For today’s news updates as they happen in Brisbane and beyond, follow us here.
For today’s news updates as they happen in Brisbane and beyond, follow us here.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has dismissed the threat of Queensland billionaire Clive Palmer’s latest venture, a new political party called Trumpet of Patriots.
After failing in his High Court bid to register the United Australia Party for the upcoming election, Palmer was forced to start a new outfit, forming the Trumpet of Patriots in what appears to be a nod to US President Donald Trump.
Albanese quipped that it “wasn’t value for money” to spend “over $100 million to deliver one senate seat to a bloke who sits in the corner and engages in conspiracy theories”, referring to United Australia Party’s sole representative, Victorian Senator Ralph Babet.
“People are entitled to run, but it’s a distortion of democracy when you have an individual spending $100 million on a campaign right around the country,” Albanese said in Sydney a short time ago.
“If you’re a serious political party, then you have to have serious policies. At the moment, there’s only one political party in Australia that has serious policies,” the PM said, before listing Labor’s policy platform.
Billionaire Clive Palmer misspoke and called his party the “Trumpet of Parrots” before correcting himself in the press conference.
Speaking about the name of his new party, The Trumpet of Patriots, Palmer acknowledged he had a bit of a stutter before accidentally saying parrot.
“The idea of an election, of a democracy, is to have a battle of ideas. You don’t have to agree with all of them, but we have to defend that in Australia, that’s a very important thing. That’s the name of the party when we joined it, it’s very appropriate for this election, because it’s the trumpet of patriots,” Palmer said.
“It’s the trum-pet, I stutter a little bit, so I say the trum-pit of patriots, that’s what it is, it’s a clear definition of what you’re voting for,” Palmer said just before he misspoke.
“They want to vote for the Greens, I can’t see that, do they want to vote for the Teals? They shouldn’t, but do they want to vote for the trumpet of parrots … patriots, of course they do, especially the trumpet part. That’s if they believe in Trump’s policies.”
Keeping with Clive Palmer, the billionaire is launching his Trumpet of Patriots party, listing his policy priorities as recognising two genders and bringing Kevin Rudd back from Washington.
Speaking in Canberra, Palmer said he would put Australians first and “make Australia great again”.
“Our policy is to recognise that there are two genders, a male and a female. We don’t want men in women’s sports, and we don’t want males dressed as females confusing our children in our schools,” Palmer said.
“All children should be entitled to a normal, safe environment in our schools and public toilets. All children must be entitled to decide who they are and what their sexual orientation is when they’re adults, not have it forced … on them.”
Changing course, Palmer then criticised Australian Ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd.
“It’s time to bring Kevin Rudd back from Washington. There’s not too many ambassadors in Washington that insult the president of the United States – Kevin Rudd ranks alone in that – and Australia needs an effective representative in Washington,” he said.
“There’s over 3.7 million Australian households in this country that don’t have enough food, that can’t afford it because of the cost of living that the Labor Party has brought upon them because of the excess spending and waste in our public service. We find Australian children going to bed at nights hungry, ask the chairman of Foodbank.”
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has dismissed the threat of Queensland billionaire Clive Palmer’s latest venture, a new political party called Trumpet of Patriots.
After failing in his High Court bid to register the United Australia Party for the upcoming election, Palmer was forced to start a new outfit, forming the Trumpet of Patriots in what appears to be a nod to US President Donald Trump.
Albanese quipped that it “wasn’t value for money” to spend “over $100 million to deliver one senate seat to a bloke who sits in the corner and engages in conspiracy theories”, referring to United Australia Party’s sole representative, Victorian Senator Ralph Babet.
“People are entitled to run, but it’s a distortion of democracy when you have an individual spending $100 million on a campaign right around the country,” Albanese said in Sydney a short time ago.
“If you’re a serious political party, then you have to have serious policies. At the moment, there’s only one political party in Australia that has serious policies,” the PM said, before listing Labor’s policy platform.
Turning now to our key story this morning: Greater Brisbane will be home to more than half of Queensland’s population within months, as migration reshapes the Sunshine State.
For the first time since 1978, and as people continue moving from interstate and overseas, Greater Brisbane will officially have more residents than the regions from 2025-26.
The milestone had been tipped to occur years later, but has now been brought forward – with long-term implications for funding distributions, infrastructure planning, and even electoral boundaries.
Greater Brisbane is tipped to have 2,887,000 residents in 2025-26, rising to 3,288,000 by 2034-35, as Queensland continues to take on more interstate migrants than any other jurisdiction.
A 20-year-old man has been charged with the murder of a 10-week-old baby girl in Rockhampton.
Emergency services were called to a property in the Rockhampton area of Gracemere about 11.15pm on Sunday, January 19, where they found the baby unconscious and not breathing. The infant had suffered life-threatening injuries.
She was rushed to Rockhampton Base Hospital before being flown to Brisbane, where she was pronounced dead several days later on January 22.
“Following investigations, detectives from Rockhampton Child Protection Investigation Unit and specialist police from Crime and Intelligence Command’s Child Trauma Unit arrested and charged a man overnight,” police said in a statement today.
The 20-year-old Rockhampton man has been charged with one count of murder (domestic violence offence).
He is due to appear before Rockhampton Magistrates Court today.
Let’s check in on our poll asking which animal should be Brisbane’s mascot for the 2032 Olympic Games.
On the weekend, Premier David Crisafulli revealed he’s not a fan of the ibis, more affectionately known as the bin chicken.
The bush-stone curlew has surged to the top of the poll so far. What do you think?
A 78-year-old man has been charged with attempted rape after a girl was allegedly assaulted in a park toilet block north of Brisbane.
Police said a group of people were socialising at the park on Raymond Terrace in Deception Bay on Saturday when the 78-year-old man went into the toilet block on his mobility scooter with the child.
A witness intervened and the incident was reported to police.
Police believe the victim and alleged offender are not directly known to each other, but both often attend the park.
Detective Inspector Phil Hurst said police believe there may be more victims.
“As these alleged offences were committed in a public place, I’m urging anyone who has witnessed suspicious activity to contact police,” he said.
“Remember that reporting sexual offences against children is mandatory, and not doing so is a criminal offence.”
Detectives executed a search warrant on Sunday and arrested the man at a Deception Bay property.
The 78-year-old has been charged with two counts of indecent treatment of a child under 12 years and one count of attempted rape.
He is due to appear in Redcliffe Magistrates Court on March 5.
Anyone needing support can contact the Sexual Assault Helpline on 1800 010 120, or 1800 RESPECT.
We have photos of the aftermath of a crash on Brisbane’s southside this morning, where a car ploughed into three parked vehicles.
Residents likened the sound of the crash that occurred about 5.50am to an explosion.
The crash occurred near the intersection of Creek Road and Tarrant Street in Mount Gravatt East, next to the Freedom Fuels petrol station.
In this morning’s flashback, here is a unique view of City Hall in 1978, courtesy of the Old Brisbane Album, Facebook page.
Six public officials will be investigated over their roles in the robo-debt scandal, in a major backflip from the National Anti-Corruption Commission’s original decision not to pursue those involved in the unlawful welfare repayment scheme.
In 2023, robo-debt royal commissioner Catherine Holmes, SC, found that 526,000 people were asked to repay money they did not owe under the robo-debt scheme that was intended to recoup welfare overpayments during the previous Coalition government.
Former opposition leader Bill Shorten has welcomed the decision to investigate the as yet unnamed individuals.
“We’ll see where it goes, but I think it was quite a remarkable and positive development yesterday,” Shorten told ABC News Breakfast.
Asked if he knew who the six officials referred to NACC were, Shorten said he could probably guess but didn’t want to prejudice legal proceedings by revealing their likely identities.
“Guessing isn’t what the nation needs on something as important as this,” Shorten said.
“The reality is that I think my former colleagues in the government would like to see the names eventually revealed. But what I don’t want to do is prejudice any investigations.”
Shorten continued that he had assured families of victims and activists in conversations overnight that the individuals’ names would emerge.