Extreme heat and ‘classic fire weather’ across Victoria tomorrow – as it happened | Australia news

An extra $1.8bn in payments to veterans will be included in the mid-year budget update, with the federal government saying the additional funds explain a “slippage” in the budget since May.

It said the need to take “decisive action” to clear a “backlog” of 42,000 veterans’ claims would put more pressure on government coffers, given $6.5bn was already included in the 2024-25 budget to deal with the issue.

The treasurer, Jim Chalmerssaid:

We’re doing the right thing by our veterans and that will have an impact on the budget.

Supporting those who served our country is our responsibility. We’re paying veterans what they’re entitled to.

Pressures on the budget are intensifying, estimates variations like payments to veterans are a big part of the story and you’ll see that in the mid-year update.

Asked whether Labor would consider dropping a moratorium on nuclear power if voters supported it, Anthony Albanese said that would “make no sense” to do so, and reminded reporters that the national ban on nuclear energy had been introduced by John Howard’s government.

John Howard introduced the moratorium on nuclear energy because it doesn’t make any sense here. And last term, Peter Dutton, Barnaby Joyce, Angus Taylorare all on the record with quotes saying, ‘It’s too costly, it takes too long, and it’s a distraction from what Australia needs.’

They, in their own words, wrote this off. What you have here is a National party tail wagging the Coalition dog, and Peter Dutton being too weak to stand up to the ideologues who dominate the Coalition, too weak to stand up to them and say, “No, this does not make sense for Australia” …

Every energy expert in this country is saying it doesn’t make sense and that’s why Friday’s so-called release of costings didn’t last an hour.

Nuclear plan ‘doesn’t stack up’, PM says

Anthony Albanese said the Coalition did not consider nuclear energy as an option while previously in government because “it doesn’t stack up”:

There is not a single private investor coming forward saying they want to invest in nuclear because it doesn’t stack up. It does not make sense for Australia …

Peter Dutton has been opposition leader for two and a half years. He hasn’t come up with a single cost-of-living measure and now he’s come up with the most expensive form of new energy that somehow he says will make things cheaper.

Well, I’ll listen to the CSIRO, I’ll listen to the Australian Energy Market Operator, who all say that the most expensive form of new energy will increase people’s power bills by $1,200 – which is why on Friday, there was no mention about the impact on consumers, none whatsoever, because Peter Dutton isn’t concerned with that.

He just wants to stop investment in renewables as part of his ongoing culture war because this is a guy who always seeks to divide, never seeks to bring the country together. That’s been his whole record in public life for two decades.

‘I want an Australia that seizes the opportunity of clean energy’

Anthony Albanese criticised the Coalition’s nuclear energy plan:

What the opposition has declared on Friday with an energy plan that is based upon 40% less energy being produced – that means 40% less economic activity is what they are planning for. We want to attract industries, like green steel, green aluminium. We want to attract manufacturing here driven by clean energy. Tasmania is in a really strong position to do that along with other parts of the country to take advantage of what we have.

What they are saying is that the Coalition with their nuclear energy plan want a smaller economy, they want less jobs, they want less growth, they want less activity going forward, and it’s there in their own documentation … I want an Australia that seizes the opportunity of clean energy, that seizes the opportunity of growth creating those jobs.

PM on salmon farming in Tasmania

Anthony Albanese is in Launceston,, Tasmania. Asked whether he viewed it as a mistake to visit Macquarie Harbour on Tasmania’s west coast yesterday while the environment minister, Plibersek askedis deciding on the future of the salmon farming industry there, Albanese said:

I don’t make a mistake by complying with the law. I support jobs on the west coast. I support the salmon industry, and I’ll continue to do so, and I was welcomed very strongly.

Environment groups have requested that licences for salmon farming be revoked in Macquarie Harbour after finding that fish farms are the greatest threat to the survival of the endangered Maugean skate.

Albanese:

What I’m doing is supporting industry and also supporting good outcomes for the skate. That’s why we’re funding the oxygenation at Macquarie Harbour. That’s why we’re funding the captive breeding program that’s been very successful. That’s why we’re following the science.

Pseudolaw ideas causing havoc in custody disputes

Self-declared sovereign citizens, who believe Australia’s laws do not apply to them, are having a serious impact on the family court, experts say.

This year my colleague Ariel Bogle has tracked almost a dozen family court judgments where adherents are using “legal argumentation” that has no legal basis – often predicated on a belief in the illegality of or corruption of government.

Pseudolaw ideas about children and the court are shared openly in groups on the messaging app Telegram, and taught in online Zoom sessions, she reports.

You can read the full story here:

Huge swathes of the country will continue to swelter as a severe heatwave is set to continue across much of Australia until the middle of next week.

The Bureau of Meteorology has heatwave warnings in place for all states and territories on the Australian mainland.

Temperatures between 5C and 12C above average are expected through most of South Australia, Victoria, Tasmania and NSW, as well as parts of the southern Northern Territory and southern Queensland.

Senior meteorologist Miriam Bradbury said Monday would be the hottest day for Victoria, NSW and Tasmania, with temperatures up to 16C above average:

Adelaide is forecast to reach 40C on Sunday, and Melbourne is forecast to reach the high 30s or even 40C on Monday. Were this to occur, it will be the warmest day in Melbourne since January 2023 and the warmest December day since 2019.

Other parts of Victoria and NSW could be in the low to mid 40s. Inland NSW could even reach the high 40s on Monday. Along with the heat, windy conditions and a lack of rain are likely to lead to a spike in fire danger during Sunday and Monday for much of the east and south-east.

‘Tragedy and trauma can visit anybody’

Louisa Hopeone of the Lindt Cafe siege survivors, told the ABC that the fateful day remained vivid in her memory:

It is still amazing to me – miraculous, really – that I didn’t die that day.

Being a survivor of a victim of terrorism is slightly different to being a survivor of other violent crime. Other violent crime is usually personal. But of course, the terrorist is not interested in me personally … They’re really interested in hurting the state or our collective sense of security.

The siege made her “very aware” of “how “tragedy and trauma can visit anybody and can be part of all of our lives”, Hope said, adding:

I think that, certainly for myself, it’s given me hope that we can actually survive the worst. You just don’t know when you’re having a cup of coffee in a cafe … and your life can change.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the beginning of the siege at the Lindt cafe on Martin Place, where Man Haron Monis took 18 people hostage over 17 hours, AAP reports.

At gunpoint, Monis forced hostages to call police and media organisations, falsely warning that he had placed bombs around the city, including in his backpack, and that it was an attack by Islamic State. Images of the terrified hostages standing at the windows for hours were widely broadcast.

Monis eventually fatally shot cafe manager Tori Johnsonwhile barrister Katrina Dawson was killed by stray police bullet fragments in the final moments of the siege.

After the tragedy, a sea of flowers washed over Martin Place, as family, friends and onlookers remembered the pair who were killed.

Ten years on, a permanent exhibition is embedded into the concrete in Martin Place, with small flowers set into the pavement behind glass frames. On Monday, the NSW government erected a commemorative exhibition, displaying photos of the sea of flowers behind panels.

Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. Donna Lu here, coming to you from a sunny Melbourne to take you through the news today.

It’s 10 years ago today that the Lindt cafe siege began at Martin Place in Sydney, where Man Haron Monis took 18 people hostage. The victims of the tragedy, cafe manager Tori Johnson and barrister Katrina Dawson, have been remembered by a commemorative exhibition erected by the NSW government.

Another heatwave is set to bake swathes of the country’s interior in the coming days, bringing temperatures above 40C and the warmest summer in years for much of south-east Australia.

And the end of Bashar al-Assad’s rule in Syria has led to “pure joy and awful sadness” as Syrians in Australia express cautious optimism for their homeland’s future.

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