One injured after Sydney apartment block blast
Fire and Rescue NSW responded to reports of an explosion at an apartment block in the western Sydney suburb of Lidcombe this morning.
Officials said there was an explosion in a unit on the second level of a three-story building that blew out a brick wall, damaged a car and caused damage to adjoining units in the structure.
Emergency officials found one person they described as “unconscious or semiconscious” who was rescued, treated by paramedics and taken to an area hospital for treatment.
Fire and Rescue NSW superintendent Adam Dewberry said there were no other reported injuries at this stage, but that there was “significant damage” to the building.
We are not sure at this stage how this explosion has occurred. There is no fire.
Key events
One Nation won’t contest Tasmania’s snap election
One Nation said today it would not contest the snap election in Tasmania called after a no-confidence vote in Liberal premier Jeremy Rockliff. Lee Hanson – daughter of Pauline – who lost her bid for a Senate seat in the federal election, criticised the timing of the new race, which comes just 16 months after Tasmanians last headed to the state polls.
One Nation said in a statement:
Unlike the major parties caught up in political theatrics over Hobart’s proposed stadium, One Nation is choosing principle over opportunism. Hanson said neither Labor nor the Liberals can be trusted to manage Tasmania’s finances, especially with both backing what she sees as reckless stadium spending.
The party said it would instead focus on growing “its strong federal base and preparing properly for the 2028 Federal election and future state races”.
The ABC reports the Jacqui Lambie Network will also not contest the election.
Lattouf case judgment set for 25 June
Amanda Meade
Justice Darryl Rangiah will deliver his judgment in the unlawful termination case brought by former radio presenter Antoinette Lattouf against the ABC in the federal court on 25 June at 10.15am.
The highly anticipated judgment will be livestreamed by the federal court.
Lattouf was let go three days into a five-day fill-in stint on ABC Radio Sydney’s Mornings program when she shared a post that said Israel had used starvation as a “weapon of war” in Gaza.
After the Fair Work Commission found the freelance journalist was sacked from her casual presenting role on the ABC, she pursued an unlawful termination case in the federal court.
The ABC claimed in the trial that Lattouf was not sacked from her role but was merely asked not to present the final two shows.
Update on apartment building explosion
Fire and Rescue NSW superintendent Adam Dewberry said there was just one injury after the explosion and all other residents were accounted for.
The injured individual has been transported to hospital, but Dewberry said officials told him “they’ll be OK”. It’s unclear what injuries the person sustained.
Dewberry said of the damage:
A number of these people will be displaced and will not be able to go back into their accommodation due to the damage to the structure.
NSW police are leading investigations into how the explosion occurred.
One injured after Sydney apartment block blast
Fire and Rescue NSW responded to reports of an explosion at an apartment block in the western Sydney suburb of Lidcombe this morning.
Officials said there was an explosion in a unit on the second level of a three-story building that blew out a brick wall, damaged a car and caused damage to adjoining units in the structure.
Emergency officials found one person they described as “unconscious or semiconscious” who was rescued, treated by paramedics and taken to an area hospital for treatment.
Fire and Rescue NSW superintendent Adam Dewberry said there were no other reported injuries at this stage, but that there was “significant damage” to the building.
We are not sure at this stage how this explosion has occurred. There is no fire.
Catie McLeod
Turnbull says Australia should prepare for defence plan other than submarines
Turnbull said Australia needed to acknowledge the risk that the Aukus deal would not provide it with the submarines it needed and should start planning for alternative defence capability. He told 7.30 last night:
We have a submarine deal which is very likely to end up with us having no submarines and that we’ve got to start acknowledging that risk.
It’s not Australia that’s walking away from the United States – the United States is pulling away from its allies. But we have to live in the real world.
The people that are deluded are the ones that are ignoring the real risks in this deal, and the fact that we should have, responsibly, a plan B.
Taylor pushes for more defence spending but does not say how it would be funded
Taylor hedged a question this morning about how Australia could pay for increased defence spending, in line with US Pentagon secretary Pete Hegseth’s call for the country to raise its allocation to 3.5% of GDP. Taylor said Labor needed to take those calls “seriously”, adding the Coalition stood ready to work with the government to do so.
RN Breakfast host Sally Sara pressed Taylor about how the country could pay for that increase, pointing to the Coalition’s election plans to cut the public service. Taylor said:
It is very clear as you look around the world that countries like us are having to step up … As we found money to pay for the pathway to 3% [of GDP for defence spending] in the lead-up to the last election, we must in the lead-up to this election.
Sara pressed Taylor on proposals to cut the public service, with Taylor responding:
I’m not going to get into a commentary on these things now. I mean, you’re the commentator, and I’ll leave you free to do that. But what I will say is peace in our region is something that needs to be invested in. It’s something that we have to prioritise and we have to find ways of finding that money.
Catie McLeod
Turnbull expresses doubts Australia will ever get US-made submarines
Former Liberal prime minister Malcolm Turnbull roundly criticised the Aukus deal, saying it would “very likely” end up with Australia “having no submarines”.
Turnbull also appeared on ABC 7.30 last night, where he disputed Richard Marles’ claim earlier on the program that the rate of production in the US of Virginia-class submarines was increasing. Turnbull said:
That’s not true. The latest numbers given to the congress by the navy on 11 March this year was that the rate of production is 1.1 per annum.
They need to get to two by 2028 to be able to meet their own requirements, and to 2.33 to meet their own plus Australia’s.
And they have not been able to lift production rates despite the expenditure of over $10 billion over the last six or seven years. So they’ve got a real problem there.
Taylor says ‘very high price to pay’ if Aukus goes awry
Shadow defence minister Angus Taylor said he remains concerned Australia could pay a “very high price” if something goes south with the Aukus deal and the country loses out on nuclear-powered submarines. He spoke to RN Breakfast this morning:
There would be a very high price to pay if something were to go wrong with Aukus because we must have peace in our region and Aukus is crucial to that.
Taylor went on to again advocate for more spending on defence, saying “peace in our region is something that needs to be invested in”.
We don’t need rhetoric, we need readiness. We need sovereign capability. We need agility. And we need the people to be able to support that. And Labor’s falling short on all of those fronts.
Authorities ‘urgently following up’ to see if any Australians affected by Air India crash
Air India confirmed the nationalities of passengers onboard the aircraft that crashed in Ahmedabad yesterday.
The 242 people onboard included two pilots and 10 cabin crew. The passengers included 217 adults, 11 children and two infants, according to Reuters.
Of them, 169 were Indian nationals, 53 were Britons, seven Portuguese and one Canadian, Air India said. Multiple people died on the ground at the site of the plane’s crash.
There was one survivor, a Briton.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said last night it was “urgently following up” to determine if any Australians were affected by the incident.
The Guardian has reached out for more information this morning.
Catie McLeod
Marles again says ‘completely appropriate’ for US to review Aukus
The deputy prime minister, Richard Marles, downplayed the potential for the Trump administration’s Aukus review to jeopardise the trilateral security agreement.
Marles, who is also the defence minister, was questioned about the future of the nuclear-powered submarine deal on the ABC’s 7.30 last night, after the US defence department announced a 30-day review of the agreement.
Marles mainly stuck to his talking points during the interview, even as host Sarah Ferguson put pressure on him over whether the US has the capacity to construct enough conventional submarines to fulfil its end of the Aukus arrangement, even before Australia is due to start building nuclear-powered vessels of its own.
Ferguson said the Pentagon’s undersecretary of defence for policy, Elbridge Colby, had doubts about Aukus and the US’s ability to produce enough submarines to service its own navy. She noted the US had never been able to produce more than one conventional Virginia-class submarine a year, when it would need to produce two a year to enable them to be made available to Australia.
Marles insisted the challenges were “well known”, saying:
We need to get to that point in the early 2030s. That’s the time frame. Right now, we are confident that we can meet that. And we are seeing real progress – increases in both production and sustainment – associated with what we’re doing with Aukus and what the Americans themselves are doing.
That’s what is set out in the agreement that we already have with the United States, which forms part of the treaty that we now have between the US and the UK.
I think it’s completely appropriate for this administration to have a look at all of the facts and figures around that.
Albanese sets off for G7 meeting in Canada
Tom McIlroy
Anthony Albanese is leaving Canberra this morning to attend the G7 leaders’ summit in Canada early next week, a trip that will include stops in Fiji and the United States. A meeting with US president Donald Trump could take place on the sidelines of the meeting in Kananaskis – but it is yet to be officially locked in.
The prime minister of Canada, Mark Carney, and the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the European Union will also be at the summit.
On Friday, Albanese will meet in Nadi with his Fijian counterpart, Sitiveni Rabuka, for talks on climate change and regional security in Nadi. In Seattle over the weekend he will meet with business leaders to discuss technology and artificial intelligence.
Once in Canada early next week, Albanese will participate in G7 discussions on global energy, critical minerals, secure supply chains and infrastructure. The prime minister said:
Visiting Fiji so soon after the election is a deliberate decision to reinforce my government’s Pacific priorities and to exchange views with my dear friend prime minister Rabuka, a respected Pacific statesman.
I am honoured to be invited by prime minister Carney to attend the G7 leaders’ summit in Alberta as a key partner.
I look forward to working productively with world leaders to discuss how we tackle some of the most challenging issues facing Australia, our region and the world
Welcome
Good morning, Nick Visser here to guide you through today’s breaking news. Here’s what’s on the cards this morning:
Prime minister Anthony Albanese will leave Canberra this morning en route to the G7 meeting in Canada early next week. The trip will include stops in Fiji and the US, with all eyes on a potential sideline meeting with Donald Trump, although nothing has been confirmed.
The Department of Foreign Affairs expressed condolences to those affected by the Air India crash in the city of Ahmedabad last night. The Australian high commission and consulate general are “urgently following up” with local authorities to determine if any Australians were affected.
Defence minister Richard Marles again downplayed the US review of the Aukus submarine deal, telling the ABC last night he believes it is “completely appropriate” for the Trump administration to look into it.
Stick with us.
