As it happened: Coalition rejects Trump Gaza proposal; Auschwitz survivors warn of global rise in antisemitism​on January 28, 2025 at 7:43 am

Triple J has defended the lack of Australian representation in its Hottest 100 after this year’s countdown saw just 29 local artists included, down from 52 the previous year.

American artist Chappell Roan took out the top spot with Good Luck, Babe, edging out Sydney band Royel Otis, who came in second with their Like A Version cover of English singer Sophie Ellis Bextor’s 2001 track Murder on the Dancefloor.

This year’s poll is the third-lowest-ever showing for local talent, behind the first two in 1993 and ’94 (and equal to 1996). And it reignites a conversation about how to safeguard the future of Australian music in the era of globalised streaming.

Lachlan Macara, head of Triple J, suggests there were both cyclical and structural factors at play in the result.

“It’s the first time in a long while that Australian artist representation in the countdown has dipped below 50 per cent,” he says, attributing the result to “a confluence of events. There were some massive international releases – namely Billie Eilish, Charli XCX and Kendrick Lamar – that the listeners loved, and we’ve seen that reflected in the votes.”

The under-representation of Australian artists in the Hottest 100, alongside the fact that just five Australian songs finished in ARIA’s top 100 for 2024, speaks to a broader issue facing the local music scene: visibility and discoverability in the streaming era.

According to Tim Kelly, a UTS researcher and former executive with Sony and Universal, a couple of big players dominate the country’s listening.

“The Australian music industry is highly concentrated; over half the revenue derived from recorded music in Australia comes through Spotify, while Universal Music is the dominant record label,” says Kelly.

“Along with Sony and Warner, these three labels were responsible for more than 95 per cent of the Australian top 100 single and album charts. We are becoming a one-shop town with a dominant supplier, which doesn’t leave room for diversity.”

Read the full story here.

Queensland Health Minister Tim Nicholls has cited concerns over paediatric gender services in Cairns as the reason to “pause” the provision of hormone therapies to children across the state until 2026 at the earliest.

While the majority of young people with gender dysphoria seek treatment in public health facilities, Nicholls said there was “widely contested international evidence” around the use of puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormone therapy.

“Queensland has not yet undertaken its own considered review of that evidence,” Nicholls told reporters today, as he announced a review likely to report back in early 2026.

The former Miles Labor government commissioned an external evaluation of the Queensland Children’s Gender Service last year, but the incoming LNP government stopped implementing the recommendations and ordered no further expansion of the service.

Nicholls, whose party opposes the provision of puberty blockers, said the previous evaluation only asked “how is the service delivered, not whether the service ought to be delivered”.

Allegations around the “apparently unauthorised” provision of services in Cairns will be the subject of two separate investigations, he said, with those findings to also be considered by the broader review.

“While this review is taking place, there is a need to maintain confidence in the public health services … so today I am also announcing an immediate pause on new public patients receiving hormone therapy for those who are under the age of 18,” he said.

Nicholls said patients already receiving hormone therapy would be able to continue, and other services would still be available to young people with gender dysphoria.

DeepSeek was founded in 2023 and develops open-source AI models, meaning the developer community at large can inspect and improve the software.

The app distinguishes itself from other chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT by articulating its reasoning before delivering a response to a prompt.

Though not fully detailed by the company, the cost of training and developing DeepSeek’s models appears to be only a fraction of what’s required for OpenAI or Meta’s best products.

DeepSeek’s success may push OpenAI and other US providers to lower their pricing to maintain their established lead. It also calls into question the vast spending by companies like Meta and Microsoft – each of which has committed to capex of $US65 billion ($103 billion) or more this year, largely on AI infrastructure – if more efficient models can compete with a much smaller outlay.

That roiled global stock markets as investors sold off companies like Nvidia and ASML that have benefited from booming demand for AI services.

Shares in AI giant Nvidia tanked 17 per cent and the company lost a record $US589 billion ($936 billion) in market capitalisation, with the net worth of its CEO and largest shareholder Jensen Huang falling by some $US20 billion in mere hours.

Read the full story here.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has dismissed polling that suggests he is unpopular with female voters.

Speaking to the media in Western Australia, he said that as many women were responsible for household budgets, they were upset with the prime minister.

“The reason a lot of women are unhappy with the prime minister at the moment is that, largely, they’re responsible for household budgets for making everything add up.”

He also dismissed today’s Australian Financial Review/Freshwater Strategy polling showing that, among some voting demographics, Dutton is far more popular with men than women.

Thirty-seven per cent of male voters aged between 18 and 34 prefer Dutton as prime minister, compared with 27 per cent of women of the same age. 44 per cent of men aged between 34 and 55 prefer Dutton, compared to 34 per cent of women.

The Freshwater analysis backs findings from this masthead’s Resolve Political Monitor polling, published on December 31, 2024, which found that while male and female voters have similar support for Labor, 29 per cent and 28 per cent respectively, there is a big divergence in their support for more conservative parties.

Male voters have increased their support for the Coalition from 37 to 41 per cent since the election, compared with an increase of just 34 to 36 per cent among women

Thanks for keeping me company this morning. I’m now handing over the blog to my colleague Angus Delaney, who will be with you for the remainder of the day.

If you’re just joining us, here’s what you need to know:

• Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan has reported no loss of life from a bushfire in western Victoria, but has warned of growing property damage as the blaze continues to burn.
• Temperatures are expected to top 40 degrees in Sydney on Tuesday, in what will be the city’s hottest day of the year. Soaring temperatures will force trains to slow, stoking fears of delays across the network.
• Beau Lamarre-Condon, the former police officer accused of murdering Luke Davies and Jesse Baird last year, will undergo psychiatric testing arranged by his lawyers.
• Treasurer Jim Chalmers has said there are “real reasons” for Australians to be confident about improved economic conditions in 2025, one day before December quarter inflation data is released.
• Environmental consultant Ellie Smith has been selected as a “community independent” candidate to run against Opposition Leader Peter Dutton in his marginal Brisbane seat of Dickson. She is backed by Climate 200, the group that bankrolled successful ‘teal’ campaigns in 2022.

A former police officer accused of murdering two people with his service weapon and dumping their bodies in surfboard bags will undergo psychiatric testing arranged by his lawyers.

Beau Lamarre-Condon was charged with two counts of murder after police found the bodies of Qantas flight attendant Luke Davies, 29, and TV presenter Jesse Baird, 26, in February 2024.

The 29-year-old’s defence team are still waiting to view in-full an “extraordinary volume” of evidence compiled by prosecutors, his Legal Aid lawyer Alex Curnick told Sydney’s Downing Centre Local Court on Tuesday.

The bodies of flight attendant Luke Davies and TV presenter Jesse Baird were found in rural NSW.

Curnick asked for a brief of evidence to be delivered to the defence by February 11 ahead of her client undergoing testing by forensic psychiatrist Andrew Ellis in early March.

Lamarre-Condon’s mobile phone records have now been supplied to the defence, but his lawyers were still awaiting the phone records of others linked to the case, the court was told.

The records, known as a Cellebrite extraction, include location information, internet browsing history, text messages and call logs.

Lamarre-Condon is facing two counts of domestic violence-related murder and one count of break and enter with intent to commit an indictable offence.

A police service weapon was allegedly used at Jesse Baird’s home to shoot him and Luke Davies.

Police allege the former senior constable shot the two men using his service weapon at Baird’s inner-city home before attempting to dispose of their bodies.

The men’s remains were found on February 27 inside surfboard bags at the fence line of a rural property in Bungonia, near Goulburn, about 200 kilometres south-west of Sydney.

The attack is alleged to have been premeditated after a months-long campaign of “predatory behaviour” targeting Baird, who Lamarre-Condon briefly dated before the TV presenter began a relationship with Davies.

Suspicions were raised after possessions belonging to the men were found in a skip bin in the southern Sydney suburb of Cronulla, leading police to Baird’s blood-smeared share house in Paddington.

Lamarre-Condon was sacked by the NSW Police in mid-March.

He joined the force in 2019 and previously ran a celebrity blog, posing in photos with dozens of A-listers including Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez, Katy Perry, Miley Cyrus and Harry Styles. The matter will return to court on March 20.

AAP

Chris O’Keefe has been appointed national spokesperson of the Clean Energy Council, the peak body for the Australian clean energy industry.

O’Keefe joins the Clean Energy Council one month after he announced his departure from his Drive program on 2GB, where he had been broadcasting for the past two years. He spent 13 years at Nine, including as a reporter for Nine News, A Current Affair and 60 Minutes, and wrote for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

O’Keefe said he was leaving 2GB in December to start his own political and media advocacy business.

In an announcement about his position at the Clean Energy Council on Tuesday, O’Keefe said he would help to provide “common-sense solutions” for Australian families and businesses.

“I am a patriotic Australian and I believe the families who have spent generations working well-paid jobs in industries like mining and energy should be able to see their children working in the same sector, rather than moving to the cities for work,” O’Keefe said.

“This speed and efficiency in addressing a complicated problem for our nation is what clean energy delivers and this is why I made the choice to advocate for the industry that works not only in the national interest, but in the best interests of Aussie families and businesses.”

Nine is the owner of this masthead.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is addressing media from Western Australia. You can watch through the video link below.

Sydney trains are expected to run slower on Tuesday afternoon as the extreme heat gripping the city could force delays on the transport network.

Transport for NSW Secretary Josh Murray expected trains to run up to 10km/h slower this afternoon, warning that trains in western Sydney, where temperatures are expected to reach 42 degrees, could face the greatest delays.

“The city definitely comes back to life at the end of January,” said Murray, who advised commuters to pay attention to live travel updates ahead of their evening commute.

“We obviously pay particular attention to the movement of steel tracks and overhead wiring.”

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has said there are “real reasons” for Australians to be confident about improved economic conditions in 2025, one day before critical inflation numbers are released.

In an interview on ABC Sydney Radio, Chalmers noted a mix of slowing inflation, economic growth and improved living standards could inspire optimism among Australians for the coming year.

“There are real reasons for people to be confident about 2025, acknowledging that the last few years have been especially difficult for some people,” Chalmers said. “We’re not getting carried away about 2025, [and] there’s still a lot of global economic uncertainty.”

The Australian Bureau of Statistics will release inflation figures for the December quarter on Wednesday morning, with the data looming as a major influence on the Reserve Bank as it mulls an interest rate cut ahead of its February meeting.

Chalmers said the “fight against inflation” wouldn’t stop “even if we get very encouraging numbers tomorrow”, noting that Australians were continuing to face significant financial pressures spurred by rising prices.

“We would recognise that it’s not mission accomplished, because people are still dealing with stresses and strains in their household budget.”