Australia news LIVE: Albanese wants to block livestream of US execution in Australia; Chalmers says progressives have to take One Nation’s rise seriously

Hello and welcome back to our live coverage of national news this Wednesday, October 14. Here’s what is making news today.

• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants to block the planned livestream of a US execution by firing squad after US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth promised the public would be able to watch it. The PM said yesterday he would do whatever he could to stop the stream from being available to watch in Australia, and called it “completely abhorrent”.
• Treasurer Jim Chalmers confronted One Nation’s rise during a speech to the Australia Institute last night in which he said voters were turning to the minor party as a response to genuine economic hardship. He urged the government not to take a passive approach to the far right, and said leaders had a responsibility offer solutions to the real challenges faced by Australians.
• Cornell University is suspending parties and other social events at fraternity houses for the rest of the academic year as it faces mounting outrage over its handling of allegations that a female student was sexually assaulted at a fraternity house.
• And climate campaigner Greta Thunberg has joined thousands of French school students at a rally in Paris to back their calls for more education funding.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese raised eyebrows last night when he publicly claimed credit for intervening to delay the ATO’s credit card ban.

The tax office abruptly announced earlier this month that it would stop taking credit card payments after the Reserve Bank banned passing on surcharges to customers earlier this year.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers has faced criticism from his colleagues and the opposition over the bungle, and had to front the media last week to explain the reversal.

Speaking at the Australian Chamber of Commerce Gala Dinner, Albanese told business leaders that the group’s chief executive had texted him directly about his concerns the ATO’s ban would harm small business.

“Andrew did text me last Thursday morning, and by Friday morning we had an announcement,” Albanese said according to reports, though a transcript was not sent out by his office as is customary.

“That was an example of a relationship that takes time to develop. That trust, where you can have a discussion and say ‘it is in hand, I agree with what you are saying and I will get it done’.”

The political debate around migration is too focused on numbers rather than long-term impacts on the Australian population and economy, independent senator David Pocock said this morning.

“We’re just talking numbers rather than actually laying out a 10-year, 20-year plan for Australia when it comes to migration and population, and taking into account the kind of skills that we do need [and] where we need them,” he told Nine’s Today show.

Pocock accused the major parties of failing to engage in “serious debate” about migration.

“I think most Australians now concede that we should be doing more to reduce the impact on housing infrastructure. We actually need a plan to do that. You can’t just start cutting numbers without having that plan.”

Fresh from the launch of his memoir, former treasurer Josh Frydenberg made his return to ABC’s 7.30, almost 10 months after his furious exchange with host Sarah Ferguson over his political ambitions.

Back then he was deeply offended she would suggest his impassioned speech at the scene of the Bondi attack could be seen through a political lens.

This time he was ready to discuss his political prospects, although he continues to insist he has plenty of time to make up his mind, noting that former prime minister John Howard said at the book launch he’d be crazy to decide now.

Refusing to answer questions about his leadership ambitions, Frydenberg said “Angus Taylor is the leader of the Liberal Party. I want him to do well.”

“He and his team has my support, but the reality is the Liberal Party’s primary vote at 20 per cent is less than half of what it was when the Liberal Party last won an election in 2019.”

He insisted that no one person or issue was to blame but the “party hasn’t adapted in the way that it should have adapted”.

Britain’s spy chief has concluded that Russian agencies acted “pretty strongly” to try to influence the UK referendum on the European Union a decade ago, but he warned against concluding that this meant they had a big impact on the outcome.

MI5 director-general Ken McCallum revealed his view after delivering an annual speech on the threats facing the nation, one day after Prime Minister Andy Burnham sparked intense debate by revealing that security agencies told him of the Russian interference in the Brexit vote.

“It is openly on the record that Russia Today and Sputnik and other Russian media organisations came in pretty strongly around the referendum,” said McCallum, who has led MI5 since 2020 and has been at the agency for about 25 years. “And it is also a matter of open-source record that there was a certain amount of interference attempted through trolls and bots and so forth.”

McCallum said this did not mean the interference was successful in swaying the result of the referendum, in which 52 per cent of voters chose to leave the EU. In remarks reported by the BBC, he said there was “comparative unimpressiveness” among Russian “trolls” on social media despite the attention they gained.

Burnham triggered criticism from Brexit advocates on Monday after the release of a podcast interview in which he said security agencies gave him a “clear answer” that Russia had interfered in the 2016 referendum. Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, a major advocate for Brexit, said this was a lie and there was no interference. Former prime minister Boris Johnson, another Brexit advocate, said there was no successful interference.

Amid the furious argument, Burnham’s office said the prime minister did not say the interference was effective and was not arguing the referendum outcome was not legitimate.

Pope Leo’s surgery on Tuesday (Rome time) to remove a small growth on one of his lungs went successfully and as planned, the Vatican said, about seven hours after the pontiff was hospitalised for the first major health issue of his 17-month tenure.

Leo, 71, was treated at Rome’s Gemelli hospital for the removal of the small nodule, which the pontiff said on Sunday had been spotted early during a recent check-up.

“The procedure was completed successfully, within the expected timeframe and as planned,” said a brief Vatican statement issued late on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT) that did not offer further details.

The Vatican said earlier that the procedure was led by the Gemelli’s chief thoracic surgeon, Professor Stefano Margaritora.

Hello and welcome back to our live coverage of national news this Wednesday, October 14. Here’s what is making news today.

• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese wants to block the planned livestream of a US execution by firing squad after US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth promised the public would be able to watch it. The PM said yesterday he would do whatever he could to stop the stream from being available to watch in Australia, and called it “completely abhorrent”.
• Treasurer Jim Chalmers confronted One Nation’s rise during a speech to the Australia Institute last night in which he said voters were turning to the minor party as a response to genuine economic hardship. He urged the government not to take a passive approach to the far right, and said leaders had a responsibility offer solutions to the real challenges faced by Australians.
• Cornell University is suspending parties and other social events at fraternity houses for the rest of the academic year as it faces mounting outrage over its handling of allegations that a female student was sexually assaulted at a fraternity house.
• And climate campaigner Greta Thunberg has joined thousands of French school students at a rally in Paris to back their calls for more education funding.