What happened today, Friday 19 March 2021
And so we shall leave it there for today, and for the week. Here’s what went down today:
- NSW recorded no new local Covid cases, but did record five new cases from overseas arrivals. There were also no further locally acquired positive cases from any states today.
- Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk today announced the lifting of some restrictions across the state, including on hospitals, aged care and disability services.
- Christian Porter’s seat of Pearce was not abolished today, as the Australian Electoral Commission announced a set of changes to electoral borders in WA and Victoria.
- Prime minister Scott Morrison stood by the country’s GP network as the best way to deliver the Covid vaccine.
- Qantas workers will continue receiving wage subsidy when jobkeeper ends, on the back of the government’s aviation tourism support scheme.
- A shipment of the Pfizer vaccine meant for South Australia has reportedly ended up in WA, delaying the vaccine rollout there.
And that brings to an end another hectic and difficult week. Thank you for joining us on the blog, and please take care of yourselves. We’ll see you next week.
Updated
Former AMA president Dr Mukesh Haikerwal was on the ABC’s Afternoon Briefing today, to discuss all things vaccine rollout, and he said he supported the PM’s belief that the network of GPs around the country were well-equipped to deliver the vaccine:
I think it’s always been the right thing to do in general practices. There are 500 general practices around the country. We have been doing vaccinations for people all the way through life from childhood immunisations for babies to travel immunisations, and of course influenza and other vaccines in later life.
Last year, there were over six million of these in under six weeks. The issue is of course this isn’t quite the same. We’re in a time of Covid-normal social distancing, we need more floor space to get more people in and you’ve actually got to make sure people actually get to the vaccine and have a repeat vaccine.
There are many different things to take into account but certainly we get up to do it and want to do it. But we just need to be supported to do it.
Updated
South Australia’s vaccination rollout is set to “massively” climb in the coming weeks, after a careful and steady start, as per the AAP.
SA is currently using both the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines and has administered almost 13,000 doses so far.
On Thursday, 1,504 jabs were given, with that rate now expected to increase significantly.
Premier Steven Marshall agreed the rollout had been “careful” to begin with, but expected an exponential step up.
Yes, it was careful to begin with. But I’m now seeing that daily run rate massively increase.
We’ll start to see that sail past 3,000, 4,000, and 5,000 per day going forward.
From Monday, more than 80 GP clinics across the state will also join the vaccination program, although it remains unclear if they will all have enough supplies to cater for demand.
SA Health reported one new coronavirus case today, a man in his 30s who recently returned from overseas.
His case is considered an old infection but he remains in hotel quarantine.
SA currently has 15 active cases, all in hotel isolation.
Updated
Residents in low-lying areas of Port Macquire have been ordered to evacuate as rising flood waters and wild weather lashes NSW.
The State Emergency Service (SES) has asked people to leave by 8pm tonight, when it is expected that flood water levels will rise above 1.75 metres, causing extensive flooding.
In their evacuation order, the SES said that services may be lost to the area once flood waters rise:
Once flood water begins inundating the area, road access, water, sewerage, power, phones and internet may be lost. If you remain in the area you will be trapped and it may be too dangerous to rescue you.
Evacuation orders have also been issued for low-lying areas of North Haven, Dunbogan, Diamond Head and Laurieton.
Updated
The school captain at Brisbane Boys’ College has given a speech to his classmates, calling on them to show “basic acceptance and respect”.
Brisbane Boys’ college was one of a number of private boys’ schools that were named after Chanel Contos, a former student of a Sydney girls’ school, called for victims to share testimonies of sexual assaults perpetrated by students of all-boys schools.
You can read the wonderful speech from Mason Black, printed in the Guardian today:
Updated
Pfizer vaccine shipment meant for SA ends up in WA, delaying rollout – report
In a concerning development, a shipment of the Pfizer vaccine that was destined for South Australia has ended up in Western Australia, delaying the state’s rollout.
The ABC is reporting that some aged care facilities were told today by the federal health department that scheduled vaccinations would not be happening today.
It’s not clear how many vaccines have accidentally turned up in WA, or if some were the second Pfizer doses.
Updated
Some further detail from the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) report into the $3.3m grant given to Shine Energy for the Collinsville feasibility study.
The report noted that confidential Australian government information was transmitted to various non-government email accounts.
This included email correspondence from Shine Energy that was sent by the industry department to the non-government account of their spouse.
Various documents were emailed by a ministerial adviser to the Gmail or msn email accounts of the minister (Angus Taylor). Those documents included: the Phase 1 findings presentation report about Collinsville, materials relating to the “big stick” energy legislation and “a draft report on the impacts of the closure of Liddell power station on system reliability, electricity prices, industry, and the local region along with corresponding modelling reports prepared by Frontier Economics and the Australian Energy Market Operator”.
For those crying But His Emails! we note the department:
- In January 2021 told the ANAO it had conducted an ICT audit of the information sent to the departmental officer’s spouse and had confirmed “no other emails have been sent of a similar nature”.
- In March 2021 it advised ANAO that the incoming ministerial brief contained the information security policy which sets out minimum standards.
Updated
You might remember Scott Morrison and Michael McCormack appeared in front of Qantas’s planes and held a press conference last week to announce a $1.2m support package for the tourism industry that centred on half-price flights to tourism hubs to help the sector after jobkeeper ends.
So what’s happened since that photo-op? In the two days following the government announcement, data provided to the Guardian by online travel booking site KAYAK.com.au shows searches for flights to some of the 13 destinations where half-price flights would be offered surged.
Searches for flights to Broome – a destination with one of the most expensive base fares for flights – were seven times higher than normal, while searches for flights to Alice Springs rose by a factor of four.
Flights to Cairns and Launceston were searched for at triple the average rate, while searches for Hamilton Island/Whitsundays doubled.
In the week the package was announced, the Gold Coast – one of the eligible destinations – rose above Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne from the fourth most searched airport in Australia to become the most searched for destination on KAYAK. Broome also rose to be the 11th most searched for destination in that time period.
While the announcement led to increased interest in Broome and some of the Queensland destinations, search increases were less noticeable for other cities.
Only a slightly above average number of searches were recorded for flights to Merimbula, Burnie and Devonport, with none of these cities ranking in the top 20 searched Australian destinations in the week of the announcement.
The sector remains sceptical the package can fill the void the ongoing international border closure has created, with others claiming the government subsidies for half-priced flights will mostly help the aviation sector, not tourism operators.
Labor initially criticised the government for selecting 13 destinations in what it claimed were marginal seats, and state governments including New South Wales have called for more destinations to be added within their states.
You can find out more about the flights, and how you can take advantage of the half-price airfare offer the government is subsidising, here:
Updated
Another week, another cracking Weekly Beast column from Amanda Meade, with Sky News being dumped as a regional broadcaster.
The column also covers the ABC’s attempt to broaden its coverage, with the decision to open a “pop-up studio”, in Liverpool, in Sydney’s south-west.
You can read it here:
Updated
A nurse has been stood down after giving an aged care resident in northern Tasmania the coronavirus vaccine without their consent.
AAP has the story:
The resident at Meercroft Care in Devonport was on Tuesday mistakenly inoculated and is being closely monitored for possible side-effects.
“An Aspen Health officer mistakenly gave a Meercroft resident a vaccine without the proper consent form,” CEO Wendy Shearer said in a statement.
“Meercroft takes issues of informed consent extremely seriously and is devastated that this mistake has occurred.
“We immediately contacted the relevant family and reported and apologised for the incident.”
Aspen Medical said the highly experienced staff member had been stood down pending an investigation.
“The aged care facility presented and prepared a resident, whose legal guardian had not provided consent, to be vaccinated against Covid-19,” a spokesman said.
“It was understood by the aged care facility that consent had been provided and they communicated this to our nurse immuniser.
“An additional consent check, as required by our own internal procedures, was not performed by our nurse immuniser at the facility.”
Aspen Medical apologised unreservedly to the resident and their family for any hurt and upset caused by the error.
“We are adding additional procedures to minimise this event occurring in the future,” the spokesman said.
Meercroft was investigating how the incident occurred and if any additional checks should be put in place to ensure it does not happen again, Ms Shearer said.
The federal minister for aged care services, Richard Colbeck, has been contacted for comment.
More than 9000 Tasmanians have so far been given the coronavirus vaccine as part of the state and federal government rollout.
Updated
So Scott Morrison took questions earlier today, and built on the announcement that Qantas and Virgin will be receiving support from the government in light of the closure of international borders:
What’s most important here is that we ensure we maintain that international aviation capacity here in Australia because the international borders will open up again and we cannot be kept flat-footed on that. We want to be ready to go, to take-off and go wheels up as soon as the international aviation industry is able to go again.
The PM also discussed the vaccine supply to Papua New Guinea:
We made a big commitment to address the needs of the Indo-Pacific and Papua New Guinea certainly fits firm and squarely in the middle of our vision for realising that commitment that we’ve made.
So we will be taking this up very strongly. It’s not right for advanced countries in Europe to deny the supply of vaccines to developing countries who need it desperately like Papua New Guinea. We’ll do our bit.
Updated
Qantas workers to continue receiving wage subsidy when jobkeeper ends
Qantas has announced that workers who usually work on international routes will be receiving the $500-a-week wage payment after the jobkeeper scheme ends, under the government’s aviation tourism support scheme.
The scheme will cover more than 7,000 cabin crew, pilots, engineers and technicians, who will continue to receive the payments until October.
That funding is part of a larger support package that also includes assistance to provide training to staff, so they are ready to fly when international borders reopen.
Virgin will also be receiving the funding, but will be using it for training and to prepare more flights.
The treasurer, Josh Frydenberg, was on Nine Radio earlier today, and said the funding would ensure airlines would be ready to go once international borders reopen:
It’s a fact of the matter that we need to maintain a sovereign international aviation capability here in Australia, and what we’ve announced is a package that will support 8,500 jobs at Qantas and Virgin in our international aviation space.
Updated
Greensill Capital owes creditors more than $1.75bn, administrator says
Greensill Capital, the Australian company that owns a failed global finance group run by former Bundaberg sugar farmer Lex Greensill, owes creditors more than $1.75bn and doesn’t have enough money left to pay the entitlements of workers it has laid off, administrators say.
Creditors of the company, including Japanese fund Softbank and Swiss bank Credit Suisse, met with administrator Matt Byrnes, of accounting firm Grant Thornton, this morning.
In a statement, Grant Thornton said more than $1.75bn in claims from creditors has been submitted so far.
The vast majority of Greensill Capital’s staff – 35 of what was previously understood to be about 40 – were made redundant on Monday. Grant Thornton said it was preparing to make claims on the government’s fair entitlements guarantee scheme, which pays the entitlements of workers when companies go broke without enough in the kitty to cover the cost.
A second meeting is to be held on 22 April, at which creditors will vote on whether to liquidate the company.
Updated
PM says GP network best way to deliver Covid vaccine
Scott Morrison has spoken in Melbourne at a gathering of doctors about the ongoing vaccine rollout, with GPs due to start inoculating people from next week.
The prime minister said that although GPs were reportedly overwhelmed by people trying to get the vaccine when it was announced earlier this week, he believes the network of GPs around the country is the best way to deliver the vaccine:
But you all know that our GPs around the country do about 300,000 vaccinations on any given week.
Vaccinations is what you do, amongst many other things, in providing that primary healthcare around Australia.
And so the strategy for this national vaccination rollout, put together by [the health department secretary] Prof Murphy, together with all the experts that he’s drawn together for this purpose, has very much relied upon that experience and the network.
Updated
AAP has a story on a fisherman who has been fined for illegally feeding a dingo on Fraser Island, as Queensland authorities crack down six weeks after a dingo attack on a boy:
The Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service says the man was fined $2,135 after two rangers saw him throwing a fish to a young dingo at Orchid Beach township earlier this month.
QPWS has been trying to stop people feeding the mammals due to the risk of dingoes associating humans with food and become bolder around people.
Rangers are keen to prevent another attack after a nine-year-old boy was last month bitten on the leg on the island, also known as K’gari.
“Dingoes on K’gari are not starving and they have access to plenty of natural food,” the QPWS said in a statement on Friday.
“Anyone who breaks the law by deliberately feeding or interacting with dingoes or who fails to secure their food and rubbish can expect a fine or to appear in court.
“People who feed and interact with dingoes put themselves and other people in danger, as it increases the risk of dingo habituation (dingoes tolerating humans at relatively close range).”
Tourism operators and members of the public have recently been sharing photos and videos of people feeding dingoes with authorities, resulting in fines.
“QPWS rangers have zero tolerance for people who intentionally feed or interfere with dingoes and will hold offenders accountable,” QPWS said.
Updated
The Australian Electoral Commission has given further details on the changes to Victoria’s existing electoral divisions, where all but nine of the electoral divisons will change:
Under the proposal, the boundaries of all but nine of Victoria’s existing electoral divisions would change, an additional division would be created and one electoral division would be renamed #auspol https://t.co/Y7cxAdBIB7 pic.twitter.com/qwtDiOBzQY
— AEC ✏️ (@AusElectoralCom) March 19, 2021
A mice plague is sweeping through western NSW, leaving three people in hospital and towns scrambling to hold back the waves of endless rodents.
Hospitals across the region are stepping up their baiting and trapping procedures, as they try and stave off the plague.
Farmers have also been struggling with the mice, with one farmer approved to use a drone to drop poisoned bait onto them.
One farmer said the rodents were causing “serious problems”:
They are causing serious problems now, with people getting bitten. Rats are at a nuisance level, but the mice are in plague proportions, particularly in the north and west and south-west of the state.
You can read more on what is a wild and terrifying story from Naaman Zhao here, although I would advise against watching the video if you get queasy seeing too many mice:
Updated
South Australia has recorded another day of no new cases, with more than 2,500 tests recorded yesterday:
South Australian COVID-19 update 19/3/21. For more information, go to https://t.co/mYnZsGpayo or contact the South Australian COVID-19 Information Line on 1800 253 787. pic.twitter.com/pw1tVr5J95
— SA Health (@SAHealth) March 19, 2021
The state added to today’s numbers one historic case from an overseas arrival in quarantine.
Updated
A few more details on the proposed redistribution.
In Western Australia, Stirling’s voters will be split between Cowan (held by Labor’s Anne Aly), Curtin (Liberal Celia Hammond), Moore (Liberal Ian Goodenough) and Perth (Labor’s Patrick Gorman).
Porter’s seat of Pearce will lose the wheat-belt areas to Durack and O’Connor to the north.
In Victoria the Australian Electoral Commission proposes creating a new seat named after Bob Hawke in the fast-growing communities west of Melbourne. Currently in the seats of Ballarat and Gorton, the new seat of Hawke would take in Ballan, Bacchus Marsh, Melton, Diggers Rest and Sunbury.
The AEC proposes renaming Corangamite to Tucker after Margaret Tucker, an Indigenous woman and member of the stolen generations.
Updated
Christian Porter seat of Pearce not abolished
The Australian Electoral Commission has announced it has spared Christian Porter’s seat of Pearce and instead proposes to abolish the seat of Stirling, held by Liberal MP Vince Connelly:
The proposed names and boundaries for Western Australia’s federal @AboutTheHouse electorate boundaries have been released. #auspol
— AEC ✏️ (@AusElectoralCom) March 19, 2021
- Media release: https://t.co/eHMg4pHeer
- Key changes: 👇 pic.twitter.com/WVAMmTNAgD
Updated
Australia’s retail turnover dropped by 1.1% in February, as the pandemic and restrictions in Victoria and Western Australia hit hard.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics has released preliminary figures today, showing a turnover of up to 8.7% compared with February last year.
The bureau’s Ben James told AAP that restrictions in Victoria and WA drove the fall, but there were rises in NSW and Queensland.
Both these states had seen trade impacted by Covid-19 in January and in February saw rises in industries such as clothing, footwear and personal accessory retailing and department stores.
Updated
The Queensland premier also discussed the Hotel Grand Chancellor, saying there was “no evidence” of any failure at the hotel.
The Hotel Grand Chancellor will begin taking people back into the hotel for hotel quarantine ... CCTV has found no breaches whatsoever, I am advised.
Queensland’s chief health officer, Dr Jeannette Young, added:
The hotel is a superb hotel with a really good systems in place and have some of the best CCTV footage ever now, and I thank the police for the work so there was very good footage on that floor.
Young went on to discuss the positive case at the hotel, and exactly how authorities are theorising the virus spread:
The positive case we know transmitted to another case on the floor because of the genome sequencing. The positive case was in a room at one end of the corridor, with the event for that corridor outside that room. The case that actually got infected was right down the other end of the corridor.
There were a lot of rooms in between, which is why I am very grateful that those people have understood the need to have to remain in quarantine for longer, because I don’t understand how it has gone from ... room to room and those people haven’t got it.
Updated
Queensland lifts Covid restrictions in hospitals and aged care
Queensland premier Annastacia Palaszczuk is speaking now, announcing the state had recorded zero new locally acquired cases, and the lifting of some restrictions across the state, including on hospitals, aged care and disability services:
We have some more good news for Queensland today, especially in the greater Brisbane area. That is, as of noon today, all restrictions on hospitals, aged care and disability services are lifted.
This is fantastic news and I know there are a lot of people out there that need to go and see their loved ones. From 12 noon today, you are free to go and do that.
Updated
Albanese has continued, lashing the government for their “petulant” behaviour in their dealings on the IR bill:
Yesterday as well saw the government engaging in petulant and active vindictiveness because it couldn’t get its wage cuts through the Senate.
They got rid of the provisions that were supported by every senator and every member of the House of Representatives about wage theft.
An extraordinary act from an immature government that is in chaos, that doesn’t have the concern of Australian workers at its core. Everything is about political management and if Scott Morrison who, because he couldn’t get his full bill through, got rid of the wage theft provisions.
I just find that an extraordinary act of petulance from a Prime Minister who thinks that he should just get to decide everything that happens in the Parliament and that democracy is an inconvenience that he shouldn’t have to deal with.
Opposition leader Anthony Albanese has stepped up and is speaking in Sydney at the Labour Council of New South Wales, discussing wage theft in the agricultural industry and the government’s water down industrial relations bill:
We need to do much, much better and we need to address this now. The government has a report before it ... and it’s important the government response to that report. But it’s also important that they respond to the issue of ensuring that all Australians have access to a minimum wage.
They also need to make sure that they address the issues of secure work, but what we saw yesterday was the government cutting its own industrial relations bill and leaving just one change intact – a change that makes workers more insecure, a change to casual work that will change the definition so that people who are essentially in permanent work can give to their employees all the benefit of knowing that they have that permanent worker but without any of the conditions that come with permanent work.
Updated
NSW records no new local Covid cases but five from overseas
Sticking with NSW for a bit, the state has recorded a second consecutive day of zero locally acquired coronavirus cases, although five new cases were acquired overseas:
NSW recorded no new locally acquired cases of #COVID19 in the 24 hours to 8pm last night.
— NSW Health (@NSWHealth) March 19, 2021
Five new cases were acquired overseas, bringing the total number of cases in NSW since the beginning of the pandemic to 5,067.
There were 11,872 tests reported to 8pm last night. pic.twitter.com/EFBeJ6bTSx
Updated
Authorities are urging Sydneysiders to stay indoors today and tomorrow as NSW is lashed with heavy rain.
Up to 50mm is expected to fall in Sydney today and another 120mm expected tomorrow as well. The Bureau of Meteorology has issued flood warnings for the Myall, Nambucca, Orara, Camden Haven and Bellinger rivers.
Premier Gladys Berejiklian (speaking at an aquarium, no less) urged people to stay vigilant, saying:
There have been literally hundreds of callouts overnight and there is a strong message out to say – normally we’re telling people to travel around New South Wales, but this weekend is an exception. If you did have plans to travel on the roads, please reconsider. We just want everybody to stay around and close to their home and to be safe, and to follow any of those messages.
Updated
NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian has announced this morning that the NSW government’s hospitality voucher scheme will be rolled out by the end of the month.
The $500m scheme, called the the Dine and Discover scheme, will give NSW residents four $25 vouchers – two for dining out and two for cultural venues.
The scheme was developed in an effort to get more people spending amid the pandemic, and will be rolled out across one local government area after the other. You can check if you can apply for the vouchers at the link here.
Updated
In the meantime, Senator Jacqui Lambie has written an opinion piece for the New Daily in which she argues that the biggest problem in parliament is elitism, in addition to sexism.
She says she hasn’t experienced sexism but has seen “arrogance, entitlement and elitism more than sexism, but it’s easy to mistake them for each other.”
When the politicians that rule us are all coming from the same gene pool, generation after generation, you end up with a pretty weird gene pool.
Look at the royal family, God bless them.
But what I’m punting on is that there’s more people out in the real world that shop like me, speak like me, look like me, than there are who are like the rest of these politicians in Canberra.
People who talk in jargon, who treat policy like sport, who all went to prestigious universities after attending prestigious private schools, who have three pairs of black RM Williams boots.
Updated
Good morning, and a quick thanks to Elias for his guiding hand this morning.
We are expecting both the PM and the opposition leader to speak soon, so let’s dive in.
I’m going to hand over the blog to my colleague Mostafa Rachwani, who will take you through the next part of the day.
I mentioned earlier the expected announcement from the Australian Electoral Commission about the redistribution in Western Australia.
It looks like the AEC will announce its proposals at 9am WA time, which is 12pm for the eastern states (11am in Queensland).
At approximately midday AEDT (9am AWST) today https://t.co/nPVEdcHEP4
— AEC ✏️ (@AusElectoralCom) March 18, 2021
The redistribution could mean the abolishment of a seat – including potentially Pearce, the seat held by the attorney general, Christian Porter.
Updated
The journalists’ union is considering withdrawing from the press watchdog, which it says has become ineffective, lacking in transparency and too slow to rule on unethical journalism.
The warning from the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance (Meaa) that it may dump the Australian Press Council comes after some of the self-regulatory body’s adjudications were openly mocked by journalists and publications which were found to have breached standards.
When the council ruled against a Tim Blair blog post and video on the Daily Telegraph website last year, the author wrote: “Excuse me, but these people are idiots. They can’t even accurately describe a simple 19-second video” next to the adjudication and left the offensive video – which included the words “Look out faggot!” – live on the site.
Next month the union will vote on whether to withdraw funding and membership of the council.
The Meaa media president, Marcus Strom, told Guardian Australia:
For some time, Meaa members have been dissatisfied with the press council over its poor governance standards, lack of transparency in funding, slowness in adjudications and a concern about irregularity in some decisions.
Read more:
Updated
At least three people have been bitten by mice in regional Australian hospitals, as farmers battle what they describe as “an absolute plague” tearing through regional and rural areas.
Large swathes of inland New South Wales have been “inundated” with mice and rats, with the rodents getting into homes, hospitals and hotels.
Hospitals across western NSW are stepping up baiting and trapping procedures, laying down odour repellents, and blocking up door and window seals to ward off the rodent wave.
Read more:
We’re expecting a few political developments today.
Notably, the Australian Electoral Commission is expected to release details of a redistribution in Western Australia which will result in the loss of one federal seat.
Scott Morrison will also hold a press conference at 9.30am from the Portland Aluminium Smelter in Victoria. It’s expected we’ll hear more about an energy and subsidy deal the government has struck with the facility’s owner, Alcoa, to save the jobs of its employees.
Anthony Albanese will also hold a presser conference at 11am about wage theft in the horticultural industry.
We’ll bring you updates about all of these as they happen.
Updated
Australia is committed to effective global cooperation to help us through this crisis together. In a call, @antonioguterres and I discussed COVID-19 in PNG, global health security, the military coup in Myanmar and support for Rohingya. @AustraliaUN 🇦🇺🇺🇳 pic.twitter.com/Y5T5rFuEIm
— Marise Payne (@MarisePayne) March 18, 2021
Australia is the worst performer on a list of the world’s 50 largest economies for “green recovery” spending to kickstart economic growth after the Covid pandemic, according to research conducted for the United Nations environment program.
The research suggests Australia spent US$2bn (A$2.6bn) on green initiatives during the coronavirus recovery, compared with US$57bn in France, US$54bn in South Korea, US$47bn in Germany, US$42bn in the UK, US$41bn in China and US$24bn in Japan. Germany spent $9bn on hydrogen alone.
The work draws on evidence collected up to February 2021 by Oxford University’s Economic Recovery Project. The initiative is supported by the United Nations and the International Monetary Fund.
Katharine Murphy and Adam Morton report:
Updated
Heavy rain lashing the New South Wales coast from the Illawarra to the mid-north coast has sparked flood warnings for multiple areas, including greater Sydney and the state’s far west.
Up to 100mm of rain fell across the regions overnight on Thursday, leading to hundreds of calls for help.
In the past 24 hours, State Emergency Service crews have undertaken 11 flood rescues, three of which were in western Sydney.
More heavy rain, thunderstorms and damaging winds are forecast on Friday and into the weekend, heightening the risk of flash flooding and hazardous surf and heavy swells.
Read more about the weather warnings here:
Updated
Home affairs minister Peter Dutton has denied the federal government botched the vaccine rollout but has conceded there have been some problems as 100 federal vaccination clinics begin taking bookings from today for the next phase of the rollout.
The online booking system has been plagued with problems since it launched on Wednesday, local doctors have been overwhelmed with requests and there are fears the government will miss its October deadline to vaccinate all Australians.
Dutton said there were bound to be teething issues, reports AAP.
He told the Nine on Friday morning:
The website will have a problem one day. The hotline is going to be jammed.
These teething problems will happen but there are almost a quarter of a million people who have been vaccinated already and the numbers will ramp up dramatically.
But Australia is lagging behind many other countries with the vaccine rollout, and some medical clinics remain confused about the timelines.
More than 250,000 people have been vaccinated using either the Pfizer or AstraZeneca jabs.
The next phase of the program, known as 1b, includes 6 million Australians – those aged over 70, health care workers, Indigenous people aged over 55, adults with a specific medical condition or disability and high-risk workers in defence, police, fire, emergency services and meat processing.
More than 100 federally funded clinics will take bookings for Covid-19 vaccines from Friday to ease pressure on GPs and state-run health services.
The clinics, which will start delivering the jabs on Monday, don’t require a patient being a member of a practice.
An average of 1,000 doses will be available a week through the clinics, with some of the larger facilities having up to 2,000 doses available.
Over the next week states will receive 150,000 doses, GPs 200,000, commonwealth clinics 50,000, and 100,000 doses will go to frontline workers and aged care.
You can read more about the next phase of the rollout, and the issues GPs have encountered, here:
Updated
A federal Labor MP has accused the Coalition of taking national security threats seriously only when it’s “politically convenient”, after the Australian spy agency, Asio, changed the language used to describe the rising threat of rightwing extremism.
Ed Husic, who became the first federal MP to be sworn in on the Qur’an in 2010, said he and other Muslims had previously faced repeated calls from conservatives to condemn Islamist extremism “louder, stronger and more regularly”.
But Husic noted that some politicians in government ranks had taken exception to the term rightwing extremism now they were “being asked to confront an errant, ugly streak within conservatism”.
With rightwing extremism having recently increased to 40% of Asio’s priority counter-terrorism caseload, Husic said he could not help but think the agency “now had to redefine the name of the threat just to get the government to take this issue seriously”.
Husic told parliament in an emotional speech late on Thursday:
It begs a deeper, more serious question: does the Coalition only take certain national security threats seriously if it’s politically convenient or comfortable to do so?
On Wednesday, Asio dumped terms like rightwing extremism and Islamic extremism, arguing such labels were “no longer fit for purpose”. The new umbrella categories to be used by Asio are “ideologically motivated violent extremism” and “religiously motivated violent extremism”.
Read more:
Updated
Josh Frydenberg has welcomed news out of Europe this morning that authorities investigating a causal link between the AstraZeneca Covid vaccine and blood clots found the jab to be safe.
The treasurer acknowledged that Australia’s vaccine rollout will be “relying on the AstraZeneca vaccine” because of the planned local production of the jab by CSL in Melbourne.
But Frydenberg, being interviewed on ABC TV, would not give an exact date for when he expects the Therapeutic Goods Administration to complete its testing of the first batches and give the final tick of approval needed for distribution to begin.
The Guardian understands the first locally produced vaccines will be leave the Melbourne factory they were produced in for delivery by early next week.
Asked about yesterday’s updated unemployment rate – which is down to 5.8% – Frydenberg played down concerns about the impact of the jobkeeper cutoff at the end of the month.
He referenced the Reserve Bank’s board minutes – something he did when faced with the question on Thursday – that while the wage subsidy cutoff might be “bumpy” initially for the 1 million Australians still receiving that, that the long-term forecast is for no “sustained increase in unemployment”.
Frydenberg was also pressed on Scott Morrison’s comments from Monday, that women protesting outside parliament would be shot were they doing so in other countries.
He said the prime minister was “championing Australia’s democracy”.
Asked if he would use the same sentence, Frydenberg said:
Well, every day of the week I would say we are fortunate in Australia to have the democratic right to demonstrate and to protest. But the key point the prime minister was also making, in that very statement, was that he understood the frustration of the people who were demonstrating, he welcomed their call for greater action and he’s committed to that.
Updated
Good morning
This is Elias Visontay bringing you this morning’s main stories: some Covid vaccine developments, a growing political feud and misogyny culture in the spotlight across the globe.
The AstraZeneca vaccine is “safe and effective”, Europe’s medicines regulator has said, but it will continue to study possible links between the shot and a rare blood clotting disorder. Australian doctors have complained about vaccine supply issues but, from Monday, an additional 6.14 million Australians will be eligible to receive the jab – here’s how to to find out if you’re one of them, and how to book. Australia’s economic performance is also under scrutiny, as the worst performer on a list of the world’s 50 largest economies for “green recovery” spending to kickstart economic growth after the pandemic.
The ABC has secured the former solicitor general to lead the national broadcaster’s defence in a high-stakes defamation action launched by the federal attorney general, Christian Porter – who began proceedings in the federal court this week to counter “false allegations against him in relation to a person who he met when he was a teenager”.
As a national outcry over the treatment of women both outside and within parliament continues, as Thérèse Rein and Lucy Turnbull say nothing has changed in Canberra in regard to rape and sexual harassment for years. The two prime ministerial spouses made a joint television appearance last night to encourage women to come forward to speak to the Jenkins inquiry into parliamentary culture. Overseas: female reporters have said sexual harassment is “as pervasive as air” in the New York state capitol; and devastating new figures from the UK reveal that one in four women in England and Wales have experienced sexual assault or attempted sexual assault, since the age of 16.
The Labor MP Ed Husic yesterday accused the Coalition of only taking national security threats seriously when it’s “politically convenient” after the Australian spy agency Asio changed the language used to describe the rising threat of rightwing extremism. (The new umbrella categories are “ideologically motivated violent extremism” and “religiously motivated violent extremism”.) Husic said the decision to change the language followed “hectoring” from government senators now “being asked to confront an errant, ugly streak within conservatism”.
If you see something you think I should know about this morning, you can contact me on email at elias.visontay@theguardian.com or get in touch on Twitter @EliasVisontay and securely and anonymously via my Wickr username eliasvisontay.
Updated
