The home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, slammed Donald Trump Jr on Twitter - in tweets she has since deleted - as “a bit of a sore loser” and “a big baby” after his tour to Australia was postponed.
Fire and Rescue NSW crews have extinguished the fire at a detention centre at Villawood in Sydney’s west today, during which detainees on the top floor had to smash windows and jump onto mattresses below to escape the smoke.
Protesters arrested as bulldozing begins at NT Gouldian finch habitat site
Adam Morton
Traditional owners in Darwin have made an emergency application urging the federal environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, to order that bulldozing of native forest near the NT capital be stopped on cultural heritage grounds.
Video posted on social media shows bulldozers clearing savanna woodlands at Lee Point, less than 20km from Darwin city, to make way for a defence housing development.
Plibersek approved the clearing last month, but acknowledged there was a significant risk to more than 100 endangered Gouldian finches spotted in the area. She said it could go ahead with some changes to the original proposal, including a 50 metre buffer around the known finch habitat near a waterhole.
Ten people were arrested in a protest at the site today and dozens of scientists attending an ecology conference in Darwin were headed to the site late this afternoon.
Traditional owners said the area, also known as Binybara, had trees that dated back to 1759. They said they feared the site’s history and culture could be lost in the next few days.
The organisation Environmental Justice Australia lodged the application with the minister to halt the clearing under section 9 of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Heritage Protection Act.
Larrakia Danggalaba elder Tibby Quall said her people had been living off the Binybara land “since time immemorial”:
I’m 74 and I’ve been living here and taking family to Binburra my whole life. It’s a sacred place.
Why are they building in a place where thousands of people enjoy fishing, hunting and exercising every day of the week?
Plibersek’s office has been asked for its response.
Former ministerial staffer suing NSW Liberal party
Despite being aware of serious allegations of misconduct, the Liberal party was able to sit on its hands and do nothing because it did not have to face the legal consequences, a court has heard.
Former ministerial staffer Natalie Baini is suing the New South Wales division of the Liberal party, alleging she was unfairly blocked from being preselected for the inner west Sydney seat of Reid at the 2019 federal election.
On Thursday, Baini acknowledged that the party’s status as an unincorporated association meant it could not actually be pursued in the lawsuit.
She told the NSW supreme court that this status should not be misused as a “shield” that prevented accountability.
Lidia Thorpe says she has been ‘excluded’ from writing voice no pamphlet
Josh Butler
Independent senator Lidia Thorpe says she expects to be shut out of contributing to the “no” essay in the official referendum pamphlet, despite opposing the Indigenous voice and campaigning against its success.
However, the Victorian politician has flagged sending her own literature to voters, even if it isn’t included in the pamphlet.
Thorpe said in a statement today:
The Coalition has made it clear to my office that they are the ones writing the No pamphlet and that they are only interested in my contribution if it aligns with their priorities. They will decide what goes in the pamphlet.
As we have reported, the Coalition has the majority on the “no” committee and will therefore basically be able to decide on their own what goes in the “no” essay that will be distributed to all voters.
Thorpe, the left-wing former Greens senator backing a so-called “progressive no” vote, has aired similar concerns:
I’ve been excluded from the writing of the no pamphlet as there are no processes in place to provide a fair discussion of what should be in it or to ensure that my analysis of the voice will be shared with the Australian people.
Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, shadow Indigenous Australians minister and leader of the “no” campaign, declined to answer numerous requests for comment from Guardian Australia in recent days about whether Thorpe’s views would be included.
Thorpe said she would be “putting out a statement on the voice with a focus on providing information to those voting on the referendum that is factual, [that] explains how the voice is just another advisory body that can be ignored by government and [which] was not informed by self-determination.”
More on that fire in Melbourne’s Southbank: a Fire Rescue Victoria statement says the fire involves two small factories and that there are no reported occupants in the buildings.
Police officers and paramedics are also at the scene.
A fire has erupted from a Melbourne city building, with smoke pouring over the city.
Social media footage shows the building in Southbank engulfed in flames.
Fire Rescue Victoria says there is no threat to the community but residents should remain indoors and monitor conditions. Fire Rescue Victoria crews are attending the scene on Clarendon Street.
Nine, the publisher of the Australian Financial Review, has just issued an apology for the “no” campaign advertisement published this morning.
In a statement, a spokesperson for the company said:
The political advertisement about The Voice Referendum placed into today’s Financial Review should not have run and we apologise for that. We want to encourage a mature debate from both sides and avoid personal and/or inappropriate attacks.
There is public transport chaos brewing in Sydney this afternoon with a number of train services out of action due to “operational issues” and “staffing and resourcing issues”.
Various Sydney train lines – including the T1, T2 and T5 lines – are reporting services not running and at least an extra hour of travel time for those that are.
At about 3pm, Sydney Trains’ T1 twitter account posted:
Most Cumberland Line trains are not running due to a staff resourcing issue. T1 Western Line trains are not running between Parramatta and St Marys and between Parramatta and Blacktown/Richmond.
A later update suggested trains were running again but that there were delays and possible changes to stops.
Commuters were urged to allow extra time, delay their trips or consider alternative transport options.
Marcus Stewart from the Referendum Working Group has been speaking on ABC TV this afternoon about the “no” campaign’s advertisement today (which you can read more about here).
He said he “felt sick” when he saw the ad:
How can you sit comfortable in portraying our people like that? It’s offensive, it’s upsetting and I think we’re better than that. Let’s argue this on its merits on the reform, let’s not get personal, let’s not actually portray people and belittle people, we’re better than that.
To look at the picture and think it anything but racist is insane.
International flights leaving Australia set to be delayed after IT outage
Elias Visontay
Delays are expected to hit international flights out of Australia due to a technical outage of the system processing passengers.
There were queues at international check-in counters at Melbourne airport on Thursday, after the system relied on by the Australian Border Force (ABF) stopped working.
An ABF spokesperson told Guardian Australia that check-in staff at all international check-in points across the country have had to revert to manual processing of passengers where applicable.
Manual processing has meant queues are moving “very very slowly” according to those on the ground at Melbourne airport, and Guardian Australia understands the outage will likely lead to delays to international flights later on Thursday.
Disruptions are understood to be less severe in Sydney and Brisbane, with manual processing numbers so far proving more manageable due to the number of flights and passengers at those airports throughout the first half of Thursday.
The outage has meant the ABF’s passenger screening information is not being communicated to desks where airlines are checking in passengers, forcing checks to be done manually.
Guardian Australia understands additional ABF staff are working in response to the outage.
The ABF spokesperson said the force “can confirm our service provider who manages the Advanced Passenger Processing systems (APP) is experiencing an IT outage”:
The system outage is affecting the APP in all international check-in points. We are working with the service provider to assist with resolving the matter urgently.
Looking ahead to the robodebt royal commission, one woman wants answers
The same questions still consume Colleen Taylor.
Former Centrelink employee Colleen Taylor, who worked at Department of Human Services when she became an internal whistleblower. Photograph: Dan Peled/The Guardian
They have persisted in her mind, unanswered, in the half a decade since she quit Centrelink, despondent that her efforts to raise the alarm about robodebt were being ignored at the highest levels.
Now, in little more than 24 hours, the robodebt royal commission may finally give her some answers.
James Paterson calls Clare O’Neil’s tweets ‘childish’
Liberal senator James Paterson has continued to attack the home affairs minister, Clare O’Neil, for her now-deleted tweets calling Donald Trump Jr a “big baby”.
Paterson wrote on Twitter:
It’s good to see these childish tweets have now been deleted. The minister should leave the woke tweets to Labor backbenchers and get back to focusing on the serious national security challenges facing Australia.
A tweet from Australian Federal Senator James Paterson Photograph: @SenPaterson/Twitter
Storms forecast for Victorian coastline this weekend
A big storm surge is forecast for the weekend across the Victorian coast, with sea levels over a foot above the normal tide, bringing stronger winds, ocean waves to 6m and high tides.
Big storm surge forecast for the weekend, with over a foot of extra sea level above the normal tide, maybe comparable to the 2014 event (which flooded Nepean Hwy at Frankston!). Winds with a long fetch of over 30knots, ocean waves to 6m, and high tides. https://t.co/nnohWg5OyLpic.twitter.com/TEwkT6VVkA
