NSW Liberal party state director sacked over administrative disaster
NSW Liberals state director Richard Shields has been sacked after the party’s failure to nominate more than 130 candidates for local government elections, AAP reports.
In a statement issued at the conclusion of an emergency meeting late last night, the party’s state president Don Harwin said its executive had unanimously decided to terminate Shields’ employment over the fiasco:
The state director was given the opportunity to explain the circumstances to the state executive. This failure to meet such a fundamental responsibility has rendered his position untenable.
As a result the state executive has unanimously resolved to terminate the state director’s employment with immediate effect.
Earlier in the evening, Shields labelled as “premature” calls for his resignation. Shields had said:
There must be a proper review of the nomination process to establish the full facts.
Eight local councils – including several in party heartland – will go to upcoming statewide elections without a Liberal candidate on the ticket.
You can read more on this below:
Key events
Marles says current system related to listed terrorist organisations is ‘utterly clear’ amid coalition push for committee
Q: The coalition is calling for a parliamentary committee to investigate the definition of what constitutes support for a terrorist organisation. Would Labor support that, to “put any doubts to rest”?
Richard Marles:
I don’t think there are any doubts. And I don’t think, to be honest, Peter Dutton has any doubts. He actually knows what the situation is here, and he knows that the processes that are in place are unchanged…
I think the system in relation to listed terrorist organisations is utterly clear, and that very much includes Hamas, and we have been very robust in the way in which we have condemned the actions of Hamas and condemned those who are associated with Hamas.
And what our processes that we have in place do is ensure that people who are associated with Hamas do not pass a security check, and Peter Dutton knows that.
So again this, I think, is about trying to create doubt and sow seeds of division, which is in fact the last thing that we should be doing here when we need to be bringing the country together in this moment to reassure people that the very robust systems that we have to protect Australians do work and do keep Australians safe.
Marles calls commentary in parliament over Palestinian visas ‘disgraceful’
The deputy prime minister Richard Marles just spoke to ABC RN about the Coalition’s push for a Palestinian visa ban after opposition leader Peter Dutton escalated his rhetoric on Wednesday.
Asked if this would have real-world consequences, Marles said it did – pointing to the warning Asio chief Mike Burgess gave when raising Australia’s terror threat level, that everyone needs to be careful with their words while engaging in public discourse:
To be frank, I think what we’ve seen in the parliament over the last 48 hours has been a disgrace from the leader of the opposition and the Liberal party. I think we can look at those words and know what the leader of the opposition is doing here.
We all know that the security assessment process is utterly unchanged to that which was applying when Peter Dutton himself was the minister for home affairs, responsible for immigration. Those checks are rigorous, and they remain in place, so that’s what’s applying to anyone who is coming from Gaza.
Google, Meta and Microsoft to weigh in on Australian AI
Four of the world’s biggest companies will be questioned about the risks and benefits of adopting AI tools in Australia as part of a national inquiry into the technology, AAP reports.
Representatives from Google, Meta, Microsoft and Amazon will appear before the adopting artificial intelligence inquiry in Canberra today in its fifth public hearing.
The firms, which are responsible for AI tools including Gemini, Meta AI and Copilot, are expected to face questions about how businesses could deploy the technology but also ways in which it has been misused.
Microsoft is also the largest investor in OpenAI, which owns ChatGPT, although the firm operates independently.
The inquiry was called in March and is tasked with examining AI trends, errors, bias and opportunities, as well as its impact on elections and the environment. Previous hearings have heard calls for restrictions to be issued for the use of AI tools in fields such as healthcare, media and art.
The parliamentary committee is expected to release its findings in September.
New Zealand-Australia talks to revisit deportations spat
Deportations, migration and closer defence partnership will be on the agenda when Anthony Albanese meets his New Zealand counterpart Chris Luxon in Canberra today.
As AAP reports, the two prime ministers are meeting for the annual Australia New Zealand leaders meeting.
Cooperation between the two governments is already broad, with more than half of the New Zealand cabinet visiting Australia since Luxon’s government took office last November. But one issue – deportations – continues to cause friction.
New Zealand has long protested against Australia’s practice of deporting criminals with NZ passports but with stronger ties to Australia. Once in New Zealand, deportees have allegedly joined gangs in huge numbers, and New Zealand argues they stand a better chance of rehabilitation in their adopted communities.
New Zealand won a concession from Albanese last year when he agreed to consider these concerns but earlier this year it was revealed that a number of deportees who won the right to stay in Australia allegedly committed heinous crimes, prompting a reversal of the policy concession.
Luxon said it was back on the agenda and he would be raising it “pretty directly” on Friday:
Because we’ve got trust and friendship, we can actually talk about those things and have differences of opinion.
NSW Liberal party state director sacked over administrative disaster
NSW Liberals state director Richard Shields has been sacked after the party’s failure to nominate more than 130 candidates for local government elections, AAP reports.
In a statement issued at the conclusion of an emergency meeting late last night, the party’s state president Don Harwin said its executive had unanimously decided to terminate Shields’ employment over the fiasco:
The state director was given the opportunity to explain the circumstances to the state executive. This failure to meet such a fundamental responsibility has rendered his position untenable.
As a result the state executive has unanimously resolved to terminate the state director’s employment with immediate effect.
Earlier in the evening, Shields labelled as “premature” calls for his resignation. Shields had said:
There must be a proper review of the nomination process to establish the full facts.
Eight local councils – including several in party heartland – will go to upcoming statewide elections without a Liberal candidate on the ticket.
You can read more on this below:
Welcome
Emily Wind
Good morning and happy Friday – welcome back to the Australia news live blog after an eventful sitting week. I’m Emily Wind and I’ll be taking you through our rolling coverage today.
Making news overnight: NSW Liberals state director Richard Shields has been sacked, AAP reports, after a failure to nominate 140 candidates for local government elections. We’ll bring you the full statement from the party’s state president Don Harwin in a moment.
Anthony Albanese is set to meet his New Zealand counterpart Chris Luxon in Canberra today for the annual Australia New Zealand leaders meeting. Also in Canberra today, four of the world’s biggest companies will be questioned about the risks and benefits of adopting AI tools in Australia as part of a national inquiry into the technology.
We’ll bring you more on both of these stories in a moment.
As always, if you see something that needs attention you can reach out via X, @emilywindwrites, or send me an email: emily.wind@theguardian.com.
Let’s get started.