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The Guardian - AU
The Guardian - AU
National
Donna Lu, Cait Kelly and Stuart MacFarlane (earlier)

Thousands protest in Canberra; NSW records 32 Covid deaths and Vic 19 – as it happened

New South Wales United States Australia Labor Covid-19 Scott Morrison Canberra Dominic Perrottet Ukraine Strathfield
Convoy to Canberra protesters outside Parliament House today. Police are predicting protest numbers to reach up to 4,000.
Convoy to Canberra protesters outside Parliament House today. Police are predicting protest numbers to reach up to 4,000. Photograph: Lukas Coch/AAP

What we learned today, Saturday 12 February

The time has come to wind down the blog for the evening. Here’s a summary of the day’s key developments:

  • Thousands of anti-vaccine activists, conspiracy theorists and people from the sovereign citizen movement protested in Canberra. The prime minister, Scott Morrison, said he “understands” the concerns of protesters and blamed vaccine mandates on state governments.
  • Morrison also urged Australian citizens in Ukraine to leave immediately as the situation there becomes increasingly dangerous.
  • People in four electorates in New South Wales headed to the polling booths today, with byelections in Strathfield, Monaro, Bega and Willoughby. Soggy weather and a high proportion of postal votes made for a muted affair.
  • The Australian Capital Territory’s top prosecutor warned against “officers of the court and public figures” making public comment on active cases following the furore over Morrison’s comments to Brittany Higgins.
  • Australia is set to face more pressure to increase its 2030 emissions reduction targets after a new US strategy for the Indo-Pacific was released today, which calls climate change a “major challenge” for the region.

Thanks for following along!

Updated

Staying with sport, Australian skeleton racer Jaclyn Narracott is on the brink of Olympic history – she will enter tonight’s final runs in Beijing in gold medal position.

Skeleton (or as I like to think of it, scarier bobsled) sees athletes race head-first down a frozen track in a tiny sled at speeds of up to 140km/h.

Australia has never medalled in any of the sliding events at a Winter Olympics.

You can read more about Narracott here, via AAP:

Another Australian Olympian, Belle Brockhoff, has meanwhile had a rougher run.

Brockhoff, 29, was taken to hospital for x-rays following a heavy crash in the quarter-finals of the mixed snowboard cross teams event. She has been cleared of serious injury after complaining of neck soreness following the crash.

From AAP:

Brockhoff was in a qualifying position in second when she got too much speed off a jump and clipped the board of the leader, American Lindsey Jacobellis, who won gold in the women’s event.

Countrywoman Josie Baff also crashed out, ending Australian hopes of a medal in the new addition to the Olympic program.

Both Australian pairings were drawn in the second of four quarter-finals and male boarders Cameron Bolton and Adam Lambert successfully navigated the opening leg.

But with snow falling at Genting Snow Park, the luckless Brockhoff and Baff both failed to finish the second leg, ensuring that the US and Switzerland claimed the top two positions.

Updated

Victorian batsman Will Pucovski has suffered yet another concussion setback, AAP reports. The 24-year-old left the field earlier today after just one over of Victoria’s Sheffield Shield match against South Australia.

It is believed to be the 11th concussion he has suffered during his frequently interrupted career.

Cricket Victoria said in a statement:

Pucovski reported concussion symptoms to medical staff while fielding in the first session of play this morning … He will continue to be monitored by Cricket Victoria medical staff.

Read the full story here:

Updated

A spokesperson for the energy minister Angus Taylor has told Guardian Australia the federal government’s 2030 emissions reduction target will not change, in relation to the US’s newly released Indo-Pacific strategy.

That strategy outlines climate change as a “major challenge” for the Asia-Pacific region, and states the US “will work with partners to develop 2030 and 2050 targets, strategies, plans and policies consistent with limiting the global temperature increase to 1.5C”.

A spokesperson for Taylor said:

Australia welcomes the US’s commitment to the Indo-Pacific region.

Australia is one of only a handful of countries to set out a detailed plan to achieve net zero emissions by 2050.

Our 2030 target is fixed, and our commitment to the Australian people is to meet and beat it. The latest official forecasts show we will deliver on that commitment, beating our 2030 target by up to 9%.

Australia was the only major developed country that refused to lift its 2030 emissions reduction targets at Cop26 in Glasgow last year. In November, former US vice president Al Gore said a 2050 net-zero target “without a near-term pledge has very little meaning”.

Updated

Labor leader Anthony Albanese has been out campaigning for Jason Yat-Sen Li in the New South Wales electorate of Strathfield today.

Speaking alongside the shadow climate change minister, Chris Bowen, he said Yat-Sen Li would make a “major contribution” to the state if he was elected, as would Labor’s other candidates.

Albanese said:

We’re hopeful of a good outcome for the state byelections, not just here in Strathfield, but, of course, in Bega and Monaro we’re also running Labor candidates.

It’s been a long day on the polling booths across the four electorates up for grabs today.

Campaigners in every seat told the Guardian the soggy weather and high proportion of postal votes meant it had been one of the “slowest” election Saturdays they had ever seen.

Anthony Albanese speaks during the Super Saturday byelections at Burwood Park in Sydney
Anthony Albanese speaks during the Super Saturday byelections at Burwood Park in Sydney. Photograph: Steven Saphore/AAP

Updated

Scott Morrison has urged Australian citizens in Ukraine to leave immediately as the situation there has become increasingly dangerous.

He said:

It has been a clear message for some time now that Australians in Ukraine should be seeking to get out of the country.

It comes after the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, who visited Australia this week, said Russia could invade Ukraine at any time. The US and other countries have also urged their citizens to leave.

AAP has the full story here:

The reverend and former World Vision Australia chief executive Tim Costello has joined the Freedom Cage campaign outside the Park Hotel in Carlton.

In a recent video calling on the federal government to release the men detained there, Costello said:

These refugees fled unthinkable horror in their homelands to save their and their families’ lives, only to find a different horror in Australia … Our politicians are using these people in the most callous and cruel way, in a way that no dog would ever be treated.

Costello was preceded in the cage by Sister Brigid Arthur, co-founder of Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project.

John Farnham’s You’re the Voice has been in heavy rotation at Canberra’s anti–vaccination mandate protests.

It’s worth noting that Farnham’s former manager, the late Glenn Wheatley, previously criticised anti-lockdown protesters for using the song.

“It’s very offensive to John and I that they choose to use You’re the Voice as the theme,” Wheatley said in a September 2020 interview. (Wheatley died in early February, at the age of 74, after being hospitalised with Covid-19.)

Updated

The novelist Arnold Zable has locked himself in a cage outside the Park Hotel in the Melbourne suburb of Carlton, in protest against the indefinite detention of refugees.

The gesture is part of the Freedom Cage campaign, which is calling for the immediate release of all detained refugees and asylum seekers.

Other notable figures to participate in the campaign include the retired soccer player Craig Foster and the bishops Philip Huggins and Paul Barker.

The Park Hotel currently holds 25 refugees and asylum seekers, most of whom have been detained for nearly nine years.

Thanks Cait! I’ll be here all afternoon. If you have any news to share, you can tweet me @donnadlu or email Donna.Lu@theguardian.com.

South Australia has reported one new Covid-related death – a woman in her 90s – and 1,372 new infections. The state’s death toll from the beginning of pandemic is now 149 people. There are 213 people in hospital with Covid, including 17 in ICU, with four on ventilators.

And with that, I am going to hand you over to my colleague Donna Lu who will take you through into the evening.

Thank you for a great day on the blog.

Updated

At least two homes have been destroyed by a bushfire in Western Australia.

Crews have been battling fires in WA’s Great Southern region since Friday after lightning sparked fires across the region.

The fire and emergency services commissioner, Darren Klemm, confirmed the homes had been destroyed and that the conditions yesterday had been “incredibly severe”.

“The conditions in the Great Southern last night were incredibly severe – the winds were so strong that they actually tore roofs off homes near the fireground,” he said.

“A sudden wind change also changed the direction of the bushfires and firefighters had to move extremely quickly to prevent the fires from reaching more homes.

“There has been some rainfall overnight that has helped firefighters get the situation under control and our immediate priority is to control and extinguish these bushfires.”

Updated

Earlier today the NSW premier, Dominic Perrottet, visited a polling booth in Willoughby with the Liberal candidate, Tim James.

The safe Liberal seat on Sydney’s north shore was held by Gladys Berejiklian until she resigned as premier last September.

Asked if he would interpret the results from the four byelections today as a referendum on his leadership, Perrottet said it was about what direction voters wanted to see the state move in.

Perrottet said:

I see it as a vote in terms of making sure a clear decision between do you want to go backwards as a state or do you want to go forwards?

That’s what the Liberals and Nationals here in NSW want to do – we want to take our state forward.

We need to open up and we don’t want to go back into lockdown.

Dominic Perrottet with Liberal candidate Tim James at Cammeray public school
Dominic Perrottet at Cammeray public school in the Willoughby electorate with Liberal candidate Tim James. Photograph: Steven Saphore/AAP

He pointed to schools being open and kids being back in classrooms as a sign his government was leading the state though the pandemic.

Labor is not running a candidate in Willoughby.

Voters are also heading to the polls in Bega, Strathfield and Monaro today following a series of high-profile resignations last year.

Updated

As house prices soar to record levels across capital cities, an increasing number of younger Australians are giving up on the hope of owning a house with a backyard. Raising a family in an apartment is fast becoming the new, compact Australian dream.

Read more here:

Updated

We mentioned before Pauline Hanson had missed a few parliamentary sitting days – but still managed to turn up for the protest today.

Turns out last week wasn’t the only ones she missed:

Updated

The number of Australians who have had their booster hasn’t been put into a % in the daily vaccine graph. Maybe because it is so low?

Biden to put more pressure on Australia over climate change

Australia is set to face more pressure to increase its 2030 emissions reduction targets after a new Biden administration strategy for the Indo-Pacific was released today.

The White House published an Indo-Pacific strategy document on Saturday, ahead of the US secretary of state Antony Blinken’s visit to Fiji.

Blinken arrived in Australia earlier this week for a meeting with the foreign affairs minister, Marise Payne, and her Indian and Japanese counterparts, a grouping known as the Quad.

The US strategy document outlines climate change as a “major challenge” for the Asia-Pacific region:

Climate change is growing ever-more severe as South Asia’s glaciers melt and the Pacific Islands battle existential rises in sea levels ...

The Indo-Pacific is the epicenter of the climate crisis, but it is also essential to climate solutions. Achieving the goals of the Paris agreement will require the major economies in the region to align their targets with the agreement’s temperature goals ...

The United States will work with partners to develop 2030 and 2050 targets, strategies, plans, and policies consistent with limiting the global temperature increase to 1.5C, and will seek to serve as the preferred partner as the region transitions to a net-zero future.

Australia was the only major developed country that refused to lift its 2030 emissions reduction targets – formally known as a nationally determined contribution – at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow last year.

Former US vice president Al Gore criticised the Morrison government in November for failing to increase its 2030 emissions reduction ambitions, saying a 2050 net-zero target “without a near-term pledge has very little meaning”.

Updated

Western Australia records 27 new local cases

The state’s number have dipped to 27 new cases, down from the 51 recorded on Friday.

There are also 22 cases from returned travellers in quarantine.

More to come.

Updated

After being absent in parliament this week, Pauline Hanson went to the protest in Canberra today. Cool.

We’ve got more info on Victoria’s Covid deaths here:

The 19 people who died were in their 70s, 80s, 90s and 100s.

Twelve of them occurred in the past week and the others were in the past fortnight.

Updated

National Covid-19 update

Here are the latest coronavirus numbers so far from around Australia today:

ACT

  • Deaths: 0
  • Cases: 428
  • In hospital: 51 people, three in ICU

NSW

  • Deaths: 32
  • Cases: 8,183
  • In hospital: 1,650 people, 104 in ICU

Queensland

  • Deaths: 13
  • Cases: 3,600
  • In hospital: 508 people, 49 in ICU

Victoria

  • Deaths: 19
  • Cases: 7,224
  • In hospital: 487 people, 79 in ICU

Tasmania

  • Deaths: 0
  • Cases: 456
  • In hospital: 17 people, one in ICU

Northern Territory

  • Deaths: 0
  • Cases: 1,425
  • In hospital: 170 people, two in ICU

Western Australia

  • Deaths: 0
  • Cases: 27

South Australia

  • Deaths: 1
  • Cases: 1,372
  • In hospital: 213 people, 17 in ICU

Updated

Politicians are out in force in NSW today, here’s a rundown of whose been seen campaigning in the byelections from AAP:

Premier Dominic Perrottet made campaign pit stops in both Sydney seats, Strathfield and Willoughby, while opposition leader Chris Minns started his morning in the Bega electorate.

Prime minister Scott Morrison gave a shout out to his “dear friend” Bridget Sakr vying to win for the Liberals in Strathfield, as federal Labor leader Anthony Albanese lent a hand in pitching for votes on the ground in the same electorate.

Former deputy premier John Barilaro was also out spruiking for the Nationals candidate he backed to replace him in Monaro.

However, a notable absence on polling day is Ms Berejiklian.

Liberal candidate Tim James is tipped to be her successor as the member for Willoughby, a safe blue-ribbon seat on Sydney’s north shore.

It’s another story in Bega, where Labor is hoping it can net a “historic win”.

The seat on the state’s south coast was held by Liberal and former transport minister Andrew Constance on 6.9 per cent margin.

Labor has never won it, but the party is hopeful local gynaecologist and obstetrician Michael Holland is about to break the drought.

Updated

Queensland Covid stats for today have dropped on socials:

Updated

The Morrison government has faced one of the biggest parliamentary revolts in decades. Five Liberal MPs crossed the floor to pass Labor amendments to the government’s religious discrimination bill in the early hours of Thursday.

The last time any Australian government faced a revolt of this magnitude was when six Coalition senators crossed the floor in November 1982 to support a Labor bill to curtail the power of the Senate to bring down governments by blocking or threatening to block supply.

Crossing the floor is rare, and only seems to be getting rarer, with a minority of federal politicians having ever crossed the floor and just a single politician involved in more than half of all floor crossing divisions between 1950 and 2019, according to data compiled by the parliamentary library.

Hello everyone – this is Cait, I am back in the blog seat to take you through the afternoon.

If you want to flag any news with me – tweet me @cait__kelly or email cait.kelly@theguardian.com.

Let’s get into it.

Updated

Some reactions to the Lifeline Canberra book fair shutting due to protesters:

Updated

Turning to Victoria, there are also protesters currently marching up Swanston Street in Melbourne’s CBD.

Protestors march in Melbourne’s CBD under police escort.
Protestors march in Melbourne’s CBD under police escort. Photograph: Ben Butler/The Guardian

My colleague Ben Butler estimates there are around 500 people, who are moving towards the inner-north suburb of Carlton under police escort.

Updated

Ongoing protests in the Australian Capital Territory against vaccine mandates have forced the closure of the Lifeline Canberra charity book fair today, a major fundraising event for the organisation. The Exhibition Park in Canberra (EPIC) saw an influx of people overnight.

Protestors have moved from EPIC, where they have been staying for more than a week – and must leave by Sunday – to Parliament House.

Updated

An update on the Covid figures in Victoria:

There are 487 people in hospital with Covid-19 in the state, 49 of whom are in ICU, including 20 on a ventilator. It’s the first time since January 3 that the hospitalisation figures have dropped below 500 in Victoria.

Of Victorians aged 18 and older, 49.9% have now had three vaccine doses.

The health department has further confirmed that Omicron is the dominant variant: “extensive genomic test results” found that, of 10,222 samples sequenced between early December and early February, 98% were Omicron.

While campaigning in the Sydney seat of Strathfield today, where a byelection is being held, Labor leader Anthony Albanese was asked about the government’s now shelved religious discrimination bill.

Albanese said:

We believe that no child deserves to be discriminated against because of who they are and that is consistent with what the prime minister wrote to me last year, saying that was his position. They put it out on the front page of newspapers and then walked away from it. It shows they can’t be trusted.

The other thing we’re committed to is all of the amendments that we put forward, which include any vilification provisions. How is it that a Muslim woman can be vilified for wearing a hijab, or a Sikh man because of the fact they’re easily identifiable?

We need strong provisions which prevent discrimination against all people, whether it be on the basis of gender, or age, or race or faith or sexuality.

Albanese accused Scott Morrison of “playing politics”, saying:

What the prime minister has to … explain is why has he pulled a bill that is now consistent with what he said was his objective. It just was all about wedging and playing politics … It’s just all about the politics all about the game. And that’s why he ends up wedging himself, like he did last Thursday morning.

Updated

Hello, it’s Donna Lu here, keeping the blog warm for a while.

Updated

Millionaire businessman Neville Power is facing a possible jail term after pleading guilty to breaches of Western Australia’s strict Covid quarantine laws during a private helicopter trip.

Power, 63, and his son, Nicholas Power, 36, on Friday admitted failing to self-quarantine upon returning from Queensland in October last year, an offence that carries a maximum penalty of 12 months’ imprisonment.

The breach came just 18 months after Neville Power was appointed to head up prime minister Scott Morrison’s since-disbanded National Covid-19 Coordination Commission.

From AAP:

Labor has urged voters to send the NSW premier a message at the ballot box, hoping anger at his government could net them a “historic win” in at least one of four seats up for grabs in byelections.

Four months after Gladys Berejiklian’s sudden resignation prompted three other MPs to follow suit, polling day has finally arrived in Bega, Monaro, Strathfield and Willoughby.

While about 40% of constituents in the electorates have already picked their candidate – voting early or via post – people began turning out to booths saturated with signage on Saturday morning.

The contests are the first electoral test for Liberal premier Dominic Perrottet and Labor leader Chris Minns, and come a year before all NSW voters heads to the polls in a general election.

Both men were recently elevated to their position and both are painting their parties as the underdog.

For Mr Perrottet, there is the usual swing against the government in by-elections, the loss of popular and senior MPs, as well as scrutiny of his handling of the surging Omicron wave.

The government is already in minority, and a loss of any further seats would force it to rely more heavily on the votes of independent or minor party MPs.

Updated

Lastly, the PM has offered his “support” to the Liberal candidates in today’s NSW by-elections.

Scott Morrison says he 'understands' Canberra protesters

The PM has been asked about the anti-vaccination/anti-mandate/anti-establishment protests in Canberra today:

My message to them today as Australia is a free country and they have a right to protest. I would ask them to do that in a peaceful and respectful way.

I want to be very clear when it comes to the issue of action mandates. Commonwealth government have only ever unsupported mandates that relate to aged care workers, disability workers and those that are working in high-risk situations in health system.

All other mandates that relate to vaccines have been imposed unilaterally by state governments.

They have not been put in place by the commonwealth government. In fact, the commonwealth government cannot impose such a mandate. So I understand their concerns about these issues.

Here are some pics from scenes earlier in Canberra:

Updated

The PM is speaking in Sydney:

The situation in Ukraine is very serious. Starting last year, when we began to say to Australians who were in Ukraine to take their own decisions, to put themselves in a position of safety.

We have continued that well into last month and it has been a clear message for some time now that Australians in Ukraine should be seeking to get out of the country.

There are many Ukrainians, Australians of Ukrainian descent and citizens that are living there and will make their own decisions.

We respect their decisions but our advice is clear, this is a dangerous situation and bring your own safety, you should seek to make your way out of Ukraine.

We have some more info from NSW on today’s Covid numbers:

Of people aged 16 plus, 47.3% have now received a third dose of a Covid-19 vaccine. This represents 51.6% of the eligible population that received their second dose more than three months ago.

Of the 32 people who died; one person was in their 40s, two people were in their 50s, seven people were in their 60s, 11 people were in their 70s, six people were in their 80s and five people were in their 90s.

Eight people who died were aged under 65.

Three of these people had received three doses of a Covid-19 vaccine, three people had received two doses and two people were not vaccinated. Seven people had known underlying health conditions.

Updated

From AAP:

Swimming Australia has appointed three-time Olympic gold medallist Tracy Stockwell as its new president – to replace the departing Kieran Perkins.

Stockwell, who has been on the Swimming Australia board since 2016, will assume the presidency on Monday while Perkins transitions into his new role as chief executive of the Australian Sports Commission.

Stockwell – who capped off her swimming career with three gold medals at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games, where she captained the United States team – said she was keen to get started in her new job in the decade-long lead-up to the 2032 Games in Brisbane.

“Swimming has played such an important role in my life, and I feel privileged to take on a role that will empower me to give something back to the sport that has provided me with so many opportunities,” Stockwell said.

“As we begin the journey to Brisbane 2032, we must do everything within our capability to fulfill our vision to be globally admired for our performance in and out of the water.”

Stockwell, who is also a five-times world champion and set five world records, was inducted into both the US Olympic and International Swimming Halls of Fame in 1990.

Updated

ACT records 428 new Covid cases and 51 in hospital

Patients in ACT hospitals as at 8pm yesterday: 51 (including 3 in intensive care and 1 who is ventilated).

ACT residents aged 12 and over who are fully vaccinated: 98.6%

ACT residents aged 16 and over who have received their booster: 58.9%

ACT residents aged 5-11 who have received one dose: 75.1%

New deaths: 0

Total deaths since the pandemic started: 31

New cases of COVID-19 recorded in the ACT in the 24 hours to 8pm yesterday: 428 (255 PCR and
173 RAT)

Active cases: 2,618 (1,444 PCR and 1,174 RAT)

Total number of cases: 40,946 (30,438 PCR and 10,508 RAT)

Gerrard said the technical issues with the Covid data should be sorted out today so we will bring you more on that when we have an update.

Updated

John Gerrard:

In terms of the hospital situation, this continues to improve significantly. We have 508 people in our public hospitals being treated for Covid-19. That is down from 535 yesterday. Those falling numbers continue on a daily basis, 49 patients are currently in intensive care.

We do know that the intensive care admissions tends to lag behind as well, and in the private hospitals also the numbers of inpatients continue to fall, down to 30 in the last 24 hours, from 49 for the previous reporting period.

In terms of school-aged children, there has been an issue with data collection pertaining to PCR results, but we do have the self-reported rapid antigen test results for children, in the last 24 hours there were 655, about the same number as the last period when it was 633, so no major change there.

Updated

Queensland reports 13 Covid-related deaths with 538 people in hospital

Queensland health authorities are giving an update about data issues with today’s Covid cases. Chief health officer Dr John Gerrard says:

[We’re] reporting 3,660 cases, but they have had some technical issues with regards to data collation, so that is probably likely to be a bit of an underestimate and we will report on the additional cases that are likely to occur in the next 24 hours.

So there are some slight data problems there in the last 24 hours. As we have said, we have 13 deaths to report today, one person in their 50s, two in their 60s, three in their 70s, five in their 80s and two in the 90s. Six of these 13 were not vaccinated.

Updated

Lastly, McKenzie is asked about an article in the Saturday Paper this morning saying the prime minister’s apology to victims in Parliament House was never intended to happen, only intended to come from the presiding officers.

At the last minute, the PM decided he would speak after finding out the opposition leader was speaking, the article alleges.

This is what she said (and you might notice, she completely dodged the question):

I‘m a National party Senate leader and, on that particular day in my chamber, every single leader, both the Liberal party, the Labor party, the Greens and the National party stood up and welcome to the Jenkins report, spoke very much and my comments were around our generation of MPs being the generation of change.

For too long sexual assault has been okayed not just in our workplace but in many workplaces in the broader community in Australia.

It’s not OK anywhere, anytime. And I’m very buoyed by the fact that all sides of politics, all parties, agree on that.

Updated

McKenzie is asked if she thinks the five Liberal MPs who crossed the floor “misled” the government (as Peter Dutton has claimed). This is what she said:

Well obviously I’m disappointed that government MPs who won an election in 2019 on the back of delivering a religious discrimination bill chose to at the 11th hour not support the government’s position.

That’s always disappointing because we took that to the election and we won the election on the basis of that.

Updated

McKenzie:

It would be inappropriate and actually negligent for us to immediately the next day actually pass the bill that we don’t know the impact of those amendments to the Senate.

Updated

McKenzie on religious discrimination:

We ran on delivering a religious discrimination act and heavily consulted on that.

The bill that was put before parliament this week was actually a compromise between faith groups, the broader community – making sure that we had an a religious discrimination bill that balanced the competing rights, shall we say.

It’s always about competing rights and getting the balance right.

We heavily consulted that bill in the broader community and the consensus position was put to the House.

Updated

McKenzie has been asked about the government failing to deliver the religious discrimination bill – an election promise in 2019.

It was a larger commitment and we put that to the floor of the House of Representatives and it passed. Unfortunately, because of matters within the Senate and the waging of amendments that Labor put on the table in the wee hours of the morning ... we were unable to proceed without into the Senate.

Updated

The minister for emergency management and national recovery and resilience, Bridget McKenzie, is on the ABC right now.

She is talking bushfire funding.

The Australian government continues to stand with those bushfire affected communities, long into the recovery, because we know it takes time.

You mentioned in your early comments we put $280m on the table for our bushfire recovery grants program, to get those locally led recovery solutions, and because of the calibre of applications were received, from right across those communities we’ve been able to extend that funding by $110m, to see $390m into communities.

These 524 projects across the 110 local government that were affected during those devastating fires, include things like not just the community infrastructure type of project we are seeing here in Wodonga, but support for our emergency service providers and those longer-term social support projects like mental health support.

The $390m [builds] on and is included in our over $2.2bn we have put on the table.

Updated

The Australian Capital Territory’s top prosecutor has issued a warning against “officers of the court and public figures” making public comment on active cases following the furore over prime minister Scott Morrison’s comments to Brittany Higgins.

Morrison was forced to clarify comments to Higgins earlier in the week relating to her time in parliament.

The comments prompted a rebuke from Warwick Korn, the lawyer representing the man accused of her rape, Bruce Lehrmann, and other leading legal figures, who feared they could be prejudicial.

From AAP:

Queensland’s health chief is “personally reluctant” to repeal a venue vaccine mandate before the end of winter and says it could in fact be the very last pandemic restriction ditched.

The state’s Omicron outbreak peaked on January 25 with 928 patients in hospital and 71 in intensive care, well below a predicted 3000-7000 general admissions and an ICU intake of several hundred.

Double-dose vaccine coverage is above 90 per cent and natural immunity high, with at least 343,000 Queenslanders having officially had Covid-19.

Chief health officer Dr John Gerrard, who hasn’t knowingly had the virus himself, believes the real number could be as high as 1.7 million.

He says infection and vaccination have created “a substantial wall of immunity”.

But easing remaining restrictions – mandatory indoor face masks, vaccine mandates in venues, and quarantine and isolation – will depend on what happens over the next two months.

Authorities are wary of the virus spreading in schools, which reopened this week, and the onset of winter.

Updated

After the week we had in federal politics, I thought it would be good to highlight the trans-inclusive schools that are changing lives through inclusion.

You can read more here:

Two bushfire warnings in Western Australia’s south have been downgraded from emergency to watch and act.

Authorities are still warning though that there is a possible threat to lives and homes in Hopetoun in the shire of Ravensthorpe, on the state’s south coast, and part of the Jerramungup townsite in the Great Southern.

Evacuation centres have been set up in both areas. More info here:

NSW records 32 deaths to Covid-19

NSW has lost 32 more people to Covid-19, 1650 people are in hospital and of those, 104 are in ICU.

Victoria records 19 Covid-related deaths

Vicotria has lost 19 more people to Covid-19 while there are 487 people in hospital, and of those 79 are in ICU.

Updated

The stability of the Indo-Pacific will also be in danger if Russia is allowed to threaten Ukraine with impunity, the US secretary of state has warned during a visit to Australia.

Antony Blinken said on Friday there were “very troubling signs of Russian escalation”, adding: “We’re in a window when an invasion could begin at any time – and to be clear, that includes during the Olympics.”

He said the US would continue to draw down its embassy in Kyiv and reiterated calls for any American citizens who remain in Ukraine to leave immediately, following Joe Biden’s comment that “things could go crazy quickly”.

From AAP:

Australian health authorities are hoping the availability of the Novavax Covid vaccine from Monday will inject new momentum into the program.

So far 93.9% of Australians over 16 are double-dosed, according to official figures.

But the second-dose rate is below this in Western Australia, Queensland, South Australia, the Northern Territory and Victoria.

Some people have been holding off getting vaccinated until the protein-based Novavax was approved and rolled out.

Novavax will be made available at GP clinics, community pharmacies and state-run vaccine clinics.

The first batches of the vaccine arrived in the country earlier this week, with the government having purchased 51 million Novavax doses.

“Despite high vaccination rates in Australia, there has been demand for a protein-based formula. For some people, the arrival of Novavax will be the extra push they need to get their first jab,” health minister Greg Hunt said.

Updated

The company behind Australia’s offshore processing regime on Nauru made a $101m profit last financial year – more than $500,000 for each of the fewer than 200 people held on the island.

Rard No 3, the holding company for Canstruct International, which has the government contract to run the Nauru offshore processing centre, has more than $340m in cash and investments, according to its most recent accounts filed with the corporate regulator.

When Canstruct International was initially awarded the Nauru contract in 2017 the company had $8 in assets.

Read more from Ben Doherty and Ben Butler here:

After almost 11 years of Coalition dominance in New South Wales, could Labor be about to mount its comeback?

Saturday’s byelections in four New South Wales state electorates are likely to have wide-ranging impacts.

The worst case scenario for the premier, Dominic Perrottet, would see the state government lose its stable majority in the lower house of parliament. More likely, though, is that these byelections could set the tone for next year’s state election.

Read Ben Raue’s analysis of today’s byelections here:

NSW premier Dominic Perrottet speaks to the media on Friday.
The NSW premier, Dominic Perrottet, speaks to the media on Friday. Photograph: Bianca de Marchi/AAP

Updated

Good morning, Stuart MacFarlane here to guide you through the news this Saturday morning for the next hour or so.

Polling day has arrived for four New South Wales electorates heading to the ballot box in byelections triggered by the resignations of senior state MPs.

Within days of former premier Gladys Berejiklian quitting her leadership in October, the then Nationals leader, John Barilaro, former transport minister Andrew Constance and former Labor leader Jodi McKay announced they would leave state parliament too.

They left vacant the Sydney seats of Willoughby and Strathfield, and regional seats of Bega and Monaro. The contest to find their replacements is the first electoral test for Dominic Perrottet and Chris Minns and comes a year before all NSW voters heads to the polls in a general election.

But election day is likely to look quite different than previously due to precautions put in place amid the state’s Omicron Covid wave.

Voters have previously needed a suitable reason to vote early, or via post, but all constituents in the four seats were this time allowed to do either. However that means results will be delayed, NSW electoral commissioner John Schmidt has warned.

Further protests against vaccine mandates are expected in Canberra today, with police predicting protest numbers will reach up to 4,000 on Saturday before a planned march to Parliament House today.

Authorities are also preparing for the possibility the protesters will target and disrupt a “Superhero Day” being held at the mass vaccination site at the Australian Institute of Sport, which is aimed at boosting child vaccination rates.

Anti-vaccination protesters have been ordered to leave Exhibition Park in Canberra, where they have been staying for more than a week, by Sunday.

Emergency bushfire warnings have been issued for residents in parts of Jerramungup, Hopetoun and Mount Sheridan in Western Australia.

“You are in danger and need to act immediately to survive. There is a threat to lives and homes,” the Department of Fire and Emergency Services warnings said.

All fires were out of control and conditions were worsening for the Jerramungup fire, which was moving fast in a southeasterly direction. Residents in the three communities have been advised to leave for a safer place if the way is clear or to shelter in their homes if they cannot leave.

We will also have all the latest Covid news.

Let’s jump in.

Updated

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