KPMG to cut nearly 400 staff in wake of audit leaks scandal
Luca Ittimani
KPMG Australia is cutting 27 partners and about 360 employees in the wake of an audit leaks scandal that saw it cut off from new government contracts.
The audit and consulting giant today reported its revenue fell 1% year-on-year, to $2.26bn in the year 2025-26.
While the embattled audit arm had seen revenue grow 11%, its consulting revenue was down 16.9%. Most of the workers to be let go are from the consulting arm.
KPMG’s new chief executive, John Sams, said weak demand for its services was expected to continue beyond the next 12 months, blaming Australia’s weak economy. He said:
The professional services sector is also changing rapidly as client expectations evolve, AI reshapes the way services are delivered and government spending on consultants remains lower. We also recognise the challenges created by our own failings, and the work we must continue to do to rebuild trust …
After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to reduce our workforce and restructure parts of the firm. This is not a decision that has been taken lightly, and we know it will have a very real impact on people.
The firm said it was discussing further cuts to a small number of award-based jobs. Sams said KPMG would continue to assess its operating environment as it sought to stay financially sustainable. You can read about the firm’s difficulties here:
Key events
NSW premier supports extending antisemitism royal commission
Penry Buckley
The NSW premier, Chris Minns, says he supports extending the royal commission on antisemitism after calls for an extension by the federal opposition were rejected by the Albanese government.
The royal commission, established following the Bondi attack, is holding its final scheduled hearing block this week. Last week, shadow federal education minister and prominent Jewish MP, Julian Leeser, brought an unsuccessful motion to extend its reporting date to allow it to hear from further witnesses. This morning, the shadow home affairs minister, Jonno Duniam, reiterated the call to extend the royal commission on ABC Radio National.
At a press conference today, Minns he had spoken to senior members of the Jewish community who were “satisfied both with the hearing they got and the platform that enabled them to make their case”, but did support an extension to allow further witnesses to appear. He said:
Given the expense and time that’s gone into the royal commission, and the fact that we’re not going to have another one, at least for a long period of time, and we are using this royal commission to get to the fundamental truths of what happened on the day, and also what happened in the lead-up to that day, particularly around antisemitism, I’m hopeful that it will speak to as large a number of people as possible, and genuinely get the perspective of the community.
If we need to go a couple of weeks longer, given that most of the expense was spent setting it up, that would seem to be money well spent because both the federal and the state government are relying on these recommendations to shape some of our policy.
Prior to Anthony Albanese‘s announcement of the federal royal commission following the Bondi attack, Minns had announced plans for a state-led commission, which was superseded by the national inquiry.
KPMG to cut nearly 400 staff in wake of audit leaks scandal
Luca Ittimani
KPMG Australia is cutting 27 partners and about 360 employees in the wake of an audit leaks scandal that saw it cut off from new government contracts.
The audit and consulting giant today reported its revenue fell 1% year-on-year, to $2.26bn in the year 2025-26.
While the embattled audit arm had seen revenue grow 11%, its consulting revenue was down 16.9%. Most of the workers to be let go are from the consulting arm.
KPMG’s new chief executive, John Sams, said weak demand for its services was expected to continue beyond the next 12 months, blaming Australia’s weak economy. He said:
The professional services sector is also changing rapidly as client expectations evolve, AI reshapes the way services are delivered and government spending on consultants remains lower. We also recognise the challenges created by our own failings, and the work we must continue to do to rebuild trust …
After careful consideration, we have made the difficult decision to reduce our workforce and restructure parts of the firm. This is not a decision that has been taken lightly, and we know it will have a very real impact on people.
The firm said it was discussing further cuts to a small number of award-based jobs. Sams said KPMG would continue to assess its operating environment as it sought to stay financially sustainable. You can read about the firm’s difficulties here:
Leah Stewart recounts shark bite: ‘I’ll never forget its face’
Leah Stewart, the woman bitten by a shark at Sydney’s Coogee beach in June, will appear on next Sunday’s episode of 60 Minutes. A short clip of the interview includes the mother recounting coming face-to-face with a great white shark.
She said:
Its face was horrific. I’ll never forget its face. It was a monster. …
It was holding on to my leg, and I just thought of August. And I thought: ‘she’s not going to have a mum, she’s going to grow up without a mum’.
I couldn’t handle that, I didn’t want her not to have a mum.
Stewart went on to say: “I just thought I’ve got to, I’ve got to fight it. Do everything I can to be here”.
Jobseeker payments now amount to just 68% of the pension
Cait Kelly
Australia’s unemployment payments have fallen so far behind the pension they now amounts to just 68% of the payment, a new research paper released today by the Australian Council for Social Services (ACOSS) has revealed.
A person aged 67 who is eligible for the age pension receives $600 a week, but a 66-year-old who loses their job receives just $409 a week to cover the same basic living costs.
In the 1970s, jobseeker and the pension were paid at the same rate and by the early 90s, jobseeker was still about 90% of the pension. But in 1997, the Howard government legislated pensions to be benchmarked to 25% of male total average weekly earnings – but left unemployment payments out of that legislation.
Pensions have risen in line with wage growth many times while jobseeker has not, and the pension was increased in real terms by more than $30 a week in 2009.
Now the pension is 60% of the minimum wage, while jobseeker is just 40.6%.
ACOSS’s CEO, Cassandra Goldie, called on the federal government to raise the jobseeker rate to two-thirds of the minimum wage:
A 66-year-old and a 67-year-old face exactly the same rent, grocery bill and energy costs. There is no reason one of them should be living on $191 a week less than the other.
Woefully low income support is causing physical and mental harm and trapping people in a cycle of poverty and deprivation.
People who receive jobseeker are skipping meals and forgoing essential medications just to keep a roof over their heads.
We are one of the wealthiest countries in the world yet successive governments choose to keep 3.7 million people living in poverty. We know how to fix this problem, we just need politicians to act.
Police identify man found with critical injuries on busy Melbourne walking trail
Victoria police have identified a man found with critical injuries on a busy walking trail in Glenroy, about 14km from Melbourne’s CBD, on Sunday afternoon, as reported earlier in the blog.
Police said in a statement:
Police would like to thank the media and public for their assistance. At this stage it is not believed he was assaulted, however the circumstances surrounding what has occurred is unclear.
The man remains in hospital in a serious condition.
A little penguin break
We have some important photos of little penguins getting vaccinated against H5 bird flu to break up the day’s news:
Ampol’s profit soars on war-linked price surges
Oil refiner and petrol seller Ampol has seen its interim earnings jump after it managed to secure fuel supplies to capitalise on the impact of the Middle East conflict on energy prices, AAP reports.
Net profit on a replacement cost basis – which excludes the impact of oil prices on inventories – jumped more than four times to $857.2m in the six months ended June 30, from $180.2m a year earlier.
Its statutory first-half result was even bigger at $1.4bn, against a loss of $25.3m in the first half of 2025.
Matt Halliday, the company’s chief executive, said:
While the market dislocation provided a benefit to our financial results, our supply responsiveness, trading capabilities, refinery reliability, customer and supplier relationships, as well as the progress of our retail segmentation strategy all enabled Ampol to meet its customer needs.
Ampol is Australia’s largest transport fuel provider, accounting for about 15-20% of total refined fuel needs.
Luca Ittimani
Apartment rents now cost more than half a typical worker’s take-home pay in all Australian capital cities
Renting a mid-priced unit in any of Australia’s capital cities now costs more than half a typical single worker’s take-home pay, spurring advocates to urge Labor to offer renters more protections.
New modelling shows someone earning $70,000 – close to the median annual income – would have to spend two-thirds of their earnings if they wanted to rent the median Sydney apartment.
Everybody’s Home, a housing advocacy group, released the analysis in its latest “Priced Out” report amid a political debate over rent hikes and the Albanese government’s tax reforms.
Read more here:
Amanda Meade
Alan Jones trial enters its fourth week
The Alan Jones trial enters its fourth week today, with a series of witnesses expected to give evidence at Sydney’s Downing Centre local court before Judge Glenn Walsh.
Jones has pleaded not guilty to 20 charges of indecent assault and two counts of sexual touching against six complainants.
The second alleged victim, known as complainant C, has finished giving evidence, and witnesses relevant to his nine allegations against the former broadcaster are next to appear.
The court has heard Jones allegedly groomed C for a decade, resulting in the young man sending multiple explicit texts to the broadcaster who he alleges touched him without consent.
After the younger man left his job as a driver for Jones, the two continued to text each other in a way “inconsistent” with C feeling uncomfortable after the alleged incidents, defence barrister Gabrielle Bashir SC suggested.
Joyce steps in on One Nation’s migration target
Barnaby Joyce says a fellow One Nation MP made a mistake on Sunday by suggesting the minor party’s migration numbers would not be much different to Labor’s, AAP reports.
One Nation MP David Farley told the ABC on Sunday that the party’s migration policy would include an extra 100,000 people annually, to provide a necessary regional workforce, on top of the 130,000 it had already flagged.
The overall number would be slightly higher than the forecast 225,000 people under Labor’s policy. The comments from Farley were soon corrected by party leader Pauline Hanson on social media, who said the policy remained to reduce net overseas migration to 130,000 people.
Joyce said Farley had misspoken when he made the comments on migration numbers:
Show me a political career where people haven’t made a mistake, and I’ll show you a person who’s not told the truth. I’m not going to throw anybody under a bus. When people are new in parliament, they can sometimes get things incorrect, and that’s what happens. God knows, I’ve done it enough.
Joyce said One Nation’s policy remained at 130,000 people annually for net overseas migration.
Victoria police race to identify man found with critical injuries
The race is on to identify a young man found unconscious on a busy walking trail before he succumbs to his critical injuries, AAP reports.
Emergency services were called to Moonee Ponds creek trail in Glenroy, about 14km north from Melbourne’s CBD, on Sunday afternoon after a passerby found the man moaning and unconscious.
The man was treated by ambulance paramedics at the scene before being taken to hospital to be treated for critical injuries.
Police said the man, who is believed to be aged in his early 20s, did not have any belongings or identity documents with him and nothing of note was found at the scene.
He is described as Caucasian in appearance, about 175cm tall, with a slim build, hazel-coloured eyes with no facial hair and brown, shoulder-length curly hair.
He was wearing a grey singlet top and ripped blue jorts, a style of baggy denim shorts, when he was found. He also has residue of dark red nail polish on some fingernails.
At this stage, police do not believe the man was assaulted, but it is unclear how he became injured.
Thousands of little penguins being vaccinated against H5 bird flu in Victoria – video
Leah Stewart thanks community after Coogee shark bite: ‘I can finally see some light’
Leah Stewart, the woman who was bitten by a shark at Sydney’s Coogee beach in June, issued an update on GoFundMe yesterday, thanking the community for its support during her recovery.
Stewart wrote:
After what has been an incredibly difficult few months, I’m so happy that I’ve progressed enough to build some independence, and I can finally see some light after all of this.
I’m sorry we’ve been quiet on the GoFundMe recently, we’ve just been focused on my healing, and I’ve been actively trying to do everything in my power to get back to some sort of normal life. I still have a long way to go, but my recovery has been remarkable, and a huge part of that is because of the absolute army of love, support, prayers and encouragement surrounding my family and I from all over the world.
That means more to me than I can say, and I truly believe it’s played a huge role in my recovery.
Stewart said she feels like she’s been given “a second chance at life, and I’m not going to waste it”.
As I get better, I know I’ll make something of this second chance and aim to give back even more in generosity, care, and love. I will forever be grateful for everything, and everyone, I’ve been given.
You’ve inspired me to get better, not bitter.
Watt says fur seal death from bird flu is ‘very serious’ but government prepared
Murray Watt, the environment minister, said the first confirmed death of a fur seal was a “very serious development”.
Watt spoke to ABC News Breakfast, saying the government had warned the H5 strain of bird flu was likely to spread and more mass mortality events were likely, but officials have also been preparing for that eventuality.
He said:
What we’ve been doing over the last couple of years is trying to build up larger populations of these mammals, so if we do have bird flu come, and it does kill some of them, we still have resilient populations for the future.
I know it’s a distressing thing for Australians to hear but we need to be realistic. This is the sort of thing we have seen overseas. We’re very fortunate we’re the last continent to have the bird flu happen. But we’ve been preparing for this for some time.
Watt said the government would continue to do “everything we can to ensure these beautiful creatures will be here for us for a long time to come”.
Phillip Island’s penguin parade gets vaccinated for bird flu
The nightly parade of penguins on Phillip Island is a tourist favourite, but has recently taken on a more serious tone, AAP reports.
As the little penguins toddled up the Victorian beach on Sunday night, many were corralled into pens to receive the first of two vaccinations against bird flu. The H5 strain of bird flu first reached Australia’s shores in June and is already confirmed to have claimed the life of one of the penguins in the colony.
With case numbers on the rise, authorities have stepped in to do what they can to defend the 5,000-strong colony of little penguins living on Phillip Island, south-west of Melbourne.
The penguin’s nightly ritual of returning the same burrow, along the same path, made them ideal candidates for vaccination, said Phillip Island nature parks reserve manager Ben Thomas:
We started on some of the quieter penguin pathways to fine-tune the whole process and and get it working as quickly as we can, so we can process as many penguins as we can each night.
We’ve now moved to the western end of the penguin parade, where the larger numbers are, and it’s working really well.
Second fur seal dies of suspected bird flu
A second long-nosed fur seal is suspected to have died in South Australia from H5 bird flu, just a day after officials confirmed the first death of a mammal on the Australian mainland.
The South Australian government said the second fur seal death occurred offshore at the Pages conservation park. More than 1,000 dead crested terns were found across Troubridge Island and the Pages islands in recent weeks, with the latter a known breeding site for a colony of endangered Australian sea lions, with long-nosed fur seals known to visit the area.
Samples will be taken for confirmatory testing, with results expected in the coming days. The South Australian government maintained that there are no H5 bird flu detections in poultry or livestock and the risk to humans remains low.
“South Australians are encouraged to continue being vigilant in reporting sick and dead birds and other wildlife,” the government said in a statement.
Major housing investment near Perth aimed at increasing apartment builds
Sarah Basford Canales
The National Reconstruction Fund will invest $120m into a $240m advanced manufacturing project north of Perth expected to be able to build 2,000 apartments a year once fully operational.
The announcement this morning also includes a $20m grant from the Western Australian government and a $100m equity investment from Wesfarmers, the owner of popular retail brands, including Kmart, Bunnings and Officeworks.
The Built Living project, which will begin before the end of the year, will be able to build residential apartments at scale through advanced manufacturing. The government says it will deliver apartments up to 20% cheaper and up to 50% faster than traditional construction.
The federal industry minister, Tim Ayres, said:
Australia needs to build more homes, but we also need to build more capability. This project brings advanced manufacturing into the housing supply chain, lifting productivity and helping deliver more homes for Australians.
Welcome
Good morning. Nick Visser here to get the news going. Here’s what’s on deck:
Leah Stewart, the woman who was bitten by a shark at Sydney’s Coogee beach, issued a thankyou to those who supported her after the attack.
She wrote on GoFundMe: “After what has been an incredibly difficult few months, I’m so happy that I’ve progressed enough to build some independence, and I can finally see some light after all of this.”
Stewart was in an induced coma after the shark attack and had multiple surgeries, including the amputation of one of her arms.
Meanwhile authorities have begun vaccinating as many of Phillip Island’s little penguins as they can against the H5 strain of bird flu. The island, south-west of Melbourne, has a 5,000-strong colony, which sees a nightly ritual of the penguins returning to the same burrow, along the same path, making them ideal candidates for vaccination. It comes a day after authorities revealed the death of a seal from the flu, the first confirmed mainland mammal fatality.
Stick with us.
