Australia news LIVE: Biden welcomes PM to White House for state visit; Australian households taking on more financial risk

Returning to the US, Australian rapper Kid Laroi will join Anthony Albanese and Joe Biden at a state dinner at the White House in the next few hours, according to reliable sources in Washington, who have shared some of the details about the guest list for the event.

Laroi, whose real name is Charlton Howard, is best known for his 2021 single Stay with Justin Bieber, and he happens to have been born in the Sydney suburb of Waterloo, just near the prime minister’s home base in Marrickville.

One of the rumoured guests, Margot Robbie, is not attending, but her name was on the guest list until her work made it impossible for her to attend.

Some of the other guests are not hard to identify because they arrived at the White House for the prime minister’s ceremonial welcome hours before the dinner.

Those on the south lawn of the White House to watch the ceremony included Australian Industry Group chief Innes Willox, ACTU president Michele O’Neil, NRL boss Peter V’landys, ACCI chief Andrew McKellar, Australian of the Year Taryn Brumfitt, Business Council of Australia chief Bran Black, New York consul-general Heather Ridout and University of Canberra chancellor Tom Calma.

They were joined by Resources Minister Madeleine King, ambassador Kevin Rudd and wife Therese, and members of the prime minister’s delegation, including chief of staff Tim Gartrell and national security adviser Kathy Klugman.

Biden and his wife Jill greeted Albanese, before the US president introduced the prime minister to members of the official party, including Vice President Kamala Harris, Climate Change Envoy John Kerry and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

The two leaders inspected the honour guard and delivered their speeches to the crowd gathered on the south lawn. The White House estimated 3982 guests watched the welcome on the grounds.

Rideshare giant Uber has been hit with a fine for sending two million emails that breached spam laws.

The media watchdog says Uber sent all those messages on a single day in January, failing to include an unsubscribe link in emails advertising an alcohol home delivery service.

Half a million emails were sent to customers who had already unsubscribed from Uber’s messaging.

It also breached spam laws as businesses must get consent from consumers before they send direct marketing messages.

Australian Communications and Media Authority chair Nerida O’Loughlin said Uber had accidentally characterised the emails as non-commercial, leading to the breach in their spam obligations.

“An avoidable error has led to more than two million messages being sent without a way for people to unsubscribe,” she said in a statement.

“Consumers are fed up with their wishes not being respected. People rightly expect to have choice over who contacts them for marketing purposes.”

Uber has already paid its $412,000 fine.

AAP

Households are taking on more financial risk by cutting back on insurance, running down savings and resorting to short-term credit as they grapple with inflation and higher interest rates.

New data reveals a substantial fall in household spending on health insurance since interest rates began to rise, with this expense 10 per cent lower in June 2023 than a year earlier.

Credit bureau illion estimates there has also been a 7 per cent decline in spending on home and contents insurance in June 2023, compared to a year earlier.

The analysis of spending patterns by illion is compiled using credit and banking data from more than 18 million Australian credit consumers.

Barrett Hasseldine, head of modelling at illion, says the fall in insurance spending indicates families are choosing to drop cover, reduce cover, or increase their insurance claims excess to reduce costs.

Learn more about the stresses facing households here. 

United States President Joe Biden has warned Australia about the risks of dealing with China and vowed to press ahead with the AUKUS pact on nuclear-powered submarines, in a press conference with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that emphasised America’s commitment to stability in Asia.

Biden said his administration would take on China and present the US as a more reliable partner in the region, but he made it clear that this “extreme competition” did not mean he wanted conflict.

The president made the remarks while standing with Albanese at a press conference in the rose garden of the White House after a ceremonial welcome and a meeting in the Oval Office to project the strength of the Australian alliance with the US.

With Albanese due to visit Beijing within a fortnight to hold talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, the comments in Washington sent the message that Australia could trust the US more than China.

Read more on this here.

After 22 days of paralysis, four nominees and several backroom brawls, Congress finally has a new House Speaker, electing a Donald Trump ally who backed the attempt to overturn the 2020 presidential election.

Three weeks after Kevin McCarthy was ousted from the job, Republicans put aside their differences for long enough to appoint Louisiana lawyer Mike Johnson as his replacement.

The move ends an unprecedented period in Washington, in which Congress was unable to pass legislation, approve more funding for Israel or Ukraine, or provide Prime Minister Anthony Albanese a platform to give a joint address as part of his state visit this week.

But in a sign of more turmoil to come, the deeply divided House of Representatives now has only a few weeks to negotiate a deal to avoid a government shutdown that could force millions of Americans to lose pay or access to services when departments run out of money.

Here’s the full story from our North America correspondent.

Good morning and thanks for joining us.

It’s Thursday, October 26. I’m Caroline Schelle, and I’ll be anchoring our live coverage for the first half of the day.

Here’s what you need to know before we get started:

• Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has backed the “moral clarity” of United States President Joe Biden in his response to the conflict in the Middle East.
• The Liberal Party’s sole Indigenous MP has questioned the courage of the authors of an anonymous letter censuring people who voted No at the referendum.
• A transnational crime syndicate is accused of laundering dirty funds and tainted crypto via a money-moving business spruiked by an ex-Howard government minister.
• Households are taking on more financial risk by cutting back on insurance, running down savings and other measures as they grapple with inflation and higher interest rates.
• Foreign Minister Penny Wong has joined Western allies in calling for a pause to hostilities in Gaza so that food, water and supplies can be delivered to Palestinian civilians.
• The NSW treasurer has accused manufacturers campaigning to prevent a nationwide ban on the use of engineered stone of spreading misinformation.
• Overseas, Donald Trump was fined $US10,000 ($15,000) after the judge overseeing his civil fraud trial found that the former US president violated a gag order in the case.
• In other overseas news, China’s defence minister Li Shangfu was ousted after missing for weeks, without explanation.

Let’s get into it.