Australia news live: health minister issues warning on new Covid variant; Ley pays tribute to mother on morning of funeral | Australia news

What you should know about NB.1.8.1, the new Covid variant

More than five years since Covid was initially declared a pandemic, we’re still experiencing regular waves of infections.

It is more difficult to track the occurrence of the virus nowadays, as fewer people are testing and reporting infections. But available data suggests in late May 2025 case numbers in Australia were ticking upwards.

Even if neutralising antibody levels are modestly reduced against NB.1.8.1, the WHO has noted current Covid vaccines should still protect against severe disease with this variant.

Read more here:

Woman charged after allegedly stabbing four people in eastern Victoria

Police have charged a 24-year-old woman after four people were allegedly stabbed in Bairnsdale, Victoria, on Thursday night.

Investigators say they were told a woman was behaving erratically at a supermarket in the city just before 10pm last night. Police allege the woman approached a staff member, stabbed him in the stomach and left the store.

She then allegedly had an altercation with a man at in nearby fast-food restaurant car park, assaulted a man at a hotel and stabbed a man at the Bairnsdale train station. All four people were taken to hospital, with the supermarket worker still in serious condition. The other three were treated for minor injuries and released.

Police arrested the woman at the station and have since charged her with intentionally causing injury and recklessly causing injury.

Queensland tourism minister ‘confident’ Great Barrier Reef won’t be listed by Unesco as in-danger

Andrew Powell, Queensland’s tourism minister, says he is confident that Unesco, the UN world heritage body, won’t list the Great Barrier Reef as in-danger. Unesco has been threatening for years that the mammoth natural wonder could be designated as such if Australia doesn’t take greater efforts to address climate change and a series of mass coral bleachings.

Powell told RN Breakfast:

We have to ensure that we can continue to protect our reef and have our tourism operators continue to offer the product that they do. So I’m confident that [we have] got the processes, the practices, the programs, the investment that is required to ensure that we’re doing all we can at the state level to keep the reef off that Unesco list.

Powell said he was a “little bit frustrated” by previous Queensland governments actions on the reef, but said he remains focused on the site as an international draw card.

I’m a father of five. I want my kids to continue to experience the Great Barrier Reef in the same way I have, if not in a better way.

You can read more about the Unesco threats here:

Pat Dodson says he is encouraged about Labor’s comments on truth-telling

Pat Dodson, a former Labor senator and a commissioner of the 1989 royal commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody, said he was dismayed and saddened after the death of a 24-year-old Indigenous man in police custody in Alice Springs earlier this week.

Dodson, known as “the father of reconciliation”, said he was encouraged that the Albanese government signalled this week it remained open to truth-telling and treaty. He told RN Breakfast:

I’m encouraged that the way to go forward is being proposed. Proposed or that they’re open to that, and obviously it’s got to be committed to, and then they’ve got to set up a process to enact it. But it’s a great thing because we’ve got to start listening to the different stories.

These are unique peoples with a unique culture who are here prior to the colonisation of the nation and we’ve got to start respecting them as such and dealing with them.

Read more here:

Hume says it’s time to ‘straighten your tiara’ and get to work, as her mother would say

Hume went on to say that, despite her feelings, she would support Ley’s leadership and work to “win back the hearts and minds and votes of Australians”. She told Sunrise:

The most important thing we can all do here now is get behind Sussan Ley, put our shoulders to the wheel. Because there’s a very big task ahead of us.

As my very wise mother would say: ‘Stop your nonsense, chin up, chest out, straighten your tiara and let’s get on with the job.’

Jane Hume: ‘Of course it hurts’ being demoted to backbench

The Liberal senator Jane Hume said she was hurt after being demoted from the shadow cabinet to the backbench this week under the newly reformed Coalition. “This isn’t the playground. This is the parliament,” she said this morning. Hume spoke to Sunrise:

Of course it hurts. It hurts professionally because I was a hard-working and prolific and high-profile member of the frontbench in the previous opposition. It hurts personally, too, because you know, Sussan and I are friends.

Hume went on to say there was something “liberating” about being on the backbench and being able to “speak without having to stick to the party line”.

That’s certainly going to make for much more interesting Sunrise interviews.

Read more about the new shadow cabinet here:

Dai Le says Magda Szubanski’s diagnosis reminded her of her own health troubles

MP Dai Le was on Today this morning and spoke about actor and comedian Magda Szubanski, who said yesterday she has been diagnosed with stage four blood cancer. Le, who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2014, said this morning:

I mean, as a breast cancer survivor, when I watched that clip, I remember also when I had to shave my hair off because I knew that my hair would fall off once chemo started.

And it’s so great that she actually, you know, can talk about it because a lot of women just don’t don’t want to go there.

Le said it was one of the most difficult times in her life when she received her own diagnosis. She encouraged people to speak with their doctors early if they had any troubling symptoms.

Mark Butler reiterates Australia will not bail out Healthscope

The health minister reiterated on RN Breakfast that the government would not bail out Healthscope, the private equity-backed operator of Sydney’s embattled Northern Beaches hospital. The company has maintained its 37 hospitals will remain open as it works through receivership. Butler said:

We’re not going to bail out an overseas private equity who made a play to make a profit. We’re not going to do that, I don’t think there would be many taxpayers who would urge me to do that.

As possible, we can see an orderly transfer and sale of these important assets to a more stable operator.

Read more on the collapse of Healthscope from the Guardian’s Jonathan Barrett and Natasha May here:

The health minister, Mark Butler, has said a new Covid-19 variant is spreading around Australia, encouraging Australians to stay up-to-date with their boosters. He told RN Breakfast:

I do encourage, particularly as we head into winter, for people to think about the last time they got a Covid vaccine.

If you are over 75 you should have one if it’s more than six months since you had your last booster. If you’re 65 to 74, if it’s more than 12 months. And for everyone else have a serious think.

You can find full advice here.

The opposition leader, Sussan Ley, has paid tribute to her mother and “inspiration” who died just days after her daughter became the first woman to lead the Liberal party, AAP reports.

Ley was deep in negotiations with the Nationals leader, David Littleproud, to reach a new coalition agreement after the federal election loss, while tending to her dying mother.

Angela Braybrooks’ funeral service will be held at St Matthew’s Anglican Church in Albury, New South Wales, on Friday morning. Ley said in a statement:

Like so many of her generation, she weathered uncertain times with strength and determination.

I have taken inspiration from her every single day of my life and I always will.

NSW police have found the body of a missing fisherman who never returned from a fishing trip on Lake Macquarie.

Officials said they were called to the area on Thursday afternoon, where they found the 82-year-old man’s boat abandoned during a search near Summerland Point. Police found the man’s body later that evening.

Hazardous Surf Warning in place for entire NSW coastline this weekend

Surf lifesavers are warning swimmers, boaters and rock fishers to take great care on NSW beaches this weekend. A powerful southerly swell is predicted from Saturday, which has prompted a Hazardous Surf Warning for the entire NSW coastline. Steve Pearce, the chief executive of SLSNSW, said:

What we’re seeing across many of our beaches is really quite dangerous surf conditions that have the potential to cause the public harm if they’re not cautious.

We really want to stress this message to rock fishers in particular as the winter months are when we see a large number of rock fishers visiting our coastline.

There have been 49 coastal drownings in NSW since 1 July 2024.

Thanks to Martin Farrer for getting the blog rolling today. I’ll be with you throughout the morning with updates on the day’s news.

States rated on vaping scorecard

South Australia and Queensland are leading the nation when it comes to tackling tobacco and vapes, while the Northern Territory and Western Australia are falling behind, according to a scorecard assessing the different jurisdictions.

New South Wales, Victoria, the ACT and Tasmania fall into the middle tier of performance in the scorings released by the Australian Council on Smoking and Health (Acosh) almost a year on from the federal government’s reforms.

The scorecard measured progress across nine key areas including cracking down on illegal sales and enforcing vape laws, protecting children from marketing, ensuring smoke and vape-free public spaces, investment in public education, support for high-risk groups and whether governments are keeping the tobacco industry at arm’s length.

In South Australia, the only state to achieve an A+, there have been more than 500 inspections conducted with closures of retailers who are doing the wrong thing and huge resourcing and investment into government taskforces that are seizing millions of dollars’ worth of illicit cigarettes and vapes, according to Acosh.

In Queensland, which received an A, there has been an introduction of significant penalties as well as large-scale seizures and stronger enforcement.

However, the Acosh chief executive, Laura Hunter, said “if this were an exam result, you’d have to say some states and territories are struggling. The scorecards found:

Tasmania, which received a B, is showing progress by updating state legislation, but their funding commitment to education needs to be lifted.

NSW, which received a C, has seen progress with the introduction of a licensing scheme to control supply but the focus needs to turn to resourcing compliance and enforcing.

The ACT, which also received a C, similarly needs compliance and enforcement to be strengthened.

Victoria, which also received a C, is progressing tobacco control reforms but some details are yet to be released and Acosh expects the new licensing scheme to improve the state’s score next year.

Western Australia, which received a D, has made some progress in regulations introducing the prescription-model for vaping products but is yet to update its tobacco laws, which is hampering compliance and enforcement efforts.

The Northern Territory, which received an F, needs to “urgently prioritise tobacco and vaping reforms and progress legislative changes. They have fallen behind other jurisdictions and need immediate action.”

Protests against Woodside’s North West Shelf project in WA

Community anger will show itself today after the life span of a mammoth gas project was extended for decades, the Australian Associated Press reports.

Woodside’s North West Shelf project – which hosts Australia’s biggest gas export plant – has been given the green light by the federal government to keep operating until 2070.

The Australian energy giant still has to accept conditions around heritage and air quality at the project on Western Australia’s Burrup Peninsula, home to ancient rock art, before the approval is made official.

The decision has been met with anger by environmental and Indigenous groups who argue it will trash efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions and have a ruinous effect on ancient petroglyphs.

Campaign group Disrupt Burrup Hub will today gather outside the WA district court, arguing the decision to extend the project’s life showed the government “cannot be trusted with protecting First Nations culture or our climate”.

The protest will double as a support rally for three people who targeted Woodside’s 2023 annual general meeting with stench gas and flares in what the group has previously said was an attempt to get the building evacuated.

Gerard Mazza, Jesse Noakes and Tahlia Stolarski have pleaded guilty to creating a false belief in their protest at the Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre in April 2023.

They will face the district court for sentencing today, having labelled their protest “a successful hoax” when they pleaded guilty to the charges.

The prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and his cabinet are set to head to WA next week where they are likely to face further protests.

Stephanie Convery

Greens say Woodside extension will export profits overseas ‘at the expense of everybody else’s safety’

More from that interview with Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young last night: she noted the expansion of Woodside’s gas project was not about increasing gas supply for Western Australia but rather to export overseas for company profit, “the profits of a big company like Woodside at the expense of everybody else’s safety”.

Hanson-Young said it was a “furphy to suggest we need to create huge carbon bomb” to ensure domestic supply.

There’s plenty of gas that is already being produced in Australia for Australian use … That’s not what the purpose of this is.

This is about exports, big money going overseas and pollution being created offshore at a time when it’s already a stark problem for Australia. We are one of the largest exporters of fossil fuels in the world. That means that we have a huge role in actually reducing pollution globally if we want to. There’s an opportunity for Australia.But rather than taking that opportunity, this government has given the green light to more pollution and more damage.

Stephanie Convery

Sarah Hanson-Young condemns Labor’s Woodside decision

The Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young has decried the decision by the environment minister, Murray Watt, to approve the extension of Woodside’s North West Shelf gas project as NSW residents are battling a natural disaster exacerbated by climate crisis.

Speaking to ABC’s 7.30 on Thursday, Hanson-Young said:

We know that every time a new huge gas field like this project is given the green light, or the pipeline, we know that that intensifies the pollution going into the atmosphere and therefore makes climate change worse. It just beggars belief that this week was the week that the new environment minister decided to make this decision to approve this huge pollution bomb at the same time as residents in NSW are struggling with floods. People have lost their lives, their homes, their livelihoods.

The law was “so poor, so broken” that it would allow approval for a hugely polluting project without considering the amount of pollution the project would generate, Hanson-Young said, imploring the newly re-elected Labor government to be bold in tackling climate change.

It just doesn’t make sense that in 2025 you can give an environmental approval to a project that is environmentally damaging and don’t even consider the climate damage. It just doesn’t make sense.

Look, I am hopeful. This election has provided Labor with a super majority in the house. The Greens in sole balance of power in the Senate. There is an opportunity to get the important bold reforms needed that’s done. But the government has to have the courage to do that and that means staring down the fossil fuel industry and protecting not just nature and wildlife but our children’s future.

Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the best stories of the morning and then it will be Nick Visser to take you towards the weekend.

South Australia and Queensland are leading the nation when it comes to tackling tobacco and vapes, while the Northern Territory and Western Australia are falling behind, according to a scorecard assessing the different jurisdictions. More coming up.

After this week’s decision to extend the life of Woodside’s North West Shelf LNG facility in the Burrup Peninsula in Western Australia, local activists will be out in force in Perth today. The campaign group Disrupt Burrup Hub will today gather outside the Western Australian district court against the decision and as three of their number are sentenced for a protest against Woodside. Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young has decried the decision by the environment minister, Murray Watt, saying it “beggars belief” in the age of climate change. More coming up.