Today's Headlines

Levy on cards for disability insurance

A medicare-style levy to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme has emerged as the likely centrepiece of next month's budget after Julia Gillard revealed her government was looking afresh at all options to fund its “wise investments”. The West

Shell's Pickard departs for new role in Arctic

Shell Australia chairman Ann Pickard is being posted to a new position, heading up the oil major's operations in the difficult Arctic region. The Fin

Militant union underpins ALP

Australia's most militant union has been quietly underpinning the Labor Party’s finances, donating more than $9.1 million since the start of the Cole royal commission, placing intense pressure on the Gillard government over the future of industrial relations policy. The Aus

Business calls for 'root and branch' review of spending

Leading company chairmen have urged spending restraint, including a stricter approach to the Gonski and national disability insurance scheme programs, warning business tax hikes to help plug the budget hole could damage the slowing economy. The Aus

500-pen marina sets sail for Rockingham

A 500-pen marina, tipped to be the “Hillarys of Rockingham” has been given conditional approval by the environmental watchdog, paving the way for one of the biggest developments in the area in decades. The West

 

Top Resources Headlines

 

Argyle could be jewel in Rio's sell-off crown

Rio Tinto’s push to sell off non-core assets to meet its target of $US5 billion ($4.8bn) in global savings by the end of next year could see it split its diamond assets, leading to the separate sale of Western Australia’s historic Argyle diamond mine. The Aus

Forrest calls in Credit Suisse to sway US debt markets

Andrew Forrest’s hopes of reviving the historic Windarra nickel project in the face of low nickel prices will rest on his famed relationship with US debt markets. The Aus

Shell's Pickard departs for new role in Arctic

Shell Australia chairman Ann Pickard is being posted to a new position, heading up the oil major's operations in the difficult Arctic region. The Fin

Lanco settles legal fight

Perdaman Chemicals boss Vikas Rambal has set himself a six-month target to revive his planned Collie-based coal-to-urea plant after settling a bitter $3.5 billion legal action with his former supplier, Lanco Infratech. The West

 

Top Politics Headlines

Levy on cards for disability insurance

A medicare-style levy to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme has emerged as the likely centrepiece of next month's budget after Julia Gillard revealed her government was looking afresh at all options to fund its “wise investments”. The West

Militant union underpins ALP

Australia's most militant union has been quietly underpinning the Labor Party’s finances, donating more than $9.1 million since the start of the Cole royal commission, placing intense pressure on the Gillard government over the future of industrial relations policy. The Aus

Business Council seeks proof of 457 visa scams

Government claims of excessive growth and widespread rorting of the 457 visa scheme are unsubstantiated and harming Australia’s international reputation, a peak business group has warned. The Aus

Business calls for 'root and branch' review of spending

Leading company chairmen have urged spending restraint, including a stricter approach to the Gonski and national disability insurance scheme programs, warning business tax hikes to help plug the budget hole could damage the slowing economy. The Aus

 

Top Property Headlines

500-pen marina sets sail for Rockingham

A 500-pen marina, tipped to be the “Hillarys of Rockingham” has been given conditional approval by the environmental watchdog, paving the way for one of the biggest developments in the area in decades. The West

Carey accused of asset stripping

Property and investment entrepreneur Norm Cary was accused yesterday of engaging in asset stripping on the day that receivers were appointed to flagship company Westpoint Corporation Pty Ltd. The West

Bankwest to offload Perth office site

A four-storey office building in the inner Perth entertainment district of Northbridge has been placed on the market by Bankwest. The Fin

 

The West Australian

Page 1: A medicare-style levy to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme has emerged as the likely centrepiece of next month's budget after Julia Gillard revealed her government was looking afresh at all options to fund its “wise investments”.

Page 4: A 500-pen marina, tipped to be the “Hillarys of Rockingham” has been given conditional approval by the environmental watchdog, paving the way for one of the biggest developments in the area in decades.

Page 6: Interest groups have started circling the wagons to protect themselves from funding cuts and tax increases as the Gillard government seeks to stem the bleeding of its budget.

Page 7: As Labor hunts for cash to prop up the budget, the big miners have defended paying little mining tax, telling a Senate inquiry they are already major contributors to government coffers.

Page 15: Mandurah and Bunbury have topped a list of bankruptcy hotspots in WA, according to a report that reveals people from low-income areas are taking on unmanageable debt.

Business: Ann Pickard, who has transformed Royal Dutch Shell into the most aggressive oil and gas player in Australia, is set to leave her powerful Perth-based post to look after the Anglo-Dutch giant's ambitions in the Arctic Circle.

Rio Tinto has tried to inject some pace into the stuttering sale of its diamonds division, declaring that its Argyle operation in the Kimberley could be sold separately or as part of a broader sharemarket float.

Andrew Forrest's dream of cutting the ribbon at the famous Windarra nickel mine has moved closer, with Poseidon Nickel slapping a $197 million price tag on bringing the historic northern Goldfields operation back into production.

Property and investment entrepreneur Norm Cary was accused yesterday of engaging in asset stripping on the day that receivers were appointed to flagship company Westpoint Corporation Pty Ltd.

Perdaman Chemicals boss Vikas Rambal has set himself a six-month target to revive his planned Collie-based coal-to-urea plant after settling a bitter $3.5 billion legal action with his former supplier, Lanco Infratech.

The company behind an ambitious plan to create one of the world's biggest prawn farms, C02 Group, is focusing on a site in the Kimberley as it seeks investors for the first stage of the $1 billion project.

Ironbark Zinc has shrugged off pessimism in global metals markets to paint a positive picture of its Citronen zinc-lead project in Greenland, placing a $US484.8 million price tag on its development and pointing to Chinese funding support.

The global withdrawal from greenfields resources projects has claimed another victim, with Aquila Resources announcing yesterday its Japanese partner had baulked at joining a $109 million Queensland coking coal exploration project.

 

The Australian Financial Review

Page 1: Prime Minister Julia Gillard raised the prospect of a Medicare-style levy to fund her proposed National Disability Insurance Scheme as she warned that business, families and institutions will be hit at the May 14 budget to help pay for the scheme and the government’s school funding reforms.

Retailers say Australians are paying too much for groceries because multinational suppliers earn excessive profits by charging local retailers more than their overseas peers.

Page 5: Business groups are warning that Prime Minister Julia Gillard's declaration that “every reasonable option” is on the table before the budget could lead to tax rises and derail a nascent recovery in household and company sentiment.

Page 6: The minerals resource rent tax is highly flawed and might never raise any revenue in its current form, leading economist Ross Garnaut has told a Senate committee.

Tax on Australian mining companies is “Mount Everest” compared with international tax rates, the head of the mining industry group has told a Senate inquiry into the minerals resources rent tax.

Page 7: Major accounting and legal firms will reap generous benefits from the federal opposition's paid parental leave scheme, without having to contriute to the $1.5 per cent tax to fund it.

Page 8: Indian power group Lanco Infratech will pay $7.5 million plus court costs to Perth-based Perdaman Chemicals to end a bitter legal dispute over a coal supply contract in Western Australia.

Page 9: Immigration Minister Brendan O'Connor was unable to provide evidence of up to 10,000 “illegitimate uses” of 457 visas by temporary skilled migrants, the day after claiming widespread rorting of the system.

Page 15: Asciano chief executive John Mullen has raised concerns the privatisation of NSW ports in Sydney and Wollongong could lead to inflated rents being charged by their new owners to justify high acquisition costs.

Shell Australia chairman Ann Pickard is being posted to a new position, heading up the oil major's operations in the difficult Arctic region.

Page 17: Rio Tinto is considering a $US2 billion-plus float of its diamonds business as early as this year despite strong interest from trade buyers in some of the assets to date.

Page 19: The Toronto Stock Exchange is putting pressure on the Australian Securities Exchange by enticing local mining companies to list in Canada, claiming they will gain access to more international investors and a deeper pool of capital.

Page 22: North America may emerge as a much more powerful competitor in liquefied natural gas supply than most local producers expect and could rival Australia as the largest exporter by early next decade, according to Barclays' top energy investment banker.

Page 37: A four-storey office building in the inner Perth entertainment district of Northbridge has been placed on the market by Bankwest.

 

The Australian

Page 1: A crackdown on existing disability entitlements and a levy on higher-income earners are being considered as part of the Gillard government’s plans to fund the $15 billion-a-year national disability insurance scheme.

Struggling Goulburn Valley cannery SPC Ardmona has appealed to Canberra to impose a special tax on a flood of cheap imported tinned fruit in a desperate bid to save the local industry.

Page 2: Australia's most militant union has been quietly underpinning the Labor Party’s finances, donating more than $9.1 million since the start of the Cole royal commission, placing intense pressure on the Gillard government over the future of industrial relations policy.

The NBN Co has admitted it has no control over what subcontractors handling the rollout are paid, placing further scrutiny on those main contractors who have been allegedly gouging the program.

Almost 150 suspected rorts of the Gillard government’s Renewable Energy Target scheme were reported to the regulator last year, with NSW and federal authorities assisting with the execution of two search warrants as a part of the probe.

Government claims of excessive growth and widespread rorting of the 457 visa scheme are unsubstantiated and harming Australia’s international reputation, a peak business group has warned.

Page 4: Leading company chairmen have urged spending restraint, including a stricter approach to the Gonski and national disability insurance scheme programs, warning business tax hikes to help plug the budget hole could damage the slowing economy.

Company, superannuation and mining taxes are falling far short of Treasury’s forecasts, but the government is still achieving good revenue growth from individuals and the carbon tax.

Business: The NSW government has left open the possibility of introducing competition for off-course totalisator betting as exclusive rights over Tabcorp’s biggest revenue earner are set to expire.

Andrew Forrest’s hopes of reviving the historic Windarra nickel project in the face of low nickel prices will rest on his famed relationship with US debt markets.

Broker Merrill Lynch has downgraded earnings estimates for retail giant Woolworths over concerns its Masters hardware joint venture is set to lose more than $800 million over the next four years.

BHP Billiton has got off to a flying start in its fresh round of asset disposals by pulling in a better-thanexpected $US650 million ($629.5m) from the sale of its Pinto Valley copper mining operation in Arizona to a Canadian miner with South Korean state-owned backing, Capstone Mining.

The number of powerful business women on the local scene is to become even more sparse with the return of Shell’s boss for Australia, Ann Pickard, to her native America, where she will become executive vice-president of Shell’s environmentally controversial exploration and production interests in the Arctic.

Rio Tinto’s push to sell off non-core assets to meet its target of $US5 billion ($4.8bn) in global savings by the end of next year could see it split its diamond assets, leading to the separate sale of Western Australia’s historic Argyle diamond mine.

Private equity giant KKR is weighing a bid for Rio Tinto’s majority stake in an Australian copper-gold mine in a sign that private-equity firms are hunting for bargains among assets no longer wanted by major resources companies. Tiger Airways Australia’s new chief executive says he is looking forward to ‘‘a new and exciting chapter’’ at the troubled low-cost carrier as it heads into a new ownership structure

Kingsgate Consolidated, which produces gold in Thailand and Australia, is reviewing spending plans following a sharp fall in the precious metal’s price.

Oil and gas producer Santos has committed to a $100 million drilling and appraisal program in the Northern Territory over the next 12 months.

 

 

 

The Daily Telegraph

Page 1: Workers could face an average $300 increase in the Medicare levy to help fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme.

Page 2: The Australian Racing Board has accused the NSW government of failing to deliver on its own election promises by refusing to set up exclusion zones to protect the most important stud farms from proposed coal mines.

Page 3: Exposing former cancer patients to peptides would put them at considerable risk of relapsing, a human growth hormone expert says.

World: Investigators have confirmed they are pursuing other "persons of interest" who may be linked to the deadly bombings at the Boston Marathon.

Business: BHP Billiton's simplification drive is gathering pace with a US copper mine the latest asset to be sold.

Sport: South Sydney's anger over the rough tactics aimed at Greg Inglis could be tempered when rugby league's leading minds gather to debate if the game should do more to protect superstars from foul play.

The Sydney Morning Herald

Page 1: Prime Minister Julia Gillard has opened the way for a range of policy reversals, including tax increases, as her government struggles to contain a ballooning budget deficit, and to dampen expectations of a return to the big surpluses of the past.

Page 2: John Singleton faces a ban from owning racehorses if he refuses to name the friends who told him Tom Waterhouse had tipped them off that the horse More Joyous "had no chance" in Saturday's All-Aged Stakes.

Page 3: Racehorse trainer Gai Waterhouse's husband, Robbie, has a financial stake in the bookmaking empire of their son, Tom, that is at the centre of a conflict of interest row with advertising mogul John Singleton.

World: Palestinian schoolboys are learning how to fire Kalashnikovs, throw grenades and plant improvised explosive devices as part of a program run by Hamas's education ministry.

Business: Rio Tinto has made its first payment under the Gillard government's mining tax, but remains in "very high-level" discussions with the Australian Taxation Office over whether it has been correctly calculating its obligations during the first nine months of the controversial tax.

Sport: Wests Tigers five-eighth Benji Marshall is poised to sign one of the biggest deals in the NRL.

The Age

Page 1: $12 billion black hole opens the way for a slew of policy reversals including tax increases. Catholic Church was "unChrist-like" in its response to sexual abuse by priests, Victorian inquiry into child sexual abuse hears.

Page 2: A former Ballarat priest says the Catholic Church in Ballarat effectively facilitated child sexual abuse by leaving known predators in its ministry.

Page 3: Aboriginal artwork to be stencilled on to a 700-square-metre section of the roof of the Musee du Quai Branly in Paris. Construction workers face $10,000 fines if they attend Tuesday's mass rally targeting Grocon and safety regulator WorkSafe without their employers' permission.

World: Army brings in heavy earthmoving equipment as search for survivors of the collapsed garment factory in Bangladesh ends.

Business: Rio Tinto makes its first payment of mining tax but checks with the taxman to see if it has calculated the bill correctly.

Sport: The investigation into the irregular practices at AFL club Essendon last year has been completed by Ziggy Switkowski.

The Herald Sun

Page 1: Workers could be slugged an extra $300 in Medicare fees in next month's budget in order to fund the National Disability Insurance Scheme. After losing her legs to a bacterial infection seven-year-old Laura Davoli is back at school.

Page 2: Opposition Leader Tony Abbott warns that penalty rates are killing jobs and says a Liberal government would support applications to the independent Fair Work umpire for adjustments.

Page 3: Parents plea for Madison to come home after she disappeared on Sunday. Royal prank DJ Mel Greig will appear at the inquest on British nurse Jacintha Saldanha. Refugees arriving in record numbers as they pass 3000 in one month for the first time.

World: Three policemen killed by Taliban remote bomb.

Business: BHP Billiton jettisons US mining project in its offensive to simplify the business.

Sport: Stats show opponents are scoring with ease from turnovers and stoppages in the Collingwood defensive half.