Middle East escalation to drive up petrol prices
Jonathan Barrett
Oil prices are rising today after the widening Middle East conflict sparked new supply fears, driving Brent crude up more than 3% to US$108 a barrel this morning.
The price rally follows fresh Houthi strikes on Saudi Arabia, which have led to the temporary closure of a vital oil pipeline.
Most shipping in the crucial Strait of Hormuz has also stopped amid renewed tension between Iran and the US after failed peace talks.
The crude disruptions are driving up prices across refined derivatives like petrol, ending a period of market calm during which traders had expected normal supplies to resume.
AMP’s chief economist, Shane Oliver, says petrol prices are “likely heading even higher with rising global oil prices”.
Australian fuel prices could climb a further 20-30 cents a litre in the coming weeks, testing the high levels reached in the weeks immediately after the initial US-Israeli strikes on Iran.
The national average retail petrol price rose by 5.6c a litre last week to $2.11, according to the Australian Institute of Petroleum.
Key events
Hastie says Whyalla closure a ‘brutal blow’
The shadow industry minister, Andrew Hastie, says the expected closure of a blast furnace at the Whyalla steelwork is a brutal blow for hundreds of workers and the country.
The shutdown, which will soon be announced, will likely see 500 Australian workers lose their jobs, as well as 100 contractors working at the site.
Hastie is doing a doorstop ahead of question time and says the closure is due to government’s energy transition:
This is a brutal blow for 500 Aussie workers, a brutal blow for the town of Whyalla and a brutal blow for Australia as much sovereign capability. What we have seen now as the closure of 75% of Australia’s capacity of structural steel making. It is a future made overseas, not a Future Made in Australia, and this is all caused by Labor and its relentless ideological pursuit of a net zero climate targets.
Australia must reject Pauline Hanson’s ‘toxic agenda’, Indigenous Australians minister says
Pauline Hanson has spent her entire career pedalling racism, says Malarndirri McCarthy, in response to resurfaced comments from the One Nation leader calling First Nations Australians “primitive”.
The minister for Indigenous Australians took to social media to disparage the remarks, and said someone trying to incite hatred isn’t fit to be a leader.
McCarthy is a Yanyuwa and Garrwa woman and represents the Northern Territory in the Senate. She writes:
Senator Hanson has peddled racism and division her entire career. Anyone seeking to be prime minister should not divide Australians and incite hatred … I am proud to represent First Nations people who come from the oldest continuous culture on the planet.
We must reject senator Hanson’s toxic agenda now and all the way to the next election.
Coalition still unhappy about digital duty of care bill
Labor is still yet to win over the Coalition to support its digital duty of care bill despite Anika Wells yesterday saying that she was prepared to water down some of the ministerial powers in the bill.
Angus Taylor at his press conference earlier today said it still read like a “big brother” bill.
The legislation would put the onus on tech platforms to remove harmful content for adults and children or face fines of tens of millions of dollars.
Taylor said:
This is the big brother bill, frankly … they should put forward an alternative. But right now, that’s what we’re seeing, and we can’t support that.
‘There’s no group in society that Pauline Hanson isn’t prepared to kick down’, Plibersek says
The social services minister, Tanya Plibersek, has defended Anthony Albanese against Pauline Hanson’s comments about his upbringing and his mother, and said the criticisms show the One Nation leader knows nothing about public housing.
Plibersek tells News24 that Albanese is a “big boy” and copping criticism for things he does is fair game, but attacking his family is not. She says she personally knew Albanese’s mother before she became an MP.
Come on, like, I’m all for free speech, but attacking someone’s dead mum, is that really what we’ve come to when it comes to free speech in this country?
Anthony was her carer from a very young age. He was cooking the meals, he was cleaning the house. He was helping her do up her buttons, he was her carer, and to pretend for a second that she could have gone out and found private rental, and that she was clogging up public housing, I think that says a lot more about Pauline Hanson and what she thinks of people who live in public housing today than it says about Maryanne Albanese.
Hanson is also under fire for more resurfaced comments where she called First Nations Australians the “most primitive race on earth”.
Plibersek says:
I think this proves that there’s no group in society that Pauline Hanson isn’t prepared to kick down on … We’re really lucky in this country, to have 65,000 years of history and culture to learn from.
‘Wall of Tears’ exhibition outside Parliament House mourns children killed in Gaza
An exhibition out on the front lawns of Parliament House today has named the 18,457 children that were killed in Gaza between the 7 October 2023 attack and July 2025.
The Wall of Tears installation by artist Phil Buehler also includes the photographs and stories of some of the children.
Greens deputy leader, Mehreen Faruqi, spoke at the exhibition this morning.
It is inconceivable that anyone can see this loss of innocent life and not feel their heart break. With every child killed, our hearts break a little bit more.
Our government calls Israel a friend and continues to sell weapons parts that are used to murder children. This exhibition being brought to Canberra is a necessary reminder of our leaders’ complicity in these crimes. I hope that all Labor MPs will take the time to view the exhibit and reflect.
Unicef estimates more than 64,000 children have been killed or injured in Gaza since October 2023.
Ukraine and Venezuela among countries barred from coming to Australia under One Nation plan
Migration from 26 countries on the government’s do not travel list will be banned by One Nation under their plan, which will include countries such as … Ukraine and Venezuela.
Most nations on the list are in the African continent and the Middle East, due to on-the-ground conflict.
Other nations include Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Kuwait, Bahrain, Lebanon, Chad, South Sudan, Russia and Belarus.
This might be sounding somewhat familiar to you, and that’s because One Nation had announced this a little earlier this year, and will go some way to reduce some of the temporary visas they’ve promised.
Douglas Smith
Labor’s Yiwarr McGrath wins NT seat of Mulka
Labor has won the seat of Mulka in the Northern Territory’s north-east Arnhem Land in a byelection over the weekend, after 35-year-old Yolngu man Yiwarr McGrath secured the victory.
McGrath, a registered nurse and 2021 NT Young Australian of the Year, won 77.5% of the vote on Saturday amid a low voter turnout.
Labor’s victory comes after the resignation of long-time Independent Yiŋiya Guyula from the seat of Mulka, previously known as Nhulunbuy last month, in protest of the Country Liberal party’s policies, calling them “dehumanising, oppressing and destroying our communities and our people”.
In Nhulunbuy after his win, McGrath told the ABC that he was inspired by his upbringing to make a difference for his people.
So, I’m going to come here to the parliament with real-life experiences and influence policy for my people and everyone else in this region.
NT Labor leader, Selena Uibo, congratulated McGrath:
As a Yolŋu man and registered nurse, Yiwarr has seen first-hand the impact of overcrowded houses on families.
He will fight for more housing, reliable local health services, better roads and economic opportunities for people across the electorate.
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Middle East escalation to drive up petrol prices
Jonathan Barrett
Oil prices are rising today after the widening Middle East conflict sparked new supply fears, driving Brent crude up more than 3% to US$108 a barrel this morning.
The price rally follows fresh Houthi strikes on Saudi Arabia, which have led to the temporary closure of a vital oil pipeline.
Most shipping in the crucial Strait of Hormuz has also stopped amid renewed tension between Iran and the US after failed peace talks.
The crude disruptions are driving up prices across refined derivatives like petrol, ending a period of market calm during which traders had expected normal supplies to resume.
AMP’s chief economist, Shane Oliver, says petrol prices are “likely heading even higher with rising global oil prices”.
Australian fuel prices could climb a further 20-30 cents a litre in the coming weeks, testing the high levels reached in the weeks immediately after the initial US-Israeli strikes on Iran.
The national average retail petrol price rose by 5.6c a litre last week to $2.11, according to the Australian Institute of Petroleum.
OpenAI says it wants to train models in Australia
Luca Ittimani
OpenAI has said it wants to train its models in Australia and is negotiating with the Albanese government over copyright rules.
Ann O’Leary, OpenAI’s vice president for global policy, told the Sydney Dialogue the prime minister’s speech vowing to protect artists from “theft” had “caught our attention”. She said OpenAI was “very eager to have a bigger and broader relationship” with Australia. She said:
I don’t have to tell any of you how important Australia is from a geopolitical standpoint … We very much recognise that having a diversification of where we train is going to be important as you move forward.
She said the OpenAI wanted to ensure creators could keep creating and was in “regular” and “deep” conversation with the government about the copyright rules, which would impact its access to Australian-made content.
O’Leary said OpenAI agreed with Australia’s principles for building datacentres but the AI industry had been surprised by the upset from the projects.
I think many of us have been surprised at the turn of how much upset there has been over datacentres … People feel like, ‘OK, we have this datacentre in our back yard that may be noisy and may be something I don’t want to look at. In addition to that I don’t really know what it’s doing that benefits me.’ So until we can do a better job having people live it and feel it and benefit from it, it’s going to continue to be hard.
She urged Australia to advocate for strong AI governance and its own access.
Australia also has to be attracting us, companies like ours, to come to Australia but not just for the purposes of working on energy and datacentres but also to come and recognise the value of Australia.
‘Lazy policy’: crossbenchers and Liberals unite against private health rebate changes for over 65s
Independents Monique Ryan and Jacqui Lambie and shadow health minister, Anne Ruston, have railed against the government’s plan to reduce private health insurance rebates for over 65s.
This morning, the group released data from the parliamentary budget office that said half of the $3bn in savings would come from the pockets of pensioners.
At a press conference a little earlier, Ruston said it was “lazy” policy.
You are being a lazy minister, this is lazy policy, this is a lazy bill and it’s lazy tax growth. And 1.2 million pensioners who can least afford a $1.5bn additional cost on their everyday lives.
What is frontier AI?
A great question, and something which I have learned myself about 30 seconds ago.
Frontier AI systems are basically the most advanced, recent and capable models available.
It’s like you would say the frontier of knowledge is the farthest, most advanced point of human understanding.
The Australian national cyber-security centre says a new class of frontier AI called agentic AI tools can even “plan, make decisions and take actions on your behalf”.
The Greens earlier this morning tried to push the government to urgently debate and legislate mandatory safety testing and transparency obligations for frontier AI systems – but that bid failed in the Senate.
One Nation plans to get visa numbers down ‘primarily by not issuing new’ ones, Barnaby Joyce says
Barnaby Joyce says One Nation will cut 750,000 temporary visas primarily by not issuing new ones, rather than kicking people already in the country out.
He tells News24 by not allowing the family of temporary skilled workers to apply to join their partners or parents in Australia, that’ll cut the number down by more than 100,000.
Joyce has his glasses on and has brought some papers with him to try and explain all the figures on air.
Asked how this will affect critical shortages like in health and aged care, Joyce claims there already aren’t that many nurses coming into Australia.
We bring up … nurses thinking ‘Oh well, that’s 50%, or 30% [of skilled migrants]’. No, it’s 1% or less, the nurses, and less than 1% is aged care workers.
We’re getting numbers down primarily by not issuing new visas.
Asked whether nurses and construction workers should be incentivised to come to Australia by bringing their family with them – unlike other temporary skilled workers under the One Nation proposal – Joyce says no.
This isn’t an exact apples-for-apples comparison, but the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation estimates that internationally qualified nurses (IQNs) make up approximately 20% of the total nursing workforce, and 35% in aged care.
Hastie says Australia will be ‘supplicant state’ without US AI deal
Luca Ittimani
Andrew Hastie has claimed Australia will become a “supplicant state” if it doesn’t make a deal with the US to get its frontier AI, suggesting the Aukus military agreement could be a suitable path.
The shadow industry minister told the Sydney Dialogue the US government’s shutdown of access to Claude Mythos in June showed Australia could be held hostage if it didn’t get local AI capacity. He said:
Without a sovereign AI frontier model here in Australia, we are going to be a supplicant state, not a sovereign state … People think it’s making memes on ChatGPT. We’re talking about the global order being changed and Australia falling behind.
Hastie said Australia was far behind in the race for development so should look to make a deal with the US as it makes its AI “arms race” against China.
We need to work on a way to get a hyperscaler down under, or multiple hyperscalers to invest in sovereign capability, the same way Ford and General Motors did 100 years ago … I think working with the United States, through Aukus if we want to use that frame, is the pathway.
He said such an outcome would be a “balancing act” as Australia would not have “complete control” but said the country could bring its policy settings to bear on the businesses that agreed to set up here. He cited a former Labor prime minister’s argument.
I think Dr Kevin Rudd was exactly right last week when he said … industry policy is now the norm not the exception … Ditch the orthodoxies of the last 40 years and wake up to the reality that is now shaping our world.
Greens call for debate on frontier AI models that ‘may make us extinct’
The Greens have gone from zero to a hundred in the Senate this morning, immediately moving to suspend standing orders to push the government to debate and legislate safety testing and transparency on frontier AI systems that could make us go extinct.
Senator David Shoebridge is moving the motion which also calls for the government to push for a global treaty on AI regulation with middle powers, including Canada, Singapore and France.
He tells the Senate the government could legislate an “ethical AI industry” that constrains the frontier model.
This morning Sam Altman and Elon Musk called for the sector to pump the breaks on “reckless” AI development
Shoebridge says:
I’ll tell you what the Greens think we should be talking about, not the Regulatory Reform Omnibus Bill, but the fact that major players from the AI industry across the world are saying we need to slow down development of frontier models because it may make us extinct …
I can’t believe anyone would vote against this motion, and I can’t believe Labor would say ‘no we don’t want to deal with an extinction risk’.
First female high court justice Mary Gaudron remembered
Mary Gaudron, Australia’s first female justice of the high court of Australia, has been remembered as a woman who broke down barriers for women across Australia, for her intellect and courage.
In a social media post, the governor general, Sam Mostyn, wrote Gaudron’s distinguished career “transformed Australia’s legal landscape”.
From her upbringing in Moree NSW to her advocacy for equal pay and her distinguished service on the nation’s highest court, Justice Gaudron brought her fierce intellect, integrity, compassion and a deep commitment to justice to every role she held.
The social services minister, Tanya Plibersek, also paid tribute to Gaudron on social media this morning:
Mary Gaudron changed Australia’s legal landscape. She fought for equal pay, broke down barriers for women in law and public service, and went on to become the first woman appointed to the High Court of Australia. Her intellect, integrity and courage made our country fairer and opened doors for generations of women who followed.
Benita Kolovos
Victorians right to question road maintenance: Carroll
Following from our last post …
In the 50km zone around where the motorcyclist’s crash occurred, the road condition deteriorated from 1% poor or very poor in 2022 to 44% in poor or very poor condition in 2024.
Ben Carroll was pressed on how the Victorian government had let this occur. He said:
We have had a range of climatic events. We have bigger, heavier trucks travelling on our road network more than ever before. Having said that, business as usual on our roads and road resurfacing has not worked … That is why you look at the example in Western Australia, they brought road maintenance back inside of government after it was outsourced, and that has seen a vastly bigger improvement …
Carroll said the state government had invested $1bn into road maintenance and road resurfacing every year and that Victorians were right to question whether they were getting the “best bang for our buck”.
Read more:
Victorian premier vows ‘no more buck passing’ after motorcyclist’s death
Benita Kolovos
The Victorian premier, Ben Carroll, was on ABC Radio Melbourne, following the death of a motorcyclist after hitting a pothole.
The 71-year-old Ballarat man was killed after striking the pothole and losing control of his bike on the Western Highway at Trawalla, near Ballarat, on Sunday.
Potholes had already emerged as a key political issue ahead of the November election, but this death has only heaped further pressure on Carroll. He told host Mary Gearin the death was a “tragedy”.
The buck does stop with us. I’ve made it very clear there cannot be any more buck passing on road maintenance. That’s why I have said, under my government, it was outsourced in the mid-1990s, I’m going to bring road maintenance back inside of government.
