Focus · Capitals Wire
From 1h ago Angus Taylor says Anthony Albanese is ‘swanning around New York’ for UN summit Angus Taylor had some harsh words for the prime minister this morning, saying Anthony Albanese is “swanning around New York” at the UN general assembly rather than tackling fuel prices at home. Taylor had this to say this morning: double quotation mark Australians are suffering. And that’s why our fuel price shield will bring down the price of fuel when the price is high ...
What we see is a prime minister swanning around New York, getting his global citizen of the year award, hanging out with the United Nations, instead of looking at and seeing the pain that Australians are feeling at the bowser and struggling to make ends meet. Get real, mate. Get back here and cut the price of fuel.
Albanese issued robust calls for an end to the Iranian war during his address to the UN general assembly today. Taylor and the Coalition have proposed a cut to the fuel excise tax whenever oil prices are sustained at more than US$100 a barrel. Key events 1h ago Angus Taylor says Anthony Albanese is ‘swanning around New York’ for UN summit 1h ago NSW renter rights strengthened in latest tranche of Minns reforms 3h ago Albanese pitches for Australia to join UN security council 4h ago Jane Hume says AI breach shows we need more AI in Australia 4h ago AI government website hack a ‘wake-up call’, Albanese says 5h ago Police officer killed in crash in Sydney 6h ago Gen Z going without for a house 6h ago Opposition defence spokesperson says PM’s AI hack timing not a coincidence Achol Arok Police commissioner pays tribute to officer killed in Redfern crash Police Commissioner Mal Lanyon has paid tribute to constable Mia Lay , who died after a police car crashed into a tree in Sydney’s inner south.
The police car was travelling along Gibbons Street in Redfern with its lights and sirens activated when it crashed at about 1.30am on Friday. Police said Lay died “instantly”. Lay had served with the force for 16 months, based in the South Sydney Police Area Command. double quotation mark She showed exceptional promise and was well loved.
She would have been an outstanding police officer. And to lose her life both in its prime and just at the infancy of becoming a police officer is a terrible tragedy. Today is a terribly difficult day.
We are here, we will support each other as police officers. We understand the risk of what we do. We put our lives in the way for the safety of the community, to prevent crime and to make sure the community is safe.
Terribly on of those days, some police officers pay the ultimate sacrifice. To Mia, thank you for your courage. Angus Taylor says Anthony Albanese is ‘swanning around New York’ for UN summit Angus Taylor had some harsh words for the prime minister this morning, saying Anthony Albanese is “swanning around New York” at the UN general assembly rather than tackling fuel prices at home.
Taylor had this to say this morning: double quotation mark Australians are suffering. And that’s why our fuel price shield will bring down the price of fuel when the price is high ... What we see is a prime minister swanning around New York, getting his global citizen of the year award, hanging out with the United Nations, instead of looking at and seeing the pain that Australians are feeling at the bowser and struggling to make ends meet.
Get real, mate. Get back here and cut the price of fuel. Albanese issued robust calls for an end to the Iranian war during his address to the UN general assembly today.
Taylor and the Coalition have proposed a cut to the fuel excise tax whenever oil prices are sustained at more than US$100 a barrel. NSW renter rights strengthened in latest tranche of Minns reforms Renters in New South Wales will only need to provide their driver’s licences and passports if they are about to sign a lease, instead of including them in every rental application, under new laws. Agents and landlords will also be required to use one standardised rental application form, which will not request details such as photos, social media accounts, details about children – or tattoos.
The new rules also require landlords and agents to say if photographs of the property have been digitally altered or AI-generated to hide faults – including “fake furniture that hides structural damage or misrepresents room proportions”. In addition, it will become mandatory for agents to tell renters if a property is locked in to an embedded utility network – like a private electricity or gas system – which stops them from shopping around for the best price. Potential breaches will be up to $11,000 for individuals and $49,500 for corporations for privacy violations, and up to $22,000 for failure to disclose digitally altered photographs.
Anoulack Chanthivong , the minster for better regulation and fair trading, said: double quotation mark This is a strong step forward to protect renters from false information in the rental market and is an important part of the Minns Labor government’s commitment to supporting the ethical use of AI across the state. These laws put an end to the practice of excessive and intrusive data collection in the rental process and make it fairer for renters and less stressful for landlords and agents. Whether you have a tattoo, or what school your kids go to, is not relevant to whether you’ll be a good tenant.
Australia has a new chicken factory, but will it improve animal welfare? The sleek, rust-coloured saucer settles into the earth, mirroring the surrounding hills. It looks like an art gallery or a high-end conference centre – an architectural masterpiece designed to sit lightly on the land.
Until you see the shed behind it. The new Baiada facility in Tamworth. Photograph: Baiada The sweeping lines are the gateway to a $600m poultry processing plant that will, at full capacity, process 3 million chickens a week.
Jed Goodfellow , the director of policy and government relations at the Australian Alliance for Animals, said while the Baiada building may be state of the art, he believes “the welfare model behind it is anything but”. Read more here: Anthony Albanese posts a selfie with the Greek prime minister at the UN summit Albanese is back on the selfie game: he’s just posted a photo alongside the Greek prime minister, Kyriakos Mitsotakis . Allow Instagram content?
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The post comes after another, much-talked about selfie with the US president, Donald Trump . You can read about that one here: ‘We can’t ignore AI or prevent it’, Albanese tells UN Albanese again addressed the AI hack of Medicare during his address, saying the episode reflected the need for greater regulation of artificial intelligence. He said: double quotation mark AI can improve lives, boost growth and productivity, provide revolutionary breakthroughs in healthcare and other fields – but leaders of AI companies themselves have warned of the potential risks to allow frontier AI to develop too fast without guardrails.
Recently, an artificial intelligence agent infiltrated an Australian government website. This is unacceptable. And it is why Australia has been leading the way in establishing Australian standards for AI.
Standards to ensure that AI will work and deliver for people, not for other way around. We can’t ignore AI or prevent it. And it’s why we joined with other nations this week to call for action to shape artificial intelligence development, rather than be passively shaped by it.
Albanese pitches for Australia to join UN security council Albanese is detailing Australia’s bid for a temporary seat on the UN security council for 2029 to 2030. He said: double quotation mark We understand that the UN mission cannot be entrusted solely to the great powers or the biggest countries or even the loudest voices alone. Nor can it be subcontracted to the world’s richest companies or dictated by the pace of technology.
The world faces tough times and Australia wants to respond, to partner, and to make a difference. Should our security council bid prove successful, our purpose and approach will be consistent with how we have always conducted ourselves at the UN. We will listen with respect, we will partner as equals, and we will protect what matters most.
Anthony Albanese addresses the 81st session of the United Nations general assembly. Photograph: Frank Franklin II/AP Albanese addresses UN general assembly The prime minister, Anthony Albanese , is addressing the UN general assembly in New York City. We’ll bring you some key moments from his address in a moment.
Watt says government will do what it needs to after AI breach Murray Watt, the environment minister, also spoke about the AI hack this morning. He told Sunrise the timeline behind OpenAI’s notification was “completely unacceptable”, and that the sending of an “email to a generic inbox that isn’t monitored all the time” wouldn’t stand going forward. He added: double quotation mark We have commissioned a task force to do an investigation of this event, and if it is possible to press criminal charges, that will happen.
But what it also highlights is that we do need to ensure that Australian laws are keeping pace with this new and emerging technology. But if we need to update our laws to improve the requirements for notification of these kind of events, then that’s what we’ll do. And of course, if there’s further safeguards that need to be put in place, that’s what we’ll do as well.
Tom McIlroy AI hack of Medicare exposes Australia’s vulnerabilities Technology experts have warned revelations an artificial intelligence agent hacked Medicare’s internal systems will not be the only dangerous breach of government data and have called for Australia to boost its protections against the growing risk. The Australian Council on AI Strategy chief executive, Anna-Maria Arabia , said the case was unlikely to be an isolated incident. “All of the evidence shows that our operating systems are vulnerable,” she told Guardian Australia. double quotation mark Frontier AI now has capability to expose those vulnerabilities at a rate quicker than we can keep up, quicker than we can patch them.
Read more here: Jane Hume says AI breach shows we need more AI in Australia Jane Hume, the deputy leader of the opposition, was on Sunrise this morning talking about the AI breach. She questioned security on government websites and wondered what would have happened if the breach were more serious: double quotation mark What if it was a less benign breach? What if it was a less benign actor?
Let’s face it, clearly, Services Australia’s cybersecurity is woefully inadequate. I mean the irony here is that you actually need AI to fight AI. This should hasten, if anything, our move over in the US to less finger wagging and Trump one-upmanship, and more about embracing these AI companies and bringing them here so that we can have frontier models providing sovereign capability to Australia.
Because AI is going to happen. Hume said the incident should be a “warning bell” to make sure we “get on with the job of making sure that we have that capability here”. Senator Jane Hume says ‘you actually need AI to fight AI’.
Photograph: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty Images AI government website hack a ‘wake-up call’, Albanese says The first reported artificial intelligence agent hack into an Australian government website is a “wake-up call” of the dangers of the technology, Anthony Albanese says. AAP reports the prime minister spoke to a predecessor, former prime minister Kevin Rudd , who now heads up the Asia Society, in New York. Albanese said the hack was cause for concern about whether “humans remain in charge”. double quotation mark This was an AI agent acting independently of its instructions, that is learning by itself.
So it’s a bit of a wake-up call ... about the risks. This technology is moving very very fast, and we need to make sure that we have a responsibility to keep on top of it. Albanese and Kevin Rudd.
Photograph: Mick Tsikas/EPA Charlton says AI incidents likely to become ‘more and more prevalent’ Andrew Charlton , the assistant minister for science, technology and the digital economy, said yesterday’s reported hack of Medicare by an OpenAI agent was a “novel” moment for cybersecurity, but was likely to become “more and more prevalent in the future”. Charlton spoke to RN Breakfast this morning, saying the government wanted to tell the Australian public “as quickly as possible” about the breach. When pressed why it took Services Australia five days to notify the Australian Signals Directorate about the episode, Charlton said the true blame laid on OpenAI’s slow and “completely inadequate” response: double quotation mark In this type of situation, you know, you would expect for an incident which is as serious as this, you would expect that disclosure to be delivered in a very serious way.
It was not delivered in a very serious way, it was delivered via an email to a public inbox. He said the government is still looking at any legal action and there were questions about liability as an AI agent was “not a legal person”. Assistant minister Andrew Charlton.
Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP Falling meth prices help drive deaths to record levels Falling methamphetamine prices have helped push overdose deaths to record levels, new data shows. AAP reports increased global supply and strong local demand are among the factors driving a surge in use of the illicit drug, according to the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre . “Use and harms remain substantial and appear to have continued the upward trajectory that we saw before the Covid-19 pandemic,” University of NSW Sydney medical researcher Amy Peacock told AAP. double quotation mark In fact, several of the indicators are now at the highest observed levels that we’ve seen, including wastewater, consumption, methamphetamine-related hospitalisations, and death.
There were more than 750 overdose deaths involving amphetamine-type stimulants – primarily methamphetamine – in 2024. That’s a rate of 2.9 deaths per 100,000 people, substantially higher than in 2021 to 2023, when it was closer to two deaths. Evidence suggests Australia continues to have one of the highest recorded rates of methamphetamine use in the world.
A person holds a bag of crystal methamphetamine. Photograph: Matt Hunt/NurPhoto/Shutterstock Good morning, and happy Friday. Nick Visser here to take over the blog.
Let’s get to that weekend, shall we? Police officer killed in crash in Sydney A crime scene has been established after a police officer was killed in a crash in Sydney’s inner west. At 1.30am, a police car was travelling on Gibbons Street in Redfern with lights and sirens on when it crashed into a tree.
Police say the passenger – a female constable – died “instantly”, while the driver – a male constable – was taken to the Royal Prince Alfred hospital in a stable condition. The female constable was killed ‘instantly’ in the Sydney crash, police said. Photograph: Nsw Police/PR HANDOUT The NSW premier, Chris Minns , said the entire NSW policing community would be grieving the “devastating” news. double quotation mark I’m also thinking of the officer injured in the crash and everyone who responded to this terrible scene.
NSW’s opposition leader Kellie Sloane said she was “heartbroken”, saying the woman was “out working while most of us were asleep, protecting the community”. double quotation mark Our police put themselves in harm’s way every day to protect us. Today, we stand with them as they mourn one of their own. Anyone with information about the incident – including dashcam footage – is urged to contact Crime Stoppers.
Gen Z going without for a house Australia’s gen Z are the generation most willing to cut their spending way back to afford a home, according to Cotality data reported by AAP. The figures show more than 75% of all Australians were curbing their outgoings in pursuit of property, meaning we are more likely to do so than our Canadian, US and UK peers (for whom the figures sat below 70%). Levels of discretionary spending, like eating out, owning a car, and even moving from the family home into a share house, have dropped among young adults in recent years.
But it wasn’t just first-time buyers making significant financial sacrifices to climb the ladder. Millennials – the largest buyer cohort in the world – are readily forgoing small luxuries to afford homes large enough for their families. Prospective buyers were selling their second car or putting off holidays while their children were young, Capital Buyers Agency owner Claire Corby said. double quotation mark For many, it’s around delaying things like going away, or reducing things like dinners out.
People are leaving where they want to live and buying in cheaper markets. Most Australians would not be persuaded to participate in the housing market until mortgage interest rates hit a 4.9% average, the data revealed. The average rate for an owner-occupier in August 2026 was 6.3%, meaning the market is likely to stay quiet for some time and allowing bold buyers to swoop in. double quotation mark People are being conservative and cautious.
Opposition defence spokesperson says PM’s AI hack timing not a coincidence Catie McLeod The opposition’s defence spokesperson, James Paterson , has questioned the timing of the prime minister’s announcement that an AI agent hacked Medicare. Paterson made the claim on the ABC’s 7.30 program last night after Anthony Albanese publicly disclosed that an AI agent developed by OpenAI hacked Medicare in June and that the tech giant only notified the government earlier this month using an email sent to a “public mailbox”. Paterson told 7.30 he believed Albanese had chosen to make the announcement at the UN summit in New York, as part of his effort to stand up to “big tech” on AI.
The senator said: double quotation mark The government has questions to answer about when they knew and ... why the prime minister decided to disclose it in the way he did in the place he did at the time he did. But in terms of the nature of the potential of actual security breach this is the bottom end of the spectrum of seriousness. I don’t think it was a coincidence.
I think it neatly dove-tailed with the political agenda the prime minister has in New York City. Paterson said he didn’t consider the breach to be overly serious because the data the AI agent accessed was made freely available to researchers and academics studying the health system, and was not personal or private in nature. He said the breach was cause for “being alert but not alarmed”.
Nevertheless, he said Australians were “entitled to demand explanations and contrition” and to want high levels of confidence when entering into agreements with big tech companies such as OpenAI. Shadow minister for defence, James Paterson. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP 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.
Source: The Guardian
