Key events
Luca Ittimani
Macquarie Bank sheds $6bn in market value
Macquarie Bank has lost almost $6bn in market value after disappointing investors with its financial results – though its efforts to break up the big banks’ party have seen some success.
The challenger to the big four banks enjoyed double digit growth from April to September in home lending and household deposits. Mortgage brokers are responsible for most of the boom in Macquarie borrowers, while its condition-free savings account has attracted households’ cash.
Profits in its banking and financial services exceeded market expectations, but net profits across the group were less than $1.7bn for the six months to September, $200m lower than expected.
John Storey, an analyst with UBS, said the market would need to trust in management to deliver a much stronger next six months. The market has shown no such trust, dumping Macquarie shares to a six-month low.
Princess Anne to arrive in Australia tomorrow
Princess Anne will land in Melbourne tomorrow for a tour of Australia taking in Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland.
Anne is visiting from 8 to 11 November in her role as colonel-in-chief to the Royal Australian Corps of Signals, which is marking 100 years since its formation.
The visit, one of more than 20 by Anne to Australia, is the first royal visit since King Charles’s in October last year.
It comes almost immediately after Charles officially stripped their brother, now Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, of his HRH style and his prince title.
A US congressional panel has written to Mountbatten Windsor to ask that he submit to questioning as part of its investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s criminal operations.
Weekend thunderstorms forecast for much of the east
The Bureau of Meteorology is forecasting rain storms for much of eastern Australia this weekend, with severe weather possible for parts of NSW and southern Queensland on Saturday.
Severe thunderstorms are possible across the east coast tomorrow from Wollongong up through Sydney and into southern parts of Queensland and Brisbane’s western suburbs.
The BoM meteorologist Jonathan How says thunderstorms are more likely in some areas, bringing heavy rainfall, damaging winds and large hail.
We also do have an area of red where severe thunderstorm is likely. That extends from Newcastle and the Hunter, up into the mid-north coast and then southern parts of the tablelands … We may also see the additional risk of destructive winds gusts which can cause significant damage.
A cold front, a low pressure system and a warm front moving through eastern Australia will also bring rain and the risk of minor flooding to South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania, before conditions ease into Sunday.
Ley goes on to say she values “every single member of my team”, including Henderson.
In order to interrogate her view, you should probably ask her … What I am saying is that every one of my team is absolutely united behind the focus that we have right now, which is to hold this Labor government to account for an energy policy that is destructive of households, businesses and, indeed, harming the economy.
Asked about backbencher criticism, including of her recent calls for the US ambassador, Kevin Rudd, to be sacked, and her decision to go after Anthony Albanese for wearing a Joy Division T-shirt, Ley says:
I’m proud of my team and I know that every single member of that team is contributing to the serious credible policy agenda that I spoke about.
Asked about how she plans to fix disunity in the Liberal party, including around net zero emissions policy, Ley says:
I’ll clearly have more to say after the Liberal party meets, and I’m not going to presuppose the outcome of that meeting. Because I made it clear when I became leader that every single member of my party room would be enfranchised to contribute to the policy discussion about energy, and they have. That includes the working group, led by Dan Tehan, that has heard from industry and experts. It includes backbench committees.
Ley won’t ‘comment on commentary’ amid leadership concerns
The opposition leader, Sussan Ley, is speaking now in Canberra, after the Liberal senator Sarah Henderson expressed concern about her hold on the Coalition in an interview with Sky News this morning.
Asked about Henderson’s comments, Ley says:
I’m not going to comment on commentary. You wouldn’t expect me to. Because I’m not focused on comments that other people relay to me, or that might be made in a variety of contexts. The only thing I care about is working hard for the Australian people, and I lead a team of very … a very proud team.
Police appeal for information after four found dead in Queensland house fire
Police are appealing for information after four people were found dead after a house fire in Emerald, a town in central Queensland, yesterday.
Emergency services were called to the address just before 7am on Thursday and found a property fully engulfed in flames. The blaze was extinguished shortly afterwards, but four people were found dead inside the property.
Formal identification is ongoing, but police say a man, 36, a 15-year-old girl, a one-year-old girl and a five-month-old boy were killed in the blaze.
Two other women, aged 25 and 38, escaped the fire and were treated at a nearby hospital. Det Acting Insp Brett Richard said in a statement:
It has been a very sad and tragic scene, and we have a lot of families gathering around to provide support to each other.
A crime scene has been established and an investigation is ongoing. Police said during a press conference today there is not yet a known cause for the fire.
Penry Buckley
NSW government considering changes to legal protection for 10 to 14-year-olds
The NSW premier, Chris Minns, says the government is considering legislative changes to the common law presumption of doli incapax, under which children between 10 and 14 are protected from criminal prosecution.
The centuries-old presumption, from the Latin for “incapable of evil”, offers protection on the basis 10 to 14-year-olds don’t understand the difference between right and wrong, although it can be rebutted.
The premier, speaking in Tamworth earlier to announce an investment to tackle regional youth crime, said the government was also considering changes to “the situation as it’s currently constituted”.
It’s not necessarily about driving high conviction rates, it is the current situation. But for many youth, there is no consequences at all … we just can’t be in a situation where we’re asking the police to arrest the same person over and over and over again, because it’s not good for anyone.
It’s not good for the community. It’s not good for the families involved. And lastly, perhaps most importantly, it’s not good for the child involved either.
Following a high court decision in 2016 clarifying the presumption, the proportion of 10 to 13-year-olds prosecuted in court fell from 76% in 2015-16 to 16% in 2022-23.
A review into doli incapax commissioned by the NSW attorney general, Michael Daley, has recommended the common law presumption be made statutory law, although Minns says the review shows the principle is “not working”.
The review said while youth crime was a concern, only a small proportion in the 10 to 13 age group engaged in serious or persistent offending, and the principle remained an “important safeguard against the possibility of inappropriate findings”.
Liberal party to head to trial over Pesutto loan after mediation fails
Benita Kolovos
A dispute over the $1.5m loan issued to the former Victorian Liberal leader John Pesutto is set to go to trial after attempts to settle the matter outside court failed.
Five members of the Victorian Liberal administrative committee – recently renamed the state executive – launched supreme court action against the directors of the party’s finance vehicle, Vapold, and the remaining 14 members of the executive over the loan.
They argued that the party’s constitution prohibited the loan, which was approved by the executive after a vote in June.
The loan was used to help cover $2.3m in legal costs after fellow MP Moira Deeming successfully sued Pesutto for defamation.
If he had failed to pay, Pesutto would have had to declare bankruptcy, forcing a byelection in his marginal seat of Hawthorn.
Senior Liberal sources confirmed that formal mediation, ordered by the supreme court, came to an end on Thursday after the parties were unable to reach an agreement.
It means the case will now proceed to an expected five-day trial, which has been set down to begin on 16 March, just eight months out from the state election.
The opposition leader, Brad Battin, will be among defendants likely to take the stand to be examined over his role in approving the loan.
Defence submissions, seen by Guardian Australia, argue that the interpretation of the constitution is not a matter for the courts.
Three pedestrians seriously injured after being struck by car in western Sydney
Three people have been taken to hospital in a critical condition after being struck by a car at an intersection in western Sydney.
In a statement, NSW police say emergency services responded to reports just after 9am following a crash in Blacktown.
Police say the three men, believed to be aged in their 30s, were standing outside a business when the cars collided, causing one to mount the curb and allegedly strike the pedestrians.
NSW Ambulance paramedics treated the men at the scene for multiple injuries, with all three taken to Westmead hospital. A crime scene has been established.
The drivers of both vehicles, believed to be aged in their 20s and 30s, have been taken for mandatory testing. No charges have yet been laid.
Nine asks for compensation if gambling ads are banned
Luca Ittimani
Nine Entertainment has asked the Albanese government to pay it compensation if it bans gambling advertisements, and not to limit any ban to broadcast media.
The Albanese government has resumed negotiations with the wagering industry to restrict ads, with industry sources expecting to see legislation by the end of the year, Guardian Australia reported in October.
Nine chair Catherine West confirmed the company had been discussing ad restrictions with the government, seeking “some type of compensation” and a commitment to make any ban apply broadly across all media types. She told Nine’s AGM:
We believe that gambling across the society is a collective responsibility … We already have a lot of regulation.
It would not be fair for us to not be able to do gambling and gambling companies to be able to sponsor word searches on Google. That will just mean that the revenue is diverted away from us across the board.
West did not directly answer when asked whether Nine had asked the government to resist moves to limit gambling ads. She said the ads accounted for the “low single digits” of Nine’s revenue, which was nearly $2.7bn in the year to June.
West said Nine was not considering allowing viewers to opt out of gambling ads, a method pioneered by SBS in 2024.
The Guardian has not accepted gambling advertising across all of its global platforms since 2023. You can read more about the decision in this piece by Guardian Australia’s editor Lenore Taylor:
Tory Shepherd
New neurotechnology gets $54m investment from federal government
A brain-computer interface (BCI) that promises to help paralysed people control digital devices with their minds has scored a $54m investment from the federal government.
Synchron, which started at the University of Melbourne, has developed neurotechnology that has been described as “miles ahead” of Elon Musk’s Neuralink.
The federal funds come from the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC) as part of its latest $305m funding round.
The NRFC said in a release “the company’s status as an industry pioneer means that it will likely set the standards for BCI integrations with products such as iPhone, Apple Vision Pro, and Chiral AI – the world’s first cognitive AI”.
Synchron founder Tom Oxley said the investment would help the company fund their final clinical trials.
Overnight, Unesco adopted new guardrails for the “wild west” of neurotechnology amid ongoing concerns about mental privacy and freedom of thought.
Read more here:
