Australia news LIVE: Revolt brewing over Reserve Bank reform; Albanese says working from home can be ‘win-win’

We’re winding up this blog for the evening, but we have some good news if you missed out on a ticket to Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour; we will be live blogging every moment from the megastar’s first Sydney show. Follow it here.

Otherwise, here’s a quick recap of the day’s top stories:

• A new student safety watchdog will be stood up to oversee how universities handle sexual assaults and complaints following a scathing report lambasting the sector for a lack of oversight.
• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will attend a private performance by Katy Perry at the Melbourne mansion of billionaire Anthony Pratt with a crowd of 200 of the country’s most prominent corporate leaders and political figures.
• At a Senate hearing Beverley McGarvey, the local executive of Paramount, which owns Network 10, said it took her “45 minutes to find the 10Play app” on a new LG television, saying Australians should not have to search to find free services.
• In Victoria, bushfires in the state’s west have razed a number of homes. Meanwhile, police sadly revealed that they have doubts missing Ballarat East mum Samantha Murphy is still alive.
• In NSW, a police officer has been charged with the murder of Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies after earlier handing himself into a police station.
• The US achieved a historic lunar milestone with the touchdown of the Odysseus spacecraft, which marks the first lunar landing achieved by a private company.

Thanks for joining our live coverage, we’ll be back Monday morning. Until then, have a good weekend.

The Australian sharemarket pared back some of its early morning gains but remained in the green at midday after Nvidia’s record $422 billion day triggered a rally on Wall Street and the local index.

The S&P/ASX 200 rose 46.6 points, or 0.6 per cent, to 7657.8 about 12.45pm, with information technology stocks rising 1.8 per cent, amid global enthusiasm for artificial intelligence products.

NEXTDC shares hit an intraday record high of $15.34 just before 10.30am before trimming to $15.16 at midday.

WiseTech was up 1.2 per cent and Xero soared 3.5 per cent.

By midday, utilities was the only sector trading in the red, dragged down by Origin (down 0.8 per cent), AGL (down 0.7 per cent) and APA Group (down 1.2 per cent). Meridian Energy, however, rose 2.4 per cent.

Read our market wrap here.

Almost 80,000 fans are expected to flock to each night of Taylor Swift’s sell-out Sydney shows, but in Melbourne, Katy Perry will be performing at a more intimate gathering.

This masthead can reveal that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese will attend a private performance by Perry at the Melbourne mansion of billionaire Anthony Pratt with a crowd of 200 of the country’s most prominent corporate leaders and political figures.

Anthony Albanese will attend a very exclusive performance by Katy Perry at packaging magnate Anthony Pratt’s mansion on Saturday evening.Credit: Getty, Alex Ellinghausen

Sources familiar with the planning of the event, who were not authorised to speak publicly, said Albanese had RSVP’d to the event and will likely use his weekend in Melbourne to campaign in the seat of Dunkley before the March 2 byelection in the bayside electorate.

Read the full story here. 

A new student safety watchdog will be stood up to oversee how universities handle sexual assaults and complaints following a scathing report lambasting the sector for a lack of oversight.

Education ministers ticked off on an action plan to tackle gender-based violence at universities when they met in Melbourne on Friday.

Federal Education Minister Jason Clare said not enough has been done to tackle sexual violence in universities.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

The independent ombudsman will allow higher education students to escalate complaints about the actions of their provider, including complaints about sexual harassment, assault and violence.

It will be able to consider whether decisions and actions taken by universities are unreasonable, unjust, oppressive or discriminatory and respond to complaints if there are delays.

The ombudsman will be able to recommend the university take specific steps to resolve the complaint or share information with relevant regulators.

Additionally, it will offer a restorative engagement process, whereby a person who has disclosed a sexual assault meets senior leaders of the institution to tell their story, including details about the abuse and the impact it’s had.

Legislation will be prepared to put the reform in place.

AAP

Support is available from the National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732).

To Perth now where wrestling fever has reached such a bizarre crescendo that Western Australian Premier Roger Cook has uploaded a letter addressed to Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson to his social media accounts pleading with him to appear at the WWE Elimination Chamber event on Saturday.

The state has paid an undisclosed amount to bring the WWE to Optus Stadium this weekend, and in the lead-up, fans were hopeful The Rock would make a surprise appearance.

In a video posted to the WWE’s official X account, The Rock said he would fly to Perth if fellow wrestlers Cody Rhodes and Seth Rollins “trash talked” him while there.

In his tweet, Cook said he felt compelled to inform The Rock there had been “a lot of out-of-towners talking trash in the lead up to the Elimination Chamber”.

“I am sorry to have to inform The Rock, I feel much of this trash talk has been directed at The Rock himself,” he said.

WA Premier Roger Cook has made a plea for Dwayne Johnson to visit the state this weekend. Credit: AP

“On behalf of the people of Western Australia, I thought I’d let The Rock know.

“The State of Western Australia stands ready to assist The Rock in making ‘magic’ happen and provide logistical support so you can respond to this outrageous trash talk.

“Western Australians would love to smell what The Rock is cooking.”

But hopes of a surprise appearance were dashed by wrestling legend Triple H on Triple M who said The Rock would not appear in Perth.

“I’m not gonna spin that because I don’t want people expecting that and not see that. The show will be spectacular, I believe when it’s done, nobody will miss The Rock,” he said.

A police officer has been charged with the murder of couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies.

Baird’s former partner Beau Lamarre walked into Bondi police station about 10.30am on Friday and was taken into custody.

Luke Davies (left) and Jesse Baird.

He has since been charged with two counts of murder, homicide squad detective superintendent Daniel Doherty said.

Follow the latest here. 

Thank you for tuning into our live coverage.

If you’re just joining us, here’s what you need to know:

• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says some supermarkets have “excessive market power” but has no plans to break up the major chains.
• Nationals spokesman for veterans’ affairs Barnaby Joyce says everything is professional in his relationship with Nationals leader David Littleproud.
• Australia’s top media executives are appearing in Canberra speaking about laws that would legislate viewers’ ability to easily find free-to-air apps on smart televisions.
• NSW’s top prosecutor has given no update to the William Tyrrell inquest as it considers a brief of evidence from police suggesting the toddler’s foster mother could be charged with concealing his accidental death.
• The US achieved a historic lunar milestone with the touchdown of the Odysseus spacecraft, which marks the first lunar landing achieved by a private company.

My colleague Shelby Garlick will keep the blog updated for the rest of the afternoon.

A handful of Victorian and NSW private schools together outspent 3300 of the nation’s public schools on new facilities in just one year, analysis of the latest financial data shows.

State education ministers are calling for the Commonwealth to close the gap in capital infrastructure spending, with a one-off $215 million public school upgrade program set to expire, and new analysis by the Australian teachers’ union revealing twice as much money is being spent on private infrastructure per student as public.

State education ministers are calling for the Commonwealth to close the gap in capital infrastructure spending.Credit: Erin Jonasson

In a report to be released on today, Australian Education Union researchers analysed school spending on capital works via Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority data, taking in both government funding and money spent by non-government schools from other large revenue sources such as parent fees, investments and donations.

Learn more about the schools here. 

Turning to Victoria, at least one home has been lost as bushfires rage in the state’s west.

Emergency Commissioner Rick Nugent confirmed at least one home was destroyed, but thataerial support saved up to 50 properties overnight.

“Firefighters have been working around the clock for the last 24 hours to suppress this fire and minimise the impacts on the community,” he said.

Emergency Management Victoria Commissioner Rick Nugent.Credit: Paul Jeffers

There are currently 59 aircraft in Victoria, three aircraft from New South Wales, including two large air tankers and a large helicopter, supporting the firefighting efforts, the commissioner told reporters.

For the latest details on the fires, tune into the live blog here.

The bureaucrat hand-picked by the Albanese government to run its new high-speed rail authority was found to have engaged in “serious misconduct” as part of an investigation ordered by the NSW transport department into allegations of “conflicts of interest and … corrupt conduct”.

But those findings, part of a long-running series of internal probes into alleged misconduct by employees and contractors within the agency responsible for delivering NSW’s multibillion-dollar Metro rail projects, were later rejected by the same department as being “unsupported by tangible evidence”.

Former Sydney Metro senior executive Tim Parker has rejected the allegations.Credit: AFR

Details of the explosive allegations, some of which were later referred to the NSW anti-corruption watchdog, are contained in documents obtained by this masthead.

Find out more here.