News update for Mon 2 June 2025

Your trusted guide to the top independent news and views of the day...

Jun 02, 2025

Welcome to your TrueNorth news update where every weekday afternoon we share curated articles from Australia’s independent news media sector.

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TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - and through 6 News here

Laura Tingle: After 45 years watching politics, here's my last wish for this government and its big mandate - The ABC

"Dear government, don't be terrible."

The 2025 election has been generally seen as a message of a rejection of the fringes — at both ends — and a move to the centre.

The prime minister has spoken about the idea of "progressive patriotism" as being central to his campaign

"We spoke about doing things the Australian way, not looking towards any other method or ideology from overseas," he said.

"At a time where there's conflict in the world, where people are often divided on the basis of race or religion, here in Australia, we can be a microcosm for the world."

So there's a nice thought.

But whether you want to prosecute a case for a nice thought, or a really complex policy agenda, you need to be both able and willing to sell it.

Greg Jericho says Labor’s super tax reveals a system built for the rich - Full Story Podcast

The Albanese government wants to reduce the tax breaks for those with more than $3m in superannuation. And while sections of the media are highly critical of the changes, others say the proposal does little to address intergenerational inequality in the tax system. Columnist Greg Jericho speaks to Reged Ahmad about why the media debate over a smaller tax break for Australia’s wealthiest 0.5% is divorced from reality.

Listen to the Full Story Podcast

North West Shelf gas extension will deliver ‘almost nothing’ to Australia’s public purse - The Guardian

Experts say hugely profitable east coast LNG producers pay little in resources rent tax and Woodside project won’t help country’s energy shift.

Extending the licence for the North West Shelf gas project won’t assist Australia’s energy transition, experts say, even as it allows Woodside and its foreign partners to profit from the nation’s mineral wealth while delivering “almost nothing” to the national purse.

Environmental and Indigenous groups were dismayed this week after the environment minister, Murray Watt, granted conditional approval to extend the Woodside Energy-operated NW Shelf gas project out to 2070.

Karen Middleton: The Senate’s status seekers - Inside Story

As the Nats formally walked back into the coalition on Wednesday, leader David Littleproud took a swipe at the “gossip and backgrounding” of the past week. Alluding to leadership rumblings over how he’d handled talks with Liberal counterpart Sussan Ley — the talks that produced a sensational week-long bust-up — Littleproud was keen to emphasise that he and his colleagues were getting on with the job. Unlike those engaging in all that speculation, he insisted, the Nats were having “real conversations” tackling “real problems.”

Some of those conversations — and problems — are now coming to light.

Also read >

Senate preferences playing a bigger role - The Tally Room
Taxpayers to pay Pauline Hanson’s PHON $3m for no seats - Rex Patrick for Michael West Media

Michael Pascoe: A dying demographic: how Murdoch is slowly killing the Liberal Party - Michael West Media

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is dragging the Liberal Party down “one funeral at a time”. And visa-versa.

Two swimmers struggling in the water might survive individually but both are more likely to drown if they grab the other. The Murdochs’ Australian operation and the Liberal Party are like that, captives of the mutual base they have created, dragging each other down.

Quite simply, Murdoch is killing the Liberal Party, locked in a vicious cycle of needing to feed its audience the echo chamber it demands, ensuring in the process that the Liberal base remains disconnected from modern Australia, reinforcing the narrow conservatism that has led the coalition into the electoral wilderness.

Also read > Six quotes that prove Australian media failed on the Bondi Junction attacks - Crikey (paywall)

Inside story: Advance ‘siphoned’ Liberal resources -The Saturday Paper

In the 28 days since the election, Liberal Party operatives have begun to cast doubt on the effectiveness of Advance – despite the right-wing lobby having a war chest of more than $15.6 million and being the country’s richest non-party group.

“Not only did they siphon precious resources from our campaign, donors who might otherwise have given their money to us, but their messaging reinforced the perception that we were joined at the hip to Donald Trump,” says one Liberal strategist, who was based at the Coalition’s Parramatta campaign headquarters.

Also > Zoe Daniel says 'lies and attacks' impacted election outcome in Goldstein - ABC Radio Melbourne

Today’s cartoon by Fiona Katauskas

TODAY’S BREAKING NEWS UPDATES: See all the breaking news of the day through The Guardian here - and through 6 News here

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Hugh White: In Australia’s post-US future, we must find our own way with China - The Guardian

hanks to US regional strategic primacy, Australia has been virtually immune from the threat of direct military attack since the defeat of Japan in 1945. Now that is changing. In future it will no longer be militarily impossible for China to attack Australia directly. And not just China: other major regional powers, especially India and eventually perhaps Indonesia, will have the potential to launch significant attacks on Australia.

That does not mean we now face a serious threat of Chinese military attack. Today the only circumstance in which Australia could credibly find itself under attack from China would be if Australia joined the US in a war with China over Taiwan.

Also read >

The Grand Tour - June 1 - Natasha Cica and Georgina Godwin - The Sunday Shot Podcast

The Sunday Shot goes to Europe! In honour of Dave’s Continental sojourn we examine the state of Europe with Georgina Godwin in London and Natasha Cica in Belgrade. Plus an interview with the Climate Council’s Greg Bourne on the implications of the extension of the North West Shelf gas project. Spoiler alert: not good.

Listen to The Sunday Shot Podcast

Elon Musk’s Legacy Is Disease, Starvation and Death - The New York Times

Musk’s absurd scheme to save the government a trillion dollars by slashing “waste, fraud and abuse” has been a failure. The Department of Government Efficiency claims it’s saved $175 billion, but experts believe the real number is significantly lower. Meanwhile, according to the Partnership for Public Service, which studies the federal work force, DOGE’s attacks on government personnel — its firings, rehirings, use of paid administrative leave and all the associated lack of productivity — could cost the government upwards of $135 billion this fiscal year, even before the price of defending DOGE’s actions in court. Musk’s rampage through the bureaucracy might not have created any savings at all, and if it did, they were negligible.

Now Musk’s Washington adventure is coming to an end, with the disillusioned billionaire announcing that he’s leaving government behind. “It sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in D.C., to say the least,” he told The Washington Post.

Celeste Liddle: Jacinta Nampijinpa Price knows where her power base lies, and her time may come again - Crikey

Jacinta Nampijinpa Price is ambitious, and for a very long time, she has shown an ability to read the play, tap into the section of the community she knows can deliver her power.

There is absolutely nothing surprising about the career trajectory of Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price. As a longtime observer of her, I was congratulated the other day because my predictions about her current predicament have been bang on. But Price has made no secrets of her goals. Indeed, she has been incredibly consistent, and perhaps the surprise lies more in who she is — a reactionary right Indigenous figure going for the top positions — than anything she has done.

Right now, her timing is off, but that doesn’t mean her rise will be permanently cut short.

Also read > Maidens of the crumb: Hume, Henderson and Price demotions are no great loss for women - Rachel Withers for Crikey (paywall)

U.S. MILITARY CONTRACTOR BACKING AUSTRALIAN NUCLEAR WASTE DUMP - Declassified Australia

A US military mega-contractor assisting an Australian company to develop a proposal for a nuclear waste dump in Central Australia has a flawed safety record in handling nuclear waste storage.

In Alice Springs, Central Arrernte Country, the giant American military contractor, Amentum Holdings, is responsible for the day-to-day running of facilities for the secretive US-Australian Pine Gap satellite surveillance base. Now it’s involved in developing a proposed nuclear waste dump in Central Australia.

Declassified Australia can reveal that Amentum’s Alice Springs-based workforce of 400 people provides a myriad of support services to keep the ever-expanding base functioning, including infrastructure management, facilities operations, and maintenance services.