Key events
Chinese premier Li Qiang heads to Perth
Daniel Hurst
The Chinese premier, Li Qiang, will attend several events in Western Australia today on the final day of his four-day visit to Australia.
Today’s schedule includes a banquet with members of the Chinese-Australian community, with both Li and the Australian prime minister, Anthony Albanese, expected to deliver brief speeches to the event.
Li is also expected to meet the WA premier, Roger Cook, and visit two businesses related to critical minerals processing and the transition to net zero.
In Perth today, business leaders will meet for the first Australia-China CEO Roundtable to be held since 2017. The event is co-chaired by the Business Council of Australia and the China Development Bank and will include a range of business leaders including Fortescue’s Andrew Forrest, Rio Tinto’s Kellie Parker, and BHP’s Vandita Pant.
Li has travelled to Perth from Canberra, where he and Albanese held the annual leaders’ meeting yesterday.
While both leaders pointed to progress in managing differences and stabilising the bilateral relationship, a signing ceremony at Parliament House was overshadowed somewhat by Chinese embassy officials’ apparent attempt to block the view of the formerly detained Australian journalist Cheng Lei. You can read more about that incident here:
Good morning, Mostafa Rachwani with you to take you through the day’s news.
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Martin Farrer
Good morning and welcome to the live blog. I’m Martin Farrer with some of the best overnight news lines and then my colleague Mostafa Rachwani will be along to get into the real business of the day.
The Chinese premier, Li Qiang, will head to Western Australia today on the final day of a four-day visit that has been overshadowed by the apparent attempt by Chinese officials to obstruct the view of Australian journalist Cheng Lei at a ceremony at Parliament House yesterday. Li and Anthony Albanese will be hoping there is no more controversy as they prepare to give speeches in a schedule today that includes a banquet with members of the Chinese-Australian community. More coming up.
Peter Dutton’s back-to-the-future attack line on Labor’s climate ambitions may yet gain some traction with voters, our latest Essential poll suggests today, but Labor has nevertheless regained the lead over the Coalition in two-party-preferred terms after lagging for the previous two months. Voters are split on Dutton’s controversial proposal to abandon Australia’s 2030 emissions reduction target, the poll shows, despite his plans for nuclear power being unpopular. More coming up.
The Reserve Bank wraps up its latest two-day board meeting this afternoon with Australia’s borrowers expected to be spared another interest rate rise. All economists surveyed by Reuters are expecting the cash rate to remain steady at 4.35% for a fifth consecutive meeting. More coming up.
