US President Donald Trump says Japan will be the recipient of a letter related to trade, following pledges by his administration to send letters to countries outlining tariffs they would need to pay to the United States.

“I have great respect for Japan, they won’t take our RICE, and yet they have a massive rice shortage,” he said in a Truth Social post.

“We’ll just be sending them a letter, and we love having them as a Trading Partner for many years to come.”

Trump did not say what terms would be outlined in the letter.

Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council, told reporters at the White House that Trump “is going to finalise the frameworks we negotiated with a whole bunch of countries after the weekend”.

Trump has suggested that the US will be sending letters to many countries, informing them of the new tariff rates they will face from the US after a July 9 deadline when the president’s 90-day pause on “reciprocal” tariffs expires.

Hassett said of tariff negotiations with Japan that there will “still be discussions right up to the end”.

Hassett also confirmed on Monday that US-Canada trade negotiations would resume after Canada scrapped plans for a digital services tax targeting US technology firms.

“Absolutely,” Hassett said on Fox News Channel when asked about the talks restarting.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters that Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called Trump on Sunday evening to tell him the tax was being dropped, calling it a big victory for US tech companies.

“Very simple. Prime Minister Carney in Canada caved to President Trump and the United States of America,” she said, crediting Trump’s hard-line negotiating style for the shift.

“President Trump knows … that every country on the planet needs to have good trade relationships with the United States, and it was a mistake for Canada to vow to implement that tax that would have hurt our tech companies here in the United States,” she said.

Trump had asked Canada to drop the tax at a G7 meeting in Canada earlier in June, Hassett said.

“It’s something that they’ve studied, now they’ve agreed to, and for sure that means that we can get back to the negotiations.”

Canada’s finance ministry said late on Sunday that Carney and Trump would resume trade negotiations in order to agree on a deal by July 21.

“Thank you Canada for removing your Digital Services Tax which was intended to stifle American innovation and would have been a deal breaker for any trade deal with America,” US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick responded in a post on X.

Stocks hit record highs on Wall Street on Monday morning as sentiment in the markets rose amid optimism about US trade negotiations with key partners including Canada.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent also struck an optimistic tone over the potential for “a flurry” of trade deals ahead of a July 9 deadline, after which 10 per cent US tariff rates on imports from many countries are set to snap back to Trump’s April 2 announced rates of 11 per cent to 50 per cent.

But Bessent, speaking on Bloomberg Television, warned that countries may not get extensions from that deadline even if they are negotiating in good faith as he suggested previously.

Any extensions would be up to Trump himself, Bessent said.

Leavitt said Trump was meeting his trade team this week to set tariff rates for those countries that were not negotiating.

“He is going to set the rates for many of these countries if they don’t come to the table to negotiate in good faith, and he is meeting with his trade team this week to do that,” she said.

with AP

Workers will receive a boost to retirement contributions as a long-awaited lift to the superannuation guarantee kicks in, but further increases are unlikely any time soon.

The rate of super employers are required to pay employees increased from 11.5 per cent of their wages to 12 per cent on Tuesday, along with a raft of other changes to payments and prices to mark the dawn of the new financial year.

It’s the culmination of a decades-long process to increase the super guarantee from three per cent when it was introduced in 1992 and follows a six-year delay in the rollout to 12 per cent under the previous coalition government.

Former prime minister Paul Keating – who conceived compulsory superannuation alongside union boss Bill Kelty – said the system had finally matured.

“Superannuation, like Medicare, is now an Australian community standard, binding the whole population as a national economic family, with each person having a place,” Mr Keating said.

The Labor Party’s national platform still lists an aspiration for the party to “set out a pathway” to increase the guarantee to 15 per cent, but voices in the Labor movement have recently cooled on the idea.

Sally McManus, secretary of peak union body the ACTU, said getting to 12 per cent was an “amazing achievement”, but the union movement was not pushing for more.

“There’s a question about whether or not we’ve actually reached the point of a dignified retirement at 12 per cent,” she told AAP.

“Obviously, we’ll keep assessing that.”

Former Labor treasurer Wayne Swan, who legislated the increase of the super guarantee from nine to 12 per cent and now chairs industry super fund Cbus, doesn’t want further rises.

The scheme provides “adequate retirement savings for most workers” at 12 per cent, Mr Swan argued in an op-ed in the Australian Financial Review at the weekend.

Labor figures are concerned that the scheme no longer functions as intended – to provide a dignified income in retirement and reduce reliance on the old age pension.

The increasing use of super as a tax minimisation vehicle rather than a retirement nest egg by Australians prompted the government to introduce legislation, increasing the tax rate on earnings from super balances above $3 million from 15 per cent to 30 per cent.

The change is yet to pass parliament but will be backdated to July 1 once legislated, assuming Labor wins the support of the Greens in the Senate.

The government will also pay super on paid parental leave from Tuesday, in a “major win” for women who take time out of the workforce to raise children, said Mary Delahunty, chief executive of peak superannuation body ASFA.

Workers on minimum and award wages will receive a 3.5 per cent pay bump on Tuesday – a significant boost to real wages above inflation. 

As well as helping address a decline in living standards in recent years, Ms McManus said it would help the economy because consumer spending was essential for businesses and workers on award wages spend rather than save a higher proportion of their income.

“People are still behind where they were prior to inflation going up. So there is more catch-up to do,” she said.

While wages and government assistance payments were going up, so too were price hikes for business registration and energy bills, which could be up to 9.7 per cent higher for some households.

Increased costs for businesses and households would hit living standards and hamper productivity, said shadow treasurer Ted O’Brien.

“This new financial year was Labor’s chance to reset, instead Labor have doubled down on higher costs, more red tape, and policies that make life harder for working Australians.”

Jurors deciding mushroom cook Erin Patterson’s fate will start their first full day of deliberations on whether she is guilty of triple murder. 

The jury retired to consider its verdict on Monday afternoon as the Victorian Supreme Court trial reached its 10th week.

It will be up to the 12 jurors to decide whether Patterson, 50, intentionally served her lunch guests beef Wellingtons laced with death cap mushrooms.

Her former in-laws Don and Gail Patterson, and Gail’s sister Heather, all died after consuming the lunch at Patterson’s regional Victorian home on July 29, 2023.

Heather’s husband Ian Wilkinson also ate the meal but survived after spending months in hospital.

Patterson claims it was all an accident and has pleaded not guilty to three counts of murder and one charge of attempted murder.

The jury heard from more than 50 prosecution witnesses throughout the trial before Patterson entered the witness box for eight days.

The prosecution and defence then spent a week delivering their closing arguments, before Justice Christopher Beale provided his directions to the jury. 

He said the jurors needed to consider whether the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt Patterson deliberately served death caps with the intention to kill her guests.

Justice Beale reminded the jurors if they held any doubts about Patterson’s guilt, they must acquit her.

“You cannot be satisfied that the accused is guilty of an offence if you have a reasonable doubt if she is guilty of the offence,” he told the jury on Monday.

The jury is being sequestered during the deliberations and will have to remain together until unanimous verdicts are reached on all charges.

Justice Beale reiterated that every juror must agree on the verdict, although it did not matter how each person reached their conclusion. 

The jury can deliver its verdicts any time from 10.30am to 4.15pm on Monday through to Saturday.

The jurors will still be sequestered on Sunday if they have not reached a verdict, but they will not have to deliberate.

Justice Beale reminded the jurors they cannot return home until their unanimous decision.

An Islamic preacher sued for calling Jews “vile and treacherous” will learn if he has defended a discrimination lawsuit by arguing for religious freedom.

Sydney-based Al Madina Dawah Centre cleric Wissam Haddad has been accused of racial discrimination during a series of fiery sermons from late 2023 that racked up thousands of views online. 

In the speeches, Mr Haddad – also known as Abu Ousayd – referred to Jewish people as “vile”, “treacherous”, “murderous” and “descendants of pigs and apes”.

The Federal Court lawsuit was filed by Executive Council of Australian Jewry co-chief executive Peter Wertheim and deputy president Robert Goot.

They want court orders that the published lectures, which they say are offensive and could incite violence towards Jews, be taken down and Mr Haddad banned from making similar comments. 

Justice Angus Stewart will deliver his judgment on Tuesday.

At a hearing in June, Mr Haddad’s lawyers argued that the speeches were not racist, but rather they were protected speech because they were historical and religious lectures delivered in good faith to contextualise the war in Gaza.

While initially claiming that the sermons were made for a small private Muslim audience, the Islamic preacher admitted part-way through the hearing that he knew they would be published online.

Lawyers for the two Jewish leaders have accused Haddad of engaging in an offensive pattern of behaviour, pointing to provocative statements he previously made about Christian and Hindu communities.

Tax incentives and artificial intelligence lessons in schools could help ensure Australia doesn’t miss out on the benefits of the AI wave, according to the firm behind industry giant ChatGPT.

For OpenAI chief economist Ronnie Chatterji, a visit to Australia to meet with business leaders, investors and policy makers comes at an opportune moment.

The federal government has embraced AI as a key plank in its mission to fix the nation’s stagnant productivity growth and improve living standards ahead of an economic reform roundtable in August.

“It’s a good time where there’s a big conversation in economic policy circles right now about how to increase productivity,” Dr Chatterji told AAP.

AI can make the economy more productive and society more prosperous by freeing workers from mundane administrative tasks, OpenAI said in an economic blueprint for Australia released on Tuesday.

“A nurse unburdened by paperwork can spend more time with patients,” its report said.

“A business owner with more bandwidth can pursue bold ideas.”

But to achieve this utopian vision, governments must encourage adoption with targeted investment and extra training, it argued.

Tax incentives should be offered for businesses to increase adoption and training programs should be rolled out to increase the capability of the workforce.

In education, AI literacy and ethics lessons should be introduced to schools to give students the skills to harness the technology when they enter the workforce.

Australia had huge potential to capitalise on AI, Dr Chatterji said.

Its geographic position near Southeast Asia, strong software sector epitomised by firms like Canva and Atlassian and abundant renewable energy resources made it a perfect place to invest in data centres needed to power the technology.

AI has been touted as a general-purpose technology that, like electricity or the steam engine, can transform the entire economy.

But like the industrial revolutions of the past, fears have grown about the dislocation that the new technology will bring to the job market.

Early studies showed AI was complementing workers and boosting their productivity rather than eliminating them, Dr Chatterji said.

The view that over time transformative technologies add more jobs to the economy than they eliminate is shared by Andrew Leigh, the assistant minister for productivity.

“The biggest employment risk from AI may not be job displacement – it may be working for a business that doesn’t adopt it and falls behind or fails entirely,” he said in a June speech.

But Dr Leigh acknowledged there was a risk removing grunt work would eliminate entry-level positions, like his role sifting through case documents as a young lawyer.

Dr Chatterji, a former Biden administration adviser, is alive to concerns about AI’s potential impact on jobs, privacy and misinformation, insisting his company is intensely committed to safety and aligning with societal values.

An OpenAI model was recently pulled back from release after in-house testing revealed concerns it was being too sycophantic.

While it shows an example of the industry self-regulating, governments would also have a role to play, especially around behavioural models and safety, Dr Chatterji added.

ACTU secretary Sally McManus said it was important the economic dividends AI brought were shared with workers and not just swallowed up in corporate profits.

“We want (productivity) to improve because we want people’s living standards to improve,” she said.

“You have to make sure that you have a fair distribution of gains in productivity, and that could be via shorter working hours, or it could be via higher pay.”

A positive result from a meeting with Donald Trump is more important than how soon a one-on-one with the US president can be arranged, the prime minister says.

Anthony Albanese says Australia will press the case for a total removal of US tariffs when he meets with Mr Trump.

The pair were due to come face-to-face at the G7 summit in Canada earlier in June but that opportunity was lost at the eleventh hour when the US president left early due to the Middle East conflict.

Mr Albanese has faced criticism for a lack of urgency in lining up the meeting,but he said the final result of the discussion mattered more than timing or location.

“Where the meeting takes place is less important than what comes out of the meeting, frankly, and I know there is a laser-like focus on this,” he told ABC TV on Monday.

“I’d be prepared, of course, to meet with President Trump when a suitable time can be organised.”

An in-person meeting could take place at the next Quad summit, the annual conference involving leaders from Australia, the US, Japan and India.

The possibility has also been floated of Mr Albanese stopping by the US in September during the next meeting of the UN General Assembly.

Mr Albanese said he would continue to press the case for a removal of all tariffs on Australian exports to the US.

“In supporting Australia’s national interest, I’ll continue to advocate for the best outcome possible,” he said.

“I look forward to having a meeting and continuing the constructive dialogue that I have had with President Trump up to now.”

Nationals deputy leader Kevin Hogan said it was “frankly embarrassing” the prime minister was yet to secure a meeting with Mr Trump.

“Resolving trade tensions – particularly tariffs affecting Australian agricultural and manufactured exports – must be a top priority,” he said.

Tariffs of 10 per cent on all Australian exports, as well as 50 per cent for aluminium and steel products, are due to come into effect on July 9.

The UK was able to strike a deal to ensure steel and aluminium exported to the US are subject to 25 per cent levies but the federal government has called for tariffs on Australian goods to be removed altogether.

Penny Wong has flown out for Washington DC for a meeting of Quad foreign ministers, which will include talks with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

The one-on-one with Mr Rubio will be a key opportunity to argue for tariff removal to members of the Trump administration.

The Quad summit coincides with calls from the US for Australia to lift its defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP.

Australia is on track to lift its defence budget to 2.3 per cent by 2033/34, with the federal government holding firm on its spending commitments.

The prime minister said he would make the case to the US that Australia was bolstering its defence budget.

“We’ll invest in whatever capability Australia needs to defend ourselves, and that is the way that you make sure that you maximise the defence of this country,” he said.

“We’ve got significant upgrades in our defence capacity coming on board.”

Britain’s prime minister has led criticism of chants at Glastonbury for “death” to the Israeli military as the BBC faces pressure to explain why it kept broadcasting.

Rapper Bobby Vylan, of rap punk duo Bob Vylan, on Saturday led crowds on the festival’s West Holts Stage in chants of “Free, free Palestine” and “Death, death to the IDF (Israel Defence Forces)”.

A member of Belfast rap trio Kneecap suggested fans “start a riot” at his bandmate’s forthcoming court appearance related to a terrorism charge.

Responding to the chants from Bob Vylan, Prime Minister Keir Starmer said there was “no excuse for this kind of appalling hate speech”.

“I said that Kneecap should not be given a platform and that goes for any other performers making threats or inciting violence.

“The BBC needs to explain how these scenes came to be broadcast.”

A member of Kneecap said “f*** Keir Starmer” during their performance after the prime minister called for the band not to play at the festival.

Avon and Somerset Police said video evidence from the performances would be assessed by officers to determine whether any offences may have been committed that would require a criminal investigation.

Glastonbury organiser Emily Eavis said Bob Vylan’s chants “very much crossed a line”.

“We are urgently reminding everyone involved in the production of the festival that there is no place at Glastonbury for antisemitism, hate speech or incitement to violence,” she said in Instagram.

Shadow home secretary Chris Philp said Bob Vylan was “inciting violence and hatred” and should be arrested and prosecuted.

“By broadcasting his vile hatred, the BBC appear to have also broken the law,” he said.

“I call on the Police to urgently investigate and prosecute the BBC as well for broadcasting this. Our national broadcaster should not be transmitting hateful material designed to incite violence and conflict,” he posted on X.

Health Secretary Wes Streeting called it a “pretty shameless publicity stunt” and said the BBC and Glastonbury have “questions to answer about how we saw such a spectacle on our screens”.

Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch called the scenes “grotesque”.

“Glorifying violence against Jews isn’t edgy. The West is playing with fire if we allow this sort of behaviour to go unchecked,” she wrote on X.

Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy has spoken to the BBC director general about Bob Vylan’s performance, a government spokesperson said.

The BBC said it showed a warning during the performance and that viewers would not be able to access it on demand.

A spokesperson for the broadcaster said: “Some of the comments made during Bob Vylan’s set were deeply offensive.

“During this live stream on iPlayer, which reflected what was happening on stage, a warning was issued on screen about the very strong and discriminatory language.

“We have no plans to make the performance available on demand.”

The Israeli embassy said it was “deeply disturbed by the inflammatory and hateful rhetoric expressed on stage at the Glastonbury Festival”.

The Campaign Against Antisemitism said it would be formally complaining to the BBC over its “outrageous decision” to broadcast Bob Vylan.

“Our national broadcaster must apologise for its dissemination of this extremist vitriol, and those responsible must be removed from their positions,” a spokesperson said.

with PA

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney says trade talks with US have resumed after Canada rescinded its plan to tax US technology firms. 

US President Donald Trump abruptly cut off trade talks with Canada on Friday over its tax targeting US technology firms, saying that it was a “blatant attack” and that he would set a new tariff rate on Canadian goods within the next week.

The tax was three per cent of the digital services revenue a firm takes in from Canadian users above $US20 million ($A31 million) in a calendar year, and payments will be retroactive to 2022.

Carney’s office said Carney and Trump have agreed to resume negotiations.

“Today’s announcement will support a resumption of negotiations toward the July 21, 2025, timeline set out at this month’s G7 Leaders’ Summit in Kananaskis,” Carney said in a statement.

Carney visited Trump in May at the White House, where he was polite but firm. 

Trump travelled to Canada for the G7 summit in Alberta, where Carney said that Canada and the US had set a 30-day deadline for trade talks.

Canada is the second-largest US trading partner after Mexico and the largest buyer of US exports.

It bought $US349.4 billion ($A534.7 billion) of US goods last year and exported $US412.7 billion ($A631.6 billion) to the US, according to US Census Bureau data.

The Canadian government says “in anticipation” of a trade deal “Canada would rescind” the Digital Serves Tax. 

Trump, in a post on his social media network last Friday, said Canada had just informed the US that it was sticking to its plan to impose the digital services tax, which applies to Canadian and foreign businesses that engage with online users in Canada. 

The tax was set to go into effect on Monday.

The digital services tax was due to hit companies including Amazon, Google, Meta, Uber and Airbnb with a three per cent levy on revenue from Canadian users.

It would have applied retroactively, leaving US companies with a $US2 billion ($A3.1 billion) US bill due at the end of the month.

Trump’s announcement on Friday was the latest swerve in the trade war he’s launched since taking office for a second term in January. 

Progress with Canada has been a roller coaster, starting with the US president poking at the nation’s northern neighbour and repeatedly suggesting it would be absorbed as a US state.

with reuters

Australia will leave no stone unturned in its push for a full tariff exemption as the foreign affairs minister heads to the US capital for crucial talks.

Penny Wong will fly out to Washington on Monday ahead of a meeting of Quad foreign ministers, which includes US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, along with ministers from India and Japan.

Her visit, which will also include a one-on-one talk with Mr Rubio, represents a prime opportunity for Australia as all of America’s trading partners make their cases for exemptions from President Donald Trump’s tariffs regime.

The UK was able to strike a deal to ensure steel and aluminium exported to the US are subject to 25 per cent levies, rather than the 50 per cent tariff rate applied to the same goods from other US trading partners.

But Australia is aiming higher and will put forward its case for a total tariff exemption.

“It shouldn’t be 10 (per cent), it should be zero,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

“We engage with everyone in the United States.

“We’ve put forward, very clearly, our arguments and will continue to do so.”

During Mr Trump’s first term, Australia – alongside other nations – managed to secure a full exemption on metals tariffs, but the Republican has been far less liberal with his exemptions this time around.

The meeting with senior US officials comes after Mr Albanese was due to meet Mr Trump at the G7 summit in Canada earlier in June.

However, the talks were cancelled at the eleventh hour due to the situation in the Middle East.

Australia has been trying to get the US economic sanctions removed, both the 10 per cent tariff applied to all exports and the 50 per cent tariff for steel and aluminium.

But the prime minister could soon get another chance to make his case with the US president, as cabinet minister Tanya Plibersek said the government was awaiting confirmation of a “suitable time” for their meeting.

The Quad summit coincides with calls from the US for Australia to lift its defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP.

Australia is currently on track to grow its defence budget to 2.3 per cent by 2033/34, with the federal government holding firm on its spending commitments.

The debate on defence spending comes as a report from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute released on Monday called for security for sovereign research to be increased.

The report urged for research security to be given the same level for defence priorities as dealing with foreign interference and espionage.

“Foreign states have actively targeted Australia’s research ecosystem, seeking to influence research agendas, extract sensitive information and exploit institutional vulnerabilities,” the report said.

“However, the threat landscape hasn’t remained static, it has evolved, and rapidly.”

The report said research security would become even more important as the AUKUS partnership between Australia, the US and the UK developed.

Meanwhile, as Mr Albanese prepares to travel to China, its ambassador Xiao Qian has penned an opinion piece arguing that “dramatically increasing military spending places a heavy fiscal burden on the countries involved”.

“Some countries are ailing yet demand their allies and partners foot the bill for medicine, which seems to be an almost laughable notion,” he said, in what appeared to be a reference to the US, in the article published in The Australian on Monday.

“China unwaveringly adheres to a defensive national defence policy, with military spending accounting for just 1.5 per cent of its GDP,” he said.

“It is far below the global average and paling in comparison to certain hegemons or their allies and partners.”

The foreign minister is set to meet with her US counterpart for crucial talks as America ramps up pressure on Australia to increase defence spending.

Penny Wong will fly out to Washington on Monday ahead of a meeting of Quad foreign ministers, which includes US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, along with ministers from India and Japan.

The trip to the US will also see Senator Wong hold one-on-one talks with Mr Rubio, as Australia tries to carve out an exemption to tariffs imposed on exports to America.

“This will be the second Quad Foreign Ministers’ meeting within six months, reflecting the importance of our partnership and the strategic circumstances confronting our region and the world,” Senator Wong said.

“The United States is our closest ally and principal strategic partner. Our alliance contributes to the peace, prosperity and stability of our countries and the region we share.

“We will continue to work together to further our important economic and security partnership and advance our mutual interests.”

The meeting with senior US officials comes after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was due to meet President Donald Trump at the G7 summit in Canada earlier in June.

However, the talks were cancelled at the eleventh hour due to the situation in the Middle East.

Australia has been trying to get the US economic sanctions removed, both the 10 per cent tariff applied to all exports and the 50 per cent tariff for steel and aluminium.

The Quad summit coincides with calls from the US for Australia to lift its defence spending to 3.5 per cent of GDP.

Australia is currently on track to grow its defence budget to 2.3 per cent by 2033/34, with the federal government holding firm on its spending commitments.

The debate on defence spending comes as a report from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute released on Monday called for security for sovereign research to be increased.

The report called for research security to be given the same level for defence priorities as dealing with foreign interference and espionage.

“Foreign states have actively targeted Australia’s research ecosystem, seeking to influence research agendas, extract sensitive information and exploit institutional vulnerabilities,” the report said.

“However, the threat landscape hasn’t remained static, it has evolved, and rapidly.”

The report said research security would become even more important as the AUKUS partnership between Australia, the US and the UK developed.