Australia news LIVE: US, Iran reach deal to extend ceasefire, Trump yet to sign off; Opposition leader won’t say he regrets calling PM an ‘arrogant prick’

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of news from Australia and around the world. It’s Friday, May 29. Here’s what is making headlines today.

• Treasurer Jim Chalmers has introduced the first tranche of legislation to enact the tax overhaul announced in the government’s budget. A Senate inquiry will examine the proposed changes.
• This morning, Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has defended his decision to call Prime Minister Anthony Albanese an “arrogant prick” during question time. Taylor withdrew the comment in the chamber yesterday.
• Albanese’s department has sought to block royal commissioner Virginia Bell from considering whether the government directed intelligence agencies to reduce counter-terrorism resources in the lead up to the Bondi massacre, a senior minister has confirmed.
• Counter-terror police have charged a woman with terrorism offences after she returned to Australia from Syria last year. She will seek bail in Melbourne on Monday.
• A group of passengers who were on board a hantavirus-struck cruise ship will have their quarantine period in a COVID-era facility in Perth extended by three weeks. The World Health Organisation advises hantavirus has an incubation period of up to 42 days. The passengers monitored for the entirety of that period. The group will be released on June 23.
• And the US and Iran have reached a tentative agreement to extend the ceasefire in the war by 60 days, but President Donald Trump has yet to approve it, according to sources familiar with the matter.

One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce has repeated his calls for an early election today, after he told Sky News last night that “One Nation would do exceedingly well” if an election were called.

“I’ll take an early election,” Joyce told the Today show.

“I don’t know whether that’s a smart thing for the Coalition to do right now, I really don’t, but One Nation would certainly take an early election if there’s one on offer.”

Joyce’s remarks this morning follow earlier calls for a snap election by Nationals leader Matt Canavan, who said Australians “should not be taxed before they have a say in what those taxes are”.

A 21-year-old man who admitted to plotting an attack on a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna in August 2024 has been sentenced to 15 years in prison.

A state court in Austria convicted the defendant, an Austrian citizen known only as Beran A, of various terror-related offences. His defence lawyer said he had admitted to charges related to the concert plot on the opening day of the trial last month.

Beran A planned to target people outside Vienna’s Ernst Happel Stadium, where tens of thousands of Taylor Swift fans had gathered for the singer’s record-breaking Eras Tour. The attack was thwarted, but Austrian authorities still cancelled Swift’s three shows, prompting many Swifties to gather in the city centre to trade friendship bracelets and commiserate.

Prosecutors said Beran A had been radicalised and had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State. He had networked with members of the terror group, they said, and they had discussed buying weapons and making bombs.

“I would just like to say that I am sorry,” he said in a final statement after closing arguments in court.

Reuters, AP

Independent senator Lidia Thorpe says the government’s landmark legal action against 3M over its firefighting foam containing “forever chemicals” does not do enough for the communities that are still suffering the effects of contamination.

Thorpe, who led a Senate inquiry into per- and polyfluoroalkyl chemicals (PFAS) that recommended the legal action, said international studies had shown the harmful health effects of the chemicals.

“[The lawsuit] is a first step to hold this chemical company accountable for poisoning our country, but it’s not enough,” she told Radio National this morning.

“There is clear direct impacts on communities, and if you have a look at Wreck Bay [in NSW], it’s a cancer cluster. The cemetery at Wreck Bay is full of people ... who’ve died of rare cancers,” she said.

“There’s a lot of work that needs to happen around the health impacts.”

Attorney-General Michelle Rowland said it was up to the antisemitism royal commissioner Virginia Bell to choose whether she would publicly release confidential cabinet documents after the Commonwealth sought to block their release.

Rowland said making a public interest immunity claim to protect cabinet confidentiality was routine and the government had “fully co-operated” with the royal commission.

“We’ve assisted the royal commission to provide redacted versions of witness statements, which are suitable for publication… there is nothing that the Commonwealth is doing that is novel in terms of there being cabinet confidentiality,” she told Radio National.

Asked why she would not use her own power to waive the confidentiality provisions, Rowland said: “It’s a well-established legal principle that cabinet documents and information of that nature attract public interest immunity in legal proceedings and royal commissions.”

“But it’s important also to note that decisions about whether to disclose cabinet information are ultimately a matter for the commissioner. Commissioner Bell can see this information and can release it, she has the authority to do so, and if it’s determined to be in the public interest, then that is the case.”

Last night, ASIO told the Senate that the agency had not sought to block the royal commission from accessing the documents.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s department has sought to block royal commissioner Virginia Bell from considering whether the government directed intelligence agencies to reduce counter-terrorism resources in the lead up to the Bondi massacre, a senior minister has confirmed.

ASIO officials told a Senate estimates hearing last night that they had not sought to prevent the royal commission from accessing the relevant material, backing up a written statement by ASIO Director-General Mike Burgess to the royal commission.

Burgess said in his statement that the Commonwealth had made several public interest immunity (PII) claims to block public release of documents, including a cabinet memorandum.

The documents would be blocked not only from the public but from royal commissioner Virginia Bell.

Asked about the matter, Environment Minister Murray Watt said the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet had made a public interest immunity claim regarding cabinet documents.

Read the full story here.

Health Minister Mark Butler has denied the government’s estimations on rental price hikes could be incorrect and claimed other independent institutes have backed Treasury’s modelling on rental costs.

“We’ll back the officials in Treasury who are employed by the public to do this modelling in the public interest, not in the interest of vested interests,” Butler told Seven, after he was presented with supposed independent modelling conducted by the broadcaster that showed rents increasing by more than the estimated average of $2 a week.

He said there were various factors contributing to rent increases that had nothing to do with changes made in the budget.

“Of course, we’re arguing numbers that are directly related to the changes set out in the budget. There are a whole bunch of other reasons why landlords will increase [rents].”

Butler said modelling by independent research institutes such as the Grattan Institute matched modelling conducted by Treasury.

Angus Taylor’s attack on the prime minister during question time reflects a broader public sentiment of frustration towards the government, says independent MP Dai Le.

“[It’s] what a lot of people are saying online, on social media everywhere anyway,” the member for Fowler told the Today show this morning.

“People are already out there saying those things.”

During a debate over income tax proposals in question time yesterday, Taylor called the PM an “arrogant prick”. He withdrew the comment.

Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has refused to back down from his attack on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese during question time yesterday.

During debate over the government’s income tax proposals, Albanese said that for many MPs it “might be the last time” they vote on an income tax proposal. His suggestion was that many of his opponents would be wiped out by One Nation, or Labor, at the next election.

“Arrogant prick,” Taylor said in an off-mic comment across the desk separating the pair, according to Labor frontbenchers who told this masthead what they heard. Taylor withdrew the comment.

But speaking on the Today show this morning, Taylor would not say he regretted the choice of words.

“I had to withdraw. It was unparliamentary, but what I am hearing everywhere I go is far worse than that.

“And the worst thing … is that we ask questions of the prime minister in question time. He doesn’t even try to answer them. He’s not even attempting.”

The US and Iran have reached a tentative agreement to extend the ceasefire in the war by 60 days, but President Donald Trump has yet to approve it, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Among the first issues to be negotiated during the 60-day window is what will happen to Iran’s highly enriched uranium, a US official said. Details of the pact were first reported by the US news outlet Axios.

The memorandum makes clear that Iran will not be able to impose tolls on the Strait of Hormuz and that Iran will have to remove all mines from the vital waterway within 30 days, according to the US official, who was not authorised to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The US, meanwhile, would gradually lift its naval blockade on the strait, the conduit for about a fifth of all traded oil and natural gas before the war. Its closure has sent oil prices skyrocketing, driving up fuel prices around the world.

A second US official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private diplomacy, said the broad outlines of an agreement have been reached but stressed that until Trump signs off on it, there is no deal.

Reuters

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of news from Australia and around the world. It’s Friday, May 29. Here’s what is making headlines today.

• Treasurer Jim Chalmers has introduced the first tranche of legislation to enact the tax overhaul announced in the government’s budget. A Senate inquiry will examine the proposed changes.
• This morning, Opposition Leader Angus Taylor has defended his decision to call Prime Minister Anthony Albanese an “arrogant prick” during question time. Taylor withdrew the comment in the chamber yesterday.
• Albanese’s department has sought to block royal commissioner Virginia Bell from considering whether the government directed intelligence agencies to reduce counter-terrorism resources in the lead up to the Bondi massacre, a senior minister has confirmed.
• Counter-terror police have charged a woman with terrorism offences after she returned to Australia from Syria last year. She will seek bail in Melbourne on Monday.
• A group of passengers who were on board a hantavirus-struck cruise ship will have their quarantine period in a COVID-era facility in Perth extended by three weeks. The World Health Organisation advises hantavirus has an incubation period of up to 42 days. The passengers monitored for the entirety of that period. The group will be released on June 23.
• And the US and Iran have reached a tentative agreement to extend the ceasefire in the war by 60 days, but President Donald Trump has yet to approve it, according to sources familiar with the matter.