Regulator summons fuel giants over price hikes
Jonathan Barrett
The consumer watchdog is calling major fuel suppliers and retailers to an emergency meeting today to demand explanations for the recent surge in petrol prices.
Fuel prices have surged in recent weeks and some regional retailers have even run dry, with customers panic-buying petrol over concerns the Middle East conflict will lead to shortages.
Representatives of major fuel suppliers and retailers, including Chevron, BP and Ampol, have been called in to the meeting run by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, said:
Today the regulator will get a chance to make the retailers and suppliers justify their prices. I’ve made it very clear that if they find evidence of misconduct, we expect the ACCC to throw the book at them.
Petrol prices have started to push past 230c per litre in most state capitals.
Global oil prices have surged by about 40% in March in response to the Middle East conflict and closure of the crucial strait of Hormuz, prompting fears of a breakout in global inflation.
Determining the direct impact of global oil prices on pump prices has historically proven difficult due to the supply chain’s complexity.
Donald Trump has called on regional partners to assist in securing the strait, which is largely controlled by Iran.
Graham Readfearn
Far north Queensland on cyclone watch
Communities in Far north Queensland have been asked to be on alert with the latest Bureau of Meteorology forecast suggesting a tropical low in the Coral Sea could become a cyclone as early as tomorrow evening.
The timing of a likely declaration has shifted with tropical low 34U now being given a high chance of becoming a cyclone – which will be called Narelle if it eventuates – earlier than was forecast yesterday.
Current weather models suggest a landfall somewhere north of Cooktown late on Thursday or on Friday morning when the system is expected to track west over the Gulf of Carpentaria.
Angus Taylor says we need to ‘drill more, 100%’
The opposition leader, Angus Taylor, is speaking in New South Wales about the ongoing fuel issues linked to the war in the Middle East. He said he thinks we need to “drill more, 100%”.
Taylor said:
We’ve got great resources. Bass Strait is an old source of oil and gas, but an important one, and we need to get the most out of it, and we’ve got new emerging sources in the north in the Beetaloo basin.
So we need to see that drilling happen at pace. This is a government that’s made it very hard for resources companies to get the approvals they need … to get resources, oil and gas, out of the ground.
Daisy Dumas
NSW becomes first state to launch digital birth certificates
People aged 16-21 in New South Wales are the first Australians to be able to set up digital birth certificates.
The state government said the digital documents, launched today, were designed to international security standards and could be set up via the Service NSW app.
Sixteen to 21-year-olds born in NSW and who hold a NSW photo card or driver licence are eligible to apply.
The government said digital birth certificates can be used to verify identity and apply for licences and certifications needed to start a job – and that, over time, the move will give people greater control over what information they share.
Jihad Dib, the minister for customer services and digital government, said:
I’m proud that NSW is the first place in Australia where young people across the state can carry their birth certificate securely on their phone – instead of having to rummage through drawers or call mum and dad!
He said the technology was “the same as having a birth certificate in your pocket – but much more secure”.
Households struggle with confidence as cash rate rise looms
Patrick Commins
A parade of bad news overseas, soaring petrol prices and expectations of higher interest rates have left households the gloomiest they have been since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic in early 2020.
ANZ’s weekly consumer sentiment survey revealed a severe confidence hit to Australians still struggling to cope with the high prices left by the pandemic inflation outbreak.
Sophia Angala, an ANZ economist, said “households are increasingly pessimistic about the one-year and five-year outlooks for the economy, likely driven by geopolitical uncertainty and the shifting outlook for inflation and rates”.
The Reserve Bank is expected to lift its cash rate target to 4.1% at 2.30pm today, in a double blow to households facing a 30-40% jump in fuel prices since the start of the US-Israel war on Iran.
“With inflation above target and the labour market viewed as tight by the RBA, there is likely to be less tolerance than usual to an external inflation shock, in this case from higher oil prices,” Angala said.
More on police operation at Lidcombe
We have more details from Lidcombe, where a major police operation ended a short time ago.
Police say an investigation is now under way after a woman was threatened by a man armed with a gun at a multi-level car park on Uhrig Road at about 7.20am.
The man, who was not known to the woman, left the scene in a white Subaru SUV with cloned number plates, police said. The woman was shaken but not physically injured.
A perimeter was established and specialist officers were called to assist. An extensive search of the area was conducted, police said. No shots were fired, they said.
Police are appealing for any information or dashcam vision related to incident.
Caitlin Cassidy
Confidentiality clauses ‘silence’ students’ complaints, ombudsman says
Students may be choosing not to seek support from their universities over sexual harassment and assault complaints because of confidentiality clauses preventing them from speaking with anyone about their experience, a new report has found.
The National Student Ombudsman’s first report, published on Tuesday, found 21 universities used confidentiality clauses in their complaints – applying to around 770,000 students. The clause often automatically apply to students when they lodge a complaint, preventing them from speaking with anyone outside of the university about their experience or the complaint’s outcome.
In some instances, student wellbeing and recovery were put at risk, including a university beginning misconduct proceedings against a student when it alleged they breached confidentiality after reporting sexual harassment to their university.
The ombudsman, Iain Anderson, said students “should have the right to talk to others for support and seek external advice after they have made a complaint to their higher education provider”.
Excessive confidentiality can cause a complainant to feel silenced or disempowered … I am concerned that students … could be left unable to discuss the situation with a support person, seek legal advice, contact a health professional for support, or take ownership of how they talk about a traumatic experience including gender-based violence.
The ombudsman was established last year to tackle gender-based violence on university campuses.
No arrests after police operation in Sydney’s west
A police operation in Lidcombe has ended with no arrests, no injuries and no shots fired, police say.
As we reported a short time ago, police were called to a unit block in Lidcombe at about 7.20am after numerous reports to triple zero of a man acting suspiciously following an argument between a woman and a man at the address.
A perimeter was established, and the public was urged to avoid the area.
Victorian farmers urge commuters to swap cars for public transport
The Victorian Farmers Federation (VFF) has asked commuters to leave their cars at home and use public transport to relieve pressures on fuel supplies.
VFF president Brett Hosking said that for most Victorians, a fuel shortage means “cancelled plans, longer queues and a tighter weekly budget”, but that for farmers, “timing is everything”:
Farming runs on narrow weather windows, and if the tank is empty at the wrong moment you can’t just wait for prices to settle, you lose the opportunity, and sometimes the entire crop.
Keeping farmers moving is in everyone’s interest. Victorian farmers grow almost a quarter of Australia’s food and feed millions more across the globe.
Should just one in five Victorian car commuters adopt public transport, it would save enough fuel to plant roughly half of Australia’s wheat, barley, canola and lentil crop, he said. He continued:
A little would go a long way. Even taking one or two trips a week on the train, tram or bus instead of driving can leave more fuel in the system for the jobs that keep supermarket shelves stocked.
The VFF is calling on the state government to temporarily make public transport free across Victoria and to run services more often.
Caitlin Cassidy
Peak bodies urge federal government to rebuild Australia’s research sector after strategic review paints a dire picture
Australia’s leading scientists say “urgent attention” is needed to reform the nation’s Research and Development (R&D) system after a strategic review, commissioned by the federal government and released on Tuesday, found the system was underfunded, underperforming and under-coordinated.
Among its 20 recommendations were lifting the PhD stipend to $50,000 in priority areas, which currently languishes at $34,315 (below the Henderson Poverty line of $690.50 per week) and better supporting and funding the CSIRO.
Australian Academy of Science president Professor Chennupati Jagadish AC said the government should have been prioritising R&D decades ago:
Senator the Hon Tim Ayres, Minister for Science, has recognised that business must play a greater role if Australia is to lift overall investment in R&D. They must. However, the Australian Government must also reverse its own underinvestment. Putting research at the centre of the Government’s productivity agenda is essential for our future prosperity. Rebuilding Australia’s research system will take multiple budgets – but it must start with this one.
The chief executive of Universities Australia, Luke Sheehy, said for “too long Australia has been falling behind in the global race for research and innovation, while our economy remains heavily reliant on digging things out of the ground instead of building new industries”. He continued:
It’s now up to the government to make the most of this opportunity and respond with ambition.
Major police response in Sydney’s west after reports of man acting suspiciously
Heavily armed police have swarmed a unit block just a day after a man was killed in a gangland-style shooting nearby, AAP reports.
Police were called to a unit block in Lidcombe about 7.20am after numerous reports to triple zero of a man acting suspiciously.
Heavily armed police, some carrying semi-automatic weapons and wearing camouflage, set up a perimeter around the block of units, located near Stadium Australia.
The public is urged to avoid the area. Police said there had been no reports of injuries.
Tuesday’s dramatic police presence follows a fatal shooting inside a Lidcombe unit on Monday. There is no reported link between the two events.
NSW police have been approached for comment.
Brisbane Roar football club welcome two Iranian women’s team players
The Brisbane Roar welcomed two Iranian women’s team players this morning, saying the pair had been invited to the club’s training facilities to train with its squad.
The club wrote on X:
Welcome, Fatemeh and Atefeh 🦁
Today, Brisbane Roar officially welcomed both Fatemeh Pasandideh and Atefeh Ramezanisadeh to the club’s training facilities to take part in training with our A-League Women squad and remain committed to providing a supportive environment for them whilst they navigate the next stages.
Welcome, Fatemeh and Atefeh 🦁
Today, Brisbane Roar officially welcomed both Fatemeh Pasandideh and Atefeh Ramezanisadeh to the club’s training facilities to take part in training with our A-League Women squad and remain committed to providing a supportive environment for them… pic.twitter.com/p0BNohIT21
— Brisbane Roar FC (@brisbaneroar) March 16, 2026
Bluesfest collapse leaves punters, suppliers reeling
Ticketholders are not the only ones dudded by the sudden collapse of music festival Bluesfest, with one small business left $90,000 out of pocket, AAP reports.
Uniform Print Lab was supplying merchandise for the Byron Bay festival and spent six weeks printing about 15,000 items including T-shirts, stubby holders, hats and lanyards. The family business in the NSW town of Tweed Heads was organising to deliver it all on Friday when they heard the festival had entered liquidation.
Bluesfest is one of a string of Australian music festivals to hit the wall in recent years, along with Splendour in the Grass and Groovin the Moo.
Promoter Peter Noble had advertised 2025 as the final year of Bluesfest, but when it attracted more than 100,000 patrons across four days, he decided to return in April 2026.
The festival’s collapse has left an estimated $23m in ticket sales in limbo, with appointed liquidators warning ticketholders are unlikely to be refunded.
Regulator summons fuel giants over price hikes
Jonathan Barrett
The consumer watchdog is calling major fuel suppliers and retailers to an emergency meeting today to demand explanations for the recent surge in petrol prices.
Fuel prices have surged in recent weeks and some regional retailers have even run dry, with customers panic-buying petrol over concerns the Middle East conflict will lead to shortages.
Representatives of major fuel suppliers and retailers, including Chevron, BP and Ampol, have been called in to the meeting run by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. The treasurer, Jim Chalmers, said:
Today the regulator will get a chance to make the retailers and suppliers justify their prices. I’ve made it very clear that if they find evidence of misconduct, we expect the ACCC to throw the book at them.
Petrol prices have started to push past 230c per litre in most state capitals.
Global oil prices have surged by about 40% in March in response to the Middle East conflict and closure of the crucial strait of Hormuz, prompting fears of a breakout in global inflation.
Determining the direct impact of global oil prices on pump prices has historically proven difficult due to the supply chain’s complexity.
Donald Trump has called on regional partners to assist in securing the strait, which is largely controlled by Iran.
Scientists have welcomed a ‘pivotal’ review of Australia’s research sector
Donna Lu
The final report of the federal government’s Strategic Examination of Research and Development (SERD) in industry was released last night. It recommends a simplified system focusing on six priority areas: health and medical, agriculture and food, defence, environment and energy, resources, and technology.
The review, chaired by Robyn Denholm, pushes for a “move away from an underperforming system that is the result of often trifling, incremental improvements, risk aversion and Band-Aid solutions”, and recommends more investment in competitive grant schemes to better fund science research.
The minister for science, Tim Ayres, said:
Meeting Australia’s big collective challenges – food and agriculture, energy security, new industrial and tech processes, water security and dealing with the human, animal and plant diseases of the future, to name just a few – requires a modern and fit for purpose research and development system. This report charts out a long-term reform roadmap for me, and for the government to consider over coming months.
Jas Chambers, the president of Science and Technology Australia, said:
This is the first pivotal step in tackling the longstanding challenges facing Australia’s research, development and innovation system that will lead to lasting and intergenerational opportunity.
Our sector is hurting. An STA survey last year found nearly half of Stem professionals are thinking about leaving their role. Action is needed to improve job security and pay, which are the main reasons behind low morale.
SA opposition leader says Liberals will preference One Nation in her home seat
Ashton Hurn, the South Australia opposition leader, said the Liberals will preference One Nation over the Labor party in her seat of Schubert in the state’s upcoming election.
Hurn spoke to RN Breakfast this morning, saying there were a “number of different scenarios” the Liberals had planned across dozens of seats, but the priority was “getting rid of the ALP”.
She said:
We’re in the business of getting rid of the ALP. The ALP are a bad government here in South Australia. They have proven time and time again that they’re more interested in PR and politics than they are on delivering practical outcomes for South Australians.
But this is not a vote of confidence in One Nation. In fact, far from it. But you’ve got to put people somewhere on the ballot. That’s the decision that we’ve made. And this is a vote of no confidence in the government. And that’s who I’m focused on defeating at the election on Saturday.
Hurn said she wasn’t concerned about One Nation becoming the opposition party in SA.
Read more about the swing to One Nation here:
Sarah Basford Canales
Details of revamped disability community program released
The federal government has announced its revamped disability community program will deliver $90m to 62 disability support and advocacy organisations in its first year.
The NDIS minister, Jenny McAllister, will announce today $50m will be given to 38 organisations to support people with disabilities, their carers and families with workshops, mentoring programs and referral services.
Another $40m will be shared between 24 groups aimed at offering information and advice to help the disability community access relevant supports and services.
It comes as the NDIS undergoes a number of changes while the start date for the Thriving Kids program has been delayed to October.
McAllister said:
We want to make sure that people with disability and their families are empowered by a broad network of supports and services on the ground in their communities.
It’s essential for the ILC Program to reflect the genuine needs of the disability community to provide quality, targeted supports to those who need them most.
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