What we learned, Friday 27 September
Well readers, that’s all from us on the live blog tonight. If you are reading in Victoria, I hope you’ve had a lovely grand final eve public holiday. If you are reading in Sydney or Brisbane, may the best AFL team win (and stay dry – it’s wet out there).
Here were today’s major developments:
Mpox cases have surged across Australia, swelling from a handful to hundreds in the space of a few months. More than 600 cases have been notified to federal authorities in the current reporting quarter, as of Friday, amid an explosion in the virus worldwide.
The value of Star Entertainment has fallen almost $600m this morning, after shares in the embattled casino operator resumed trading on the ASX for the first time this month.
Former prime minister Paul Keating has accused the government of “flogging a dead seahorse” with its nuclear-powered submarine plan and has argued the Labor party’s rank-and-file membership “abhors Aukus”.
The Bureau of Meteorology has issued a severe weather update for parts of north-east New South Wales and south-east Queensland as wet and windy weather continues to batter the east coast.
And a statue of former Victorian premier Daniel Andrews is in the works one year after he resigned from the state’s top job.
Updated
Covid report due this week faces month-long delay
We might have to wait a little longer for answers from the much-awaited federal Covid inquiry, with news released late on Friday that its final report – which was due to be delivered to the government by the end of this month – would now be delivered nearly a month later.
After 5pm on Friday evening, the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet uploaded a statement to its website confirming the change. The independent inquiry, set up in September 2023, had – according to its terms of reference – been asked to “deliver a Final Report to Government including recommendations to the Commonwealth Government to improve Australia’s preparedness for future pandemics by the end of September 2024”.
The Monday coming is the last day of September. The Department of PM&C says in a statement that “the inquiry will complete its work on 30 September 2024, consistent with the Terms of Reference”.
But, it goes on to say:
Given the complexity and size of the report the Prime Minister granted our request for an extension to provide the report by 25 October 2024.
This extension enables the report to be prepared for publication so it is available to the wide range of people that participated in the inquiry. This will allow the report to be readily released to the public.
We’ve asked for further clarification on when the report will actually be released to the public.
Updated
