth, in terms of ongoing work … contracts that existed, is much diminished.

I think there has been financial consequences but also significant reputational damage – and not just to PwC – but to the broader consultancy sector.

There are a range of inquiries under way. This report was one of them and the government will look at that.

But a five-year ban of one company is something … that we would have to justify, I would think.

Two-year-old boy bitten by dingo on K’gari

Andrew Messenger

Queensland government rangers are hunting for an untagged female wongari (dingo) after the animal bit a two-year-old boy on K’gari yesterday.

The incident occurred in the carpark at Lake McKenzie. Queensland parks and wildlife service were advised at about 2.45pm.

A family was about to leave the area when the father saw a wongari near the right-hand side of their car.

He told his family to get in the car through its left hand side. The animal walked to the other side of the road before running to the front of the vehicle.

It bit the two-year-old on the right thigh before the father chased it away. The child was left with two puncture wounds.

They drove to Eurong to report the incident to rangers before heading to a nearby resort for further medical treatment.

The state government is pouring millions into safety on the island, which is also known as Fraser Island, after a string of attacks.

Katy Gallagher on social media: ‘When you ban something it doesn’t mean people’s interest wanes’

Sticking with the issue of age verification for social media, Labor’s Katy Gallagher has waded into the discussion, saying she was concerned that content viewed by young men could be having a detrimental impact on their attitudes towards women.

The finance minister was on ABC Radio National this morning to discuss the issue, which she said a complex one without an easy solution:

It’s really concerning because it has consequential impacts through the generations really as we’re trying to address violence against women and children in this country.

It’s not easy and I’m not going to pretend it is, but it’s another front that we have to confront and respond to.

These things are really hard. When you ban something it doesn’t mean people’s interest wanes or that children all of a sudden are not going to have access to that information.

Sussan Ley says it is ‘disgusting’ how social media companies profit from accounts of children

Sussan Ley says the Coalition will look to compel social media companies to introduce age verification for children under the age of 16, if the opposition wins the next election.

The deputy opposition leader, appearing on Channel 7’s Sunrise, backed Peter Dutton who yesterday said he’d take the policy to the election. Ley said:

That was strong, decisive leadership we saw from Peter Dutton yesterday on an issue that is personal to him – protecting kids when he was a policeman, protecting kids online and protecting kids when he was home affairs minister and passing laws to do that.

The last thing we want to hear is the Labor party start to say it is all too hard. We have to push through this.

The tech companies, when asked to do this, under a legal framework, will find a way … I don’t think they are saying they can’t do it. I think it’s saying they’re reluctant to do it. What they’re doing is actually profiting off the social media accounts of our kids. That is disgusting.

Darebin For Palestine, the community organising group behind pro-Palestinian protests targeting Labor MPs in Victoria, says it will defy the PM’s directions and continue to apply pressure.

In a statement this morning, the group said they intend to target the offices of three local MPs on Saturday as part of a mass demonstration that they’re calling a “protest parade”.

The three MPs are the state member for Preston, Nathan Lambert, the federal member for Cooper, Ged Kearney, and the state member for Northcote, Kat Theophanous.

The group expects the protest to take “several hours”, marching from Lambert’s office in Preston to Theophanous’s office in Northcote.

Jess Gordon, one of the rally organisers, said some constituents were “furious” with Labor for their position on Israel’s war on Gaza.

They are fed up with state and federal Labor’s shameless ongoing military and economic support of the Israeli apartheid state and denial of what is clearly a textbook case of genocide.

Five men and a teenager have been arrested and charged with rioting offences as part of the investigation into the riot outside a church in Sydney’s south-west in April.

It brings the total number of people charged with offences related to the incident to 29, a result of Strike Force Dribs, which was established to look at the Wakeley incident.

A 41-year-old man, a 31-year-old man, a 29-year-old man, two 20-year-old men and a 17-year-old boy were all arrested and charged with rioting offences, including destroying/damaging property during public disorder and throwing a missile at a police officer at public disorder.

The education minister, Jason Clare, has said stricter regulations on social media for teenagers had bipartisan support.

Speaking to Channel 7’s Sunrise, Clare called social media a “cesspit”, and added that Labor’s age verification trial would be the first step to protecting young people.

I think we all agree that social media’s a cesspit. We all agree we don’t want our kids on it. It’s about how do you do it?

This should be something where the Labor party and the Liberal party can work together.

You have mums and dads getting kids ready for school. Anyone with a child from 5-15 is worried about it.

They don’t need us having a fight about this. They want to hear we’re working together.

We want to make sure it is bulletproof, that we have the right sort of technological fix here that our kids aren’t exposed to some of the awfulness we see on social media.

Melbourne shivers through coldest day in five years

Overnight, some areas of NSW and Victoria saw temperatures drop to their lowest maximum in years, with Melbourne shivering through its coldest day in five years.

Temperatures maxed out at only 10.1C in Victoria’s capital yesterday, but it was even colder in the NSW Riverina, where Griffith recorded maximum temperatures of only 9.2C, the town’s lowest maximum in eight years.

Australia’s south-east continues to face a prolonged spell of wintry weather, with temperatures today expected to remain below average across the region.

Good morning. Mostafa Rachwani with you to take you through the day’s news.

The consequences of Peter Dutton’s climate war – Full Story newsroom edition

If elected, the opposition leader Peter Dutton says he will abandon Australia’s 43% emissions reduction target for 2030.

The prime minister Anthony Albanese labeled his comments divisive, and climate experts say his position will put Australia in breach of the landmark Paris climate agreement.

Bridie Jabour speaks to editor-in-chief Lenore Taylor and climate and environment editor Adam Morton about the consequences of putting politics ahead of good climate policy.

Sydney’s Leichhardt Oval to get $40m for upgrades to crumbling facilities

Josh Butler

Sydney’s famous Leichhardt Oval will get $40m to upgrade its crumbling facilities, with the federal government joining state and local governments in a bid to rescue the football stadium.

Anthony Albanese will announce $20m of federal funding on Friday, with the Inner West council and New South Wales government to chip in another $10m each, to upgrade female change rooms and build new seating.

A home ground for the NRL’s Wests Tigers, as well as a hub for local sporting fixtures, Leichhardt Oval and its local supporters have been calling for new funding for some time.

“The Albanese government recognises the significant contribution Leichhardt Oval has made, and continues to make, to sport in Australia,” the prime minister’s office said in a statement.

“It is on track to host 120 sporting fixtures in 2024, including both men’s and women’s national rugby league matches and dozens of other sport events including women and girls’ soccer.”

The funding will support new female-friendly change rooms, an increased seating capacity of 3,000, and a new northern grandstand.

Sarah Basford Canales

More on that audit report on My Health Record:

The audit office found the Australian Digital Health Agency, which runs the My Health Record platform, had only been “partly effective” in adhering to government rules due to “poor” contract planning.

The audit office found exemptions in the contracting rules allowing agencies to offer contracts directly to favoured suppliers should only be used in “situations consistent with the condition (extreme urgency brought about by events unforeseen by the entity) and not in situations of poor or late planning”.

The Anao recommended the agency resolve the issues and improve their processes in time to offer a competitive tender process for the platform’s IT management and maintenance by the middle of next year.

The agency blamed the Covid-19 pandemic for some of its shortcomings, noting “system stability and reliability were priorities in procurement approaches taken”.

It accepted 12 of the Anao’s recommendations and agreed in principle to another.

IT contract for My Health Record platform balloons out from $47m to $746m

Sarah Basford Canales

An IT contract for the country’s My Health Record increased more than 14 times its original value over 10 years due to poor planning, a scathing audit report has found.

The Australian National Audit Office, in its probe into contracts for the national digital health program, found a contract with Accenture grew from $47m in 2012 to its current value of $740m because the agency had failed to adequately plan for its ongoing maintenance needs and assess the contract’s value for money.

The digital database was created in 2012 as a tool for patients, doctors and specialists to share patient history, X-rays, prescriptions and other medical information with ease. Around $2bn has been spent on the platform.

The audit report, released on Wednesday, showed the original contract with Accenture was for $47m over two years to create the platform’s IT infrastructure. It had been amended 21 times between 2012 and 2017, growing to $506m.

It was then varied a further six times between 2018 and 2023, ballooning to $746m.

Bird flu has been detected at a sixth Victorian farm which was already in quarantine, Australia Associated Press reports.

The case of avian influenza (H7N3) was confirmed at a property in the Golden Plains shire, 200km south-west of Melbourne, Agriculture Victoria said last night.

All ducks at the property will be culled under veterinary supervision, with the site cleaned and cleared of the infection.

The duck farm, which is in the current restricted area, produces commercial eggs and meat.

Victoria’s chief veterinary officer, Graeme Cooke, said the detection isn’t wholly unexpected due to the farm’s proximity to other impacted sites.

“We have established restricted and control areas in proximity to existing IPs which has assisted us in limiting the spread and quickly detecting the sixth IP through comprehensive surveillance activities,” Dr Cooke said.

“It’s a difficult time for our farmers and we’re making sure mental health support is available and eligible producers can access compensation.”

UK Labour ‘fully committed’ to Aukus pact

Daniel Hurst

The UK government would remain “fully committed” to the Aukus pact if Labour wins next month’s election.

Labour – which enjoys a significant lead in the opinion polls – released its manifesto last night. The section on the UK’s place in the world includes this passage:

Labour is fully committed to Aukus, the trilateral security partnership with Australia and the United States. We will ensure it delivers its full economic as well as security potential, increasing jobs and investment in communities across the UK.

The manifesto also promises that a Labour in the UK would “bring a long-term and strategic approach to managing our relations” with China, adding:

We will co-operate where we can, compete where we need to, and challenge where we must.

This has echoes of the Australian government’s refrain on China that “We will cooperate where we can, disagree where we must and engage in our national interest”.

The UK Labour party also says it is “committed to recognising a Palestinian state as a contribution to a renewed peace process which results in a two-state solution with a safe and secure Israel alongside a viable and sovereign Palestinian state”.

Good morning and welcome to our final news blog of the week. I’m Martin Farrer and I’m here to bring you the best of the morning stories before Mostafa Rachwani sets up.

Our top story this morning is an exclusive revealing that Queensland’s commitment to new laws to prevent faith-based schools from discriminating against gay teachers is being sacrificed as part of the Labor government’s electoral calculus. Advocates say the decision to shelve new anti-discrimination laws will leave women fleeing domestic violence, people with disabilities and members of the LGBTQ+ community at risk.

The big story of the week has been Peter Dutton’s plan to scrap the Coalition’s commitment to the government’s 2030 emissions target, thus reigniting the “climate wars”. Our political editor, Karen Middleton, writes today about how the bad-tempered exchanges between Anthony Albanese and Dutton about the policy show both sides are “stress-testing” their messaging ahead of next year’s election.

Immunisation rates are lagging in Australia’s most vulnerable populations – the very young and old – with experts blaming practical barriers as well as the misinformation and vaccine hesitancy that took off during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The National Audit Office has issued a scathing report on a government IT contract that ballooned from $47m to $740m due to bad planning. More on that soon.

And bird flu has been found at a sixth farm in Victoria. Agriculture Victoria said last night the case of Avian influenza (H7N3) was confirmed at a property in the Golden Plains shire, 200km south-west of Melbourne. More coming up.