Penny Wong and Wang Yi meet in Manila
The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, met her Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, on the sidelines of the Asean foreign ministers’ meeting in Manila last night, a statement from her department said.
In their 12th meeting, the ministers discussed Asean priorities and the importance of peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific.
Wong raised Australia’s concerns about China’s test of a nuclear-capable submarine-launched missile earlier this month – and noted the strong concerns expressed by many Pacific island countries.
Wong also raised a range of consular issues including the case of Dr Yang Jun, respect for Australia’s laws, sovereignty and freedom of expression, the importance of safe and professional maritime conduct, and human rights.
Key events
Tobacco excise is ‘too high’, Chris Minns says
The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, was also asked about the Australian Border Force’s efforts to disrupt illicit tobacco supply chains when appearing this morning on ABC Radio National.
On Tuesday, NSW Labor’s health minister, Ryan Parks, said the issue had gotten away from authorities and more needed to be done.
Minns said NSW was “doing a lot” and had implemented “massive increases” in fines but the tobacco excise was “too high”.
It feels sometimes like we’re standing on a beach trying to stop the tide from coming in … The drive to illicit tobacco in Australia is being driven by the massive excise on legal cigarettes and it’s … driving otherwise lawful people into an illicit black market. It’s making cheap cigarettes available and plentiful, particularly for young people, and it’s fuelling organised crime in Australia.
So I just think we needed a rethink on the excise. It’s just too high. Before people jump on me and say, that means that you’re pro-smoking. I’m not. I can’t stand the tobacco companies, but this is just a policy that’s not working.
Bill Shorten says there’s a ‘national appetite’ for a gas tax
Circling back to last night’s 7.30 program, the former Labor leader and current University of Canberra vice-chancellor, Bill Shorten, also supported the government enacting a tax on gas exports.
Asked about “rumours” Labor may return to the “once very popular issue”, he said the time had arrived to “consider reviewing the taxation on gas”.
I think there’s a national appetite. I mean, the government’s paring back on things like the NDIS … But I think there’s a lot of people saying, what about the gas companies? And I think the timing for a future gas tax, not one which rips up previous contracts, that would be sovereign risk.
But I think in the future, Aussies are saying, how is it fair that gas companies are making such a big profit and why don’t they share more of it with the people? So I think probably the time is right to have that discussion.
You can read more about the issue here:
Home-building costs rise, but not as much as feared
The Middle East conflict has fuelled a sharp acceleration in construction costs, but price growth remains relatively soft by historical standards. Construction costs increased 1% in the June quarter, according to data firm Cotality’s latest Cordell construction cost index, released on Wednesday.
While steeper than the 0.2% rise recorded in the March quarter, the annual growth rate of 2.8% remained below the 2.9% growth recorded in the March and June quarters of 2025, Cordell costings estimation manager John Bennett said.
After the initial outbreak of fighting between the US and Iran at the end of February halted most shipping traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, analysts predicted huge increases in construction costs due to higher material and fuel prices. Building materials were already 38.2% more expensive than in 2019 and the Middle East conflict could add further cost pressures, Master Builders Australia chief executive Denita Wawn said:
Higher oil prices are driving up the cost of fuel and key products such as PVC, plastics and cabling. We urge the government to support local manufacturing by reducing input costs while maintaining access to high-quality, compliant building products and materials.
– Australian Associated Press.
NSW Labor under threat from One Nation, Chris Minns says
The New South Wales premier, Chris Minns, says the state’s Labor party is under threat from One Nation and “we’ve got to fight for those votes”.
Appearing on ABC Radio National this morning, Minns was asked if One Nation was a “racist party”. He said people who had concerns about the levels of immigration weren’t necessarily racist but some of the things Pauline Hanson had said were.
Certainly some of the things Pauline Hanson says are definitely racist, when she said there’s no such thing as a good Muslim. I mean, how else do you characterise that? You’ve got to be straight with people. And that clearly is. But I don’t think everyone who’s supporting them currently is racist at all … And we’ve got to fight for those votes.
Asked how NSW Labor would fight for those votes, he said firstly, “pointing out that there are no easy answers in a difficult economic environment, particularly as a result of geopolitical fights around the world”.
I think that we are under threat in a whole bunch of seats as a result of the surge of votes for One Nation … So we’re doing some what we regard as practical commonsense changes to policy in New South Wales.
TAB fined $2.7m for telemarketing and spam breaches
Tabcorp Holdings Limited (TAB) has paid more than $2.7m in penalties after the Australian Communications and Media Authority (Acma) found multiple breaches of spam and telemarketing laws by the gambling giant.
Between February 2024 and June 2025, TAB made telemarketing calls to VIP customers that included 351 calls to numbers on the Do Not Call register without consent, 82 calls outside permitted hours, and nearly 4,000 calls without properly identifying itself as the caller, Acma found.
The action was taken after TAB self-reported in 2025 that it had sent more than 217,000 marketing emails and texts in just over a fortnight to unsubscribed customers. Authority member Samantha Yorke said the conduct was unacceptable:
When people join the Do Not Call Register or unsubscribe from marketing messages, they are making a clear choice. Those choices must be respected – especially given the heightened risks of financial loss and psychological harm from gambling marketing.
The scale and range of these breaches point to serious weaknesses in TAB’s compliance systems.
It’s Acma’s second spam enforcement action against TAB in less than two years.
Murray Watt says Pauline Hanson ‘not on the side of working people’
Murray Watt was also asked about Pauline Hanson’s whirlwind trip to Europe and the UK during the northern hemisphere summer, which included a fashion show with billionaire Gina Rinehart and some downtime by the pool in Sicily.
Asked if the One Nation leader should be transparent about who was funding the trip, Watt said:
I think Senator Hanson does owe it to Australians to come clean about who has funded this luxury trip with Gina Rinehart in Sicily in the last couple of weeks. You know, I think that I don’t know what the secret is here … It’s almost as if she’s got a guilty conscience about who has paid for this trip.
I think the broader point though, James, is that this goes to Pauline Hanson and One Nation’s priorities. Her priority has been undertaking a luxury trip overseas with a billionaire at the same time that she’s voting to cut the wages and cut cost-of-living relief for the battler she says she cares about. It’s a really clear demonstration that she’s not on the side of working people.
Murray Watt says government has taken ‘serious action’ on gambling in defence of response to Murphy report
Minister for the environment and water, Murray Watt, is appearing on ABC News Breakfast from Adelaide this morning ahead of the Labor party’s national conference. Asked if it would be like “WWE wrestling” (frightening imagery), Watt said there would be “a few little stage fights, but ultimately, it’s going to be an endorsement of the federal government’s policy agenda”.
He continued:
We know that many Australians still continue to do it tough, despite the work we’ve done around tax cuts and increased wages and cost of living relief. So I think what you’ll see at this conference is a really big focus on what more we can be doing as a party, and as a government, to deliver that real change.
Pointed to an area where there does seem to be disquiet among the party’s rank and file – gambling reform, where many don’t think the government’s changes have gone far enough – Watt said Labor had proposed the “most far reaching” reform on gambling of any government.
Asked if a national gambling regulator could be enacted, he said:
I don’t want to pre-empt the conference. There’ll be people who’ll say a range of things about these sorts of issues, but I do think it needs to be recognised that the government has taken some very serious action already.
Good morning
Good morning readers, Caitlin Cassidy here taking the reins from Martin Farrer to guide you through today’s news. I’ll be with you until mid-afternoon – it’s caitlin.cassidy@theguardian.com if you’d like to get in touch.
Christopher Pyne speculates that Barnaby Joyce could return to Nationals
Christopher Pyne, a minister in several Coalition governments, agreed with Bill Shorten that Pauline Hanson and One Nation were coming under more scrutiny because of their surge in popularity since the Bondi terror attack.
But he said “voters will have the final say”, and that “I don’t believe by election day [people] will be voting for One Nation in the numbers that are currently being seen in the polls”.
After Barnaby Joyce’s colourful appearance on the program on Monday night, there has been speculation about how he can accommodate himself with Hanson in the wake of her cosying up to the UK extremist Tommy Robinson and suggesting that the White Australia policy should not have been scrapped.
Pyne said:
Barnaby can do almost anything. Nothing would surprise me – if he went back to the National party, especially now that David Littleproud is not the leader – I don’t have any inside information, but nothing would surprise me if this continues with some of these less mainstream comments being made.
Shorten and Pyne cast doubt on One Nation’s staying power
Bill Shorten and Christopher Pyne have had their disagreements in the past, but they both agreed last night that voters will not turn out for One Nation at the next election at the levels suggested by recent polls.
Appearing on ABC’s 7.30, the Labor and Liberal veterans were asked about the impact of more scrutiny on the party, Pauline Hanson’s controversial trip to the UK, and possible tensions with Barnaby Joyce.
Shorten, a former Labor leader, said:
I don’t think [voters] are happy with the system, but I don’t think she should assume her 30% of people who say they want to support One Nation are the same as her 6% to 7% rusted-on hardline true believer vote of the past.
Some of the people who are looking to her now are sick of the system, and they’re hurting, but I think they would be perturbed by dusting off the bones of a White Australia policy.
Wong, Rubio criticise ‘dangerous’ China-Philippines skirmish in South China Sea
Penny Wong also criticised “destabilising and dangerous conduct” by China after a clash at a disputed shoal in the South China Sea, AFP reports.
The Philippines and China summoned each other’s ambassadors on Tuesday after the Philippine military accused the China Coast Guard of clubbing a Filipino sailor with a baton on Monday as they approached a grounded vessel that has long served as a Philippine garrison.
The Philippine president, Ferdinand Marcos, met with China’s ambassador to Manila on Tuesday after summoning the envoy over the incident at the flashpoint Second Thomas Shoal in the sea.
Multiple nations in the region, including the Philippines, have territorial claims that overlap with China’s, and altercations regularly occur in the heavily patrolled waterway.
Washington also condemned Beijing’s “dangerous and aggressive actions”.
The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, in an opinion piece published in Philippine media outlets on Tuesday, heralded Washington’s commitment “to freedom of navigation in Southeast Asia” while reaffirming the US defensive umbrella in the region.
“This freedom is by no means guaranteed. If these waters were to fall under the control of a power willing to use trade as a geopolitical weapon, both the United States and the ASEAN states would face serious new threats to their sovereignty, security, and economic future,” he wrote, in an apparent allusion to China.
Penny Wong and Wang Yi meet in Manila
The foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, met her Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, on the sidelines of the Asean foreign ministers’ meeting in Manila last night, a statement from her department said.
In their 12th meeting, the ministers discussed Asean priorities and the importance of peace and stability in the Indo-Pacific.
Wong raised Australia’s concerns about China’s test of a nuclear-capable submarine-launched missile earlier this month – and noted the strong concerns expressed by many Pacific island countries.
Wong also raised a range of consular issues including the case of Dr Yang Jun, respect for Australia’s laws, sovereignty and freedom of expression, the importance of safe and professional maritime conduct, and human rights.
Welcome
Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the top overnight stories before your morning blogger arrives with the main action.
We begin with geopolitics: Australia’s foreign affairs minister, Penny Wong, has sat across the table from her Chinese counterpart at the Asean meeting in Manila. They talked about peace in the Pacific, and Wong says she brought up China’s recent test of a nuclear-capable submarine-fired missile.
Wong also took aim at China over a recent clash with the Philippines in the South China Sea. More on that soon.
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