Australia news as it happened: One Nation scores extra Senate seat; Magda Szubanski reveals cancer diagnosis; McCormack keeps Nationals leadership door open

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Here’s a quick recap of today’s top stories:

• Comedian Magda Szubanski revealed she has stage four cancer, diagnosed with rare mantle cell lymphoma.
• In the tight race for Bradfield, Liberal candidate Giselle Kapterian leads teal independent Nicolette Boele by just one vote. The AEC expects to finalise the count next week.
• Uncle Ned Jampijinpa Hargraves is demanding answers about his grandson’s death in custody and the treatment of First Nations people.
• Opposition Leader Sussan Ley dodged questions about Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price’s merit-based appointment claims and defended her shadow cabinet, despite criticism over the lack of women.
• Elon Musk is stepping down from his role as a top adviser to President Donald Trump.

Tesla chief executive Elon Musk at the White House last week for a meeting between Donald Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa.Credit: Bloomberg

• The Australian is reporting Israeli President Isaac Herzog has invited Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to visit Israel, following his condemnation of Israel’s Gaza blockade.
• Former Nationals leader Michael McCormack has not ruled out a comeback for the leadership.
• Ley denied claims that Liberal Senator Jane Hume was demoted for supporting work-from-home policies.
• Independent MP Allegra Spender is calling for urgent reforms to Australia’s environmental laws after the controversial North West Shelf gas project approval.
• The PM hit back at a think tank’s report criticising defence spending, warning it could leave the ADF underprepared.
• A US court blocked President Trump’s tariffs, ruling he exceeded his authority with blanket duties on imports.
• Families of those killed in the Westfield Bondi Junction attack shared emotional tributes at the end of the five-week inquest.

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Australian investors are holding out for Donald Trump’s next move after a US trade court blocked his “Liberation Day” tariffs from going into effect on Thursday, ruling that the president had overstepped his authority.

The Court of International Trade’s three-judge panel ruled on several lawsuits arguing Trump exceeded his authority, casting doubt on trade policies that have jolted global financial markets, frustrated trade partners and raised uncertainty over the outlook for inflation and the global economy. Trump will appeal the decision.

Wall Street is awaiting Nvidia’s latest results, which will drop after the closing bell.Credit: AP

Many of the President’s double-digit tariff hikes are paused for up to 90 days to allow time for trade negotiations, but the uncertainty over their eventual outcome has stymied businesses and left consumers wary about what lies ahead.

Goldman Sachs chief US political economist Alec Phillips observed that the ruling “represents a setback for the administration’s tariff plans and increases uncertainty but might not change the final outcome for most major US trading partners”. Phillips said he expected Trump would “find other ways to impose tariffs”.

Locally, investors reacted positively to the news, though their outlook was tempered. The Australian sharemarket edged up, with the S&P 200 gaining 12.9 points or 0.2 per cent to 8,409.8, a three-month high. Futures pointed to gains on Wall Street as markets in Asia also rallied.

Read the full market wrap here.

One Nation has leapfrogged Labor in a shock victory to secure Western Australia’s sixth Senate spot and increase its presence in the upper house by a third after the Australian Electoral Commission finalised the count.

Labor’s Deep Singh, a former United Workers Union organiser, had been leading the count for the sixth spot for several weeks, but a late surge of preferences towards One Nation gave candidate Tyron Whitten the seat today.

Pauline Hanson with newly elected One Nation WA senator Tyron Whitten.Credit: Save Australia/Facebook

Whitten will join One Nation leader Pauline Hanson and fellow Senator Malcolm Roberts on the crossbench.

His victory leaves the Liberals with one fewer seat in WA, which was held by retiring Senator Linda Reynolds in the last term.

One Nation WA congratulated Whitten on his victory on Facebook.

“A well-deserved result for a passionate advocate of the people,” the party said.

“We look forward to the strong voice he will bring to parliament on behalf of Western Australians.”

Whitten received 5.87 per cent of the vote, or 98,000 first preference votes.

Read more on newly elected One Nation senator Tyron Whitten here.

Warning: Graphic content

In New South Wales, Gareth Ward’s defence team has suggested that a political staffer who was allegedly raped by the Kiama MP omitted key details in his initial interview with police, as footage of him retracing his steps was played in court.

Ward has pleaded not guilty to one count of sexual intercourse without consent against a man who was 24 at the time, as well as three counts of assault with an act of indecency involving an 18-year-old man and an alternate charge of common assault against the younger man.

Kiama MP Gareth Ward arrives at the Downing Centre District Court for day three of his sexual assault trial.Credit: Jessica Hromas

The 43-year-old’s criminal trial began in the Downing Centre District Court in Sydney on Tuesday, three years after the charges were laid.

The older alleged victim earlier told the jury that Ward invited him to walk back with him to his Potts Point apartment in Sydney’s eastern suburbs following a boozy event at NSW Parliament House in September 2015 and that the man agreed, due to difficulties in getting home.

Read more on what took place during the third day of the trial here.

It may have been the most closely watched bond auction in years. Japan’s sale of 40-year bonds on yesterday didn’t, however, dispel the question marks investors have over not just Japanese bonds and Japan’s economy, but sovereign bonds around the world.

The weakest demand in nearly a year for 40-year government bonds followed an even more disconcerting auction of Japan’s 20-year bonds last week, where demand was at its weakest in a decade.

“Our country’s fiscal situation is undoubtedly extremely poor, worse than Greece’s”: Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba.Credit: AP

The imbalance between supply and demand for the bonds have sent their yields soaring, with the yield in the 20-year securities hitting a record high last week and the 40-year bond yields up a whole percentage point in only a week.

The disturbing developments within the long end of Japan’s government debt market over the past week have created the steepest yield curve for government debt in the world, and caused the Bank of Japan to rethink its strategy.

It is contemplating reducing the supply of ultra-long-dated debt and issuing more short-term notes to adjust supply of the 20, 30 and 40-year bonds to the diminished demand.

Read more of senior business columnist Stephen Bartholomeusz’s opinion piece here.

The parents and siblings of those killed at Westfield Bondi Junction have expressed grief, gratitude and fury in emotional scenes at the end of a five-week inquest into the attack that claimed six innocent lives, and that of the killer.

The harrowing evidence provided one of the most powerful moments in the inquest, as the brother of one victim extended an olive branch to the parents of the killer, Joel Cauchi.

Flowers at the memorial site at Westfield Bondi Junction in the aftermath of the attack.Credit: Flavio Brancaleone

Cauchi, 40, was shot dead by a NSW Police officer after he stabbed 16 people in the shopping centre on the afternoon of April 13, 2024.

Six people died of their injuries: Dawn Singleton, 25, Ashlee Good, 38, Jade Young, 47, Cheng Yixuan, 27, Pikria Darchia, 55, and Faraz Tahir, 30. A further 10 people were injured but survived.

Jade’s mother, Elizabeth Young, said her daughter was murdered “by an unmedicated, chronic schizophrenic, who had in his possession knives designed for killing”.

“On a lovely autumn afternoon, to learn your daughter is dead, stabbed in broad daylight, killed amidst fellow unsuspecting shoppers, was living, breathing just an hour ago – it’s the stuff of nightmares, of a parallel universe,” Young told the Lidcombe Coroners Court on Thursday.

Read more on the family statements read out today in the NSW Coroners Court here.

Indigenous Australians Minister Malarndirri McCarthy says the death of a Yuendumu man in custody in Alice Springs on Tuesday was a “very traumatic time for families”.

Minister for Indigenous Australians Malarndirri McCarthy.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

McCarthy said Australia needed to look at many things when it came to addressing the issues of Indigenous deaths in custody.

“Even the high rates of incarceration of First Nations people is a matter of concern across Australia, but especially here in the Northern Territory,” she said.

“We have to look at these issues, we have to look at the opportunity for anything other than jail time.”

Independent Western Australian MP Kate Chaney says before the election she was open to a conditional extension of the controversial North West Shelf project, but the decision has now been made without considering climate impact.

Curtin MP Kate Chaney.Credit: Hamish Hastie

“Like any project, it should go ahead if it stacks up when it takes into account environmental, cultural issues, and climate impact,” she said.

“What we need is a regulatory framework that allows governments to decide what is in the best interest of the country, taking into account all the factors, including climate change.

Hogan says the Coalition should “always” aspire to have more women occupy leadership roles.

“Absolutely I think we should always aspire to have more women representatives,” he said.

“But I do make the point, in the last parliament our shadow cabinet was 50-50 … and also as the Coalition we had a male and female deputy [leader].”

Nationals deputy leader Kevin Hogan has told the ABC’s Patricia Karvelas that Barnaby Joyce and Michael McCormack were swapped out of the frontbench for “fresher faces”.

This week Joyce repeatedly took aim at David Littleproud’s use of the term “generational change” to explain the changes in the opposition’s shadow cabinet.

Nationals leader David Littleproud with deputy leader Kevin Hogan and Senate leader Bridget McKenzie.Credit: AAP

“Do I look it? That’s the important thing,” Hogan joked when told he was, in fact, older than Joyce – a point Joyce has used repeatedly this week.

“We’re a relatively small team the Nats, I regard Barnaby and Michael as friends – I get how disappointed they would be,” he said.

“There was change in the sense of fresher faces that arrived in parliament much [more] recently than Michael and Barnaby, and I think that’s the point David [Littleproud] was trying to make.”