Australia news live: shadow arts minister Angie Bell, a former musician, says AI giants must pay for content

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Australia news live: shadow arts minister Angie Bell, a former musician, says AI giants must pay for content

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LIVE Updated 3m ago

Nick Visser

Thu 2 Jul 2026 21.34 EDTFirst published on Thu 2 Jul 2026 17.25 EDT

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Key events

1h ago

Tens of thousands of Victorian drivers could get refunds after incorrect toll charges

2h ago

Shadow arts minister says AI companies need to do what everyone else does: ‘ask permission and pay for it’

2h ago

Coalition backs artists as Labor weighs AI plan

3h ago

Teen charged with murder after boy, 15, found with fatal stab wounds outside medical centre

3h ago

Former Sydney childcare worker sentenced to 12 years in jail

3h ago

Albanese defends gambling reforms, says he’s ‘not against someone having a punt’

3h ago

Pocock says it’s ‘tragic’ gambling reforms don’t go nearly far enough

4h ago

Moira Deeming launches court challenge as Victorian Liberals consider her fate

4h ago

Good morning

Shadow minister for the arts, Angie Bell. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

Shadow minister for the arts, Angie Bell. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

From 2h ago

The shadow minister for the arts, Angie Bell, who was a professional musician for 35 years, has said strong copyright protections are essential to ensure Australian creators were “respected, rewarded and able to continue to produce world-class work”. She said:

If AI companies want to use Australian creative work, they should do what everyone else does: ask permission and pay for it. That’s how copyright works, and that’s how it should stay.

Australian creativity is one of our greatest national assets – not a free resource for multinational tech companies. The Coalition will always back the right of artists to control their work and be fairly compensated when others profit from it.

This is about consent, fairness and respect for Australian creativity.

Guardian Australia is among the media companies supporting the campaign to safeguard copyright laws.

Angie Bell. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

Key events

1h ago

Tens of thousands of Victorian drivers could get refunds after incorrect toll charges

2h ago

Shadow arts minister says AI companies need to do what everyone else does: ‘ask permission and pay for it’

2h ago

Coalition backs artists as Labor weighs AI plan

3h ago

Teen charged with murder after boy, 15, found with fatal stab wounds outside medical centre

3h ago

Former Sydney childcare worker sentenced to 12 years in jail

3h ago

Albanese defends gambling reforms, says he’s ‘not against someone having a punt’

3h ago

Pocock says it’s ‘tragic’ gambling reforms don’t go nearly far enough

4h ago

Moira Deeming launches court challenge as Victorian Liberals consider her fate

4h ago

Good morning

Teen to stand trial over allegations of attempted plane hijacking

A teen accused of trying to hijack a commercial plane has been committed to stand trial in Victoria’s supreme court, AAP reports.

The now-19-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, appeared in a children’s court on Friday, formally pleading not guilty over the March 2025 incident.

It’s alleged the teen, dressed in high-vis clothing and carrying a toolbox, sneaked his way onto the Jetstar flight at Avalon Airport in Melbourne’s southwest.

The teen, who appeared sweaty and clammy, allegedly told cabin crew staff he had bombs in his bags and needed to go into the cockpit, court documents released to the media said.

The teen, who was 17 at the time, was charged with eight offences, including attempted hijacking and prejudicing the safe operation of an aircraft with intent to kill. The teen’s lawyers pushed for the case to remain in the children’s court but a magistrate in June determined it should be uplifted to a higher court.

On Friday, the teen formally pleaded not guilty to all of his eight charges and was committed to stand trial in the Victorian supreme court. He was remanded in custody to face a directions hearing on 21 July.

Harmful online content? Not our problem, X says

When Elon Musk’s X Corp (formerly Twitter) was asked what sort of “harmful experiences or content” digital platforms should stop allowing Australian kids to see, it said “none”.

The federal infrastructure department put out a survey at the end of last year to gauge what people thought about having a digital duty of care, which would make social media platforms take steps to stop foreseeable harm.

At the royal commission into antisemitism this morning, counsel assisting Richard Lancaster asked the department’s first assistant secretary Sarah Vandenbroek about the survey:

The first question was: ‘Which of the following kinds of harmful experiences or content do you think digital platforms should take steps to prevent for young Australians under 18 years?’

And then there’s a series of harmful forms of online content.

And X Corp ticked the box ‘none of the above’?

“Yes,” Vandenbroek said.

Lancaster then took her to a similar question, but this one was about adults. He said.

This is again a series of boxes that are available to be checked for various types of online hate speech and violent pornography and content that promotes seriously harmful behaviour. And again, X Corp ticked ‘none of the above’.

It was a “disappointing” response, Vandenbroek said.

Earlier, Vandenbroek agreed with Lancaster there was a financial incentive for social platforms to “promote or acquiesce in the spread of harmful content online because it is likely to be or more likely to be controversial or shared or commented on” because they rely on eyeballs to attract advertising.

Socceroos ‘prepared’ to face Egypt’s Mo Salah

The Socceroos are set to face Mo Salah in their last 32 match, though uncertainty hangs over whether the Egypt great will start the World Cup knockout in Dallas or come off the bench.

Salah was seen training with his teammates on Thursday and Egypt coach Hossam Hassan confirmed his “passionate” forward was fit enough to play.

Mo Salah (L) of Egypt attends a training session ahead of the match against Australia. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

“We look forward to him playing tomorrow, though we are not sure whether he is going to be in the starting lineup,” Hassan said, confirming the player himself was keen to play.

“[Salah] is looking forward to making his own contributions with his teammates tomorrow,” he said.

Australia coach Tony Popovic said his team will be prepared whether Salah is on the pitch or not.

Read more here:

Socceroos ‘prepared’ to face Egypt’s Mo Salah who is fit for last-32 clash after injury

Read more

Tens of thousands of Victorian drivers are set to get refunds from toll company Linkt after they were incorrectly charged on several toll roads.

Transurban, the company that runs Linkt, said the affected motorists may have had their vehicles wrongly classified on the CityLink and the West Gate Tunnel.

The company’s spokesperson told ABC Radio Melbourne this morning it had found about 90,000 vehicles that may have been incorrectly classified “to some degree”, encompassing about 1.4m trips.

“Customers don’t need to do anything. We’ll be in contact with them if they have been overcharged,” he told the ABC. “We will also be making an additional payment to customers to recognise the significant inconvenience that this has clearly caused.”

Linkt says on its website this morning:

We are working as quickly as possible to identify affected motorists, fix classifications and address any incorrect charges.

For affected customers, we will be providing toll credits or refunds that will cover the amount overcharged and recognise the inconvenience.

Inside the West Gate Tunnel in Melbourne. Photograph: Christian Pearson/West Gate Tunnel Project

Australians have more negative view of Israel than of China, Guardian Essential poll finds

Australians have a more negative view of Israel than of China, the latest Guardian Essential poll has found, with women and middle-aged people exhibiting the least positive perception of Israel.

The poll also finds Australians’ perceptions of Donald Trump have tumbled since his re-election, with fewer than a third of voters having a positive response to the US president.

The poll of 1,017 people last week asked respondents for their attitudes towards a number of countries including the US, China, Iran, Russia, Ukraine, the UK, Palestine and Israel. The highest favourability rating was towards the UK, with 53% of voters having either a positive or very positive reaction, followed by “European nations” with 47% favourability and Ukraine with 41%.

Read more here:

Australians have more negative view of Israel than of China, Guardian Essential poll finds

Read more

The shadow minister for the arts, Angie Bell, who was a professional musician for 35 years, has said strong copyright protections are essential to ensure Australian creators were “respected, rewarded and able to continue to produce world-class work”. She said:

If AI companies want to use Australian creative work, they should do what everyone else does: ask permission and pay for it. That’s how copyright works, and that’s how it should stay.

Australian creativity is one of our greatest national assets – not a free resource for multinational tech companies. The Coalition will always back the right of artists to control their work and be fairly compensated when others profit from it.

This is about consent, fairness and respect for Australian creativity.

Guardian Australia is among the media companies supporting the campaign to safeguard copyright laws.

Angie Bell. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

The federal Coalition has thrown its support behind creatives in their fight for fair compensation for their work, putting further pressure on the Albanese government as it weighs up a deal with big tech.

Musicians, artists and media companies are concerned the government could cave to pressure from artificial intelligence giants and weaken copyright laws in exchange for billions of dollars of promised investment in datacentres.

Guardian Australia this week reported that an industry proposal had been presented to ministers that would grant AI companies special exemptions to mine creative content.

In exchange, the companies would bankroll a $350m-per-year artists’ fund and commit more than $50bn worth of investment in datacentres.

The government has publicly and privately denied such a deal is on the table, insisting it has no plans to grant AI companies a so-called “text and data mining” exemption to copyright laws.

Microsoft and Nine strike AI deal

Microsoft and Nine have reached a deal for the tech giant’s AI chatbot, Copilot, to use the media company’s journalism in its search results.

Nine said the deal, which will be formally announced today, will see its content used by the AI bot. Users will be directed to Nine journalism from the Sydney Morning Herald, the Age and the Australian Financial Review when they conduct searches.

Copilot will display “snippets, headlines and summaries” before “funneling them towards” Nine properties.

Matt Stanton, Nine’s chief executive, told the SMH in a statement today:

As AI continues to evolve, the role of verified, premium journalism in grounding these outputs is essential. This collaboration is a win-win, delivering for users of AI while respecting copyright and protecting the long-term value of our intellectual property.

The Herald said the deal would unlock “significant potential new revenue streams” for Nine and its publications.

A teenager has been charged with murder after a 15-year-old boy was discovered with fatal stab wounds outside a community medical centre.

AAP reports the boy was found critically injured outside Craigieburn Community hospital in Melbourne’s north about 7.50pm on Wednesday. A staff member from the clinic rush

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