What we learned today, Tuesday 29 September
It’s been quite a day for the news cycle!
Before we say goodbye, let’s recap the day’s top headlines:
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The Reserve Bank has lifted its key interest rate to 4.6%, its highest level since 2011, from 4.35%. The RBA’s rate-setting board, in its statement accompanying its decision today, has warned its fears about inflation are coming to fruition and it is ready to lift interest rates again.
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The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, said Australians are “under pressure” and has pointed to the conflict in the Middle East as a major driver of rising inflation.
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Macquarie Bank was the first to announce changes to interest rates across its variable-rate home loans and everyday bank accounts from next month.
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Mehreen Faruqi and Sarah Hanson-Young have said they will contest the Greens leadership after Larissa Waters’ shock resignation.
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OpenAI’s chief strategy officer will fly to Australia from the US next week to appear before a joint select committee on artificial intelligence.
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New South Wales police have arrested a man over the suspicious deaths of two men in the state’s north who were found dead at the same property.
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A small number of bogong moths have arrived at Parliament House in Canberra, the first sightings amid an apparent resurgence of the endangered native insect.
Thanks for sticking around, we’ll see you tomorrow morning to do it all over again.
Updated
Australia investigating reports of detained activist
Australian officials are making “urgent” inquiries with Vietnamese authorities to confirm the detention of a democracy campaigner.
Vietnamese Australian Tran Hiep, 50, has not been in contact with his family since 18 September, following a short trip to Cambodia to meet with human rights activists.
A spokesman for the foreign affairs department said it had made “urgent inquiries with Vietnamese authorities to confirm reports that an Australian citizen has been detained”.
We are providing consular assistance to the Australian’s family.
In a statement, the Vietnamese government said it had arrested Hiep and two others entering the country from the Cambodian border.
Updated
Greens need to grow, Faruqi and McKim say
Mehreen Faruqi and Nick McKim have issued a statement about their joint ticket for the Greens leadership. They said.
To meet the moment, the Greens need to grow.
We need to take the fight to Labor and a broken economic system that rips off young people, keeps working people drowning in bills and wreaks havoc on nature and climate.
“As the far-right gains strength, we think we are the right people to resist, and to grow our movement alongside our colleagues, members and supporters. Our politics are unapologetically bold and we want to lead with hope over hate and people over profit.
Mehreen Faruqi to run for Greens leadership
NSW senator and current Greens deputy leader Mehreen Faruqi will run for the party leadership this week, on a joint ticket with Tasmanian senator Nick McKim.
Faruqi is the second declared candidate, after Sarah Hanson-Young said on Tuesday she would contest the leadership.
The race has been sparked by Larissa Waters’ shock resignation on Monday night due to health concerns.
A decision is expected in the next 48 hours, with Greens members set to congregate at a two-day party retreat in Sydney.
Faruqi has been in federal parliament since 2018 and holds portfolios including university education, international aid and animal welfare.
McKim, who would become deputy leader, holds the party’s treasury portfolio.
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Bob Brown says Waters can ‘feel very proud’ as she steps down as Greens leader
The Greens party co-founder Bob Brown says Larissa Waters can “feel very proud” of her time as party leader after stepping down due to ill health.
Waters quit the top job after 16 months as she manages a worsening chronic kidney condition. Speaking on ABC’s Afternoon Briefing, Brown said:
The last couple of months have shown the highest poll ratings for the Greens in history. Up there averaging 13%, 14%, [sometimes] hitting 16%. So … the Larissa team, and Larissa herself, can feel very proud about that as she leaves and hopefully gets very better, very much better from the health problems she’s had.
Brown said he felt “very confident” about whoever the party chose as its next leader.
It’s a team that’s going places.
The Greens party room will make the decision tomorrow. I’ll leave that to them. What I can say is it now has a depth of talent for leadership. There are three or four people in there who would make excellent leaders.
They know each other’s qualities, and the public can be sure they’ll come up with the right answer.
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Man arrested after two men found dead at same home two weeks apart
A man has been arrested after two men were found dead at a home in Gurranang, about 25km north of Grafton, two weeks apart.
Police were called to the house on 13 September where they found the body of a 79-year-old man inside.
On 28 September, police went to the same location as part of their investigation, and while there they found the body of another man inside a shed. The second man is believed to be aged 59.
Today, police arrested a 32-year-old man at a hospital in Grafton. He was taken to the Grafton police station and the investigation is ongoing.
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Max Chandler-Mather calls for direct election of new Greens leader
The former Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather has called for the party’s membership to get a vote on its next parliamentary leader.
Defeated at last year’s election, the former Griffith MP is now the head of the party thinktank The Green Institute.
In an open letter, he called a members’ vote “a radical idea”. A plebiscite in 2020 saw 62% of Greens members support “one-member, one-vote” for the election of the leader, but the move fell short of a required two-thirds majority.
Chandler-Mather said:
People often ask how to recreate the political success and energy of UK Greens leader, Zack Polanksi or New York Mayor, Zohran Mamdani.
The recipe for their success doesn’t just lie in their policies, rhetoric or even organising strategy. It lies in the process by which they won their elections. In both instances they were elected by direct member elections.
If we want to win real change, then the Greens should aspire to become a genuine mass membership party with well over 500,000 members, where its support and organisation reaches into the working class communities long abandoned by the Labor party.
Direct member election of the leader won’t achieve [our aims] on its own. But I fundamentally believe it is a crucial step towards building the movement we need.
Updated
More ‘boots on the ground’ for missing hiker in Peru
Loved ones of an Australian hiker missing in Peru have vowed the traveller will return home safely, as they ramp up a private rescue mission.
Jordan Yap, 30, last made contact with friends and family the day before a planned 10-day solo trek along the challenging Cordillera Huayhuash mountain range, starting on September 14.
The Melbourne man’s best friend, Kevin Nguyen, said:
Jordan, in my opinion, is coming home.
(Jordan) is someone that is incredibly adventurous and takes life by its hands.
More than $74,000 has been donated to an online fundraiser for a private search team of specialised high-altitude mountain guides, alongside rescue efforts by local authorities.
In an update posted online, Yap’s family said they need “more boots on the ground to cover as much territory as possible”.
Updated
Markets lift bets on higher interest rates after RBA warning
Markets are expecting interest rates will stay higher for longer after the Reserve Bank board lifted rates and said it was willing to move again.
Money markets were already expecting today’s hike would be followed by another in February and potentially one more later in 2027, with no cuts in the near future.
Those predictions appear to have been bolstered by the RBA’s harsh verdict on Australia’s inflation problem. The Australian dollar is up from 70.11 US cents before the decision to 70.17 US cents.
Bond yields have nudged upwards, and the sharemarket benchmark, the S&P/ASX200, slipped from 8,697 to 8,671 points.
Investment management companies were split on what comes next, with Vanguard predicting rates would stay on hold but VanEck tipping another hike as “highly likely”.
Australia a ‘global outlier’ on rate rises: Liberal MP
Liberal frontbencher Simon Kennedy has criticised the federal government over the Reserve Bank’s rate rise decision today, calling on the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, to redo the federal budget. Kennedy said:
Paul Keating gave us the recession Australia had to have. Jim Chalmers has given us the household recession Australia did not need to have.
We have had four interest rate rises this year.
Jim Chalmers needs to immediately redo his budget, cut government spending, and explain to the 3 million Australian households with mortgages what this will do to inflation and interest rates.
Kennedy says Australia is a “global outlier” with the most interest rate rises this year of any advanced economy.
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RBA not ruling out further rate rises
The RBA has not ruled out further rate rises, saying higher interest rates are necessary to bring inflation back to target.
Speaking in Sydney, the governor, Michele Bullock, said:
Higher interest rates are needed to ensure inflation returns to target.
We raised interest rates three times earlier in the year. A lot of that effect is still to flow through. This is one more.
What we are predicting here is that this will be restrictive enough. Those interest rate increases bring things down.
Bullock said the board would raise interest rates again “if that’s what’s needed to get inflation down”, while acknowledging the impact on households and businesses.
Now, I know this decision is difficult for households with a mortgage and businesses with loans, but high inflation hurts all Australians, especially the most vulnerable.
Every household has seen how the price of everything has gone up in recent years. Pay packets don’t go as far as they used to and that’s why we need to stop this high inflation.
The governor said that, alongside inflation, the “global AI investment boom” had also played a role in driving up costs.
These costs are now beginning to flow through to the prices faced by businesses and consumers. The AI boom is also adding to demand in the Australian economy at a time when we already have capacity pressures.
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Wondering what the RBA’s rate rise means for you and your mortgage?
Use the Guardian’s mortgage calculator to find out how changes to interest rates could affect your repayments.
‘A dark day’: Angus Taylor anticipates RBA rate rise will add to ‘tough time’ for mortgage holders
The opposition leader, Angus Taylor, acknowledged the rate rise will compound the “tough time” facing millions of Australians. Speaking in Melbourne, he said:
Just talking to small business people and hearing about the tough time that we’re seeing right across Australia right now.
This is a dark day, a tough day for hardworking Australian families with a mortgage, those in small businesses, but more particularly households who have got a mortgage who are going to pay more as a result of this $1,400 a year in additional costs.
Taylor accused the government of exacerbating the pressure on Australians by increasing inflation with excessive government spending.
We know that this is a government that is spending too much. We also know it’s an economy that is not working and that drives up inflation and it drives up interest rates.
Labor’s spending has been much faster than the overall economy. Households and families are having to tighten their belts, but the government hasn’t tightened its belt and that drives up inflation and interest rates, and all Australians are paying a price for that.
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Macquarie Bank passes on interest rate increase after RBA decision
Macquarie Bank has announced changes to interest rates across its variable-rate home loans and everyday bank accounts from next month.
The announcement came less than an hour after the Reserve Bank decided to increase the official cash rate.
In a statement, the bank said:
Macquarie will increase variable home loan reference rates by 0.25% p.a., effective from 15 October 2026. Macquarie will also increase the ongoing variable interest rates paid on its transaction and savings accounts from 15 October 2026.
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Chalmers says RBA decision 'make things tougher for a lot of people'
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, says Australians are “under pressure” and has pointed to the conflict in the Middle East as a major driver of rising inflation. Speaking in Queensland, he said:
The Reserve Bank statement makes it really clear that we have an inflation challenge in our economy, which is made worse by the war in the Middle East.
The statement makes it abundantly clear that one of the main drivers of inflation in our economy is a conflict on the other side of the world, pushing up global oil prices and being felt right around our economy and indeed right around the world.
The war in the Middle East is not the only factor when it comes to our inflation challenge, but it is a very, very big factor.
Chalmers said Australians were paying a “hefty price” for the conflict.
I do understand that a lot of Australians are doing it tough and this decision today from the Reserve Bank will make things tougher for a lot of people.
Australians are paying a very hefty price for that war in the Middle East. And today that price became a bit steeper with this decision from the independent Reserve Bank.
So, we do take responsibility for our part of the fight against inflation. That’s why we will continue to manage the budget in a responsible way, roll out cost-of-living help in a responsible way and deal with these longer-term challenges as well.
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Good afternoon!
I’ll be here to guide you through what looks set to be a busy afternoon. Stay tuned.
That’s all for me. Achol Arok will take things from here. Take care!
Hanson-Young on Greens leadership: ‘I will fight with everything I’ve got’
Sarah Hanson-Young has confirmed she is running for the Greens leadership.
Here’s more of her statement:
People deserve better than the failed policies and weak excuses from the Labor and Liberal parties and the hate peddling from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.
Our communities and environment are being hammered by a rigged system and they want politicians that will fight for them.
I will fight with everything I’ve got.
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RBA board unanimously voted to hike and is ready to lift rates again
The RBA’s rate-setting board, in its statement accompanying its decision today, has warned its fears about inflation were coming to fruition and it is ready to lift interest rates again.
The nine-member unanimously voted to lift rates to 4.6%, showing stronger resolve than ANZ and Westpac had forecast (each predicted a split vote).
It singled out a broadening Middle East conflict and strong AI-related demand for pushing up prices globally. Locally, inflation was higher than the RBA expected and businesses were either lifting their prices or looking to do so.
The board said higher fuel prices were partially being passed on to prices of other goods and services and it was possible the ongoing US war on Iran could push inflation still higher and drag global economic activity even lower.
The RBA has already lifted interest rates three times this year. The board said those hikes appeared to be slowing the economy but another was needed to bring too-high inflation back down “in a reasonable period”.
It warned it was not necessarily done moving rates:
The Board will continue to do what it considers necessary to bring inflation sustainably back to target, including increasing the cash rate target further if needed.
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Reserve Bank hikes cash rate to 4.6%, the highest level since 2011
The Reserve Bank has lifted its key interest rate to 4.6%, its highest level since 2011, from 4.35%.
The widely expected fourth increase to the cash rate this year will add to repayment costs for millions of mortgage holders across the country.
Data to be released on Wednesday is expected to show underlying inflation rising at an annual pace of 3.6% for the third month running in August, well ahead of the RBA’s target range of 2% to 3%.
The RBA governor, Michele Bullock, has warned workers and businesses could lift their prices and wage demands as they start to expect persistent high inflation.
Before the decision, markets were predicting a further hike by February and more than a 50% chance of another by mid-2027.
Bullock will speak at 3.30pm AEST in Sydney to explain the decision.
Hanson-Young to seek Greens leadership
Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young has confirmed she will stand for the party’s leadership.
In a statement posted to social media in the past few minutes she said she was “shocked and saddened” by outgoing leader Larissa Waters’ decision to quit.
I know this was an incredibly difficult decision for her and my thoughts are with her and her family.
Larissa has given so much to our movement and to the parliament and we wish her a full and speedy recovery. We look forward to welcoming her back as a fulltime senator when she is ready.
I am speaking with my colleagues about the best way to help the Greens and have asked for their support to be the next leader.
RBA decision coming at 2.30pm eastern
We’re just under half an hour from the RBA interest rate decision. We’ll bring you live updates from our business reporters as soon as we know more.
Sydney police investigating after man found with gunshot wound
NSW police are investigating after a man was shot in Sydney’s south west around lunchtime today.
Officials said officers arrived to an address in Liverpool around 12.40pm, where they found a man, 32, suffering a gunshot wound to his leg. He was treated by NSW Ambulance paramedics and taken to the hospital for further treatment.
A crime scene has been established and an investigation into the matter is under way.
Anyone with CCTV or information about the incident is urged to contact the police.
Driver pleads guilty after man killed by vehicle at Melbourne comic convention
A driver who ploughed through a group outside a popular comic convention has pleaded guilty to killing a pedestrian, AAP reports.
Awer Dau, 34, appeared in Melbourne magistrates court on Tuesday on a video link from prison as he entered pleas over the Supanova incident. Dau was behind the wheel of the Toyota sedan that mounted the kerb outside the Melbourne Showgrounds event in Ascot Vale about 5pm on 18 April.
A 20-year-old man died at the scene while another man the same age was seriously injured after being struck by the car.
Dau was charged with offences including culpable driving causing death, negligently causing serious injury, possessing methamphetamine and failing to render assistance after an accident. He only spoke during Tuesday’s brief hearing to confirm his pleas of guilty to the charges.
He did not apply for bail and was remanded in custody to face a plea hearing at the Victorian county court in February.
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Video: crowds of onlookers gather after dead whale washes up on a Perth beach
Surf lifesavers found the dead animal at Perth’s City beach at about 7.30am on Monday and raised the alarm. Local authorities closed the beach for several kilometres in each direction of the carcass, which appeared to be about six metres long. Multiple sharks have been spotted in the area.
Local officials have been trying to arrange for the whale’s removal.
“I’ve been warned by people that were involved in [another] incident … that it is going to be expensive,” Gary Mack, the mayor of the town of Cambridge, told ABC radio Perth this morning.
But one thing we do know is that we can’t wait, we’ve got to get that carcass removed as soon as possible and that’s our intent.
Read more here:
Updated
When does daylight saving start again in Australia?
In one word: Sunday.
Daylight saving returns on the first Sunday of October every year and ends on the first Sunday in April.
In 2026, daylight saving time will recommence on Sunday 4 October at 2am Australian eastern standard time (AEST).
Clocks will move forward one hour to 3am, giving an extra hour of afternoon daylight.
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Shoebridge does not rule Greens leadership nomination ‘in or out’ ahead of party vote
The Greens are expected to select a new leader as soon as tomorrow, with party members set to attend a two-day retreat in Sydney starting on Wednesday.
Larissa Waters shocked colleagues on Monday by announcing her resignation as leader, due to a chronic kidney condition. The retreat was already scheduled and is now likely to include negotiations over the leadership and other party positions.
The party’s defence spokesperson, David Shoebridge, is considered a possible frontrunner, along with Sarah Hanson-Young and the deputy leader, Mehreen Faruqi.
“I’m not here to rule anything in or anything out in terms of leadership,” Shoebridge said. “That will be a matter … that the party room makes a decision on.”
A spokesperson for Faruqi said the NSW senator was considering her options.
All positions within the party room will be spilled, and negotiations to avoid a leadership ballot could be considered.
Updated
Have a question about politics? Ask our Canberra team anything!
It’s already been a busy week in politics.
The RBA is set to raise the cash rate today, with many analysts tipping a further rate rise later in the year.
OpenAI has apologised for a rogue AI agent that breached Medicare.
And the Greens leader, Larissa Waters, has announced she will step down due to ill health prompting questions about who will be the next leader of the party.
Do you have a question about how this will affect the political landscape?
Send us a question and political editor Tom McIlroy may answer it in our brand new newsletter, Politics, really.
Email your question to [email protected], and don’t forget to sign up for the newsletter here.
Updated
First home buyer numbers recover to May levels, broker reports
First home buyer applications have recovered to their May levels as house prices slide around the country, brokers’ group Loan Market has reported.
Applications for first home loans in the second week of September were back at highs not seen since the May budget, the company said. Applications had dropped off in June and July, then started picking up in August.
The recovery will likely be short-lived, with applications slumping each time the Reserve Bank lifts interest rates. Another rate increase is expected this afternoon.
Applications to refinance existing home loans have surged to hit their highest level since March, Loan Market said. That means even more people have looked for a better deal on the mortgage this month than they did in the same period in May.
Property investor applications, meanwhile, are still running lower than they were before the budget, which tweaked their tax breaks. Some landlords will likely be better off under the reforms but investors have been scared off by the market slowdown.
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Albanese wishes Larissa Waters well as Greens leader steps down over ill health
Anthony Albanese says he has wished outgoing Greens leader Larissa Waters well after she announced she would step down to manage pre-existing kidney disease that has “declined significantly”.
Albanese said he had spoken with Waters and wished her “all the very best for the health issues that she’s dealing with”.
When I spoke to her, you know, she was going off to see further health checks today. And I wish her well.
This is a job, and a leadership position for a minor party means a lot of travel and a lot of pressure … she wasn’t in a position to be able to do that job going forward. But she intends to stay in the Senate.
Albanese said that, despite their political differences, he wished Waters “all the very best on a personal level”.
I obviously have differences with the Greens political party, but this is a human issue. I can also have compassion and I have a good relationship with Larissa …
I thank her for the constructive engagement that I’ve had with her. I work with people across the parliament. We have to do that in order to secure any legislation through our Senate. We haven’t always agreed and we won’t always agree going forward. But I wish her all the very best.
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Albanese says OpenAI talks after the Medicare hack were ‘very constructive’
The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, is speaking in Adelaide.
He was just asked about any future cut to the fuel excise, but said the government would resist any measure that could increase inflation.
Albanese was also asked again about OpenAI, echoing his remarks yesterday that he spoke to the company’s Sam Altman and had a “constructive discussion”.
OpenAI have been very constructive and open in engaging in that process. And I welcome that. … [AI] can provide revolutionary breakthroughs in health and research and science and innovation. But there are risks. And we’ve seen those risks exposed.
So we need to work this through. We see this as an opportunity, but we want to seize the benefit while mitigating the risks.
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OpenAI promises new safeguards to reassure people ‘AI is being developed safely’
OpenAI said it has enacted multiple safeguards amid a slate of concerning incidents, including the Medicare website and the Hugging Face breaches.
The AI giant said it has new controls to block live internet access in research environments and pointed to its decision to pause training and evaluation involving tool use for its “most capable models”.
OpenAi said it would only resume training the models “when we are confident that we have additional safeguards in place, which we are working on now”.
The company continued:
People want to know AI is being developed safely, and that starts with what companies like ours do ourselves. … In Australia, we are committing resources and expertise to support affected agencies and help defenders put these principles into practice.
OpenAI said it would provide dedicated support for affected agencies in Australia, funding and support to strengthen Australian cyber defences and the establishment of an Australian taskforce to develop “practical policy recommendations”.
Australia’s governments, industries, and citizens are and have been invaluable partners to OpenAI. We do not take this for granted, and we intend to make this right.
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OpenAI executive flying in from US for committee hearing on artificial intelligence
OpenAI’s chief strategy officer will fly to Australia from the US next week to appear before a joint select committee on artificial intelligence, just days after the prime minister confirmed one of its models hacked a Medicare website.
Jason Kwon will appear before the committee in Sydney on 6 October.
OpenAI said it was “sorry and working to do better in the future” in a lengthy blog post about the incident, writing:
We are setting out what we know, what we have changed, and what we will do to rebuild trust with the Australian people. This is a new kind of cyber incident which represents an emerging global challenge.
One of the ways we intend to take accountability for the situation is to be intentional in working with Australia to help develop practical approaches to how AI developers and governments identify, disclose, and respond to AI cyber behaviour, whether malicious or unintentional.
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OpenAI scraps release of model expected to appear in ChatGPT over safety concerns
OpenAI is scrapping the release of GPT-6.1 Astra, a next-generation AI model planned for an October debut, over safety concerns raised by researchers during internal testing, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
Reuters said the model, expected to appear in ChatGPT and Codex, was designed to handle more complex tasks without human assistance, the report said.
Earlier this month, Dario Amodei, the Anthropic CEO, called for the industry to slow the development of frontier AI models to allow safety measures to keep pace, a view endorsed by Sam Altman, the OpenAI CEO, and Elon Musk, the SpaceX CEO.
OpenAI did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Read more:
Updated
18-year-old arrested in NSW on charges of using drone in alleged plot to murder man
NSW police have charged a drone operator over an alleged plot to murder a man in Sydney’s south west.
Officials said the man, 18, was arrested in Silverwater on Monday. Police will allege in court he was operating a drone to conduct surveillance as part of an alleged conspiracy to murder a man.
He has since been charged with conspiracy and agreement to murder a person, participation in a criminal group contributing to criminal activity and other charges linked to the drone.
He was remanded in custody and will appear before court today.
Massive great white shark spotted near whale carcass at popular Perth beach
Multiple sharks, including a five-metre great white, have been spotted swimming near a large, smelly whale carcass that washed ashore at a popular Western Australia beach, drawing hundreds of onlookers. Surf lifesavers found the dead animal at Perth’s City beach at about 7.30am on Monday and raised the alarm. Local authorities closed the beach for several kilometres in each direction of the carcass, which appeared to be about six metres long.
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UNSW researchers trained AI models to act ‘drunk’, then spill things they shouldn’t
Researchers at the University of New South Wales say large language models (LLMs) can be manipulated to imitate drunken behaviour … and possibly leak confidential information or answer questions they’re not supposed to.
UNSW researchers said AI models trained or prompted to mimic drunken speech became more vulnerable to privacy breaches than their “sober” counterparts.
The researchers asked a model to role-play as a drunk person, or used a dataset of drunk texts to “fine-tune” the LLM to complete sentences like a drunk person would say them.
A third strategy involved rewarding a model for using language that resembled a drunk text.
The plan wasn’t tested on every LLM available, but UNSW selected a representative sample including OpenAI’s GPT-4 and GPT-3.5.
The researchers said the “drunk” models were consistently easier to manipulate.
“We do observe that particularly with deception and disinformation, most of the language models got jailbroken,” Aditya Joshi, a researcher at UNSW, said in a statement:
It does give out secrets – across the board for all three methods, it is vulnerable.
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Greens to meet next week to choose new leader after Larissa Waters steps down
In case you missed the news last night, the Greens leader, Larissa Waters, has announced she will step down due to ill health.
A party room meeting next week will be held to choose her successor, with the deputy leader, Mehreen Faruqi, and high-profile senators Sarah Hanson-Young, David Shoebridge and Nick McKim all possibilities to contest the leadership ballot.
Waters said she had been managing a pre-existing kidney disease, but her health had “declined significantly over the course of recent months”. Her prognosis for recovery is positive, but she said the pressure of leadership was detracting from her focus on her health.
She said:
I’m really sad that illness means my time as leader has been cut short, but our movement needs a leader in good health to lead us to success at the next election.
Passing the torch on to the next leader of the party will put them in the best position to take the Greens to the next election, fighting for people, not the corporate interests that run Labor, Liberals and One Nation.
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A timeline of One Nation’s instability: more than half MPs departed party, data shows
More than half of the One Nation MPs elected to state or federal parliaments have left the party before the end of their term, with 28 of the 51 people elected under Pauline Hanson’s banner either resigning midterm or being expelled.
One Nation, which won 6% of the national vote at the 2025 federal election, is now polling above 30% in some surveys, potentially enough to make the party the official federal opposition or even in a position of minority government.
But Guardian Australia analysis of the party’s colourful candidate history shows the party has a history of chaos and instability.
Take a look:
Updated
Bogong moths back at Parliament House
A small number of bogong moths have arrived at Parliament House in Canberra, the first sightings amid an apparent resurgence of the endangered native insect.
Swarms of bogongs have been reported across NSW, part of the annual migration when huge numbers of the insects travel to cool caves in the Australian Alps to escape the summer heat.
The moths were a common sight in Canberra for decades, with particularly large numbers congregating at Parliament House. The lights around the building, including the huge Australian flag, attracted the moths. But in recent years numbers have dramatically dropped.
The moth has been listed as endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature since 2021, but is not listed as a threatened species under federal conservation laws.
Guardian Australia saw a few bogongs in the Senate wing on Monday.
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Dfat providing assistance to family of Melbourne hiker missing in Peru
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Dfat) is providing consular assistance to the family of Jordan Yap, a Melbourne man who remains missing after setting out for a difficult trek in Peru.
Dfat said it couldn’t provide further comment owing to privacy obligations.
A GoFundMe page set up by Yap’s family and friends said the man, 30, was meant to return from the 10-day hike on 23 September, but he never checked back into his hostel in Lima.
They have been paying private rescue teams to search for him and are arranging for more crews to head to the area “to cover as much territory as possible”.
“We expect to have these units actively searching in the next few days,” they wrote on the page. “Thank you again for standing with Jordan. Your support means more than we can say.”
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Police investigating suspicious deaths of two men in northern NSW
New South Wales police say they are investigating the suspicious deaths of two men in the state’s north.
Police said they found the first man – who has since been identified as a 79-year-old – dead at a property on Summerland Way at Gurranang, near Grafton, on 13 September.
Police said they attended the same property about 3.40pm on Monday as part of their investigation.
After arriving at the house, police said they found the body of the second man, who they believe to be aged in his 50s, and set up another crime scene.
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Chalmers: Australia should not ‘carry the can’ for overseas decisions
Chalmers said he doesn’t believe inflation is out of control, but he doesn’t want to see Australians “carry the can for decisions” on the other side of the world.
The treasurer is appearing on what seems like every television and radio program this morning to tout the government’s record on the economy while acknowledging the difficulties reining in inflation amid a cost of living crisis.
He said a lot of Australians are bracing for an almost certain Reserve Bank interest rate increase today, adding the government sees taming inflation and keeping unemployment low as “two important objectives”.
And that’s equally important in the Reserve Bank’s mandate, dual mandate, which talks about maintaining full employment at the same time as they go for price stability, which means inflation in the target band.
He defended his government’s tax receipts as a percentage of GDP, saying they were lower than under the Howard government.
Well, it’s still lower than what we saw under Howard and Costello, is the first point.
When asked if he would accept higher unemployment in exchange for tamed inflation, Chalmers maintained the government was “not for higher unemployment”.
I think that’s pretty clear. And what we’ve seen in recent years is that it’s possible to have low and steady unemployment at the same time as we see inflation moderate to more normal levels.
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Wife of missing activist urges Albanese government help
The wife of an Australian activist missing in Cambodia has implored the Albanese government to find him and bring him home, Australian Associated Press reports.
Tran Hiep, a 50-year-old Australian-Vietnamese democracy campaigner, was due to return to Bangkok, Thailand, to reunite with his wife, Chloe Dang, after a short trip to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to meet human rights defenders.
But he never boarded his flight and has not communicated with his wife since 18 September, leaving her worried for his safety.
My husband deserves protection, and I really hope the Australian government will continue to put pressure on Cambodia to do an investigation to find out where he is right now.
Hiep, a freelance IT professional who founded the Australian Alliance to Combat Human Trafficking, was travelling with another human rights activist, Nguyen Duc Thuan, who is also Vietnamese and holds a Norwegian passport.
The pair travelled to Cambodia to meet with dissident Vietnamese activists for training.
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Chalmers says Australians understand there are ‘inflationary challenges’ in our economy
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, said the inflationary challenge in the economy is being made “much worse” by the war in the Middle East.
Chalmers, speaking on Channel 7’s Sunrise this morning ahead of the RBA announcement, said the government has focused on savings and delivering surpluses to get government debt down.
But we know that there’s always more work today. I think people understand, people who might be bracing for an interest rate rise later today. … I think people understand that there are inflationary challenges in our economy.
But when you see what’s happening with global oil prices … obviously, factually, that is one the big drivers of inflation that people are having other deal with right now.
Chalmers said he knows that people are under pressure and that interest rate rises add to that pressure.
That’s why we accept our part, our responsibility for our part in this fight against inflation. … And it also means dealing with these longer term economic challenges.
Mia Lay among officers mourned at National Police Remembrance Day
Mia Lay, the Sydney police officer who was killed in a car crash last week, will be among those mourned at National Police Remembrance Day 2026 in Sydney.
New South Wales’ premier, Chris Minns, governor, Margaret Beazley, and police commissioner, Mal Lanyon, will be among the guests at Sydney’s Domain.
Minns said he felt incredibly gratitude for the service of police officers across the state:
[Police] start a shift not knowing what you are going to face, and we ask these young men and women to put themselves in harm’s way to keep the rest of us safe.
Police and counter-terrorism minister, Yasmin Catley, said:
My thoughts are with the families of Constable Lay, Sergeant [Mark] Bransgrove and everyone else who has lost a loved one in the line of duty. Their sacrifice will never be forgotten.
Lay, 20, had worked as a police officer for just 16 months when she was killed “instantly” in the crash in Redfern on Friday. Sgt Mark Bransgrove, who died in July last year, served in the police service for 38 years, including 30 years in the Forensic Services Group.
Remembrance events will also be held in Broken Hill, Bourke, Orange, Lithgow, Inverell, Dubbo and Tamworth, as well as other cities and towns across the country.
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Good morning, and happy Tuesday. It’s Nick Visser here to take over the blog. Let’s get to it.
There were 30 drowning deaths in 2025-2026, the highest number in almost a decade, according to a Royal Life Saving Australia report that Australian Associated Press reports on.
Of them, 14 involved more than one death, often related to boating, driving through floodwater, or people exploring unfamiliar environments, chief executive Justin Scarr said.
The message is to know the swimming skills of all the people in your group.
It is the largest spike in deaths since 2016-2017, when 34 lives were lost.
Over the past decade there have been with 229 deaths, or an average of 23 per year.
In the most recent year, 83% of drowning victims were men, 37% were born overseas and a quarter were aged between 65 and 74.
Nearly one-third of the fatal events were related to boating, while driving through floodwater and swimming were the other leading circumstances.
Besides the RBA decision at 2.30pm, the other big political story of the day is that Larissa Waters is standing down as Greens leader.
She said last night that a kidney disease she has been managing has recently worsened and that she needs to stand down.
Here’s our story from political editor Tom McIlroy:
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Chalmers defends record ahead of RBA cash rate decision
The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, has defended his economic record on the eve of what is widely expected to be the fourth interest rate rise of 2026, as the Reserve Bank remains concerned about persistent inflation.
The RBA board is poised to hike the cash rate from 4.35% to 4.6% on Tuesday, which would be the fourth increase in 2026 and push typical home loan interest rates to 6.5%.
Speaking on the ABC’s 7.30 program last night, Chalmers emphasised the factors contributing to inflation, saying that Australia was performing well considering what was going on in the world, particularly in the Middle East.
We have a lot going for us and we’ve got a lot of work to do to make sure that in these difficult global circumstances Australia continues to out-perform the world.
We have a big inflation challenge in our economy. It’s made much worse by decisions taken on the other side of the world.
From an economic point of view this war in Iran has been an absolute disaster for Australian families, because they have been asked to pay a hefty price.
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Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the top overnight stories and then it’ll be Nick Visser with the main action.
Jim Chalmers has defended his stewardship of the economy ahead of what is widely expected to be the fourth interest rate rise of 2026 as the Reserve Bank tries to bring down persistent inflation. More coming up.
Besides the RBA decision at 2.30pm, the other big political story of the day is that Larissa Waters is standing down as Greens leader. We’ll have reaction as it comes in this morning plus the latest on who might replace her.
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