Australia news live: NSW to introduce minimum age for ebike riders; Angus Taylor calls for end to ‘net zero ideology’ | Australia news

British journalist who interviewed ex-prince Andrew ‘stunned’ by his arrest

Emily Maitlis, a British journalist who interviewed Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor during a disastrous interview in 2019, said on RN Breakfast this morning she is “stunned” at the former prince’s arrest.

Maitlis held the shocking interview in 2019, as the then-prince Andrew tried to explain his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. The journalist told RN to many his arrest overnight seemed to happen “incredibly quickly”:

I am stunned. I just have to say this doesn’t happen in our country. It is virtually unheard of.

So, to say that this is a crisis moment, I think doesn’t begin to cover it.

Read more about the arrest here:

NSW says ebike safety ‘ a huge challenge to solve’

The New South Wales transport minister, John Graham, said the changes will recognise the reality of ebikes’ popularity while moving towards a safer future.

He said:

We want children outdoors and active but keeping them safe is paramount. I am concerned that we have primary school-aged children trying to control ebikes that in some cases are heavier than them.

The community has spoken against souped-up motorbikes masquerading as ebikes and this new standard makes clear that ebikes must perform like bicycles not motorbikes.

Make no mistake, with more than 750,000 e-bikes on NSW roads, this is a huge challenge to solve.

Read more here:

NSW to introduce minimum age to ride an ebike

New South Wales will introduce a minimum age to ride an ebike as part of an effort to improve rider safety, the safety of pedestrians and of the wider community.

The minimum age will be between 12 and 16 and come after an expert review by Transport for NSW. Currently, a child of any age can ride an ebike and riders of any age can carry passengers if the bike’s design allows.

The Minns government said the state would also adopt safety and performance standards similar to those in Europe to ensure ebikes act more like bicycles, an effort to remove “high-powered illegal motorbikes masquerading as ebikes” from the streets.

Any ebike deemed to be against the law will be phased out over a three-year transition period to recognise they were bought legally. From 1 March 2029, only ebikes that meet European standards will be road legal in NSW.

Good morning! Nick Visser here to take over. Let’s see what Friday has in store.

NSW police said in a statement early this morning that robbery and serious crime squad detectives had “located a crime scene in Dural believed to be linked to the kidnapping of Chris Baghsarian”.

The 85-year-old was taken from his North Ryde home last Friday morning in what police said was a case of mistaken identity. Det Acting Supt Andrew Marks said on Monday that police believed Baghsarian was still alive.

You can read more about the story here:

In their Friday morning statement, police said a Dural property was “believed to have been used as a makeshift stronghold by the kidnappers”, and a search warrant was carried out there at 7pm on Thursday.

The investigation continues, they said, appealing again for public assistance and telling anyone who “may have seen or heard anything relating to the kidnapping or witnessed any sort of suspicious activity in the Dural area since last Friday” to contact police.

Angus Taylor claims Australians ‘deeply concerned’ about classroom indoctrination

In Angus Taylor’s lengthy interview, Peta Credlin took the new opposition leader to a couple of other culture war issues including school curriculums, where he suggested children shouldn’t be “indoctrinated” in the classroom, and that “Australians are deeply concerned about it”.

I think our education system, our school system and our tertiary system has been drifting on this over a long period of time … we do need to give Australians the assurance that their kids are going to be educated, they’re going to be taught about our wonderful nation, warts and all, but they should be celebrating our country as part of their education, and they shouldn’t be receiving indoctrination.

We’ve heard the word indoctrination before – former Liberal leader Peter Dutton also said kids were being indoctrinated but claimed he had “no proposals” to change it.

Net zero is still dead, if not more dead under Angus Taylor’s Liberal party.

When Sussan Ley announced the party’s commitment to drop net zero in November, she kept the caveat that net zero would still be a welcome outcome if “we can get there with technology, with choice and with voluntary markets”.

Taylor now wants to abandon net zero terminology as a whole, telling Sky News’ Peta Credlin on Thursday night:

I think the starting point is to get that net zero ideology out of our system … We have uranium, we have coal, we have gas, we do have renewables, of course, in people putting solar cells on their roofs at a rapid pace, it’s the mix that’s going to get us the solution.

The government – and experts – have argued that renewables are the cheapest form of electricity.

Good morning and welcome to our live news blog. I’m Martin Farrer with the best breaking news stories before Nick Visser takes over.

The biggest story overnight was the arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor at Sandringham estate, on suspicion of misconduct in public office – you can find our live coverage here and we’ll bring you more developments and reactions throughout the day.

Elsewhere, a group of Australian men suspected of being former IS State fighters are among more than 5,000 detainees transferred from Syria to Iraq, where they potentially face charges that could carry the death penalty.

And in New South Wales, police said early this morning that they have located a crime scene in Dural as investigations continue into the kidnapping of Chris Baghsarian. They will speak to media later this morning – and we’ll bring you more details soon.