Australians are being warned to prepare for trade-offs in areas such as housing if the nation’s productivity push is to be successful.

Productivity Commission chair Danielle Wood is calling on Australia to adopt a “growth mindset” to prioritise economic outcomes and boost living standards.

That means changing corporate taxes to promote investment, simplifying regulations, speeding up housing and energy approvals and ensuring AI adoption is not undermined by unnecessary regulation, among other suggestions.

It comes as the commission prepares to release a series of reports detailing how Australia can get productivity moving again.

“Australia should be a place where children born today can expect to live better and more prosperous lives than the generations who have come before them,” Ms Wood said.

“Productivity growth is essential to fulfilling that promise.”

But productivity growth has plummeted in recent years.

How much Australia produces with the same amount of workers has grown at just under 0.4 per cent per year since 2015, compared with the 60-year average of 1.6 per cent. 

That’s been caused in part by governments ignoring or minimising economic growth when making policy choices in recent years, according to a paper released by the commission.

Policymakers have made it harder that it should be to start a business or build essential infrastructure such as housing or renewable energy because they have failed to weigh trade-offs effectively, been too risk-averse or “overly influenced by vocal stakeholder groups”.

Governments must balance competing objectives and make choices that improve Australians’ overall wellbeing, even if those decisions might negatively affect other goals.

“Bringing a growth mindset to policy decisions means elevating economic growth and its benefits,” Ms Wood said.

“That doesn’t mean policymakers should ignore other objectives, but it does mean being clear-eyed about the trade-offs.”

The paper lays the groundwork for five forthcoming reports the commission is preparing to release before an economic roundtable convened by Treasurer Jim Chalmers.

He said the report made clear the productivity problem had been around for decades and almost every comparable country had the same challenge.

“The best way to strengthen our economy and make it more productive is to work through the issues in a methodical and considered way in collaboration with business, unions and the broader community,” Dr Chalmers said.

In its submission to the roundtable, a joint group of industry associations including the Business Council of Australia and the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry outlined four priority areas for reform.

They include reforming research and development funding models to boost innovation; cutting the regulatory burden by 25 per cent by 2030; co-ordinating and unifying planning processes to speed up project approvals; and committing to comprehensive tax reform.

“We need to cut unhelpful red tape, streamline planning, fix the tax system and improve incentives for investment,” Business Council chief executive Bran Black said.

“These policies can deliver benefits for economic activity across the whole country and importantly ensure future generations aren’t worse off.”

Australia’s move to lift restrictions on US beef is unlikely to shift the dial on tariff negotiations, as the nation’s products face the possibility of even steeper duties.

The Albanese government will allow access to US beef that has been raised in Canada or Mexico but processed in America, following a safety review.

Australia is subject to a baseline 10 per cent tariff applied by the Trump administration and has been keeping an eye on the trade negotiations of other countries.

AMP chief economist Shane Oliver said Donald Trump’s flagged higher tariffs might include the nation’s exports.

“The risk for Australia is that we may be lucky to hang on to 10 per cent, which could actually turn out to be higher,” he told AAP.

“This (beef decision) might help us hang on to 10 per cent or avoid a worse outcome, but I don’t think there’s any guarantees of that.”

American beef was banned from Australia almost two decades ago following an outbreak of mad cow disease.

Mr Trump has pressured the government to ease restrictions as Labor argues for an exemption from the tariffs as part of the US president’s deepening trade war.

Former ambassador to the US Arthur Sinodinos said while biosecurity investigations can take a while to finalise, it was a “sensible outcome”.

“The challenge here is it doesn’t look like we’re putting together a package deal,” he said.

“It’d be better if there was a package approach to this if we’re seeking to gather an overall trade outcome with the US.”

Australian Farm Institute executive director Katie McRobert said the cattle industry has been “extremely nervous” about biosecurity traceability from different parts of the north and South America regions.

“We wouldn’t expect a significant impact on Australian producers from the potential to import American beef … because we already produce far more beef in Australia than we can possibly eat,” she said.

Trade Minister Don Farrell said he didn’t have any meetings scheduled with American counterparts after last meeting US trade representative Jamieson Greer on the sidelines of an OECD ministerial meeting in Paris in June.

Senator Farrell said Mr Greer didn’t raise beef concerns at that meeting. 

“We believe that America should lift those tariffs on Australia, there’s no justification whatsoever for the United States to apply tariffs to Australia,” he told reporters in Canberra on Thursday.

“We have a free trade agreement, that agreement makes it very clear that it’s a tariff free arrangement.”

Senator Farrell also denied the move was to create a bargaining chip.

The Philippines and Japan recently struck agreements with the US to lower their tariff rates, but both are still above the 10 per cent baseline.

The United Kingdom has fast become one of Australia’s most important defence allies amid turmoil under the Trump administration, a security analyst says.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong and Defence Minister Richard Marles will host their UK counterparts David Lammy and John Healey in Sydney for joint talks on Friday.

Australian Strategic Policy Institute senior analyst Alex Bristow said ministerial meetings moving to more of a six-monthly cycle rather than their traditional annual timeline highlighted strengthened ties between the two nations.

“The tempo of it increasing, I think, is a signal that Britain is moving into an elite category,” he told AAP.

The UK was probably third behind Japan and the US in terms of how strategically significant the defence relationship was to Australia, Dr Bristow said.

The UK’s Carrier Strike Group, led by Royal Navy flagship HMS Prince of Wales, arrived in Darwin on Wednesday as Australia’s largest military exercise Talisman Sabre is underway.

It’s the first UK carrier strike group to visit Australia since 1997.

It is an international task group which includes five core ships, 24 jets, and 17 helicopters, centred around the flagship aircraft carrier.

UK High Commissioner to Australia Sarah MacIntosh said the arrival of the strike group was a demonstration of commitment to the region and the strong relationship with Canberra.

“This is an anchor relationship in a contested world,” she said.

Dr Bristow said Australia should be welcoming carrier strike groups from European countries.

He said NATO had identified China as a threat to its interests as Beijing continues to collaborate with Russia and North Korea.

“It’s entirely in the interests of European allies in NATO to be working with Indo-Pacific allies,” Dr Bristow said.

The US has promised to sell Australia nuclear-powered submarines under the AUKUS agreement, which has since been put under review by the Trump administration.

The three-nation pact, which includes the UK, will likely be discussed during the high level talks in Sydney.

Defence analysts believe a likely outcome of the review will be a request for more money from Australia towards the US submarine industrial base, rather than the deal being scrapped.

The Australian government has said it remains confident in the nuclear-submarine deal being delivered.

President Donald Trump plans to step foot in the Federal Reserve as his allies scrutinise its expensive building renovations, a highly personal and confrontational escalation of his campaign to pressure the central bank to slash interest rates.

Trump administration officials have used concerns about the building overhaul to cast doubt on Fed Chairman Jerome Powell’s decision-making. 

They were scheduled to inspect the site on Thursday, and the White House announced late Wednesday that the president would also be visiting. 

The visit reflects Trump’s disregard for the traditional independence of the Fed, which plays a foundational role in the American economy by setting monetary policy that is supposed to be free of political influence.

While previous presidents have criticised the Fed’s decisions, Trump’s sustained campaign is an unusual and, his critics say, dangerous departure from the norm. 

He has called on Powell to resign, insulted him repeatedly and suggested he could be fired.

More recently, Trump has said he has no plans to oust Powell, which could be illegal. 

Pushing Powell out also would send shockwaves through global markets, potentially having the opposite effect that Trump wants as he pushes for lower borrowing costs. 

Trump, a Republican, appointed Powell during his first term, and President Joe Biden, a Democrat, extended his tenure. 

Powell’s term doesn’t end until next May, and he’s previously insisted that he will serve until then. 

Not everyone in Trump’s administration agrees with the president’s contention that Powell needs to resign.

“There’s nothing that tells me that he should step down right now,” said Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, whom Trump has floated as a potential replacement for Powell, in a recent interview with Fox Business. 

“He’s been a good public servant.”

Trump has criticised Powell for months because the chair has kept the short-term interest rate the Fed controls at 4.3 per cent this year, after cutting it three times last year. 

Powell says the Fed wants to see how the economy responds to Trump’s sweeping tariffs on imports, which Powell says could push up inflation. 

Powell’s caution has infuriated Trump, who has demanded the Fed cut borrowing costs to spur the economy and reduce the interest rates the federal government pays on its debt. 

Trump will likely be disappointed again soon. 

A key Fed committee is expected to keep rates where they are when it meets next week. 

The Fed has been renovating its Washington headquarters and a neighbouring building. 

With some of the construction occurring underground and as building materials have soared in price after inflation spiked in 2021 and 2022, the estimated cost has ballooned from $US1.9 billion ($A2.9 billion) to about $US2.5 billion ($A3.8 billion). 

When asked last week if the costly rebuilding could be grounds to fire Powell, Trump said: “I think it sort of is”. 

“When you spend $US2.5 billion ($A3.8 billion) on, really, a renovation. I think it’s really disgraceful,” Trump said.

Brisbane writer Siang Lu has won the Miles Franklin Literary Award for his comical novel Ghost Cities, after more than 200 publishers rejected the manuscript.

And the 39-year-old author isn’t joking when he says he was shocked to find out he’d won the $60,000 prize after being shortlisted for the first time.

“I just sat down and actually lost all feeling in my hands and legs, and I lost my voice,” he said.

“It was one of the first times in my life where I actually had to ask someone with complete seriousness, to just tell me that I wasn’t dreaming.”

Australia’s most prestigious literary award was announced at a ceremony in Sydney on Thursday night, at which Lu revealed that he finished the manuscript for Ghost Cities a decade ago in 2015, but it was rejected more than 200 times by publishers in Australia and overseas.

“I used to print my rejections and Blu Tack them on the glass pane between my office and my bedroom … eventually, they grew so numerous that I could no longer see through the glass,” he said in his acceptance speech.

Having finally been published by University of Queensland Press, the winning book has been described by critics as both intellectually ambitious and zany, and it’s been shortlisted for no fewer than seven book awards.

The Miles Franklin is the pick of the bunch, of course, and Lu says his win changes things dramatically – not only financially, but in terms of recognition for the quality of his work.

Ghost Cities was inspired by megacities built in China during the nation’s real estate boom, many of which have been left uninhabited and falling into ruin.

It weaves together multiple stories – including that of a young man who is fired from his job as a translator at the Chinese consulate in Sydney, when it is discovered he is monolingual and has been relying on Google Translate.

There’s also a chess automaton with a secret, and an ancient emperor who creates a thousand replicas of himself.

Since it hit the shelves in 2024, Lu has found what he describes as a perverse joy in chatting to his readers, as they try to guess what Ghost Cities is actually saying.

The answer is less complex than readers might imagine: “It is trying to be funny,” he promises. 

The 2025 shortlist was dominated by writers of colour, including veteran Brian Castro, who has made the shortlist four times, and two-time winner Michelle de Kretser.

The six authors shortlisted for the Miles Franklin also receive $5000 from the Copyright Agency’s Cultural Fund.

Australia and other nations have an obligation to curb carbon emissions and to redress climate change damage in other countries, an international court has found.

The non-binding advisory opinion by the International Court of Justice at The Hague in the Netherlands paves the way to require high carbon-emitting countries to pay reparations to low-emitting countries.

“For young people and for future generations, this opinion is a lifeline and an opportunity to protect all that we hold dear,” said Vishal Prashad, the director of a group of island law students who spearheaded the campaign with the backing of the Vanuatu government.

“Today is historic for climate justice and we are one step closer to realising this.”

Vanuatu’s government had been engaging the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change for 30 years before the decision, the nation’s climate change adaptation minister Ralph Regenvanu said.

“Today’s ruling confirmed states do have legal obligations to act on climate change,”  Mr Regenvanu told reporters.

“And these obligations are grounded in international law, they’re grounded in human rights law, and in the duty to protect our environment.”

Australia’s response to the ruling would dramatically impact its relationships with Pacific neighbours, La Trobe University anthropology and development lecturer Aidan Craney said. 

“We can either show solidarity or lose all legitimacy,” he said.

The legality of Australia’s continued support for and subsidisation of fossil fuel projects could come under scrutiny after the decision, Grata Fund founder Isabelle Reinecke said.

“This historic ruling by the world’s highest court officially marks the end of an era of states ducking and weaving legal responsibility for climate harm,” she said

The international court’s opinion would pave the way for exchanges between climate change-impacted states and large polluting nations over reparations, Australian National University international law expert Donald Rothwell said.

“If settlements are not reached there is now a clearer pathway forward for international climate litigation by the specially impacted states,” he said.

Importantly, all states – not just signatories to the Climate Change Convention, the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement – would face obligations under the court’s advice.

While no judgment had been issued, advisory opinions could still be very influential in the interpretation and development of international law.

“In this way, the ICJ advisory opinion does not only clarify existing rules, it creates legal momentum,” said Sebastien Duyck, senior attorney at the Center For International Environmental Law.

ActionAid Australia executive director Michelle Higelin said the ruling was clear and Australia must play its part to keep global heating to 1.5C.

“This is not a choice, this is an obligation to take stronger and more urgent action,” she said.

ActionAid wants the government to “urgently” transition away from fossil fuels and support climate adaptation efforts in low-income countries.

Oxfam climate change policy lead Nafkote Dabi agreed.

“Rich countries have to increase their financing to Global South countries to help them reduce emissions and protect their people from past and future harm,” Ms Dabi said.

“This is not a wish-list – it is international law.”

Global science and policy institute, Climate Analytics, which has an Australia-Pacific region office, said the finding foreshadowed potentially serious legal penalties.

Action could be taken under customary international law if countries climate targets undershoot the Paris Agreement to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.

Australia’s commitment to the agreement includes reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 43 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030 and achieving net-zero emissions by 2050.

“The degradation of the climate system and of other parts of the environment impairs the enjoyment of a range of rights protected by human rights law,” presiding judge Yuji Iwasawa said, handing down the court’s opinion.

The court decision “confirms that states’ obligations to protect human rights require taking measures to protect the climate system … including mitigation and adaptation measures,” Judge Hilary Charlesworth, an Australian member of the court, said in a separate opinion.

A response was sought from the federal government.

Hopes of near-term relief for borrowers have taken a hit after the Reserve Bank’s governor said it wouldn’t have cut interest rates even with a surprise jump in unemployment.

Michele Bullock brushed off suggestions the central bank was blindsided by a spike in the jobless rate to 4.3 per cent less than two weeks after the central bank board held interest rates steady in a split decision that shocked markets.

In minutes detailing the early July meeting, board members noted the jobs market was still tight and it was prudent to wait for more data, including unemployment figures, to confirm inflation was sustainably on target before cutting rates.

But asked on Thursday if the board’s decision would have been different if it had had access to that data before its last meeting, Ms Bullock said she did not believe so.

“The monthly numbers jump around,” she told an Anika Foundation fundraising lunch in Sydney.

“You’ve got to take a little bit of signal from monthly numbers. But I wouldn’t over-interpret every single monthly number.”

The unemployment rate for the June quarter was in line with the RBA’s prediction, Ms Bullock said.

While the spike in unemployment in June surprised market economists, a consensus of whom predicted the rate to remain at 4.1 per cent, the central bank saw it coming.

“Some of the coverage of the latest data suggested this was a shock – but the outcome for the June quarter was in line with the forecast we released in May,” Ms Bullock said in a prepared speech.

“That on its own suggests that the labour market moved a little further towards balance, as we were anticipating.”

The comments pushed back on expectations a rate cut at the next RBA meeting in August is inevitable.

The rates market has priced in a 25 basis point cut on August 12, which would bring the official cash rate down to 3.6 per cent.

NAB head of market economics Tapas Strickland said the comments leaned slightly hawkish and highlighted the importance of upcoming inflation data.

Volatile monthly CPI data suggested inflation might not have fallen as much as the RBA had forecast, which could also threaten an August cut if confirmed in quarterly data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.

“We still think it will show inflation declining slowly towards 2.5 per cent, but we are looking for data to support this expectation,” Ms Bullock said.

While the jobs market was easing, it was unlikely unemployment was about to jump up above RBA forecasts.

“We do highlight that that’s a possibility, but the forward looking indicators, including vacancies, including lay-off rates, including the information we’re getting from liaison (with businesses), aren’t suggesting that anything’s falling off a cliff any time soon,” she said.

Ms Bullock also signalled concerns over the way Donald Trump was exerting political pressure on her US counterpart Jerome Powell.

The president has ramped up pressure on the Federal Reserve chair in recent weeks, calling him a “numbskull” and saying he will be out of the job in eight months for resisting demands to lower interest rates.

“I would say, wouldn’t I, that I think central bank independence is very important,” Ms Bullock said. 

“Certainly, what’s going on in the United States is challenging that.”

The Fed was doing its job by focusing on the economy and not getting drawn into the political debate, she said.

About one in seven Australian workers will have their penalty rates increased and their employers will not be able to reduce them, under changes proposed by the Albanese government. 

One of those workers is service assistant Ruth Sumner, who for 25 years had to struggle to provide for her kids. 

Although her children have moved out, she still has to look for deals to pay for her basic needs, sacrificing her quality of life. 

“It’s sad because everything’s going up. It’s your power and everything,” Ms Sumner told AAP. 

“I look at an apple that I really like but if there’s one two dollars cheaper, I’m going to buy the cheaper one.”

She stands to benefit from a bill Labor has introduced to the lower house that seeks to enshrine higher rates of pay for award workers when they work late nights, early hours, weekends and public holidays.

If it is passed, award workers will earn a base weekend penalty rate of about $40 an hour.

While rates can vary depending on an employee’s specific award or agreement applicable to that industry, common pay rates for workers on a Sunday are double time (200 per cent) or time and a half (150 per cent).

A calculation of rates on the Fair Work Commission’s website shows a common penalty for a casual hospitality Saturday shift to be $40.85 per hour, while a Sunday shift could bring in $47.65 per hour.

Ms Rishworth said award workers deserved to have their wages protected.

“Wages of low-paid workers should not go backwards because that’s not fair and not what Australians expect of our workplace relation system,” Ms Rishworth said as she introduced the bill. 

“The bill is designed to be simple, fair, and workable.”

The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said the bill was anything but simple and fair, calling it a “backwards step” and “out of touch.”

Acting chief executive David Alexander said it made negotiating wage changes harder for employers, especially small businesses who already struggle to work through the “complex” fair work act.

“Tying Australian businesses up in knots around workplace systems has the effect of strangling growth and that means less jobs and lower wages,” Mr Alexander said.

“This bill is at odds with the government’s plans to improve productivity, and instead injects more rigidity and complexity into the fair work laws.”

Peak retail and business groups also put forward proposals for large companies to opt out of providing penalty rates for staff in exchange for a base-level pay rise.

Opposition employment spokesman Tim Wilson said the coalition supported penalty rates.

“We will work through the legislation to make sure we consult the businesses and those it’s going to impact to get the best outcome,” he told AAP.

The coalition also wants to assess how the changes would interact with the Fair Work Commission, which would be required to apply the new rules.

A longstanding inner-city support hub for Aboriginal women will get a big cash injection to protect them from financial abuse.

The Mudgin-gal centre in Sydney’s Redfern has operated for more than three decades, providing a safe space with programs and facilities for women, mothers and families experiencing domestic violence or homelessness.

Sometimes the centre simply serves as a place to drop in for a yarn, and its chief executive Ashlee Donohue says provides a sanctuary for women no matter who they are or what they have experienced.

Mudgin-gal’s important work is expanding with a grant of up to $200,000 and mentoring from the Commonwealth Bank to tackle financial abuse in the community.

The support will allow for culturally safe programs like their trauma-informed sacred circle initiative, which focuses on healing while building financial literacy so women can gain an understanding and independence around money.

“This is a big deal for us,” Ms Donohue told AAP.

“The fact that there’s mentoring with it, we’re not just guessing, we’re getting proper information from the bank, and that’s remarkable.”

The grant is part of the bank’s Next Chapter Innovation program, which invests in First Nations-led initiatives to provide culturally informed, practical responses to financial abuse.

Other program grant recipients include the Queensland-based Mookai Rosie-Bi-Bayan, which provides healthcare and accommodation to women and children in Cape York, the Northern Peninsula Area and Torres Strait.

The Next Chapter Innovation program was established to help “break the cycle” of financial abuse, Commonwealth Bank’s Indigenous business products executive manager Mitchell Heritage said.

“We are proud to back community-led organisations that are delivering real change on the ground,” he said.

Financial abuse can look different in Indigenous communities with family pressure and exploitation of cultural obligations sometimes used to control finances, Ms Donohue said.

Many women who are in a financially abusive situation may not be able to recognise it as such she said, which is why it is important to build financial literacy.

“There’s a need for our women to understand finances better,” Ms Donohue said.

“In reality we’ve always been behind the eight ball with money in this country – our ancestors worked for no wages – so this skilling up and sharing knowledge in this space hasn’t really been done before and that in itself is innovation.”

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The speed of Australia’s decision to lift restrictions on US beef has raised eyebrows in the cattle industry, breeding calls for an independent, scientific review.

The federal government has revealed Australia will allow access to US beef that had been raised in Canada or Mexico but processed in America.

The government has faced pressure from US President Donald Trump to ease restrictions as it seeks an exemption from wide-ranging tariffs.

Its announcement was made early on Thursday morning, less than a day before industry groups were briefed and hours before the full details were made public on the government’s website.

While Australia’s cattle industry groups have remained generally unperturbed, there have been calls for an independent, scientific panel to review the government’s risk assessment.

“We remain concerned at the speed of this – we were a little surprised,” veterinarian and Cattle Australia senior adviser Chris Parker told AAP.

“There’s some bits and pieces that we need to get a very clear understanding of, but we don’t have at this stage due to the speed of this announcement.

“It’s all well and good to say, ‘We branded a cow or a steer, we put a … tag in there’, but what’s the system that actually underpins that?”

The US has been able to send beef to Australia since 2019.

Beef raised in Canada or Mexico was barred because of concerns the latter’s livestock tracking system could inadvertently lead producers to import product from parts of the continent where there were disease outbreaks.

Thursday’s decision was made only after the US introduced more robust movement controls in recent months, allowing for improved identification and tracing throughout the supply chain.

“We have not compromised on biosecurity,” Agriculture Minister Julie Collins told reporters in Canberra.

“(The department) is satisfied the strengthened control measures put in place by the US effectively manage biosecurity risks.”

But tuberculosis and brucellosis remain significant concerns, Dr Parker said.

Australia is free of the diseases, but both can spread among cows and humans, which means the government must be assured its expanded supply chain is free and safe from them.

The US also implements strict controls over Australian imports, such as regular facility audits and government officials undergoing final inspections, and Dr Parker says Australia should have equivalent arrangements for American beef.

“I’m not saying that US product is not safe – what I’m saying is they have some things we don’t and we need appropriate processes that assure us the supply chain remains safe,” Dr Parker said.

The Nationals have echoed calls for an independent review after its leader David Littleproud accused the government of trading away biosecurity protocols to “appease Donald Trump”.

For months, the government has considered using US beef as a bargaining chip in its attempts to carve out an exemption from Mr Trump’s tariffs.

Asked whether tariffs had influenced Thursday’s announcement, Ms Collins insisted the decision followed a decade-long review process, saying she had kept the industry up to date since the US requested expanded market access in 2020.

Australian Meat Industry Council CEO Tim Ryan said the move was not a surprise, while Cattle Australia chief executive Will Evans acknowledged the importance of maintaining beef export access to the US.

Some have raised worries US beef could affect Australia’s domestic market, but Mr Evans said the imports were unlikely to have an impact.

The US could not even meet its own needs, he said, and remained one of the main export markets for Australian beef.

US Agriculture Secretary Brooke L Rollins congratulated Mr Trump after Australia’s beef deal.

“Gone are the days of putting American farmers on the sideline,” Ms Rollins said.

“This is yet another example of the kind of market access the president negotiates to bring America into a new golden age of prosperity, with American agriculture leading the way.”