Latest news with #StateParliament
West Australian
a day ago
- West Australian
Police Minister warns E-hoons: your devices will be seized
Police Minister Reece Whitby has defended police figures showing fines for speeding and not wearing a helmet on e-rideables are down, saying more modified devices are being seized. The West Australian on Wednesday revealed only 14 e-riders were fined for exceeding the speed limit in the first 10 months of last year. That compares to 25 in all of 2023 and 34 in 2022. 'The way police have approached this operationally is to be looking at those devices which are capable of excessive speed and have been illegally modified,' Mr Whitby said on Wednesday. 'Police have seized hundreds, hundreds of those vehicles per year and, indeed, it's increasing year on year and many have been destroyed.' According to figures tabled in State Parliament, 156 e-scooters were impounded in 2024 up from 75 in 2023, 30 in 2022 and only three in 2021. 'Increasingly they are seizing those devices now, whether they're e-rideables, whether they're e-bikes, whether they're e-motorbikes of dirt bikes,' Mr Whitby said. 'Any vehicle that has been illegally modified, whether they're speeding or not. It could be resting on the side of the road . . . they are seizing those devices now. 'Police are taking very firm action on this issue.' A State Parliament inquiry investigating whether regulations need to be toughened got underway on Wednesday and has been expanded to include e-bikes, after the death of a nurse who was allegedly hit in an Edgewater park on Saturday. Mr Whitby has called on the Federal Government to do more to stop dangerous imports. 'There is no need for someone to be on an e-rider or a scooter or a knee bike at 60 or 70 or 80 kilometres an hour,' he said. 'You cannot do it legally on a road, or certainly a footpath, so why should they be for sale? So this is an issue I want to take up with the Federal Government in terms of important devices capable of these speeds.' A 17-year-old boy has been charged with manslaughter, over the Edgewater crash.
West Australian
15-07-2025
- Health
- West Australian
Feral deer to be culled across 1000sqkm area near Esperance and Harvey
A feral deer population of about 1500 will begin to be culled across southern WA next week after being identified through aerial surveillance and thermal imaging technology. Agriculture Minister Jackie Jarvis told State Parliament the project had covered 660sqkm near Esperance, 440sqkm near Harvey, and 41sqkm near Muchea during the past two years. More than 1500 feral deer were identified in the three targeted areas— with about 660 feral deer found near Esperance, about 700 near Harvey, and about 170 near Muchea. The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development will start localised aerial control for feral deer in the Esperance and Harvey areas next week. A spokeswoman for Ms Jarvis said WA was in a 'unique' position to control feral deer populations while they were still 'relatively small and localised'. 'Feral deer populations in WA have the potential to grow quickly and are an emerging pest threat, impacting agricultural production, important environmental values and sensitive areas,' she said. 'Like many pests, deer tend to prefer areas on the fringe of bushland and farmland, where they can graze in paddocks but retreat to cover if startled.' A declared pest, feral deer damage the WA environment and agriculture industry by grazing on native plants, competing with native fauna for food and habitat resources, impact water quality and soil properties, and damage pasture, commercial crops and orchards. They also act as carriers for diseases and pathogens such as foot-and-mouth disease, and can transmit exotic livestock diseases to cattle, sheep, and goats. The aerial control will take place across Crown land and over a small number of private rural properties. DPIRD has liaised with affected landholders to plan control efforts. 'During the past two years, DPIRD has undertaken aerial thermal surveys targeting agricultural and conservation areas where there are known populations of feral deer,' the spokeswoman said. 'The information gathered is aiding the development of tools and management strategies to develop best practice control measures.' Australia is home to more than 1.5 million feral deer, the population exploding from about 80,000 in 1980. DPIRD has been assisted by the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions with deer research initiatives, surveys, and control program activities. 'Thermally-assisted aerial control is an effective method for reducing deer populations across a landscape,' the spokeswoman said. She said any future control would be determined by the success of the current program and DPIRD was continuing to liaise with rural landholders near Muchea to plan for local aerial control activities in early 2026. Landholders who see vertebrate pests, such as feral deer, on their property can report sightings using the FeralScan App or online at .
ABC News
11-07-2025
- Politics
- ABC News
It can happen here: For Jewish Australians, being relentlessly targeted is not just frightening — it is exhausting - ABC Religion & Ethics
To many people, the events of last Friday — specifically, the simultaneous attacks on the Australian Jewish community on the Sabbath eve — felt like a turning point. To this broader sense, I want to add my voice, not as an echo, but as a caution. I am a writer and policy analyst, a trained Holocaust educator, a descendant of the Shoah. I am also the daughter of a proud, Melbourne-born Australian, the sister of a former senior member of State Parliament, and a dual Australian-Israeli citizen. These aren't just biographical details — they are essential facts that shape how I see this moment. They give me a perspective that bridges lived history, national identity and political reality. I've both witnessed and taught the dangers of hate, the courses that it runs (sometimes shrewdly), how silence enables it, how democracies can erode when it is ignored and when truth is avoided. I have also spent almost equal parts of my adult life in Australia and in Israel. On Friday, 4 July 2025, around 5:45pm our family lit candles — the two regular ones in readiness for our Shabbat meal, plus an additional Yahrzeit candle to commemorate the fourth anniversary of my father's passing. At the same time, a group of 20 men, women and children sat down to pray before their meal, across town inside the East Melbourne synagogue. A view of the damaged entrance of East Melbourne Synagogue, following an arson attempt on Friday, 4 July 2025. (Photo by Alex Zucco / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty Images) Our traditional Friday night tranquillity was disrupted by the news of an attempted arson attack on the front door of the 150-year-old synagogue on Albert Street, and that congregants were forced to flee through a back door. As you'd expect, word travelled quickly across Jewish homes in Melbourne. I was outraged — but, as strange as it may seem, I was also relieved. Relieved that my father, Lou, had not lived to see this. That he didn't have to witness another attack on the Australian Jewish community, just six months on from the destructive firebombing at the Adass Israel Synagogue in Ripponlea — this time, at his favourite synagogue, the oldest in our state and set in the heart of the city. East Melbourne Synagogue has long hosted Jewish lawyers at the annual ceremony marking the start of the legal year. Dad, a lawyer himself and father to Victoria's former Attorney-General, loved nothing more than the ritual of the legal gathering in the renaissance building. Not long after, we learned of a violent protest that had taken place at a local Israeli owned restaurant, Miznon in Hardware Lane — with protesters chanting the same murderous slogan, 'death to the IDF', that was recently shouted from the big stage at Glastonbury. The protesters brought Kristallnacht into the streets of Melbourne, as my friend the artist Nina Sanedze aptly described the scene. My father, Louis Pakula (1940–2021), aged 26, pictured here at his graduation from the University of Melbourne in 1966. (Supplied: Tammy Reznik) 21 months of incessant marches on the streets of Australian cities, using slogans that call for the destruction of the Jewish state and the eradication of the Jewish people, would have done my father in. I doubt he would have believed it possible, having grown up in the heart of post-war Australia's multicultural experiment during the 1950s and 60s. His children were raised as beneficiaries of that Australian ideal: long road trips, larrikin humour, the local primary school in a melting pot neighbourhood — layered, always, with the sounds of Yiddish and the weight of Jewish tradition and memory. Like many Jews born in the generation after the Holocaust, we lived in its shadow. Of the three kids, I was the one who took that legacy most to heart. I visited the camps where family members were murdered, walked hallowed ground, breathed the history. I was the one most drawn to Zionism — initially, to the idea of a different type of Jew, resilient and resourceful. My dreams were realised when my sister and I first visited the land, as starry-eyed twenty-somethings, and later when I met the Israeli man who would become my husband and the father of my children. My older brother took a different path: a Jew in politics, though more often in footnotes than in headlines. He moved through the Union movement and public life with his Jewishness tucked quietly in the background. And all these different expressions of life as Jewish people were possible in this land down under. Though far from being some utopia, Australia was the land of the fair go. This was the mantra that I heard daily in my job at the Holocaust Museum, as heroic survivors described to students the welcome that they received in Australia, the 'farthest place from the horrors of Europe'. Australia was also the first of the Western powers to welcome refugees from the Second World War, and thus became home to the second largest survivor population per capita, after Israel itself. Police arrive on the scene at Miznon, an Israeli-owned restaurant in Melbourne, which was damaged after being targeted by protesters, on Friday, 4 July 2025. (Photo by Ye Myo Khant / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty Images) In all those years of educating tens of thousands of students, the most common question I heard was: Do you think it could happen again? Could it happen in Australia? My answers would vary, but they usually incorporated on the factors that led to the rise of Nazism — economic downturn, societal division, widespread resentment, scapegoating, and so on. But that was then, right? Could society once more allow for the erasure of Jewish people from every level of society and every rank in public service, even those who had filled them with such dignity and devotion? I am ashamed to admit, however, that I didn't see this coming. The cancellation of Jews from cultural spaces, the doxxing of hundreds, possibly thousands, a genuine feeling of unsafety in my own city. And then there were the scenes of celebration following Hamas's wanton killing spree on 7 October 2023, with some of my fellow citizens evidently exhilarated by the deeds of these 'freedom fighters'. And then came the graffiti on Jewish homes, the torched cars, the targeted businesses, the threats to Jewish politicians, the university encampments, the burning of synagogues. In the nearly two years since the terror attack on kibbutzim and communities in southern Israel, the West's decent into the latest wave of antisemitic hatred has shocked Jews to the core. For many of us, the sheer volume of antipathy being directed at us is not just disappointing and frightening — it is exhausting and bewildering. Jewish university students, including my own children, discover that are expected to be the defenders of Israeli policy, and face intimidation from angry groups of students who have no desire to listen. They are forced to dissociate themselves with our homeland, deny themselves certain truths to fit into certain spaces, and feel increasingly as though they are strangers on their own campuses. This is an experience that has been shared by other Australian Jews in other areas of life: hiding religious jewellery, staying away from certain postcodes, needing to remove identifying symbols. Just last Sunday, after the terrible events on 4 July, I joined with fellow Melburnian Jews at a 'solidarity' rally on the steps of State Parliament. After the rally concluding and I was making my way back to Flinders Street Station, I found myself rolling up the hostage poster that I had been carrying and tucked it into my bag. Why? I no longer felt safe in the city that I called home. Special Envoy Jillian Segal and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese attend a press conference on Thursday, 10 July, for the release of Segal's antisemitism plan. (Photo by Dan Himbrechts / AAP) On Thursday, the Australian federal government was handed a landmark report recommending tougher measures to tackle antisemitism — including defunding universities, revoking visas and increasing oversight of cultural institutions. Written by Special Envoy Jillian Segal, the report responds to the surge in antisemitic incidents since the 7 October Hamas attacks. The report recognises what many in the Jewish community have long known: this is no longer about isolated incidents; it is systemic and hence demands a 'whole-of-society response'. It calls for urgent reforms across education, immigration, media and online platforms to drive antisemitism to the margins of society. While it cannot repair the damage that has already been done, this report represents a welcome development. Nevertheless, most of the Jewish Australians I know remain on high alert. We await to see whether the Prime Minister will commit to implement the Special Envoy's recommendations. The Jewish people are well versed in the practise of resilience; but if we continue to live in a constant state of fight or flight, many may, in fact, choose flight. And I don't mean this in the figurative sense. Many will seriously contemplate packing up and leaving for Israel. It would be a major blow if Australia allowed itself to continue down this path of lawlessness and unsafety, with the departure of the Jewish people as the consequence. Tammy Reznik is a Melbourne based writer, commentator, certified educator and policy analyst.
West Australian
04-07-2025
- Politics
- West Australian
Age of sewer pipeline not a factor in Beaconsfield spill as park prepares to reopen
Bruce Lee Oval in Beaconsfield is set to reopen this month, weeks after a burst sewage pipeline left the park contaminated and flooded neighbouring streets. Water Corporation expects to hand the reserve back to the City of Fremantle on July 21, after the re-turfing of the grass is complete. 'Once handed back to the City, the park will be safe for public use,' a Water Corp spokesperson told The West Australian. However, questions have been raised about WA's water and sewerage infrastructure system as investigations continue into the cause of the sewage pipe failure. Asked by Nationals deputy leader Peter Rundle if a similar incident was likely to happen again, Water Corporation boss Pat Donovan told State Parliament that the pipe that burst was still well within its expected service life, so there is no clear explanation for the failure yet. 'This was a unique event, in that it was a pipeline that was well within its asset lifespan; it was a 1966 pipeline,' Mr Donovan told State Parliament during estimates on Thursday. 'The pipeline itself has an asset life of about 80 years, so we are still working through exactly what occurred in terms of the root cause of the incident.' Less than two weeks after the incident, the State Budget was released, which included an additional $35 million for the Water Corporation's asset maintenance budget. It's believed the burst in Beaconsfield occurred after sewage was diverted to the area, to relieve pressure following another sewage burst in Spearwood. It took the Water Corp several days to repair the burst pipe, causing considerable disruption to neighbouring residents. Mr Donovan thanked all those affected by the incident for their patience during the fix of what was 'undoubtedly a very unpleasant situation,' and said the corporation would learn from the incident. 'As we do with all such pipeline failures, we will be making sure that we learn from it and that it informs our asset management system going forward in terms of where we need to do proactive maintenance, further inspections or, indeed, asset replacement', he said. 'We will continue to ensure that we understand exactly what happened and make sure that we feed that back into our asset management system.'
West Australian
03-07-2025
- Politics
- West Australian
Anti-Israeli graffiti attack on Parliament sparks camera upgrade and push case for ‘Post and Boast' laws
An anti-Israel graffiti attack has sparked a review of State Parliament's security cameras, after the incident revealed a gap in coverage. Senior staff told a Budget estimates hearing on Thursday that the night-time attack was only partly captured on CCTV. 'The area is actually under CCTV surveillance. However, it was at night time, and the cameras aren't the night vision type of cameras,' Parliamentary Services Executive Manager Rob Hunter said. 'So there is a need to upgrade our cameras across the whole precinct. They go into over 100 cameras, so that one there did capture some things, including the offender coming down Harvest Terrace.' Mapping has started but funding is yet to be allocated to upgrade cameras, six weeks after a door of State Parliament and the footpath in West Perth were spray-painted. 'We expect that this year we will see some upgrades in our cameras across the precinct,' Mr Hunter said. It was also revealed that the 22-year-old charged over the damage has since paid 'restitution' of $2200 for the clean-up. It was also revealed he had posted video of the crime on social media, but proposed 'post and boast' laws set to carry a maximum penalty of three years jail are yet to pass Parliament and did not apply.
