Good morning. Anthony Albanese’s newly sworn-in cabinet will meet on Thursday as Labor considers how best to respond to a cost-of-living crisis facing Australians, including soaring energy bills and rising interest rates for mortgage holders.
Labor faces calls to provide emergency assistance to those on low incomes hit hardest by rising costs. Albanese said on Wednesday that cost-of-living concerns would be “front and centre” of the cabinet meeting and that the cabinet would “consider what can be done” while being “economically responsible as a government. The consideration of further cost-of-living relief comes as the government also mulls how to intervene in the energy market to get on top of soaring power prices, which are threatening to stoke further inflationary pressures.
The amount of plastic pollution on Australia’s coast has decreased by up to 30% on average as a result of work by local governments to reduce litter, according to research by Australia’s science agency. Denise Hardesty, a CSIRO researcher and one of the paper’s co-authors, described it as a “heartening” sign of change.
Australia’s law enforcement integrity watchdog refused to investigate the Australian Federal Police who relied on a deeply flawed technique to use false dates of birth on sworn legal documents to prosecute Indonesian children as adult people smugglers. The Guardian used a trove of internal documents to show how police relied on flawed evidence to alter the dates of birth given to them by Indonesian children found crewing asylum boats in 2009 and 2010. The new dates were used to allege the boys were adults, paving the way for their prosecution and imprisonment.
Australia
The new minister for financial services has asked Treasury for advice on how to compensate Indigenous people who were victims of the collapse of the funeral expenses fund Youpla. Stephen Jones, who was sworn in last Wednesday after Labor’s election victory, stopped short of committing the Albanese government to compensating the victims, telling Guardian Australia he first needed to understand how big the problem was.
The death rate in Australia in 2020 was the lowest ever recorded, according to newly released data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. In 2020, 627.8 people for every 100,000 died of any cause, a figure that has trended steadily downwards since the 1940s. There were 161,300 deaths in total.
Tenants in Sydney have been told by their real estate agency it is “critical” they regularly open windows during winter to restrict the spread of mould.
The world
Chinese and Cambodian officials attended a ceremony for a controversial naval port expansion on Wednesday, dismissing reports that the base will provide a crucial strategic foothold for Beijing. Albanese has described Cambodia’s reported arrangement with China as “concerning”.
Authorities in the Brazilian Amazon have arrested a man in connection with the disappearance of a British journalist and an Indigenous advocate as calls grew for swift action in the case that has shocked the media and environment worlds.
Harvey Weinstein will face two charges of indecent assault against a woman in London in 1996, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has announced. After a review of evidence gathered by the Metropolitan police, the CPS gave the force the green light to charge the former Hollywood film producer on Wednesday.
UK home secretary Priti Patel’s plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda as soon as next week is facing a legal challenge under emergency proceedings launched in the high court on Wednesday.
Moscow’s chief rabbi, Pinchas Goldschmidt, is “in exile” after resisting Kremlin pressure to support the war in Ukraine, his daughter-in-law has said.
A New Zealand man who spent 19 years in prison for murder has had his conviction quashed after the supreme court found there had been a substantial miscarriage of justice when key evidence was not disclosed in the original trial – something the crown itself acknowledged was wrong.
Recommended reads
I lost my home, moved into a van and found freedom, writes Charlotte Bradman. After a devastating breakup and her beautiful home being repossessed, Bradman packed everything she owned into her campervan and headed to Cornwall.
The poignantly titled anthology production We Are Still Here draws together film-makers from Australia, New Zealand and the south Pacific to respond to the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook’s arrival in the region. Combining eight strands from 10 directors, the film reaches into the past, dramatising debates within Māori communities about whether to fight in the Battle of Ōrākau of 1864 (Te Puuru, written and directed by Tim Worrall and Richard Curtis); and visiting the trenches of Gallipoli where a Samoan soldier bonds with a Turkish enemy during the first world war.
Listen
The energy and climate change minister, Chris Bowen, has held an emergency meeting with state and territory ministers about the impending energy crisis, with electricity prices soaring up to 18% as supply issues plague much of the country. Laura Murphy-Oates speaks with economics correspondent, Peter Hannam, about what’s really behind this crisis and how we could prevent another one.
Full Story is Guardian Australia’s daily news podcast. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or any other podcasting app.
Sport
The golden age of Queensland began its decline with the retirement of Billy Slater, but the state’s resurgence has begun with his appointment as coach. In a victory that will live long in the collective memory of those north of the Tweed, the underdog Maroons defeated the Blues 16-10 in front of a sold-out Homebush heaving at the seams to not only boot Slater’s career off with a win but add to the Queensland Origin legend.
Media roundup
Police have uncovered a suspected Chinese money-laundering syndicate headquartered in Victoria and NSW that is moving hundreds of millions of dollars annually to China and across the globe, raising questions about whether Beijing is turning a blind eye to organised crime, the Sydney Morning Herald reports. A former Australian diplomat is warning the new Solomon Islands and China security pact could see Australian and Chinese troops on the ground in the Pacific country at the same time, according to the ABC.
Coming up
New Zealand’s prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, and Albanese will hold informal and formal talks in Sydney on Thursday night.
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