Federal MP David Repacholi has condemned racist stickers appearing around Cessnock in New South Wales’ Hunter Region, warning that attempts to spread hate and division would not be accepted in the local community.

In a social media post, Repacholi described the stickers as “disgusting racist” material and called on residents to report their locations so they could be removed.

“Enough of this racist bullshit,” he wrote.

“The cowards spreading this rubbish don’t represent our community.”

The latest stickers reportedly depicts a man of Indian appearance defecating on a street, alongside the message:

“If this is you culture? We don’t like it”.

It also states that “32% of Australia’s population is foreign born”, claims India is “at the top of that list” and calls for:

“REMIGRATION NOW!”

Repacholi said racism had no place in Cessnock or the wider Hunter Region.

“Racism isn’t welcome in Cessnock. It isn’t welcome in the Hunter. And it won’t go unchallenged,” he said.

“We’re better and stronger than the hate and division these people are trying to spread.”

He urged residents who had seen the stickers to tell him where they were located so the material could be reported and removed.

“Don’t give these cowards any more publicity than they deserve,” he added.

The latest incident follows a similar controversy in July, when racist leaflets targeting Indian migrants and promoting anti-immigration messages were reportedly distributed in letterboxes across Kurri Kurri, also in the Hunter Region.

The leaflets urged residents to “keep curry” out of the town and promoted concepts including “remigration” and the preservation of culture.

Repacholi condemned that material at the time, warning that racist leaflets had been distributed across the community and saying local doctors had already faced racist comments and abuse.

So school kids in France aren’t happy about their schooling conditions so they hit the streets in protest with a lot of the country supporting them. With all of the stuff that is happening in Australia, rising costs of living, fuel pricing, excess taxing, being ripped off by major companies, banks rorting us and everything else, why do we lie down and accept it? Are we as a nation soft and just used to being shafted? Or do we just accept that we are royally screwed?

Children who drink just a couple of cans of caffeinated soft drinks a week could be putting their mental health at risk, a study suggests.

Researchers found youngsters consuming as little as 90mg of caffeine a week, roughly the amount in a cup of coffee, were more likely to experience emotional and behavioural difficulties 18 months later.

The study, led by scientists at King’s College London, analysed existing data on more than 9,600 children aged nine to 11.

Researchers examined how often the youngsters consumed caffeinated drinks including tea, coffee and soft drinks, then compared this with reports of their emotional and behavioural health six and 18 months later.

Brain scans also revealed subtle differences in several areas involved in learning, reasoning, memory and problem-solving.

Higher caffeine consumption was linked with smaller surface areas across several brain regions, with differences appearing among children who drank just one caffeinated beverage a week.

Those consuming more caffeine also tended to sleep less, while being more likely to show signs of anxiety and depression.

Professor Divyangana Rakesh, a neuroscientist and the study’s lead author, said: “Caffeine is such a normal part of daily life that it’s easy to forget young people are consuming it too.”

She added: “We found that even fairly low levels of caffeine were linked to small differences in brain structure and later mental health, and lower sleep duration seems to be an important underlying link.

“And yet, it is completely unregulated.”

However, the scientists stressed that the research does not prove caffeine causes mental health problems or changes in the brain.

Jiayi Zheng, the study’s first author, said: “Soft drinks also often go hand in hand with less healthy lifestyle habits and more risk-taking behaviours, so we can’t yet separate the role of caffeine from everything else that comes with them.”

Dr Charalampos Rallis, a genetics expert at Queen Mary University of London, said the brain differences were “very small” and that the association with later mental health was “negligible”.

He said: “The most robust conclusion is consistent with existing evidence: caffeine can reduce sleep in children.”

From April 2027, under-16s will be banned from buying energy drinks containing more than 150mg of caffeine per litre.

But lower-caffeine drinks such as Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Dr Pepper will not be covered by the proposed restrictions.

​

One thing I find genuinely ironic is how many people on the left, including socialists and progressives, support high immigration while also claiming to stand up for workers against big business.

Isn't there a pretty obvious contradiction here?

Australia has billion-dollar industries, highly profitable corporations and businesses that depend on a steady supply of workers. When employers can't find enough workers at the wages they're offering, they have two options: offer better pay and conditions to attract local workers, or change how their business operates.

Yet high immigration can increase the supply of available labour, potentially reducing the pressure on employers to raise wages, improve conditions or invest in productivity. The effects vary between industries and occupations, but it's a legitimate question about whose interests the system serves.

If a business can only remain profitable by continually importing workers willing to accept lower wages or less favourable conditions, is that really an efficient business model? Or is it one that relies on keeping labour cheap?

And if a major corporation has billions in revenue but claims it can't afford to pay competitive wages to attract Australian workers, why should expanding the labour supply be the default solution rather than expecting that business to adapt?

This is where I think the class politics gets interesting.

Reducing immigration could shift some bargaining power back towards workers. If labour becomes harder to obtain, employers may have to compete more aggressively for staff through higher wages, better conditions, training and investment in automation.

That could mean a greater share of the economic pie going to workers rather than being retained as profits or captured through lower labour costs. It could also make certain business models less viable, which isn't necessarily a bad thing if those models depend on permanently cheap labour.

Obviously, immigration isn't the only factor affecting wages. Productivity, union strength, industry concentration, housing costs, outsourcing and government policy all matter. Migrants are workers too, and they can be exploited by the same employers. Cutting immigration alone also won't automatically guarantee higher wages.

But I think the underlying question deserves more attention:

Why do so many people who oppose the power of corporations support a policy that can increase the supply of labour available to those same corporations?

If the objective is to improve conditions for the working class, shouldn't we at least be questioning whether high immigration levels serve that objective?

I'm not arguing that Australia should stop immigration altogether. I'm arguing that immigration levels should be set with the interests of existing workers, wage growth, housing affordability and living standards in mind, rather than treating employer demand for additional labour as an overriding priority.

Genuine question: If Australia substantially reduced net overseas migration for several years, wouldn't at least some employers have to raise wages, train local workers and invest in productivity? And if that transferred some income from business owners to workers, why wouldn't the economic left support it?

Is this dual take common? The only party supporting these simultaneously is Sustainable Australia which is a tiny party...

The average apartment now costs half of the average Australian income to rent, with prices exceeding the 30 per cent housing stress mark even for six-figure earners, according to a new report. 

Housing advocacy group Everybody's Home has found renting a unit now costs more than half the median take-home pay of a single worker in every Australian capital city.

The 2026 Priced Out report found apartments on average nationally cost $614 per week, making up 56 per cent of the take-home income of someone earning $70,000 — close to Australia's median income of $74,100. 

Everybody’s Home spokesperson Maiy Azize said this was a "crisis that continues to get worse for the country's renters". 

"We now see people earning really high incomes are still spending more than a third of their income on rent. If you are earning $130,000 a year, you are still spending more than a third on rent," she said. 

"If you are earning an average income between $70,000 and $80,000 and living in a capital city, you are spending two-thirds of your income to afford the average rent. 

The report found northern WA, the Gold Coast and Sydney were the three most expensive places to rent, followed by the Sunshine Coast and Perth. 

"For a long time Sydney was ground zero for the crisis and it is still really bad news, shocking if you are a renter in Sydney," Ms Azize said. 

"This year one of the most expensive... capital cities in the country is Perth and WA across the board has some really dire results. 

"The Gold Coast has been surging every year that we have done this report and it is getting expensive to rent on the Gold Coast, even if you are earning $130,000 a year, you can't afford to rent on the Gold Coast. You would need to be in a couple or a multi-income family to make that work."

The report found, for someone earning $70,000, median Sydney rent would take 69 per cent of their weekly pay, while even Adelaide — the cheapest capital — would cost more than half.

Since the March 2025 Priced Out report, rents on average have increased by $48 a week — almost $2,500 a year. 

This year's report found for an employee on $40,000, that increase would be the equivalent of 4.4 weeks of work per year; an employee on $70,000, 3.1 weeks and for someone earning $130,000 1.6 weeks.

Changes to housing policy in this year's budget were predicted by the government to result in a median rental increase of $2 a week. 

However, Ms Azize said rents had been surging by about 10 per cent every single year. 

"I think it's a bit of an insult to people's intelligence when the industry comes out and says that any rent increases from here are going to be down to these changes," she said. 

"Any renter in Australia knows that they get whacked with a huge rent increase every single year." 

However, she said changes to negative gearing and capital gains tax were positive overall. 

"They're changes that we've been pushing for a really long time," she said. 

"They're really good news for anyone who wants to make the housing system fairer, especially those renters who are trying to save to buy.

"But what these results show us is that the federal government and state and territory governments especially now really need to turn their attention to renters and taking some steps to limit rent increases because there's really only so much that people can afford to pay."

The report recommends several recommendations, including the Australian government committing to build 940,000 public and community homes over the next 15 years; introducing limits on the number and amount of rent increases during a tenancy and ending no-grounds evictions. 

"For the past four decades we've seen the federal government especially really step back from funding housing, from playing a role, and they're leaving it entirely to the private sector," Ms Azize said. 

"We can see that over that same period renting has become incredibly expensive. 

"So we need to see the government step back in. 

"When you look around the world at the countries that are actually doing a good job of turning around their housing crisis or better yet avoiding it altogether, they're the countries where the government is playing a really big role in providing housing. They're not just leaving it to the private sector."

For years everyone has been dancing around Trump’s unpredictability, his bullying and his threats. It’s past time to reassert our values

Be it Mozzarella or Bega.

Chicken or Beef.

Plain or Chicken salt.

Fresh or Frozen

Now and forever all Parmis are equal! Buuuut some are more equal than others.

For years, Anthony Albanese's ability to maintain discipline within Labor has been one of his greatest political strengths.

His MPs have largely kept their complaints private, accepted decisions made by a small group of senior figures and trusted the prime minister’s judgement.

But political loyalty is easier to maintain when a government is winning, and the patience of some Labor MPs is beginning to wear thin.

Thousands pack Wentworth Park for the final time before the stadium is demolished and returned to parkland

my favourite is jessie in the skate bowl with the rat

With the current Greens controversy, I wanted to look at whether this is a problem across Australian politics rather than just one party.

The Coalition had the Brittany Higgins case, which raised serious questions about how the Morrison government handled the allegations and supported staff who came forward.

Edit to add for above: Looks like the courts ruled there wasn’t factual evidence of a coverup sorry.
Re the coverup accusation a comment in the thread “Just read your edit. It goes way beyond that there wasn’t factual evidence of a cover up. There were findings that there in fact was no cover up. Just lies”

Labor has had its own controversies, including the David O'Byrne complaint and reports from female staffers about sexual harassment and how complaints were handled.

The Greens have had multiple cases where complaints of sexual misconduct were mishandled. Their own party organisations have acknowledged serious failures in the ACT and NSW, and the current controversy raises further questions that need to be properly investigated.

One Nation has had its share of controversies too. Former candidates criticised Pauline Hanson and James Ashby over the decision to employ Sean Black, who had previously been convicted of rape and assault. There were also competing sexual harassment allegations between Hanson and former senator Brian Burston.

To be clear, I'm not bringing up these other cases to downplay the current Greens controversy or engage in whataboutism. Whatever happened in the current case should be taken seriously, and any allegations should be properly investigated regardless of which party is involved.

I'm more interested in the bigger picture. When you look across the political spectrum, there seem to be recurring problems with how complaints are handled, who gets protected and whether people are taken seriously when the person accused has connections or is politically useful.

At what point do we acknowledge that this is a problem within the political bubble itself, rather than something unique to one party?

Have all the major parties had this issue to some extent? And are there other examples where party officials knew about allegations but failed to act?

Hi all…came upon this cap and am struggling to find out which sport, club, or players are involved.
Any help would be much appreciated,
Thanks.

There’s a simple solution to homelessness, advocates say. You need a house, and you need support

Bob Katter has accused the Prime Minister of refusing to give resource-rich North Queensland a fair go, as the push to form a breakaway seventh Aussie state gains momentum.

The colourful exchange erupted during Question Time on Monday, when the outspoken Kennedy MP challenged Mr Albanese to commission a report into the viability of splitting Queensland and creating Australia’s seventh state.

Mr Albanese admitted the proposal was “not on his bingo card”, joking that the break-up of Queensland could produce a Premier Katter and would weaken Queensland’s State of Origin team.

“The idea of a break-up of the states, including the great state of Queensland, would perhaps see a Premier Katter in Far North Queensland,” the Prime Minister said.

“Which might or might not be a good thing.

“It would weaken the Queensland State of Origin team somewhat, given the magnificent players who’ve come from places like Cloncurry and Mount Isa.”

But while the exchange drew laughter in parliament, Mr Katter said the Prime Minister’s response had reinforced his belief that Brisbane and Canberra were unwilling to relinquish the economic benefits generated by northern Queensland.

When news.com.au recently broke the news of the renewed push for the seventh state, an internal poll – receiving more than 9000 votes – found 69 per cent were in favour of North Queensland’s secession.

Speaking to this outlet after Question Time, Mr Katter accused Brisbane and Canberra of “bludging” off the resource-rich region for a financial benefit they played little part in producing.

“I’m getting the message that they’re not going to give up all that bloody money coming out of North Queensland to a North Queensland state,” he said.

“They’re not gonna give up all that bloody money … No way, Jose.

“And of course, the Brisbane government would be fanatical about it. Fanatical.”

Mr Katter argued that Brisbane would ultimately be better off with the succession, however, with an initial loss compensated by a “vast treasure trove” that would come through the region’s mining, agricultural and water development opportunities.

The renewed statehood push follows years of campaigning by the Katter family, with Robbie Katter, Bob’s son and the leader of Katter’s Australian Party, previously moving a motion in the Queensland parliament calling for steps to establish a separate state under section 124 of the Australian Constitution.

The provision allows for new states to be formed from existing states with the relevant parliamentary consent, although any proposal would face significant political hurdles.

Bob Katter suggested the campaign could initially pursue territory status, rather than full statehood, acknowledging the difficulty of securing the necessary support.

“Give us eight seats in North Queensland. We will give you a new territory,” he said.

“I’m not saying state, it’s a little bit difficult.”

He argued that a new administration could deliver many of the benefits of statehood while giving northern communities greater autonomy.

The veteran MP also linked the campaign to broader concerns about Australia’s economic independence, criticising reliance on imported goods and the management of the country’s coal and gas industries.

During Question Time, Mr Katter told the Prime Minister that North Queensland had about one million people, compared with Brisbane’s population of roughly 1.1 million, yet it remained governed from the state capital roughly 3000km away.

He cited $1 billion in mining investment and another $1 billion in irrigated agriculture that he claimed were being held back by decisions made in Brisbane.

Mr Albanese acknowledged the challenges facing regional Queensland, saying there was a case for ensuring Far North Queensland received its fair share of resources, particularly infrastructure.

He pointed to projects including the Einasleigh River Bridge and the upgrade of Karumba Airport, as well as his visits to communities such as Normanton and Cloncurry.

The Prime Minister also defended the 2032 Brisbane Olympics after Mr Katter compared Queensland’s $70 billion budget with the amount he claimed would be squandered on the two-week sporting event.

Mr Albanese said the Games would generate economic activity and jobs, with some events to be held in regional Queensland.

He also pointed to the lasting benefits of infrastructure built for previous Olympic Games in Sydney and Melbourne.

But Mr Katter remained scathing about what he described as the gulf between Brisbane’s infrastructure spending and the needs of the north.

He contrasted the kilometres of tunnels being built in Brisbane with what he said was the absence of comparable infrastructure in North Queensland, arguing that a single half-kilometre tunnel could help unlock mineral resources.

His criticism extended to the delayed electricity connection intended to link Mount Isa to the national grid.

Mr Katter said politicians had posed for photographs announcing the project more than three years earlier, but claimed not a single pylon had been erected.

“That’s the sort of government North Queensland is getting,” he said.

“We can’t even get electricity for the fourth biggest industrial centre in Australia.”

The constitutional pathway remains difficult, and the Prime Minister gave no commitment to commission the report requested in parliament.

Instead, Mr Albanese defended his government’s record in the region and the benefits he believes the Olympics will bring.

For Mr Katter and many North Queenslanders, however, the exchange was further evidence that the statehood campaign is still struggling to be taken seriously by the political establishment.

And despite the Prime Minister’s suggestion that a breakaway state could produce a “Premier Katter”, the veteran MP made clear he believes the argument is about far more than his own political future.

https://www.cotality.com/au/resources/quarterly-rental-review-report

A 13-year-old Canberra boy has gone missing and his family and police have expressed concern for his welfare.

Dramien was last seen in west Canberra suburb Kaleen at 9pm on Thursday but has not been heard from since.

Police and Dramien's family have asked members of the public to help locate him.

He is believed to also frequent the northern suburb of Taylor.

Dramien is described as Caucasian, with a fair complexion, solid build, blond hair and blue eyes.

Anyone who has seen Dramien or may have information about his whereabouts should contact ACT Policing.

Police have said information can be provided anonymously.