Your noon Briefing: Police defend response after youths trash Airbnb rental

Welcome to your noon digest of what’s been making news and what to watch for.

Hello readers. Here is your noon roundup of today’s top stories.

The apartment block at 200 Spencer Street, Melbourne. September 9th 2018.

Cops defend party response

Senior police have rejected a leaked incident report which claims local officers did not have the resources to properly combat an out-of-control Airbnb party involving up to 40 youths of African appearance in Melbourne’s CBD. The African Australian youths allegedly tore apart a short-term rental apartment in the Neo200 tower on Spencer Street on Saturday night with police arriving early Sunday to find holes in the walls, doors off hinges, plates smashed, and broken bottles on the floors.

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NAB CEO Andrew Thorburn speaking to local farmers in Wagga, NSW.

NAB holds rates

National Australia Bank has broken ranks with the other big banks and kept its home loan rates on hold in an attempt to win back customer trust. Blaming higher funding costs, Commonwealth Bank, ANZ and Westpac have all increased their home loan rates in the last few days and at 5.24 per cent NAB will have the lowest advertised standard variable home loan rate. This compares to Westpac at 5.38 per cent, CBA at 5.37 per cent and ANZ at 5.36 per cent. Second tier bank Suncorp is closer to six per cent.

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Former prime minister Tony Abbott leaves after a speech on the state of the Australian political landscape at The Centre for Independent Studies in Sydney, Saturday, August 25, 2018. (AAP Image/Joel Carrett) NO ARCHIVING

‘We have a fighting chance’

Tony Abbott has downplayed Newspoll figures showing Liberals trailing Labor, saying “we shouldn’t worry too much”. Keep up with all the latest from the PM’s first Question Time in our live blog, PoliticsNow.

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An environmental activist wearing a face-mask depicting US President Donald Trump takes part in a demonstration in front of the United Nations building, where experts from across the planet locked in key talks aimed at breathing life into the Paris Agreement on climate change, in Bangkok on September 8, 2018. - The 2015 Paris deal -- which must be adopted by signatory nations by December 2018-- aims to limit global temperature rises to "well below" two degrees Celsius and to less than 1.5 degrees if possible. (Photo by LILLIAN SUWANRUMPHA / AFP)

Bangkok stalemate

The United States and Australia have been accused of working to stall negotiations on a $US100 billion a year climate change fund and put the Paris Agreement in jeopardy. An emergency meeting of climate delegates in Bangkok ended last night with claims the talks had been “beset with tension”. Key issues remained “stalemated” and the future of the Paris deal was “on the brink”, climate groups said.

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Iron bar fence with old street

Uighur abuses

A new report alleges human rights violations in China’s Xinjiang are of a scale not seen since the Cultural Revolution and people are locked up simply for having relatives or friends living abroad. The report also alleges ethnic minority Chinese nationals have been detained in political education centres in the region just for downloading apps such as WhatsApp or for using a Virtual Private Network — allowing one to cross the great firewall.

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Britain's former foreign secretary Boris Johnson sits in the stands during play on the second day of the fifth Test cricket match between England and India at The Oval in London on September 8, 2018. (Photo by Ian KINGTON / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE. NO ASSOCIATION WITH DIRECT COMPETITOR OF SPONSOR, PARTNER, OR SUPPLIER OF THE ECB

Boris dirt file

The Tory party was plunged into a bitter civil war over dirty tricks last night after it was revealed British Prime Minister Theresa May’s aides drew up a dossier on Boris Johnson’s sex life in an apparent effort to prevent him becoming prime minister. The document, passed to The Sunday Times by a Conservative source, contains a catalogue of lurid allegations about Mr Johnson’s sexual liaisons, quips from him about cocaine and damning assessments of his character.

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Comment of the day

“Anybody would be ‘preferred’ to Shorten so that is a no-brainer. The real story will be whether Scott Morrison will be able to return the one million traditional Liberal voters that Malcolm Turnbull turned away.”

Noel, in response to ‘Newspoll: Coalition faces election wipeout with 40th straight loss’.