Health News at Your Fingertips

Our own Daniel Hurst is up asking a question in the Press Club.

Hurst: How do you see the Aukus arrangement when it comes to the submarines? How do you see that in terms of us making our own decisions in war?

Well, all these capability decisions should be about increasing Australian independence and sovereignty. That’s the whole reason you have a Defence Force. So that’s absolutely critical.

I would say that to me the larger threat to Australian sovereignty and independence doesn’t come from a like-minded democracy, it comes from a huge superpower in our own region that is run by a Leninist political party. To me, the Aukus arrangement will strengthen our independence and sovereignty because it will give us access to technologies that increase the deterrent power that we have.

Fullilove says we need to reset relations with China, revealing that our trust in the country has slipped even further:

Four years ago, over half of Australians, 52%, trusted China. But … by last year that figure had dropped to 16%.

And I can reveal today that in the 2022 Lowy Institute poll, that number has fallen further to 12%. So while 9-in-10 Australians believe our alliance with the United States is important to our security, only 1-in-10 Australians trust China.

This is no cause for celebration. It is in our interest that relations between Canberra and Beijing are stable and … productive. This is in China’s interest, too. We should certainly be on speaking terms with China, as are all our Quad partners. So it’s good the defence minister, Richard Marles, met with his counterpart at the Shangri-la dialogue 10 days ago. This is just a first step to a difficult path.

WA has recorded two deaths and 5,770 new cases.

Today’s report includes two deaths, dating back to 6 June, which were reported to WA Health yesterday; a man in his 90s and man in his 80s.

Active cases: 28,770

Cases in hospital: 259

Cases in ICU: 9

Back to Fullilove quickly, who is now speaking on the divisiveness of climate change policy in Australia’s recent history:

The Albanese government has indicated it intends to work through the UN to promote global action to tackle the climate crisis including by bidding to cohost the 29th Conference Of the Parties (Cop29) in 2024.

Imagine if Australia were to become a leader in international climate negotiations, seeking to shape outcomes rather than a laggard seeking to stymie them. I hope this election signals the end of Australia’s climate wars which destroyed several prime ministers and nearly broke our politics.

I must tell you I have long been perplexed by the inconsistent approaches … that Australians, conservatives and progressives, take to the two different issues of hard security and climate. Many on the right believe, apparently, that we should lead on security and free ride on climate. And many on the left believe we should lead on climate and free ride on security.

But these are both good fights and I’m in favour of fighting both of them. Australia can’t stop global warming alone and neither can we ensure stability in this region. But in both cases, we can make a meaningful contribution, and a sure route to failure is if countries such as Australia stand down rather than standing up.

Perrottet urged to halt Barilaro appointment pending inquiry

Michael McGowan

The Labor opposition managed to pass a motion on Wednesday calling for the NSW state government to delay former deputy New South Wales premier John Barilaro’s appointment to a $500,000-a-year trade commissioner job until an urgent upper house inquiry reports its findings.

Terms of reference for the upper house inquiry – which is expected to begin in a matter of weeks – have yet to be published, but it will focus on the circumstances, process and probity of the appointment.

The motion passed 20 votes to 18, despite opposition from the government and One Nation. While it is not binding, Labor’s upper house leader, Penny Sharpe, said there were questions that needed to be answered before the former deputy premier moved.

“This has been one of the murkiest appointments that we have seen in this 12-year-old government,” she said.

The education minister, Sarah Mitchell, said it was “inappropriate” to block the move.

“By calling on the government to delay his appointment pending an inquiry, the motion is asking the government to interfere in the appointment and employment of a public servant,” she said in parliament.

“This is highly inappropriate. It is not in place of elected officials to be interfering in the engagement or employment of public servants and to call on the government to do so be highly unconventional.”

The executive director of the Lowy Institute, Michael Fullilove, is speaking at the Press Club right now.

He has just shared some findings from the 2022 Lowy Institute poll which will release next week.

This year, when thinking about world events, only five-in-10 Australians say they feel very safe or safe.

This represents a 17 point fall from last year and a 39 point fall from 2010, when 9-in-10 Australians felt safe. So in a bit more than a decade, we have gone from 9-in-10 to 5-in-10.

It’s not all bad news, however.

The United States is now being led by a decent human being – something that wasn’t true until relatively recently. In the defence of Ukraine, the Biden administration has led by example, providing weapons, intelligence and funds to Kyiv.

Other western countries, the scales falling from their eyes, have also stepped in. Sweden and Finland have applied to join NATO. There has been a quickening of connections between like-minded countries in the face of challenges from Russia and China.

Cait Kelly

Hello everyone – this is Cait Kelly, you know the drill – if you want to flag soemthing you can ping me @cait__kelly or email cait.kelly@theguardian.com.

Let’s get into it!

Mostafa Rachwani

And with that, I will hand the blog over to Cait Kelly. Thanks for reading.

The Northern Territory is reporting 248 new Covid cases overnight, while the Australian Capital Territory has recorded 1,085 new cases:

So Anthony Albanese’s press conference has come to an end, but not before the PM launched into another attack on the former government, saying he is “not focusing on the politics” and that he will operate with an eye on the next election:

What I’m doing is focusing on good policy, because I believe that when Australians see a government that’s actually doing its job, it’s not issuing media releases don’t lead to anything that’s actually making childcare cheaper, as we said we would that’s investing in housing and creating the housing Australia Future Fund, because we said we would. That’s creating jobs and skills in Australia and dealing with the skills crisis, because we said we would that’s dealing when it comes to energy.

Can you imagine the other mob? That would have had four different policies in the last week. They would have had announcements and declarations that things were going to change. We didn’t. We got together state and territory ministers. We supported Aemo to take the action in which they did. We acted in a way that ensured that they weren’t blackouts that we dealt with a crisis that was not of our creation. That was the former government’s creation and responsibility. But we dealt with it.

And I said during the election campaign that I had my eye on two dates. One was the 21st of May. There are a range of people who made comments 18 months ago that we couldn’t win this election. I said that we had a plan.

The plan that I also said we had was an eye on the election in 2025. An election in which we will go to the people saying that we have acted responsibly, that we haven’t acted on a 24-hour political cycle basis every day that our announcements actually lead to something happening and we will go to the people including here in Tasmania with that record.