Australia news LIVE: Rental inflation expected to soar; Ukraine still waiting for urgent shipment of Australian coal

Global property giant Lendlease will shift away from the overseas construction markets and focus on its Australian businesses, which will incur costs of up to $1.475 billion, as part of its move to simplify its operations.

There will be a $500 million share buyback, a writedown of goodwill attached to the US and UK construction businesses, which arose because of the Bovis acquisition in 1999, and impairments of certain overseas development projects.

There will be staff cuts that could number more than 1000 in the overseas construction businesses.

In its investor update strategy announced on Monday, embattled chief executive Tony Lombardo said he had retained the investments platform in international markets “for several compelling reasons”.

Here’s the latest on this issue.

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles says the amount of antisemitism happening in Australia is at a level he has never seen in his life.

Over the weekend, antisemitic graffiti was written on Mount Scopus College – a Jewish school in the Melbourne suburb of Burwood – and Marles spent the morning speaking to staff and students.

“The levels of antisemitism that we have seen in the past few months [is] more than any that I’ve seen during my lifetime, and it must stop. It has no place in our country,” he told reporters this morning.

The sorts of words that we saw written on the walls of this school have no place in our society and it is critically important that … the nation stands up against this antisemitism, which is why we are here today.

The Jewish community are proud Australians and they have every right to be able to pursue their life as Australians to enjoy the benefits of our country, to do so in a way where they proudly wear the symbols of their culture without feeling abuse, without feeling intimidation, without feeling prejudice.”

NSW Premier Chris Minns has refused to reveal the date Sydney’s flashy new Metro line will open.

In a press conference from Waterloo station, the first of the new city stations to be completed, the premier said it was still due to open “in the middle of the year” but didn’t have an exact date to offer.

“That’s primarily because the independent safety auditor has to run with people on it first, so that they can simulate not just the operation of the line, but also things like medical emergencies and how people will respond in the event of something going wrong.”

In response to a question about whether it would open in August, Minns said he didn’t expect that to be the month it opened.

“You’re trying to get me to name a date, and I’m telling you I can’t do that … The reason we don’t have a date is not because we’re trying to be coy with you, or the potential commuters … it’s because it’s out of our hands and needs to be done by national independent auditors and as soon as they’re done, the line will be up and running,” he said.

High-profile presenter Lisa Wilkinson has asked Network Ten to pay more than $1.8 million in legal costs amid the financial fallout from Bruce Lehrmann’s failed defamation case.

During a costs hearing in Sydney today, Federal Court Justice Michael Lee said Wilkinson was seeking “in excess of $1.8 million”.

In the absence of agreement between the parties, Lee is expected to settle terms of reference for a referee, who will inquire into and report on specific costs of the case, including the costs of Ten and Wilkinson’s successful truth defence.

On May 10, Lee ordered Lehrmann to pay Ten and Wilkinson’s multimillion-dollar costs of the truth defence on an indemnity basis, which covers about 90 per cent of a successful party’s legal bill.

However, he said Lehrmann should only be on the hook for the costs of the media parties’ unsuccessful fallback defence of qualified privilege on an ordinary basis, which would cover about 70 per cent of their costs.

Here’s the full story.

NSW Premier Chris Minns is speaking from Waterloo, in Sydney’s inner-south, about the new Metro line due to open later this year.

Construction on the station has just been completed, and new housing on top of the station – including 70 social housing units – is due to finish next year.

Watch his press conference with Transport Minister Jo Haylen and Housing Minister Rose Jackson live below:

Students at the pro-Palestinian Australian National University in Canberra have been directed to vacate their encampment as it “poses an unacceptable safety risk”.

ANU students have maintained the Gaza Solidarity Encampment since April 29 to protest against the occupation of the Palestinian territories.

In a media release this morning, ANU stated the small number of remaining participants had been asked to move.

“The encampment is currently occupying the primary emergency evacuation site for the large number of people living in, visiting and using Kambri and the surrounding area,” the statement said.

“ANU identified an alternative evacuation point to service this highly used and heavily populated area of campus at the encampment’s inception.

“However, during a fire alarm and related evacuation of the residential hall and the cultural centre in Kambri, the alternate assembly area failed.

“This failure and unacceptable risk to health and safety was immediately reported by relevant university authorities and an investigation identified an intolerable risk to students, staff and wider public.”

The statement continued to say the university had not directed any students to stop protesting and they could continue to protest as long as it was respectful, peaceful and abided by the university codes of conduct.

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce has ranted about the ABC being the “mad left-wing” after Laura Tingle, chief political correspondent of the national broadcaster’s 7.30 program, reportedly said Australia was a racist country.

Reported in The Australian, Tingle allegedly voiced criticism against Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s migration policy at the Sydney Writers’ Festival yesterday and said, “We are a racist country, let’s face it.”

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek – who was speaking with Joyce on Seven’s Sunrise this morning– began her answer by saying that Australia was a great multicultural country and did not say if she thought Tingle was wrong.

Joyce, however, began his answer saying Australia was not a racist country.

“It’s the mad left-wing and that’s and that’s who runs the ABC and … [their] audiences dive through the floor,” he said.

“The question has to be asked, ‘Why do we fund something that only wants to talk to half of Australia?’ Not even half, maybe 10 per cent of those really well held views and they get all so frustrated as they’re reading Dostoevsky and they get all turn up inside out and then they go on a panel and say what’s the lefty issue du jour today?”

Through the rants and shouting, Plibersek intervened, saying, “A lot of farmers listen to Radio National in the tractor” before being asked again if she thinks Australia is a racist country.

“No, I think it’s a fantastic multicultural country, but we have to protect against incidents of racism, which occur in our community as they do in every community,” Plibersek said.

Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles is planning to visit a school in Melbourne that had antisemitic graffiti sprayed on it, as the government considers banning phrases under proposed hate speech laws.

The graffiti was uncovered at Mount Scopus’ Burwood campus over the weekend, and Marles labelled it an “appalling” act.

“I think all of us have been really confronted with the level of antisemitism that we are seeing in the last few months. It’s a level that I can’t remember in my lifetime, and it’s really important that Australians are standing with the Jewish community today,” Marles said on ABC’s RN Breakfast.

On the proposed bill to target hate speech, he said he wasn’t aware of how it would operate at this stage.

Returning to Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles, who was asked on ABC radio about providing additional support to Ukraine and targeting Russian assets.

Marles was asked whether the Australian government should have pledged money to a Czech government initiative to buy Ukraine hundreds of thousands of shells.

“I would emphasise that we are in a good conversation with Ukraine about how we can best provide our support,” he said.

“When I was visiting there has been a gratitude from Ukraine for Australia for the level of support we are giving.”

He said Australia had provided artillery to Ukraine, having sent 10,000 shells to the country.

He was also questioned on whether frozen Russian assets in Australia could be redirected to helping Ukraine fund its efforts.

“There are constitutional issues around simply seizing those assets and using them, but we have those assets frozen, and those steps come on top of significant sanctions we have in relation to trade,” Marles said.

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce and Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek have got into a heated debate about whether regulating vapes is a better approach than banning the products completely.

A report in The Daily Telegraph and The Herald Sun says NSW and Victoria could make $836 million and $765 million in GST revenue over four years respectively if vapes were regulated like tobacco.

Joyce told Seven’s Sunrise that, considering vapes do not have the effect of alcohol or drugs that inhibit a person’s capacity to drive or act in public, there should not be a complete ban on the product.

“We’ve got to be a realist and say that unless … you want people to take an unregulated product from China and the money just goes flying by to criminals in China and criminals in Australia, then you have to be realist and say, ‘Well, wouldn’t it be better if we have a regulated product that we can constrict the control and the revenue goes back to the Australian health system where it belongs?’ ” he said.

Plibersek disagreed, telling Joyce: “You might make a bit of money from tax revenue; we would spend billions in the health system cleaning up the mess of the vaping addiction that has taken hold of young people today.”

In response, Joyce said he agreed with Plibersek’s concern, but vapes were already available now despite the laws restricting their use.

“Well on that calculation … we legalise illicit drugs Barnaby because, you know, they’re still out there,” Plibersek hit back.

Joyce however landed the final quip, saying that comparing illicit drugs with vapes was not a valid argument.

“If you pull the cones and then jump in a car, you’re likely to kill somebody and … [it] inhibits how you act, it makes you dangerous, but the problem with [vapes] … it is unhealthy,” he said.