Calls for the government to lower the voting age to 16; President-elect Donald Trump travels to Texas for a SpaceX rocket launch; And in football, the ParaMatildas become the first Australians to win a World Cup.
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TRANSCRIPT
In this bulletin;
- Calls for the government to lower the voting age to 16;
- President-elect Donald Trump travels to Texas for a SpaceX rocket launch;
- And in football, the ParaMatildas become the first Australians to win a World Cup.
Young people are calling on the government to lower the voting age to 16.
Advocacy group Make It 16 gathered at Parliament House today demanding the government stop ignoring younger Australians.
The group says 16 and 17 year olds are politically engaged and want a say in government decisions that affect their lives and future.
Independent Senator Monique Ryan says she is in full support of lowering the voting age.
"As a former neurologist I can tell you that young people have the mental and emotional maturity to make a decision about who should govern them and they should be given that opportunity given the fact that in this place we make decisions everyday which affect their futures."
—
New legislation will be introduced this week requiring employers to set gender targets for boards, narrow pay gaps and provide flexible working hours.
The announcement comes as the Workplace Gender Equality Agency finds Australia's gender pay gap is still more than 20 per cent.
And that gap is even bigger among chief executive officers at 25 per cent.
The gender pay gap has shrunk year by year - which has been largely fuelled by growth in the pay of the lowest-earning women in the workforce.
Labor minister Kate Thwaites says the new legislation will help drive down the gap further.
"This is us being serious about making sure we are supporting Australian women, that we're closing the gender pay gap, and we're doing the work that we know is good for our country as a whole."
—
SpaceX has launched another Starship rocket, with U-S President-elect Donald Trump flying to Texas to watch.
It's the latest sign of a deepening bond between Mr Trump and Elon Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX.
The launch saw the successful ignition of one of the spacecraft's engines in space before the spacecraft descended and splashed down into the Indian Ocean.
The company had also intended to try and catch the rocket's booster in mid-air using giant mechanical arms.
But the catch was called off four minutes into the test flight for unspecified reasons.
It was the sixth test for the world's biggest and most powerful rocket that SpaceX and NASA hope to use to get astronauts back on the moon and eventually Mars.
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Greens Senator Larissa Waters says women in Australia must be assured safe and affordable access to abortion care is secure, as her party calls on the Opposition leader to remove an anti-abortion bill from the Senate.
The private senators' bill is co-sponsored by the Queensland National Matt Canavan and South Australian Liberal Alex Antic, and has been on the Senate notice paper for two years.
Senator Waters announced she would move a motion on November 26 to have the Human Rights (Children Born Alive Protection) Bill discharged.
This comes as Mr Dutton called for Coalition MPs to avoid public debate about abortion.
Ms Waters says if the Opposition leader wants to avoid a debate on the issue, he should assure Australian women their abortion rights are secure.
"I understand that's a bit inconvenience for the liberal party to have this issue on the agenda, but I'm afraid if Mr Dutton says he doesn't want this to be an issue, then he needs to ask his senators to remove a piece of legislation that is currently on the notice paper that is a thinly veiled attack on women's rights to decide what they want to do with their bodies."
Meanwhile Nationals Senator Matt Canavan says the debate shouldn't be silenced.
"This is an attempt to censor and silence debate in this country. This attempt is simply to take a bill off the notice newspaper. This bill is not going to a vote at this time."
Mr Canavan claimed two babies are born alive a week in Australia, while experts have previously warned “born alive” campaigns are often riddled with misinformation and use misleading statistics.
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The ParaMatildas have become the first Australian football team to ever win a World Cup.
The team beat the USA 6-2 in the 2024 International Federation of Cerebral Palsy Football Women's World Cup final in Spain overnight.
The USA scored two goals in the opening six minutes.
But Australian goalkeeper and captain Katelyn Smith surprised everyone by scoring three goals.
Georgia Beikoff scored two goals and Annmarie de Uriarte another to round out the emphatic win.
The team will maintain their ranking as the world No. 1.
