Category: Australian News

The ACT Government has released the Sullivan’s Creek Re-naturalisation Opportunities Report, which identifies ways the natural environment in the area could be transformed to promote environment in the suburbs and provide a biodiversity corridor through the heart of the city.

Minister for the Environment, Parks and Land Management Rebecca Vassarotti said the report includes a variety of suggestions to turn the creek into a community hub where people can relax, play, learn and connect with nature.

“Right now, Sullivan’s Creek is a concrete labyrinth that runs right through the heart of our city, often collecting sediments and algae that are really detrimental to water quality,” Minister Vassarotti said. 

“Already in Canberra we’ve seen the massive positive impact renaturalisation projects can have on building positive community spaces, urban biodiversity and environment in our suburbs.

“That’s why we want to open a dialogue with Canberrans about bringing Sullivan’s Creek up to its full potential, turning it into an ecological corridor that protects water and fosters even greater biodiversity down the spine of the inner north.

“Today we’re releasing the Sullivan’s Creek Re-naturalisation Opportunities Report to share the outcome of extensive consultation with the community in 2023, showcasing community needs and desires at the forefront of the report’s recommendations.

“Based on the feedback we’ve received from Canberrans, the report includes suggestions tailored to managing flood risks, creating vibrant and inviting green spaces, and contributing to the positive health and wellbeing of people living in our beautiful city.

“There are numerous benefits to re-naturalising Sullivan’s Creek, including restoring the native habitat and supporting the movement of native species, improving water quality, building resilience to climate change and enhancing our connection with nature.

“The report released today is aspirational but will set the vision for an area that brings our community together and revitalises the landscape. This report will be used as the foundation for any future plans for the site, subject to the considerations of the next government, and further consultation and investigation, ” said Minister Vassarotti.

Sullivan’s Creek and the surrounding waterways and landscape are significant to the Ngunnawal community. The report also includes opportunities to strengthen Connection to Country and invigorate the cultural aspects.

For more information on the Sullivan’s Creek Re-naturalisation project, or to read the Sullivan’s Creek Re-naturalisation Opportunities Report, visit the ACT Government’s YourSay Conversations project webpage.

New data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) shows the national gender pay gap is the lowest on record – today falling to 11.5 per cent from 12 per cent in November 2023, and 14.1 per cent in May 2022. Under the Albanese Government, women’s average weekly earnings have increased $173.80 a week since May 2022.

Labor came to government in 2022 with a commitment to drive action to close the gender pay gap. Since then, we have seen the gender pay gap drop to all-time lows over four consecutive reporting cycles.

Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese:

“We came to Government with a commitment to help close the gender pay gap and that’s exactly what we’re seeing.

“That’s not a coincidence, it’s because the Government has taken action like banning pay secrecy clauses, modernising the bargaining system, enforcing transparent gender pay gap reporting and delivering pay rises for aged care and child care workers.”

Minister for Women, Katy Gallagher:

“Closing the gender pay gap means that women are taking home more money at the end of each week.

“Whether it be by boosting the pay of early childhood educators and aged care workers by 15 per cent, backing a pay rise for minimum wage workers or banning pay secrecy clauses – Labor is doing work right across the economy to lift women’s pay.

“This progress isn’t just good for women – it’s also good for men, good for children, good for the economy and good for the community.

“Closing the gender pay gap is a key ambition of Working for Women: A Strategy for Gender Equality, because we know that it is both a driver and a result of inequality. We know there is still work to do and we will keep going.

“As well as lowest gender pay gap on record, we now also have reached a record high for women’s workforce participation at 63.2 per cent”

Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, Murray Watt:

“We’ve secured record pay rises for hundreds of thousands of women on award wages, fixed the bargaining system to get wages moving in feminised industries, and changed workplace laws to put gender equity at the heart of the Fair Work Commission’s decision-making.

“We said we’d get wages moving again and that’s exactly what’s happening.

“This is despite the Opposition opposing almost every single one of these measures and promising to repeal a range of Labor’s laws that are delivering better pay for Australian workers.

“At the same time the gap has narrowed, an extra 510,000 women are now in jobs since the Albanese Government came to office, with 60 per cent of these jobs full-time.”

The ABS average weekly earnings data can be found online: Average Weekly Earnings, Australia

Information on the gender pay gap can be on the WGEA website: The ABS data gender pay gap

On Friday, the Prime Minister announced at a press conference that he was going to abandon religious discrimination reform after the Opposition vetoed their legislation. 

This broken promise from Labor has received universal scorn from across the political aisle. Religious leaders, LGBTIQA+ community and Labor’s own voters expected Labor to deliver their election promise — not capitulate to Peter Dutton’s whims. 

The Australian Law Reform Commission’s report last year was a roadmap to reform everyone could agree to and Labor has had a clear pathway through the Senate, with the support of the Greens and crossbench, to deliver those recommendations in full. 

But to Labor, the only opinion that matters is Peter Dutton’s. 

Stephen Bates, Australian Greens LGBTIQA+ spokesperson

Yet another broken election promise from a Prime Minister too cowardly to do his job. Labor won the last election with a promise to protect LGBTIQA+ workers and people of faith from discrimination and he’s failed at both. 

Enough broken promises. If this government cares at all about LGBTIQA+ workers, they would move right now to remove section 38 of the Sex Discrimination Act like the Law Reform Commission said to. 

This Labor government has had the numbers to get this done for months and The Greens have offered time and again to work collaboratively to make this change. 

The LGBTIQA+ community wants protections. Communities of faith want protections. The vast majority of the country wants this positive and progressive change. 

When it comes to keeping progressive promises, it seems this Labor government is incapable of doing so without the sign off of the LNP. 

Sex discrimination reform on Friday. Makarrata Commission on Monday. How many election promises does Albanese plan on breaking this week?

Labor needs to realise that they are the government and have been for over two years. They have the power to implement progressive change with The Greens but it’s painfully clear that Labor has no intention of doing that. 

When the LNP are in government, they waste no time in implementing a radical conservative agenda. Now that Labor is in power, we are told their hands are tied and that they’d love to do nice things but can’t because Dutton won’t let them. No-one’s buying it. 
 

The Victorian Greens are calling for a moratorium on evictions for public housing residents following revelations that the Victorian Labor Government has secretly signed the demolition contracts to steamroll ahead with tearing down public housing towers in North Melbourne and Flemington. 

The Victorians Greens are bringing a motion before the Parliament today that stands up for residents who face being forced from their homes in North Melbourne and Flemington now that Labor has signed the demolition contracts. 

It comes as leaked documents recently revealed that Labor is pulling funding from multiple public and community housing, offering up land set aside from public and community housing to private developers and have signed this $100 million demolition contract with John Holland.

During question time on Tuesday, the Greens grilled Labor on whether the signing of the demolition contracts would be used to pursue legal action against residents, to which the government refused to give a straight answer. 

The Victorian Greens spokesperson for Public and Affordable Housing, Samantha Ratnam said that Labor have clearly signed these contracts to have legal grounds to force evictions, which will displace hundreds of residents and tear their communities apart. 

She added that while Labor continues to pull funding from social and community housing and is handing over swathes of public land to developers, it’s impossible not to think that they will do the same with the towers. 

the Victorian Greens spokesperson for Public and Affordable Housing, Samantha Ratnam: 

“We’re in a housing crisis and instead of building public housing, Victorian Labor is conducting a fire sale of public housing land and demolishing the public homes we have. 

“Labor has clearly signed these contracts in order to pursue legal action against residents and force evictions displacing hundreds of people who are currently living in the North Melbourne and Flemington towers. 

“We’re having thousands of conversations directly with residents who have no certainty about their future. 

“Labor has sold off hectares of public housing and land to private developers – now they’ve signed these contracts, how can Victorians have any confidence they won’t do the same to all 44 public housing towers?

“We won’t stop holding Labor’s feet to the fire on this. We’re in the middle of a housing crisis where we should be building more public housing on public land, not tearing down our existing housing and selling off public land to private developers for massive profits.” 

The Greens say Labor’s excuse for caving-in to the gambling lobby is shifty and they will test the Government with a Senate vote to ban gambling advertising in line with the Peta Murphy Inquiry recommendations. 

Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young is spokesperson for Communications and Manager of Greens Business in the Senate:

“Don’t buy Bill Shorten’s lie. Labor have caved in to the gambling lobby and they are scraping around for an excuse. The gambling lobby have had their claws in both the Labor and Liberal Party for far too long. 

“We can support public interest journalism in this country without sucking the life and happiness out of Australian families, forcing gambling addicts to pay the price. The Prime Minister of this country Anthony Albanese needs to stand up to the gambling lobby.

“Experts have told us we need to ban gambling advertising, like tobacco ads, and Labor will be tested on this question in the Senate when Greens amendments for a full gambling ad ban in line with the Peta Murphy recommendations are voted on.

“We should be banning gambling advertising, taxing the big tech corporations and funding public interest journalism. Gambling addiction is not the solution for public interest journalism. 

“It is incredible that only two months ago the Albanese government threw free to air broadcasters under the bus by locking sport behind the paywalls of the global streamers with their anti-siphoning laws. Now, suddenly are using Free TV as an excuse to cave-in to the gambling lobby. Labor caved to the pressure of the big tech companies like Kayo and Amazon, now they are caving to the gambling lobby.

“This is not about championing Free TV or quality journalism, this is about Labor caving to vested interests instead of standing up for the public interest.”

Today the NSW Labor Government has confirmed their plans for an independent office of animal welfare — except that it will not be independent, not an office and not for animal welfare.

The NSW Upper House has today debated the NSW Greens Independent Office of Animal Welfare Bill introduced by Greens MLC Abigail Boyd.

As part of their platform ahead of the 2023 State Election, NSW Labor committed to introducing a new animal welfare framework in NSW, including establishing an independent office of animal welfare. However, in voting down the bill, the Agriculture Minister made clear Labor’s intentions to introduce their own bill that creates a body that has no operational costs, sees the inherently-conflicted Minister for Agriculture of the day retain primary responsibility for the welfare of animals, and which is required to consult as much with industry as it does with animal welfare stakeholders.

Abigail Boyd, Greens NSW Animal Welfare spokesperson:

“It is truly shameful to hear the Agriculture Minister confirm what we have long suspected — that Labor has no intention of keeping their election commitment to introduce an independent office of animal welfare, and is instead slow-walking towards creating wholly inadequate regulation that will overlook the interests of animals in our state.

“Unless it is truly independent, robustly resourced and responsible for prioritising the interests of animals, Labor cannot possibly call their long-promised reform an independent office of animal welfare.

“Labor is too afraid to do anything that is not in the interest of Big Ag, and as a result we will undoubtedly see animals across our state continue to suffer in the name of profit.

“Establishing an Independent Office of Animal Welfare that aligns with scientific evidence and community expectations has been core Greens business for over a decade.

“Our Greens bill was developed in close consultation with the animal welfare sector and the community, and would have done exactly what is needed to overhaul our outdated animal welfare framework.

“Labor’s failure to support our Greens bill today is yet another broken election promise, and is an insult to all those in the community who have campaigned tirelessly for an independent office of animal welfare for years.”

Today, the ACT Greens have announced an election initiative to scale-up our city’s capacity to grow and produce food, giving Canberrans more access to healthy local food while bringing real competition to the supermarket duopoly.

“Growing the food that ends up on our dinner tables locally rather than importing it from across the country is good for farmers, good for the environment and good for giving Canberrans greater choice to buy and support local businesses,” said Deputy Leader of the ACT Greens, Rebecca Vassarotti.

“The corporatisation of food production in Australia has created a food system that is vulnerable to climate change, unfair to farmers, and which sells food to Canberrans at exorbitant prices while big supermarkets rake in record profits.

“The ACT Greens plan will establish a new food hub in Fyshwick to ensure local farmers have the right equipment to pool, process and distribute the food they grow so that Canberrans can buy it straight from their local shops and markets, not from the supermarket giants.

“This food hub will empower Canberrans to boycott imports from the big supermarkets and buy more local food, giving them confidence in where their food has come from, who has grown it and why their food costs what it does.

“Under the ACT Greens plan, we will combine this new food hub with access to up to $1 million in interest free loans to support projects that help food producers get their food out to local shops so that they can more easily sell to Canberrans. 

“For example, farmers might like to get together and purchase an electric van for food deliveries to local shops and restaurants, or as part of a box scheme direct to the front doors of Canberrans.

“These sorts of programs are the foundation to helping local farms and local farmers thrive. Our suite of initiatives will be good for farmers, good for the environment and good for the bank accounts of Canberrans.

Some of the key initiatives the ACT Greens have announced today include:

• Invest $3.5 million to establish a food hub which will allow local farmers to set up a base of operations for food production and distribution
• Protect prime agricultural land and so farmers have fair, long-term leases 
• Provide $1 million in interest free loans to empower local farmers to invest in collaborative local food logistics and enterprise-building projects 
• Revitalise and refurbish the Canberra City Farm in Fyshwick 
• Establish a farm training centre which will run training and jobs programs for people at risk
• Provide $2 million over four years to fund five full-time equivalent primary school garden coordinators, to support school kitchen gardens
• Invest $600,000 over 4 years to create new large community gardens for the suburbs, using the Community Garden Grants program for smaller projects

The full list of our initiatives for local food is available on the ACT Greens website.

ACT Greens Member for Brindabella, Laura Nuttall, said the ACT Greens will give farmers confidence in the future of their business, guaranteeing fair and long-term leases and establishing a new future farming training program. 

“For too long, farmers have been left in the lurch about how long they will be able to continue to run their business in the ACT. If we’re going to scale-up the role of farmers in growing affordable food for Canberrans, we need to give them certainty,” said Ms Nuttall. 

“The ACT Greens will make sure farmers can have confidence in the future of their business by recognising prime agricultural land as part of changes to zoning rules, and providing long-term leases to create a pipeline of affordable and sustainable food for many years to come.

“Securing the future of our farming workforce will be a key part of our plan to scale-up affordable local food production in Canberra. That’s why we will create a new education and training program to support people to become local growers.

“We will proactively open up this training scheme to Canberrans experiencing barriers to work, such as people who have experienced homelessness or have had contact with the criminal justice system, to provide them with stable employment and a pathway to learn about and succeed at being a local grower. 

“This is modelled on successful long-term programs overseas that have demonstrated that local food is a pathway for people to rebuild their lives” said Ms Nuttall. 

The Greens will force a Senate vote this week for a ban on gambling advertising. The Greens will move in the Senate for a ban on gambling advertising in an amendment to the Communications Legislation Amendment (Regional Broadcasting Bill). The ban would apply to broadcast and online platforms.

Senator Hanson-Young is spokesperson for Communications and Manager of Greens Business in the Senate:

“Labor should honour the legacy of Peta Murphy, not the profits of parasites in the gambling lobby.

“Australia banned tobacco ads in this country because they did acute harm. Gambling companies profit from addiction and misery, targeting our kids and wrecking families. They must be banned too.

“It’s time for Parliament to listen to the experts, respect public opinion and back a full ban on gambling ads.

“The gambling lobby may have deep pockets, but the public want strong action. Our amendment will be a test for Labor and the Coalition this week.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will welcome the Prime Minister of New Zealand, The Rt Hon Christopher Luxon, to Australia from 15–16 August 2024 as a Guest of the Australian Government.

Prime Minister Albanese will meet with Prime Minister Luxon in Canberra for the annual Australia-New Zealand Leaders’ Meeting.

The leaders will discuss modernising our economic relationship, strengthening our Alliance and broader security partnership, and supporting our Pacific partners.

This will be Prime Minister Luxon’s third official visit to Australia.

Prime Minister Luxon travelled to Australia in December 2023 for his first overseas trip as Prime Minister, as well as visiting for the ASEAN-Australia Special Summit in March this year.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese

“Australia’s relationship with New Zealand is one of the closest in the world, built on our shared history and generations of cooperation across the Tasman.

“I am looking forward to hosting Prime Minister Luxon in Canberra for his first annual Australia–New Zealand Leaders’ Meeting.

“We will continue to work together to advance our collective interests and to achieve a peaceful, stable, prosperous and resilient region.”

Today I announce the recipients of the Australian Cultural Diplomacy Grants Program (ACDGP) for 2023-24, which promotes Australia’s vibrant creative sector and First Nations experience and expertise internationally.

The Program also aims to deepen bilateral partnerships, strengthen Australia’s reputation as a modern, diverse nation, and build people to people links internationally.

Promoting the vital role that First Nations stories play in Australia’s art and culture is a priority for the Program and Revive, Australia’s National Cultural Policy. This year five First Nations applicants received grants.

I congratulate the 11 successful grantees, including the following projects:

• A Pacific Tour of Burrbgaja Yalirra 2 by dance company Marrugeku to build connections through workshops and tell histories of migration, relocation, cultural adaption and survival.
• Ngulmiya Nundhirribala will perform and collaborate with leading Indonesian musicians in Jakarta, Ubud and Makassar.
• Australian filmmakers will be able to show their work in Germany, Denmark and Iceland, at the Down Under Film Festival.
• Outdoor screen projections of urban ecological futures by the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology will feature in Hong Kong.
• Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands artists and educators DEM MOB spoke and performed at the 2024 International Indigenous Summit in Toronto, Canada in June.

There has been a surge of interest in representing Australia on the global stage, with a record 229 applications received, the highest number of applications in the Program’s history.

Further information on ACDGP can be found on the DFAT website.