Category: MIL-OSI

Source: Airservices Australia

Introduction

Good afternoon and thank you for the opportunity to speak at this conference. The theme – banking and financial stability – is a topic of deep interest to the RBA given our longstanding mandate to contribute to financial stability. And I would like to say thank you to all of you, for your work in this important area and contributing to our understanding of the issues.

Today I’m going to explore two broad questions relating to financial stability.

First, why does financial stability matter and what is the RBA’s responsibility in relation to it?

Second, how does the RBA deliver on its financial stability responsibility?

Along the way, I’ll highlight some of our ongoing work in this space and the issues that are on our mind. To summarise, our overall assessment is that in this period of elevated global uncertainty, the Australian financial system is well positioned to weather most shocks. However, we cannot be complacent. The nature of risks is changing and so there is ongoing work for regulators and industry to remain prepared in this evolving environment.

Why does financial stability matter and what is the RBA’s role?

Financial stability is important because of the role that the financial system plays in the everyday life of Australians.

The financial system is made up of a range of financial institutions. It includes banks, insurers, superannuation funds and non-bank lenders. It also includes financial markets, where financial assets such as shares, bonds and foreign exchange are bought and sold. And it includes market infrastructure, such as the payments system and other systems that support the trading of financial assets.

It is important that all these elements of the financial system are working well because together they provide the financial services that Australians depend on in their everyday life. More concretely, a well-functioning financial system enables households and businesses to:

• save, borrow and invest – so that they can prepare for retirement, buy their first home, or purchase equipment to expand their businesses
• make payments – so they can move money efficiently and securely, such as when they’re tapping their card to pay for groceries, or making payments for their bills online
• insure against and manage risk – so they can protect themselves against unexpected costs, such as damage to or loss of property, or unexpected medical bills.

In other words, the financial system is vital in helping Australians get on in life and plan for the future. This means that if the financial system overall is not functioning well, it is costly for everyone.

• For example, if banks are unwilling or unable to lend money, businesses might not get the working capital they need to run their operations, households might reduce spending further than otherwise, it can become more challenging to purchase a home and economic activity can suffer. Indeed, financial crises lead to economic hardship for many with long-lasting consequences for economic growth.
• Another example is disruptions to payments systems, which can prevent salaries and pensions from being paid, households from buying the things they need and transactions in financial markets from settling, causing widespread difficulties.

Maintaining financial stability is about ensuring we have a financial system that is strong, operationally resilient and prepared for adverse conditions, so we can avoid these types of disruptions and their broader costs. This doesn’t mean reducing risk to the point that we compromise innovation, competition and efficiency. But it does mean ensuring resilience alongside these other features. Indeed, innovation and competition can lead to better ways to achieve resilience. We need a financial system that can support the economy by reliably providing the financial services that households and businesses depend on, both in good times and bad. A stable financial system promotes saving and investment, supporting lower funding costs, productive investment and thus longer term growth. So financial stability is a necessary underpinning to support the economic prosperity and welfare of Australians – which is the RBA’s overarching legislative objective.

Given the alignment between financial stability and the RBA’s other functions and objectives, the RBA – like other central banks – has long had a mandate to contribute to financial stability. This is a role that has evolved and changed over time. Initially it spanned all the way from liquidity provision to banking supervision. But in the late 1990s, this changed following the Financial System Inquiry (Wallis Review). Responsibility for banking supervision was transferred to a new separate agency – the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA), which was set up to bring the prudential functions of the RBA and Insurance and Superannuation Commission together into a dedicated agency. So unlike in some other countries, in Australia, the RBA, as the central bank, is not responsible for prudential supervision of these entities – that is APRA’s job.

Although the Australian Government’s response to the Wallis Review meant that supervision of these individual financial institutions was transferred to APRA, the RBA still retained a general (albeit non-legislated) responsibility to safeguard stability of the financial system as a whole. This reflects that the RBA, as the central bank, is well positioned to both assess financial system stability – given the breadth of our system-wide responsibilities – and to support financial system stability – given our balance sheet capacity to provide liquidity. We also cannot achieve our monetary policy objectives without financial stability. Relatedly, following the Wallis Review the RBA also gained enhanced powers to regulate the payments system to ensure it is secure, stable and efficient. The RBA’s responsibility to promote the stability of the Australian financial system was recognised by the Government at that time, and in subsequent agreements between the RBA and Treasury.

More recently, following the independent Review of the RBA in 2023, the RBA’s financial stability role was enshrined in legislation – making ‘contributing to financial stability’ a core part of the RBA’s legislative functions. The Review highlighted the importance of this for reinforcing accountabilities and strengthening the foundation of cooperation arrangements with other agencies that share a mandate for promoting financial stability.

How does the RBA deliver on its financial stability responsibility?

So how does the RBA deliver on this high-level responsibility to contribute to the stability of the Australian financial system? The answer is in a number of ways, and in conjunction with other agencies.

In Australia, delivering on financial stability is a team effort. Responsibilities are shared across several agencies, each with complementary mandates and policy tools (Figure 1).

As the central bank, the RBA has a range of responsibilities which I’ll cover in more detail shortly.

As I’ve already mentioned, APRA is the prudential regulation authority, responsible for regulating and supervising banks, insurers and superannuation funds, so that Australians’ financial interests are protected and the financial system is stable, competitive and efficient. This includes responsibility for macroprudential policy and bank resolution.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and the Treasury also have important financial stability roles. ASIC is responsible for market integrity and consumer protection across the financial services sector, and regulates clearing and settlement facilities (complementing the RBA’s supervision of those same facilities from a financial stability perspective). And the Treasury has an important role in advising the government on financial stability, including the financial regulatory framework. Treasury also has important policy tools that can help alleviate the economic impacts of financial crises.

These institutional arrangements and mix of responsibilities make cross-agency collaboration essential in Australia’s financial regulatory framework. And this is where the Council of Financial Regulators (CFR) comes in.

The role of the CFR

The CFR plays a crucial role in bringing together the RBA, APRA, ASIC and Treasury to coordinate and collaborate on financial stability issues. Its ultimate aim is to promote the stability of the Australian financial system and support effective and efficient regulation.

The CFR agencies work together to promote financial stability in three key ways:

• We analyse vulnerabilities in the financial system that could amplify shocks, and work together to understand their potential impacts and coordinate policy and other actions to address them.
• We support coordination of financial regulation, so that it is effective, efficient and promotes competition in the financial sector.
• We maintain crisis readiness so the CFR agencies are as ready as can be to work together to respond to support financial stability in the event of future shocks.

Earlier this month, the CFR published its first annual update on its initiatives to address risks and vulnerabilities in the financial system – covering progress over 2025 and focus areas for the year ahead. These focus areas for 2026 are geopolitical vulnerabilities, operational vulnerabilities, systemic liquidity risk and high household leverage. Given the international environment of elevated uncertainty and geopolitical tensions, strengthening crisis readiness is a common theme running through much of this work.

While the CFR does not have formal regulatory or decision-making powers separate from those of its individual members, it has a strong track record of effective collaboration – including in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the global financial crisis. The RBA Review in 2023 highlighted the importance of reinforcing cooperation arrangements among the CFR agencies for promoting financial stability. Consistent with this, the CFR Charter and Memorandums of Understanding between the agencies were updated earlier this year to clarify roles and responsibilities, and how agencies work together to promote financial stability.

Having talked about the CFR and its agencies, let me now turn to the specifics of the RBA’s role and how exactly we fulfil our financial stability responsibilities.

The RBA’s contribution to financial stability

The RBA contributes to financial stability in several distinct ways. Some contributions aim to be preventative – focused on promoting resilience and mitigating vulnerabilities, so that the financial system can withstand a wide range of adverse conditions. Others are curative – designed to contain disruptions and restore confidence during periods of financial stress. We’ve recently set out the RBA’s framework for contributing to financial stability on our website as part of our broader commitment to enhance transparency and public understanding of the work we do. I’ll now step through the elements of this framework (see below).

Monetary policy

Arguably the most fundamental way the RBA supports financial stability is by setting monetary policy to achieve low and stable inflation and full employment. To see why, let’s consider the alternative. For example, unemployment is the most common reason why households are unable to repay debt owed to banks, which can lead to loan losses for banks. High inflation can also trigger financial difficulties for households and businesses by leading to higher interest rates and lower real incomes, in turn affecting their ability to service loans. If a sufficiently large number of borrowers were to fall into negative equity and default on their loans, lenders could face widespread losses as a result. If these losses were large enough, this could lead to lenders sharply restricting the supply of credit to even very sound borrowers. This could disrupt economic activity and add to unemployment. And if households and businesses become concerned that their deposits at banks might not be safe, financial system stability and economic activity will be disrupted further still. So by setting monetary policy to achieve our objectives of low inflation and full employment, the RBA has a key role to play in helping create the economic conditions that support stability in the financial system.

Likewise, a stable financial system supports us to achieve low inflation and full employment. Well-functioning financial markets and institutions are essential for the transmission of monetary policy, and history has shown that episodes of financial instability can have lasting impacts on the economy and employment.

Working with the CFR agencies

As I’ve already discussed, the RBA also works closely with the other CFR agencies to support financial stability. As part of this, the RBA advises the other CFR agencies on the outlook for financial stability, including if monetary policy might affect – or be affected by – financial stability concerns.

As noted earlier, monetary policy and financial stability objectives are generally complementary, and indeed necessary for each other in the longer term. However, there can be times when monetary policy actions needed to deliver price stability and full employment may not align perfectly with financial stability goals. For example, an extended period of accommodative monetary policy required to lift employment and inflation to their appropriate levels could potentially contribute to the build-up of leverage and imprudent risk-taking in parts of the financial system. A tightening in monetary policy to control inflation at a later point could then expose these vulnerabilities.

As part of managing these interactions, the Monetary Policy Board has committed to ensuring the CFR is informed when there are material interactions between financial stability and monetary policy. This is important to support coordination of policies to address financial stability risks across the CFR, including the use of APRA’s macroprudential policy tools. In this context, the RBA and APRA have recognised that APRA’s macroprudential policy, as a financial stability tool, is better placed in most circumstances to address the build-up of certain systemic vulnerabilities than monetary policy.

The RBA now provides financial stability advice to the CFR and APRA on a regular basis, and at least annually to accompany APRA’s update to the CFR on macroprudential policy, most recently at the September 2025 CFR meeting. In that context, the RBA noted that housing credit growth has picked up, driven by strong growth in lending to investors, as borrowers have responded to lower interest rates. However, lending standards have remained sound and riskier forms of lending – such as high-loan-to-valuation-ratio (LVR) loans, high-debt-to-income (DTI) loans and interest-only loans – have edged up only slightly (Graph 1).

Looking forward, however, vulnerabilities could build if households begin to take on excessive debt. One way this could play out is if there was a sharp rise of investor activity from already elevated levels that results in rapid and unsustainable increases in housing prices, leverage and/or an easing in lending standards as other borrowers try to keep up.

The CFR has been discussing the importance of taking pro-active steps to prevent vulnerabilities building in the financial system over time. In this context, the CFR supported APRA’s recent decision to activate a new macroprudential policy tool – limits on high DTI lending – to pre-emptively contain the build-up of housing-related vulnerabilities in the financial system. These limits are not currently binding but would become so if high DTI lending were to pick up materially from here.

Managing monetary policy and financial stability interactions

Of course, macroprudential policy and other financial stability tools are not always going to be the answer, or at least not the whole answer. There may be circumstances where they cannot fully address financial stability concerns, either because of the nature of the financial vulnerability or because the relevant financial stability tools are not available or used. Where that has implications for the achievement of the RBA’s inflation and employment objectives, the Monetary Policy Board has flexibility in its framework to account for those concerns.

This could include circumstances where financial system vulnerabilities are assessed to be accumulating over time, resulting in a trade-off between the RBA’s ability to meet its monetary policy objectives at different time horizons. For example, holding interest rates low might, in certain circumstances, be needed to ensure the RBA achieves its inflation and employment objectives in the short-to-medium term, but in doing so result in an accumulation of vulnerabilities that pose a risk to longer term inflation and employment outcomes. As I mentioned earlier, macroprudential tools are often most appropriate in such circumstances. But if that proved unworkable or ineffective, the Monetary Policy Board might need to consider setting monetary policy so as to return inflation to target over a slightly longer timeframe than it otherwise would if there were no financial stability concerns. The Board’s actual decision would, of course, depend on the specifics of the situation and their assessment of the risks. But as highlighted in the RBA Review, transparency about decision-making is important. In any circumstance where financial stability considerations have had a bearing on the monetary policy decision, the Monetary Policy Board will clearly communicate how its decisions remained consistent with achieving its monetary policy objectives. That includes explaining:

• how and why it might use the flexibility in its monetary policy framework to take account of financial stability considerations relevant to the outlook for inflation and employment
• how it had assessed any trade-offs in its ability to achieve its monetary policy objectives in the short vs medium term
• why financial stability policies may not be sufficient to fully address the financial stability concerns.

To be clear, none of these considerations are bearing on monetary policy at the moment. Given the resilience in the Australian financial system, the Monetary Policy Board recently observed that there are no immediate implications for monetary policy arising from domestic financial stability considerations.

Communicating regular financial stability assessments

Each of the contributions to financial stability I have mentioned so far are underpinned by the RBA’s ongoing monitoring and assessment of financial stability. Our own research and analysis is complemented by insights from others in Australia and abroad, importantly including liaison with Australian financial institutions, businesses and community services organisations, as well as the other CFR agencies.

We publish a comprehensive financial stability assessment twice yearly in the RBA’s Financial Stability Review. This includes where we see potential risks to financial stability and vulnerabilities in the financial system, given the prevailing domestic and international environment. To make this assessment, we also consider the resilience of households, businesses, banks and non-bank financial institutions in the face of potential shocks.

By making sure there is good information about where the risks and vulnerabilities lie in our financial system, we can support good decision-making by individuals, businesses and policy-makers to address and manage these threats, and to limit excessive risk-taking. This is another way the RBA contributes to financial stability.

The RBA published its most recent Financial Stability Review in October (see below). A key takeaway was that the heightened risk in the international environment means a systemic risk is most likely to come from abroad. However, our judgement is that Australian households, businesses and banks are well placed to weather most shocks. This is thanks to ongoing strength in the labour market, prudent lending standards and high levels of bank capital and liquidity.

Financial Stability Review, October 2025

The Australian financial system is well placed to withstand most shocks but continued effort is needed to stay prepared for emerging challenges

However, this is certainly not an environment we want to become complacent in. There are two key issues here we called out in the Review.

First, it is important that lending standards remain sound so that the good level of financial resilience among households and businesses is not undermined over time. APRA’s pre-emptive introduction of high DTI lending limits will help in this regard.

Second, it is important that financial institutions continue to build their resilience to geopolitical and operational risks. These threats are intensifying, and we are alert to the prospect that financial and operational stress events occur at the same time. We got some sense of the potential challenges here in April this year, when cyber-attacks on the Australian superannuation sector coincided with stressed conditions in financial markets. There is, accordingly, a big program of work underway across the CFR agencies, government and industry to strengthen resilience both of individual institutions and the financial system as a whole.

So the upshot of all that is while the Australian financial system is starting from a good place, there is work to do to keep up with the evolving environment.

Crisis management, liquidity provision and financial market intervention

Having discussed the things the RBA does to support financial stability in advance, let me now turn to what we stand ready to do in the event a shock does occur. This includes our responsibilities in crisis management (in coordination with the CFR) and through our role as the ultimate provider of liquidity to the financial system.

The RBA works with the CFR agencies to maintain crisis management readiness and ensure effective responses to a range of potential or actual instances of financial instability. These may include material stresses in financial institutions, disruptions in financial markets, interruptions to the smooth functioning of financial market infrastructure, or major operational disruptions affecting the provision of financial services.

Each CFR agency has a range of responsibilities that collectively contribute to the CFR’s crisis management arrangements. Fortunately, Australia has not had to contend with the failure of a key financial institution for many years. But to remain prepared, the CFR conducts regular crisis exercises and simulations – including joint exercises with the New Zealand financial authorities (through the Trans-Tasman Council on Banking Supervision). And we have, of course, had real life practice at responding to various shocks to the financial system, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, all of which our financial system has managed to weather.

In a crisis situation the RBA has a number of responsibilities. First, the RBA has lead responsibility among the CFR agencies for monitoring systemic risk (including in financial markets, clearing and settlement systems, and the payments system).

The RBA is also responsible for adjusting the supply of liquidity to institutions or markets as appropriate.

In exceptionally rare circumstances, this could include providing liquidity assistance to a bank or clearing and settlement facility that is solvent but facing acute liquidity pressures. To provide such ‘exceptional liquidity assistance’, the Monetary Policy Board would need to be satisfied that to do so was needed to contribute to the stability of the Australian financial system, in line with its legislative responsibilities.

In rare instances of market-wide liquidity stress, the RBA may also determine it is appropriate to provide liquidity support to eligible counterparties more broadly. This is the approach the RBA adopted in response to the disruptions following the outbreak of the pandemic in March 2020, when we adjusted the size and frequency of our repurchase operations and broadened the range of accepted collateral to support financial stability.

I should also note here that the RBA’s provision of liquidity in normal times is also an important contributor to maintaining financial stability. This occurs through the RBA’s standard liquidity facilities as part of implementing monetary policy and ensuring banks have enough cash (or liquidity) to meet their day-to-day obligations.

As well as ensuring adequate liquidity is provided to the financial system, in rare circumstances the RBA may also intervene in the markets for foreign exchange or bonds issued by Australian governments to address dysfunction in these markets where that dysfunction threatens broader financial stability. We can do this by temporarily buying and selling certain assets when markets are displaying signs of substantial illiquidity or there are very sharp changes in prices that do not appear to be explained by economic news or other market forces.

For example, during the period of exceptional instability at the onset of the pandemic, the RBA purchased Australian Government bonds and semi-government securities for this purpose. This helped restore market functioning, bringing bid-offer spreads back down to more normal levels (Graph 2). Effective functioning of the government bond market is important for financial stability because it is a key market that provides the pricing benchmark for many financial assets.

Finally, the RBA, in coordination with ASIC, is also responsible for the supervisory response to financial stress at clearing and settlement facilities and for the resolution of these facilities if required. This broadly mirrors the recovery and resolution role that APRA has for banks, insurers and superannuation funds.

Broader contributions to financial stability

While that gives you a flavour of how the RBA contributes to financial stability, the list is not exhaustive. The RBA engages with the CFR on a wide range of financial stability topics beyond those relevant to monetary and macroprudential policy. We are an active participant in international forums that support global and regional financial stability and promote effective standards and cooperation. And we play an important role in regulating and supervising the payments system – to ensure it is safe, competitive and efficient – and in managing Australia’s high-value payment system (the Reserve Bank Information and Transfer System or RITS).

Conclusion

In conclusion, financial stability matters. It ensures the financial system can reliably provide the financial services that Australians depend on through good times and bad. This is a critical foundation for Australia’s economic prosperity and welfare.

The RBA has long had a financial stability role, and we welcome that this now has a clear statutory basis following recent amendments to the Reserve Bank Act 1959. Delivering on this mandate involves a range of activities. The RBA contributes through its monetary policy, liquidity provision, payments system and financial market infrastructure oversight and public communication of where risks may lie or vulnerabilities may be building.

Equally important is our work with others. Collaboration across Australia’s financial regulators has always been central to maintaining financial stability. Through the CFR we have a strong track record of effective cooperation. Recent steps strengthen this collaboration further, by enhancing clarity of individual agencies’ responsibilities, the CFR’s collective objectives, and setting out clear and specific commitments for how the agencies will work together to promote financial stability.

While the Australian financial system is well positioned to weather most shocks, working together effectively is key to ensuring we remain prepared for any challenges ahead.

Thank you and I look forward to your questions.

Source: Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission

What you don’t see is as important as what you do, when it comes to mapping Antarctic seabird breeding sites.
According to Australian Antarctic Division seabird expert, Dr Colin Southwell, knowing whether a species is present or absent from a site is critical for population and biodiversity studies, detecting change in species’ distributions, and prioritizing sites for protection.
However, while wildlife literature is peppered with observations of breeding seabird presence, reports rarely include absence, or search effort – where a scientist looked and didn’t find anything, or didn’t look (‘ignorance’).
“You may not see anything because the animal isn’t there, it’s hidden, or you didn’t search everywhere, and it can be difficult to record this,” Dr Southwell said.

The distinction between whether a breeding seabird is absent or just hidden from view is important, as it skews the accuracy of observations towards species like penguins, that are large, easily detectable and widely distributed.
This could affect decisions around environmental and conservation management.
Dr Southwell and a team of Australian and international researchers address this issue in a new study that pulls together 100 years of information from published papers, unpublished reports, data held in the Australian Antarctic Data Centre, handwritten field notes, and oral histories.
The data covered breeding habitat for eight bird species, across 5000 km of East Antarctic coastline, and extending 2000 km inland.
“The distinction between presence, absence and ignorance is a central concept of the study, which is widely acknowledged in ecology but seldom addressed,” Dr Southwell said.
“We tried to address this issue by considering where researchers have searched, how thoroughly they are likely to have searched, and how easy each species was to see.
“We then made inferences about the certainty of absence. If there was no evidence of searching at a place, we concluded there was ignorance.” 
The team used this approach to assess the thoroughness of surveys over the past 100 years, and identify knowledge gaps in the species and places surveyed.
“Unsurprisingly, observations were clustered close to permanently occupied research stations, most of which are located on the coast,” Dr Southwell said.
“They were also biased in favour of species like Adélie penguins, which are monitored as a sentinel species for fisheries and climate change impacts.
“There was limited information on smaller species such as the Wilson’s storm petrel and snow petrel, likely because they are well camouflaged or hidden in rock crevices and tend to occupy less accessible locations.
“We found that the coverage of observations in recent decades would be insufficient to effectively detect change in breeding locations into the future.”
The team then looked at the effect these knowledge gaps had on environmental management and conservation actions aimed at mitigating the impacts of human activities – specifically aviation and fisheries – on seabirds.
As aviation can disturb breeding seabirds, understanding where knowledge is limited or absent is important in refining flight paths.
“Mapping where we have no knowledge is important, as breeding seabirds could be mistakenly assumed to be absent when they’re not. This could lead to inadvertent disturbance,” Dr Southwell said.
Similarly, management of krill fisheries by the Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) uses information on the distribution and abundance of predators, including seabirds, to distribute krill catches across location and time.
“Existing seabird population counts at known breeding sites are likely to underestimate the total populations in the CCAMLR Management Areas,” Dr Southwell said.
“Identifying knowledge gaps in seabird breeding populations could inform new surveys where count data are missing or uncertain, to better represent seabird populations in management decisions.”
The team say future monitoring should report absences as well as presence.
“For practical reasons we will never have perfect knowledge or ecological information, but conservation science should strive to improve knowledge and hence management outcomes,” Dr Southwell said.
This content was last updated 5 hours ago on 15 December 2025.

Source: Australian Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Industry

On Wednesday, Finance Minister Katy Gallagher and I will hand down the first budget update of the Albanese Labor government’s second term.

It will be all about delivery, responsibility and restraint.

We will deliver on our promises, make room for big pressures on the budget, and update our forecasts.

No government in Australia’s history has delivered a bigger nominal improvement to the bottom line than this one, we’ve delivered the first surpluses in almost 2 decades, a much smaller deficit last year, and that’s meant much less debt than we inherited.

We’ll make even more progress in the mid‑year update on Wednesday.

That progress won’t be accidental or coincidental, it will be deliberate, and the direct result of the fine balances we’ve struck and the tough decisions we’ve made to prioritise responsible economic management.

The mid‑year budget update will include $20 billion in additional savings and reprioritisations to improve the budget bottom line.

It’s a powerful demonstration of Labor’s responsible economic management.

We have identified savings in every single one of our 7 budget updates.

The substantial savings we’ve found in this one mean the Albanese government has now delivered $114 billion in savings and reprioritisations since coming to office.

This is around 5 times more than the Coalition delivered in their last 7 budget updates combined. In fact, the $20 billion in savings we detail this week are roughly equivalent to the savings and reprioritisations it took our predecessors 7 updates to find.

We’ve kept average real spending growth to around half the 30‑year average and much less than what our predecessors averaged.

We’ve also got payments as a share of the economy down from almost a third to around a quarter and it’s forecast to be a bit above that over the next couple of years.

Finding savings and restraining spending are essential elements of our economic strategy in this mid‑year update.

But this sensible and responsible approach to the nation’s finances isn’t an end in itself, it’s the foundation from which we can deliver on our commitments and reform our economy.

2025 is all about delivery and so is the mid‑year update.

From building more homes to new training opportunities and more mental health centres, the mid‑year budget update will deliver what matters most for Australians.

It will provide billions of dollars to help deliver the policies and programs Australians voted for at the election.

We’re able to deliver the essential services and infrastructure Australians need and deserve because we’re managing the budget responsibly.

Along with funding our commitments, we’ve made room for substantial and unavoidable pressures on the budget without a substantial deterioration in the bottom line.

The figures we release on Wednesday will show we’ve put aside an additional $6.3 billion for disaster relief as previous disasters are proving to be more costly, an extra $3 billion more in support for seniors on the age pension, an extra $2.1 billion more for military superannuation schemes, an extra $2 billion for veterans, and more.

We take our responsibilities to veterans and older Australians very seriously and we’ll always make room in the budget to do the right thing by people and that’s what we’ve done in the mid‑year update.

Wednesday is also an opportunity for Treasury to update its economic forecasts.

The mid‑year update will confirm our economy continues to gather momentum in the face of substantial global uncertainty.

An important feature of this is the private sector recovery that we’ve been planning for and preparing for, which is really starting to take shape.

The mid‑year update forecasts a further pick up in business investment off the back of big increases in private sector spending on new technology and renewable energy.

Updated estimates for business investment will show the forecast in 2025–26 has doubled to 3 per cent. That’s very good for our economy and our budget.

Since we came to office, new business investment has grown by an annualised average of 3.9 per cent, compared to negative 1.3 per cent growth under our predecessors.

Productivity has now grown for 4 consecutive quarters, in annual terms it’s growing at 0.8 per cent, and 1.1 per cent in the market sector.

While there’s more to do to make our economy more productive and deal with the challenges coming at us, the mid‑year update will highlight Australia’s enviable combination of low unemployment, high participation, real wages growth and an economy and private sector that are strengthening.

Whether it’s the big turnaround we’ve engineered in the budget, the $114 billion in savings we’ve found since coming to government or the big increase in business investment driving the private sector recovery that will be a prominent feature of Treasury’s updated forecasts on Wednesday, we’ve made a lot of progress together.

We’ll build on this progress in the mid‑year update with more savings and more spending restraint that enables us to make room for the things that matter most to Australians.

Responsible economic management is a defining feature of the Albanese government and it will be a defining feature of the mid‑year budget update this week as well.

Source: Australian Department of Communications

AUSTRAC has refused to renew the registration of Yellow Sands Trading Pty Ltd, an independent remitter trading as Raiyyan Exchange. 
Raiyyan Exchange is no longer permitted to provide money transfer services in Australia.
In exercising its regulatory functions, AUSTRAC identified serious deficiencies in Raiyyan Exchange’s ability to understand, manage, and mitigate its money laundering and terrorism financing risks. 
AUSTRAC worked closely with the New South Wales Police Force in forming this view.

Source: Tasmania Police

Police clamp learner driver’s car over hooning incident at Lutana

Monday, 15 December 2025 – 11:39 am.

A learner driver has had their vehicle clamped and will be summonsed to court over a hooning incident at Lutana late last month.
A concerned member of the public reported the incident on Lennox Avenue on 19 November to police, providing quality dash cam footage of the offence.
As a result, officers from Southern Road Policing Services located the 16-year-old L-plater and clamped the vehicle for a period of 28 days.
Acting Inspector Penny Reardon said police remained committed to the Enough is Enough campaign – which calls for community support in detecting dangerous driving.
“Road safety is everyone’s responsibility, and we urge anyone with information about hooning or reckless driving to contact police,” she said.
“Those who engage in such dangerous behaviour on our streets will be investigated and can face significant penalties including their vehicle being clamped, seized or confiscated.
“Tasmania Police will continue to have zero tolerance for dangerous hooning behaviour.”
Reports can be made to police by calling 131 444 or Crime Stoppers anonymously on 1800 333 000, or at crimestopperstas.com.au.
If you can’t report it at the time but you have footage, submit it to our evidence portal at https://www.police.tas.gov.au/report/

Source: Australian Capital Territory – State Government

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Source: Australian Capital Territory – State Government

Source: Australia Government Statements 2

Kieran Gilbert, Host: Let’s go to the Assistant Foreign Minister, Matt Thistlethwaite. I want to ask you, first of all, you’re the Member for the neighbouring seat of Kingsford Smith in the Eastern Suburbs. You know Bondi better than most. It is an iconic place in this country. Has it changed forever?

Matt Thistlethwaite, Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade: Bondi Beach is a place of happiness. It perfectly represents the good about Australian values. Sand, sea, people go there for good times. And that’s what was occurring last night. A Chanukah event, first day of Chanukah, where our Jewish community were coming together to celebrate light over darkness, to celebrate family, to celebrate this important occasion. And that’s just been completely shattered. This is an act of pure terror. Pure, pure evil. At the time, I was at Coogee Beach at a Chanukah event with the local Jewish community from the Coogee Shule. And there were record numbers and it was a time of happiness. It was a time of brotherhood and friendship and coming together. And that was completely shattered last night. And obviously, our thoughts are with the local Jewish community. I’ve had several conversations with them last night and this morning. We’re providing as much support as we possibly can. But I urge all Australians today, if you have a friend or a work colleague that is in the Jewish community, please reach out to them, let them know that we stand with them, that we support them and that Australia wraps its arms around the Jewish community today.

Gilbert: And I know that you have been engaged regularly with the Jewish community in your area. We’ve spoken about it at length, and you’ve been very strong in your language about anti-Semitism. Has the government been strong enough? Has the Albanese Government been strong enough in cracking down the scourge of anti-Semitism? Because that is certainly not the view of Benjamin Netanyahu. He was scathing about the Australian government overnight.

Assistant Minister: Kieran, unfortunately we had some shocking anti-Semitic attacks in my electorate in January when there was a firebombing of a childcare centre next door to a shule. The Prime Minister and the Premier joined myself that morning on the scene. In the wake of that, I convened a group, a local Operation Shelter group, with the local police, local elected representatives and members of the Jewish community. And we’ve been meeting regularly to make sure that we do all we can to keep the community safe. Our government acted to support security upgrades to local synagogues, to local Jewish schools and educational institutions. And we’ll continue, obviously, to make sure that we monitor the situation and provide as much support as well to the Jewish community. I’ll be meeting again with that group this morning with the local police. I’ve just spoken to the local area commander and we’re going to convene that meeting this morning with leaders of the Jewish community and we’ll do whatever we need to, to keep that community safe.

Gilbert: Does there need to be a step up in that sense? Chris Minns has been praised for his response in the wake of October 7, your government has been accused of falling short by no less than the Israeli Prime Minister. Do you need to step this up a great deal?

Assistant Minister: We have stepped it up, Kieran. We strengthened the laws in the wake of some of the anti-Semitic attacks earlier on. We upgraded security at Jewish institutions. But we’ll obviously monitor this situation. Obviously, there’s a police investigation that needs to occur and we have every trust and confidence in our security and intelligence agencies and the police. And I want to congratulate the local police who were there on the scene very quickly. Unfortunately, we had police officers that have been injured, but we will certainly do whatever we need to make sure that we step up and protect Australia’s Jewish community, not only in my area, but across the nation.

Gilbert: Matt Thistlethwaite, Member for Kingsford Smith and Assistant Foreign Minister. Thanks for your time. Appreciate it.

Source: Australian Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Industry

Jim Chalmers:

On Wednesday, Katy Gallagher and I will be handing down the seventh budget update of the Albanese Labor government. This budget update is all about delivery, responsibility and restraint. It won’t be a mini budget. There’s not a lot of new stuff in there, but there is a lot of hard yards to make room for our priorities, to deliver on our commitments and also to make sure that we can accommodate some of these big upward pressures on the budget.

There’s about $35 billion worth of pressures from estimates variations. If you take the GST out of that, still leaves about $25 billion worth of pressures in areas like natural disasters, the age pension, veterans, defence super and the like. So the big task for Katy Gallagher and I and the Expenditure Review Committee has been to make room for these pressures on the budget in a way that ensures that the budget doesn’t go substantially backwards.

The key thing to remember about this government and about this mid‑year budget update, this Albanese Labor government is defined by responsible economic management, and the mid‑year budget update will be defined by responsible economic management as well. This is all about ensuring that we deliver on the commitments we took to the Australian people in May. It’s all about making room for those pressures and it’s also an opportunity for us to update our forecasts.

There will be $20 billion of savings in the mid‑year budget update on Wednesday. To give you a sense of the magnitude of that, it took our predecessors 7 budget updates to find $20 billion in savings. We have $20 billion in this one budget update which we will release between now and Wednesday. What that shows is we’ve now found $114 billion in savings and reprioritisations to make sure that we are funding the things that our community desperately needs – strengthening Medicare, 3 rounds of tax cuts, building urgent care clinics, investing in mental health and building more homes.

What you’ll see in the mid‑year budget update is us delivering on our commitments in those important areas, making sure we’re funding our commitments to 100,000 new homes for first home buyers, making sure we’re meeting our commitments to mental health and also to fast track tradies and to build infrastructure in local communities.

2025 has been a year of delivery and the mid‑year budget update will be all about delivery as well. Now those $114 billion in savings combined with spending restraint is the sort of responsible economic management which would be unrecognisable to our predecessors. As I said, it took them 7 updates to find $20 billion. Our $114 billion in 7 updates is 5 times what they found in their final 7 updates. And so Katy Gallagher and I will detail those savings during the course of the week.

The mid‑year budget update has got a number of difficult decisions in there. A difficult decision not to extend a fourth round of electricity bill rebates. That wasn’t an easy decision, but it was the right decision. We’ve said for some time that those electricity bill rebates are an important part of the budget, but not a permanent part of the budget. They are one way that we’re helping Australians with the cost of living, but not the only way. And by not extending those electricity bill rebates, that signifies a shift from temporary help with the cost of living to permanent and ongoing help with the cost of living delivered via the tax system.

So our commitment to helping with the cost of living has not changed even as the nature of that cost‑of‑living help has evolved over time. A big shift from temporary help to permanent help delivered via the tax system, via bulk billing, cheaper medicines, cuts to student debt and all of the different ways that we are helping with the cost of living.

Now the mid‑year budget update, as I said, will deliver our commitments on housing and mental health and infrastructure and skills. We’ve also made very substantial progress in the last couple of days when it comes to 2 other important commitments.

We are cracking down on price gouging by the big supermarkets. This is a commitment we took to the election. It is now law, and it will come into being next year. This is all about making sure that families and pensioners get a fairer go at the checkout. We know that people are under pressure. We want to make sure, and we will make sure that the supermarkets are not price gouging their customers and that’s what this important change is all about.

We’re also bringing in our cash mandate. Our cash mandate means that there is an obligation on supermarkets and fuel retailers to accept cash. This is all about ensuring that when Australians want to or need to use cash at the supermarket or the servo that they can use cash. Because even as fewer and fewer people are using cash in our economy and in our communities, we know that there are a number of people who still like to use cash. This is about making it easier for people to use cash to buy essentials at the supermarket and the servo. We’ve done a lot of consultation, we’ve done a lot of work on this, and we believe that we’ve struck the right balance when it comes to this cash mandate.

So a lot of activity, a lot of action in this portfolio when it comes to supermarkets, when it comes to cash, and obviously when it comes to the mid‑year budget update. We know that even after Wednesday there will be a lot more work to do to make our economy stronger, to lift living standards and boost wages and make our budget more sustainable. But we’ve done a lot of work in this mid‑year budget update to make room for our priorities and pressures. You’ll see that on Wednesday. It won’t be a mini budget. The main game will be in May with the 2026 Budget but we will make substantial progress when it comes to the numbers that we release on Wednesday. Happy to take a couple of questions.

Journalist:

Are MPs’ travel entitlements too generous or do you agree with the charges that your colleagues have racked up?

Chalmers:

Look, I understand that there is very substantial community concern about these arrangements. I think it’s appropriate that the colleagues have sought assurances from the independent body that these claims are within the rules. I’m confident that they are, but it’s appropriate that they’ve asked to put that beyond doubt. It’s also appropriate that the Prime Minister has asked the organisation at arm’s length from the government for advice on any changes which may be necessary. So, we will await that advice. We’ll get it in due course. In the interim, of course, as Treasurer, my focus is on delivering with Katy Gallagher the mid‑year budget update on Wednesday.

Journalist:

But haven’t your own colleagues cruelled your credibility to ask Australians to bear spending cuts by spending big on their travel allowances?

Chalmers:

Well, it’s always important that colleagues from all sides of the parliament act within the rules. I’m confident that’s what’s happened here. But there are good reasons why colleagues from time to time will ask for that to be put beyond doubt by the independent authority. There are good reasons why this regime is maintained at arm’s length from politicians and good reasons why the PM has asked for advice on any changes which may be necessary.

Thanks very much.

Source: Northern Territory Police and Fire Services

The Northern Territory Police Force is investigating an alleged sexual assault that occurred in Alice Springs this morning.

Around 4:30am, the Joint Emergency Services Communication Centre received a report that a woman aged in her 20s had been sexually assaulted by a man not known to her along Larapinta Drive in Araluen. The offender allegedly stole the victim’s handbag and fled the scene on foot.

Police attended and a crime scene was established. The victim was conveyed to hospital by St John Ambulance.

The offender remains outstanding at this time and investigations are ongoing.

Police urge anyone with information, including CCTV or dash cam footage of Larapinta Drive between Zeil Steet and Lyndavale Drive between 2am – 3am this morning, to contact police on 131 444. Please quote reference P25338047. Anonymous reports can be made through Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or via https://crimestoppersnt.com.au/.