The NSW greens have accused the premier, Chris Minns, of undermining the state’s independent judiciary by appearing to reject the NSW court of appeal’s finding that public assembly restriction declaration (Pard) laws were unconstitutional.
Earlier, the premier was asked about the court’s ruling that the use of social cohesion to justify the laws was not legitimate. In an extended answer before ending the press conference, he took aim at the Greens’ support for protesters charged following February’s protest at Sydney’s town hall, claiming he there had been “violent confrontations” and “violent rhetoric and hateful, hateful phrases via loudspeakers on Sydney streets” in the two years leading up to it.
The idea that the police and the government’s rational and proportionate changes to the law that we pursued after that Bondi terrorist attack somehow spurred these people into a violent confrontation is utter garbage.
Minns has previously said that protesters put police in an “impossible situation” by seeking to march in defiance of the Pard laws and a major events declaration.
In a statement this afternoon, the Greens justice spokesperson, Sue Higginson, said the premier had “launched an extraordinary attack on our independent judiciary”, calling on the premier and police commissioner, Mal Lanyon, “to accept that they got it wrong and stop these bad prosecutions against the community”.
The actions by the premier and the police caused serious harm and the police relied on powers that were unlawful, for the premier and the police commissioner to double down in the face of this failure and say ‘oh well we had the major event declaration as back up’, likely won’t cut it in the Courts.
Minns has been contacted for comment.
Thanks for staying with us today. Here were the day’s top stories:
Queensland police confirm death of helicopter pilot
Queensland police have confirmed the death of a helicopter pilot after a crash in western Queensland.
Emergency services were called to a helicopter crash near Blackall, about 965km north-west of Brisbane, on Monday morning about 9.30am.
“The pilot and sole occupant of the helicopter, a 42-year-old man, was declared deceased at scene,” a spokesperson for the police said.
A spokesperson for the Australian transport safety bureau said it had launched an investigation into the incident.
The Robinson R22 helicopter crashed at Pretty Plains Station after being “observed descending rapidly, prior to a collision with terrain,” the spokesperson said.
A team of investigators is expected to arrive at the remote location tomorrow.
Barnaby Joyce says One Nation poll dip due to convicted rapist
Barnaby Joyce has said One Nation likely lost support over hiring and firing of convicted rapist Sean Black, while failing to rule out the chance Black is still volunteering for the party.
Pauline Hanson last week said she had fired Black after his employment received media attention. Joyce pointed to the coverage as a reason for today’s Resolve poll finding One Nation support had slipped by 2% (within the margin of error), when asked by Afternoon Briefing host Patricia Karvelas on the ABC:
Yes, in the last week the Sean Black thing was not good media, but Sean Black is now gone and we move on. … He doesn’t work for us any more, Patricia, he is gone …
Asked if Black was volunteering for One Nation or remained on its payroll, Joyce said:
He is not working for us any more. That is the advice I have got and that is the advice I’m running with. I’m not trying to be evasive. I’m telling you exactly what I know …
There’s no reason the people who told me that are pulling my leg or telling me a yarn …
The Coalition is worried about One Nation when they should be worried about the nation … and that suits us. If they have their eyes on us and we have our eyes on the Australian people, ultimately I know which one the Australian people will be supporting … You can write things on the back of the toilet door about us. It doesn’t get you votes.
Joyce went on:
I can go through every party and find mistakes they have made. We can do that. We can go and have a litany of cathartic dispositions about certain people and when they were employed and why they were employed. I [can] go to the ABC and fire them, one, two, three, four, five people who did this and did that and I can prove it and say to you: ‘Patricia, do you feel comfortable working for the ABC? Do you think you should be with that organisation?’. You’d say: ‘Did we deal with the problem, well yes, we dealt with the problem, move on.’
Shell will send Australian chair to gas inquiry – but still no CEOs
Just circling back to earlier news about the parliamentary inquiry into the tax settings for gas companies, which kicks off in Canberra tomorrow.
As reported, the chief executives of the major gas companies won’t be giving evidence despite invitations from the Greens-chaired committee.
But while one of those companies, Shell, won’t be sending its chief executive, the committee will hear from its most senior person in Australia – country chair, Cecile Wake.
Wake is due to give evidence at 11am on Wednesday.
Barnaby Joyce says Australians risk losing US military defence by criticising Trump
Barnaby Joyce has claimed One Nation is not having trouble for its association with Donald Trump and warned criticising the US president risks leaving Australia without military defence.
Appearing on the ABC’s Afternoon Briefing, Joyce denied Trump was a problem for the party’s brand, after GetUp attack ads highlighted One Nation’s support for the foreign president. He said:
No, the ABC would like to make it a problem for us, but I don’t think it is … What you’re actually saying is, ‘Donald trump is a problem for you, isn’t it Barnaby, I want you to affirm that on TV.’ And I’m not going to do that ‘cos I don’t think it is.
Asked for his personal opinion on Trump, Joyce said:
We have got ourselves into an awful pickle because of our lack of power that we should have to deal with the circumstances we find ourselves in, in south-east Asia which is where we live. And if we get too far out of our lane, believe you me United States can live [without] us but we cannot live without United States …
Our defence policy at the moment, from what I can see, is if we get into trouble, we get the United States’ mums and dads to send their sons and daughters over to die for Australia. And that’s a pretty poor defence policy because we have no hope of conducting it by ourselves.
Because you have an incredibly awe-inspiring contract you would hope the American people would honour, you have to be careful what you say about United States of America, and, whether you like it or not, their elected president.
Coalition calls for 5% deposit scheme to be means-tested
Andrew Bragg, the Coalition housing spokesperson, has suggested the 5% deposit housing program should be means-tested.
The Coalition last week called for the Albanese government’s first home buyer scheme to exclude permanent residents, days after One Nation’s Pauline Hanson criticised the program’s open design.
Bragg this afternoon appeared to call for further restrictions, excluding high-wealth or high-income people. When asked on the ABC about whether the NDIS should be means-tested, he pivoted to the 5% deposit scheme:
In general, we need more means testing across the board. In my own portfolio we have the 5% deposits available to any Australian regardless of their income.
What you’ve seen there is a massive increase in house prices for entry-level houses, which has meant the Australian dream is further out of reach for younger Australians. It’s crazy we have programs that aren’t means-tested.
Read more on how the Coalition took up One Nation’s anti-immigration stance on that first home buyer scheme:
No means-testing for the NDIS, assistant minister for Treasury says
Andrew Leigh, Labor’s assistant minister for Treasury, has ruled out means-testing for the national disability insurance scheme ahead of key talks on budget cuts for the program.
Guardian Australia has reported the states are on edge about the federal government’s plans to cut and shift costs for the scheme on to state governments.
Leigh has told the ABC’s Afternoon Briefing:
We understand the NDIS is the biggest savings challenge we have in the budget … When we came to office it was growing at 22% a year.
Asked whether the Albanese government would “play hardball” with state governments, Leigh said:
I am confident they are coming to these conversations with goodwill. States and territories before the NDIS played a more significant role in supporting people with disability and their families.
On whether the NDIS should be means-tested, Leigh said:
My understanding is that’s not on the table at the moment. We are focused principally on cost control in this scheme.
Gina Rinehart blames Coalition, not just Labor, for fuel crisis
Gina Rinehart, Australia’s richest person, has weighed in on the fuel crisis, blaming the country’s dependence on imports in part on the Coalition.
The comments follow Rinehart distancing herself from the Liberals and Nationals as she backs the smaller rightwing party One Nation.
Rinehart said Australia’s dependence on imports for its fuel needs demonstrated the failures of the Coalition as well as Labor governments. She told a Hancock Iron Ore event on Friday night:
Australia was previously around 96% fuel sufficient. Excessive tape, excessive approvals, be that Labor or Coalition, the Paris Agreement, the unreliable, expensive net zero we cannot afford, has changed this …
This is not the petrol stations’ fault. It is not even the recent Iran war. It is successive governments who have caused us to become around 96% dependent on overseas fuel and have not even spent the money we should have on creating fuel reserves, as stipulated by the International Energy Agency.
Excess bureaucracy not familiar with industry, ideological policies, weak governments and green fantasies driven by those who don’t want to understand this deters [mining] investment …
The irresponsible policies of both Labor and the Coalition increasingly against our industry is seeing investors increasingly focus their investments overseas, decisions which affect Australians future and our already record debt.
A man has died while delivering glass panes to a home in Dural, in Sydney’s north-west.
A number of the sheets collapsed on to the 49-year-old as he brought the glass to the Valencia Street property this morning, New South Wales police said.
Emergency services were called at about 11.30am, with Fire and Rescue and NSW Ambulance arriving to assist. Paramedics treated the man but he could not be revived and died at the scene, police said.
A crime scene was established and Worksafe NSW has been notified.
The NSW greens have accused the premier, Chris Minns, of undermining the state’s independent judiciary by appearing to reject the NSW court of appeal’s finding that public assembly restriction declaration (Pard) laws were unconstitutional.
Earlier, the premier was asked about the court’s ruling that the use of social cohesion to justify the laws was not legitimate. In an extended answer before ending the press conference, he took aim at the Greens’ support for protesters charged following February’s protest at Sydney’s town hall, claiming he there had been “violent confrontations” and “violent rhetoric and hateful, hateful phrases via loudspeakers on Sydney streets” in the two years leading up to it.
The idea that the police and the government’s rational and proportionate changes to the law that we pursued after that Bondi terrorist attack somehow spurred these people into a violent confrontation is utter garbage.
Minns has previously said that protesters put police in an “impossible situation” by seeking to march in defiance of the Pard laws and a major events declaration.
In a statement this afternoon, the Greens justice spokesperson, Sue Higginson, said the premier had “launched an extraordinary attack on our independent judiciary”, calling on the premier and police commissioner, Mal Lanyon, “to accept that they got it wrong and stop these bad prosecutions against the community”.
The actions by the premier and the police caused serious harm and the police relied on powers that were unlawful, for the premier and the police commissioner to double down in the face of this failure and say ‘oh well we had the major event declaration as back up’, likely won’t cut it in the Courts.
Minns has been contacted for comment.
Thanks Nick Visser and good afternoon readers. I’ll be guiding you through the rest of the day’s breaking news.
That’s all from me, folks. Luca Ittimani will take things from here. Take care!
Trucking companies and workers have welcomed the Fair Work Commission’s order for businesses to adjust their fuel payments every fortnight.
The FWC today ordered businesses who contract out their transport services to review the amount they pay for fuel cover more regularly.
The order will come into force tomorrow, in response to the surge fuel prices since conflict in the Middle East closed the strait of Hormuz and restricted oil supply.
It will last until diesel wholesale prices fall below $2 a litre, well below their level today of close to $2.60 a litre.
The Transport Workers’ Union national secretary, Michael Kaine, said:
This is a historic order from the Fair Work Commission that, for the first time, puts obligations on the wealthy clients at the top of our supply chains to pay their fair share to the transport industry.
Over the last few weeks drivers and transport businesses have outlined the dire circumstances they are facing with diesel costs, many already having to park up their trucks or rely on personal loans just to keep going.
The Australian Road Transport Industrial Organisation, speaking for employers, also welcomed the decision. National secretary Peter Anderson said:
“The entire transport industry will benefit from this emergency fuel order, which will assist transport businesses small and large with getting through the fuel crisis.
Adelaide University considers dropping Santos name from building
The newly formed Adelaide University is considering removing gas company Santos’s name from one of its buildings.
On Saturday, students and conservationists rallied outside the Santos Petroleum Engineering building, calling on the university to dump the name because of the company’s new gas projects.
The university had already been considering dropping the name after a sponsorship deal expired, its vice-chancellor told Guardian Australia.
Prof Nicola Phillips started as vice-chancellor in January after the University of South Australia and the University of Adelaide merged.
“That process of consideration was already under way,” she said.
Read more here:
Queensland parliament to debate third round of adult crime laws
Queensland parliament will debate a third round of the state’s “adult crime laws this week
“We promised Queenslanders to restore safety where they live, and today, I can announce that this week in parliament, we will be debating the third tranche of adult crime adult time,” youth justice minister, Laura Gerber, said on Monday.
The expanding “adult crime, adult time” and taking a strong stance on the drugs and antisocial behaviour amendment bill 2026 is a broad-ranging bill with three main elements.
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It rolls back the state’s drug diversionary scheme.
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The bill gives police expanded move on powers in designated precincts allowing them to ban people from returning to a place for three months, which critics say would be used against vulnerable groups such as the homeless.
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It also adds an additional 12 offences to the state’s “adult time, adult crime” sentencing system, which increases youth sentences.
The deputy opposition leader, Cameron Dick, refused to say how the opposition would vote on the bill this morning, though Labor’s statement of reservation on the bill says it would take “an iron fist to the most vulnerable in our communities”.
Like the other two adult crime laws, the bill limits a number of human rights, including the right to protection from cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment and the right to liberty and security of person, among others, according to the government.
Environment minister says Taylor talking ‘rubbish’
The environment minister, Murray Watt, criticised Taylor’s speech in a post to X.
Once again Angus Taylor is talking absolute rubbish about fast-tracking projects, this time in WA. Taylor and the Liberals had ten years to overhaul the EPBC Act to fast-track project approvals but instead oversaw the closure of four fuel refineries.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: theguardian.com
