Australian News

In short:

The federal government is committing to significant changes to the student debt scheme in a pitch to younger Australians hit hard by cost of living pressures.

It claims the changes to the minimum repayment threshold and indexation will see the average HECS-HELP debt holder save $680 in yearly repayments.

What's next?

The government will introduce legislation to implement the changes next year.

Under the proposal, repayments would operate similar to income tax thresholds where you pay a set rate per dollar above a certain level.

That rate per dollar increases as you move along the income scale.

The federal government's plan also lifts the minimum repayment threshold from $54,435 to $67,000 next financial year.

That threshold will also be indexed to stay at 75 per cent of average graduate earnings.

A university graduate earning $70,000 a year would see a $1,300 reduction in their minimum repayments.

A graduate earning $80,000 a year would pay $850 less each year.

The measure applies to graduates earning up to $180,000 a year.

Original URL: https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/six-teams-to-save-america-sky-news-goes-all-out-for-maga-fans-20241029-p5km8k.html

One Nation leader ordered to delete tweet and pay Greens senator’s costs, likely to total ‘many hundreds of thousands’

In short:

Hundreds of Sunshine Coast residents are without power after storms swept the region last night, with 75 millimetres recorded at Mapleton.

Locals say hail from the storm, which was golf-ball sized in some areas and "horizontal"in others, was the worst they've seen.

What's next?

The weather bureau says more storms are possible today.

Furness recommended the Nacc revisit the controversial decision, which had already been the subject of 900 complaints when she promised in June to inquire into the matter.

Following the inspector’s recommendation, the Nacc will now appoint an “independent eminent person” to deliberate afresh on a possible corruption investigation into robodebt.

The report has a clear message – the world is sick, it's addicted to fossil fuels and the only way to bring the temperature down is to get off them

Vote Green ffs

The title has youtube face but the story is lovely.

Archive link if you hit a paywall: https://archive.is/zWqIc

In short:

Alan Yazbek pleaded guilty in court on Thursday to the charge of displaying a Nazi symbol.

He was seen at a large rally holding a placard which took the Israeli flag, but replaced the Star of David with a blue swastika.

What's next?

Yazbek's wife and business partner confirmed her husband is no longer involved in the management of their well-known restaurant business.

Original URL: https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/2024-10-22/ty-article/.premium/australian-israeli-former-diplomat-mark-regev-under-trial-for-genocide-advocacy/00000192-b4e6-d006-a5b3-feee3fa30000

State Finance Minister Courtney Houssos on Wednesday revealed two government agencies – Revenue NSW and Service NSW – had charged about $144 million in merchant fees since 2016 across 92 million card transactions.

The payments were charged despite the practice being flagged as unlawful in legal advice received from the Crown Solicitor’s Office on three occasions between February 2016 and December 2022, Houssos revealed on Wednesday.

The payments are largely small. Renewing a driver’s licence for three years costs $162. The merchant fee on that transaction would amount to about 71 cents, the government said. Houssos said modelling had shown that over the eight years in which the charges were in place, the average person would have paid about $30 in unlawful fees.

However the government said it could not commit to refunding the illegal payments, in part due to the complexity of identifying who had paid what as a result of privacy stopgaps in online payment systems. Dib said the government was “working on a number of different potential strategies”.

In short:

Police used capsicum spray on neo-Nazis who disrupted an asylum seeker rally in Melbourne last night.

The group was clad in black and chanted white supremacist slogans while holding an offensive banner.

Police said no arrests were made and nobody was injured.

In short:

The UN Rights of the Child committee chair is writing to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese about the Northern Territory's move to lower the age of criminal responsibility, which she says "contravenes" global treaty obligations.

The NT's new conservative Country Liberal Party government legislated a new criminal age of 10 years old during its first parliament sittings this week.

Australia's Children's Commissioner is also calling on Mr Albanese to make child welfare and justice a national cabinet priority.

In short:

The Department of Defence has confirmed Australia provided support for the US strikes on underground bunkers used by Yemen's Houthi rebels "through access and overflight for US aircraft in northern Australia".

The US said its strikes were ordered by President Joe Biden to degrade the Houthi weapons stores and send a message to "our adversaries", which includes Iran.

An Australian official said the support was "consistent with our long-standing alliance commitment and close cooperation, demonstrating the interoperability of our militaries".

In short:

The Northern Territory has passed new laws that lower the age of criminal responsibility to 10, about two years after the previous government raised the age to 12.

It comes a day after the Country Liberal Party government pushed through tougher bail legislation and extra powers for police as part of a suite of law and order changes.

What's next?

New laws on public drinking and assaults on workers are expected to pass when parliament resumes next week.

They found a 110 year old thylacine head in a bucket of ethanol in the back of a cupboard in a museum with RNA intact.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/14326042

Australia’s biggest carbon credit scheme is barely removing any greenhouse gas from the atmosphere, according to a new study, despite hundreds of millions of dollars being pumped into it by businesses and the government.

One of the study’s authors, Dr Megan Evans from UNSW Canberra, said the findings about the Human Induced Regeneration scheme, known as HIR, pointed to “such huge failures that it’s almost beyond belief”.