Category: MIL-OSI

Source: New places to play in Gungahlin

Source: Australian Ministers for Regional Development

Unsafe products in online marketplaces will be a major focus of the ACCC’s product safety priorities during 2025-26, ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb announced today.

Addressing the National Consumer Congress in Melbourne, Ms Cass-Gottlieb outlined the importance of the ACCC’s role in protecting consumers from unsafe products and announced five priority areas.

Among the priorities is addressing unsafe products in the digital economy.

“Reducing the prevalence of high-risk unsafe consumer products online will be key. We will focus on systemic and high-risk product safety issues for consumers. And we will use a combination of regulation, education for consumers and for businesses, compliance and enforcement tools, where appropriate,” Ms Cass-Gottlieb said.

“The risks in the digital economy are layered, they include not only physical harm from unsafe or non-compliant goods, but also the associated economic harm and decline in consumer trust in markets.”

“Addressing these harms is essential to maintaining trust in digital markets and ensuring those markets are competitive and safe,” Ms Cass-Gottlieb said.

The other four priorities are consumer and product safety issues impacting young children, lithium-ion battery safety, updating mandatory standards and improving product safety data to identify safety risks. Aligned with these priorities, the ACCC will maintain strong relationships across the regulator network, including information sharing and responding to harm. 

“The ACCC will continue to prioritise product safety affecting young children, who can be at greater risk of injury or death from consumer products,” ACCC Deputy Chair Catriona Lowe said.

“We will focus on compliance with button battery standards and continue to raise awareness about new infant sleep and toppling furniture standards.”

“The dangers of button batteries, unstable furniture, and unsafe infant sleep products impact families every day and we want to ensure the standards don’t just exist, but are understood, implemented and enforced so children are kept safe,” Ms Lowe said.

The ACCC will continue to support the safe use of lithium-ion batteries, which power everything from smartphones to e-bikes, and are used in home solar systems. As the use of lithium ion batteries grows, the ACCC continues to focus on the safety of these products.

“Raising consumer awareness about the safe purchase, storage, use and disposal of lithium-ion batteries, and monitoring recalls of unsafe lithium-ion battery products, will be another major focus this year,” Ms Lowe said.

The ACCC will begin a series of expedited reviews of existing mandatory standards from July 2025, following recent amendments to the Australian Consumer Law. These reviews will consider which voluntary overseas and international standards should be added as compliance options for mandatory standards. This will help ensure that mandatory standards are up to date, and can lower compliance costs for businesses.

The ACCC will also work to continue to improve product safety data to help us identify risks and protect consumers. This will include strategies to increase reporting of product safety incidents to the ACCC, working with other regulators and stakeholders to increase data sharing and undertaking new consultation and research to understand the key risks affecting Australian consumers.

“The priorities I have outlined today reflect the environment we’re operating in – one defined by digital acceleration and rising complexity,” Ms Cass-Gottlieb said.

“These priorities are designed to respond to known harms, and to anticipate the emerging risks that could shape the future of consumer safety. They reflect our commitment to protect Australian consumers and build and maintain their trust in markets in an era of change and uncertainty.”

More information including the full list of the ACCC’s product safety priorities is available at Product safety priorities 2025-26. 

A transcript of Ms Cass-Gottlieb’s National Consumer Congress address is available on our website.

Background

Each year the ACCC announces its compliance and enforcement priorities and product safety priorities for the financial year ahead.

These priorities help guide the product safety work of the agency and ensure it focuses its work on the most important and impactful issues.

The Australian Product Safety Pledge helps the ACCC remove unsafe products from  those online marketplaces that are signatories.

We are looking to expand the pledge and strengthen its commitments and reporting requirements to address the unsafe products available for sale on online marketplaces.

Source:

27 June 2025

Almost half of all Australian Rules Football (AFL) umpires have experienced verbal abuse such as ridiculing, humiliation or aggressive remarks, threats or gestures, at least every couple of games, according to new research by the University of South Australia.

The survey of more than 350 umpires from 2021 to 2022 has identified that one in five umpires (21%) reported having also experienced some form of physical abuse, whether it be invasion of personal space, pushing, or punching by players, coaches, parents or general spectators.

Twelve per cent of those surveyed umpired in community junior football, 80% umpired in community senior football and 8% umpired in state league and talent pathway.

The study was conducted by UniSA’s Dr Jamie Cleland, and Dr Alyson Crozier, experts in sports management and sports psychology respectively, in a bid to examine the extent of abuse towards match officials, particularly at the youth and grassroots levels, and the reasons for poor retention of umpires in the sport.

Dr Crozier says poor behaviour by clubs, parents or spectators can filter down to the youth and grassroots levels where umpires aren’t protected by security like elite AFL umpires and can face verbal and physical hostility when their decisions are disputed.

“Spectators, players and coaches tend to strongly identify with their team, whereas umpires are viewed as an external authority figure – and this creates an ‘us versus them’ mindset,” she says.

“This then can lead to dehumanisation and justification of aggressive behaviour towards umpires as they’re seen as a threat to the team’s success. Professional AFL umpires are conditioned to expect abuse on the field and understand it as being part of the game.

“But while uMpires may expect the abuse, it doesn’t make the experience ‘right’. Workplaces outside of umpiring wouldn’t tolerate the levels of abuse experienced by some umpires in Aussie Rules; in no other workplace would it be considered acceptable, and it shouldn’t be acceptable for footy umpires either.”

Of the research participants, 91% identified as male and 80% of them umpired in community senior football. 21% said they received verbal abuse every game, 28% said every couple of games and 38% said a couple of times a season.

One umpire in community senior football commented how it “had been the worst year for myself personally as far as coach and supporter abuse – I was threatened with my life this year and the league did nothing about it”.

Another community senior football umpire shared their account of being physically attacked. “I was assaulted two years ago by a spectator. Lucky I was bigger than him. I was disappointed he only got a one-year suspension from attending games,” they said.

More than half of participants (53%) had reported at least one incident of abuse to the relevant authority and of those who had reported abuse, 73% felt supported through the process, with 62% satisfied with the eventual disciplinary outcome.

Dr Crozier says a number of the umpires in the study commented positively on the AFL’s 50m penalty for players who show dissent towards an umpire, such as challenging an umpire verbally or physically after a decision has been made on the field.

“However, although some umpires recognised how their experiences had improved after the introduction of the dissent rule, for the majority, the top-down approach still wasn’t influencing bottom-up behaviour change at the youth and grass rooms levels. It’s at these levels where mass participation occurs that umpires are significantly outnumbered and not sufficiently protected from harm,” she says.

“Umpires told us they need to be communicated with before and after cases of misconduct against clubs, players and spectators, not only for their own health and wellbeing, but because they’re more likely to keep umpiring if they feel supported and valued.”

The researchers suggested technology could enhance the reporting process for bad behaviour, using real time mobile apps to log incidents immediately after a match. Various sporting leagues globally are trialling body cameras for game officials to reduce the level of abuse they face.

An article on the topic is published on The Conversation. It can be republished online or in print for free, provided you follow these guidelines.

Source: New places to play in Gungahlin

Source: Northern Territory Police and Fire Services

The Northern Territory Police Force has arrested a 47-year-old male in relation to an aggravated robbery in Pinelands yesterday afternoon.

Around 5:00pm, the Joint Emergency Services Communication Centre received reports of a disturbance involving a male allegedly armed with a machete on the Stuart Highway in Pinelands.

It is alleged a trailer containing construction equipment was stolen from a business premises along the Stuart Highway in Pinelands, before the victim observed it was missing a short time later. The victim drove around before stopping nearby after noticing the suspected stolen property attached to a vehicle broken down on the side of the road nearby.

Initial investigations indicate the alleged offender threatened the victim with a machete after the victim approached him. The offender then allegedly entered the victims vehicle to jump start his own personal vehicle before fleeing the scene.

Shortly after, the vehicle broke down nearby the Stuart Highway and Tiger Brennan Drive on-ramp, where the male fled into nearby bushland.

The Dog Operations Unit and general duties members attended on scene swiftly.

Patrol Dog (PD) Wedge was deployed and tracked the alleged offender 400 metres where they located and apprehended him while concealed within the bush.

The male was arrested and is likely to be charged later today.

A machete was seized and the stolen property was returned to the victim.

The Crime Command has carriage of the investigation.

Acting Superintendent Meacham King stated, “This is another good example of the essential work the dog operations unit undertakes in tracking violent offenders and apprehending them.

PD Wedge and his handler are a highly effective team protecting the community.”

Anyone who witnessed the incident, particularly anyone with dash cam footage from the area at the time, is urged to contact police on 131 444. Please quote reference number P25171430. Anonymous reports can be made through Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

Source: Northern Territory Police and Fire Services

Source: New places to play in Gungahlin

Source: New places to play in Gungahlin

Source: Australian Ministers for Regional Development

NBN Co’s fixed wireless and Starlink’s satellite networks are providing Australians living outside of the fixed-line network footprint with high speed alternatives, according to the ACCC’s latest Measuring Broadband Australia report.

The report, which compared broadband performance during March 2025, found that both networks can deliver download speeds above 100 Mbps during evening busy hour periods between 7 and 11 PM on weekdays.

Starlink services recorded an average busy hour download speed of 170.2 Mbps, while services on NBN Co’s new Fixed Wireless Home Fast and Fixed Wireless Superfast plans achieved median results of 166.2 and 283.5 Mbps, respectively.

“Australians who live in regional and remote areas and cannot access a fixed-line network rely on alternatives such as satellite and fixed wireless services to connect to the internet,” ACCC Commissioner Anna Brakey said.

“The introduction of Starlink and upgrades to the NBN Fixed Wireless network have provided these consumers with access to faster speeds than before.”

While both networks were capable of high download performance, Starlink services delivered higher upload speeds, the report found.

The average busy hour upload speed observed on Starlink’s standard service was 29.2 Mbps. This result exceeded the individual upload performance of all monitored services on the Fixed Wireless Superfast plan, the fastest plan on the NBN Fixed Wireless network.

The average busy hour upload speed observed on the popular Fixed Wireless Plus plan was 11.2 Mbps.

Starlink services recorded lower averages for latency and loading times for popular websites, while NBN fixed wireless services recorded fewer outages and lower packet loss. However, the difference in average performance for these metrics is minimal and is unlikely to significantly impact the user’s overall experience.

“In addition to our performance data, we encourage consumers to consider the price of the service, including any hardware and installation costs, and their household’s broadband usage needs” Ms Brakey said.

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