Australia By Aussie

Australia By Aussie Australia By Aussie shares real stories and everyday life from inside Australia, brought to you by locals.

03/09/2026

Jane Hume has rejected claims the Coalition’s plan to tackle illegal to***co is simply a copy of One Nation’s proposal.

The Coalition is proposing an 80% cut to to***co excise and a $200 million law enforcement boost, while One Nation has separately proposed a 75% cut.

03/09/2026

Jim Chalmers is defending Treasury’s housing forecast after the Commonwealth Bank predicted house prices could fall by almost 10 per cent across capital cities.

Treasury modelling says the government’s recent tax changes would reduce house price growth by 2 per cent over the next couple of years.

Chalmers says the Commonwealth Bank’s forecast needs to be compared with Treasury’s longer timeframe, pointing out that the bank expects house prices to recover next year.

He also says the housing market had already started to soften before the budget, with interest rates among the factors affecting prices and auction clearance rates.

The debate now centres on how much of any housing slowdown can be linked to the government’s tax changes, and how the different forecasts should be compared.

03/09/2026

Pauline Hanson has questioned government spending linked to Chris Bowen’s role in preparations for COP31.

In a post on X, the One Nation leader highlighted more than $5.6 million in hotel contracts linked to the Pre-COP meeting in Fiji, while also referring to separate travel spending involving Bowen.

The reported Fiji contracts include more than $2.1 million for the Sheraton Fiji Golf and Beach Resort and more than $2 million for the Sofitel Fiji Resort and Spa, with several other hotels also included.

The government says the accommodation is being reserved for international delegates and that costs will be recovered where appropriate.

Separate departmental records showed $283,976 associated with Bowen’s six-day trip to Bonn, Germany.

The opposition has also questioned the spending and called for more information about the Fiji event.

02/09/2026

Communications Minister Anika Wells is urging Telstra to act without delay after an independent investigation into the telco’s nationwide network outage in July found preventable failures.

The investigation found gaps in ownership and oversight of key network functions contributed to the failure. The outage was triggered after a software update had not been completed on a GPS card, causing incorrect timing information to flow through the network.

The July outage caused widespread disruption across Australia, affecting people, businesses and transport. Further Triple Zero calls were also unable to connect during the incident.

Wells said the report was concerning and showed there had been failures that could have been prevented.

She also stressed that Australians expect to be able to reach Triple Zero when they need emergency help and that telcos are legally required to ensure those connections occur.

Telstra has accepted the independent review’s findings and is working through its recommendations.

A separate Australian Communications and Media Authority investigation is still underway and could result in penalties of up to $30 million per breach.

02/09/2026

Victorian Premier Ben Carroll has announced a $270 million road upgrade commitment in Epping as part of his re-election pitch.

If Labor wins the Victorian election, the proposed funding would be used to improve an intersection in Melbourne’s north and double the number of lanes on Findon Road from two to four across 3.6 kilometres.

The announcement comes after Carroll’s recent focus on a pothole blitz across Victoria.

During the press conference, Carroll was also questioned about a police management direction concerning bail decisions amid increasingly overcrowded police cells. He defended the approach and said he made no apology for cells being more full, arguing that it reflected stronger enforcement and accountability.

Carroll also rejected suggestions that he planned to raise Victoria’s age of criminal responsibility to 14, despite the policy being included in the Labor Party platform.

The $270 million road commitment is conditional on Labor being re-elected.

02/09/2026

Sydney Ferries services have been disrupted today after Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) members stopped work from 9am to 2pm as part of protected industrial action.

The stoppage is affecting ferry services across Sydney, with Transport for NSW warning that cancellations, delays and changes could also affect services immediately before and after the five-hour action.

The MUA is seeking a 5% wage increase, along with guaranteed annual increases in following years, as workers negotiate a new enterprise agreement with private operator Transdev.

MUA Deputy Branch Secretary Paul Garrett said workers were seeking a fairer wage that keeps pace with rising living costs.

The union has also warned that further industrial action could follow if an agreement is not reached.

Passengers have been urged to check transport alerts and the Opal Travel app and allow extra travel time.

02/09/2026

Nationals leader Matt Canavan has linked the growing attraction of some young boys to “manosphere” content online to what he described as the “feminisation” of the school curriculum.

Speaking ahead of Chanel Contos’s National Press Club address, Canavan said boys needed more direction, leadership and male role models in schools.

His comments come amid a wider debate over whether social media algorithms are helping push young people towards harmful misogynistic content.

02/09/2026

Should social media algorithms be opt-in for everyone?

Independent MP Allegra Spender says Australia has an opportunity to make social media algorithms safer for all Australians — not just young people.

Spender is backing calls for algorithm-driven social media feeds to be opt-in, meaning users would actively choose whether they want to receive content selected by algorithms.

Speaking on ABC Radio National’s RN Breakfast, Spender said algorithms can, in some circumstances, serve content that can have damaging effects across the community.

She argued that making safer settings the default could give people more active choice over how social media works for them.

The discussion comes as the Australian government considers changes to online safety settings. The government has also raised concerns about the role social media can play in harmful content reaching young people.

Chanel Contos’s Teach Us Consent has been campaigning for social media algorithms to become opt-in, with concerns about the way platforms can recommend harmful and misogynistic material.

Spender also questioned the effectiveness of Australia’s under-16 social media restrictions, saying the challenges associated with social media do not simply disappear when someone turns 16.

She pointed to the addictive nature of social media and said adults can also be exposed to harmful and misogynistic content.

The debate raises a broader question: should users have to actively choose algorithm-driven feeds, rather than having them switched on by default?

For supporters of the proposal, the idea is about giving Australians more control over what appears in their feeds. For others, the key question will be how such a system could work across different platforms.

As Australia continues to debate online safety and the role of social media, the focus is increasingly moving beyond age restrictions and towards how platforms themselves operate.

Would you choose to opt in to algorithm-driven social media feeds?

02/09/2026

Australia will invest $600 million over the next 10 years to help Pacific countries fight the growing trade in illicit drugs.

The Waqa Moana initiative will strengthen aerial surveillance, police and border training, intelligence sharing and regional coordination, with Pacific countries able to opt in.

More than 17 tonnes of illicit co***ne and methamphetamine have been seized in the Pacific since the start of 2026, compared with about 4.6 tonnes during all of 2025. (ABC News)

The Australian government says the initiative is aimed at disrupting organised crime and stopping more drugs from reaching Australia.

02/09/2026

Chanel Contos is calling for social media algorithms in Australia to become opt-in, arguing that young people need greater control over the content recommendation systems place in front of them.

The Teach Us Consent founder says boys can be drawn from seemingly harmless fitness or motivational content into online communities known as the “manosphere”, where misogynistic ideas can be promoted.

The federal government is considering options to give Australians more control over algorithmically recommended content, while a proposed Digital Duty of Care is also being developed.

Address

32 Amesbury Avenue
Brisbane City, QLD
2162

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when Australia By Aussie posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share

Category