RUSH HOUR: The stories you need to know today
WITH all the news around shark attacks this week, you can understand why this couple wanted to take precautions. But this is ridiculous.
- BBC presenter drops C-bomb live on air
- Jimmy Barnes hits out at Reclaim Australia rallies
- ISIS are using chicken suicide bombers
- Satirical website The Onion accidently breaks news story
GOOD morning, and welcome to our headlines-in-a-hurry news coverage. We bring you the morning’s biggest stories so you can get across the news quickly.
10am:
That’s it for our live #RUSHHOUR news blog. You can get across the stories you need to know today below or go to news.com.au for the latest headlines.
9:45am:
ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr has urged the nation’s other leaders to move beyond ruling things in or out as they prepare to meet for a special retreat in Sydney.
Mr Barr is open to NSW Premier Mike Baird’s proposal to raise the GST rate to 15 per cent to plug future shortfalls in health funding, even though he prefers Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews’ idea of an increase to the Medicare levy.
“We need to move beyond instantly ruling in and ruling out,” he told Sky News ahead of the retreat today.
Daniel Andrews insists there is nothing that will change his mind on increasing the GST rate.
“This is not reform, it’s simply hiking the rate,” Mr Andrews told ABC Radio this morning.
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk reiterated her view that increasing the GST was not an option.
Instead she favours increasing the Medicare levy.
“If Tony Abbott wants to go and put that to the Australian public, that is his option,” she told reporters.
-AAP
9:30am:
You can’t blame them for wanting to protect themselves but a couple who tried to enter the water with DIY shark cages is a little beyond ridiculous.
Thankfully the lifeguard thought better of it and called them back in from the water, makeshift cages and all.
The truly bizarre sight took place on a North Carolina beach and video and was uploaded to YouTube by Jordan Cutrell.
Mr Curtell said the makeshift cages appeared to be made out of plastic and not out of something that would prevent a shark attack, reports Fox8.
9:15am:
Singer Jimmy Barnes is appalled his songs have been used as anthems by anti-Islam protesters at weekend rallies across the country.
The singer has taken to his Facebook page to denounce the Reclaim Australia rallies and distanced himself from those who participated.
“It has come to my attention that certain groups of people have been using my voice, my songs as their anthems at rallies.
I only want to say the Australia I belong to and love is a tolerant Australia. A place that is open and giving. It is a place that embraces all sorts of different people, in fact it is made stronger by the diversity of its people,” he wrote.
“The Australia I belong to and love is a tolerant Australia,” he said in the Facebook message, adding that it was important to stand up for love and tolerance in modern times.
None of the Reclaim Australia protesters represented his views and he did not support their cause, he said.
-With AAP
9am:
Former FIFA Vice President Jeffrey Webb has had to cough up a whole lot of luxury goods in order to secure his release from jail on bond, using diamonds, cars, properties and his wife’s wedding ring to pay his bail.
The indicted football official is providing 11 luxury watches to secure the $10 million bond that provided his release from custody along with his wife’s wedding ring, three opulent cars and 10 properties.
According to an order filed Monday setting the conditions for release, Webb secured the bond with a five Rolex watches plus a Cartier Roadster, Hublot, Breitling, Panerai, Royal Oak Offshore and Luminor Marina.
The government noted that the Hublot has not yet been turned over to the FBI and must be provided by Aug. 2
Webb’s bond also is secured by a 2015 Ferrari and 2014 Range Rover in the name of his wife, Dr. Kendra Gamble-Webb, a 2003 Mercedes-Benz in his name and a 401k account in his wife’s name.
His wife’s diamond wedding ring also is security along with a diamond bracelet, diamond and pearl necklace, one pair of pearl earrings, one pair of long-hanging diamond earrings, and Rolex and Hublot watches. Her partnership equity interest in a company whose name was redacted was also used.
-AP
8:45am:
Numerous media reports have revealed that the Islamic State are using chicken suicide bombers to carry out their attacks.
Strapped with explosive devices, the chickens are let loose in enemy territories where IS militants try and keep an eye on them.
Once the animals have wandered off into enemy camps and are within striking distance, IS members apparently use remote controls to set off the explosives in an effort to kill anybody near by, reports The Express.
Disturbing images of the chickens have appeared online which appear to show the birds with their own version of suicide jackets.
8:35am:
Pro surfer Mick Fanning may have almost lost his life or a limb at J-Bay, but he certainly didn’t lose his sense of bravery.
The three time World Champion has said he will return to the beach where the harrowing incident occurred.
“How many people have gone and surfed J-Bay and nothing has happened. It was unlucky but lucky in the same sentence,” he said.
8:20am:
If you missed it, and you probably did, a new batch of snails have slugged it out in the World Racing Championship in England.
The bizarre event is an established part of life in the village of Congham in Norfolk where it has been taking place for over 40 years.
A hundred and seventy-five snails were entered for this year’s championships until the eventual winner was crowned.
The rules are simple as the snails are dropped in the middle of a circle and have to slink their way to the periphery.
“Once the snail has started there is absolutely nothing you can do apart from shout for it but preparation I feel is quite important, you know train it but don’t over train it, feed it properly, diet is always important with any athletic process. Just really enjoy it and it is such an enjoyment,” event organiser Neil Riseborough told The International Business Times.
The overall winner was George, who crossed the line in an impressive 2 minutes and 40 seconds, just 20 seconds shy of the World record set 20 years ago.
8:10am:
Breakthrough genetic research by Queensland scientists will soon allow parents to determine a newborn’s chances of becoming an obese teen.
The findings will go towards enabling early intervention, such as psychological help, for people who are genetically predisposed to binge eating, according to the researchers from the University of Queensland’s Diamantina Institute.
The Institute’s Professor David Evans and a team from the University College London’s Institute of Child Health crunched data from 6000 teenagers aged 14-16 in the course of their research.
They found that the FTO gene, which has already been linked to obesity, also contributes to binge eating.
Teens that had a particular variation in the FTO gene were up to 30 per cent more likely to binge-eat.
“In theory if you knew all the genes underlying binge eating you could use that as a strategy to determine which individuals are going to be susceptible to it,” Prof Evans said.
He said his team’s discovery showed this gene was influencing obesity by “operating though appetite”.
Read more at The Courier Mail.
8am:
Another shortsighted criminal has be brought down by his own hubris and vanity.
UK drug dealer, Richard Edmunds, thought it would be a good idea to take a selfie while posing in front of his considerable marijuana growing setup.
However when the photo was shared via text message between a few friends, the police soon discovered the incriminating evidence and were quick to show up at his house.
When they entered the house they discovered two bedrooms converted into rather sophisticated grow rooms.
Mr Edmunds was jailed for 20 months, suspended for two years and ordered to do 200 hours unpaid community work, reports The Metro.
7:45am:
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten will lay out a bold agenda to slash coal consumption and adopt a 50 per cent renewable energy target by 2030 when he speaks at Labor’s national conference this weekend.
The move would also pave the way for a milder carbon emissions trading scheme to combat climate change.
“We will take steps to reduce (carbon) pollution and will not be intimidated by ridiculous scare campaigns,” Mr Shorten told Fairfax Media.
Mr Shorten has ruled out reintroducing a fixed price carbon tax, which contributed to Labor copping a walloping at the 2013 federal election.
Labor environment spokesman Mark Butler said Australia has to do its fair share to keep global warming below two degrees.
“We have some of the world’s best resources: solar, wind, geothermal, wave ... some of the best scientists and innovative businesses,” he told ABC Radio this morning.
The comments offer a stark contrast to the actions of Tony Abbott who has been accused of “dragging Australia back” by ramping up his attacks on the renewable energy sector.
-With AP
7:25am:
The infamous satirical website known as The Onion has managed to outdo the very news outlets it is spoofing.
The tongue-in-cheek website accidentally broke a story about the US offering “a nice, big shipment” of missiles to Israel to appease it over the nuclear deal with Iran.
"When The Onion is the most reliable news source about your country, you know you’re a mess" http://t.co/kAtHX09pC5 pic.twitter.com/QJCBEvaVV4
— Haaretz.com (@haaretzcom) July 21, 2015The spoof article titled “US Soothes Upset Netanyahu With Shipment Of Ballistic Missiles” appeared 24 hours before real news reports the exact thing occurring in real life, reports The Independent.
Israeli newspaper Haaretz graciously admitted in a blog post that: “There’s no other way around it: the fake newspaper broke the story.”
The only difference from the satirical article to the real life version was the response from Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu who eventually rejected the offer from Obama.
7:15am:
A Sydney home burned for hours before collapsing to the ground in the city’s southwest overnight.
Three adjacent homes were evacuated as the property became engulfed in flames on Cabramatta’s High Street.
The fire burned for several hours but has been brought under control.
Despite the dramatic vision, all occupants were accounted for and no one was injured.
7:05am:
A 48-year-old New Zealander has taken out the French Scrabble prize despite not speaking word of French. Bushy-bearded, bespectacled Nigel Richards is already a celebrity in the English version of Scrabble, winning its world championship in 2007 and again in 2011.
But this is the first time in history that a player who cannot speak the language has won the francophone world championship, which was contested by 74 players in Belgium on Monday.
Federation spokesman Antoine Rousseau said Richards had just nine weeks to prepare for the competition.
He did so by memorising all of the possible words in the official Scrabble dictionary, from two to 10 letters.
In a three-hour final match, Richards won against Gabonese player Schelick Ilagou Rekawe with a word played on two ‘triple-word score’ boxes — the most coveted in the game.
After his win on Monday, Richards received a warm round of applause ... but then needed a translator to thank the audience.
-AFP
6:50am:
If there’s one word you don’t want to say on live television this is probably it.
While reading out an email from a viewer during a segment on cancer diagnosis, a BBC presenter accidentally said the word “c*nts” instead of “clients” as he stumbled through the sentence. Both the anchors carried on without missing a beat, however people were quick to flock to social media to discuss the tongue slip and a video of the segment quickly found its way to YouTube.
BBC Breakfast’s Bill Turnbull is a veteran of the news reporting game and he isn’t even the first BBC presenter to commit the embarrassing gaffe.
In 2010, BBC Radio 4’s James Naughtie famously referred to then culture secretary Jeremy Hunt as something much worse.
6:40am:
At least two crossbench senators would vote against a hike in the GST proposed by NSW Premier Mike Baird. Family First’s Bob Day and Liberal Democrat David Leyonhjelm have declared their strong opposition to increasing the GST from 10 to 15 per cent.
They believe any proposal to lift the tax should be put to a public vote.
“We know what they’ll say. `We don’t want to pay more tax’,” the pair said in a joint statement.
“We pay enough. The states, territories and feds should stop wasting our money.” It comes as state and territory leaders prepare to meet with Prime Minister Tony Abbott at a leaders retreat in Sydney today, where the GST is expected to be top of the agenda. Mr Baird wants an increase to cover a projected shortfall in future health funding.
The senators believe they have a friend on the issue in Palmer United Party senator Zhenya (Dio) Wang, who they hope will also vote against an increase.
-AAP
6:30am:
The owner of an American diner who yelled at a screaming child is being praised on social media for taking a stance against parents who ignore their children when dining out.
Darla Neugebauer, owner of Marcy’s Diner in Portland, said she was frustrated after two customers ordered their two-year-old daughter pancakes but didn’t feed them to the girl, causing her to cry loudly.
“I was working on the grill. I had my back to the child. I listen to the child scream for probably close to 40 minutes,” Darla Neugebauer told WCSH-TV.
“I slammed my hands on the counter and said, ‘This needs to stop,’” said Ms Neugebauer.
The child’s mother Tara Carson later posted a complaint on the Marcy’s Diner Facebook page, saying that she had the “worst experience”.
“The owner is an absolute lunatic and screamed in the face of my almost two-year-old child because she was crying ... You have a problem with a child crying then you are not suitable to run a business,” she wrote.
However many on social media came to her defence and admonished the parents for being lazy and inconsiderate.
“Allowing your child to carry on and disrupt a restaurant without any consideration of others, is classless!!!!! I also doubt their child is traumatised. Kid is probably in shock from hearing another adult act like an adult in charge.”
Another wrote, “Kudos to the owner for not apologising for telling the kid to shut up. For that reason we will be patronising Marcy’s Diner this Sunday. I’ll be ordering the Screaming Kid Special!”
6:15am:
A naked bandit was arrested after allegedly breaking into a Sydney home overnight.
Police were called to the house on Ventana Court in Luddenham just before 7pm after they received reports a man had a gun inside the house following a home invasion.
When police arrived on the scene the man reportedly bolted but was apprehended by officers.
Fearing another person was inside, heavily-armed officers from the Tactical Operations Unit surrounded the house and conducted a heavy-handed raid.
However there was no one inside the house and the property was declared safe.
The naked man is currently in hospital under police guard and an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the incident is underway.
Tactical police storm home in Sydney's west after surrounding it for hours. Earlier, naked man fled and was arrested. pic.twitter.com/Y476bQStrI
— Chris Urquhart (@chrisurquhart) July 21, 20156am:
They say you’ve got about as much chance of winning the lottery as you do of getting stuck by lightning. Well this guy has now experienced both.
Statistically speaking, Peter McCathie went from being one of the unluckiest people in Canada to one of the luckiest this week when he and a co-worker collected their million dollar prize.
The odds of getting struck by lightning in Canada are less than one in a million, while the chances of winning this particular lotto are less than one in 13 million, reports CTV Atlantic News.
Mr McCathie was struck by lightning as a teenager while wading through some shallow water and was lucky to survive.
“I was trying to lock the boat up, it was a very sunny day, there was one big, white cloud in the sky and the lightning bolt came through the trees and hit me,” McCathie told CTV Atlantic.
Unbelievably, his daughter, was also struck by lightning a few years ago while working as a wilderness guide.
According to a mathematics professor at the University of Moncton the odds of this story happening is in the trillions.
“By assuming that these events happened independently … so probability of lotto … times another probability of lightning — since there are two people that got hit by lightning — we get approximately 1 in 2.6 trillion,” said Sophie Leger.
As for his lottery winnings, Mr McCathie couldn’t be happier. “I honestly expected to get hit by lightning again first,” he said.
Inside feud that brought Sydney to a halt
Five months of transport disruptions and chaotic commutes were brought to an abrupt halt this week after a fiery fight between the unions and the government.
Driver charged over meat cleaver incident
A man has been charged after reports a driver allegedly wielded a meat cleaver at other drivers on the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Commuters warned of further travel chaos
Commuters are being urged to brace for another day of cancellations and delays as the rail union and the NSW government take their fight to court.