Australia news live: social media lights up with spectacular aurora photos; Woolworths says ‘ask Arnott’s’ why Tim Tams are cheaper in UK | Australian politics

Rafqa Touma

Penalties on platforms, not users, in approach to social media age ban legislation

Penalties will be faced by platforms, not users, in the federal government’s legislative design for a national minimum age for social media access, the minister for communications, Michelle Rowland, says.

She is addressing the social media summit in South Australia, and said:

A key design principle of the commonwealth’s legislative approach is to place the onus on the platforms, not on parents or young people. Penalties for users will not feature in our legislative design.

Instead, it will be incumbent on the platforms to demonstrate that they are taking reasonable steps to ensure fundamental protections are in place at the source. Our approach will ensure the eSafety regulator provides oversight and enforcement.

Rowland said the federal government is considering an exemption framework, “to accommodate access for social media services that demonstrate a low risk of harm to children”. She said the aim is to “create positive incentives” for platforms to develop “age-appropriate versions of their apps and embed safe and healthy experiences”.

By design, we are conscious of the harmful features in the design of platforms that drive addictive behaviours, and this is why we will set parameters to guide platforms in designing social media that allows connections but not harms to flourish.

The federal government will set a 12-month implementation timeframe, for the industry and regulator to implement necessary systems and processes, Rowland said.

Andrew Messenger

Queensland premier forgets second candidates’ name in repeat gaffe

The Queensland premier, Steven Miles, has again forgotten the name of a local Labor candidate.

The premier was campaigning in Kawana, on the Sunshine Coast, today, one of the LNP’s safest seats. But there was no sign of Jim Dawson, who is trying to take the electorate off the LNP’s deputy leader, Jarrod Bleijie.

When asked where his candidate was, Miles said:

I’ll be campaigning on Sunshine Coast seats from now all day. So stay tuned.

He was then asked a follow-up question: who were they?

“That’s a good question,” Miles said before a lengthy pause.

We’ll get that for you and I’ll be with them later.

It was an embarrassing repeat of a similar blunder in central Queensland last week, when the premier forgot the name of Mirani candidate Susan Teder.

The Sydney local health district says it is assisting the Holy Family medical centre in Dulwich Hill, in Sydney’s inner west, after patients were given less-effective vaccines due to storage issues.

Vaccines were incorrectly stored at the practice and patients who received a vaccine between 4 December 2019 and 30 July 2024, may have received a vaccination that was less effective.

The Sydney LDH will assist the medical centre to coordinate and run a revaccination clinic “in the coming weeks”, prioritising children under five and adults over 65.

In a statement, the LHD said patients who received the private travel vaccine and influenza vaccines are not at risk.

Holy Family medical centre is notifying all patients affected, including a number of children who were aged between 0 and 5 years at the time of their first vaccination.

Repeating a vaccination will not cause any harm, even if the first vaccine was effective.

Rafqa Touma

Michelle Rowland addressing social media summit

The federal minister for communications, Michelle Rowland, is addressing the social media summit in South Australia.

She will be laying out the commonwealth’s approach to legislating a national minimum age for social media access.　She labelled it a “significant reform” and said the government would work with “state and territory governments, regulators, experts, industry and the community”:

Today I’ll cover three things: the pragmatic approach we are taking to social media, age limits, the design principles that will underpin our reforms, and finally, how this aligns to our whole of government approach to improving online safety.

Amanda Meade

Federal court reserves decision on whether to suppress details on Channel Seven lawsuit

The federal court has reserved its decision on whether an “extraordinary and unprecedented” application by Channel Seven to suppress details of a dispute with a former employee should be granted.

A former Spotlight journalist, Amelia Saw, has taken legal action against the network and alleges in her statement of claim that the program created a hostile working environment for women. Seven is seeking to suppress the details of her claim ahead of mediation.

Philip Boncardo, acting for Saw, described Seven’s application as “extraordinary and unprecedented” and told the court Seven was essentially trying to avoid embarrassment.

In her submission for Seven, Kate Eastman SC said Saw’s statement of claim and amended statement of claim contained “salacious communications” about conversations and text messages and should not be made available to the media.

Three media organisations, including Nine Entertainment, opposed the suppression order. Justice Nye Perram reserved his decision.

Deepfake political advertisements with videos pretending to be the prime minister or opposition leader will be allowed at the next federal election, AAP reports, under contentious recommendations from an AI inquiry.

Voluntary rules about labelling AI content could be fast-tracked in time for the 2025 election and mandatory restrictions applied to political ads when they are ready.

The Adopting Artificial Intelligence inquiry issued the recommendations in its interim report today, but failed to secure the endorsement of a majority of its members, with four out of six senators clashing over its content.

In a dissenting report, the inquiry’s deputy chair, Greens senator David Shoebridge, said the recommendations would allow deepfake political ads to “mislead voters or damage candidates’ reputations”. Two Coalition senators argued a rushed process would unfairly restrict freedom of speech.

A temporary, targeted ban on political deepfakes should be introduced to help voters participating in the next federal election, Shoebridge said.

Under current laws, it would be legal to have a deepfake video pretending to be the prime minister or the opposition leader saying something they never, in fact, said as long as this is properly authorised under the Electoral Act. That falls well below community expectations of our electoral regulation.

At the press conference, South Australia’s premier, Peter Malinauskas, said there would be a school-based program applied to all school across the state within the curriculum to give children “the knowledge and the tools about how to confront the challenges they’ll experience online”:

No one is suggesting for a moment that we should keep kids off the internet.

Yes, we want to put an age limit in place in terms of their access to social media, but if we’re serious about their safety, we (have) got to make sure they have got the skills and the capability to be able to deal with cyberbullying, to be able to understand what healthy messages are around body images, to understand what is illicit content and really isn’t safe for them. To give them the preparedness, to know what to do and who to speak to if an online predator comes after them.

Malinauskas said this would roll out in schools from next year.

Aurora Australis lights up the night

Natasha May

There’s been a massive solar storm overnight and it’s not only the northern hemisphere which has had a cracker aurora night as a result– some parts of Australia have also seen light shows in the sky.

Solar storms occur when there is a sudden explosion of particles, energy, magnetic fields, and material blasted into the solar system by the sun, according to Nasa. A geomagnetic storm then occurs due to the interaction of the Sun’s outburst disturbing the Earth’s magnetic field, resulting in the auroras.

Around the country from Canberra to Perth and Cape Schanck, many stayed up to see nature’s spectacle: